These words are followed by the record that all Israel, from Dan to Beersheba

knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet for the Lord.  Samuel's

continuance as a faithful prophet is indicated in 1 Samuel 9:6, where the

servant of Saul said:

'Behold now, there is in this city a man of God, and he is an

honourable man; all that he saith cometh surely to pass: now let us go

thither; peradventure he can shew us our way that we should go'.

There is an explanatory note given in 1 Samuel 9:9 that we should

'He that is now called a Prophet (nabi) was beforetime called a Seer'

The seer, was a 'see -er', one who saw either by vision, or by the

perception and understanding.  Abraham named the Mount whereon he had been

willing to offer Isaac, 'Jehovah -Jireh', 'Jehovah will see', which differs

little from Moriah which means 'shown by Jah'.  Abraham was also a prophet

nabi (Gen. 20:7).  Here the predicting of future events is secondary, the

prime meaning of the word being one who is God's spokesman.

We find this to be the meaning of the second occurrence of the word:

'See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be

thy prophet' (Exod. 7:1).

This needs no further explanation than is provided in Exodus 4:14 -16:

'Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother?  I know that he can speak well

... And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his mouth: and I

will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, and will teach you what ye

shall do.  And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people: and he shall

be, even he shall be to thee instead of a mouth, and thou shalt be to

him instead of God'.

The diffidence of Moses and the anger of the Lord was overruled to

provide us with a fairly clear idea of the status of a prophet.  He is

'instead of a mouth'.  This being the case we can understand how it was that

the Lord did let none of Samuel's words fall to the ground.

Another usage of naphal that bears upon our subject is found in Job

12:2,3 and 13:2:

'No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you.  But I

have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior

(naphal with m following) to you: yea, who knoweth not such things as

these?' (12:2,3).

Again, in the law regulating the vow of a Nazarite, it is written that

if a Nazarite be suddenly rendered unclean by contact with death he must go

through certain ceremonial cleansings and shall be restored but,

'The days that were before shall be lost (naphal), because his

separation was defiled' (Num. 6:12).