Prophet

"To determine whether a man is indeed a prophet, one must consider whether he has been following the way of "holiness" (qedushah) and "separation" (perishut). A prophet separates himself from the vanities and the intrigues of the times and "from the general ways of the people, who walk in the darkness of the time." The path of holiness, like the "way of the wise men," is a preparation for theoria. The prophet trains himself to keep his mind completely clear of vain and empty matters."

"When you spread out your hands in prayer,"

"While predicting the future is a rare gift, testifying for the truth is a duty for every woman and man of conscience. …A prophet, [Roman Catholic archbishop Óscar] Romero added, is one who has an “undisturbed conscience.” This is an interesting statement. Only those who are firmly rooted in conscience as their moral compass may calmly tell the truth about injustice and corruption, no matter the risks. And risks there are since prophets easily make enemies."

"[Religious leader Abdullah] Hashem teaches that even prophets made mistakes, as only God is infallible by nature. However, Jesus and Muhammad made only minor occasional mistakes and Muhammad, his daughter Fatimah[, and] the Twelve Imams can be called inherently infallible, and the Twelve Mahdis, including the Qaim/Riser, are in the category of “earned infallibility.” This does not mean that the covenant of Muhammad is still in force, and at any rate we do not know the integrality of his teachings, as the Quran that we have today is incomplete and corrupted."

"A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country and in his own house."

"Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. "You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? "So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit…"

"No prophet is accepted in his own country."

"And those dwelling on the earth rejoice over them and enjoy themselves, and they will send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those dwelling on the earth. And after the three and a half days spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet, and great fear fell upon those beholding them."

"No voice, no lute, no pipe, no incense sweet From chain-swung censer teeming; No shrine, no grove, no oracle, no heat Of pale-mouth’d prophet dreaming."

"... it is always the habit of man to reincarnate his heroes and divinities, so that and Odin tend to become indistinguishable, and Moses is forever reappearing—in our own time as Joseph Smith, Mary Baker G. Eddy and a long series of lesser prophets. No doubt Noah, as a small boy, heard in his school of an Ur-Noah, and played with a toy ark. And the Ur-Noah that he heard of probably had predecessors of his own."

"As it was, deformed and made mad by his hellish life, he had become what prophets had probably always been: not frauds, for they themselves believed what they had seen, but pitiful creatures, dreaming some salvation from this crushing world in their malfunctioning brains. Yaum ed din, the crazy little man, the prophet Aida’s John the Baptist, had said: the Day of Religion, the Muslim’s term for Judgment Day. Yaum ed din, the last consolation of the crazy and the weak."

"If I have eschewed the word prophet, I do not wish to attribute to myself such lofty title at the present time, for whoever is called a prophet now was once called a seer; since a prophet, my son, is properly speaking one who sees distant things through a natural knowledge of all creatures. And it can happen that the prophet bringing about the perfect light of prophecy may make manifest things both human and divine, because this cannot be done otherwise, given that the effects of predicting the future extend far off into time."

"Would to God that all the LORD's people were Prophets."

"And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house. With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the LORD shall he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?"

"The prophets in Hebrew Scripture and Jesus in the Gospels are figures in conflict with the religious establishment. They denounce the use of religion to sacralize unjust privilege and to ignore the needs of the people. Prophetic faith announces a God who is active in history, to overturn an unjust social order and to transform the world into a new social order where there will be no more war, no more injustice, where justice between people and harmony with nature has been restored and all creation will be in communion with God."

"I tell you in truth: all men are Prophets or else God does not exist."

"The historian is a reversed prophet."

"If your prophet was sexually insecure, or if his later interpreters were, that religion demanded celibacy or repression or even hatred of women; if the prophet was a homophobe, he preached persecution of homosexuals; and if he was both lecherous and greedy, he preached polygyny. If he was luxurious, he preached give-me-money-and-God-will-make-you-rich; if he felt put upon he preached God-of-Vengeance, let’s kill the other guy; and no matter how much well-meaning ecumenicists pretended all the gods were one god under different aspects, they weren’t any such thing, because every prophet created God in his own image, to confront his own nightmares."

"Prognostics do not always prove prophecies, at least the wisest prophets make sure of the event first."

"The prophets ... hurled their "woe be unto you" against those who oppressed and enslaved the poor, those who joined field to field, and those who deflected justice by bribes. These were the typical actions leading to class stratification everywhere in the ancient world, and were everywhere intensified by the development of the city-state (polis)."

"It is characteristic of the prophets that they do not receive their mission from any human agency, but seize it."

"If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."

