Among the points bearing on the nature and
fulfilment of prophecy, few call for more special attention than this,--that
some predictions are conditional, whilst others are absolute. Many of the
utterances of Scripture (e.g. Lev.
26) present alternative prospects. If Israel followed the course of obedience,
certain happy consequences would ensue. If they disobeyed, various specified
evils would follow. So it was in the case of individuals. Jeremiah said to King
Zedekiah, “If thou wilt go forth to the king of Babylon’s princes, then thy
soul shall live, and this city shall not be burned with fire; but if thou wilt
not go forth to the king of Babylon’s princes, then shall this city be given
into the hand of the Chaldeans and they shall burn it with fire, and thou shalt
not escape out of their hand” (Jer. 38. 17, 18). Similarly, two alternatives
were present before the little remnant with whom Jeremiah found himself
associated after the Captivity (Jer. 42.10-13).
But the conditional nature of a prediction is
not always plainly stated in Scripture. Thus, Jonah is said to have preached
that within forty days Nineveh should be destroyed; the people repented at his
preaching, and Nineveh was not destroyed; yet so far as we know, the people
were not told that if they repented the judgment should not fall on them.
Predictions of this class are so numerous
that we conclude there must have been some unexpressed but underlying condition
in all such cases which justified God in departing from the literal fulfilment
of the prophetic utterance. What that condition is we may gather from such
chapters as Jer. 18 and Ezek. 33. After Jeremiah had watched the potter at his
work and had learned the great lesson of the Sovereignty of God, a further
message was presented to him: “At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation
and concerning a kingdom to pluck up and to pull down and to destroy it, if
that nation against whom I have pronounced turn from their evil, I will repent
of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak
concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom to build and to plant it, if it do
evil in My sight that it obey not My voice, then I will repent of the good
wherewith I said I would benefit them” (Jer. 18:7-10). Acting on this
principle, Jeremiah speaks thus to the princes when the priests and prophets
wanted to have him slain:--“The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house,
and against this city all the words that ye have heard. Therefore now amend
your ways and your doings and obey the voice of the Lord your God, and the Lord
will repent Him of the evil that He pronounced against you” (Jer. 26.12, 13).
If the people would repent, in one sense, the Lord would repent, in another. And
on what ground? ON the ground of the original, essential and eternal attributes
of the Divine nature, and on the ground of the old promises and covenants which
God had made with the fathers as a result of those attributes. Thus God says to
Israel, “Return, thou backsliding Israel, and I will not cause Mine anger to
fall upon you, for I am merciful and I will not keep (anger) for ever” (Jer. 3.
12). It is the goodness of God which leads to repentance (Rom. 2.4). Ezekiel’s
words are most significant:--“When I say to the righteous that he shall surely
live, if he trust to his own righteousness and commit iniquity, all his
righteousness shall not be remembered, but in his iniquity which he hath
committed, in it shall he die. Again, when I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt
surely die; if he turn from his sin and do judgment and justice . . . he shall
surely live” (Ezek. 33.13-15). In accordance with this fixed principle the
appeal goes forth, “Repent and turn from all your transgressions, so iniquity
shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions whereby ye
have transgressed, and make you a new heart and a new spirit. For why will ye
die, O house of Israel. For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth,
saith the Lord God; wherefore turn and live ye” (Ezek. 18.30-32).
It may be gathered from these and other
passages that the actual fulfilment of a prophecy depends on the moral and
spiritual condition of those to whom or of whom the word is spoken. This
consideration throws light on many things.
It is a fundamental principle of revealed
theology that God is slow to anger and repenteth Him of the evil. “He is not
slack as some men count slackness, but it longsuffering to us-ward, not willing
that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3.9).
This principle is exhibited in His dealings with the nations which inhabited
the countries round Canaan. Their judgment may have been postponed or modified
in consequence of some good thing which was seen in them. Similarly, in the
case of individuals we can trace a relaxation or postponement of judgment. When
Ahab had been convicted of grievous sin he rent his clothes and put sackcloth
upon his flesh and fasted and went softly. “And the word of the Lord came to Elijah,
saying, Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before Me? Because he humbleth
himself before Me I will not bring the evil in his days: in his son’s days will
I bring the evil upon his house” (1 Kings 21.27-29).
It is probable that hundreds of prophecies,
which look absolute as we read them, were not fulfilled in their completeness
because the words of warning from the prophet produced some result, even though
slight and temporary, on the hearts of the hearers. God does not quench the
smoking flax.
It would be interesting to enquire how far
the principle thus clearly laid down is applicable to the case of our first
parents. God is represented as saying to Ada, “In the day that thou eatest
thereof thou shalt surely die” (Gen. 2.17). The eternal attribute of goodness
lay beneath the utterance; and in this sense, if in no other, the Lamb was
regarded as slain before the foundation of the world. So it came to pass that
Adam did not actually die when he ate the forbidden fruit, though the seeds of
spiritual and physical death were then sown in him.
In Num. 14.34 we read, “Ye shall know My
breach of promise.” The words have to do with the threat of judgment on Israel
for their unfaithfulness and their murmuring, in consequence of which their
carcases were to fall in the wilderness, and forty years should elapse before
they entered Canaan. There is some doubt as to the exact rendering of the
Hebrew word HEB, translated “breach-of-promise.” Probably the margin in the
A.V. (“the altering of My purpose”) comes sufficiently near the truth. It would
seem as if there were a constant reconstruction of the Divine plan, to meet the
new set of circumstances brought about by human failure; so that whilst in one
sense God is not a man that He should repent (Num. 23.19 and 1 Sam. 15.29), yet
He does repent, in the sense of changing His course (1 Sam. 15.35). (R.B.
Girdlestone, The Grammar of Prophecy: An
Attempt to Discover the Method Underlying the Prophetic Scriptures [London:
Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1901], 25-28)