Prophecy

A prophet is a person who plays as special role mediating the relationship between other people and the divine. People typically envision prophecy in terms of God communicating through a prophet to others some important information that could not have been known to the prophet in any ordinary way. Prophecy is interesting from a philosophical point of view for many reasons, including the fact that it raises compelling questions about divine knowledge and communication, human language, the nature of time, and human freedom. Unlike theologians or apologists, philosophers rarely argue about who has actually prophesied what, or whether or not a given prophecy came true. Instead, they prefer to argue about ideal cases, where the theoretical issues can be clearly identified. In this article, we will follow their lead by sidestepping completely the question of whether or not any apparent prophecies have actually been fulfilled. We will also avoid the question of the existence of God, which is addressed by a number of other entries in this encyclopedia