The end of the world
45 failed predictions for 1999
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Disclaimer:
We offer no guarantees that the prophets listed below
actually made these predictions. We have described their alleged predictions as they were
reported on the Web, in newspapers, books, etc. We do not have the resources to track down
original source material.
Overview:
In the past, some Christians and secular individuals predicted several
momentous events that they
believed are related:
 | The second coming of Jesus Christ,
when he returns to earth after almost two millennia. |
| The war of Armageddon -- a massive
battle in Israel. |
| The arrival on earth of the
Antichrist, an evil political, military leader. |
| The Tribulation, a seven year
interval of great suffering and death. |
| The Rapture,
when Christians who have been born again -- both living and dead -- will
rise into the sky towards Jesus. |
| Some horrendous natural disaster. |
| etc. |
These prophecies share one factor
in common with all of the other predictions that were to come to pass in
previous years: In spite of the obvious sincerity of the persons making the
prophecies, none actually materialized.
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Failed predictions:
| About 1999: Orville T. Gordon (a.k.a. Nodrog) leads a Texan group
called "Outer Dimensional Forces." He expected that UFOs would come from
outer space, remove the ODF groups from earth, and destroy the United States with a
great flood. It is not clear where all the water would come from.
|
| Sometime in 1999:
 | A nuclear war will erupt in the Middle East. Those members of The
Order of the Solar Temple, who have survived earlier mass
murders and suicides, believed that they would gather at Jerusalem in a celestial
paradise. They believe that tose members who had previously died have already been
transported some 9 light years to Sirius.
|
| The following isn't exactly a prophecy; it is the theme of the
Super Nintendo Video Game "Chrono Trigger." In this
alternative universe, the world is projected to end in 1999
CE. Either the Anti-christ named Lavos, or the
coming of Lavos from under the earth symbolizes the Anti-christ. He
destroys the earth by sucking the energy from it. The goal of the
game's hero is to save the earth by destroying Lavos in time.
|
| Hon-Ming Chen founded God's Salvation Church in
Texas. The group believed that a nuclear war would have destroyed parts of
Earth in 1999. They have identified a nine-year old boy as the
"Jesus of the East", a reincarnation of Jesus
Christ. They believe that if they can link him up with the "Jesus of the West"
then 100 million lives will be spared. The second Jesus is
supposed to live in Vancouver BC, look like Abraham Lincoln, and
have been born in late 1969. Their search to date has been
unsuccessful.
|
| Edgar Cayce predicted that Armageddon would arrive, the earth's
axis would shift, and both England and Japan would sink in to the
ocean. New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco will be destroyed
by earthquakes and floods. The island of Atlantis will rise from
the ocean floor. However, this last event may not happen until
2001 or 2002.
|
| Sukyo Mahikari is a secretive Japanese group which predicted
that "mankind
might be annihilated by the baptism of fire" as the year 2000
approaches.
|
| Spokesperson for Nelly Hurtado, a visionary from El Salvador,
claimed that the virgin Mary appeared and warned that a comet will
appear in the sky in 1999 as a sign of the end. Also, World War
III will break out and the Great Miracle predicted at Garabandal
will happen.
|
| Father Alexander McKenna claims that the Virgin Mary spoke to
him in the Chapel of the Apparitions where she had first appeared
to the children of Fatima in Portugal. Her message was that unless
people abandon Atheism, sin, war
and hatred, that most of the world's population will be destroyed
before the end of 1999 in a nuclear and environmental disaster.
Satan "will infiltrate into the highest
levels of the [Roman Catholic] church including the Throne of Peter."
1
The war will be intense: rivers will turn to steam;
cities will be leveled; the whole world will be burned with fire.
|
| 1999: A movie released in 1999-NOV pointed out that if you take the
number 1999 and invert it, you get 666 plus a spare digit 1. "666"
is the number associated with the Antichrist in the Biblical book of
Revelation.
|
|
| In late 1999 or subsequent years:
| 1999-SEP to 2000-SEP: A 16th century Kabbalistic text
says that in the Jewish year 5760: "the depths will rise up and
flood the world, and there will remain the Land of Israel, which
will be like the Ark of Noah."
