,

mcrtc n
Winter 1996 - 1997

A Journal of Atheist News and Thought

Millennium
Madness

$5.95

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American Atheist

A Journal of Atheist News and Thought

Hmerican
Htbeist
=r::

Winter 1996-1997

Editor's Desk
Frank R. Zindler
From the new editor of
American Atheist

Countdown to the Millennium:

4
Last Tango on Planet Earth?
Conrad F. Goeringer
The millennium is coming! This time
around, both Jesus and E.T. are
expected back for The Big Sequel.

One, Two, Many Endings!

27
Conrad F. Goeringer
The biblical Book of Revelation isn't
the only roadmap for the end of the
world.

Cover design derived from "The Four

Horsemen of the Apocalypse" (1498),
by Albrecht Durer. Other designs by
Durer will be found throughout this
issue.

The Chupacabras: A Monster

for the New Millennium?
Conrad F. Goeringer
This blood-sucker is linked to
religious mysticism, reports of
UFOs, aliens, and apocalypse.

Millennium Foolishness
John Higdon
11
Dr. Higdon focuses a psychiatric
eye on the millennialist psyche.

31

Where Jesus Never Walked

Frank R. Zindler
The geography of "Jesus of
Nazareth" is very similar to the
15
geography of the Wizard of Oz.

33

Welcome Home, Son

Henry Oliver
Jesus returns, but to unholy Toledo
instead of the "Holy Land."
An Epistle of Brother Josiah
Josh Karpf
Humor
Once Upon a Millennium
Frank R. Zindler
An examination of a millennium
that came and went a thousand
years ago.

Volume 35, No.1

Austin, Texas

Examining the Apocalypse

43
James B. Pullen, Jr.
Revelation, the most mind-boggling
17
book in the Christian Bible, .ikes
sense if read as an astral allegory.

18

Prophecy Failed:
22
From The Great Disappoint
ment to Apocalypse Ranch
Conrad F. Goeringer
The false prophecy of William Miller
in 1843 led to Jehovah's Witnesses,
Seventh-Day Adventists, and Waco.
Winter 1996-1997

Poetry

47

Social Psychopathology of
48
End-Times Faith
Conrad F. Goeringer
Thirst for vengeance, conspiracy
theorizing, and postmodern
conflicts are combined in the millennialist social psychopathology.
Another Epistle
of Brother Josiah
Josh Karpf
More humor.

51

Page 1

Membership Application For

American Atheists, Inc.

Ic.n Atheist
Volume 35 Number 1
EDITOR I MANAGING EDITOR
Frank R. Zindler
ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Ann E. Zindler
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
Conrad F. Goeringer
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American Atheist

Editor's Desk

Born-Again American Atheist

ith the exception of a special

issue of American Atheist
which was published in the
spring of 1996, this magazine has not
been seen since around July of 1992.
The special issue had been almost
completed by the Murray-O'Hairs before their mysterious and troubling
disappearance at summer's end in
1995. It was quite clear that America's
First Family ofAtheism had intended
to "resurrect" America's premier Atheist literary organ, after having been
forced by seemingly unending urgent
matters to lay it aside for several
years. The issue they produced (dated
August, 1995) lacked only six pages to
be complete, and so the American
Atheists Board of Directors decided
the magazine should be completed and
mailed out to members. It was done.
But one last, special issue of
American Atheist was not enough to
satisfy American Atheists members
nor its officers and board of directors.
The magazine had to be "born again"
and published on a regular schedule.
Due to logistical problems relating to
production, however, it has proved
necessary to publish the magazine as
a quarterly rather than a monthly as
previously was the case. Accordingly,
the subscription price is being lowered
to $20 per year. Unfortunately, the
stunning increase since 1992 in the
cost of paper and printing supplies and
the escalation in postal rates has made
it impossible to provide the magazine
free as an incident of membership in
American Atheists, Inc. Since there
are no gods to suspend the laws of
nature (or economics!) for us, we have
had to face the reality that the magazine will be available only by special
subscription. (A subscription form has
been included with this magazine, and
we hope everyone will fill it out and
mail it in right away.)
The issue before you has been as-

Frank R. Zindler
Austin, Texas

signed the volume number 35, a number one greater than the volume number of the last regular issue released
back in 1992. While there may be some
confusion resulting from the equation
of volume 34 with 1992 and volume
35 with 1996-1997, that confusion will
be far less than what would result if
we counted one volume per year and
came up with 38 for the new volume.
Librarians and everyone else would
suppose there were over forty missing
issues! We hope it will seem obvious
to the bibliographically aware, when
they see that the volume number of
the first new issue is just one unit
greater than the last known regular
issue published, that publication was
suspended for several years.
The theme of this first new issue
is "Millennium Madness," referring of
course to the insanity already begun
as Christendom counts out the minutes remaining in the twentieth century of the Christian era. In many
ways, this issue is a tour-de-force performance by Conrad Goeringer, a contributing editor of American Atheist
and the director of American Atheists
On-line Services. Conrad has written
a book on millennialism, from which
his articles in this magazine have been
excerpted. It is our hope that American Atheist Press will be able to publish the entire book. Certainly, the
topic is timely!
In addition to the contributions of
Mr. Goeringer, we have an article by
Dr. John Higdon on the religious psychology involved in millennialist escapism and an article by James Pullen,
Jr., exposing the Apocalypse (the biblical book that is the cause of most of
the hysteria now being spread by religious contact) as just an astral allegory interpreting the "signs in the sky"
in order to understand what should
happen some time in the first century
- not some time thousands of years in
the biblical author's future. To place
perhaps the last nail in the millenWinter 1996-1997

nialist coffin, my own article "Where

Jesus Never Walked" has been included. It demonstrates that much of
the geography of the New Testament
is fictional, and that "Nazareth" did
not exist during the first century C.E.
Without Nazareth, "Jesus of Nazareth" enters the realm of characters
such as the Wizard of Oz. Ifhe didn't
come the first time, no use waiting for
a second coming! Just in case Jesus of
not-Nazareth should return, however,
we have a short story by Henry Oliver
poking good-natured fun at JC for returning to unholy Toledo instead of the
Holy Land.
We have been unable, in this first
new issue, to include all the departments that formerly the magazine
contained. Letters to the Editor were
left out for the simple reason that letters received back in 1992 no longer
are pertinent. Readers of this issue
who are moved by its contents to write
to us to share their opinions are invited to do so.
Another department
we would
like to include in the next issue is Talking Back. This feature provides several short answers to a "typical" religious question often asked ofAtheists.
Responses are limited to 200-250
words. Two suggested questions to
chew on: (1) How can you be moral if
you don't believe in a god? Without
god, all is permitted; (2) Don't you
know that Jesus loves you? Why don't
you open your heart and let him come
in?
Me Tho is another department we
would like to carry once again. This is
for essays 650 to 1,500 words long that
are written in response to topics covered by American Atheist or of general
interest to the Atheist community.
We hope that this first new issue
of American Atheist will be found
pleasing in proportion to the amount
of work that has gone into producing
it. The next issue will, of course, be
better!
Page 3

COUNTDOWN TO THE MILLENNIUM:

Last Tango On Planet Earth?

With the third millennium only a few"short

years away. Christian
apocalypticians. new-age
eschatologists. and others are anticipating the
end of the world. or the
advent of cosmic utopia.
History demonstrates.
though. that as centuries draw to a close. the
world still survives along with the human
propensity for folly and
credulity. This time
around. both Jesus and
E. T. are expected back
for The Big Sequel!

Conrad Goeringer is an antiquarian bookseller and freelance

writer who lives on the cape of
New Jersey. A frequent speaker
at American Atheists national
conventions, he is director of
American Atheists On-line
Services and a contributing
editor of American Atheist.

Conrad F. Goeringer
Page 4

When 1 saw the lamb break

open the sixth seal, there was a violent earthquake; the sun turned
black as a goat's-hair tent cloth
and the moon grew red as blood.
The stars in the sky fell crashing
to earth like figs shaken loose by a
mighty wind. Then the sky disappeared as if it were a scroll being
rolled up; every mountain and island was uprooted from its base...
Revelation 5:12-15
Few people today doubt that history is moving toward some sort of
climactic catastrophe ...
Hal Lindsey, pop-culture eschatologist and author

hat better time to worry about

the end of the world? People
throughout history have agonized over
the earth's demise by flood, fire, war,
plague, intervention ofgods, or the evil
actions of other human beings. Just as
people have asked, Where did it all
come from? they have also pondered,
How it will end? Ancient stories, from
the tale of Gilgamesh through the accounts of Genesis, have claimed to reveal how the universe and humanity
originated. There are also stories
about the final days when, for whatever reason, life will cease to exist.
Just as nearly all cultures have a creation myth, they likewise have some
idea of how their world is to perish.
Today, many fundamentalist
Christians - and a surprisingly diverse
and large portion of other people believe that we are approaching those
final days, the end times. Some speak
of a widespread sense of dread, a
confluence of events and processes
foretold in prophetic utterances in everything from the Bible or the writings of Nostradamus, to alleged warnings from long-dead civilizations, or
Winter 1996-1997

even scientists.
From television
preachers to Internet prophets, to the
tabloids at the supermarket check-out
counter, murmurs about the end of the
world are suddenly going mainstream.
For evangelical or fundamentalist
Christians, those end times are the
fulfillment ofbiblical prophecy foretold
in apocalyptic writings such as the
Book of Daniel and the Apocalypse
<Revelation). Wars, famines, earthquakes, accidents, and other calamities are increasingly viewed as signs
and portents that humanity is indeed
barreling down the Apocalypse Road,
with the pedal to the meta1. Beyond
the next turn - maybe - are such dramatic unfoldings as the Rapture,
Tribulation, the appearance of the
dreaded Antichrist, and the Second
Coming of the Messiah.
There are other travelers on the
Apocalypse Road, too. As the year 2000
approaches, it isn't just the regular
viewers of The 700 Club who seem to
be tapping into a cultural wellspring
of anxiety and expectation that something momentous and cataclysmic is
about to happen. Since the 1970s,
American Atheist

western culture has been mushing it's

brain with a steady diet of new-age
faddism. Combined with the contemporary quest for spirituality rampant
among the generation
of baby
boomers, this is producing a confluence of bizarre hybrids fusing traditional religious metaphors with popculture, new-age kitsch. As with many
biblical fundamentalists,
the year
2000 is laden with millennialist potential- everything from the landing of
wise, benevolent aliens in flying saucers to the revealing of a "Cosmic
Christ" (best described as a blissedout Jesus on Prozac), with perhaps the
"transformation" of humanity into a
race of''higher beings" possessing telepathic abilities and other wondrous
talents.
There are theopolitical apocalypticians traveling the road as well. For
them, the millennium promises to be
the long-awaited eschatological confrontation and shoot-out, the ultimate
fighting match between the Forces of
Good and the Powers of Darkness. The
enemy - Jews, Freemasons, blacks,
Atheists, whoremongers, gays, racemixers, race-traitors,
"false Christians" - will receive their due. It is a
long enemies list, indeed. God's chosen children will be waiting out the
floods, plagues, and other calamities
unleashed in the final days, standing
by to reclaim the earth from the
wicked and finally usher in the "New
Jerusalem" foretold in prophetic literature and visions. For these apocalyptic warriors, Jesus isn't on Prozac
as much as he is pumped-up on steroids - with an attitude. Variations on
this theme run deep in the culture;
from the fortified encampments of
white racist survivalists
to hardscrabble biblical literalists. There is
evidence that now this dark vision of
the near-future is a world populated
by technotribalists, killer cultists, organized doomsday storm troopers,juju
warriors, and self-appointed apocalyptic agents of Chaos. As the centrifugal forces of modern society become
more pronounced,
nation states
threaten to disintegrate into competing tribal gangs. Fueled by ecological
catastrophe, economic collapse, and a
Austin, Texas

host of other factors, this peculiar

brand of eschatology is already flexing its muscle.
. Early Days of the End Times
For the Western world, scenarios
about the end times originate mostly
in the body of apocalyptic, eschatological writings of the New and Old
Testaments. It is in the final book,
Revelation, that the most striking and
symbolic representations
about the
end of the world are said by many to
be depicted. It has been dubbed the
"American International
Pictures
version" of the end; and pop-culture
writer Stanley Young reminds us
that while it is definitely worth the
read, most of it is obscure
beyond even the lyrics of
Bob Dylan.
It is a difficult work to
comprehend. Probably no
other piece of writing in history
has been examined more thoroughly
and interpreted more widely. It is the
end-of-the world legend, a doomsday
tale on crack cocaine, 3-D with wraparound multi sound and special effects.
It has been the inspirational fountainhead for mad prophets, pulpit-pounders, frothing apocalypticians, knaves,
credulous fanatics, grade-B movie hustlers, and more.
By most scholarly accounts, Revelation was probably written between
90-96 C.E. by someone named John. It
is not entirely certain that this was the
same John of the apostles, especially
given the lack ofhistorical evidence for
even the existence of Jesus. Some
records suggest that Revelation was
set down after John had been tortured,
boiled in oil, and exiled to Patmos, an
island in the lEgean Sea about seventy
miles from Ephesus. Whoever wrote
the text of Revelation, though, probably lived during the reign of the emperor Domitian, a formidable persecutor of the early Christian church.
Revelation is composed as prophetic vision, and divided into six
parts replete with symbolism and numerological code. The number seven
which traditionally has represented
perfection, is used 54 times. Twelve,
identified with the tribes of Israel,
Winter 1996-1997

appears 23 times. The numerical references to beasts,

seals, horns,
churches, and other artifacts found in
Revelation harkens back to the ancient practice of gematria. Religious
mystics ofthe Greek and Roman times
assumed that many sacred texts, including the Bible, had both a literal
meaning and a deeper sub-textual significance revealed through numerical
analysis of letters and names.
This book also boasts a cast of
players like no other - the Harlot,
beasts, angels blowing trumpets and
opening scrolls, the 144,000 followers,
and of course Satan himself who ends
up being subdued, set loose, imprisoned yet again, and finally consigned
to eternal fire after the cataclysmic
Battle of Armageddon. Revelation
turns out to be a work of fantastic,
even demented proportions. When the
sixth trumpet sounds, for instance,
200 million horsemen pour out of the
east to slay one-third of the earth's
people. Their mounts spew forth fire,
smoke, and sulfur, but even this bloodfest does not stop the heathens from
worshipping idols of gold, bronze, and
silver. A giant mountain crashes into
the sea (a comet or asteroid"), and a
third of the ocean life dies. A third of
the light of the sun, moon, and stars
Page 5

From the earliest days of the

church, anticipations of millennium the thousand-year reign of the returned Christ - were beginning to conflict with certain established ecclesiastical policies. In what is today Turkey, a man named Montanus claimed
to have experienced a vision of a heavenly New Jerusalem about to descend
to the earth. This utopian prophecy
was quickly perceived as a threat to
ecclesiastical authority, though, and
Hippolytus, writing in 215 C.E. accused the Montanist believers of heresy, including listening to revelations
from female seers. Montanism continued to spread, especially
after
Tertullian - the brilliant legal scholar
who had been born in Carthage and
converted to Christianity in 196 C.E.
- joined the movement. He too reported a vision of this heavenly city
descending from the sky, a metaphor
which persisted for centuries.
Hippolytus did his own calculations about the end times, based
Early Christians believed that the mostly on the writings found in John.
end of the world and the reappearance
He believed that the evil empire of
of their Messiah were immanent.
Revelation was Rome, and that the
Christ's return
ticket had been
Christian church still had a couple of
punched for their lifetime. In this con- centuries left. to fulfill its mission of
text, say many biblical scholars,
spreading the gospel before the
eschatological literature such as Rev- world ended.
elation was not describing a distant
Early Christians, though, were
star-wars battle pitting Jehovah
impatient. What would the
against Satan, but instead depicted
heavenly kingdom be like?
the persecution ofthe early Christian
they wondered. How would
church by villains like Nero or the righteous live after years
Domitian. Indeed, Revelation cau- of torment and persecution
tioned: "Do not seal up the words of once Satan and his minthe prophecy of this book for the time ions have been vanis near..."
quished? For followers of
Even the church father Irenseus,
a Gnostic
prophet
in the second century C.E., wrote that
named Cerinthus, it
there was to be a Kingdom of Heaven
would be a time to
soon, and on earth. He criticized here- reap the benefits of
tical groups like the Gnostics who unconditional
chose to interpret eschatological litera- faith.
ture and prophecy strictly in terms of
Although
being spiritual events. Not so, insisted
Gnosticism
had
Ireneeus - the end would take place spiritualized
events
soon, and the way to know the truth
foretold in Revelation,
concerning this event was to patiently
there were still those who insisted that .
listen to and believe in those who con- paradise
could exist on earth.
stituted the unbroken church hierarCerinthus embraced chiliasm, a
chy going back to the apostles. Already, form of apocalyptic vision that dea party line was being established.
picted the millennium
as a
is extinguished; water is poisoned,
plagues of locusts descend, and there
are monstrous winged-beasts lead by
Abaddon, angel of destruction. Even
Godzilla doesn't have a prayer in this
cosmic upheaval.
Conflict and devastation persist
throughout the verses of Revelation.
In its sheer imagery and traumatic
prophecy, it puts to shame anything
of modern times, from the gruesome
images ofPoe and Clive Barker to the
Wagnerian apocalypticism ofthe Ring
Cycle. It is the Mother of All EndTimes Visions, a near-bottomless pit
filled with raw material for the human
imagination, so rich and at times incoherent that the symbolism can be
construed to depict anything lurking
in our deepest fears or longings.
It was not very long after the writing of Revelation that people began
interpreting its verses according to
their own expectations and psychological requirements.

