Prophecy and the Psyche
"He who could foresee affairs three days in advance would be rich for thousands of years."
Chinese proverb.
"When the fork is supported by two pillars, with six half-horns and six open scissors: The very potent Lord, heir to the toads, Will then subjugate to himself the entire world."
There has been no shortage of effort on the part of men to predict the future. One man who is popularly credited with foretelling many things is Nostradamus, the sixteenth-century French astrologer and physician. "The first two lines indicate a date. When the fork, "V" is sustained by two pillars, they make an M, the Roman numeral for one thousand. Six half-horns are CCCCCC, the numeral for six hundred; six open scissors, XXXXXX, make sixty. In other words, in 1660 the great Lord of France, heir to the Merovingians whose emblem was the toad . . .will be the greatest monarch in the world . In 1660 Louis XIV married Maria Theresa of Spain. Early in 1661 Louis, at twenty-two, became virtual autocrat of France, the Grand Monarch of the civilized world.
On this interpretation by followers of Nostradamus of this particular quatrain the Saturday Review states, " That isn't exactly what Nostradamus said, but then again, who knows what he meant?"
Of the alleged 946 predictions attributed to Nostradamus, only about 70 are considered to have had some kind of fulfillment. That works out to less than a 7-percent success rate. However, regarding the 'successes,' M'Clintock and Strong's Encyclopedia comments that many are considered to be the "bold forgeries" of his interpreters, including the prediction of his own death. Others were "composed after the events to which they seem designed to refer." Some are "strained" i...
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... partly clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly brittle.
43: As you saw the iron mixed with miry clay, so they will mix with one another in marriage, but they will not hold together, just as iron does not mix with clay.
44: And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall its sovereignty be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand for ever;
45: just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be hereafter. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure."
Pay attention to Daniels Prophecy! -- published by the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society of NY inc.
LaHaye, Tim, and Ed Hindson. The Popular Encyclopedia of Bible Prophecy. Eugene, OR.: Harvest House Publishers, 2004.
Foreshadowing is literary device by which an author hints what is to come. People cannot predict their future, however the choices they make foreshadow what the future will hold for them. In the epic, The Odyssey by Homer is about Odysseus’s journey back home and at the end of Book Nine, Homer used foreshadowing through prophecy’s curse and naming an approaching event. Homer use foreshadowing through Polyphemus’s prayer and when Odysseus was cursed by Zeus. After Odysseus escape from the Polyphemus and anger him, Polyphemus prayed to his father that Odysseus “never reaches home” and if he does, “let him come home late and come a broken man- all shipmates lost” (153). Homer also added, “so he prayed and the god of the sea blue mane Poseidon
In the novel, later, Mme. de Clèves asks for further explanation for the love between a woman and the king with “several other lovers” (1039). This passion forms the “political and social effects” (1039) that change the norms in the court. The court mixes this false “event into its own structure, so that the implausible now becomes the norm for the entire court” (1039). This incident drives to the extent of passions, “political ambitions and social events”, that utilize M. de Clève’s passion. Hence, the power of Duchesse de Valentinois doubles “the power of the monarch” (1039).
At the beginning of the 17th century, France was a place of internal strife and bickering bureaucrats. The king, Louis XIII, had come to the throne in 1610 at the age of nine, leaving the running of the kingdom to his mother, Marie de Medici. One of her court favorites, Armand de Plessis de Richelieu, rose through the ranks, eventually gaining the title of Cardinal and becoming one of Louis’ key advisors and minister. His political manifesto, Political Testament, was a treatise for King Louis XIII that offered him advice mainly concerned with the management and subtle subjugation of the nobles and the behavior of a prince. Beneath all of the obeisant rhetoric, Richelieu was essentially writing a handbook for Louis XIII on how to survive as a king in a political landscape increasingly dominated by the aristocracy. Richelieu’s ideology shows a pragmatic attitude reminiscent of The Prince, a political work by 15th century Florentine politician Niccoló Machiavelli.
