Conditionals (2)

If you assent and listen, the land’s bounty you shall eat.  But if you refuse and rebel, by the sword you shall be eaten, for the Lord’s mouth has spoken.  Isaiah 1:19-20  Robert Alter

If – Now we know that the poetic context of Isaiah’s opening probably requires nuanced conditionals, not declarative absolutes.  ʾim needs to be consistently translated “if.”  This discovery reveals a crucial point about Hebrew prophecy.  It is intended not to come true!

Jacob Neusner first provided this insight.  Hebrew prophecy is almost always conditional, that is, it should almost always be read as an “if—then” sequence.  Like this passage in Isaiah.  God says, “If you do this, then that will follow.”  And, of course, what follows depends on what you do.  The Western view of prophecy isn’t biblical.  The Western view treats prophecy as if it is history in advance.  It views prophecy from the Greek substructure of fate.  The difference between the biblical view and the Western view boils down to our conceptualization of time.

Thomas Aquinas, perhaps that most influential Western theologian who ever lived, constructed an analogy about God’s relationship to the temporal world that has affected the concept of biblical prophecy in disastrous ways.  Aquinas suggested that God is like a man in a high tower.  He looks down upon the actions occurring below, and because of His lofty position, He can see what will inevitably happen while those on the ground, with their extremely limited viewpoints, can only see what’s in front of them.  The man driving toward the curve in the road cannot see the other car approaching in the wrong lane.  But God can.  In fact, says Aquinas, God “sees” all actions and all reactions simultaneously, in what Aquinas termed “the eternal present.”  Prophecy in this view is nothing more than certain prediction of inevitable conclusions.  The only ones in the dark are the temporal actors, but God, from His ex-temporal (timeless) position sees perfectly all that has, is, or will occur.  There’s nothing conditional about it.  Prophecy is history in advance.

Fortunately, this isn’t the biblical view.  It’s the Greek view, no doubt, but it’s not the Hebrew view.  The Hebrew view is eloquently expressed by the king of Nineveh: “Who knows, God may turn and relent, and turn from His burning anger so that we will not perish” (Jonah 3:9).  In modern Jewish parlance, “It all depends.”  God does change His mind.  Prophecies do not come true (intentionally).  Circumstances change.  The divine will isn’t fixed.  Is it any wonder that no man, including the Messiah, knows when God will finally pull the trigger?  God’s calendar is always subject to revision.  It depends.

This is precisely God’s message to Israel in this text.  He lays out the conditions, just as Moses had centuries before.  But the very fact that there are conditions means there is always the possibility of revision.  That’s what God is counting on.  “Come to your senses, people.  If you keep going in this direction, you’ll end up slaughtered.  So, listen to Me.  I’m begging you.  Change direction before it’s too late.”  Why?  Because it’s not too late yet.

Topical Index: conditional, prophecy, revision, Jonah 3:9, ʾim, Isaiah 1:19-20