Page 6

Winter 1996-1997

physical
and material
period.
Cerinthus said that after the resurrection there would be an earthly kingdom of Christ, and that the flesh, that
is, men, again inhabiting Jerusalem
would be subject to desires and pleasure. He added, "The kingdom of
Christ would ... consist in the satisfaction of the stomach and of even lower
organs, in eating, and drinking and
nuptial pleasures."
No wonder that this vision of sensual ecstasy moved one writer to describe Cerinthus and his followers by
noting, "There was great enthusiasm
among his supporters for that end ..."
Many chiliasts
believed
that in the millenall manner of physical
cr aving would be satiated, that
men
would find all women
beautiful, and willing to
par take in carnal delights.
Others taught
that women would bear
many
children, but without the pain of
childbirth
or
even the inconvenience of sex.
Indeed, there is
a colorful
streak in the
millennialist

American Atheist

through the centuries has focused on

the matter of sex. Often the males (especially those in leadership positions)
are enticed with visions of seductive
and willing women, ''brides of Christ"
on earth, chosen to receive "the seed"
of a charismatic prophet, even if his
name is Joseph Smith, Rajneesh, or
David Koresh. This preoccupation
with "seed" resonates today with
dystopian, apocalyptic sects, especially those of a racialist bent intent
on "protecting the seed" from "pollution" inflicted by other groups.
The cranky theologian Origen,
however, was quick to condemn the
chiliasts, who had described the New
Jerusalem as a place paved with gold

and precious stones, where believers

would be rewarded by having their
pagan persecutors as slaves (along
with the bonus, presumably, of "willing women"). "Flesh and blood cannot
inherit the Kingdom of God," declared
Origen. For the institutionalized
church, spirituality - not full bellies
or exhausted loins - was to be the salvation of souls. Origen was true to his
word, castrating himself in order to
avoid temptation or suspicion while
spreading the gospel to (potentially
"willing") women.

Problems for the Church

These anticipations rampant in
early Christian communities resulted

in considerable problems for church

fathers who busied themselves codifying dogma and constructing a farflung ecclesiastical movement. Too
many of the flock were waiting for the
end rather than living the kind of life
and having the sorts of beliefs that the
bishops demanded. End-times fever
simply would not go away, and much
of it remained centered on the hedonistic New Jerusalem, a salvationist
Las Vegas with rewards, luxury, happiness, swollen bellies, and fiery loins.
In North Africa there arose the
Donatists, led by Tyconius, who predicted that the world would end in 380
C.E.Augustine, then Bishop of Hippo,
took aim at the sect in an effort to dis-

Apocalypse Minutice
For Christians, especially those
who accept the literal interpretation
of biblical text, there are several endtimes camps or interpretations; and
there are peculiar mixtures which can
be invented and popularized to fit
one's perception of circumstances.
Considering the popularity of his
books, millions must agree with Hal
Lindsey, pop-culture drum major for
the apocalypse, that "few people today doubt that history is moving toward some sort of climactic catastrophe ..." The sequence and details
vary depending on whether you
choose pre-, post-, or mid-tribulationist scenarios, or even believe in
multiple-rapture theory, where the
chosen (living and dead) rise to
heaven. Lindsey, Pat Robertson,Jerry
Falwell,and much of the high-profile
Christian
right are considered
dispensationalists who believe in the
eras or dispensations
of history.
Within this category one finds a
stable of end-times tendencies and
camps.

Cut-and-Run Salvation
Pretribulationists believe that the
rapture of the chosen will take place
prior to a seven-year period of sufAustin, Texas

fering to be known as the tribulation.

At rapture, those chosen by god ascend
into heaven. Dead bodies are reconstituted if necessary to facilitate this process. The seven-year period includes all
of the terrors found in Revelation, including famine, war, pestilence, and the
reign of the Antichrist. "Pre- Tribs" are
basically waiting for Christ and the cosmic cavalry to show up just in time to
rescue the elect (in some interpretations believed to number 144,000),
while others remain behind to endure
the agony of the tribulation. Whether
redeemed by good works or solid faith,
the elect rise to heaven and avoid Satan's
last grasp for power.

Hell and Damnation - Almost

There are midtribulationist
rapturists, though, for whom Christ
chooses to wait three-and-a-half years
before he rescues them, in the midst of
persecution. By this time, the Antichrist
has seized control of the world, and in
the modern versions is conducting gruesome executions of believers, confiscating Bibles,promoting godless one-world
government, and fluoridating the water
supply. Those who refuse to wear the
feared "Mark of the Beast" - a tattoo
or bar-code which some believe will be
Winter 1996-1997

stamped on everyone's forehead or

hand - are ostracized and forbidden to
do business of any kind. The "people of
faith" endure persecution in a sort of
reverse-Inquisition. Decadence and debauchery abound, and the "true church"
is replaced by a secular or false religion
presided over by the Antichrist's sidekick, the False Prophet. Some prophetic
literature insists that the Antichrist is
alive today, in his mid-forties, and will
survive an accident which will bring him
to public attention.

Pumped-Up for Parousia

Posttribulationists have been aptly
described as the "hang-tough-throughdisasters lot." They are believers who
see plenty of suffering ahead as their god
chooses to get even with sinners. The
chosen must endure the entire tribulation, and its sink-or-swim doomsday
promise appeals to right-wing survivalist
types,
especially
those
in the
theopolitical orbit of movements like
Christian Identity and Aryan Nations.
"Post- Tribs" don't exactly see Star Trek
in the near future. There's nuclear war,
financial collapse, rioting (usually by testosterone-overloaded
blacks), mandatory mixing of races, and molesting of
children by degenerate homosexuals.
Page 7

prove what he termed "out-dated and

inappropriate dreams of an earthly
paradise." After his death in 430 C.E.,
a council of church leaders meeting at
Ephesus condemned the literalist vision of a physical, worldly millennialist utopia.
After so many centuries, though,
the Second Coming wasn't even a postponed cameo role - it was an out-andout no-show. Jesus did not return, and
the Parousia, as it was termed, was
routinely being postponed and rescheduled due to technical prophetic
difficulties. Apocalyptic movements
rose and fell, and by the end of the first
millennium, the fascination with the

end of the world persisted in the public imagination. Many Christians eagerly sought signs befitting the template of last-days prophecy. Otto III,
with the cooperation of Pope Sylvester
II, was busy extending his rendition
of the Roman Empire. The emperor's
coronation regalia depicted imaginative scenes from the verses of Revelations. Sylvester, who had received
much of his knowledge through eastern occultists, was busy applying the
lore ofthe kaballah and esoteric books,
in an effort to comprehend the present
and future.
In the twelfth century came
Joachim of Flore (1130-1202), a

Circle the Winnebagos! Stock up on the another battle between King Josiah of
ammo and freeze-dried food! The Jesus Judah and another Egyptian ruler. Acof the posttribulationist
crowd often
cording to 2 Kings 23:29: "Pharaohsports swastika tattoos and Doc-Mar- nechoh king of Egypt went up against
tin boots, and he'll be spending seven the king of Assyria ...and king JOSiah
years whipping the ass of the human went against him; and he slew him
race. Everyone lucky enough to live must (joslah) at Megiddo.:"
endure the suffering of the tribulation,
For biblical literalists and others,
and there is no guarantee that the cho- Armageddon is Satan's Last Stand. Desen few will even survive.About the only spite his unlimited power, tribulationist
hope which exists in some Post-Trib
persecutions, and supermarket barcircles is that after about three-fourths
codes, he is nevertheless prophesied
of the population is dead (some by hang- to go down for the count and end up
ing and shooting), the chosen - inevita- vanquished for eternity to a burning
bly white folks - will create some monolake of fire.
chrome utopia free of collard greens and
Along with Hal lindsey, these
rap music.
Omni-Max versions of Final-Days FolMany Raptures, Many Ruptures
lies are promoted by countless fundaThere is also a partial-rapture sce- mentalist outreaches like that of Sanario where numerous raptures occur
lem Kirban, whose books have found
during the tribulation. Jesus returns,
their way into drugstore and supermarand there is finally a thousand-year
ket reading racks, and eventually yard
period of peace followed by"eternity."
sales and thrift-store shelves.
But in all of these possible versions of
"Sometime in the near future sevthe end times, the Antichrist and his eral million people will suddenly dislegions run amok, and engage in one . appear from this earth in the twinlast slug-fest at the Battle of Armagedkling of an eye," Kirban assures his
don. In the time of John, suspected
readers. His books show a detailed,
author of Revelation,Armageddon was exciting timetable for events during
Har-Megiddon or "Mount of Megiddo," the" end times. By his reckoning, eva small town fifty-five miles north of ery symbol and metaphor in RevelaJerusalem.Around the fifteenth century
tion has a corresponding character or
B.C.E.,the Egyptian pharaoh Thutmose
event in the future. The second seal, a
III defeated the Canaanites there. In rider on a red horse, rivers of blood 608 B.C.E., Me iddo was the scene of all of this is real.
Page 8

Winter 1996-1997

Cistercian monk who devised a system

ofsrecula, or ages. Joachim interpreted
human events as unfolding within distinct temporary periods; people thus
began to consider themselves as living "in an age," with all of these stecula
accumulating until the millennialist
last days. In Joachim's trek down the
Apocalypse Road there were to be
three successive stages: the Age of the
Father (Old Testament), the Age of the
Son (New Testament), and the Age of
the Holy Spirit. The New Catholic Encyclopedia notes that after the culmination of these ages, "hierarchy and
sacraments will disappear, monasticism as the essence of the primitive
Church will become the vehicle of the
new-age." The Cistercian set the year
1260 as the date of the Messiah's return, but even when this prophetic
timetable failed, a veritable cottage
industry of trying to predict the apocalypse continued to thrive.
Thirteen centuries of history had
seen a radical transformation in the
fate and status of the Christian
church. It was easily the wealthiest
and most powerful organization in its
part of the world, and it was also the
only transnational
or international
entity playing-off respective monarchies and principalities against each
other while courting special privilege
with all. The church managed to endure, even if Parousia (the Second
Coming) was on temporary hold. But
beneath the surface of ecclesiastical
'and feudal authority, there persisted
an undercurrent of anxiety originating from the peasantry and other malcontents. Some resentments
found
their vent in witchcraft, or in the stubborn retaining of old nature-oriented
cults. Still others discovered refuge in
apocalyptic scenarios, or in covert opposition to the clergy and the church
in general. While some later historians and social critics would praise the
Middle Ages as a time when "there was
a place for everyone, and for everyone
a place," it was a time of ignorance,
resentment, and periodic peasant uprisings followed by brutish repression.
The western part of Czechoslovakia was once known as Bohemia; and
by the late fourteenth century, a deAmerican Atheist

bauched and corrupt clergy owned

nearly one-third of the land and as
much of the treasury. To the local inhabitants,
ecclesiastical
overseers
were a bloated and foreign Germanic
ruling class in a predominantly Slavic
region. One Jan Milicz proclaimed that
the reign of the Antichrist existed in
Bohemia in the person of the Emperor
Charles IV, with the Roman Catholic
Church playing the detested role of
False Prophet. Many people quickly
embraced this sentiment, including a
philosopher
at the University
of
Prague, Jan Huss. Huss publicly denounced numerous clerical abuses,
including the sale of indulgences and
positions by the pope (an objection
later raised by Luther in the Reformation). Soon, a Hussite movement arose,
joining the agrarian peasantry with
townspeople and merchants
in demanding immediate reform. A radical
sect known as the Taborites wanted
more - they called for outright social
revolution, and began establishing fortified compounds including one they
named Mount Tabor after the mountain in the New Testament
where
Christ had foretold his second coming.
In 1419, a Taborite preacher
announced that between February 10
and 14 of the following year, fire would
rain down upon every city and village
which was not a Taborite community.
Christ would then appear and take his
rightful place as the Emperor of
Bohemia, ushering in the long-awaited
millennium. This would make another
of Joachim's "ages," one without need
of the institutional church. All people
would be free and equal. Some thought
that all property would be held in common, while others eagerly echoed the
theme of women bearing many children without even the need for intercourse.
Once again, the failure of prophecy did not dissipate either personal
expectations or social discontent. By
1420, there were three major sides in
the Taborite conflict, each with a large
and belligerent army intent on ridding
the world (or at least Bohemia) of sinners. Hussites, Taborites, and the papacy-supported Royalists engaged in
a bloody civil war until 1471, when the
Austin, Texas

Hussites emerged victorious and established

their faith as the official church until 1620.
By the 1500s, there
was a steady flow of
predictions about the
end of the world, and a
macabre
game
of
"name the Antichrist"
was in fashion. Hieronymus Bosch (1450?1516) had given Europeans a colorful and
nightmarish
vision of
hell and the devil. Nine
years after his death
soothsayers were predicting February
1,
1524 as Doomsday, this
time through deluge of .:
water. Thousands
of
people, particularly in
England,
abandoned
~~--their homes for higher .. ~~.
ground. Feb. 1 came
and went, and astrolo- -------------------=:..:..::..--~
gers quickly "revised"
their calculations
for
yet another century.

The Messianic
Legacy
---.
--.--------~
Continues
Along with the prophecy of the end
times inevitably arose the claim of
messianic
inheritance.
Biblical
eschatology prophesied the Parousia,
Armageddon (as the ultimate conflict
of good and evil), judgment of souls,
and millennium - the thousand-year
reign.of Christ on earth. Discovering
signs of impending apocalypse required equally. vigorous efforts to locate the Messiah who would usher in
this period of the New Jerusalem.
Self-messiahship had existed since
the time Jesus is alleged to have
walked the earth, of course. But the
various "christs" of New Testament
times were followed in subsequent centuries by men who linked their own
destiny to the unfolding of apocalyptic prophesy. One such self-authored
messiah was a Jew named Shabtai Zvi
(Sabbatai
Sevi), who in 1648 anWinter 1996-1997

__

__J

nounced his godly status to a band of

followers. He was driven from his
home in Smyrna (Turkey) following
this, but continued to insist that he
would soon perform marvelous deeds.
In 1666, he set off for Constantinople
in a crusade to dethrone the Sultan.
His followers were ecstatic, and Jews
throughout Europe began selling their
worldly goods and heading off to join
the messianic army. The outcome,
though, did not exactly fulfill the
promise of the apocalyptic drama. In
more a version of opera bouffe, the
Sultan induced Zvi to convert to Islam,
much to the dismay of the prophet's
followers.
There have been all manner of
gloom-and-doom predictions concerning the end of the world, along with a
flock of would-be saviors and messiahs. And there have been convulsive,
Page 9

periodic waves of apocalypse

fever, along with ceaseless
hunts for the Antichrist and
other characters in the Revelation scenario. Especially in
times of social uncertainty
and dislocation, the quest for
the Antichrist assumes the
coloration of a bizarre historical parlor game. The bestiary
identified by this game includes Frederick II in the
thirteenth century, Napoleon,
multiple popes, Hitler, Stalin,
Pol Pot, Fidel Castro, Henry
Kissinger, and the King of
Spain, Juan Carlos. (Despite
his command over a small
and impoverished 'island nation, Castro was selected for
Antichristhood thanks to a
CIA covert operation, when
that intelligence service attempted to instigate a revolt
against the cigar-smoking
strongman. The spooks in
Langley created an instant
"shake'n-bake"-style prophecy which said that the Virgin Mary was coming to save
the world, but would by-pass Cuba as
the people were "unworthy" and "sinful" for tolerating Fidel.)
The eventual demise ofAntichrist
candidates, though, due to death, retirement, or other circumstances, does
not stop the game or quench the thirst.
New candidates are quickly discovered, just as new events are pounded
into the procrustean mold of apocalyptic prophecy. Wars, famines, floods,
momentous political changes, movements of planets, even solar eclipses,
are all grist for the final-judgment
mill. When Comet Shoemaker-Levy
broke into fragments and crashed into
Jupiter in 1974, for instance, everyone
from new-agers to traditional Indian
religionists perceived this to be an
omen - but of exactly what they could
not agree.

Looking Ahead - Disneyland

for Doomsdayers
So what is supposed to happen
when 2000 finally arrives? Some predict that we will have a repeat of the
Page 10

25 in Rome marked the new

year, a holdover from the ancient holiday of Saturnalia.
The early Christian church
had grafted the celebration
onto a "holyday" designed to
commemorate
the virgin
birth of Jesus. Saturnalia,
though, was a "solar" commemoration,
mar-king approximately that time of the
year when the sun reached its
lowest point in the annual
journey across the sky (winter solstice) and was "reborn"
or "resurrected." In England,
the new millennium didn't
arrive until March 25, although Spain and Portugal
waited until January 1. Even
so, popular myths about the
end of the first millennium
tell us that farmers did not
plan t crops because the end
was near, that famine resulted, that people abandoned their houses and property. Little of this actually
happened, but the millennialist paradigm
- widehysterics of a thousand years ago when spread fear and anxiety coupled with
the first millennium drew to a close, mass expressions of fervent religiosonly colorized and with a better sound- ity - persist.
Just as people disagreed as to extrack. The historical record, however,
suggests that there was not consider- actly when the first millennium ended,
today a similar debate rages about
able apocalyptic dread specifically
linked to the year 1000. It was not re- when the third millennium arrives. Is
ally 1,000 years after the birth ofJesus
it 20nO or 2001? In Israel, our year
Christ, anyway. His existence is prob- 2000 will be 5761. Muslims will count
lematic, and even those who believe it as 1421, and for the Chinese it will
in the historicity of the Christian mes- be 4698.
siah quibble over the exact year of his
None of these problems about datbirth. There is also a convoluted his- ing seem to weaken the band-wagon
tory of how exactly calendric time was effect which already is building in anfirst assigned, and then altered, going ticipation of the year 2000. Apocalypback to one Dennis the Diminutive
-tic belief is similar to other elements
(Dionysius Exiguus). Struggling with in the religious mind-set. It possesses
the fact that Passover, when Jesus is incredible immunity to the truth, and
manifests a plasticity which allows
said to have risen from the dead,
shifted each year according to the lu- doctrines, phobias, and beliefs to renar cycle, this sixth century abbot at- shape endlessly to support new millentempted to find an appropriate and nialist perceptions. The fever will
strike, in part because so many people
fixed time to celebrate the holiday.
Dennis' mathematics was fraught
expect it to happen!
For many individuals, including
with errors, so that when 1000 C.E.
arrived, it did so in different places at tens of millions of fundamentalist or
relatively different times. December
See Countdown page 52
Winter 1996-1997

American Atheist

The CttUPflCflBitfiS
II Monster For the Hew Millennium?

Tales and hysteria about

the "blood-sucker"
monster have captivated
news audiences in
Mexico, Puerto Rico,
and now the United
States. The legend of
the chupacabras is
closely linked to religious
mysticism, reports of
UFOs, aliens, and
apocalypse

Conrad Goeringer is an antiquarian bookseller and free

lance writer who lives on the
cape of New Jersey. A frequent
speaker at American Atheists
national conventions, he is
director of American Atheists
On-line Services and a contributing editor of American Atheist.

