Past dates for failed doomsday prophecies

From Doomsday debunked

Here are some examples, with the predicted date of the end of all things. Please, past dates only, so we can share this with people who get easily scared of future dates.

See also List of past dates predicted for apocalyptic events

1st century CE[edit]

7th century[edit]

  • Muslims believed in the Qiyamah (Last Judgement) during which time Jesus[2] will come to earth, end all wars, and kill ad-Dajjal — the Muslim anti-Christ. Then every person who ever lived will be bodily resurrected, before being judged by God. The faithful go to heaven, and the rest to hell. Apparently there's also room for some "People of the Book," i.e. Jews and Christians, though hopefully there won't be any wars between the lot in heaven. Presumably God will actually do something to stop fighting within his heavenly realm, unlike on Earth, so that celestial wars would seem unlikely.

16th century[edit]

A little grandiose, eh?
  • Circa 1504: Painter Sandro Botticelli believed he was living during the End Times/Template:Wpl, according to an inscription on his painting The Mystical Nativity.
  • 1533: Michael Stifel, Judgement Day.[3] A common saying in German for PIDOOMA is to "calculate" or "talk a Stifel."[4]

18th century[edit]

  • 1719: Jacob Bernoulli: a comet seen in 1680 would return and collide with the Earth.[5] Said comet hasn't been seen since.[6]

19th century[edit]

  • The "Great Disappointment": William Miller predicts the end would come in 1843... then 1844... oh. His many thousands of followers reacted in different ways to his utter failure: some wised up and gave up on his predictions, while others became Seventh Day Adventists. They're still waiting. Still others became the Jehovah's Witlesses, who badly retconned Miller's prediction so they could claim it actually did happen, just not the way he predicted.
  • 1865: predicted by Edward Bishop Elliott, a Victorian Biblical scholar; he later revised this to 1941.[7][8]
  • 1881: according to an 1862 edition of the prophecies of Mother Shipton, who allegedly wrote "The world to an end shall come, In eighteen hundred and eighty one."[9] (Seems she was no better at poetry than she was at prediction.)
  • Native Americans in Spring 1891: All the whites are gonna die really soon!

20th century[edit]

Halley's Comet (1910) : the tail did not wag the dog
  • 1910: Halley's Comet's tail crosses the Earth and people think that the world will be gassed to death by cyanogen gas.[10]
  • 1914: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1915: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1918: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1920: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1923: Wilbur Glenn Voliva: Flat Earth to end[12]
  • 1925: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1927: Wilbur Glenn Voliva[12]
  • 1930: Wilbur Glenn Voliva[12]
  • 1934: Wilbur Glenn Voliva[12][13]
  • 1935: Wilbur Glenn Voliva[12]
  • 1941: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11]
  • 1941: Victorian scholar Edward Bishop Elliott, based on his interpretation of the Book of Revelation, came up with this date after his earlier predictions in the 1860s proved untrue.[14]
  • 1975: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[11][15]
  • Mid-1970s: David Wilkerson: Worldwide economic depression.[16]
  • 1977: William Branham: Destruction of the U.S., termination of all governments into a world government, Second Coming.[17]
  • 1977: Pyramidologist Adam Rutherford: Beginning of the Millennium.[18]
  • 1978: Jim Jones took his cult with him.
  • 1979-1980: John Todd: Installation of a world government ruled by the Illuminati, with Jimmy Carter as the anti-Christ. Because...peanuts?
  • 1980: Pat Robertson: "A year of sorrow and bloodshed that will have no end soon, for the world is being torn apart, and my[19] kingdom shall rise from the ruins of it."
  • 1981: Hal Lindsey: Pre-tribulational rapture.
  • 1982: Pat Robertson: Great Tribulation.
  • 1982: R.E. McMaster: World War III and/or economic depression, based on cyclical theory.[20]
  • 1985: Pat Robertson: Worldwide economic collapse.
  • 1988: Hal Lindsey: Second Coming.
  • September 11-13, 1988: Edgar Whisenant: Second Coming.[21]
  • 1988: Colin Deal: Second Coming.[22]
  • 1989: Edgar Whisenant: Second Second Coming.[23]
  • 1990: Elizabeth Clare Prophet: Global thermonuclear war.
  • 1991: Louis Farrakhan: The looming Gulf War would be the "War of Armageddon which is the final war."
  • 1992 (September 28): Rollen Stewart: Second Coming.
  • 1992: Mission for the Coming Days: Second Coming.[24]
  • 1992: First end of the world prediction from collision with the Pleiades star cluster (a.k.a., "photon belt")
  • 1994: Harold Camping: Second Coming.[25]
  • 1994: Some Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[26]
  • 1997: Heaven's Gate: Earth changes and a UFO abduction coinciding with the Hale-Bopp comet. Mass suicide in the hopes of hitching a ride on said UFOs.
  • 1997: Jehovah's Witnesses: Armageddon.[15]
  • 1998: The Church of the SubGenius: the Rupture. Every year on July 5th, they meet and party in reverence, certain that it will happen this year. (Recent writings have inverted the year to "8661.")
  • 1999: according to some interpretations of Nostradamus[27]
  • 1999:A now little-known collision with Planet X
  • 1999-2000: David Wilkerson: Worldwide economic depression.[28]
  • May 5, 2000: Cataclysmic crust displacement predicted by Richard W. Noone[29]
  • 2000: Y2K: Collapse of civilisation. Christian preachers in Papua New Guinea predicted the end.[30] Hal Lindsey failed on this one again.

