Bible Code Lectures in the Pentagon?

[Darth Buddha]

Rapture or Rupture?
World thinks America has gone mad, and they are correct

by Bryan Zepp Jamieson
04/26/04
http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Religious/rapture.htm

Folks in most developed countries are utterly flabbergasted to learn
that evolution is controversial in the United States. They think – at
first – that the controversy lies in scientific debate over the exact
mechanisms of evolution, or the course taken that led from one species
to another. Although, they reason, with our knowledge of DNA and the
functions of the genes becoming ever more exact, there are less gaps in
our store of knowledge to debate over.

So, these folks ask, why is debate increasing in the United States?

That’s where the flabbergasting comes in. In the US, the debate is
over whether evolution occurred at ALL, and there are a good 30% of the
population who not only completely reject the idea of evolution, but
stridently demand that evolution be taught on an equal footing with
amazing fairy tales about great world wide floods and an account of
creation that not only contradicts all scientific knowledge, but even
itself (the bible has two contradictory accounts of creation). There is
a large chunk of the population that believes the earth stopped rotating
for 36 hours during the battle of Jericho, or that representatives of
every species on earth were crammed into a boat sixty feet long, and
(for the sake of creation science) that dinosaurs and humans once
cohabited the planet.

No, really. About 30% of Americans run around believing stuff like
this. They’re serious. Some of them want to change what’s taught in
schools to mesh with these notions.

The best selling books on the fiction lists over the past 7 years or so
are the “Left Behind” series, which purport to be a “fictionalized but
realistic” account of the Rapture, the End of Days, when all good
Christians go to heaven and the rest of us have to stay put and deal
with the IRS, TV commercials, Britney Spears and all the rest of Satan’s
imps. It’s all based on the book of Revelation, the final book of the
bible written by St. John the Seriously Stoned, who acts as a reminder
that magic mushrooms grow on the Greek island of Patmos.

The problem is that Revelation, like most such mystical babble, says
pretty much whatever you want to interpret it to say. And for 1500
years or so, nobody interpreted it in any way similar to the “Left
Behind” series. But then, according to a book just out by Lutheran
Minister Barbara R. Rossing (The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in
the Book of Revelation, Westview), a girl in Scotland in 1830 had a
series of “visions” (barely pubescent girls and religious mania
sometimes combine like that, usually with unfortunate results) and a
preacher named Darby elaborated on them, inventing different epochs with
different rules to mask over the general incoherence of the girl’s
vision. Rossing concludes, “The Rapture is a racket.”

Biblical prophecy is utter drivel. As Parke Godwin once put it,
“Christians have been waiting 2,000 years for the other shoe to drop”
and in the meantime have been busy inventing endless rationales as to
why it hasn’t happened yet, despite all the “wars and rumors of wars”
and countless other “signs” that are a normal part of the human
condition, and of course, simultaneously explaining why it’s going to go
ahead and happen any day now.

The one point all the thousands of such prognostications had in common
is that none of them were worth anything. In fact, the bible itself
debunks all efforts of prognostication in advance, not only saying “no
man may know the hour or the day,” but even Christianity’s central
figure, Jesus, made it clear that he expected the Big Wrap-Up to occur
in the lifetimes of his audience, so no later than 100 AD. I don’t
guess that happened.

Usually the doomsday prophecies are reasonably harmless. A small group
of people hole up somewhere for the rapture, and when it doesn’t happen,
they just figure their leader made a mistake in the arithmetic, and most
go right on believing. Sometimes the leader convinces his followers
that the way to not get left behind is by signing everything they own
over to the leader, and come the day of reckoning, the group finds that
they got left behind in a different sort of way. Unusual events can
trigger it in individuals: a few years ago, we had an unusual display of
northern lights, and one woman went howling out into the street,
convinced the End was Nigh. Fortunately, friends and relatives
corralled her before she could hurt herself and she got over it.