Conrad F. Goeringer
Austin, Texas

It's not just reports about flying saucers, apparitions of the Virgin
Mary, or the prophecies
of
Nostradamus which are contributing to the accumulating wave
of millennialist Angst. Now,
the apocalypse seems to have
its very own generic monster. If Godzilla was the symbol of
nuclear catastrophe for the Japanese
(the celluloid beast was, after all, suggested to be the product of atomic testing gone awry), the blood-sucking
chupacabras or "goat-sucker" is fast
becoming the poster-kid ofthe upcoming millennium bash. What started off
in Puerto Rico, and then Mexico, as
reports of a bizarre creature which had
a predilection for the blood of farm
animals, has spread to the United
States. In mid-May of 1996, the Cable
News Network (CNN) was treating the
chupacabras as a kind of digital celebrity, and by summer the winged-hybrid
creature had apparently crossed the
American pop-culture landscape, arriving in - of a IIplaces - Long Island,
and announcing its presence with reports of farm animal abuse.
Even Joe Friday would find the
facts about the chupacabras elusive
and ambiguous, and as with other reports of paranormal
or mystical
events, there is the profound chasm
between truth and anticipation. Believers in the chupacabras say that the
beast isa hybrid creature, in appearance something which resembles a
cross between a giant dog and a lizard. It is said to walk upright on two
feet, is capable of flight, and sinks its
fangs into victims and kills them by
drinking their blood. News reports of
chupacabras
sightings come from
mostly rural areas; and while the mysterious creature seems to prefer farm
animals like sheep, goats, and chickens, it has been alleged to attack humans.
Winter 1996-1997

"Myth or reality?" mused CNN

during a blitz of reports about the antics of the blood-sucker. For medical
experts, the puncture wounds found
on some dead animals weren't the
work of a cryptic life form that Darwin and his successors happened to
overlook while back-tracking along the
evolutionary highway. Many suggest
that the monster is really a wolf or
coyote, fairly common in many of the
areas which appear to have spawned
chupacabras reports. And for some,
the' tale about this elusive monster has
many similarities to the "cattle-mutilation scare" of the late 1970s and
1980s.
Those reports also came from rural areas, mostly in the United States,
and involved claims that cattle were
being killed and surgically dissected.
Often, it was reported that the animals
had been drained of all blood - something similar to the condition of the
chupacabras' victims. There was a variety of theories to explain this bizarre
phenomenon, but critics were quick to
point out that nothing unusual was
taking place, save for the persistent
interest of news media, and some outrageous, inaccurate, and unverified
claims. The "dissected" cattle had simply been attacked by natural predators whose sharp claws, beaks, and
teeth usually left precise-cut-like tears
in the prey. Some of the "mutilated"
cattle had been dead for long periods,
and often a thorough autopsy on the
remains was difficult, or not done. An
epidemic of attacks could be caused by
natural predators reacting to changes
in their own food sources; a decline in
the numbers of naturally available
prey, such as deer or other animals
could send predators roaming out of
their usual terrain into farm and
ranching areas.
The cattle-mutilation
phenomenon often existed as a media event.
Page 11

News organizations paid considerable

attention to reports at first, but then
failed to follow-up on
the less
glamorous results of
official investigations,
autopsies
(when possible), and other probes.
A number of scenarios
were conjured to explain the "mysterious" mutilations.
Originally, they were
seen as evidence of a mysterious government operation
which required organs, -tissue, and
blood for bizarre biological experiments. But there was a disturbing
problem. Often, reports noted that
there were no tire tracks, footprints,
or other traces of human activity
around the animal carcasses. Mutilation enthusiasts then proposed that
whoever had embarked on a career of
night-time animal abuse was using helicopters, or extended-lift
"cherry
picker" vehicles in order to not leave
tracks.
By the 1980s, the legend about
cattle mutilation had evolved to even
more sophisticated
and fantastic
heights. The killings were blamed on
secret, satanic cults which used the
body parts in devil-worship rituals.
Indeed, it was claimed that the removal of specific parts from the animals, such as the eyes, lips, ear, and
anus, were "proof' of this. Critics noted
that these organs were generally softer
and more accessible to natural predators. And why would a cult or government agency (presumably one wealthy
enough to afford helicopters or enormous utility vehicles) go to such
lengths? Why didn't the devil-worshipping, mutant-making craziesjustpur-

chase a cattle ranch?

Who might find it difficult to walk
into the local land office and pay cash
for a tidy spread of ranch land? Aliens.
Soon, the cattle mutilations were being associated with mysterious lights
in the sky - UFOs. Were blood and organs necessary for a strange alien experiment? Was Elsie the Cow sufficient excuse for an advanced race of
space-faring beings to expend huge resources crossing interstellar space?
Page 12

Perhaps
those
pointy-head
scientists who directed giant radio telescopes at
distan t stars
should
have
been broadcastc::::::..~ing "Old McDonald Had a Farm" instead of mathematical codes.
Was Elsie the Cow sufficient excuse for an advanced race of space-faring beings to expend huge resources
crossing interstellar space?
Tales of animal-abusing
aliens
developed on the fringes of American
culture and then spread to other countries, including Japan, through the
subculture of flying-saucer believers.
Bizarre accounts of alien abduction,
sexual experimentation, and genetic
manipulation began to emerge, and
not just on the afternoon talk-show
circuit. These stories attracted the interest of certain psychologists who had
already thoroughly tapped the market
in "ritual child abuse." If a patient's
emotional problems weren't the result
of sexual abuse at the hands of a
pedophile ring or satanic cult (often
with mom and dad participating), perhaps aliens were to blame. Currently,
about 2% of Americans believe that
they may be victims of alien abduction;
they report experiences of being transported out of their bedrooms at night
into a strange setting (presumably an
alien craft) and subjected to horrifying medical procedures. There are stories of sexual encounters, anal rape,
and hybrid births.
In the talk shows and television
specials which have transmitted legends about satanic cults, mutilated
Winter 1996-1997

cattle, and over-sexed aliens, skeptics

and critics rarely have had an opportunity to ask questions about these
claims, or to suggest more prosaic
and realistic explanations as to what
might really be taking place. Talk-show guests
continue to insist that they
have been impregnated by
spacemen,
abused by
cults as "satanic babybreeders," or implanted
with
strange,
alien devices.
Millions are still
tuning in and
believing.
Fears about such horrors, though,
are often exhibited in a wider context
of social anxiety and uncertainty about
the future. The claims about mutilated
cattle often originated in economically
depressed regions. Fears of satanic
cults on the loose and seeking to abduct young, virginal children often
thrive in smaller communities, and
frequently hint at generational conflicts or the anxieties of religious
groups prone to apocalyptic scenarios.
Social scientists have observed that,
like the cattle-mutilation reports, the
"satanic panic" of the 70s and 80s was
essentially a kind of urban legend
which had received an electronic-media steroid boost. In many cases, the
reports were fueled by uncritical and
ratings-hungry
news organizations
which found that Satan and aliens attracted new viewers.
Of Jersey Devils and Puerto
Rican Vampires
Reports of unusual beasts which
appear to defy known anatomical descriptions are not unusual. From
Egyptian hieroglyphs to the apocalyptic literature of the bible, a blending
of animal characteristics - sometimes
with human features - is often seen.
Centaurs, mermaids, Middle-Eastern
deities, Central American gods - all
depict a mythological bestiary which
is laden with symbolism. Mariners at
one time described incredible creatures, and the legend "Here be Monsters!" was simply a cartographical description of uncharted waters.
American Atheist

Folk literature occasionally involves such hybrid beasts, as in the

case of the "Jersey Devil." In the mid1800s,reports throughout New Jersey,
and later even Pennsylvania, told of a
demon creature
which attacked
people, chickens, goats, and other
farm animals. In their book The Jersey Devil, James McGloy and Ray
Miller note that the beast
is said to prowl the lonely sand
trails and mist-shrouded
marshes of the Pine Barrens,
and emerge periodically to
rampage through the towns
and cities ... In its wake it has
left many communities
in
near hysteria. Schools, factories, and theaters have closed,
armed men have "ridden shotgun" on public transportation,
and innumerable posses have
been formed to track the monster.
Reports of the Jersey Devil appear
to have peaked in the early 1900s.
McGloy and Miller, perhaps using a
bit ofliterary license, note that "thousands of people saw the Devil, and his
footprints." They referred to him as
''kangaroo horse," "flying death," and
even "woozlebug." One observer
claimed:
Its head resembled that of
a ram, with curled horns, and
its long thick neck was thrust
forward in flight. It had long
thin wings and short legs, the
front legs shorter than the
hind. Again, it uttered its
mournful and awful call - a
combination of a squawk and
a whistle, the beginning very
high and piercing and ending
very low and hoarse ...
Sightings of the Jersey Devil, or
reports that his tracks had been discovered, were surprisingly frequent.
The Philadelphia Record exposed at
least some of the legend as an outright
hoax, though, when the beast was allegedly caught and put on exhibit at a
local museum. The "devil" portrayed
Austin, Texas

by the Record artist had bat-like wings which assured the public that "The
and resembled a mythical dragon. The Jersey Devil is a Hoax." During the
hoax was said to be a heavily painted . following decade, reports
about
kangaroo shown to the public for only strange tracks led to renewed interthe briefest moment in dim lighting.
est in the creature, and state game ofFor the next few decades, the Jer- ficials set out traps and ambushes to
sey Devil is said to have appeared
calm the local residents. Even today,
ravaged animals at a poultry farm or
throughout different parts of the state.
Around the time of World War I, re- horrendous cries in the night keep the
port McGloy and Miller, "some type of legend of the Jersey Devil alive and
a strange animal, reputedly the J er- thriving.
Like the Jersey Devil or other folkcreatures, the chupacabras is a FranWas Elsie the Cow
kenstein animal. It "jumps like a kansufficient excuse for an
garoo" and "smells like sulfur." It is
"four
or five feet tall ...huge elongated
advanced race of
red eyes." One witness claimed "A
space-faring beings to
pointy, long tongue came in and out of
his mouth. It was gray but his back
expend huge resources
changed colors ...it was a monster!"
crossing interstellar
The legend of "el chupacabras"
space?
does not come originally from Mexico,
--------------though, but can be traced back to
sey Devil, was killed and put on exhi- Puerto Rico. There, the "goat sucker"
bition in Patterson." In 1925, The
was often portrayed as a kind of halfWoodbury Daily Times reported that a man, half-beast vampire. There also
man in Gloucester County encountered
were tales about other blood-drinking
creatures, including the "vampire of
a large beast consuming his chickens,
chased the creature for about half-a- Moca," reported during the 1970s mile, shot it and exhibited the remains
about the time the cattle-mutilation
to hundreds of curious visitors. It was fears were starting in the United
States.
as big as a grown Airedale with
According to The New York Times,
black fur resembling Astrafears about the chupacabras
have
khan; having a kangaroo-fash"both alarmed and amused this US
ioned hop; forequarters higher
commonwealth of 3.7 million people,
inspiring theories, satire, and Tthan its rear, which were always crouched; and hind feet
shirts." One account says that the
offour webbed toes ...Its crushblood-sucker is really an alien aters in the lower jaws each have
tracted to Puerto Rico by the giant
Arecibo Observatory, site of the world's
four prongs into which the upper teeth fit perfectly.
largest single-dish radio telescope.
Others insist that "people involved in
The Times was unable to locate ei- bloody rituals" - a phrase which
ther the farmer or the evanescent
evokes images of satanic cults - are
beast, but in neighboring counties
responsible for the animal mutilations,
there were still Jersey Devil sightings.
and that the chupacabras is only a
ruse.
Posses chased the beast in Salem
County, and in 1932, a heavily-armed
The chupacabras has attracted the
detachment of citizens and police
interest of parts of the international
combed the area around Woodstown UFO community including a man
following reports of "chilling screams
named Jorge Martin, the editor of
Evidencia, a paranormal-flying saucer
and cries from the woods."
Into the 1950s, fears of the Jersey
interest publication. He claims that
Devil were prompting authorities to "thousands
of animals have been
try to calm down excited school chil- killed" and "communities now live in
fear." In addition, says Martin, "lumidren and post signs along highways
Winter 1996-1997

Page 13

nous oval and pyramidal shaped UFOs

have been seen in the vicinity where
animals have been mutilated and,
found to be without blood." Despite
this alleged extraterrestrial
connection, though, he adds that "it is quite
possible that the chupacabras or ABEs
("Anomalous Biological Entities")
could have been developed by humans."
The chupacabras
made it to
America through Miami, specifically
with the help of one of the most popular Spanish-language
television
shows, Cristina. In March of 1996 the
program featured an hour-long report
on the legend, including an interview
with Jose "Chemo" Soto, the colorful
mayor ofCafiovanas, Puerto Rico, who
made the astounding statement that
the chupacabras had claimed more
than 100 victims. Soto was running for
reelection, and had personally organized and led posses of worried citizens hunting the beast - which seems
to have been sighted anywhere search
parties happened to have been. Displaying a swashbuckling persona to
local residents, he has been dubbed
"Chemo (Indiana) Jones." During his
combination tour, search, and destroy
missions, Soto always carried a large
crucifix and supply of garlic, in case
the extraterrestrial turned out to be a
convention vampire. ''Whatever it is,"
warned Soto, "it's highly intelligent.
Today it is attacking animals, but tomorrow it may attack people."
According to The St. Petersburg
Times [March 21, 1996], "Critics say
the hysteria (about the beast) has been
whipped up by sensationalist media
that are eager to promote the legend
as part of a sales or rating drive." It
added that:
Puerto Rico is a fertile market
for such bizarre tales, due to
widespread Afro-Caribbean
cultural and religious beliefs
that involve animal sacrifices
and blood rituals. Officials say
folk monster tales are hard to
combat with rational explanations.
Even though forensic experts have
Page 14

identified dog bites and even paw

prints at sites where small barnyard
animals have been killed, people still
insist on believing that the attacks are
the work of the chupacabras.
Following the Cristina show, reports of animal mutilation began appearing
in South Florida.
The
chupacabras legend then received national exposure in mid-May of 1996,
when CNN picked up the story. "Is it
a mutant vampire? Is it an extra-terrestrial? Or is it simply a figment of
someone's overactive imagination?"
asked correspondent Lucia Newman
from Mexico City.
The legend had all ready made the
rounds of fringe-culture groups and
publications such as Fate magazine,
and was even publicized at sites on the
World-Wide Web. By late June, fears
about the chupacabras had reached as
far as the Hispanic community on
Long Island, New York. A story in the
Long Island publication Newsday
[June 28, 1996] reported that a local
family had found its nine rabbits and
one chicken dead and allegedly bloodless. An investigator with the SPCA
"said an autopsy revealed that the
animals were crushed to death, and
their blood and organs remained inside." That finding, however, was doing little to stop rumors.
Newsday quoted the SPCA officer
as saying that the deaths were probably "a prank by humans. I told them
it was human-related and it did not
convince them." A woman told the paper: "I believe in the chupacabras ... I
believe he's an alien animal of some
sort. There's a lot of experimenting."
Another ruminated that ''The Bible
says you're going to see a lot of mysterious things in the future. It's a mystery."
For now, the chupacabras is reputed to be everything from a bloodthirsty monster to an elusive alien.
There are T-shirts, posters, even a
chupacabras song "popular on Spanish-language radio stations," according to Newsday. Hundreds of people
at a recent Hispanic Day festival wore
chupacabras shirts. One depicted
the creature as a muscled repWinter 1996-1997

tilian-looking thing holding a

lifeless and bleeding goat, and
another (portrayed) the blood
sucker as an almost humanshaped alien dressed in oversized clothes and pinkie ring.
Many of the themes voiced by
chupacabras believers resonate with
the Angst and uncertainty which characterize this premillennium
countdown period. They include a distrust
of established institutions (a cover-up?
CIA experimentation run amok?), a
lack of understanding of science, a belief in paranormal phenomena such as
UFOs and malevolent aliens, and a
folklorish religious mysticism dwelling
on the "strange things" prophesied in
the Bible. The legend also testifies to
the immunity which such claims appear to possess against reasoned, logical investigation. The will to believe in
the chupacabras definitely makes this
elusive hybrid a party-animal for the
1999 New Year's Eve extravaganza.

Subscribe 9\[pw!

Hmerican Htbeist

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American Atheist

Weltome Home, Son

By Henry Oliver

And God said: "Enough is enough,

already."
The Millennium had been cleared,
long since achieving old-joke status by
the year 2019. However, since 2002,
God had been catching heat about the
decadent and deplorable conditions of
the Earth from Moses, Adam, Gabriel,
and John F. Kennedy, to name a few.
The big guy admitted that he had ben
ignoring the Earth for a few hundred
years in lieu of other projects and
added, in his own defense, that no one
likes to confront their own mistakes.
But he agreed that something needed
to be done, so he called for a staff meeting with the highest of his high-level
advisors.
"Fire and brimstone!" Kennedy
demanded. "When those ants see a few
massive fire-balls raining down on
them, they'll shape up in a New York
minute!"
God was not impressed. "Who are
you, Nixon ? No, Jack, that's too cliche.
1 already blew my credibility with
them over the Antichrist thing. Besides, something like that will only
result in another Spielberg movie, and
you know how 1feel about Spielberg."
A collective groan buttered the
boardroom, then the committee fell
silent.
"Send a memo," Moses crowed.
''Youknow how they're so preoccupied
with corporate this and corporate that,
the bottom line, and all that crap! I'm
sure they'd pay attention to something
as official-looking as a memo!"
God sighed. "Not cost effective.
Anyway, since the Global Senate
welshed on their population-control
pact, there's no telling how many
pieces of mail would need to go out to
the horny little bastards. The Postal
Service has never been reliable, and
since they jacked the price of a stamp
up to a buck and a quarter ... "
More uncomfortable
silence.
Austin, Texas

Hands wrung, eyes searched for hiding places.

