Antoninus, the Roman emperor, once asked Rabbeinu HaKadosh — Rabbi Judah the Prince, the compiler of the Mishnah (the earliest code of rabbinic law) — for political counsel. "I want to go to Alexandria," he said. "Is it possible that a king will arise there who will beat me?"
The question was practical: should a Roman emperor fear a rival emerging from Egypt? Rabbi Judah gave a careful answer. "I do not know," he said — declining to make a political prediction. But then he offered something better than intelligence: prophecy.
"In any event," Rabbi Judah continued, "we have it in writing that Egypt is incapable of establishing either a king or a governor." The source was (Ezekiel 29:15): "Of all the kingdoms it will be the lowest, and it will not exalt itself again among the nations. And I will diminish them, so that they not dominate the nations."
The answer was devastating in its simplicity. Rabbi Judah did not need spies or military assessments. He had Ezekiel. The prophet had already declared Egypt's permanent diminishment — not temporarily weakened, but permanently reduced, never again to produce a ruler capable of dominating other nations.
This exchange, preserved in the Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael (Tractate Shirah 6:15), reveals the rabbinic conviction that the Hebrew prophets had already mapped the political future of every empire. Antoninus came seeking intelligence. Rabbi Judah handed him prophecy — and told him he had nothing to fear from Alexandria.