Sometimes you get suicide cults, such as at Jonestown, or Waco, or the
flying saucer people in San Diego. These tend to clump around “odometer
moments” where the year or an anniversary of some other event tends to
have two or three zeros at the end, and the millennia years tend to
bring about many predictions of doom, doom! I say. The most famous one
in the last millennium showed that such nuttery isn’t the sole province
of religion, as thousands sold their homes and headed for the hills to
wait out the fall of civilization caused by Y2K.

Sometimes, entire nations succumb to such madness. The Zulu Nation
committed mass suicide charging Enfield rifles with nothing more than
spears on the word of a young girl that a vision had told her the Zulus
would win. They didn’t. The French fought the English based on visions
from a young girl, Joan of Arc, and actually won, driving the English
out of France. Then, showing remarkable wisdom, they burned Joan of Arc
at the stake, since the only thing worse than a prophet of doom is a
prophet of doom who is correct. Look up the story of Cassandra (another
young girl – perhaps we need to start putting masking tape over their
mouths when they turn 10 or so). Religious nuts with a vision can
wreak remarkable damage, as in the case of Innocent III, Rasputin, or
Pol Pot (communism became a secular religion). Some, such as Cromwell,
even had good intentions in the beginning, and became exasperated when
people remained blind to God’s will. Unfortunately, that particular
type of exasperation comes readily to theocracies, and usually means
lots of dead people strewn about the countryside. It did then, it does
now. And of course, claiming religious vision is a province of nearly
every dictator in history. Hitler furnishes us with any number of
quotes about how he was performing God’s will.

The Rapture gained traction in America in 1970 (per Rossing) when Hal
Linsey wrote “The Late, Great Planet Earth”. She wryly notes that
Lindsey has had to revise his prophecies in subsequent editions as both
the Soviets and the Red Chinese became less credible antichrists. Now
it’s Islam that is the antichrist. Maybe next week it will be the New
York Yankees, who would have had my vote all along.

None of which would have meant much more than society having another
crackpot special interest group for unscrupulous politicians to pander
to and manipulate in the normal course of events. But this is America,
where large percentages of the population believe in UFOs, that Elvis
lives, and that Saddam was involved in 9/11. Having a large population
of ignorant and gullible is a drawback to begin with, but we are in a
culture inculcated to believe ignorance is just part of being a good
neighbor, and gullibility is a sign that you have an open mind.

Having an administration that is willing to exploit the Rapture crowd
as a source of cheap votes is just one of those things you expect in a
Democracy. Reagan used them to his advantage, and then spent the next
eight years promising them everything they wanted while making sure the
country wasn’t ruined by them actually collecting on the promise.

What we have now is something worse. Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney
believe in the Rapture – they even had some crackpot come in and lecture
astounded Pentagon chiefs on Bible codes – the notion that the placement
of words in the Bible signified strategy for the military to follow in
the 21st century. Condi Rice believes in the Rapture, and, along with
Karl Rove, has worked strenuously to convince Putsch that only an Israel
that controlled all of its supposed ancestral lands – much of the middle
east, including Baghdad – was what would be needed to take Condi up to
heaven.

And Putsch himself?

Yes, he believes in the Rapture nonsense. The rest of the crackpots in
the administration couldn’t be doing what they’re doing if he didn’t.

American foreign policy is in the hands of people who are seeking the
end of the world in order to hurry their personal salvation.

Which leaves the question: in a potential second term, would Putsch
encourage a nuclear war in order to kind of hurry his ascension along?
--
"Secular schools can never be tolerated because such a school has no religious instruction and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently,all character training and religion must be derived from faith.... We need believing people."
--Adolf Hitler, April 26, 1933,

Not dead, in jail, or a slave? Thank a liberal!
Pay your taxes so the rich don't have to.

http://www.zeppscommentaries.com

[Darth Buddha]

I figured that Third EYe's post on the "Kerry's Got To Go" thread sort of lowered the bar. Interesting arguments, nonetheless.

[grinner]

Sorry but that article is dogma against religion. Evolution has become a religion in its own right... and this article is witness to that.