"Billboards," said Adam.
"No."
"Radio spots," said Gabriel.
"Ho-hum."
''The New York Times," suggested
an unidentified voice that might have
belonged to John Lennon.
God was getting frustrated. "Do
you know what the front page of The
times would cost us? Besides, the only
writer we have on staffis Hemingway,
and he's been hitting the sauce again."
.Jesus knew what was coming. He
started to pray that they wouldn't call
on him, but then realized the futility
in that. On cue, all eyes swept to him
and it was obvious that the decision
had been made.
Oh shit. Not this again, Jesus
thought.
"I heard that," god warned.
"Okay, okay. When do 1 leave?"

*****

Toledo was cold in February. Bureaucratically cold, and The Lord was
not dressed for it. As he trudged the
length of one of the city's loveless,
brooding streets, he could have kicked
himself for not packing some Timberland thermals and warm socks. The
funny sicks with the batteries in them
would have been just lovely, As he
walked, he rehearsed his lines ...
People of the earth. I am Jesus
Christ, the son of God, and I have returned, as promised. My children, I
have come back to finally reveal my
father's and my plan for your eternal
salvation. It is this: Stop taking drugs,
cut back on the liquor, stop cheating
your so-called friends in business, turn
off the T.v., knock it off with the fast
food, stop shtupping your secretary
behind your wife's back, and something
about Spielberg ... Anyway, stop being
such little assholes. Do it now, because
my dad's going to trash this joint with
Winter 1996-1997

one big-assed nova. February 28,2020,

one year from now, this place is toast.
Amen.
Jesus had but one question: Why
Thledo? why couldn't he get this thing
started in, say ... San Diego? Toledo
was cold in February.
Bent against a slicing Canadian
jet stream, muttering and muttering,
Jesus came across the first sign of
human life: The You're Welcome Grille.
Breakfast special: two eggs, bacon,
toast, and coffee ... $1.99! Monday
through Friday only. And thus, the
Apocalypse began.
"Whad'll ya have?" the nearly
pretty waitress said flatly to Jesus.
"Uuuh ... " Jesus struggled, ignorant of Toledo Ohio's contemporary
dining customs.
Glaring, already annoyed, the
nearly pretty waitress shot a menu at
The Lord, then busied herself with
collecting the rank of dirty plates and
coffee cups atop the counter.
"Prune juice!" Jesus announced
-.,riumphantly. ''Yes, 1 will have an order of prune juice."
Unaffected, the waitress finished
her task at hand and disappeared into
the kitchen. She returned within two
minutes with an o-paque glass of
purple-black
liqui - and a bill for
eighty-seven cent. She turned to
scurry away, but Jesus stopped her, his
practiced speech disintegrating to gibberish in his head. She whirled back
on him with a look that said make this
quick or I'll rip your heart out! Then
Jesus began, realizing that Toledo may
be just as cold in July as it is in February.
"M-my name ... My name is Jesus.
My father ... Uuh, that would be God...
sent me to tell ... no, to warn you ... " It
wasn't going as smoothly as Jesus had
expected.
Arms folded across her breasts,
the nearly pretty waitress struck a
Page 15

talking to my boss, he has all the pull structions scribbled on the back. Docpose of sheer amusement.
She
snapped her gum and smirked, trying
around here. Now, don't go anywhere.
tor Malcolm Weintraub accepted the
to remember if she'd ever heard a line I'll be back in one minute. Stay there,
note, studied it, and excused himself
like this one before. she hadn't. this y'hear?" and she didn't wait for a re- thusly:
could be fun.
ply. "Hey, Frank! Frank! Get out here!
''Well, I see. Very well, Mr. Jesus.
"Jesus, aye?" she played, mocked. We have a very important customer
I completely understand the impor''You mean father, son, and holy spirit who'd like to have a word with you! tance of this information, and I don't
Jesus? That Jesus?"
hey Frank, you dumb bastard! Get think we should waste a moment get"The same," Jesus replied, false your ass out here!"
ting it out to ... the people."
humility shining like neon.
Frank was very impressed with
"Now you're talkin', brother!"
''You mean, died on the cross for what the Lord had to say, as were of- Jesus leaned back in his chair and
our sins Jesus? That very same one? ficers Pike and Bukowski of the Thledo laced his fmgers behind his head, just
C'mon! You're pulling my leg! This was Metro Police. The officers told Jesus
slightly smug over his efficient sucfun. The nearly pretty waitress hadn't
that this news was far too important
cess. Doctor Malcolm Weintraub exhad this much fun in months.
for just the four ofthem, and that they cused himself, and left the room. Out''Yes, that's me. But, that's not the could take him to a place where the side, he showed the note to his col. point. Look, I came here to tell you ... news would spread like holy fire.
league, Doctor Janice Lessing, but
to tell all of you ... "
"Oh, goody!" Jesus sang, almost
neither ofthem mentioned the instruc"Hey, Jee-buddy," she leaned over skipping to the police car. ''Y'know,'' he tions.
the counter, nearly pretty face coming told the cops, "you guys are going to
Dr. Lessing: ''What is your diagwithin inches of The Lord's. 'Tell me. love it up there! No bullets, no hostage
nosis?"
How was that cross thing? I mean, that
situations, and we have the best doDr. Weintraub: "Delusions ofgranmust've really sucked, being nailed up nuts ... "
deur. Paranoid schizophrenia, maybe."
on that thing. Hung out to, y'know,
Dr. Lessing: "Is he a hazard?"
*****
croak like that. C'mon, you can level
"And you say your name is ... "
Dr. Weintraub: "Hard to say. He
with me. That really sucked, didn't it?" Doctor Malcolm
"Kind of, yeah," Jesus said with a Weintraub began.
SNAPSHOTS by Jason Love
cringing little tickle in his voice. "But,
"J esus." The
listen! I came here to tell you that it's Lord assisted.
all over! All of the suffering, all of the
"And you've
turmoil! God is taking you home! He come to the earth
plans to destroy the Earth on Februto ... "
ary 28, 2020, and all you have to do is
"Look, Doc.
make a few simple lifestyle changes,
It's really quite
and you're in!"
simple. My father,
"Oh, really?" Unable to resist, the God, sent me back
nearly pretty waitress asked: "Like here to give you
what?"
earthlings a few
''Well, first of all," Jesus rambled,
simple tips that
tickled that he was making some head- will get you into
way. "Uuh ... Let me ask you. do you Heaven when the
do drugs?"
shit hits the fan."
''What kind? Crack? Booze? Aspi"And that will
rin? What?"
be ... "
"I don't know. He didn't specify."
"February 28,
''Well, then, no. I guess I don't," she 2020. Here, I've
said, gum snapping like an idiot cas- taken the liberty
tanet.
of writing down
"Okay, then you can forget that
the things you
one. Hey, you may be better off than
need to do. I think
most! Alright,
let me see. Do you'H find them
youuuu ... "
very simple, and
The nearly pretty waitress severed quite reasonable."
the Lord's thought in mid-stammer.
Jesus handed the
''Wait a minute! Since you're Jesus, the doctor the crumThe Second Coming was not proceeding as well as
real deal and all, you really shouldn't
pled bill for his
Jesus had hoped.
be talking to me. You really should be prune juice, inPage 16

Winter 1996-1997

American Atheist

seems harmless now, but who's to say

how complex these delusions will become? I suggest ... "
Dr. Lessing: "Electroshock?"
Dr. Weintraub: "Yes. The state will
cover the standard four sessions, that
should be enough. I must say though,
he is the most ... comfortable Jesus I've
ever seen. He doesn't have a doubt in
his mind. I must say, life on the streets
is becoming more and more brutal.
The things these poor souls convince
themselves of just to survive. It's
frightening!"
Dr. Lessing: "It most certainly is,
Doctor."

*****

God ordered another round: red

wine for himself, gin and soda for
Papa.
"I don't know how to get through
to them, Ernest," God complained.
"They've become so cynical, so mean!
I think they'd laugh at me and give
me the finger if I tried to destroy the
Earth."
"It's a damn shame," Hemingway
concurred. "By the way, do you hear
from Jesus?"
''You kidding? He doesn't even remember his real name. Thinks his
name is Fred Wilmerton now. He lives
in a Toledo suburb with a woman
named Sheila and two kids named
Samantha and Eric. Did you know he's
become an accountant?"
"No shit," said Papa.
They sat in silence for a moment.
The drinks came, and they both sipped
thoughtfully. As more of a verbalized
thought, Hemingway broke the silence.
"Do you have a Web site?"
"No. Do you think it would help?"
"Couldn't hurt."

An Epistle of Brother Josiah

By Josh Karpf
Pebuary 12, 1995
4 years til Armagedon
Life Line Oxigen Co
323 Plesant Avenue
New York NY 10029
Dear Life Line Oxigen

Co:

I have found you out! You areseling

our God given Air for
prophit! I am a taxpayer and a Christian and I object.
I was in the hospitul to be cut off a farm aminal. The
aminal pushed aganst me when I was taking a leek with my
trowsers down and it got stuck to me and it wasnt like
what the teevee sed at all. The docters gave me oxigen
from a big tank. I need a tank for rain water from the
hevens. There is clori nashun and salt peter in the
govimint water. The docter sed No that you sold the oxigen
too. But where did you GET the oxigen. Prom the Air. And
where did you get the Air. Prom Godl You are taking God's
Air! Even God needs Air be cause he breethed into his
nostrils the breth of life Genesis 2:7. If God has no Air
He will die agin. Is it be cause you are Jews that you do
this! Most of the docters are Jews. When the docter cut
off the aminal I showed I was not a Jew and tole him to
show Me he was not a Jew but he lafed at me insted and
gave me a bile

My nefew Ebeneezer

Zakariah in colege says that most of

the Air is nitrigen not oxigen. But it is a privat colege
where God is not taught and there are lesbeans so he is
rong. Oxigen is Air. If it isnt air why did the docter let
me breeth it. A docter would not let me breeth a tank of
pork rind be cause port rind cant be breethed. You see
now. I never breethed a nitrigen in my life.
In the begining evrything in this cuntry was free for all
American. Now its only free for the ilegal imigrints.The
negroes were the first ilegal imigrints and they stil dont
have jobs altho they have some very good teevee shows like
Sister Sister and they are also good in Sports. But eben a
negroe shuld have free Air be cause the Air is from God.
Behold the fowls of the air for they sow not says the Holy
Bible in Matthew 6:26. And when I was born I drew in the
common air says the Apocrifa which is not the Holy Bible
but you are a siner so it wil do for you.
Dont sell the Air that God gave us all. Be cause when it
runs out the goviment will give it to the negroes and real
American will have to pay big time.
Yours in Christ,
Brother Josiah

Austin, Texas

Winter 1996-1997

Page 17

-. <8ner tlpon a fllillrnnium

hOUld

As the thousandth
year of our Lord's
incarnation
approaches, I long to
see the day which
knows no evening, in
the forecourt of our
Lord. I want to be
dissolved in Christ.
-The Holy Roman
empress Adelaide to
Odilo, abbot of Cluny

Formerly a professor of biology

and geology, Frank R. Zindler is
now a science writer. He is a
member of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science, the New York Academy
of Science, the Society of Biblical Literature, and the American
Schools of Oriental Research.
He is the Editor of American
Atheist.

Frank R. Zindler
Page 18

it be The Millennium or
A Millennium? The time, that
is, when all hell should break
~
out, the pious be raptured into space,
the beast whose name numbers 666 be
unleashed, 144,000 men who have
never had sex with women be saved,
the Antichrist unleash a pandemic of
jay-walking, or the thousand-year rule
of Jesus Christ begin? Modern believers (now there's an oxymoron!) of necessity think that they are waiting for
The Millennium, for the simple reason
that when A Millennium had endedthat is, when one thousand years had
elapsed after the supposed appearance
of Christ - none of these lovely things
had happened. Since the scriptures
and the churches cannot be wrong, it
follows that what Christians should be
waiting for is a specific millenniumThe Millennium. But which one might
that be?
The handiest millennial candidate, of course, is the one fast approaching, the year 2000. But there is
nothing particularly significant about
the number 2000 - unless one be a
true-believer who rejects geology and
therefore knows that the world was
created around the year 4004 B.C.
Four thousand years before Christ plus
two thousand years after Christ total
six thousand years. Since "a day with
the Lord is as a thousand years," and
since it took Yahweh six days to create the world, whereupon the tuckered-out deity had to take the seventh
day off (or the seventh millennium off,
if you apply the one-day-equals-onemillennium equation), doesn't it seem
reasonable to suppose that the thousand-year period soon to begin is going to parallel the day when god went
to sleep? What better time for the devil
to run amuck?
There is, of course some difficulty
in this. The B.CJA.D. cleavage of history into just two eras was not devised
until the sixth century, when a Christian monk named Dionysius Exiguus
Winter 1996-1997

("Dennis the Short") tried to compute

the precise time that Jesus had begun
to crawl around the stable. Unfortunately, he misunderstood some of his
records and came up with a date that
was about four years too late (assumingforthe sake of argument that -Iesus
was a historical figure). Apart from the
embarrassment of having to conclude
that Jesus was born four years "Before Christ," believers today have an
awkward fact to face: the sixth millennium should end in 1996, not the year
2000! In fact, if the computation of
Archbishop U ssher was literally correct, i.e., the world was born exactly
4004 years before the true birth of
Christ, then the sixth millennium
ended four years ago, when Newt
Gingrich took over in the House.
However this all might be today, a
thousand years ago, when what was
believed to be the first millennium after Christ's birth was ending, probably
no one thought there was any question of which was the millennium. In
Latin, after all, there is no definite
article, and a millennium is a millennium - and everyone in Christendom
knew it was ending. Guided by their
own superstition and ignorance, which
was amplified and animated by the
blather and irrationality supplied in
abundance by the clergy, the men and
women of Europe simply went mad
with fear and apprehension as the seconds of the year 999 inexorably ticked
their way to that fateful New Year's
Eve when life as they had known it
would end, when the world would begin to act out a drama scripted in the
Apocalypse, the "Book of Revelation."
At least that is what I was taught.
But was there really hysteria during
the last year of the first millennium?
During the last century of the first
millennium? During the last day of it?
Were the people of Europe really so
lost in religion that they gave away all
their possessions, donned sackcloth,
went on pilgrimage to Rome or JerusaAmerican Atheist

lem, and expected to meet their maker

without having first to die?
The common wisdom among historians today is that the answer to
these questions is "no." Will Durant,
my favorite historian, was quite definite in his rejection of the notion of
first-millennium madness. In his hefty
volume The Age of Faith he wrote:
Their aspirations,
and the
busy politics of the world around
them, show how few were the
Christians who took seriously
the notion that the world would
end in the year 1000 ... The great
majority went on their wonted
ways, working, playing, sinning,
praying, and trying to outlive
senility. There is no evidence of
any panic of fear in the year
1000, nor even of any rise in gifts
to the Church. 1
Solid reasons for the rejection of
the idea of first-millennium panic are
hard to come by, however, in the writings of modern historians.
Most of
them simply refer to "the definitive
study" done by so-and-so; and mention
of the lack of increased giving to the
Church is about as substantive a statement as one can find. I became more
than a little suspicious when it turned
out that many ofthose definitive studies were done in the last century by
clergymen who may have had some
conflict of interest in writing upon the
subject. Imust confess, though, that I
have not taken the time to track down
all those "definitive studies," and so I
cannot write with the degree of authority for which I normally strive. Even
so, there are some indications that life
was not entirely humdrum during the
tenth century and the associated fin
de siecle, and it will be amusing, I
think, to take a look at them.
For starters, I have to point out
that Will Durant, on the very page
quoted above wrote that "At the beginning of the tenth century a Church
council had announced that the final
century of history had begun ... " Although Durant does not identify the
council,2 his statement
certainly
would seem to support the blatherand-irrationality model more than the
Austin, Texas

consensus ho-hum model. To be sure,

Durant claims that despite a Church
council's sowing ofthe seeds ofhysteria, by the end of the century only "a
small minority of men so believed, and
prepared themselves
for the Last
Judgment." That is admitting, be it
noted, that there was at least some
millennial dementia.
Going against the grain of modern
wisdom is Richard Erdoes' book AD
1000: Living on the Brink of Apocalypse.3 Erdoes paints a rather evocative picture in his very first chapter:
On the last day of the year
999, according to an ancient
chronicle, the old basilica of St.
Peter's at Rome was thronged
with a mass of weeping and
trembling worshipers awaiting
the end of the world. This was
the dreaded eve of the millennium, the Day of Wrath when
the earth would dissolve into
ashes. Many of those present
had given away all their possessions to the poor - lands,
homes, and household goods in order to assure for themselves
forgiveness for their trespasses
at the Last Judgment and a
good place in heaven near the
footstool of the Almighty. Many
poor sinners - and who among
them was without sin? - had
entered the church in sackcloth
and ashes, having already spent
weeks and months doing penance and mortifying the flesh.
At the altar the Holy Father,
Pope Sylvester II, in full papal
regalia, was celebrating
the
midnight mass, elevating the
host for all to see. Many did not
dare to look, lying down upon
the multicolored marble floor,
their arms spread out in the
shape of a cross. A few were
seized by holy ecstasy, waiting
to be united with Christ. As the
minutes passed and the fateful
hour was about to strike, a
deathly silence filled the venerable basilica. Only the voice of
the pope was heard intoning the
hallowed phrases, and, at the
words ite missa est, the great
Winter 1996-1997

bell began to ring.

