...and I feel fine

[forsyth]

The thing that's always bugged me the most about predicting the end of the world (besides the zillion times it's been wrong) is that the kind of God who'd blow up the world and make everybody's last days full of pain and suck is, by definition, a bad guy. Which sorta works for the early Old Testament God that's all "Sacrifice your kid! Flood the world! Knock down those walls and kill everyone inside!" but is pretty out of character for most non-vengeful turbolaser versions of Jesus. So, yes, a lot of these prophecies are bad biblical fanfic.

Of course, Fred's already covered this over at slacktivist with "goofy hat Jesus".

Oh, and no, the world's not going to end tomorrow. We'll still be here for my regularly non-updating blog. But just in case it does, I'm gonna be out where things are fallen down and trying to fix them, and rescue people. Because that's what good guys do. They don't sit back and laugh at other people's misery.

Comments

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

"Turbolaser Jesus" is my new favorite phrase. :)

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

That's another turn of phrase I stole from over at Slacktivist. I think it was the comments, not Fred's, though.

[amazingadrian.livejournal.com]

I think the current idea or prevalent thought behind the end times is that Jesus will return and/or the faithful will be taken up into heaven leaving the non-faithful behind. Which, doesn't necessarily equate to making everyone's last days full of pain and suck or even blowing up the world.

And you know, given Jesus character as it is most often portrayed (in the Bible), I bet he might even be willing to forgive those who weren't accepted the first time if they turn around sometime between the Rapture and their natural deaths.

The thing you are getting at is that most of the faithful are quite vindictive toward the non-faithful, and often project this onto Jesus or God, predicting some sort of fiery wrath of judgment during the second coming. While, as a human being, I can't begin to say what will or will not happen (Ha ha, Harold Camping), I can reasonably suggest that it won't happen in any way that is completely, 100% expected. Even the Book of Revelation seems to be written in code, full of hidden meanings and stuff.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

Well, the guy who predicted this one said there would be earthquakes and all sorts of other destruction. And the most widely famous version, the Left Behind series is all about the "Tribulation". Revelation itself has plenty of talk about suffering, too.

A lot of it is does seem to be a smug sense of watching other people suffer and being "See, we were right!", yeah. I definitely don't think codes, numerology, or similar things are going to reveal anything of that nature, either. Slacktivist's been good at this with his whole series on Left Behind.

But I don't think that the end of the world is plausibly considered "good" in any way, though. I can't really see a way to make that work. Personally, I'm gonna try and do my best to keep the world from ending.

[amazingadrian.livejournal.com]

Yeah. The only "good" that I can see in the End Of The World is an end to human suffering. But you know, let us see if we can try to take care of that ourselves before then. We've got a lot of prejudices and things we need to get over first.