The NIV 365 Day Devotional

Did the Prophets Know What Their Predictions Meant?

The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

Isaiah 1:1

Generally speaking, the prophets knew very well what their prophecies meant. Of course, the prophets did not know exactly how a given prediction would find its fulfillment in specific terms if those specifics were not revealed to them by God.

For example, a prophecy from God about the conquest and exile of Judah might not have given details such as exactly how many people would lose their lives in the battles or all the particular locations in which those battles would be fought or precisely how many people would be exiled to Babylon and so forth. But the actual concepts revealed to the prophets in the prophecies God gave them were not mysterious, confusing or unintelligible.

When inspiring the prophets, God used imagery, vocabulary, idioms, figures of speech and other literary forms appropriate to his revelation to the original audience — things that we modern readers may have to work to understand. But there is no evidence that the prophets themselves had any trouble understanding what they had been given by God to say to their listeners.

Taken from the NIV Quest Study Bible.