21st century[edit]

Harold Camping was a perennial favorite. Oopsie!
Skeptics trolling for the rapture
File:Smg powerstar.jpg
2007 (November 1): Mario will trigger a meltdown in a massive galaxy reactor and will cause the universe to turn into a freakish dual tornado and subsequently explode.
  • ≤2001: Cataclysmic crust displacement predicted by William Hutton.[31]
  • 2002 (December 8th): Survivalist Bruce Beach (of Ark Two fame) predicted it on a Penn & Teller: Bullshit! episode that was not aired until 2003.[32]
  • 2003: Mary 2003 was supposed to have Earth cataclysmically smash into Nibiru/Planet X, according to ZetaTalk.
  • 2005-2026: William Strauss and Neil Howe — a crisis period in the U.S. comparable in effect to the American Revolution, Civil War, and Great Depression/WWII.[33]
  • 2007: Hal Lindsey — the Second Second Coming.
  • 2007: Pat Robertson — the Great Tribulation.
  • 2008 (whenever she dies): Sarah Palin believes she is of the "Final Generation" and will see the End Times during her lifetime.{
  • 2009: David Wilkerson — Earth-shattering calamity engulfing the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America experiencing riots and blazing fires.[34]
  • 2011: Harold Camping tries again — Third Second coming/rapture. May 21st, to be precise.[35] He put up billboards![36] Later postponed to October 21st, but again nothing came of it.[37][38]
  • 2011: Ronald Weinland: Second Coming on the 29th of September. Strike one!
  • 2012: 2012 apocalypse)
  • 2012: Ronald Weinland — Second Coming on the 27th of May. Strike two!
  • 2012 (December 21st): Eastern Lightning cult predicted the end of the world.[39]
  • 2013: Supposedly Isaac Newton predicted it.[40]
  • 2013: Ronald Weinland — Second Coming on the 9th of May. Strike three, you're out! (see 2019 for strike 4)
  • 2014 (February 22nd): Ragnarok — the end of the present world according to Norse mythology.[41]
  • 2014 (March 21st): Asteroid?[42]
  • 2014: World War III, resurrected Nostradamus prophecy of a fire in the North for the reference of the end of the age of the fifth sun,[43] believed to be a specific Northern region of a country, current speculation is North Korea, as relative to the resolution of a Pope prediction.[44] Oh, and the Rapture.[45] And a giant asteroid hitting the Caribbean.[46]
  • between April 2014 and October 2015: A tetrad of lunar eclipses (or blood moons) will signal the start of the end times, according to megachurch pastor John Hagee. [47]
  • 2015: Solar flare.[48]
  • 2015 (September 23rd): (some references give a margin of September 18th to September 25th) Asteroid.[49]
  • 2015 (October 7th): eBible Fellowship, an organization vaguely related to the late-Harold Camping, is confident they've got the date right this time.[50]
  • 2016: Tom Wattkins:[51] He had a vision of the Great tribulation claiming to have met the beast of revelation, etc. Turns out the same day is a solar eclipse.[52], though of course he'll mention that.[51]
  • 2016 (April 6th): Warren Jeffs, in no way due to a contemporaneous arrangement.[53]
  • 2016 (May 16th): Pastor Richardo Salazar was allegedly told by God that an asteroid fully made of ice, with a 9km diameter, traveling at 30,000km per hour would strike earth killing 1,200 million people. As you probably can tell, that definitely happened and those totally dead 1,200 million people will be forever missed.[54]
  • 2016 (June 3-4): Modern scholars got the Mayan date wrong. It was never 2012, rather it was June 2016 and there are plenty of numbers involved.[55]
  • 2016 (June 14th-August 19th): According to this super reliable, super honest, super definitely-NOT-bullshiting "NASA scientist", there was meant to be a magnetic reversal between June and August which would cause the Van Allen belt to fall killing 80% of life on Earth. He got this information from aliens via HAARP. Yup, aliens told our good 'ol uncle Dr. Sal that the sky is falling.[56]
  • 2016 (October 31st): Walid Shoebat alleges that the world is "100% certain" to end on this exact arbitrary nutjob date. As the basis for this claim, he refers to his own science of "Futurology 101".[57]
  • 2016 (Fall): Bible student and computer scientist Nora Roth on MarkBeast.com claims as much through a lot of numerology surrounding seventy "sevens".[58]
  • 2016 (December): Bible student and computer scientist Nora Roth subsequently revised her claim to December.[59]
  • September 23, 2017: Nibiru/Planet X will again collide with Earth, the second prediction by David Meade.[60]. Plus a rare constellation alignment will start the Rapture[61]
  • October 2017: Initial forecast made by David Meade[62][63]
  • October 15, 2017: The third time's a charm by David Meade.[64]
  • November 19, 2017: The fourth time is not so charming, David Meade.[65]
  • 2017: Various Christians say we'll be chipped, and the Great Tribulation will begin.[66]
  • 2017 to 2113: Asteroids.[67]
  • 2018: 23th of April, David Meade strikes back... and fails again[68]
  • 2018: The Bible guarantees May 20, 2018 Pentecost, or your money back.
  • 2018: 24th of June, obscure crank Mathieu Jean-Marc Joseph Rodrigue ensures that doom is upon us, based on some middle school math.[69]
  • 2018: Hal Lindsey — the Third Second Coming.