"The Lord was standing by a wall that had been built true to plumb, with a plumb line in his hand. And the Lord asked me, "What do you see, Amos?""

"The Roman came into the Promised Land that had become less and less as promised. The rich got along quite well with the foreign occupation; it provided protection from desperate peasants and patriotic resistance fighters. It provided protection from prophets who could be labeled "agitators" now, without any qualms."

"The prophet's mantle, ere his flight began, Dropt on the world — a sacred gift to man."

"I shall always consider the best guesser the best prophet."

"I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away."

"The Prophet ... remains always a man apart, a narrow-minded extremist, zealous for his own ideal, and intolerant of every other. And since he cannot have all that he would, he is in a perpetual state of anger and grief; he remains all his life "a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth." [Jeremiah 15:10] Not only this: the other members of society, those many-sided dwarfs, creatures of the general harmony, cry out after him, "The Prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad" [Hosea 9:7]; and they look with lofty contempt on his narrowness and extremeness."

"Prophets don't know everything!"

"The best prophets lead you up to the curtain and let you peer through for yourself."

"The striking surprise is that prophets of Israel were tolerated at all by their people. To the patriots, they seemed pernicious; to the pious multitude, blasphemous; to the men in authority, seditious."

"Muhammad ist nicht der Vater eines eurer Männer, sondern der Gesandte Allahs und das Siegel der Propheten; und Allah hat volle Kenntnis aller Dinge."

"Wahrlich, ihr habt an dem Propheten Allahs ein schönes Vorbild für jeden, der auf Allah und den Letzten Tag hofft und Allahs häufig gedenkt."

"Erzähle, was in diesem Buch über Abraham steht. Er war ein Mann der Wahrheit, ein Prophet."

"Es ziemt einem Propheten nicht, unredlich zu handeln."

"Das Menschengeschlecht war eine Gemeinde; dann erweckte Allah Propheten als Bringer froher Botschaft und als Warner und sandte hinab mit ihnen das Buch mit der Wahrheit, dass Er richte zwischen den Menschen in dem, worin sie uneins waren."

"Selig seid ihr, wenn ihr um meinetwillen beschimpft und verfolgt und auf alle mögliche Weise verleumdet werdet. Freut euch und jubelt: Euer Lohn im Himmel wird groß sein. Denn so wurden schon vor euch die Propheten verfolgt."

"Liebe Brüder, traut nicht jedem Geist, sondern prüft die Geister, ob sie aus Gott sind; denn viele falsche Propheten sind in die Welt hinausgezogen. Daran erkennt ihr den Geist Gottes: Jeder Geist, der bekennt, Jesus Christus sei im Fleisch gekommen, ist aus Gott."

"Ihr seid auf das Fundament der Apostel und Propheten gebaut; der Schlußstein ist Christus Jesus selbst."

"Hütet euch vor den falschen Propheten; sie kommen zu euch wie (harmlose) Schafe, in Wirklichkeit aber sind sie reißende Wölfe. An ihren Früchten werdet ihr sie erkennen."

"Ein Prophet gilt nirgends weniger als in seinem Vaterland und bei seinen Verwandten und in seinem Hause."

"Kreuzigen sollte man jeden Propheten im dreißigsten Jahre, // Kennt er nur einmal die Welt, wird der Betrogne der Schelle."

"Jede Zeit hat ihre Propheten und ihre Gottbegeisterten."

"In jedem Menschen schlummert ein Prophet: erwacht er, so gibt es ein klein wenig mehr des Übels in der Welt."

"Gesell zog die halbreligiöse Verehrung auf sich, die früher Henry George umgab, und wurde der verehrte Prophet eines Kultus mit Tausenden von Anhängern in der ganzen Welt."

"Erlebnisse der Seele sind Zustände der Begeisterung und prophetischer Ahndung, die sich aufgrund von Traumerfahrungen einstellen."

"Eben diese Ungewißheit (..) muß selber in die ethische Theorie einbezogen und ihr zum Anlaß eines neuen Grundsatzes genommen werden (..). Es ist die Vorschrift, primitiv gesagt, daß der Unheilsprophezeiung mehr Gehör zu geben ist als der Heilsprophezeiung."

"Der Historiker ist nicht immer ein rückwärts gekehrter Prophet, aber der Journalist ist immer einer, der nachher alles vorher gewusst hat."

"Der Historiker ist immer ein Merlin, er ist die Stimme einer begrabenen Zeit, man befragt ihn, und er gibt Antwort, der rückwärtsschauende Prophet."

"Der Historiker ist ein rückwärtsgekehrter Prophet."