Isaiah 30:10: “Which say to the seers, see not and to the prophets, prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things and prophesy deceit.”
The way this is translated only contributes to the arrogance of modern Christians. You read this and you think: “How amazing that people would tell the prophets what to prophesy and to speak only good things. I would certainly not be that foolish.
Yet, if we alter the syntax here, we come up with something quite appropriate for today. “Who say to the seers, you do not see, and to the prophets, you do not speak right things. You speak to us smooth things and prophesy deceit.” In other words, anyone who prophesies doom and gloom are false prophets. The true prophets are always speaking of good and happy things.
Let’s take a closer look at the words that are use here. The word seer and see come from the same root ra’ah which means to see into the spirit realm. So literally this would be rendered: “Which say to those who see in the spirit realm, you don’t see in the spirit realm.”
“And to the prophets, you do not prophesy right things.” Both the words prophets and prophesy also come from the same root. It is interesting to note that this is not your standard word for prophet which navim but is the word chazah. This is the word for vision. The word for right things is nacach which literally means to be straight forward, clearly defined. We would render this as, “To you who have visions, you do not have visions that are clear cut, or straight forward.”
Then we have, “Speak to us smooth things.” The word speak is devar which has the idea of speaking the words of God or speaking from the heart of God. The word smooth is kalak which means smooth but smooth in the sense that something is easy, free from obstacles. Hence you could render this: “If you are speaking the word of God, it will be of things that are good and loving.” This is concluded by saying: Prophesy deceit. Again the word prophesy is chazah which means a vision. The word deceit is talal which in its Semitic root has the idea of illusionary. Hence, this could be rendered, “If you really are speaking words of God you will be speaking of beautiful, loving things, not of problems and difficulties and you will have visions that are not straight forward, but are filled with symbols.”
Isaiah was preaching a lot of doom and gloom and the people rejected this because they believed that a prophet should only preach lovely and beautiful things, Their visions were to be filled with a lot of symbols so there is a lot of freedom to interpret what you want to interpret.
There was this ancient pagan belief that there was power in your words, especially the words of the prophets, thus if you spoke something negative, it would happen, you should only speak positive things and then by speaking positive things you will make positive things happen. I know that sounds ridiculous, but that is what many believed in those days. Now I am not talking about negative and positive thoughts. We all know about The Little Engine Who Could. He made it up the hill because he keep saying, “I think I can, I think I can.” I am talking about prophets who actually claimed to manipulate the gods or even God Jehovah by making a positive statement. They would not prophesy bad things because their speaking it may cause the gods or God Jehovah to bring it about. This created a big problem, because God was getting ready to send judgment, but how was He going to warn of the coming judgment if prophets would not prophesy anything negative. A warning is meant to give you time to prepare.
In the movie “The Chosen” there is a wedding scene. This is shown to be one of the happiest events in the Jewish culture. Yet, right in the middle of all the joy and happiness, the rabbi goes into a mournful and melancholy dance. His message was the warning of Isaiah 30:10. Don’t get so wrapped up in letting the good times rule such that you fail to heed the warnings of a coming storm and will not make proper preparations. So too in our churches, our fellowships and in our own personal lives, we should enjoy the blessings and joys of the Lord, we should always remain positive in our outlook, but we must never forget that sin does exist, that there is still the need for repentance and that there is a world out there that is suffering and hell is a real place and billions are going there. Maybe some of us do not care, but God sure does.
Prophets were not sent to just give happy, happy, happy news, but also words which may be quite negative, word meant for us to repent and words meant for us to prepare. Positive thoughts can keep us from falling into a funk, but if we do not get into a funk over sin, positive things will not happen.
Recent Comments