[Darth Buddha]

[heavy sarcasm]Of course, everything that says anything about religion is dogma.... [/end sarcasm]

And what is religion? Dogma.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?r=67&q=dogma

dog·ma ( P ) Pronunciation Key (dôgm, dg-)
n. pl. dog·mas or dog·ma·ta (-m-t)
A doctrine or a corpus of doctrines relating to matters such as morality and faith, set forth in an authoritative manner by a church.
An authoritative principle, belief, or statement of ideas or opinion, especially one considered to be absolutely true. See Synonyms at doctrine.
A principle or belief or a group of them: “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present” (Abraham Lincoln).

You would be the dogmatic one here, old boy.

Evolution is a scientific theory. You don't mind scientific theory when it leads to a cure of a given disease, when it warms your house, corrects your vision, or the like. But dare it address your dogma, look out!

Bottom line is here, teaching creationism in science class is pure religious proselytizing in public schools. Gotta love those Christians, when they can't burn the truth, the truthpurveyors, or anyone who has learned facts they don't like... they hold an election and ram their creed down govermental channels!

So has it been, so is it now, and I'd wager so it will ever be. Those desert religions are a lot of trouble!

Convenient argument for you, though. Avoids all the nastiness done in the name of your faith. Hmmmm... similar dismissive arguments from: Pat Bakker and other fallen tele-vangelists?

[SabaceanBabe]

I just want to point out that my Left Behind :eek: fanfic series is in no way affiliated with the Rapture or rapturous stories. Although, Rohvu-John and Rohvu-Chiana may, someday, engage in rapturous activity.... :innocent:

[Darth Buddha]

Yep, your fanfic is EXCELLENT, SabaceanBabe!

[mfa96]

"She wryly notes that Lindsey has had to revise his prophecies in subsequent editions as both the Soviets and the Red Chinese became less credible antichrists. Now it’s Islam that is the antichrist. Maybe next week it will be the New York Yankees, who would have had my vote all along."


Hmmm....what does that make the Florida Marlins- since they defeated the antichrist in 6 games last Fall- I guess the seventh game they rested :D

[grinner]

Well, doing a search on this fellow... Bryan Zepp Jamieson... I've noticed that he is Anti-Bush, Anti-Religion, Anti-Republican, pretty much an Anti-Conservative. Since he is so one sided... While his opinion is his own... you should find something a little less vitriolic. ThirdEYe's piece came from the left and was against Kerry... so your post doesn't follow the same line. if you find something from the Right against Religion, then it would be a similar argument.

[Darth Buddha]

grinner, I rather liked some of this guys arguments. I see stuff here inspired by Rush "the Hatemonger" Limbaugh (like his focus on an extreme anti-war minority who transferred their hate to Tillman), so this is fair game as far as I am concerned.

Does he paint an overly apocalypitic (pun intended) read of these cultist types? Probably. But since nobody else is willling to stand up to the fundamentalists, because anyone who does can kiss a political career or even a major editorial page position goodbye, who else are you left with?

We're dealing with a vocal minority (a la some fundamentalists elsewhere) who've managed to leverage their minority into a majority in some places (but not the last presidential election) and are pushing public funding for the proselytizing efforts, are engaging foreign affairs from a suspiciously religious war like context (right down to W. calling it a "crusade", a Sr. Air Force General saying that His God was greater than their God, and the rest I can't go into due to the ban), and are trying to hijack public education to teach their dogma as science fact rather than dogmatic creed.

I'm not sure somebody who calls American Fundamentalist on the carpet can really be considered an extremist from that viewpont.

[stellar]

Can you imagine how nervous people must have been before Christ? What did they think they were counting down to?

Peter was certain that the apocalypse was coming when he ministered the gospel 2,000 years ago. Historically all generations of all civilizations have assumed that their's would be the one that would witness an apocalyptic end. Many believe that the real reason the US is so pro-Israel is because the Christian leaders want them there to herald the Rapture. I'm not so sure I believe that to a great degree, but there are some wackos out there.