Why you can ignore all date setting prophecies based on the Bible - no dates in it - Doomsday Debunked blog post[edit]

Why you can ignore all date setting prophecies based on the Bible - no dates in it

Other recent dates debunked for Doomsday Debunked =[edit]


See also[edit]

List of past dates predicted for apocalyptic events

External links[edit]


References[edit]

  1. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
  2. Yes! That Jesus.
  3. In his book Ein Rechenbuchlin vom EndChrist. Apocalyps in Apocalypsim, he put the date and time at 3rd October 1533 at 8 am. When the world did not end, he was ejected from his quarters and flogged in the streets. (Eeek.)
  4. Template:Wpa
  5. Jacob Bernoulli Deciphered
  6. Template:Wpa
  7. Victorian Apocalyptics: Three Schools of Interpreting Daniel and the Book of Revelation, Victorian Web
  8. Template:Wpa
  9. Mother Shipton, Mysterious Britain
  10. Fantastically Wrong: That Time People Thought a Comet Would Gas Us All to Death by Matt Simon (01.07.15 6:30 am) Wired.
  11. 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.6 American Atheist, April 2010. "Separation of Armageddon and State — Freethought at the Polls." Michael B. Paulk, pp 14–15. (Note that this gives 1874 as a predicted date of Armageddon, whereas this was merely the year the 1914 prediction was made.)
  12. 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4 Gardner, Martin (1957). "Flat and Hollow". Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (Second Edition ed.). 
  13. Voliva's 1934 end of the world prediction August 16, 1934 The Racine Journal-Times .
  14. Template:Wpa
  15. 15.0 15.1 Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God, Brooklyn: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, 1966. P. 29. says Fall 1975. Pp. 27-28 of the same book uses a different date counting method and says 1997. Both are based on estimates of when the earth was created of 4004 BCE and 4026 BCE respectively. So they hedged their bets but you still have to believe in YEC to believe either one.
  16. Wilkerson, David. The Vision. Spire Books 1973
  17. Branham, William. The Seven Church Ages, p. 322.
  18. http://web.archive.org/web/20050209175950/http://answers.org/CultsAndReligions/pyramid.html
  19. God's, not Pat's, we hope
  20. McMaster, R.E. Cycles of War: The Next Six Years. Timberland Trust, 1977.
  21. Whisenant, Edgar. 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be In 1988, World Bible Society 1988.
  22. Deal, Colin. Christ Returns By 1988: 101 Reasons Why. Self published, 1979.
  23. Whisenant, Edgar. The Final Shout: Rapture Report, World Bible Society, 1989.
  24. This was the South Korea-based Hyoo-go (rapture) movement, who put billboards up all over the U.S. predicting October 28, 1992.
  25. Camping, Harold. 1994? Vantage Press 1992.
  26. "Some Witnesses interpreted Template:Bible as defining the length of a generation to be 80 years. Since 1914 plus 80 equals 1994, they predicted Armageddon would occur around that year. This prediction came from the grassroots level of the organization. The WTS itself did not officially proclaim it." B.A. Robinson. "Jehovah's Witnesses' end of the world predictions: Predictions for years after 1975. Will it happen in our future?" Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance.
  27. "King of Terror: 1999". Morgana's Observatory. 2006. http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/1999.htm
  28. Wilkerson, David. God's Plan to Protect His People in the Coming Depression, 1998.
  29. 5/5/2000, ICE: The Ultimate Disaster by Richard W. Noone (1997). Three Rivers Press. ISBN 0609800671.
  30. Papua New Guinea in 1999-2000 The Journal of Pacific History 36(3): 285, 2001
  31. Coming Earth Changes: Causes and Consequences of the Approaching Pole Shift by William Hutton (1996). A.R.E. Press. ISBN 0876043619.