A fatalist talks about the future in the same way that we talk about the past. When we talk about the past events, we say that they are no longer under our control because we simply cannot change them. Taylor suggests that the reason for why we cannot alter the past lies in our inability to affect the truth-value of past statements. For example, it is true that I had pizza for dinner last night and I cannot do anything to make this statement false. Hence, there is a set of true statements about the past that we are unable to change and fatalism claims that the same is true of the future statements. Taylor claims that if x is a true statement about the future, there is nothing we can do to make it false. If nobody can make x false, then we are not free to change the fact x about the future. One might object to the premise that suggests there are true statements about the future. If we consider this objection, then the whole argument falls apart but according to the ‘law of excluded middle’ every statement is either true or false so it follows that there are some true statements about the future and argument holds valid.
Frightfully stimulated as a child from a home intrusion by Parisians during an aristocratic revolt in 1651, Louis XIV realized his rule would be decisive, militant, and absolute (458). His lengthy reign as Frances’ king and how he ruled would be the example that many countries throughout Europe would model their own regimes under. With this great authority also came greater challenges of finance and colonization. In the 17th century, the era of absolute monarchs were the means to restore European life (458).
Louis XIV is considered the “perfect absolutist” and he has been said to have been one of the greatest rulers in France’s history. He came up with several different strategic plans to gain absolute
The successful ruler is a combination of nature and fortune, de jure and de facto power. He steers his course by the tiller of an immediate past and by the stars of an immediate future. [. . .] It is this synchronizing of nature and fortune that soothsayers study, and that the witches in Macbeth know something about. We call it fate, which over-simplifies it. (88-89)
More often than not, the outcomes of events that occur in a person’s life is the product of the idea of the self-fulfilling prophecy. It is that which “occurs when a person’s expectations of an event make the outcome more likely to occur than would otherwise have been true” (Adler and Towne, Looking Out, Looking In 66). Or restated, as Henry Ford once put it, “If you think you can, you can. If you think you can’t, you’re right!” This brief research paper touches on the two types of self-fulfilling prophecies, those that are self-imposed and those that are imposed by others. Additionally, it gives a discussion on how great of an influence it is in each person’s life, both positively and negatively, and how it consequently helps to mold one’s self-concept and ultimately one’s self.
These types of decisions define why Louis XIII is an important example of the primacy of the king over all other sources of political and governmental power in the 17th century. Certainly, Louis XIII’s rise to power defines the lack of checks and balances that would typically be a part of a lesser monarchy in which the aristocracy could have an influence on governmental decisions. However, this was not the case with Louis XIII, since he had gained complete control over the government through military might and the wealth of the royal family. This historical example defines the primacy of the absolute monarch within the context of the king’s role in governing in 17th century
The Kingdom of God defined by the Israelites as a physical place here on earth. The Kingdom of God is also called the “Kingdom of Heaven.” It means God’s rule in the lives of His chosen people and His Creation. In the Old Testament, the people in God’s kingdom were the Israelites. In the New Testament and now, the people in God’s kingdom are those who believe in and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. When Jesus comes again, then God’s kingdom will become visible to all people. The term “Kingdom” according to (Kingdom of God,2011) means the rank, quality, state, or attributes of a king; royal authority; sovereign power; rule; dominion; monarchy. It can also be used in the context of a divine kingdom, the term Kingdom appears 13 times in Matthews, 7 times in Luke and 2 times in John.
Nostradamus had become a prophet through religion, astrology, and astronomy predicting the future while writing a series of quatrains. Many people relate his writings to events that have happened in this day in age, while most of it does scarcely match his predictions. His work is questionable because it can relate to much of what has happened with the world long after his death. Many wonder how he could predict things and mention certain words and names that were never even heard of until hundreds of years after him.
LaHaye, Tim F., and Edward E. Hindson. The Popular Encyclopedia of Bible Prophecy. Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2004.
Isaiah also addresses the Day of the Lord and God’s kingdom, pointing to the end of the world when Christ will return and set up God’s kingdom. All of the warnings that Isaiah preaches are for the church of all ages. The church must take heed to these warnings and accordingly can be assured that God’s promises of mercy and salvation through Jesus are true.
Edited by Metzger, Bruce M. and Murphy, Roland E.. The New Oxford Annotated Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Gen 42:36