Early Christian Quotes on Prophecy
The Shepherd of Hermas
(1st or 2nd Century)
Commandment 11:
“Sir, can a man tell who is a true prophet and who is a false prophet?”
The angel answered, “I will tell you about both, and then you can test the true and the false prophet according to my directions. Test the man who has the Divine Spirit by his life. First, he who has the Divine Spirit coming from above is meek and peaceable and humble and refrains from all sin and the vain desire of this world but contents himself with fewer wants than those of other men. And when asked to prophesy, he doesn’t answer, nor does he give private prophecies, because the Holy Spirit doesn’t speak when man wants Him to, but He speaks only when God wishes Him to speak.”
Justin Martyr’s Dialog with Trypho
(Mid-2nd Century)
Chapter 52:
There never failed to be a prophet among you [the Jewish people], who was lord and leader and ruler of your nation. For the Spirit who was in the prophets anointed your kings and established them. But after the coming and death of Jesus Christ in your nation, there is no longer any prophet among you.
Justin Martyr’s Dialog with Trypho
(Mid-2nd Century)
Chapter 77:
The Holy Spirit oftentimes announces such events as the birth of Christ by parables and similes.
Justin Martyr’s Dialog with Trypho
(Mid-2nd Century)
Chapter 82:
The prophetical gifts remain with us, even to the present time. And so you ought to understand that the gifts formerly among your nation [the Jews] have been transferred to us.
Justin Martyr’s Dialog with Trypho
(Mid-2nd Century)
Chapter 87:
The Scripture says that all powers of the Spirit have come on Jesus, not because He needed them but because they would be completed in Him, so that there would be no more prophets in Israel; and this you can plainly see, for after Him no prophet has arisen among the Jews.
Justin Martyr’s First Apology
(Mid-2nd Century)
Chapter 42:
The Spirit of prophecy speaks of things that are about to happen as if they had already happened…The things He absolutely knows will happen, He predicts as if they had already happened.
Theophilus of Antioch’s Book 2
(Late 2nd Century)
Chapter 9:
Men of God, carrying in them the Holy Spirit and becoming prophets inspired and given wisdom by God, became God-taught as well as holy and righteous. So, they were also deemed worthy of receiving the reward of being instruments of God and containing the wisdom that is from Him, through which wisdom they spoke about the creation of the world and all other things. For they also predicted diseases and famines and wars. And there was not one or two only, but many, at various times and seasons among the Hebrews (and also among the Greeks, there was the Sibyl), and they all have spoken things consistent and harmonious with each other, both about what happened before them and what happened in their own time, as well as the things now being fulfilled in our own day. That’s why we are persuaded that what they said about the future will also happen, just as the first things have already been accomplished.
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