Facts have always been important to me. My work as a forensic investigator cemented and enhanced my insistence that any claim I entertained should be backed by evidence. Simply put: the facts are what they are. As I like to say about a suspect of an investigation, "either he did or he didn't," and it isn't my job to find prove either side. My job is to present the facts as they are.
I'm not attempting to write a tautology with my statement about facts. I mean to state that the law of non-contradiction
is important to my work and to the way I approach my views of the world. A thing cannot be true and untrue at the same time. I understand that we humans are keenly able to live with cognitive dissonance, but I believe these biases have no place in an investigation, a professional conclusion, or a person's general epistemology.
How, then, should I react when one day my Facebook Timeline is plastered with a post declaring that the End Times were going to happen? And not "any day now" like believers have claimed since time immemorial. No - these things were going to happen within the next twelve months.
How, then, should I react when one day my Facebook Timeline is plastered with a post declaring that the End Times were going to happen? And not "any day now" like believers have claimed since time immemorial. No - these things were going to happen within the next twelve months.
End-times claims are reasonably considered ridiculous prima facie, but my internal forensic investigator voice reminded me that because I cannot see the future, I can't dismiss the claims outright. Based upon the reliability of previous claims throughout history, the chances of these being true are relatively low. But I didn't want to fall into the fallacy of "argument from personal incredulity," so I followed standard forensic methodology. First, I preserved the evidence. Claims can always be changed later with "that's not what I said," etc., so I took screenshots and copied the original text to my computer. Second, I performed my analysis using the best evidence, which is to say I waited for the year to play out before comparing the claims against actual events. Those 12 months are over now. We can't change the predictions and we can't change events of the previous year, making them perfect for analysis. How did the predictions fare? Read on!
What follows is the original text from the Facebook post (in red) followed by my opinion or analysis. I read the following on Facebook exactly 12 months ago, on October 7, 2014.
What follows is the original text from the Facebook post (in red) followed by my opinion or analysis. I read the following on Facebook exactly 12 months ago, on October 7, 2014.
"The LORD will not leave the
guilty unpunished"
So far, he apparently has. The world is still full of sinners and hypocrites living their lives as they always have.
Judgement (sic) is coming to
America!
It hasn’t yet. America still stands as a nation, seemingly unpunished.
Nahum 1:3 The LORD is slow to
anger but great in power; the LORD will not leave the guilty unpunished. His
way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet.
Context (KJV):
Nahum 1:2 God is jealous… (Remember this. We'll visit it again later)
Nahum 1:4 He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and
drieth up all the rivers…
Nahum 1:5 The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt,
and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell
therein.
Clearly this is not happening. Instead, scientists continue to talk about the ice caps
melting and fears of the sea levels rising. Hills have not been melting, and everyone on
earth hasn’t been burned to death. Yet. But California is on fire. Again.
God's judgement (sic) is coming
to America. I believe in the next 12 months we are going to experience a
collapse in the financial world, starting in American (sic). This will be much
worse than what happened in 2008.
We did experience a stock market dip in that time
period. He was right! Right?
No he
wasn’t.
There was a large correction (dip) during September 2015. According to CNN Money, (source)
it was the
“…worst point drop for stocks since October 2008. The Dow shed over 1,000 points in early trading. That's never happened before. America hasn't had a point drop near that since October 2008, when the financial crisis was in full effect and people were worried about more banks like Lehman Brothers collapsing.”
The worst drop since
2008 is hardly “much worse” than what
happened in 2008. Besides, the 2008
stock dip he used as the metric of “collapse” wasn’t as bad as, say, the
infamous “Black Monday” in 1987. In
other words, the disaster he predicted wasn’t even that terrible. If he wanted an example of financial ruin, he really should have predicted a collapse
worse than 1929; however, as he demonstrates later, knowing the facts of
history doesn’t seem to be important to him.
