Where does authority lie in Judaism? Deuteronomy places authority very firmly with God and Torah. The Torah, as described in Deuteronomy, is meant to be the final authority in Israelite society, the equivalent of a constitution. All officials, including the kings, priests, and prophets, are bound by its laws and derive their authority from it. Kings have strict limitations and a requirement to study and abide by the Torah. Priests and magistrates are given the power of the judiciary and legal interpretation. But chapter 18 lays out the limitations for prophets, echoing the ideas first presented in chapter 13 last week.

Only the prophets pose any threat to the social and legal order established by the Torah, demonstrating the paradoxical nature of prophecy. The Torah authors recognize the dangers prophecy posed to the political system, but as the presumed product of the prophet Moses, it cannot dismiss prophecy entirely. The questions that Deuteronomy attempts to address are: how we can identify a true prophet from a charlatan, and why trust them over psychics, mediums, and fortune tellers. God promises to provide the people with guidance through prophets like Moses, and the test consists of accurate predictions. True prophets speak only the word of God; they don’t lie, confabulate, or attempt to read people. More importantly, true prophets are not speaking in the name of false gods.

But this test poses a problem. When a prophet like Jonah predicts doom and destruction for unrepentant sinners, his prediction doesn’t happen. Does this make Jonah a false prophet according to the test of Deuteronomy 18? We know from the biblical text, he is not. This means that the test in chapter 18 is as inconclusive as the performance of miracles (Deut. 13). If conditional prophecy cannot be disqualified when the doom is averted through repentance, what is left from the definition of the prophet in these two chapters? Prophets must 1) be Israelites, 2) like Moses, 3) devoted to God alone, and 4) only speak the word of Hashem that is commanded to them. Furthermore, the prophet could not contradict, change, or abrogate the Torah (Deut. 12:32).

So, what does it mean for the prophet to be like Moses? It clearly isn’t about miracles, since chapter 13 showed their irrelevance. It could be a reference to his character as a humble, righteous, just, and caring man, or his integrity in delivering the word of God to the people faithfully. But the answer is likely contained in this passage in chapter 18: the prophet is a mediator between God and the people. Verses 16-18 establish this as the definition of what it means to be like Moses. The prophet receives the word of God and delivers it to the people when they are unable to receive it themselves.

The role of mediator, however, reveals an even greater tension in the text. We learn in chapter 30 that the Torah is not in heaven or across the sea, it is in our hearts and in our mouths; we do not need a mediator. In chapter 18 we get very similar language, stating that God places his word in the mouths of the prophets, which is the source of the prophet’s authority. If we already have the word of God within us (and on paper), and the prophet’s only job is to speak the word of God, what is the point of the prophet?

The prophet is not only the spokesperson for God. They are an advocate for the people, like Moses, and they place themselves between us and God in order to relieve us from the overwhelming nature of God. God’s power, goodness, perfection, and glory was too much to bear for the average person, and this has always been true for the majority of people. We don’t like being confronted with perfection because it reminds us of our imperfections. This leads to repression and denial, if not anger and despair. We refuse to look, to feel, to acknowledge. It’s much easier to face another person, limited and flawed like ourselves, than it is to face our own conscience in the Presence of God. And so, while it is true that we all have the Torah within us, because God is within us, we often refuse to listen. The job of the prophet is to make us listen, to remind us of what we already know.

The test of the prophet is not miracles and predictions. Does the prophet convict us? Does he remind us of what we already know to be true and right? Does she teach us to listen to the voice of God, the Torah within? Are they aligned with the holy tradition that is devoted to God alone and no other? The prophet is only needed when we refuse to listen. The age of prophecy has passed, which makes it all the more important for us to learn how to listen to the Torah in our mouths and in our hearts.