10
|
| 1999-OCT-10 to 2003-APR-22: "The prophet"
is hedging his bets. He predicts that somewhere in this interval of
time, the rapture will occur.
|
|
| More precise estimates:
| 1999-JAN: According to the 1997-JUN-24 issue of Sun Magazine Pope John
XXIII predicted in 1962 that visitors from outer space will arrive in chariots of flaming
steel and will share their advanced knowledge with humanity. Our life span will be
increased to 150 years or longer. Most diseases will be wiped out.
|
| 1999-JAN/FEB: Between JAN-20 and FEB-4, an asteroid measuring 20 miles
in diameter and traveling about 20,000 miles/hour was predicted to hit earth. At that speed
and probable mass, it would totally disrupt all life processes on earth. Dr. Morris Plammer said that a photo
of the asteroid was leaked to him by "highly placed friends"
within NASA. The photo allegedly contains markings in the shape of a Satanic face.
|
| 1999-FEB-23: In 1997-NOV, evangelist Dan Bohler predicted that the
Clinton Administration would fail on or about this date. He predicted that there
would be tanks driving up and down the main streets in every American city, and that there
would be bombs going off in Washington DC. Although not quite as disastrous an event that
other predictions, it still would be quite distressing to the people
involved.
|
| 1999-MAR: The Students of the Seven Seals (Branch Davidians) teach that disaster will strike the earth in the
form of warfare, earthquakes, blacked skies and other horrors. They believed
that on AUG-6, their late leader David Koresh will
return to earth. He will raise the dead, judge humans, and start over in Jerusalem. None
of this happened.
|
| 1999-MAR: Roman Catholic visionary called by the pen name Robert
Hartman predicted that "the Miracle" would happen before the year 2000, in a
month that contains two full moons. The last opportunity for this to happen was 1999-MAR,
when a full moon occurred on the 2nd and 31st. By including the
prophecies of other visionaries, 1999-MAR-11 appeared to be a prime date for the Miracle.
|
| 1999-APR-3: Ed. Dames, president of PsyTech predicted that solar flares
would strike the earth during the Easter weekend (APR-3 and 4 in the West). Persons who
were living in caves or under the earth might survive. The rest of the world's population
would all die. He predicted that space aliens would arrive about 2012 to rescue the few
survivors. Ed., his family and employees spent the weekend hiding out inside a lava
tube in Hawaii. Solar activity was high in early 1999; it varies routinely over an 11 year cycle.
|
| 1999-APR: On 1999-MAR-18, J. Adams, Webmaster of the "Spirit
of Truth" web page made a prediction: When the Dow Jones Industrial Average
reaches the magic 10,000 point, a surprise world war will be automatically triggered, followed by the
utter destruction of America and the Western powers. The index reached that
value; there has been no indication of destruction on this order.
|
| 1999-APR/MAY: Various Roman Catholic apocalypticists during the 1990's
have predicted a great Miracle, final judgment and the dawning of the Marian Reign of
Peace, starting on APR-8, APR-15 or MAY-13.
|
| 1999-MAY-8: An Evangelical Christian from New Brunswick, Canada, Terry
Peterson, had a vision in 1989. It involved terrible destruction caused by a
continent-wide earthquake. The epicenter will be in California, as the entire state
plunges "into the ocean as God's punishment for the 'immoral' state's sins."
He also reports massive devastation on the east coast of North America. Unfortunately, God
only revealed to him a partial date: MAY 8, 199?. The year 1999 is obviously
the last possible year. He believes that the earthquake will
occur between 11 PM on MAY 7 and one hour before dawn on MAY-8, Eastern time.
|
| 1999-MAY-21/22: Evangelist Marilyn Agee predicted that the
rapture will happen on this day, Pentecost. Earlier, she
had predicted
that it would happen on the Pentecost of 1998. The rapture, she believed, would trigger
the various events listed in the book of Revelation, including the war of Armageddon.