I believe we are going to get hit with a major earthquake on the West Coast possible (sic) in California and in Washington.
I believe we are going to get hit with a major earthquake on the West Coast possible (sic) in California and in Washington.
I believe there is going to be a
(sic) earthquake along the Madrid Fault line which runs through the States on
both sides of the Mississippi river. Some
believe this fault runs North and South, I believe the quake will cause major
damage from the South through the Northeast.
The New Madrid fault line didn’t cause all those major
earthquakes that struck the West Coast in California and in Washington in 2015 and destroyed everything
any major earthquakes on the west coast.
His prediction states that, “some believe this fault line
runs North and South.” It doesn’t matter
if some believe. The fault line is where
it is. It just is. Seismology is not a belief system. It is real, hard science.
The picture above shows reports of over 4,000 earthquakes
since 1974 (source). Notice how the most activity runs in a line
from Southeast to Northwest, exactly the opposite direction he stated.
Most of the things he wrote were hyperbole, I understand. But in this case, he could have spent 30
seconds on some due diligence when talking about an actual fault line with real
life recorded seismic activity.
I also believe we could see a
major failure of the electrical grid system sending America into the stone age
over night. This could be from a solar flare, EMP or an act of terror.
Electricity wasn’t common in American households until
the late 1800s. Killing the lights would
hardly throw us back into the stone age.
We had a bronze age, a Renaissance and the beginning of The Enlightenment all before the ubiquity of electricity. Remember, before electricity was popular, we somehow managed to write
the Declaration of Independence and form the alleged “Christian Nation” we
now live in.
Also, in case it’s not clear: What he predicted didn’t happen. I’m writing this on a computer and posting it
to the Internet. Everything seems to be
working just fine. I know he used
qualifying language like “I believe” and “could,” to weasel his way out, but I believe it's clear what he meant. And he was wrong.
There are 55,000 hubs in America,
it only takes 9 to fail and the whole system will go down. Google this, if true
it is said that 80% to 90% of the American population will die in less than a
year.
My three favorite words here are “it is said.” He provides no source. Who says?
Are they credible? Here are four true examples of "it is said" statements:
- It is said that a 14-year-old virgin got pregnant from a flu shot (source).
- It is said that a secret group of reptile people run the US government (source).
- It is said that the earth is a flat disc, not a globe (source).
- It is said that “lā ʾilāha ʾillā-llāh, muḥammadur rasūlu-llāh” (There is no god but [Allah]. Muhammad is the messenger of God).
Does he believe these things because “it is said?” Should anyone believe
these things simply because “it is said?” I say
no. I understand and empathize where this person is coming from. According to the Christian, Jewish, and Islamic creation myth, God literally spoke the entire universe into existence. The Pentateuch was written by unknown authors. The New Testament Gospels and every first-hand account of the teachings of Jesus were written by people who were not eye witnesses. Therefore, his entire belief system is rooted in things people said, rather than things that actually happened.
I believe we are going to see
acts of terror along the southern border. 100's will be killed and the number
one act of terror will be the ISIS-style be-headings (sic) left as a witness to
their evil.
The Southern border is a pretty dangerous place. It was dangerous before he made his
prediction, so anticipating violence there isn’t anything special. In fact, predicting no violence would be the real miracle. Nevertheless, we haven’t seen stories of
100’s of people being killed in ISIS-style beheadings. This
simply hasn’t happened.
We will look back and say
"What happened had to happen so that what needs to happen can happen"
This is perhaps the most dangerous and disgusting part of
the entire prediction. A person who holds
this mindset is a person who longs for the end times. This is someone who actually hopes for the
apocalypse to happen within his lifetime, who can't wait for the death and destruction of God's wrath to be visited upon people he disagrees with.
In this way, he is no different than members of ISIS and other organizations who are trying to establish
a new caliphate or unite the world against Israel so that Jesus can return.