Maybe the reason that people want the world to end is because they're not satisfied with it.

[Darth Buddha]

Perhaps it makes them more at ease with their own mortality, the mortality of their culture, and the mortality of their species.

Thinking that one's race, culture, and species are tied up with the end of the world is rather megalomanic, don't you think?

[Third EYe]

I am not a fan of Lindsey's, never really have been. End Times isn't my thing, however I have a few dozen books on the subject and trust me, Lindsey never claims to be a prophet, and absolutely he has had to change his views. He and some others have said from the start of thier writing careers, they dont' have all the answers.

There is no way for you to verify this, and it's purely informational only, since 1992 it has been my opinion that if the anti christ that the bible speaks about were to appear he would be from the Islamic religion. Not necessarily a fundy or fanatic, perhaps a secular Muslim or the like, but definately from that school.

The bible says that no man will know the day and the hour.

There are many diferent views on how the end will end or start or change or switch. Some even believe that it has already happened, yep. The dubs beleive that the prophecies in Matthew have already come to pass.

You can pick away at it all you like. I'm more than willing to answer any and all of your questions, even though I'm no expert. I've just read a lot and have many books on the subjects. I'm not concerned with what most extremists have to say, like the individual who wrote the article, he is no diferent than Jim Jones.

It's like this, when predicting the future, if you don't ask the right questions, you're gonna get the wrong answer.

As far as megalomaniacs are concerned, maybe Nietze is a good start.

[AgentSun]

this article is purely anti-religion and it's mocking the people who have a devotion to a god, whether its the christian one, allah, vishnu, whoever. it's mocking people for believing in anything but science, for thinking that there might be a higher power. i am religious, and i don't appreciate his views.

Religious nuts with a vision can
wreak remarkable damage, as in the case of Innocent III, Rasputin, or
Pol Pot (communism became a secular religion).

rasputin was a mentally deranged and manipulative con man who knew what he was doing. he was trying to manipulate the queen to obtain power and he knew she was a religious woman or at least a woman who was desperate enough to try anything to heal her son. yes there were even doctors who felt that he did have some extraordinary power to heal, but that is undocumented. he was part of a cult that believed the way to heaven was to sin as much as one could, therefore rasputin did so. to lump him in with people who actually do believe and label them as "religious nuts" is generalization. many of the people mentioned (jonestown, zulu tribes, etc.) have leaders who were either a) hungry for power and found gullible people to sell their shtick to, and b) were more vulnerable to things they could not explain. you can't expect a tribe in remote new guinea to understand DNA and atoms and nuclear fission, without attributing some to their mystical roots. the south americans and the mexican tribes all had their gods and their mystical explanations for things that happened. were they religious nuts? no. are we religious nuts? not really.

some people refuse to believe that a religious person can also be logical.

edit:

It’s all based on the book of Revelation, the final book of the
bible written by St. John the Seriously Stoned, who acts as a reminder
that magic mushrooms grow on the Greek island of Patmos.

Jesus, made it clear that he expected the Big Wrap-Up to occur
in the lifetimes of his audience, so no later than 100 AD. I don’t
guess that happened.

can someone get me a bible verse here?

wow, how about some ad hominem here. where is this guy getting any of this? where is the proof? if he wants to debunk the bible, why can't he provide some evidence and reinforce his point even more by putting it in the article?

and that quote from hitler...hitler was a madman. are we relating the two? i hope not, because hitler also believed in killing all jews even though he was related.

and another edit: this is all in fun, i'm pretty laid back about all this. sowwy if i came off mad or anything.

[Darth Buddha]

Mentally deranged and manipulative con man, eh?

I guess all the messiahs who didn't pan out fit the same model?

There were several folks who proclaimed they were the messiah, btw, it had nothing to do with divinity, but did have to do with claiming the Throne of David.

