Prophecy and Its Cultic Dimensions

Prophecy and Its Cultic Dimensions seeks to address three questions: (1) What is the overlap between the priestly and the prophetic? (2) How do the textual sources configure the role of prophecy within the cult? (3) How can “theory” aid in the understanding of the relationship between “divination and cultic ritual” (p. 7)?Marian Broida’s “Ritualization in Prophetic Intercession” reads accounts of prophetic intercession through the grid of performance-based “ritualizing” strategies and finds that “atypical” prophets (those with multiple social offices or supernatural powers) are more likely than “typical” prophets to employ “rituals.” While this is convincing, her construction of a recognizable pattern of “apotropaic intercession by typical prophets” on the basis of Amos 7:2, 5 and Ezek 9:8; 11:13 alone is unconvincing. Despite Broida’s qualifications, it is unclear what the label “ritual” contributes to our understanding of these acts (also relevant are the questions raised by Nissinen in his essay about the applicability of this label to prophecy). Furthermore, this essay does not address the implications of its findings for the volume’s overall focus on the question of prophetic involvement in the cult.In his “Cultic Prophecy Déjà Vu,” Lester L. Grabbe defines a “cult prophet” as “a member of the temple personnel who acts (at least sometimes) in the temple as a prophet” (p. 40), a description that is more specific than merely “prophecy in a temple context” (p. 40). To prove the existence of such cult prophets, Grabbe provides a cumulative case with seven lines of argumentation. Most significant are examples of court prophets associated with the temple (such as Nathan and Gad, who often appear alongside Zadok the priest). However, in some case studies, it is a considerable stretch to see how these prophets were in any sense necessarily “cultic”: regarding the 400 prophets summoned by Ahab (1 Kgs 22:6), Grabbe simply states “They seem to have been cultic prophets, connected with the temple, since Ahab as the head of the cult would probably have freely called on temple resources for his needs when it suited him” (p. 42). Readers may find that Stökl’s more nuanced definition of what is “cultic” (below) raises doubts about the validity of some of Grabbe’s other examples (e.g., the prophets who are regularly found in the temple court in Jer 26 [p. 44]).John W. Hilber’s chapter, “Prophetic Ritual in the Egyptian Royal Cult,” argues that inscriptions containing divine speech addressed to the king were related to real-life rituals where a priest or other functionary proclaimed these words to the king. He links these Egyptian texts with the royal psalms of the OT and appeals to the “pillar” in the temple where the king often stood (2 Kgs 11:14) as evidence that Israel had similar practices.In “Prophecy and Priests in the Second Temple Period,” Alex P. Jassen challenges the popular notion (often based on texts such as 1 Macc 4:46; 9:27) that prophecy had ceased during this time. Adopting Grabbe’s broad definition of prophecy as “the transmission of allegedly divine messages by a human intermediary to a third party” (p. 63), Jassen produces several convincing textual examples, including Testament of Levi 8:2, where Levi receives an “ephod of prophecy” (p. 68) and Philo, Spec. Laws 4.192, which states “the true priest is necessarily a prophet” (p. 78). He concludes that, although the title of “prophet” is often absent, there was a tendency in the second temple period for priests to perform prophetic functions.Anja Klein’s “Poetry, Prophecy and History: Divine Speech in Psalms 81 and 95” uses two important test cases to inquire whether prophets were a key part of the cult in ancient Israel, or if some psalmists merely mimicked prophetic expressions in their compositions. After working through the uses of divine speech in both psalms, she concludes that they both are “scribal products from post-exilic times that blend biblical history and prophecy with cultic elements” (p. 99) and thus are not “cultic prophecy.” Klein’s argument raises the question what constitutes adequate criteria, both for separating streams of tradition and for what would be impossible for preexilic and exilic liturgical writers. Is it really improbable that they could have drawn on multiple streams of expression in their songs? Given the Deuteronomic nature of Ps 95:7d–11, is a date radically later than the time of the composition of Deuteronomy (or the beginning of the oral tradition it was based on) really demanded? It would have been helpful if she had briefly identified the compositional model of the Hebrew Bible that she favors, or at least make clear what traditions may have been formalized prior to the return to the land.Martti Nissinen’s essay, “The Ritual Aspect of Prophecy,” reviews select examples of prophetic activities taking place in temples from both Greek and Near Eastern sources, interpreted through the lens of Sørensen’s theory of ritual actions. This allows him to distinguish between divinatory rituals and magical rituals. Since prophecy is sometimes (but not always) a subset of the former and never the latter, he concludes (in contrast to Broida’s essay) that “it does not follow ... that prophecy as such should be understood as a ritual” (p. 113).In “Ready of Not, Here I Come: Triggering Prophecy in the Hebrew Bible,” Jonathan Stökl advances the controversial thesis that the prophets of the Hebrew Bible used a number of rituals to trigger omens. He notes the problems in using modern ritual theories to understand ancient texts, a warning that often goes unheeded by contributors to this volume (Broida’s comments on p. 20 notwithstanding). His textual analysis provocatively argues that the hithpael stem of נָבָא could be better understood as “dancing and making music” (p. 121) than “prophesying” (compare DCH 5:583, which supplies glosses of “rave ... prophesy, in ecstatic state”). Another important point raised by Stökl is the need to define carefully what is “cultic.” If the “‘cultic’ [is restricted] to ritual activity in the temple” (p. 129), then prophecy is not necessarily “cultic” just because it takes place in a temple. This distinction would challenge the conclusions of some of the other essays in this collection.The final essay is Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer’s “The Seer and the Priest: The Case of the So-called Linen Ephod.” Tiemeyer makes a detailed philological argument that the term אֵפוֹד בָּד (generally translated as “linen ephod”) found in 1 Sam 2:18; 22:18; 2 Sam 6:14 is better understood as a “diviner’s ephod” (p. 146). Based on the ways the ancient versions handle the plural form בַּדִּים in Isa 44:25; Jer 50:36; Hos 11:6, she convincingly argues that the extant reading is a corruption of an original בדים, based on an Akkadian cognate meaning “diviners.”Prophecy and Its Cultic Dimensions is a worthwhile read for any Hebrew Bible scholar interested in prophecy, socio-scientific criticism, or ancient Israelite religion. The eight essays complement each other thematically and provide the reader with a representative array of perspectives on both the existence of “cultic prophecy” and the limitations of reconstructing ancient social and religious practices with texts as the sole line of evidence

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