  32. The End-of-the-World Delusion: How Doomsayers Endanger Society by Justin Deering (2012) iUniverse. ISBN 1475913559. p. 134
  33. Strauss, William and Howe, Neil. The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy, Broadway Books, 1997. Dates are approximate and based on their analysis of social cycles.
  34. Famed pastor predicts imminent catastrophe, WingNutDaily
  35. Judgment Day believers descend on Joburg
  36. http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/christians-to-install-50-billboards-in-atlanta-claiming-jesus-will-return-in-may-2011/story-e6frfku0-1225969137885
  37. Ed Brayton: Camping's Explanation: It Did Happen!
  38. Suckers.
  39. China cracking down on doomsday group Los Angeles Times, December 17, 2012]
  40. End of the world in 2013? New book recalculates Newton's endtimes clock
  41. What to Expect from the Viking Apocalypse
  42. http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/03/15/asteroid_2003_qq47_rumors_of_an_impact_in_march_2014_are_false.html (subscription required after 5 story reads)
  43. http://www.realitysandwich.com/cosmic_hour_end_5th_sun_beginning_everything
  44. Eerie accuracy!
  45. http://www.youtube.com/user/RaptureN2013GetSaved
  46. https://www.facebook.com/pages/A-Call-and-Warning-from-the-Lord-Prophet-Efrain-Rodriguez/692795807400214
  47. Tuesday’s ‘blood moon’ eclipse signals the end of the world
  48. http://news.yahoo.com/earth-will-only-have-12-hours-to-prepare-for-081651736.html plus on the webshite collapse.news
  49. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiUrevq2Ko0
  50. Christian group predicts the world will be 'annihilated' on Wednesday: Over a week after blood moon doomsday forecasts were proven wrong, eBible Fellowship leader Chris McCann says ‘the world will pass away’ on 7 October by Adam Gabbatt (Tuesday 6 October 2015 07.30 EDT) The Guardian.
  51. 51.0 51.1 "The Tribulation has began. The Anti-Christ is here. The Two witnesses are here." uploaded by Bride in the Wilderness on May 23, 2014
  52. http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEgoogle/SEgoogle2001/SE2016Mar09Tgoogle.html
  53. Rumors of apocalypse ahead of FLDS leader’s detention hearing
  54. http://mirrorspectrum.com/behind-the-mirror/pastor-ricardo-salazar-life-on-earth-will-be-wiped-out-in-2016-video
  55. The End of the World is This Week, Say “Scholars” Who Were Wrong About It All Those Other Times
  56. https://youtu.be/gFSPWC8TKnk Dr. sal's warning
  57. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=epk40SC3wNI
  58. http://www.markbeast.com/endworld/jubilees-end-world.htm
  59. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4002130/Will-world-END-month-Computer-programmer-claims-Jesus-return-destroy-planet-latest-bizarre-claim.html
  60. The world as we know it is about to end — again — if you believe this biblical doomsday claim by Kristine Phillips (September 17, 2017 at 3:52 PM) The Washington Post.
  61. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQxZCAPNP5Y
  62. Will the mysterious shadow planet Nibiru obliterate Earth in October? No. by Ben Guarino (January 5 at 5:25 AM) Washington Post.
  63. Planet X — The 2017 Arrival by David Meade (2016) Ebookit.com. ISBN 1456626922.
  64. The man who had people worried about a Sept. 23 apocalypse is peddling a new doomsday date by Kristine Phillips (September 25, 2017 at 5:20 PM) The Washington Post.
  65. Acts of Faith: Armageddon via imaginary planet has been pushed back — yet again — to November by Avi Selk (October 28, 2017 at 12:40 PM) The Washington Post.
  66. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YJsxMcAJoA
  67. http://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/507480/Asteroid-Strikes-Earth-Damage-Nasa-Destruction
  68. http://www.foxnews.com/science/2018/04/11/biblical-prophecy-claims-rapture-is-coming-april-23-numerologist-says.html
  69. http://24juin2018findumonde.e-monsite.com/

Copied from Rational Wiki here and reused under CC by SA 3.0