|
| 1999-MAY-23: M.J. Agee writes in the
Bible Prophecy Corner that because Noah had a 7
day warning that the flood was going to begin, perhaps we today will receive a 7 months
warning of the rapture. He notes that the Wye Memorandum peace agreement was signed on
1998-OCT-23 by representatives of Israel and Palestine. This is 7 months prior to
Pentecost on 1999-MAY-23 as celebrated by the Orthodox churches.
|
| 1999-MAY: Bryan Elder, an Arkansas hydraulics specialist, was quoted in
Time magazine (1999-JAN-18) as predicting that an alignment of the planets will burn up
the earth during this month.
|
| 1999-JUL-3: Some British "Nostradamologists"
predicted a world catastrophic event during the evening of JUL-3. Two TV
channels in the UK followed the "events" as they unfold. The 1st
channel of Italian TV started a special at 11:15 PM. According to CESNUR,
the program on RAI1 was to be "devoted both to Nostradamus and to the
real risks of violence caused by millenarian movements such as Heaven's Gate
or the Order of the Solar Temple." (CESNUR is an Italian group
which studies new religious movements and the anti-cult
movement.) At 2 PM ET on JUL-3, a poll of readers of the Electronic
Telegraph (an online newspaper from the UK) indicated that 18% believed
that the apocalypse is coming later that day; 24% said it will come "soon,"
and 58% said "never."
|
| 1999-JUL-4: The site "Nostradamus: Prophecies of our century"
had a prediction based on the writings of Nostradamus. World War III
will begin on this date when Russia and Iran launch a nuclear and
chemical assault on western and southern Europe. 2
|
| 1999-JUL-7 at 7:00 GMT: Eileen Lakes predicted that the
planets of the solar system would be arranged in a "Grand Cross"
configuration at that time. Inter-planetary magnetism would then cause the
earth's poles to suddenly shift by exactly 90 degrees. She believes that
this event happens regularly every 12,000 years. "Large earthquakes, tidal
waves, volcano explosions, a downpour, a large flood, etc. will occur all
over the world." The shifting of the earth's magnetic field would
cause many people to become temporarily insane. A new Arctic area would cover
Brazil, Liberia, Ghana, etc. Presumably the mid-Atlantic ocean would freeze.
Similarly, a new Antarctic area would form around the Hawaiian Islands.
3
|
| 1999-JUL: Nostradamus predicted that a great king of terror will come
from the skies. This has been interpreted by some as referring to a nuclear missile
strike: "The year 1999, seven months, From the sky will come a great King of Terror: To
bring back to life the great King of the Mongols, Before and after Mars to reign by good
luck.”
A poll at the time in Japan showed that 20% of the adult population believe in
the King of Terror prediction.
|
| 1999-JUL: God's Salvation Church in Taiwan taught that Jesus
will come to earth in a spaceship during the middle of a nuclear war. Members of the
church will climb aboard the spaceship at Lake Street Beach in Miller, IN and be saved.
They predicted that the rest of us would have a less joyful experience.
|
| 1999-JUL-26: Author Akio Cho of Japan predicted on the basis of
the writing of Nostradamus that the world will end at 5 PM (presumably Tokyo
time). That will be Monday morning, JUL-26 at 4 AM Eastern Time. On this
date, the distance between the earth and the planet Neptune will be at a
minimum.
|
| 1999-AUG-6: According to the latest interpretation of Biblical prophecy by some
followers of the Branch Davidian sect, 5 months of major
torment will begin as the sixth seal is fulfilled in the book of Revelation. They believed that David Koresh
would
return on this day with 200 million horsemen and slaughter most humans on earth. Ken
Newport, an academic who studies the group believed that, prior to this date, the group
would manipulate events in order to trigger a disaster similar to the Waco inferno. He
believed that their goal is for about 40 of their members to be dead in preparation for Koresh's return.
4 Fortunately, he was wrong.
|
| 1999-AUG-11: According to the 1997-MAY-27 issue of Sun Magazine, the
Anti-Christ is alive today and living in the Middle East. On AUG-11, the time of an
eclipse of the sun, they predicted that he would make himself known to the world.
