Week 31 Jeremiah 28
Q: What events had happened just before Jeremiah 28?
A: The Babylonians had conquered Israel. They’d shipped off king Jehoiachin to Babylon and stolen a load of religious utensils and set up a Babylon-sponsored lackey-king to caretake things in Jerusalem.
So…in 28 a prophet – Hananiah – made a prophetic forecast. He said that within two years Babylon would release Jehoiachin and ship him and the temple implements back to Jerusalem and things would pick up where they’d left off.
Jeremiah admitted that it was a pretty nice prophecy but that – unfortunately – things wouldn’t turn out that way. He explained the Test of a Prophet to Hananiah: the prophet who prophesies peace will be recognized as one truly sent by the Lord only if his prediction comes true.
A prophecy is true if it comes true.
Which means prophecy creates a bit of a dilemma for the audience. When people have two opposing predictions they can’t know which is true until one comes true. How is a prophetic prediction legitimized? If Pre-diction = Post-diction then I’ve got a Genuine Forecast.
By the time future-time morphs into present-time and the forecast becomes either true or false it might be too late to be of actionable use to the audience. So maybe prophecy has as much value for a person looking back as for a person who was looking into the uncertain future.
Note: quote from Jeremiah 28:9 (NIV). End of July reading report: 66% of the bible read in 58% of the year.