[AnnieBW]

Actually, I've heard credible sources say that the events described in Revelations accurately describe the Roman crackdown on the Zionist movement in 72 AD. But, since I'm an evil heathen unbeliever, I'm gonna be stuck on this planet that the Christians have done their best to trash.

Although, I do have to agree with one point in the article. The Yankees ARE the anti-Christ! :D They don't call them the "Evil Empire" and "George Satan-brenner" for nothing! :D

[Frellster]

Mentally deranged and manipulative con man, eh?

I guess all the messiahs who didn't pan out fit the same model?

There were several folks who proclaimed they were the messiah, btw, it had nothing to do with divinity, but did have to do with claiming the Throne of David.

Obviously, since God is the Father and we are all Gods' children, claiming to be God's only son would have only confused the people at that time. Also, the whole point of Judaism is that its completly montheistic. Claiming to be God, part-god, or devine would get you stoned (and not in a good way) because there's only one God. However, The coming of the Messiah is suppost to herald an end to all conflict on earth. No more wars; and that's kind of hard to fake, even if you can prove a direct ansestry from King David (not that people didn't try).

As for Revelations; never made any sense to me, but in America we can believe or not in any God/dess or philosphy we choose. The State is there to insure that freedom, not to preach dogma. Ideally, anyway.

[scrape_medic]

For starters, why does the antichrist have to come from a muslim background? I am niether muslim or christian, and even I take offence to that.

And as for "religious nuts"....the only thing anyone remembers about them are the prophecies that never came true....not a thing about thier lives that brought them to the point of making these phrophecies.

For instance, Nostradamus, a guy I have particular admiration for, was in fact a great physician, a scientist and had a great deal of compassion for humanity. He fought with his superiors, men of the cloth, to be allowed to treat plague victims with antiseptic drugs, but was forbidden to do so, instead only permitted to pray for their recovery.

Guess what they died, so did his wife and child....enough to turn anyone insane, at which point he started making his proclaimations. Whether he seriously thought of them as prophecies, which I doubt it, he was no where near sane enough to make that clear.

I am sure that if you looked into the background of many of the other so called phropets, you would be able to find similar disturbinbg events in their lives. I am surprised that 9/11 has not generated a whole heap more! It has certainly generated a large amount of religious "fundamentalist" dicussion on both sides.

Words like infidels and antichrist only serve to seperate humanity, but we don't mind do we. We like banners to march by, groups with which we can associate ourselves and enemies to fight. Great, thousands of years of "evolution" and we still can't agree on anything. Evolutionary theory may not be perfect, there are still loads we don't know about, but that does not mean it is "wrong", incomplete maybe. Similarly thoeries like the "big bang". If you want to belive in creation, go right ahead, it too is similarly flawed, but thats fine becuase you don't have to prove it, just have faith and believe without question.

Who is right? No one is, get over yourselves.....but don't feel like it is your duty to force your doctrine onto everybody else. Teach knowledge and allow people to make up their own minds, if your argument is good you should have no problem convincing people.

This european sees America as a religious state, despite your protestations against the idea, and if theleader of the largest force in the world is being influence by people who believe in "codes" and "prophecies", I can only say one thing...."God help us all."

[LadyCrais]

I was rather hoping this article would be something more than a diatribe with a few supported facts in it. I'm not going to get into the religious dogma vs evolution end. Unless someone knows that the vast majority of evidence in support of the theory of evolution has little or nothing to do with the fossil record, it's a pointless debate.

What I would like to know is if the throwaway lines about the belief of the current administration and the basis of military decisions having really gone the way of the Bible Code has a basis in fact? Have there been some seriously investigated and reported stories about this?

[Third EYe]

To my knowledge, and it's not infinite, the pentagon has never officially consulted the Bible Code program. This doesn't mean that some well connected official or even underling doesn't have access to the program and is using it for whatever end.

