Self fulfilling prophecy

[Wertbag]

Recently I've encountered several Christians online who seem excited to claim self fulfilling prophecies as somehow special.  First up you have the classic "there will be mockers" line, which the author had to know that making a ridiculous claim, there would be people who mocked him for this.  For some reason a Christian seeing mocking jumps to "Wow, the bible is proven correct again!"

 

Then I saw the latest in the never ending list of doomsday prophecies.  "The bible says there will be wars, and what do we see in the middle east and Europe now?"  I remember one historian attempted to find if there was ever a recorded period of history when there were no wars ongoing.  He managed to find a few decades from a thousand years ago, and even then with the fine print that it could be more the lack of records rather than a lack of war.  Any claim of natural disasters (we have tens of thousands of earthquakes every year, ~50 volcanoes erupt per year, and disease, plagues and famines are just constant) is just ignoring the way of the world.

 

Any prophecy about empires falling, cities being attacked or disease breaking out are just so statistically probable, as to be betting on the favourite.  One great example is Jerusalem "Throughout its history, the city has been destroyed at least two times, attacked 52 times, besieged 23 times, and recaptured 44 times."

One theory on the destruction of Sodom, was the town was built on a volcanic catchment lake, as fresh water was the deciding factor.  The volcano erupted as they often do, and wiped the town out.  After the case people tried to figure out a reason for the loss of life, with God's wrath being the go to excuse.  There also the claim that Lot's wife being turned to salt, was actually basalt, which was carved into the likeness as a memorial to those lost.  After the case the doomsayer preachers could all scream about sins causing God's punishment, and only the righteous survive, and amongst all the wild claims many would say "See I told you this would happen!"  And the self fulfilling prophecy comes true, convincing many that the preacher knows more than them...

[◊ Weezer ◊]

Good points.  Did you see my thread on Self-fulfilling Prophecy in Testimonials?