Songfacts®:

• This song is based on the classic 1923 book The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran, which is filled with bits of wisdom that help send sinners on a righteous path. The song is addressed to a girl who is very loose with her love. She's introduced in the opening lines:
  
  Do you love with all your heart, just for a day
  Do you steal kisses just for a thrill, then run away
  
  And then, with Chuck Jackson assuming the voice of The Prophet, he passes judgment:
  
  Then you've done a terrible thing
  
  This is not at all a typical pop song - it's more of a sermon, with lots of spoken-word warnings from Jackson, who repeats the line, "Heed the word of The Prophet."
  
  Here's more:
  
  Live for today and love for tomorrow is the wisdom of a fool
  yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is today's dream
  
  And then:
  
  And when he assigns you to his secret files
  Fear not, for you shall not be burned
  Love is like a rippling brook
  You shall know love
  
  At the end of the song, it all comes together with this moral:
  
  So be good little children
  Give all your love faithfully
  And you'll be blessed, little children
  By The Prophet eternally
  
  This all happens in the song's 2:29 runtime.
• The words of "The Prophet" were written by Luther Dixon, a writer/producer at Chuck Jackson's record label, Wand. According to Jackson, Dixon started the song with a variation on this passage from the book:
  
  When you love you should not say, "God is in my heart"
  But rather, "I am in the heart of God"
  
  In the song, this appears as:
  
  And when you love you shall not say "the lord is in thy heart"
  You shall say, "I am in the heart of the lord"
• "The Prophet" was released as the B-side of "Any Day Now (My Wild Beautiful Bird)," Chuck Jackson's biggest hit. Jackson was an acclaimed R&B singer who wasn't able to cross over to a wider audience. His other popular songs include "I Don't Want to Cry" and "I Keep Forgettin'" (which became the basis for the Michael McDonald song.
• Van McCoy, a prolific songwriter who had a #1 hit in 1975 with "The Hustle," wrote this song with Luther Dixon.