The crowd remained rooted,
motionless, transfixed, barely
daring to breathe, "not a few
dying from fright, giving up
their ghosts then and there."
This description
was written
from hearsay, and things might
not have happened just that
way, but it gives a good idea of
the all-pervading dread of the
apocalypse that held humankind in its grip.
One of Erdoes' witnesses for this
turn-of-the-millennium
period is a
medieval monk variously referred to
as Raul, Ralph, or Rodulfus Glaber
("Ralph the Baldpate"), who lived from
around 980 to about 1046, and wrote
Five Books of Histories and The Life of
St William, which survive in Latin
manuscript form. Glaber related his
millennial history to biblical "prophecy":
Warned by the prophecy of
Holy Writ, we see clearer than
daylight that in process of the
Last Days, as love waxed cold
and iniquity abounded among
mankind, perilous times were at
hand for men's souls. For by
many assertions of the ancient
fathers we are warned that, as
covetousness stalks abroad, the
religious Rules or Orders of the
past have caught decay and corruption ... Thus also it cometh
to pass that, while irreligiousness stalks abroad among the
clergy, froward and incontinent
appetites
grow among the
people, until lies and deceit and
fraud
and manslaughters,
creeping abroad among them,
draw almost all to perdition!
And, since the mist of utter
blindness hath darkened the eye
ofthe Catholic Faith (that is, the
prelates of the Church), therefore their flocks ... fall into the
ruin of their own perdition ... For
whensoever religion hath failed
among the pontiffs, and strictness of rule hath decayed among
the abbots ... what then can we
think but that the whole human
Page 19

crating a ten-year-old boy bishop

of Todi. He walked about like a
common soldier-in armor, sword
in hand. He drank wine in honor
of the devil, toasting the Prince
of Darkness with raised cup, and
he invoked Jupiter, Venus, and
Mars while playing at dice ....
He was guilty of arson and ordered the eyes of his godfather,
Pope Benedict, to be put out and
so caused the poor man's death.
He had a Roman priest who
dared to criticize him castrated,
and he put a great number
of opponents to death.f
race, root and branch, is sliding
willingly down again into the
gulf of primeeval chaos?
.. .in fulfillment (as we see)
of the Apostle's prophecy, love
waxeth
cold and iniquity
aboundeth among men that are
lovers of their own selves, therefore these things aforesaid befel
more frequently than usual in
all parts of the world about the
thousandth year after the birth
of our Lord and Saviour+

The Pope as Antichrist

Before continuing
with
Glaber's account of the end of
the first millennium, we may
note that the above quotation
alludes to pontiffs being somehow a sign of millennial disaster. Glaber probably had in
mind a honey-pope such as John
XII - a real sweetheart in the
Chair of Peter. Becoming pontiff at the age of sixteen, he
turned the Lateran into a palace ofpornocracy. Erdoes elaborates:
It was said that respectable
women offoreign nations "were
afraid to go to Rome on a pilgrimage on account of the lascivious advances of this depraved pope." He made his dead
father's mistress his own, raped
nuns, and was accused of incestuous relationships ... He sold
the great offices of the church
to the highest bidders, consePage 20

vented the do-re-mi musical system

and the custom of notating music on a
staff; that he was a master of Latin
rhetoric and knew all the classical
authors, including the logicians; that
he built armillary spheres and astrolabes; that he invented a steam-powered musical organ and a water-clock
- all these things seemed proof to
many that the pope was the Antichrist
in power. It was rumored that he had
conjured an artificial man and had
created a huge head that could answer
questions with a magically accurate
"yes" or "no."

Glaber's first millennium

For the common people at the apOf concern to Glaber as the

proach of the millennium, however, the
millennial anniversary
of the supreal monsters
in the Vatican (or
posed "incarnation"
of Christ apLateran) probably weren't the ones
proached were various "signs of the
identified as the Antichrist. The prime
times." Seven years before the millensuspect in most people's opinion probnium, for example,
Mt. Vesuvius
ably was Sylvester II, the man who
erupted "by more mouths than usual,"
actually occupied the office of pope on
hurling rocks for distances of up to
New Year's Eve on the last day of the
three miles. And then there was a panyear 999.
demic of fires - as though the end of
The case against Sylvester II (born
the world would indeed be by fire. The
Gerbert of Aurillac) was damning. He
superstitious and credulous monk rewas, first of all, the most highly edulated that
cated man of the tenth century, and
probably the brightest intellect to ap... nearly all the cities of
pear throughout
the entire period
Italy and Gaul were devastated
known as the Dark Ages. Everyone
by terrible fires, and even the
knows that the Antichrist is going to
city of Rome itselfnearly burned
be clever, and the pious who are proud .
down. On that occasion flames
to be "fools in Christ" have always been
attacked the Church of Saint
distrusting and resentful ofthose who
Peter and began to engage the
acquire too much of the "wisdom ofthis
wooden beams under the bronze
world." And so it was that many who
tiles. When a multitude of byawaited the end of the world checked
standers learned of this, and
off "Antichrist pope" on their lists of
could find no way to prevent it,
signs of the times preceding apocalypaltogether they let out a frighttic denouement.
ful shout and hurried to the
That Gerbert
was a sorcerer
Confession
of the Prince of
seemed obvious from his habit ofreguApostles, hurling imprecations
lar washing and bathing - something
to the effect that if he did not
no good Christian was known to do
take care of his own and protect
during the era once described as "a
his own church multitudes
thousand years without a bath." Add
would abandon the faith. Immeto that the fact that he taught the sphediately, the voracious flames
ricity ofthe earth and made globes; the
withdrew from the fir beams
fact that he had learned astronomy
and died out.f
and mathematics from the Saracens in
In addition, there was a five-year
Spain; that he introduced the use of
famine
throughout the Roman world.
Arabic numerals and the abacus for
People
turned
to cannibalism. Many
lightning-fast calculations; that he inWinter 1996-1997

American Atheist

eminent men died, and a terrible

plague burned through the empire.
Apparitions appeared to holy men,
who saw not only the Virgin Mary but
a group of spirit-knights who had been
killed in battle with the Saracens. And
ofcourse, the devil himself was sighted
upon occasion as the thousandth anniversary of the incarnation
approached.

Glaber's second millennium

Glaber does not record any hysteria actually associable with the end of
the year 999, but of course the
millennial year was long past when he
set his history to writing. He might
have forgotten some of the madness
of the moment, he might have suppressed mention of it due to embarrassment - or there may indeed been
nothing for him to report, as most modem historians maintain.
Whatever the facts might have
been with regard to the thousandth
year after the reckoned birth of Christ,
Glaber devotes considerable space in
his Histories to the period surrounding the thousandth year after the supposedpassion ii:e., death) of Christ. We
may surmise that there had been anxious anticipation of the millennium of
the incarnation, then puzzled relief
when the year 1000 came and went,
and then the usual recalculations. If
the world didn't end at that millennium, there must be another one. Of
course! The millennium of Christ's
death! That should occur in the year
1033.
Glaber uses the passion millennium as a reference date for many
events in his chronicle. We can gather
from his account that many people
worried about the later millennium as
much as the earlier - perhaps even
more, for our chronicler tells us that
mass pilgrimages to the "Holy Land"
took place at this time:

way, after whom came those of

middle rank, and then all he
greatest kings and counts and
bishops; lastly (a thing which
had never come to pass before),
many noble ladies and poorer
women journeyed thither. For
many purposed and desired to
die before they should see their
homes again .... Moreover, some
of those who were then most
concerned in these matters, being consulted by many concerning the signification ofthis concourse to Jerusalem, greater
than the past age had ever
heard of, answered with some
caution that it portended no
other than the advent of that
reprobate Antichrist, whose
coming at the end of this world
is prophesied in Holy Scripture. 7
This seems clear enough. While
there may not have been Pandemonium at the millennial anniversaries
of the incarnation and passion, those
times seem not to have been as humdrum as Will Durant and others have
maintained. Add to this the fact that
the Christian time-cycle just happened
to come into phase with the Teutonic
cosmogonic cycle when Nordic peoples
were expecting Ragnaroh, the Gotterdammerung in which the gods and the
evil giants kill each other off,the earth
is consumed in fire, the rivers boil, and
all is covered by churning flood waters
until a new sun sheds its light upon a
new earth.
It was of no small significance that
shortly before the year 1000 all the
pagan kings ofthe Viking Lands aban-

1 Will Durant, The Story of Civilization,

Volume IV, The Age of Faith, Simon &
Schuster, New York, 1950, p. 540.
2 Checking the source cited by Durant in
order to identify this council, I was surprised to discover that he had made a mistake in his reference. Nowhere in the entire book cited was there any mention of a
church council that had declared the tenth
century to be the beginning of the end.
Despite quite a bit of searching on my own,
I have been unable to identify such a council.
3 Richard Erdoes, AD 1000: Living on the
Brink of Apocalypse, Harper & Row, San
Francisco, 1988.
4 G. G. Coulton, Life in the Middle Ages,
Volume I, Religion, Folk-Lore, and Superstition, Cambridge University Press, Second Edition, 1928, pp. 1-2.
5 Erdoes, op. cit., p. 58.
6 Rodulfi Glabri Historiarum
Libri
Quinque, John France, Editor, Oxford
University Press, Oxford, 1989, p. 74.
(Translation mine)
7 Coulton, op. cit., p. 7.

Dial-The-Atheist is now the

American Atheist HOT LINE

At this same time so innumerable a multitude began to

flock from all parts of the world
to the sepulchre of our Saviour
at Jerusalem, as no man could
before have expected; for the
lower orders of people led the
Austin, Texas

doned Odin, Thor, and Freia (except

for calendar names!) and adopted
Christianity. Christianity's "Newborn
Son" became the "New Sun" that replaced the sun imagined to have perished in the Norse Armageddon. Thday, a thousand years later, the cycle
of time apparently has reversed itself.
Odin once again is being dusted offfor
use by former Christians who congratulate themselves for having been
born with white skin and seem to have
adopted the slogan "The North shall
rise again!" The image of the year
2000, although "seen through a glass
darkly," appears to be the mirror-reversal of the year 1000.

(512) 458-5731
GIVE IT A CALL!
Winter 1996-1997

Page 21

PROPHECY fAILED
from The Great Disappointment
to Apocalypse Ranch
Many people were
really disappointed when
the world didn't end on
Oct. 22, 1843, as
William Miller had
promised. For some
of Miller's spiritual
descendants, such as
the Seventh-Day
Adventists and the
Jehovah's Witnesses,
the end is still near just around the next
corner. For other of
his heirs, such as

those that b~ouacked

at Waco, the end has
already come and
passed.

uman history abounds with

records of unsuccessful predictions concerning the end of
the world. But in the American experience, perhaps the best known example of the failure of alleged biblical
prophecy is the Millerite movement,
named after a New York farmer, William Miller (1782-1849). Despite predicting Armageddon and the Second
Coming on three separate occasions,
Miller's organizational
legacy endured, giving rise to religious sects like
the Jehovah's Witnesses and SeventhDay Adventists. Both have become enduring symbols of the millennialist,
apocalyptic impulse in American culture. Even more surprising is that it
is possible to trace groups like the
Branch Davidian sect (Waco) back to
Millerite origins. Indeed, the bloody
assault on the Davidian compound has
become an apocalyptic rallying cry for
dissatisfied groups throughout the
country. That group's leader, David
Koresh, saw the BATF and FBI raid
on "Apocalypse Ranch" as the fulfillment of biblical prophecy.

The End Is Near It's Miller Time!

Conrad Goeringer is director of

American Atheists On-line
Services and a contributing
editor of American Atheist.

by Conrad F. Goeringer
Page 22

William Miller was born on Feb.

15, 1782, into an impoverished
Pittsfield Massachusetts family. He
was the oldest of sixteen children and
was raised in a Baptist environment.
Although Miller had little formal education, he was apparently a voracious
reader; some biographical accounts
say that his studies of Enlightenment
thinkers led him to deism, a philosophical position that was popular
among certain intellectuals of the period. Deism posited the existence of a
god, but one who established a clockwork universe that operated according to natural laws. The notion of"N aWinter 1996-1997

ture, and Nature's God" excluded most

of the tenets of Christianity, including
the divinity of Jesus or the literal truth
of the Bible.
While a Captain in the army during the War of 1812, Miller gradually
became convinced that America was a
predestined nation. In the battle of
Plattsburg in 1814, 15,000 British
troops were defeated by a US force
about one-third the size. Miller considered this evidence of divine intervention, and began to reconcile himself again with Christianity. Religious
historians note that even though he
rejoined the Baptist faith, he also embarked on an intense study ofthe Bible
in order to defend his religious views
against the rationalism and deism of
his former friends.
The Enlightenment
assault on
superstition was having a profound
impact in the United States, on both
government and religious movements.
The "official" churches of the former
colonies were "disestablished." One no
longer had to belong to the state
church in order to exercise basic rights
such as voting or ownership of property. Pennsylvania,
Delaware, and
New Jersey passed laws to this effect
in 1776; and New York, North Carolina, and Georgia followed in 1777. All
former colonies disestablished their
churches by 1818, with the exception
of Massachusetts, which delayed until1833.
From the beginning of this process, the churches resisted disestablishment. Preachers also condemned
the failure to establish Christianity as
an officially recognized state religion.
In 1803, for instance, the Rev. Samuel
Wylie, Doctor of Divinity at the University of Pennsylvania, asked, "Did
not the framers ofthis instrument (the
Constitution) in this ...resemble the
American Atheist

fool mentioned in Psalms 14:1-3 who

said in his heart, 'There is no God'?"
Others like Rev. J edidiah Morse (17611826)began to deliver sermons which
suggested that the country was fallingvictim to a godless, European conspiracy of Freemasons, illuminists,
and devil-worshippers.
This anxiety, though, coexisted
with an emerging doctrine in religious
ranks that the United States was nevertheless a divinely-ordained nation
which would fulfill biblical prophecy.
After all, early colonists who fled religious orthodoxy in Britain and Europe (only to "establish" their own
churches here!) saw this new land
as a "New Jerusalem" in its own
right. With only about five percent
of postrevolution Americans being
regular church attendees, a doctrine
which bestowed celestial sanction on
the new Republic and its people
could serve not only to revitalize religion, but provide an ideological
rationale for political decisions. The
religious roots of future ideas such
as Manifest Destiny were being implanted.
William Miller's biblical study
led him through the apocalyptic
texts of Daniel and Revelation. He
became especially fascinated with
Daniel 8:14 which declared "Unto

ing Josiah Litch of the New England

Methodist Episcopal Conference and
the Congregationalist
minister
Charles Fitch.
One follower was Joshua Himes,
a promoter, who established two Millerite publications: Signs of the Times
(later called The Advent Herald) and
The Midnight Cry. Other independent
papers which echoed Miller's message
began to appear, such as the Philadelphia Alarm, and by 1842-1843, his
"Second Advent" movement was organizing conferences, camp meetings,

two thousand and three hundred

days; then shall the sanctuary be
cleansed."He soon began to construct
a biblical chronology fixing the creation of the world, the birth of Jesus,
and the subsequent return of the messiah. Miller completed his initial calculations in 1823, and gradually began to share his findings with a close
circle of friends.
It wasn't until 1831 that he began
to establish a career as a speaker in
churches throughout New England
and Canada. Two years later he was
granted a permit to preach by the Baptist Church. His rhetorical style improved, and "eager listeners hung on
his words, spellbound for two hours at
a time, and packed houses were the
rule," according to one history. Miller's
apocalyptic message concerning the
imminence of the second coming also
began to attract clergy as well, includAustin, Texas

From the New York Herald,

Nov. 12, 1842.
and public lecturers.
Miller's initial prediction fixing
the end was for March 21, 1843. There
are different accounts of this time
frame, though; and some insist that it
covered a one-year period (March 21,
1843, to March 24, 1844). One fixed
date was April 3, 1843. Over 3,500 of
the faithful jammed the BostonAdvent
Temple, only to be disappointed. Ironically,the movement continued to grow,
and a second date ofApril 18, 1844 was
publicized. When the messiah did not
appear, there was again frustration
and some followers left the Advent
ranks. But Miller continued to preach
Winter 1996-1997

the imminent return of Christ, and

declared that the world was in a "tarrying time" or waiting period. A third
date of October 22, 1844, was promptly
set, relying mostly on the refined calculations of a Millerite believer named
Samuel S. Snow. This prediction was
considered the result of something
called "the new light," a term which
over a century later would be used by
another apocalyptician with historical
roots in the Millerite phenomenon David Koresh - to justify some of his
eschatological doctrines. The new date
was publicized as the True Midnight
Cry, and had the somewhat unpredictable effect of actually rallying
the ranks of the Millerites. They began to spread word of this new second coming with an enthusiasm not
seen before. Churches which did not
accept this message
were denounced as agents of"Babylon." And
despite opposition from established,
mainline religious groups, thousands of members - and even many
clergy - began to defect to the Millerite cult.
As doomsday approached, Millerites began to prepare. One account
notes that "Fields were left unharvested, shops were closed, people
quit their jobs, paid their debts, and
freely gave away their possessions
with no thought of repayment."
Huge press runs of Advent publications like The Midnight Cry
warned the public that "The Time
Is Short. Prepare to Meet Thy God!"
and ''The Lord is Coming!" William
Miller began peddling white "ascension robes" to the faithful, many of
whom waited for the miraculous event
in freshly dug graves.
Sexual imagery was employed
throughout the Millerite prognostication of the end times, especially as the
date of October 22 approached. Most
Christians were skeptical of the impending apocalypse. Advent believers
quickly labeled them "harlots," and
quoted from Chapter 25 ofthe new testament book of Matthew. Says one account: 'The Bridegroom had supposedly come to the marriage in heaven
instead of on earth, and He had shut
the door on those 'foolish' virgins."
Page 23

Ironically, Matthew 25:13 reminds the

faithful that "Watch therefore, for ye
know neither the day nor the hour
wherein the Son of man cometh."
October 22, 1843, came and
passed; Miller's followers called it
"The Great Disappointment." Many
began to leave the Second Advent
movement, even as explanations were
proposed to explain why Jesus had not
returned. Some claimed that
Christ had indeed arrived, but in
a "spiritual" way. For two years,
the movement languished, and
on April 29, 1845, Miller, Himes,
and the remaining membership
of the movement organized the
Mutual Conference ofAdventists
in Albany, New York.
In retrospect, the Millerite
movement became a paradigm of
what happens "when prophecy
fails." The failure of prophetical
realization does not dissuade all
believers from belief in their
creed's validity. It often serves to
create a galvanizing
effect
amongst followers, and the individual often emerges from an experience such as ''The Great Disappointment"
even more unshaken in his or her beliefs, and
more energized about converting
others. Indeed, this is what happened with the Millerite cause.
One convert to Miller's Advent
eschatology
had been Ellen G.
Harmon. By all accounts, she was a
remarkable ifnot bizarre women. She
was born on November 26,1827, and
raised in the Methodist faith. At the
age of nine, she suffered a concussion
which caused permanent disfigurement, and she went through "an agonizing period of spiritual struggle concerning her physical condition and
eternal salvation."
In 1840, after hearing a sermon
by William Miller, Harmon fell in with
the burgeoning Second Advent movement. Following "The Great Disappointment," she began to experience
public visions which supposedly confirmed the righteousness of the Advent doctrines. Three years later, she
married an Adventist minister named
James White, and the two began
Page 24

elaborating the Millerite teachings

into a formal religious system.
Unencumbered by the failure of
prophetic vision, many of William
Miller's flock adopted the doctrinal
teachings of Ellen White, including the
keeping of the Ten Commandments,
the Jewish Sabbath, and the acceptance of contemporary prophets. By
1850, mainstream Christian doctrines

The prophetess Ellen G. White as she appears in the frontispiece of the third edition of her book The Great Controversy
Between Christ and Satan (1886).

had been incorporated into the Advent

message; and in October, 1860, the
Seventh Day Adventist church was officially founded. The following year, a
membership structure was established
at the group's conference in Battle
Creek, Michigan, and by 1863 Seventh
Day Adventism became a formal, separate denomination.
The Long Road to Waco
The American penchant for "date
setting" to fix that time when the world
would end certainly did not die with
''The Great Disappointment." During
a period of widespread industrialization and expansion, old patterns of soWinter 1996-1997

cial, political and economic organization were being disrupted.