"It will be the
ultimate war." Many were expected to perish; their souls would travel to
Heaven or Hell,
depending upon which side that they supported during the conflict. Prophet
Matthew Dumbrell of Britain expected the world to end at 12:50 PM on that
day.
|
| 1999-AUG-11 etc.: The WWW site
CALENdeRsign®
listed a number of astronomical events that will happen as the millennium closes. There has
always been an association between such alignments and momentous events in the mind of the
public. Starting in late 1999, the following will be observed:
 | 1999-AUG-11: total solar eclipse about noon; visible from Europe, the Far East and
India. |
| 2000-JAN-21: total lunar eclipse; visible in Europe and US |
| 2000-APR: Triple planetary conjunction involving Mars, Jupiter & Saturn |
| 2000-MAY: "Great Conjunction" of Jupiter and Saturn. This also occurred in 7
BCE and is thought by some to be the "star" that some of the Gospels mentioned as leading
the three wise men to Jesus.
|
|
| 1999-AUG-11 to 18: Thomas Chase predicted
that something "big could hit" between these two dates
and cause 5 years of chaos on earth. This could have taken the form of a
nuclear conflict or even an asteroid hitting earth. 5
|
| 1999-AUG-18: Jeron Criswell, TV psychic and
narrator of the cult classic movie "Plan 9 from outer space" (and
other films) predicted in his book "From Now to the Year 2000"
that the world would cease to exist on 1999-AUG-18. He wrote: "A
study of all the prophets-- Nostradamus, St. Odile, Mother Shipton, The
Bible-- Indicates that we will cease to exist before the year 2000! And
if you and I meet each other on the street that fateful day, August 18,
1999, and we chat about what we will do on the morrow, we will open our
mouths to speak and no words will come out, for we have no future... you
and I will suddenly run out of time! Who knows but what future
generation from some other planet will dig down through seven layers of
rubble and find us some 2,000 years hence, and crowd around a museum
glass containing a fragment of a Coke bottle, a bent hairpin and a
parched copy of our Bible which managed to escape destruction! They will
wonder what on earth was meant by the words 'Ford' or 'Hollywood'... and
what in heaven's name was a Criswell." The world
actually did end as far as Criswell is concerned. He died on 1982-OCT-4.
But some of his other predictions -- "the destruction of Denver,
shifting polar caps, Castro's assassination" -- have not.
11
|
| 1999-AUG-24: Valerie James wrote in The European
Magazine in 1996 that "The configuration of planets which
predicted the coming of Christ will once again appear on Aug 24, 1999."
We assume that she predicted that Jesus' second coming would happen shortly
after that date.
|
| 1997-1999-SEP Russian scientist Vladimir Sobolyovhas of the
Rerikh Academy had analyzed prophesies made by Russian saints, by Nostradamus,
and others.
6 He announced his conclusions in 1997-SEP: that the earth's axis will
suddenly tilt about 30 degrees sometime during the next two years. This
would have submerged the
Scandinavian countries and Britain under water, in what was termed the Armageddon Flood.
Siberia would have been spared. He expected that aliens will intervene and lead the world into the
fourth dimension. Right now, he believes that these aliens are on earth, but in hiding. Sobolyovhas said:
"If
we completely believed in them, we would get lazy. So they are clever. They stay hidden in
the fourth dimension and only show themselves from time to time.''
|
| 1999-SEP: Stefan Paulus author of "Nostradamus 1999,"
(Llewellyn, 1999) announced that he has decoded the final prophecies of
Nostradamus. He believed that in 1999-SEP, a meteor was to hit earth, causing immense tidal waves, earthquakes,
hurricanes, clouds of dust and sea salt, bad weather, political unrest, and famine. The
Anti-Christ, an Islamic dictator, was to declare war on Western countries. In 2002 CE, World
War III will begin. By the year 2030, only one third of the world's population will remain
alive.
|
| 1999-SEP: Shoko Asahara, leader of the
Aum
Shinri Kyo destructive cult, predicted that Armageddon will happen during this month.
|
| 1999-SEP-9: This is a date represented by 9/9/99. "9999" has
been used in some computer programs to terminate programs. Thomas Chase
5 predicted that this version of the
Y2K bug
would cause a
worldwide electrical failure. This would cause worldwide disaster and chaos. This, and a
more serious manifestation of the Y2K bug at year end will trigger a world economic
depression, and bring on the Antichrist.