DARPA is most surely toying with it. I really don't know if the Bible Code is real or not. I'd be more willing to beleive it over Nostradamus. A problem is issued with the Code, and that is you have to know what to look for, it doesn't just pop up with dates for you. Most of the "evidence" that details the results of the Bible Code's acheivements are of course from events that happened yesterday. There is some talk that the Code is able to foretell, but this would require the secret of the Code, and it seems that nobody has a clue as to what this could be.

I am reasonably certain that the Bible Code is not being used to form military stategies.

[Third EYe]

For starters, why does the antichrist have to come from a muslim background? I am niether muslim or christian, and even I take offence to that.





Why do you take offence? What's it to you? Seriously, how do you profit from the antichrist being anything in particular at all? I don't think anyone has said that the antichrist must be muslim, and when I say anyone, I mean anyone I have read or know. You may know other people who have stronger opinions.

There are logical arguments for the antichrist being the Pope, whomever that happens to be at the time, or a christian of any of the denoms, or even jewish. Should I be offended if someone believes the antichrist is going to be a christian?

The antichrist could be an atheist, highly unlikely since the antichrist will be certain fo the existance of God.

I'm really having trouble understanding what could possibly be offensive to you.

If it has something to do with muslims are nice people, then forget it, I don't want to hear it, cause that's irrelevant, and my mind works faster than that.

[scrape_medic]

There is no way for you to verify this, and it's purely informational only, since 1992 it has been my opinion that if the anti christ that the bible speaks about were to appear he would be from the Islamic religion. Not necessarily a fundy or fanatic, perhaps a secular Muslim or the like, but definately from that school.


What are you saying here exactly? To me it looks like you are saying that the antichrist will be muslim.

please explain this statement, with your fast mind.

[Third EYe]

What are you saying here exactly? To me it looks like you are saying that the antichrist will be muslim.

please explain this statement, with your fast mind.



I answered this already in anticipation of you asking it. So, it would now be appropriate for you to answer my quesion, unless of course your answer is the nice people one, then I understand.

It's tough when someone answers a question with a question.

[scrape_medic]

I find it offensive when someone projects thier beliefs onto other religions and makes what looks like an inflamatory statement based on that. But I still don't think you have answered my question.....so please go ahead.

[Third EYe]

I said nothing inflamatory, nore do I base my opinion on the Islamic religion directly. I thought about all the religions that beleive in one way or another that the world will end, God will end it, and that there will be a Messiah involved. With the limited information I am able to retain regarding all of those religions. I then tried to put myself outside my system of beleif concerning the "end times".

If I were one of those people who were left behind after the rapture, what would I think about it. Aliens? Government coverup? Bible in action? I assume that any and all those three senarios will seem real to some, however the way I see things, I couldn't buy it. I went with the word "infidels". I decided if I were to be left behind and I was not a beleiver, then my only way to deal with the event of millions dissapearing suddenly without a trace would be that "god" got rid of the infidels.

The infidels would be those who thought themselves better than the rest of the world. I can see the world authorities using this explanation. That those who vanished were evil and did not love the earth and fellow man like everyone else does.

I can't possibly explain how I came to my descision in this thread, but I can give you an idea, a very basic one.

Now, if only christians were taken, and they are the infidels, who would be left behind that prior to the rapture thought they were going, or even denied the rapture was valid but knew Christ was returning, or didn't even beleive in the Bibles version of the end? Well, from my perspective all the religious leaders, like the Pope and such. The antichrist can't be just anyone, he would have to be someone of influence and knowledge. He may already have power, but not necessarily. Remember, this is my opinion, it is not doctrine or biblical teachings, just my opinion. Some of the religions that would have the majority of thier membership left behind and all their leadership left would be the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Mormons, Jainism, the Muslims, The Catholics, Jews, and a slew of 'christian' denoms . There are way too many list, but this gives an idea.

Now if I'm a Christian, so I say, and of the religions I claim would be left behind many are known and claim to be Christian, what's going on? Well it's simple, the Bible mentions this, it says roughly that not all that claim to know Me (Christ) will inherit the Kingdom. Now, those who have claimed to be Christian and are left behind, won't be trusted. If the Christians are gone and percieved to be the evil doers and this is the reason they have been banished, then why are there still some here? They, the left behind "christians" will claim they are the "true" christians and that they love the same god as everyone else. They will be given some sort of probation to prove themselves.

