I know that many of you have read the ‘Left Behind’ series, if not, I know many people have read or at least know about the book of Revelation in the Bible, and I was wondering:
If millions of people disappeared, would that make you believe?
If the 2 witnesses just appeared out of the air and started preaching, and all languages could understand them, would you believe?
If the book of Revelation started to happen, (plagues upon plagues) would that still not convince you to change?
If you consider yourself Christian and did not make the rapture, would you give up or try to do things differently?
What you are saying, IMHO, proves nothing. It does not prove that the Bible is right. What it does, is leads one to think that could be one of the solutions.
If millions of Christians (and hopefully all the fundies) suddenly disappeared, I would party! Good riddance! 
Yes, if all the born-again Christian up and vanished into thin air overnight, and events as described in the Book of Revelation began occuring, I think I would definitely have to believe in God at that point. That’s one of the things that have irritated me in hearing the Left Behind books described (I admit I haven’t read them myself)–the idea that the people “left behind” wouldn’t all immediately “get it”–that you’d have to have little bands of the newly converted running around witnessing to everyone, with most people apparently just shrugging their shoulders and saying “Oh, well, it must have been the ozone layer”. It pretty much portrays all non-Christians as being really, really dense.
Now, that said: I’d believe in the existence of God, yes. But would I become a faithful Christian? I think I’d still have doubts and questions about a lot of things; about apparent errors and inconsistencies in the Bible, about the justice of Biblical morality and eternal hellfire and things like that, about free will and divine omniscience, and so on. I mean, I just can’t help it–I can’t just turn things like that off like a light switch. So, I’d believe in some sort of Higher Power, and (depending on just how closely subsequent events matched Biblical prophecy) a Higher Power who wrote or inspired the Bible. But would I become a worshipper of the Christian God? I dunno.
OK, count me as totally confused…
Believe what?
See above.
Change from what to what, exactly?
Give up being nice to other people? Do what things differently?
I think most rational people would carefully examine any apparently supernatural event before jumping to the conclusion that it was a) in fact supernatural b) tied to Biblical prophecy.
Of course, for a time I suspected that a '54 Buick I once had was posessed, but that was before I discovered that the ignition switch stuck in the “off” position when the car was fully warmed up.
I like how fundamentalist Christians tend to ask these hypothetical questions as though such events are really going to happen in our lifetimes. “Just you wait now,” I can hear them thinking, “Revelations is coming true any second now. Then you’ll be sorry. Sure, Christians have been thinking that for 2,000 years. But I know I’m right.”
For the record, yes, I’d then believe. Now one for you: if we find a feathered dinosaur fossil, will you believe in evolution?
P.S. The author of Revelations got it wrong. If all the fundamentalists disappeared, it would be those of us left who would be in Heaven, not the ones who vanished.
It might well be true, already, depending on which “fundamentalist” sect you want to credit with having the TRUTH.
Would you try to do things differently if the rapture did not take place during the lifetimes of the Apostles, and still had not happened after nearly two thousand years? Would you limit your changes in theology to adjusting the arithmetic?
Put your faith in the Lord, and leave the measure of other peoples souls to Him. Our part in the great miracles of salvation is the part of the saved soul. Mostly it isn’t a speaking part, although we get to join in the great Chorus. Wait for the conductor to give you your cue. One thing about the end of the world: No one is going to miss it.
Tris
Just to clarify, Triskadecamus is referring to these verses:
Mark 8:38 and 9:1
Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.
And he said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death, till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.
and also Mark 13:27 - 13:30
And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.
Now learn a parable of the fig tree; When her branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is near:
So ye in like manner, when ye shall see these things come to pass, know that it is nigh, even at the doors.
Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done.
If all of the Revelation prophecies- or rather the modern fundumentalist interpretation of the Revelation prophecies- were to suddenly sart taking place, it would certainly give me pause.
It might indeed make me think those fundumentalists were right.
And it might make me ready to consign myself to hell, given that I couldn’t whorship such a mean, petty, bastard of a god as Timothy Lahaye, et. al. want to talk about.
But,thank god, I don’t think it works that way.
I’d believe super-advanced aliens with an interest in our mythology were playing some kind of trick on us.
Let me ask a serious hypothetical question:
Suppose the end-times scenario of, say, Islam were to appear to come true. Would you convert to Islam? If not, why not?