I have to defer to the wise and poignant words of
Christopher Hitchens, who said it better than I ever could:
What follows now where the writer goes into full-on Alex
Jones mode. One world government,
antichrist, the number 7, tribulation, apocalypse, you name it. If we read this while we were playing a
drinking game called “Insane Christian Terminology Bingo,” we’d all be dead
from alcohol poisoning.
satan's (sic) time is short and
he is preparing the world for the one world bank, one world church and one
world government lead (sic) by a man the will be filled by satan (sic) himself
who we call the antichrist.
The biggest thing to watch for is
the 7 year peace treaty that this administration is trying to force Israel into
to create a false peace with people that only want one thing and that is death
to the Jewish nation.
I'm still watching. This isn't the first end-times prophecy to fail.
I believe in the next 12 months
Israel will sign that 7 year peace treaty for the sake of sharing their
capital, Zion the Holy City of Jerusalem.
Didn’t happen.
A large part of the land they will give away for this
treaty is called Judea.
Nope.
They will do this so that they
can build their temple and worship their God by making sacrifices of blood.
Three and a half years into this 7 year peace treaty the new world government
leader will step foot into the Holy Temple and tell the Jewish people to quit
sacrificing to a false God but worship him as god.
The Jewish temple
was already destroyed in 70 A.D. They
don’t need to build a new one to be destroyed in order to fulfill
prophecy. It already happened. Again, knowing history (even the history of
his own religion) isn’t important to this guy.
The Bible calls this the
"Abomination of Desolation, (Matthew 24: 15, 16, 21). "So when you
see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,' spoken
of through the prophet Daniel, let the reader understand, then let those who
are in Judea flee to the mountains. For then there will be great distress,
unequaled from the beginning of the world until now--and never to be equaled
again.
When you read the last line
Matthew 24:21 this is just an example why I am now a believer in
Mid-tribulation and not per-tribulation (sic) as I have heard all my life.
After the rapture takes place the Holy Spirit and all Spirit filled believers
which is the "salt" of the world will be gone. Salt was used to
prevent food from rotting or going bad. The Holy Spirit and all true committed
followers of Jesus Christ will be taken out of this world called the "rapture"
and then now satan will not be restricted in his evil on this world.
Ah, the revelation of Daniel. The one that was supposed to come to pass in
Daniel’s time, but didn’t. Then was
supposed to happen in Jesus’ time, but didn’t.
Then was supposed to happen on September 23, 2015 (in the future at the
time of his predictions)…. but didn’t. I’d
say Daniel fails the test in Deuteronomy 18:22. I think he and other believers should stop trying to make this prophecy work. His
own Bible says Daniel’s not to be trusted. And by that same standard, the writer of this Facebook prophecy is also not to be trusted.
God has been warning us for years
to repent as a people and as a Nation and now our own President declares we are
no longer a Christian Nation.
He's obviously referring to President Obama here, which is odd considering "our own President” Thomas Jefferson said that we are
“not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion” in 1797. It's only now - 218 years later, that God’s suddenly
upset about the idea because Obama said it.
That doesn’t make sense. Nor does
it demonstrate (again) any inkling of knowledge about history.
As Israel turned their backs to
God around 782 BC Gods (sic) wrath came upon them. The Harbinger written by Jonathan
Cahn and his new Book "The Mystery of the Shemitah" shows that God is
involved in the daily workings in this great nation. He has warned us and we as
a people have turned our backs against Him. Israel worship (sic) false gods and
then began to sacrifice a few thousand babies in fires to their false gods.
Where in the Bible does it say that the Jews began
sacrificing thousands of babies to false gods?
I can show you where Yahweh kills hundreds of thousands (or millions) of
babies all by himself, and he’s the “real” God!
Why are we resorting to extra-biblical sources now? Does Jonathan Cahn
“knoweth” (Matthew 24:36, Mark 13:32)?
When his prophecies don’t come true (spoiler: they won’t), will this guy reject
him outright (Deuteronomy 18:22)?