Many
sought succor and refuge in the embrace of religious certainty, and the
knowledge that their suffering in the
world would be rewarded. The postCivil War era saw the rise of other prophetic groups, including Charles Taze
Russell's International Bible Students
Association and the Watchtower Society. Russell (1852-1916) had been
a Congregationalist
minister
whose preaching became increasingly apocalyptic: he taught that
the second coming had actually
occurred invisibly in 1874, and
that the end of the millennial age
would take place in 1914. He was
also enamored of Pyramidism, a
belief that the physical dimensions of the Great Pyramid recounted biblical history, and foretold future events including Armageddon and the end of the
world. When Russell's 1914 prediction did not occur, Joseph Rutherford (1869-1942) - who had
succeeded Russell as head of the
movement - began setting new
dates for Armageddon.
The
Watchtower movement became
the Jehovah's Witnesses, a religious sect that can boast perhaps
the worst record of prophetic accuracy the world has known.
Dates for the Parousia or Second Coming have included 1920, 1925, various
dates in the 1940's (having to do with
World War II), and even 1975.
Still another influence on Russell
and the later Witness movement was
George Storrs, publisher of The Bible
Examiner. He came from a long line of
Congregational preachers, and in 1843
he began championing the Millerite
doctrine, even though The Great Disappointment had already occurred.
Ellen White continued to lead the
Seventh Day Adventist movement
until her death in 1915. She left behind an enormous collection of doctrinal writings, said to consist of "over
forty-six books totaling more than 25
million words." Although much of her
writing was supposed to be a report of
visions - or at least the result of "inspiration" - it is now known that most
American Atheist

of her ''heavenly messages" were really secular tales retold. Walter T. Rea,
in his book aptly named The White Lie
(M & R Publications, 1982), has established beyond doubt that the wouldbe prophetess was one of the most prodigious plagiarists of all time, being
able to convert entire history books
into what would become tantamount
to scripture.
The Adventist message became
more institutionalized,
and some followers felt that White's moves toward
doctrinal orthodoxy had gutted the
Advent message. Even so, the Seventh
Day Adventists
were firmly established on the American religious scene.
One convert to Adventism was Victor T. Houteff, a Bulgarian immigrant
who had abandoned his Eastern Orthodox faith and converted to Seventh
Day Adventism in May of 1919. After
settling in Wisconsin and then moving to Illinois, he migrated to Los Angeles in 1923 and became an assistant
superintendent of an Adventist school.
In 1929 Houteffbegan to have serious doctrinal differences with the
Seventh Day Adventists, specifically
over interpretations
of passages of
Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Revelation. He
left the Adventists, insisting that the
group had compromised excessively
with the world, especially since it allowed members to attend ball games,
movies, and wear make-up. By 1934,
he formed a group known as "The
Shepherd's Rod," and with a small
group of followers who had been
disfellowshipped from the SDA, relocated to an area near the small town
of Waco, Texas. The small religious
community became known as Mount
Carmel.
By 1940, the Waco settlement had
64 residents and a number of buildings including a school, laundry, dormitories,
garages
and a common
kitchen and dining area. The Shepherd's Rod members were relatively
self-sufficient; they grew their own
food and raised cows. In 1942, Houteff
changed the name of the community
to the Davidian Seventh-day Adventists, which reflected his belief in the
imminent restoration ofthe temple of
King David's dynasty in Palestine.
Austin, Texas

By the 1950s, the Davidian's had

over ten thousand members world
wide, with about 125 living full time
at Mt. Carmel. An internal crisis occurred in 1955 when Victor Houteff
died. His wife, Florence, assumed leadership of the group, and promptly announced through a prophetic vision
that Judgment Day was imminent.
A number of apocalyptic events
were to take place, including war in
the Middle East and the establishment
of God's Kingdom in Jerusalem. There
would be tribulation and "purification"
of both the Seventh day Adventist
church and the rest of the world. Prophetic events would culminate in 1260
days following her revelation, or April
22, 1959 - coincidentally, the Jewish
Passover.
In order to prepare, the Branch
sold their property near Waco (it is said
because of encroachment by the city),
and purchased 940 acres nine miles to
the east. This apocalyptic redoubt was
christened New Mount Carmel. In the
pages of the Symbolic
Code, the
Davidian magazine, Florence Houteff
also called upon- members of the
church to gather on April 16, 1959. In
Students of the Seven Seals: An Organizational History (undated), Cary R.
W. Voss of the Communications Studies Dept. of the University of Kansas
at Lawrence described the scene:
It was also during this interim (the move to New Mt.
Carmel) that Florence Houteff
also issued a call for the faithful to gather ...in anticipation
of moving to Israel. The call
was effective, and about ninehundred people sold their
homes and .businesses, and
moved to Texas to wait for
signs of the end. It took over
seventy-five tents to accommodate the pilgrims at the site.
It has also been reported that
many Davidians felt that Victor Houteff would be raised
from the dead as a sign that
the Kingdom of God was
near ...

Winter 1996-1997

Houteff's failed prophecy didn't

receive so lofty a title as "The Great
Disappointment." Some referred to it
as "the fiasco." As a result, many left
to form splinter groups. By 1962, it
appears that Florence admitted her
failure as a prophetess and formally
dissolved the Davidian Seventh-day
Adventists. The property was sold and
the profits distributed among the few
remaining members.
The "Waco connection," though,
would again be made through Benjamin Roden, a trucking contractor
who had been a Davidian since 1946.
Roden believed that he had been instructed by God to write a series of
seven letters to Florence Houteff, including instructions
to rebuild the
Temple in Jerusalem. This reconstruction of the Temple is a necessary precondition for the Parousia in most
Christian religions. Roden also stated
that God had informed him to sign
these letters "The Branch," a reference
to biblical texts believed to prophesy
that a man by that name would rebuild
the Jerusalem Temple.
Roden's message was rejected by
many of the Davidians, including Florence Houteff. It was a clear challenge
to her prophetic and doctrinal leadership. In 1958, Roden led his wife Lois
and a small group of Davidians to Israel in hopes of building a utopian
community while awaiting the rebuilding
of the Temple and the
Parousia. But Houteff's failed prophecy drew him back to Waco. In 1962,
he purchased seventy-seven acres of
the original New Mount Carmel land,
and christened his group the "Branch
Davidians. "
Along with communal work and
religious instruction, biblical prophecy
became a core element in Branch
Davidian life. Roden labored to fit
world events into an eschatological
framework, and in a series of publications he wrote of the significance of
everything from the energy crisis of
the 70s to war in the Middle East.
Curiously, Lois Roden began to report
visions of her own, including revelations about the "feminine nature of the
Holy Spirit." When Ben Roden died in
1978, Lois assumed the mantle ofleadPage 25

ership, ostensibly based on her role as

the "sixth angel of Revelation." At this
point in the Branch Davidian chronology - one that stretched back through
over a century of doctrinal splits and
metamorphoses - a man named Vernon Howell appeared.
He would later call himself David
Koresh.
Howell was born in Houston,
Texas in 1959, and was raised in the
Seventh-day Adventist religion of his
mother. Biographical accounts show
that in addition to being fascinated by
biblical texts, especially the eschatological verses of Revelation and
Daniel, he was also familiar with the
writings of both William Miller and
Ellen White. In 1981, he was working
at Mt. Carmel as a handyman, but it
was not until 1983 that he was
disfellowshipped from the Seventh
Day Adventists. Notes Voss:
This began an intense period of spiritual growth and
soul searching, including long
crying spells and physical denials of food, as he absorbed
the teachings of Lois Roden ..
He also became popular for his
musical contributions to the
group.
He became
Lois
Roden's protege ...
Lois Roden selected Howell to become her eventual successor. But rumors that the two were romantically
involved reignited an earlier feud
which existed between Lois and her
son, George, who thought that he, not
his mother, should have succeeded
Benjamin Roden as head of the Branch
Davidians. Things got worse when
Howell decided to marry fourteen year
old Rachel Jones, the daughter of a
long-time member ofthe sect. By 1985,
George Roden had temporarily won
the struggle for power within the
Davidian movement, and took over the
Mt. Carmel compound. Vernon Howell
and his young wife headed for Israel,
and while there decided to change his
name to David Koresh. The moniker
was laden with apocalyptic significance. Koresh, a form of the name
"Cyrus," referred to the only non-IsPage 26

raelite to have been "anointed" ("mes- Branch Davidians - combined with an

siah" in the Hebrew of Isaiah 45:1). array of miscalculations
and, ultiKoresh "saw his role as that of the mately, disastrous moves by the FBI
Lamb mentioned in Revelation," and and government officials - have crebelieved that he would be able to deci- ated an aura of pop-culture folklore
pher the eschatological enigmas ofthe
which surrounds the disastrous events
"seven seals."
that took place in Waco. For many,
A string of bizarre encounters and those televised images of burning
confrontations followed that would buildings symbolize apocalypse, or cereventually lead to the events of March, tainly that an apocalypse of some kind
1993, and the televised images of a is about to happen. It is perhaps sigburning Branch Davidian compound nificant that once the people died and
outside ofWaco,Texas. Howell-Koresh .the buildings crumbled, the only thing
and his followers regained control of standing at Ranch Apocalypse was the
the Mt. Carmel property, and George Branch Davidian flag, a black banner
Roden ended up in a mental instituwith the white outline of the Star of
tion. Under Koresh's leadership, the David. It had been designed by a man
Branch Davidian compound grew, and who called himself David Koresh.
by 1993 some 100 members were living on the grounds or nearby. The
structure of life reflected the authoritarian and Millerite nature of the
group's apocalyptic philosophy. Koresh
taught that the Davidians were the
"wavesheaf," a spiritual elite who
would ascend to heaven prior to the
rapture of the 144,000 faithful souls
who would reign with the Messiah
during the millennium. He also believed that Armageddon would begin
with an attack
on the Branch
Davidians in the United States: his
sermons referred to the settlement as
"Ranch Apocalypse."
Flashback
The parallels linking the doomsday vision of the Millerites and that
of the Branch Davidians have not escaped a range of religious, political,
and cultural observers. Both were
apocalyptic movements which used
biblical interpretations as a template
in understand events. To a great extent, they were also authoritarian: the
prophetic insights of a leader are used
as the basis for organizing the collective lives of followers. The millennial
vision often demands the surrender
not only of critical judgment and intellectual independence, but of personal autonomy as well. The sect, compound, bunker, or church community
is transformed into an information-filter to shape the consciousness of followers, and assure their loyalty.
The apocalyptic teachings of the
Winter 1996-1997

Dial an Atheist
Current Atheist opinion
on [ust about everything that maHers.
Frequently up-dated
recorded messages
Columbus, Ohio
(614) 294-0300
Salt Lake City, UT
(801) 364-4939
American Atheist

One, Two, Many Endings!

)
)

Visions of
Apocalypse have
captivated .
madmen and
prophets
for centuries.
Modern-day
believers in
doomsday have an
embarrassment
of end-times
offerings to
choose from!

Conrad Goeringer is director of

American Atheists On-line Services and a contributing editor of
American Atheist.

Conrad F. Goeringer
Austin, Texas

hen people think of the

millennium and the end of
the world, they often do so
using biblical imagery such as Armageddon, Final Judgment, and the
Second Coming. But apocalyptic
texts like the Book of Daniel or Revelation aren't the only visions of
doomsday that await contemporary
end-timers. Throughout history, the
end of the world has captivated the
human imagination, and different
people have conjured a myriad of
possible destinations as they've traveled the Apocalypse Road.
Mother Shipton (1488-1561)
was a prophetess named Ursula
Sontheil who, by all accounts, was
ugly and superstitious.
John
Sladek's The New Apocrypha, A
Guide to Strange Science and Occult
Beliefs, reports that a book on her
life and prophecies depicted her as
the quintessential witch, "chin and
nose meeting, a cloak over her
hunchback, a broad-brimmed hat,
besom and black cat ..." She made
numerous predictions (mostly about
politics involving her native England), including one that said the
world would come to an end in 1991.
Many of her prophetic insights were
obtuse, others were "true" because
they were so generalized.
Joanna Southcott (17501814) made predictions about upheavals and revolution during a time
when "it was fairly safe to predict a
revolution anywhere." She badly
miscalculated, though, when she
prophesied that the Messiah would
land in England. A group known as
the Panacea Society still labors to
have a special council of Bishops of
the Church of England open a sealed
box which allegedly contains other
predictions. One promise that has
been made, though, offers:
Slow but Sure Deliverance ... from Nerves, RheuWinter 1996-1997

matism,
Eye, Ear, and
Throat Troubles,
Mental
Anxiety, Business Worries,
Faults of Disposition, and
the Tribulations
and Perplexity that will precede the
Coming of the Lord ...

Herbert W. Armstrong was one

of the most popular contemporary
prophets of doom until his death in
1986. He was influenced by the
millennialist ideology of the British
Israel Movement, and incorporated
biblical prophesy and Adventist
teachings into his Worldwide Church
of God. Though numbering
only
about 100,000 members, the church
purchased huge blocks of television
time and published a free magazine,
The Plain Truth. Armstrong was a
master in hinting that current
events always fit the prophetic template of the end-times. He saw the
European common market as the
Beast of Revelation, believed in a
nineteen-year
cycle of history,
taught that Jesus Christ wore short
hair, but never prophesied exactly
when the world would come to an
end - only that it would be "soon."
Michel de Notredame (15031566), better known as Nostradamus, is considered the odds-on
favorite prophet for mystics, occultists' and credulous new-agers, He
was a French physician, alchemist,
dabbler in mystic arts, and wrote a
book of rhymed verses in 1555 called
Centuries. Unfortunately, most ofhis
verses or quatrains are vague and
difficult to interpret. Science writer
L. Sprague de Camp attempted to
analyze 449 of Nostradamus's predictions, and found that eighteen
proved definitely false, 41 that were
true or could be construed to be accurate, and 390 simply
Cannot be identified with
anything that has happened.
Page 27

followers would supposedly sit out

Armageddon in an underground redoubt which would be entered
through "The Hole" (according to
Sladek, an artifact of Hopi Indian
legend) which was supposedly located in the California desert. "Charley" also believed
in a weird
In addition to critical reviews of synchronicity between the book of
Nostradamus's
prophecies by de Revelation and the lyrics of Beatles
Camp and Sladek, there is an ex- songs. "Revolution 9," for instance,
was really a reference to Chapter IX
haustive work by stage magician
James Randi titled The Mask oj of Revelation.
Nostradamus: A Biography oj the
Sladek, Sanders,
and even
World's Most Famous Prophet. Randi
Vincent Bugliosi have documented
demonstrates that many of the qua- some of Manson's ties and affinities
trains are ambiguously phrased al- to apocalyptic ideologies. He blended
lowing believers to "predict" events millennialist biblical verses with a
in retrospect - after they took place. hodgepodge of Scientology, new-age
He also says that some passages are crankery and occultism, and teachactually reports of events which were ings from a group known as The Protaking place while Nostradamus was cess Church of the Final Judgment.
alive, and that in a number of cases
The Process as it was popularly
the same passages have resulted in known was founded in 1964 by a
architectural
stuvastly different interpretations. The Shanghai-born
same verses, for instance, were in- dent named Robert de Grimston
terpreted at different times and by More and his ex-prostitute
wife,
different observers to predict the re- Mary Anne. The two met while enrolled in a Scientology course in Lonturn of Charles II to the English
throne, the advent of revolution and don. More was one of the few people
communism in France for a period who made it all the way up the
of three years and seventy days, and Scientology achievement ladder to a
status known as "clear." Leaving
the defeat of J acobinism in France
Hubbard's group, the two struck out
by Napoleon.
Randi notes, in a discussion of on their own and founded a self-imthe quatrains that "they were all provement company known as Compulsions Analysis. This evolved into
made for dates that are now past,
except the end of the world, which The Process, which had a swastikais happily placed in the year 3797,
like symbol of four Ps joined toaccording to some, and in 1999 by gether. In 1966 they purchased land
others."
in the Yucatan region of Mexico and
Charles Manson is known as formed a commune with about thirty
followers. While there, DeGrimston
the infamous mastermind behind
the Tate-LaBianca slaymgs depicted
reportedly began to imagine that he
in books like Helter Skelter by Los was the reincarnation
of Jesus
Angeles Prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi, Christ. He also started to formulate
and The FamUy by poet-writer Ed an apocalyptic religious creed which
Sanders. 'His "family" of followers taught that Jehovah, Lucifer, and
believed that Armageddon would be Satan were three equally powerful
precipitated by a race-war in the gods who would be reconciled and
United States which they could in- unified at the time of the Final Judgstigate in a campaign ofmurder from ment.
which the title "Helter Skelter" is
The Process ventured into the
taken. Armageddon was slated for United States and operated a series
1969 according to Manson, who was of coffee houses and thrift shops
a great searcher for hidden meanduring the late 1960s. Followers ofings in Bible verse. Manson and his ten wore black robes and peddled
They may be verified some-.
. day, but for the first three
hundred
years,
Nostradamus's rate of success as a
prophet is considerably below what he would have obtained by flipping a coin.

