Prophetic Understanding

The Old Testament prophets, to some extent, understood their own prophecies. It's a common mistake to think that they didn't understand anything, as if they received words they didn't understand, or that they were just typewriters who didn't comprehend what they wrote. But this is not true… They understood what they were writing. They had a special understanding of the historical, literal contexts in which they lived, the historical circumstances in which they lived. For example, in the book of Hosea, it says, "out of Egypt I called my son." We know from Matthew that this prophecy was fulfilled in Christ when he returned from Egypt. Although Hosea might not have known that what he wrote was about Christ, he understood that the Lord was talking about how he rescued his people from Egypt during the time of the exodus. So, the prophets understood what they wrote. Even though they didn't have the full understanding that we have through the New Testament, they understood to a large extent what they wrote.