We took prayer out of school
(Sigh) No we didn’t.
Prayer in school is perfectly legal, just like it’s always been. Government
school-led prayer is still just as unconstitutional as it’s always been. History, again.
and within 10 years legalized
abortion in the safety of a mothers womb. We have sacrificed over 53,000,000
Fifty three million. To a false god of selfishness or self.
In 2 days we will have a blood
moon which will start the final year of this 7 year cycle, this is the time
that things will be brought down. This final year is called "The
Shemitah"
For the sake of argument, let's assume all his numbers are correct. Roe v. Wade was in 1973.
That was 42 years ago. Fifty-three million dead, almost 50 years of the
slaughter of unborn babies, and God still
hasn’t stopped it? What’s His
threshold? Seriously, how many is too many? Tens of millions don’t seem to make Him mad
enough to really do anything about it.
After 2014, though.
After the Shemitah is done. At
that point, God will say “Whoa!” Then he’ll put stop it. Then
he’s had enough. Not now. No… a
million MORE babies have to die before he’ll do ANYTHING. What kind of asshole
is this God guy anyway?
This brings us to the context of his original bible quote. Nahum 1:2 states that God is jealous. Using the number stated in the Sam Harris speech popularly titled "Morality and the Christian God," from his debate with Christian apologist William Lane Craig (again, assuming all the numbers are correct), nine million children die every year before the age of 5. These are children who are not aborted. Over the course of the 42 years since Roe v. Wade, God has allegedly allowed 378,000,000 (Three Hundred Seventy Eight Million) children to die. And this doesn't count the literally billions he's killed in the womb by way of miscarriages. This is pure snark to be sure, but I'm wondering if he is mad about abortion, he's really just jealous that humans killed the 53 million, thereby robbing him of the chance to do it himself. After all, we're talking about the same person who personally killed people by the millions in the Old Testament.
This brings us to the context of his original bible quote. Nahum 1:2 states that God is jealous. Using the number stated in the Sam Harris speech popularly titled "Morality and the Christian God," from his debate with Christian apologist William Lane Craig (again, assuming all the numbers are correct), nine million children die every year before the age of 5. These are children who are not aborted. Over the course of the 42 years since Roe v. Wade, God has allegedly allowed 378,000,000 (Three Hundred Seventy Eight Million) children to die. And this doesn't count the literally billions he's killed in the womb by way of miscarriages. This is pure snark to be sure, but I'm wondering if he is mad about abortion, he's really just jealous that humans killed the 53 million, thereby robbing him of the chance to do it himself. After all, we're talking about the same person who personally killed people by the millions in the Old Testament.
In summary, here are the
predictions for October 2014 – October 2015:
Collapse in the financial world, much worse than 2008
|
FAIL
|
Major earthquake on the west coast
|
FAIL
|
Major failure of the electrical grid and the consequent
death of 80% to 90% of the American population in less than a year [after the
failure]
|
FAIL
|
100s killed in ISIS-style beheadings along the southern
US border
|
FAIL
|
7 year peace treaty where Israel starts building the
new temple to do animal sacrifices
|
FAIL
|
Blood moons in October 2014 indicate the final year of
the 7-year end-times cycle, after which “everything will be brought down”
|
FAIL
|
Some of my responses are snarky, I admit. In my defense, I believe when refuting claims that
appear to stand in such stark contradiction to both reality and sanity,
it is entirely appropriate to lampoon and deride the statements. In
other words, when a person writes something that is batshit crazy, it's appropriate to respond as if the things they say are, well, batshit crazy.
After all, as I stated at the onset, the facts are what they are. They can't
be both crazy and non-crazy. And insane ideas do not deserve, in my
opinion, the same respect as reasonable ones.
To the original author: It was a good try, but you failed. Try again next year?
To the original author: It was a good try, but you failed. Try again next year?