Page 28

Winter 1996-1997

their magazine which included special issues devoted to Death and

Fear. The group was considered a
part ofthe California undergroundstreet-scene and, predictably, broke
into factions in 1974. Subsequent
books like The Ultimate EvU by writer
Maury Terry made a not -so-convmcmg case that Process members were
linked to everything from cattle mutilations to the Son of Sam murders.
Apocalypse Culture by Adam Parfrey
(1987) was a look back at The Process and its influence on fringe culture.
Edgar C. Whisenant is a former
engineer for NASA whose name is
not known to many, unless they
happen to have been dedicated listeners to the religious Trinity Broadcasting Network during the late
1980s. Edgar picked September 1113, 1988 as the time of the rapture
when the elect would be lifted off to
heaven, with the rest of us stranded
on planet earth to endure the wrath
and ravages of the tribulation. His
booklet On Borrowed Time was
popular in fundamentalist and evangelical circles and included a foreword by the head of the World Bible
Society. Churches throughout the
country were telegraphing the good
news. One ministry organized a special Rapture Tour of the Holy Land
("only $1975 from Los Angeles or
$1805 from New York" ) - a trip
which curiously included return
fare.
We stay at the Intercontinental Hotel right on the
Mount of Olives where you
can get a beautiful view of
the Eastern Gate and the
Temple Mount. And if this is
the year of our Lord's return,
as we anticipate, you may
even ascend to Glory from
within a few feet of His ascension.
When Whisenant's predictions of
apocalypse did not come true, Trinity was somewhat unrepentant for
its decision to run selected videotapes about the scheduled rapture
American Atheist

event. Another preacher.

Hart
Armstrong of Christian Communications who had been enthused by
the promise of rapture that year.
boldly told his followers via a newsletter: "NoApologies! No Excuses! No
Explanations!"
Curiously. 1988 was one of the
more active years for prophecy-mongers. One possible explanation was
the popularity of Hal Lindsey's best
seller. The Late Great Planet Earth.
Lindsey and other biblical literalists
believe that the prophetic clock
started its count-down in 1948 with
the establishment of the State of Israel. For many. a biblical generation
is forty years. so - you do the math.
According to Soothsayers oj the
Second Advent. by William Alnor of
the Christian Research Journal.
Whisenant arrived at his prophetic
calculations in part from the influence of astrologer Jeanne Dixon. He
also used pyramidism in formulating his "88 reasons" why rapture
and Armageddon would take place
in 1988
For Mary Stewart Relfe. the
prophecy bull's-eye year was 1989.
In 1983. she predicted that as the
result of "divine revelation" she saw
World War III coming in six short
years. bringing with it the "partial
destruction of the US due to nuclear
attack." This was to be followed in
1990 by the beginning of the great
tribulation. then the return of Jesus
in 1997.
That time frame was pretty close
to the one envisioned by Henry
Kreysler of a ministry
called
"Watchman in the Wilderness." His
"proposed scenario for the end of
this present evil age" called for a
Soviet attack on Israel in 1988. rapture by 1991. and Armageddon in
1995. Another prophet. Reginald
Dunlop of California. predicted
"Worldwidefamine by 1986 ... many
will die ... the United States will feel
hunger pains for the first time."
Human body parts would be sold in
stores to alleviate the shortage. and
the Antichrist would be manifest in
1989 or 1990. "Through many
prayers ... I am MORE than positive
Austin, Texas

that this is THE YEARthat the Rapture will occur."

Trailing slightly behind Nostradamus in the prophetic popularity contest for new-agers and mystics is Edgar Cayce (1877-1945). He
is best known as "The Sleeping
Prophet." and gave over 14.000
"readings" during his lifetime on everything from health matters to the
fate of the world. (In the early 1900s.
he also invented the card game "Pit"
which is still marketed today by
Parker Manufacturing and sold in
toy stores.) Cayce believed in a number of tenets considered occult and
metaphysical. including reincarnation and the existence of the "lost
continent of Atlantis." which he said
boasted a technology far in advance
of our own with radio. planes. and a
"Great Crystal" which harnessed
energy from the sun. Today. his
"teachings"
and prophesies
are
spread by the Association for Research and Enlightenment. Among
Cayce's predictions:
California will slide into the sea
after its cities are devastated by
earthquakes.
The East Coast will be submerged. including the area of
South Carolina.
Similar floods will engulf much
of Europe and Japan.
and
"around 2000" the earth's axis
will shift. turning the frigid poles
into tropical areas.
Cayce also told followers that he
would be reborn in 1998 (hopefully
not in Los Angeles or New York). and
that Atlantis would rise off the Bahamas in 1969.
The "mystical" tradition of Cayce
resonates in the writings of syndicated columnist Jeanne Dixon.
whose 1969 book My Life and Prophecies announced to the world her
identification of the Antichrist. Dixon
says that she had a vision of the
Egyptian Queen Nefertttt and her
husband Ikhnaton giving a newborn
baby to a crowd of supplicants. She
wrote:

revelation indicates a child.

born somewhere
in the
Middle East shortly after 7
a.m. on Feb. 5. 1962 ... will
form a new 'Christianity'
based
on his 'almighty
power' but leading man in a
direction far removed from
the teachings
and life of
Christ.
For Dixon. this Antichrist will
become a popular speaker and figure who will lead humanity into a
state of "utter darkness a desolation." She predicts a war in 1999
followed by peace and disarmament.
But in the year 2000. waves of Chinese troops will purportedly invade
the Middle East.
Less oriented toward biblical
views of apocalypse
are the
millennialist themes found in the
new-age movement centered around
the Harmonic Convergence and
the writings of Jose Arguelles. Back
in August of 1987. hundreds of
thousands (perhaps even millions!)
of bliss ed-out new-agers thronged to
sites throughout the world considered "sacred" or "holy." many intent
on undergoing a twelve-day rite of
purification and consciousness development.
Locations
such as
Jerusalem. Mt. Shasta in Northern
California
(a favorite for Rosicrucians. flying-saucer buffs. even
racialist mystics). Machu Picchu in
Peru. and the so-called "power vortex" of Sedona. Arizona. were soon
over-run with believers. According
to the New Age Encyclopedia. this
was a time when many believers felt
that a particularly powerful
cosmic force peaked. and
that under its influence a
collective shift in human
mental orientation
would
occur. This shift was characterized as a move from
tribal consciousness to planetary consciousness.
from
separation to unity. from fear
to love. and from conflict to
cooperation ...

I am convinced that this

Winter 1996-1997

Page 29

All of this brain-salad came from ets in the solar system will tug at
the writings of a Mexican art histo- the earth's crust and the entire
rian named Jose Arguelles. His 1975 planet will tip over on its side. Polar
book The Transfortnatioe Vision sug- areas will suddenly end up in the
gested that "modem mankind had
equatorial belt, setting off melting
and flooding. Humanity meets its
disparaged a relationship
to the
Earth as an organism in favor of a demise as volcanoes erupt, tidal
selfish, materialistic culture." Civi- waves engulf the earth, and earthquakes level entire cities to rubble.
lization was supposedly decomposing into terror and uncertainty about This is a theme that is found in several pseudoscience accounts of histhe future, but thanks to what
Arguelles termed "a climax of mattory and how the world is to end.
ter," a new golden, millennialist age Some new-agers insist that the "lost
characterized
by "planetary con- continent of Atlantis" fell victim to
such a shift in the earth's rotational
sciousness" was just .around the
movement, and even programs like
corner.
For Arguelles, this millennialist
Mysteries of the Millennium hint that
timetable was based on a series of such a catastrophe has occurred
52-year cycles which began with the before in the planet's history. In
arrival of Cortes in the new world, some accounts, the sheer weight of
and was to peak in 1987. But this the ice pack causes the earth to "tip."
energy build-up was just a prelude
Astronomers and other scientists
to the Harmonic Convergence, when find this speculation both amusing
spiritual waves will come together in and a bit horrifying, as it suggests a
shocking lack of understanding
2012.
According to the Encyclopedia,
about our solar system. 5/5/2000
the Convergence movement marked
and related scenarios assume that
a shift in direction for new-agers.
there is some gravitational attractor
"beneath" .the planet acting on the
Personal transformation was gradually evolving into building move- ice. All the planets in the solar system can't do that job; while enorments on behalf of apocalyptic,
millennialist
thrusts
for social
mous masses are involved, so are
considerable distances which diminchange.
ish their gravitational effect. A nurse
Meantime, Arguelles' predictions
about the period 1987 to 1992 - a standing in a hospital delivery room
period of "purification, of cleansing"
exerts thousands of times more
- seem to have gone awry. Our solar gravitational effect on a new-born
system is supposedly being "syn- baby than all of the planets, and the
chronized" with six others, but as- sun, combined! (What does that say
tronomers haven't had much luck about astrology?)
locating these elusive heavenly enNo chronicle about contempotities. We're also supposed to be rary millennialist and apocalyptic
understanding the "common reso- thought is complete without mention
nance of psychic and solar energy of Hal Lindsey, probably the most
frequencies." Although all of this is influential pop-culture eschatologtst
based on Arguelles' interpretation of of the modem era. His books such
as The Late Great Planet Earth and
ancient Mayan texts, anthropologists and archaeologists suggest that
Countdown to Armageddon have
it is just so much bunk.
sold a total of over 40,000,000 copGod-like powers and global hap- ies. Like Pat Robertson, Lindsey is a
piness aren't exactly in the cards
bit slippery when it comes to preaccording to Richard Noone whose
dicting the fulfillment of biblical
book 5/5/2000 - Ice: The Ultimate
prophecy in the year 2000; but he
Disaster has gone through multiple
does insist that "there has come toprintings and become a classic in the gether all the predicted signs, and
fringe culture. Noone insists that on in the exact scenario."
Lindsey predicts that all true,
May 5,2000, em alignment of planPage 30

Winter 1996-1997

faithful believers will be raptured so

as to avoid the unpleasantness of the
tribulation, as the Antichrist runs
amok one last time. They will then
return with Christ for the Second
Coming and the Battle of Armageddon, to rule over the world for a thousand-year period of theocratic bliss.
How do we do know this is all about
to happen? Lindsey - like many
Bible-oriented doomsdayers - looks
for "signs" of prophetic fulfillment,
and finds a veritable treasure trove.
Much of it involves conspiracy politics. The Common Market or European Economic Community is the
reincarnation of the wicked Roman
Empire, the ten-horned beast of Revelation. This emergent one-world
government (a worry of many Identity and militia types) is about to be
led by the charismatic Antichrist,
who supposedly will attract attention by surviving a fatal gunshot attack. After that, everyone will receive
a "666" tattoo on the forehead. Those
who refuse will be put to death. The
False Prophet, a saddle-buddy of the
Antichrist, runs a one-world church
and leads trtbulatlonist persecution
against Christians who retreat into
a religious underground.
As gruesome as that sounds, it
pales in comparison to the warnings
from Cosmic Awareness, a "channeled" entity popularized over thirty
years ago by William Duby, which
described itself as "total mind that
is not anyone mind, but is from the
Universal Mind that does not represent any unity other than that of
Universality." Duby passed on to
higher planes, dying in 1967, and
his Organization of Awareness split
into factions. There is now a new
"channel" carrying on the work,
which warns humanity that a giant
spaceship named Nemesis is heading our way with a 40,000,000strong army of alien reptoids who
plan on conquering the earth.
Who can count?
There are literally hundreds if not
thousands of individuals and groups
beating the apocalypse drums, and
See One, Two page 52
American Atheist

JVIICCNNIOJVIfOOCI8nN88

The human tendency to

resort to magical
explanations may be
accounted for by
attempts of superstitious
people to empower themselves through energysaving, unintellectual
shortcuts. The scientific
method is difficult and
time-consuming. Magical
explanations, however,
are immediately gratifying
and effortless.

John Higdon, Ph.D., is Associate

Professor of Psychiatry at the
University of Missouri Medical
School at Columbia, where he
teaches medical psychology. Dr.
Higdon was a featured speaker
at the Sacramento convention of
American Atheists in 1993, and
has published numerous articles
in American Atheist on the
psychology of religion.
John Higdon
Austin, Texas

rom now until the year 2000 or

so,American Atheists are likely
to be treated to all manner of
superstitious ideas based upon the belief that the end of the thousand-year
period holds some sort of magical significance - perhaps, the end of the
world.
We may recall that when the year
1900 approached, people indulged in
all sorts of magical predictions. Needless to say, none of those predictions
came to pass. The current approach of
the year 2000 can be expected to generate similar or even greater superstitions, because it is not just a century
mark but a millennial mark.
One would hope that in the hundred-year period since the magical
nonsense of 1900 we would have
achieved sufficient advances in education and in scientific thinking that
magical beliefs would be much diminished. Increased intellectual sophistication has developed in many areas,
but it seems as if superstition is still
powerful- as evidenced by a staggering percentage of Americans who believe in astrology, reincarnation, crop
circles, poltergeists, telepathy, communication with the dead, space aliens,
premonitions, omens, clairvoyance,
spirit possession, psychic surgery, an
afterlife - to say nothing of god, the
"mother of all ghosts."
Journals such as American Atheist and Skeptical Inquirer make significant contributions to countering all
this foolishness, but they may be
preaching to the choir. Many who are
most in need of science and skepticism
remain as unaware of such publications as they are unaware of the scientific method generally. The increase
in home schooling will make scientific
ignorance increasingly prevalent.
One is left to try to explain the
appeal of superstition, as it seems as
iffaith unfounded on empiricism will
Winter 1996-1997

over the long haul be found wanting.

Can we explain why some individuals
- even some non-retarded ones - feel
such an attraction to magic, or can we
perhaps explain their need to force
mindless superstition on others? The
derogation of science, as in the creationism superstition,
accounts for
some of the scientific illiteracy in
America, although it does seem as if
some courts and some school systems
are increasingly willing to stand up to
religionists and may be starting to curtail the dumbing-down of our educational system.
Although there are various causal
factors, the human tendency for magical explanations may be accounted for
by attempts of superstitious people to
empower themselves through energysaving, unintellectual shortcuts. The
scientific method of reaching answers
is more efficacious, but it is challenging and time-consuming. Reason, observation, and experience are all required, and challenging stages of work
must be pursued over time in order to
achieve meaningful testing of'hypotheses. Scientific evidence is ultimately
gratifying, but it accumulates slowly
and requires perseverance.
In contrast, superstition may offer a compelling shortcut. Virtually all
omens, spirits, and signs (and all magical solutions) afford nearly instant
gratification. Thus, superstitious explanations appear to empower their
adherents better and faster than does
science which, by comparison, seems
to be a plodding affair.
A society concerned with advertising and sales may be especially
tempted to resort to instant gratification - not only for products and services but to achieve rapid pseudoexplanations for existential (life) questions. The unintellectual shortcuts of
superstition ostensibly save time and
energy.
Page 31

virtually ready-made explafantasies mayor may

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tion. It is energy-efsentially
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ficient and reassurtheir cognitive
ing. It accounts for all
processes
and
kinds of doomsday and
rapture mythologies.
prevents them
from assessing
Such rapture fantasies will most appeal to
reality accurately.
people who feel as if
Such patients
become
they are deteriorating
aware of this cognitive
breakdown on some level; but, espe- and who also feel like profound failcially if not diag- ures in life. Their doomsday and millennium fantasies thus serve to exnosed and treated
SNAPSHOTS by Jason Love
properly, they will plain and externalize a frightening
feel
highly
feeling of deterioration, help to save
threatened
by face, and simultaneously fulfill a sadotheir neurological
masochistic desire for the demise of all
breakdown
but
the rest of us - to the benefit of
society's unfortunate failures. On their
have no understandable, valid
face, doomsday fantasies offer an inexplanation
for teresting social-psychological study
what they are ex- and hold no real threat. However, more
periencing. Some disturbing is the possibility that a milwill attempt to ex- lennialist may come across the wherewithal to put his fantasy into effectternalize
the
threat from their
in other words, a self-fulfilling prophingrained reality
esy may ensue. This has in fact occurtesting and project red on limited levels, as at Waco and
it onto their envi- Jonestown. With nuclear arsenals
ronment.
"I am available, it is conceivable that it
not deteriorating;
might occur on a larger scale. Ronald
the world (or civi- Reagan, with his apocalypse mythollization) is, and
ogy and expressed belief that we might
thus it is not my be living in the end time prophesied
personal (existen- in the Bible, may have exemplified this
tial) problem."
possibility.
It remains to be seen if millenPsychotics
who already hold nialists or other religious fanatics ensome religious be- danger our society. But, at the least,
liefs and have in- they will be working to perpetuate
dulged in society- magical thinking and will try to continue the dumbing-down of American
wide institutional"Gosh, you sure were a lot lighter the
ized forms of magi- culture - at least for the next four
first time around."
cal ideation have a years.