That explains the 'christian' religions, now what about non-christian religions. I can safely say that those like Jainism and rosicrucian don't have enough members to make an impact on the world, they will go unoticed. The Jews can't be it because they will sign a peace treaty with the antichrist which he will later void.

I'm not keen on any of the Buddhist sects or Hindu religions just because of thier very nature.

This leaves Muslims, nobody at that time will have any gripe with Muslims, they will seem persecuted, and look they already do. Also, if a Muslim signs a peace treatey with Isreal, and it sticks, holy crap.

I know there are thousands of religions and I barely touched any of them, but trust me, I'd never finish typing if I tried to go thru point by point.

You have to understand, on your own, what the bible says about the end times. Just the basics. The more dificult parts lke when the rapture occurs, well, who knows. But knowing a bit about it helps understand where I am comming from.

By they way, if you like, cause you have been doubly offended, place me in one of the religions that I say stays behind. My result will be the same.

A Muslim leader, who promotes peace, demands respect from other Muslims does not tolerate insurgences and terrorist activity and punishes them himself would be heralded, because up til today, no such man exists. He would not only demand respect, he'd deserve it.

What you call inflamatory, I call hypersensitive. What if I had said the antichrist would be the Pope? Or would be a buddhist?

I really don't need a reason, not in this instance, because I'm stating anything as fact, I'm stating an opinion that I have personally come up with. I didn't borrow it from someone I have decided to emulate and parrot. There are some who beleive as I do, however they came to thier conclusions diferently. They link it will be a muslim because of Isaac and Ishmael. I can follow thier logic, but I didn't come to my opinion that way, I hadn't even considered it.

Anyway, you know there are some people on this message board beating the crap out of christians on a daily basis. I've not once seen you stand up to them for doing so, and I mean outright degrading and verbally abusing them/us. It seems to me to be perfectly acceptable here to do so. Is there a points system?

I wonder why this is? I find it a bit concerning.

[scrape_medic]

I don't think that there is point system. However the christians on the board are quite vocal themselves, nothing wrong in that, and should expect to have their arguments challenged. Bashed no, but challenged yes.

The muslim/bhuddist/hindo/seik/taoist/pagan/you name it voice is definately in a minority here at FMD.

And there has been a lot of anti muslim rhetoric as well.

If you had said the antichrist would be a pope, then no, I would not be so offended; you would be keeping it within the christian religion where it belongs; it is after all a christian belief. You could argue amongst yourselves then, nothing to do with the rest of us.

I like your argument, but not believing in any of the bible except that it may have some historical basis, rather than divine basis, I find it quite interesting, but no more than that.

And I thank you for explaining it.

As an outsider form any theistic beliefs, I find the whole idea of divine intervention a little puzzling and see it quite frankly as a waste of good human thought, and I restate that most of the process seems to result in dividing humanity rather than uniting it. Banners and flags again.

Regardless, the idea that anyone in such position of power is being influenced by one religious doctrine, or another, is still a worrying concept. Islamic fundamentalist states are a good example of that, but america is SUPPOSED to be secular and the thought of a backdoor religious state is more concerning. Deception, on this scale can only lead to trouble. I hope that it is not true.

And if I thought the christian majority here needed my help, which I don't, I would happily join in and stand up for them, but they are doing a fine job on their own.

[stellar]

The muslim/bhuddist/hindo/seik/taoist/pagan/you name it voice is definately in a minority here at FMD.

Jedi?

[zap]

I watched a program about the "Bible code" on the history channel a while back, and it was interesting. Especially when they had this skeptic on that showed how you can use the bible code formula on any book of comprable length. This fellow used Moby Dick and got equally "startling" discoveries, like 9/11, like Osama, like Hitler, etc.

