The Shame of the False Prophet

Being called for instruction, he is being convinced of this same thing along with them and of the unclean spirit. For how can the spirit of the diviners and bird-diviners not have the impurity which comes from impiety?

This same word could also be applied to the protectors of heresies, who have happened to be full of demons and deceiving spirits. For regarding them the Lawgiver Paul writes thus: 'Some will depart from the healthy faith, paying attention to deceiving spirits and demonic teachings, in the hypocrisy of false prophets, having been cauterized in their own conscience' (1 Timothy 4:2).

It is not to be disturbed if the unclean spirit is spoken of in the singular in the prophet, but the deceiving spirits are spoken of in the plural in the Apostolic Scripture. For those things which are taken individually according to each are generally called one spirit. And it is also good to say that the naming of the names of idols is being destroyed, as if their mention were no longer to be, because of their vanity and foolishness, even though they exist only as a designation and not as a power.

Zach. XIII, 3: 'And it shall come to pass, if a man prophesies any more, his father and his mother who begot him will say to him, "You shall not live, because you have spoken falsely in the name of the Lord"'; and his father and his mother who begot him will run against him in his prophesying (Zechariah 13:3).

Once the false prophets and the unclean spirit have been removed from the earth, if a man should still dare to prophesy out of frenzy and madness, he would be so much a laughingstock and subject to rebuke, that even his parents would not believe him, but would vote for his death, announcing: 'He shall not live anymore because he has spoken falsely upon the name of the Lord,' he being found not a prophet but a false prophet.

By these things, the false prophet is rebuked by his father and his mother, who run against him and join in his downfall, rebuking his sophistries and his deceptive words.

Because the phrase 'those who begot him in his prophesying' is ambiguous, it should be expanded into both meanings. One way it might be understood: those who begot him as a man have a disposition toward him as humans guarding parents, because he speaks falsely in the name of the Lord, and they join in his downfall by voting against him. The other way it might be attributed thus: his father and his mother...

They join in mockery against him, those who brought him forth into prophesying, having fathered him as a false prophet through upbringing and procreation, having generated him through imitation and teaching, and who are clearly possessed of a false-prophetic disposition.

It is not in vain that such an 'man' has been reproved; rather, because he walks falsely 'in strife and jealousy' according to the flesh, he holds the name of man, similar to those to whom it was said, 'You indeed die as men' (1 Cor 3:4), and concerning those unworthy of the Divine Spirit, the Lord says, 'My Spirit shall not remain in these men because they are flesh' (Rom 8:9).

Zechariah 13:4–6: And on that day the prophets shall be ashamed, each from his vision in his prophesying, and they shall put on haircloth instead of those garments by which they lied. And he shall say, 'I am not a prophet, because a man has fathered me from my youth.' And I will say to him, 'Why are these wounds between your hands?' And he shall say, 'Those which were struck in my beloved house.'

Those who promise foreknowledge experience shame because their pre-proclamation is falling away. Since, therefore, the indictment of the false prophet comes not from others alone but also from those who fathered him, for this reason he is ashamed, his prophecy having been exposed, so that he is left to revile himself and to be clothed in haircloth. For a man confesses that he has existed from youth, the youth of which now denotes not age but a young and impetuous character.

For the wicked one, not possessing prudent wisdom nor honorable old age, nor a life without blemish, passes through life with ignorance, according to the proverbial saying: 'Folly is widespread in the heart of a youth, and a rod and instruction are far from him' (Prov 13:24). He, finding this state to be the worst, offers a plea to God: 'Do not remember the sinfulness of my youth and my ignorance' (Ps 25:7).

He who is exposed as speaking falsely in prophesying, being ashamed of his vain vision—which is more like divination than true prophecy—confesses that he is not a prophet nor was he advanced from among the prophets to this.

And since, being clothed in haircloth, he is being coerced yet denies not in truth being a prophet, it is said to him: 'Why then the...