-Ben
I would certainly convert to Islam if Allah spoke to me directly, but I just don’t see that happening.
Don’t know about the Christian Fundie endgame though, I’d have to go do me a lot of intoxicating substances before I could swallow all the pride needed to come crawling around to those guys.
— G. Raven
“I’d have to go do me a lot of intoxicating substances before I could swallow all the pride needed to come crawling around to those guys.”
“And it might make me ready to consign myself to hell, given that I couldn’t whorship such a mean, petty, bastard of a god as Timothy Lahaye, et. al. want to talk about.”
“If all the fundamentalists disappeared, it would be those of us left who would be in Heaven, not the ones who vanished.”
“If millions of Christians (and hopefully all the fundies) suddenly disappeared, I would party! Good riddance!”
JerseyDiamond, why do you think people view fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist Christianity this way?
-Ben
If it happened the way it did in the left behind books I would believe it a fakery:)
If I were an atheist, I wouldn’t believe it. I would stick by my conviction that my inability to explain an event does not prove the existence of God.
Well as we Pagans like to say.
I hope the rapture comes soon so we can have the world to ourselves.
Well, if the events described in the Revelation of Saint John happened–the Rapture, the appearance of the Antichrist, being forced to take a mark on the right hand and forehead, the two witnesses popping up in Jerusalem–then only a very silly and/or stubborn atheist would refuse to believe. I would be signing up at the local church immediately.
However, your “what if” is an example of what Ben calls “fundamentalist porn”: the fantasy of being able to show all those doubters that you’ve been right all along, and getting to feel mighty superior in the bargain. In the real world, even atheists who were left behind after the Rapture would resist the Antichrist. We know the ACLU are all damned, so surely they’d be left to sue the Beast to keep from making the mark mandatory, for example.
But the Left Behind books are not prophecy; they’re fiction, and badly-written hackwork at that. Only gullible people who wouldn’t know decent literature if it bit them on the nose would buy those books. Unfortunately, there are enough people like that to have made Jenkins and LaHaye very rich men. <sigh>
I know that many of you have read Norse mythology, if not, I know many people have read or at least know about the idea of Ragnarok in the Norse tradition, and I was wondering:
If millions of people died in three years of unreliefed winter, would that make you believe?
If the 2 wolves Skoll and Hati Hrodvitnisson just appeared out of the air and swallowed the sun and moon, casting the world into total darkness, would you believe?
If the Fenrir ran loose upon the earth and the Midgard serpent revolted and the Naglfar ship were cast free and Loki escaped his bonds, would that still not convince you to change?
If you consider yourself a true servant of the Aesir and Vanir, and had not sought shelter under the branches of Yggdrasil, would you give up or try to do things differently?
Ragnarok and Roll!
goboy:
I actually read the first two books, and they left me bitter that I didn’t come up with the idea. I think any of a bunch of us could have executed it much better.
The thing that pisses me off is that it’s just a blatant rip-off of much better end of the world fiction that came before.
It’s like The Stand and Lucifer’s Hammer had a bastard child that got adopted by The Omega Code
Just to extend the debate a little bit, I’m going to point out that there’s a big difference between the following things:
- Deciding that, with enough direct, explicit, infallible correspondence, events are best explained by at least a partial factual correspondence with the Revelation of St. John.
I might, if things happened factually in the same way, consistently, point for point, though that means an exact correspondence. Even so, if I felt that things were inexplicable by human influence, I’d be quite likely to consider the “Ardra” scenario (from the Star Trek: TNG episode of the same name): Someone with incredibly advanced technology and a copy of the Bible is trying to take advantage of people.
- Deciding that, because Revelations appears to be correct, that the other stuff that come before it in the Bible must absolutely be correct as well.
This is tougher than it seems, since it’s entirely possible that “John”, whoever he was, filtered an otherwise true revelation through the false filter of his chosen religion - i.e., he decided that, if the world was going to end, it must be Christ who was going to end it. I would need explicit evidence that the two were related before I could take this step, such as a way of absolutely verifying a one-to-one correspondence between disappeared people and sincere christians.
- Deciding that, merely because it turns out that the omnipotent being YHWH exists, that there is value in listening to it or obeying it. I, personally, would not be capable of this step, though others may be; I bring it up simply to make the existence of this step explicit.
So, the answer is possible, but unlikely.