[stellar]

The "bible code" is just a statistical phenomenon that appears in any work of comparable length. I'm sure that somewhere in the Bible you can extract that the author of the bible code is full of crap.

[Third EYe]

Yeah, this is where I become skeptical.

Just because you can find strings in other books doesn't debunk alone, but if you can find as many, then you may have a problem.

I'm still undecided on whether I trust it or not.

[scrape_medic]

Well I got interested, so I went to look.

The BBC Horizon program did an investigation on it check the links in it here (http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2003/biblecode.shtml)

One of the links is to an artcle in the journal Chance (http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/dilugim/Chance.pdf) which compared the results from the WRR experiment on which the journalist Drosnin based his book. It compaed the chance of similar words appearing in the book Moby Dick and found similar levels of word occurence.

The book "The Bible Code" by Michael Drosnin has been the most successful mass-market book about the Torah Codes. Alas, all semblence of scientific method is missing, and all of the important codes proponents have disowned him. By repeated examples, we prove that Drosnin did not find anything that can't be found in any book, even in English.
source: Scientific Refutation of the Bible Codes by Brendan McKay and Friends (http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/dilugim/torah.html)

I was thinking of trying it out with my copy of the Farscape season four companion....wonder what apocalyptic event that might foretell.

[scrape_medic]

Okay, I am not entirely sure of the rules of the torah code, the letters have to appear in close proximetry, not necessarily in a straight line, but here goes:

Get your copy of the season four companion, the paperback version published by Titan Books.

Turn to page 17 and go to line 11, begining "episode. "we always have..."

................things that get dropped, and we........
.............because it really clears up stuff in the.....
...Kemper explains. "It was made for a certain........
..work as an ordinary flashback.
..............................on location in Maruba, and ..........

that took me about 2 minutes to find. :shrug: Have a go yourself.

Case your are wondering that is the English spelling of Usama (bin Laden)

[NYPinTA]

I watched a program about the "Bible code" on the history channel a while back, and it was interesting. Especially when they had this skeptic on that showed how you can use the bible code formula on any book of comprable length. This fellow used Moby Dick and got equally "startling" discoveries, like 9/11, like Osama, like Hitler, etc.

I saw the same show! It was pretty cool, but just reinforces for me that if you look hard enough for patterns, your gonna find patterns... whether it is the Bible, Moby Dick, or even Lord of the Rings. (Wonder what would be revealed in LOTR??;) )

[Third EYe]

No, not lines, spaces. They are looking mathematical spaces, like every 16 letters in any direction. This means the word could be backwards or fowards. Think about it, if it were by lines, then what happens if you reprint the subject when revisions are made? Diferent size book?

It's not all that simple.

[scrape_medic]

Well I have had a quick look back and there are a few close ones, page eighty three in particular where the spacing is around 41, 42. But it misses it by one on the first to second letter, assuming of course that you count only the letters and not the spaces between or the puctuation.............which makes me think it is even more likely to be bunk.

It was fun trying though, and I am pretty sure that if I wanted to waste any more time on the matter, I would find Osama in there somewhere. I did find "Hitle" on one of the pages, again incomplete, but reading the reviews of the book written by Drosnin, it looks like I am allowed a little latitude in interpretation.


These words appear as plain text in Deuteronomy, chapter 4, verse 42; The Jerusalem Bible translates them to “a man ... who had killed his fellow;” Drosnin translates them as: “an assassin who will assassinate;” the skip in Rabin’s name is of almost 5,000 letters.

Source: The Torah Codes: Puzzle and Solution. Maya Bar-Hillel, Dror Bar-Natan, and Brendan McKay, Vol II, No. 2 (1998) pages 13-19 (http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/dilugim/Chance.pdf)

Regardless, it is still of concern that anyone would be making decisions based on the afternoon dalyings of a journalist, who is obviously in it only to make his quick scaremongering buck.

Count me firmly as a non-believer

ETA : apparently it is not including spaces and punctuation marks