|
| 1999-SEP-11: Philip Berg of the Kabbalah Learning Center has
predicted that a great ball of fire will hit earth on this day. However, if enough
individuals enlighten and purify themselves with Berg's teachings, the disaster may be
eliminated. 25 It appears that they won enough converts,
because the ball of fire never came.
|
| 1999-OCT-10: "The Prophet" predicted that
the Jerusalem Temple would be rebuilt before this date, and that ritual killing of animals
would have resumed within this Third Temple. The ritual sacrificing was to be abolished on
OCT-10. This would have triggered the "abomination of desolation," and the
rapture, as mentioned in the Biblical books of Daniel and Revelation. On
OCT-11, we received an Email from The Prophet saying that he has retracted
the prediction of the rapture and the abomination. He has withdrawn from the prophecy
business. 7
|
| 1999-OCT: A Japanese writer, Toshio Hiji, has interpreted Nostradamus
quatrains as predicting that there will be an U.S. announcement concerning an alien attack
on 1999-OCT. The aliens will be led by Satan but will be fought by human armies and "good
angels." With angels on our side we would have been certain to win.
|
| 1999-NOV-12: Weekly World Magazine published an
article stating that "four of the wisest prophets who ever lived
predicted that 1999 wold be a year of extraordinary significance
that would culminate in the return of the Messiah. And incredibly,
they all agree on the specific date that the second Coming of Jesus
will occur: November 12. They cite statements by Isaiah,
Nostradamus, Sitting Bull and Edgar Cayce.
12
|
| 1999-DEC-19: Sun Magazine listed a prediction of "Bible expert"
Dotson Meade. He predicts that "something will happen that brings about the war
which will end the world as we know it... There will be a vicious cycle of storms and
earthquakes that lead to the final battle the world has awaited." This date was
derived from information in the Dead Sea Scrolls -- apparently an unreliable
source.
|
| 1999-FALL: Brookhaven National Laboratory fired up their
Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) to full power. This simulated
conditions that scientists believe happened immediately after the big bang.
They expected to attain a temperature of 10 trillion degrees C (18 trillion
degrees F). In 1999-JUL, the Sunday Times of London warned that the RHIC
could destroy the earth -- or even wipe out the entire universe through a
type of chain reaction. The chances seem quite remote because such collisions
happen naturally in nature and the universe has not disappeared yet. Anyway,
you are reading this, so it apparently didn't happen. |
|
- "Fatima judgement day warning!," Sun magazine,
1999-JUL-13, Pages 20, 21.
- "Nostradamus: Prophecies of our century" at:
http://web.tusco.net/ourlady/index.htm
- Eileen Lakes, "Grand Cross," at:
http://www.win.ne.jp/~eileenl/gdcross1.shtml.
(No longer online)
- Paul Vallely, "The second coming of the curse of David Koresh,"
The Independent, 1999-MAY-21
- "White Dove - Prophecy about the End of the World," at:
http://www.biela-holubica.sk/
- John Whalen, "Apocalypse When?," at:
http://www.sfweekly.com/extra/apocalypse.html
- Kevin Creed, "Celestial Rock is 20 Miles Wide...", Weekly
World News, 1998-APR-21, Page 9.
- S.J. Gould, "Questioning the Millennium: A Rationalist's Guide
to a Precisely Arbitrary Countdown.", Harmony Books, (1997)
You can read a
review and perhaps buy this book from amazon.com online bookstore
- Chris Nelson, "A brief history of the apocalypse," at:
http://www.chrisnelson.net
This web site contains over 200 references to end-of-the-world predictions
which have not come true.
- Steve Nettleton, "Apostles of the Apocalypse: Are we ready for the
end?," CNN.news, 1999, at:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/1999/at2000/stories/religion/
- "Biography for Criswell," Internet Movie Database, at:
http://www.imdb.com/
- "The world's greatest prophets all agree...Jesus will return to Earth on
November 12,1999," Weekly World News, 1998-AUG-18.
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