While superstition seems empoweririg in an easy way, we are also faced

with the puzzle of end-of-the-world
fantasies which crop up around century or millennial years. Clearly there
is nothing in reality which makes a
rounded-off year special, any more
than moving past a rounded-off mileage on a car's odometer signifies anything. Such rounding-off milestones
are based on nothing but happenstance of number systems, the passage
oftime, the calendar system, and other
purely arbitrary factors. Where then
do these end-of-the-world ideas really
come from?
Studies of psychopathology may
offer some insights. Psychotherapists
who study and treat severe mental disorders are aware that some psychotics
harbor what are called world-destruction fantasies: ideas that their world
or civilization is about to end. Such

Page 32

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Winter 1996-1997

tf>

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American Atheist

WHERE JESUS NEVER WALKED

A lecture delivered
at the 30th
.
anniversary
celebration and
convention of
American Atheists,
April 9-11, 1993,
Sacramento,
California

efore his vocal cords rusted,

Pat Boone used to sing a little
ditty dealing with the thrill ofretracing the steps ofJesus in the Holy Land.
The song was titled "I walked today
where Jesus walked," and it reflected
the orthodox picture of the stage on
which the drama of the ages is supposed to have played out. Unspecified
hills of Galilee, Gethsemane, Calvary
- all the important places of the Jesus
legend were there for Pat to croon
about. Unknown to the wholesome Mr.
Boone, however, the geography of that
song was about as real as that which
is reflected in the songs "Follow the
yellow-brick road," or "We're off to see
the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of
Oz."

mJ'

'1 Walked Today Where Je$U$Walked-

walked

tc-oov where Je$U$

Copyright 10 1937 (Renewed) G, SchIrmer, he,

Frank R. Zindler
Austin, Texas

There is considerable similarity

between the geography of Oz and that
of the New Testament, and a careful
study of Ozography can prepare us
methodologically for the great task of
riddling out the mysteries of Bible geography as they relate to the career of
the supposedly historical Jesus. But
before we deal with the problem of
where Jesus might have walked, let
us consider the possible perambulations of the Wizard of Oz.
It is well established that Dorothy
and Toto started from the center of
Kansas - a geographic entity at least
as well established as Jerusalem or the
Sea of Galilee. Moreover, the land of
Oz should be located at a distance of
Winter 1996-1997

Text by Daniel S,TwoI'Ig , Music by Geoffrey O'Hara

walked

Intemattonal Copyright Secured

Geography of Oz

Frank R. Z~ndler is a science

writer. He is a member of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science, the New
YorkAcademy of Science, the Society of Biblical Literature, and
the American Schools of Oriental
Research. He is the Editor of
American Atheist.

one cyclone-trip-without-transfer
away from the center of Kansas. A
careful study of meteorology, atmospheric physics, and mid-American
cyclone trajectories shows that Oz's
capital, Emerald City, must have been
located somewhere between Topeka
and the northwestern part of Missouri,
the part west of US Route 35.
Lamentably, however, a careful
scrutiny of all the Landsat photographs for the area in question turns
up absolutely no trace ofOzian ruins.
Exhaustive search detects no trace of
Emeraldite buildings. Even a careful
reading of the excavation reports made
when the Topeka and Kansas City
subway systems were built reveals no
evidence of Ozoid foundations or arti-

90-

AllllIghts Reserved

Used by Permission

facts. We must conclude that Emerald

City never existed - ever.
If the land of Oz is not real - a
mere literary fiction - what can we
believe about the Wizard of Oz? Is
there any longer any point in trying
to penetrate to deeper levels of the
scriptural text to discover a historical
kernel, some residue of an "Historical
Wizard" underlying the legendary
Wizard of Oz? Can we seriously suppose that a real Wizard, despite the
fictive elements of Baum's graceful
gospel, might yet have foisted his foolery in Kokomo or Cucamonga - even
if not in Emerald City as recorded?
What are the implications of the
discovery that Oz is a metaphor, not a
place? For one thing, it throws the
Page 33

entire subject of Munchkin historical

demography into total disarray. For
another, it makes it all but logically
certain that the Wizard ofOz is mythical. It makes us realize that if the geography in which a character supposedly acted out his career is fictional,
the character himself more likely than
not is fictional as well. While such a
demonstration falls short of proving a
universal negative, it nevertheless is
very compelling. At a minimum, it
leaves one with the feeling that it
would be quite irrational to continue
believing in the historical reality of a
character who lacked a real habitat.
When Oz does not exist, is it rational
to believe in the Wizard of Not-Oz?

be considered a suburb of Nazareth,

but in Josephus' day, I'll wager, the
people of Japha buried their dead in
the tombs of the unnamed necropolis
that now underlies the modern city
called Nazareth.
Although the New Testament tells
us very little about our mythical municipality, it does tell us enough to allow us to conclude that present-day
Nazareth couldn't be the Biblical city
referred to, say, in the fourth chapter
of the Gospel of Luke. In that chapter
we find a story about Jesus coming
back to his ''home town" and taking a
turn teaching in the synagogue. (Keep

Nazareth
Keeping the idea of the Wizard of
Not-Oz in mind, let us now turn our
attention to another character in another work of fiction: Jesus of
Nazareth, the major character of the
gospels of Luke, Matthew, and John,
although he is completely unknown to
the writers of the epistles supposed to
have been written by St. Paul. (None
of the saintly forgers called Paul ever
refer to "Jesus of Nazareth.") As the
Wizard should have been of Oz, so
Jesus should have been of Nazareth.
But where was Nazareth in the first
century C.E.?More fundamentally, was
Nazareth in the first century?
Nazareth is not mentioned even
once in the entire Old Testament, nor
do any ancient historians or geograI.
phers mention it before the beginning
of the fourth century. The Talmud, although it names 63 Galilean towns,
knows nothing of Nazareth. Josephus,
in mind that no synagogue ruins datwho wrote extensively about Galilee able to the first century have ever been
(a region roughly the size of Rhode Is- found at the present site.) According
land) and conducted military opera- to Luke's tale, Jesus'teachingriled evtions back and fourth across the tiny eryone up because of its supposed blasterritory in the last half of the first phemy, and the natives were going to
century, mentions Nazareth not even execute him for that awful crime. Inonce - although he does mention by stead of stoning him, the required penname 45 other cities and villages of alty for blasphemy, verses 28-30 tell
Galilee. This is even more telling when us the legally and culturally implauone discovers that Josephus does men- sible story that "At these words, the
tion Japha, a village which is just over whole congregation were infuriated.
a mile from present-day Nazareth!
They leapt up, threw him out of the
Josephus tells us that he was occupied town, and took him to the brow of the
there for some time. Today, Japha can hill on which it was built, meaning to
I

Page 34

Winter 1996-1997

hurl him over the edge. But he walked

straight through them all, and went
away."
Although
this is an obvious
fairytale, it does tell us that wherever
Nazareth was located, it was on a hill
and that the hill had a cliff high
enough that a man falling off it would
be killed. The town now called
Nazareth, however, until just recently
never occupied the top of a hill. Rather,
for a thousand years or more it has
occupied a valley floor and the lower
half of the hillside that bounds it on
the northwest. Excavations of the top
of the Nazarene hill show that it has
never had buildings on its top before
the twentieth century. Worse yet,
there is no cliff which can be identified with the ''brow of the hill" from
which the Jews sought to cast Jesus
down to his death.
Like the White Queen whom Alice
met in Through the Looking Glass,
Christian pilgrims have always been
able to believe six or more mutually
contradictory, impossible propositions
every morning before breakfast. Unlike the White Queen, however, the
Christians have been able to maintain
such belief after breakfast as well.
Thus, since there is no place suitable
for dwarf-tossing let alone messiahchucking on the hill at present-day
Nazareth, entrepreneureal
priests,
monks, and native guides have staked
out other places to show gullible tourists as the place where the Jews tried
to jettison Jesus - while still maintaining the city itself is Nazareth.
Although Jebel el-Qafzeh, a small
mountain 2.5 km SE of Nazareth, is
believed by the Greek Orthodox to be
the site of the attempted deicide, another mountain, several catapultthrows west of Qafzeh, is believed by
Roman Catholics to be the exact spot.
Some people probably believe that
both sites are correct, although for
some centuries there has been a tendency to reconcile the contradiction by
invention of a new, improved mythology.It seems that Luke was a bit vague
and imprecise when he claimed that
Jesus walked right through the crowd
ofJews and thus escaped precipitation
to the ranks of flattened fauna. What
American Atheist

Before the second or third century

really happened, it was discovered, is Moreover, archaeological excavations
Nazareth - even C.E.- going back to the Middle Bronze
that Jesusjumped into the air to evade at present-day
Age - the site now occupied by
the mob. It is a pity that this took place though carried out by Franciscan
before the broadjump became a part
monks and priests who must always Nazareth was a necropolis, a city of
ofthe Olympic games, since this jump be aware of the tourist significance of the dead. The hillside underlying part
of Jesus was a doozie. You see, he the real estate owned by their order of the present city is riddled with
jumped all the way from Qafzeh, the - have failed to show the remains of tombs and natural caves which for
mountain in the east, onto the moun- a single building credibly datable to over a thousand years were used for
tain several catapult-throws away in the first century B.C.E. or the first cen- burials. Since Jewish law prohibited
the west. Thus, we have the Mount of tury C.E. The oldest buildings found cemeteries from being in the midst of
seem to date from the last half of the inhabited sites, we can be quite sure
the Lord's Launching and the Mount
third century, and there is no informa- that there was no Jewish city at the
ofthe Lord's Landing.
I'm not making this up, you know. tion to indicate what the inhabitants
present site in the days when a supWe have written records to prove it. of those buildings called their village. posedly Jewish Jesus is supposed to
To be sure, the Franciscans have have been running loose there.
In 1336 Sir John Maundeville checked
Despite these facts, a visitor to
out the site where Jesus landed after
pointed to crockery, coins, and other
today's Nazareth
jumping from the
can be treated to
crowd.
"And
a visit to the room
soone after he
Text by Daniel S. Twohig
Music by Geoffrey O'Haa
'11ff
'1 Walked Today Where Jesus Walked'
in
which the Virwas founden at
gin Mary "rethe fote of an
ceived" the angel
other Mountayne
lee,
Gabriel.
(Now
therby where yet
though the perch
the prynte of his
upon which he
holy stappes are
sene" - Maunderoosted is still
ville'svery words.
there, the window
(Of course, these
through which he
fossil footprints
flew was blocked
are at the foot of
up by 1666.) Both
the moun tain
the kitchen
in
which she cooked
rather than on
the top. But only
the meals for the
child
Ish
teet;
The
a hopeless skepholy family and
tic would think
Joseph's carpenthis a discreptry workshop are
ancy.)
displayed.
The
Even before
room in which
Maundeville, in
Jesus lived after
4
Copyrlght 0 1937 (Renewed) G, Schirmer. Inc.
International Copyright Secured
AI RIghts Reserved Used by P&rmIssion
1283 Burchard of
his return from
Mt. Sion, a GerEgypt can also be
man Dominican
visited, as well as
(and thus especially trustworthy), cer- artefacts excavated from beneath the the places where the Blessed Virgin
tified that "Lord's Leap - the place various shrines at Nazareth as proof was born - there are, of course, sevwhere they tried to deject Jesus - but that the place was inhabited during
eral of them, not counting her birth[where] he slipped out of their hands
place
five miles away in Sepphoris or
the first centuries B.C.E. and C.E. But
and suddenly found himself an arrow's all these items are compatible with the her birthplace in Jerusalem. The peshot away on the flank of a mountain
idea that they were associated with culiar thing about all these sacred
across the way - where this is pointed burials, and most items are dated
spots, however, is that they are all in
out, there you can see the imprinted
vaguely (deliberately, in my opinion) grottoes or caves. MyoId German
outline of his body and his clothes." As as from "the Roman period" - to con- Lutheran pastor never told me that
far as I can tell, it's not too far a hike jure up images of Pontius Pilate and Jesus, Mary, and Joseph were troglofor pilgrims between the footprints
a branch of the
the first century, even though the Ro- dytes! Perhaps
and the bodyprint up the hill!
man period lasted into the fourth cen- Flintstone family! Another peculiar
We have already noted that the tury C.E., and even I accept the possi- fact about these sites is that they are
town today called Nazareth does not bility that the site was settled as early all within a few yards of cave-tombs,
fit the place implied in Luke's gospel. as the end of the second century.
or were themselves used as cave-tombs
Austin, Texas

Winter 1996-1997

Page 35

at one time or another, or both. Since

Jewish law prohibits habitation within
150-200 feet of a grave or tomb, we
must conclude that the "good Jewish
family" into which Christ was born
was perpetually in a state of ritual
uncleaness!
That the holy family were cave
people is only fitting, however, when
we note that Jebel el-Qafzeh, the
"Mount of the Lord's Launching," is
less than two miles away from the
Christ cave. A cave at Qafzeh has
yielded a series of Neanderthal-like
skeletons
dating to the Ice Age,
100,000 years ago. So the Flintstone
connection might not be too wide of the
mark after all!
To sum up the archaeological evidence from so-called Nazareth, no remains of actual buildings datable to
the turn ofthe era have ever been uncovered, despite the immense amount
of excavating and building that have
taken place there during the last century. What have been found, in mindboggling plenty, are cave tombs and
grave sites. Until the site was settled
some time after the expulsion of the
Jews from Jerusalem in 135 C.E., our
would-be holy city was a burial
ground, a veritable city ofthe dead, or
necropolis. In the first century, the
major town of J apha was only a little
over a mile away, and it is likely that
its inhabitants found the natural caverns and grottoes of the Nazareth hill
an ideal place to bury their dead.
Given, then, that the place now
called Nazareth cannot be the biblical
site, is there any other place for which
tradition from very early times could
nominate for the honor of being the
childhood home of Jesus? Given the
seemingly inexhaustible
capacity of
religious entrepreneurs
to multiply
sacred sites and holy relics, it is startling to discover that there really
aren't any other candidates.
In this regard, it is extremely interesting
that the church father
Origen, who lived from 182? to 254?
C.E. gave no indication
of knowing
where Nazareth was, even though he
lived in Ceesarea, a seaport town just
thirty
miles
from present-day
Nazareth!
Mind you, it is not that
Page 36

Origen had no opportunity to mention

the city. In fact he mentions it a number of times in his attempts to reconcile the contradictory accounts of the
gospel stories impacting on the passage just quoted above from Luke-.
Curiously, Origen doesn't quite know
whether the town should be called
Nazareth or Nazara. If there actually
had been such a town close-by when
Origen was writing, he could simply
have walked over to it and asked the
inhabitants how they spelled the name
of their town. But it seems clear that
Origen didn't think there was such a
town at all. To save the gospels from
their many mutual contradictions, he
had to propose a "mystical" method of
interpreting them, and argued that
they could not be interpreted literally.
Almost certainly, to Origen the geography of the gospels - including the
supposed town ofN azareth - was just
as mystical and insubstantial as the
events of the gospels.
The first supposed solid reference
to Nazareth as a geographic reality is
given by the church father Eusebius,
also ofCresarea, who wrote during the
first decades of the fourth century. His
Onomasticon, a geographic listing and
description of all the holy places mentioned in the Bible, is often cited as
proof of the Existence of a city called
Nazareth at the present location at the
end of the third century. A careful
study of the Greek text of Eusebius'
brief and confused
mention
of
Nazareth leads one to conclude that
he had never been there himself(even
though like Origen he lived only thirty
miles away) and was not at all sure
just where the place was. Nazareth
might as well have been in Mongolia,
for all the first-hand information we
get from Eusebius!
N ame-Calling
If there never was a place called
Nazareth in the first century, how did
the name get into the Bible? We have
already noted that the name is unknown in any of the epistles, those of
Paul being the oldest parts of the New
Testament. The city is named only in
the gospels and the book of Acts. The
oldest ofthe gospels is that attributed
Winter 1996-1997

to a certain Mark, even though the

authors of its various components are
utterly unknown. Mark, unlike the
later gospels, mentions Nazareth only
once: in chapter 1, verse 9, which tells
us that "Jesus came from Nazareth of
Galilee." It is of more than a little interest to learn that scholars suspect
this verse to be a later addition just
like the last twelve verses of the gospel. If this be true - and I am quite
certain that it is2 - this leaves the
oldest gospel without any knowledge
of a place called Nazareth." Once
Nazareth found its way into the gospel of Mark, it grew in importance in
the later gospels. One might say that
for Jesus to make a mark in the world,
it was necessary to make a world in
Mark!
The way in which the name
Nazareth came into existence is intimately related to the process by which
Jesus obtained his biography, and so
we must digress from pseudogeography to pseudobiography.
Before Jesus could be given a biography, he had to receive a name.
Actually, he received several names,
but all of his names were really titles.
Thus, the name Jesus of Nazareth
originally was not a name at all, but
rather a title meaning (The) Savior,
(The) Branch. In Hebrew this would
have been Yeshua' Netser. The word
Yeshua' means 'savior,' and Netser
means 'sprout,' 'shoot: or 'branch' a reference to Isaiah 11:1, which was
thought to predict a messiah (lit.,
'anointed one') of the line of Jesse
(King David's father): "And there shall
come forth a rod out of the stem of
Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of
his roots ... " (You've all heard by now
of the Branch Davidians! They take
their name from the same idea.)
While this reference to a branch
from Jesse will doubtless seem obscure
to modem Atheists, it would not have
been obscure to ancient Jews such as
those who composed the Dead Sea
Scrolls (and wrote a commentary on
Isaiah 11:1); nor would it have been
obscure to the early Christians. According to the church father Epiphanius, who was born on Cyprus in
367 C.E. and wrote a treatise against
American Atheist

"heretics," the Christians originally

were called Jessseans, precisely because of the messianic tie to Jesse.'
Although for speakers of Hebrew
and its close cousinAramaic the meaning and prophetic significance of the
title The Savior, The Branch would
have been clear, after it had been
wrestled into Greek eslesous Nazoraios
or Iesous Nazarenos, its titular significance must soon have been forgotten.
The Iesous part came to be a simple
name (Jesus in Latin) of the 'Ibm, Dick,
or Harry sort. TheNazorafos part, however, was misperceived as being derived from the name of a place - the
imaginary village ofN azareth - much
as the word Parisian can be derived
from Paris.
And so, Yeshua' Netser came to be
Jesus of Nazareth - a name of the
Jimmy-the-Greek
sort, a name
thought to contain information about
a person's place of origin.
As we have already seen, at the
turn of the era, there was no place
called Nazareth, and we do not know
when the place now called by that
name became so identified. As far as I
can tell, the place presently called
Nazareth received its name from an
imaginative Branch Jessrean some
time at the end of the second or early
third century. At the turn of the era,
however, Nazareth was as mythical as
the Mary, Joseph, and Jesus family
that was supposed to have lived there.
So Jesus never walked in Nazareth. And Jesus never walked in
Hoboken or Hamtramck. And he probably never walked on 42nd street in
Manhattan. But what about Capernaum, Bethany, or Bethphage? And
wasn't he betrayed in Gethsemane and
crucified on Calvary? And didn't he
have a girlfriend who came from
Magdala, and didn't he compete with
a guy who baptized people at a place
called .tEnon? If he didn't walk in
Nazareth, where, if anyplace, did
Jesus walk?

Capernaum
Since Capernaum is supposed to
have been the site of Jesus' second
home, the home of St. Peter, and the
site of some of his most impressive
Austin, Texas

miracles, we need to take a look at the

evidence for Capernaum.
At first glance, Capernaum differs
from Nazareth by virtue of the fact
that it is said to be mentioned by
Josephus, both in hisLife (72:403) and
in his Jewish War (111:8:519).But the
sites mentioned in Josephus'Life and
Jewish War are two different places,
and neither is the equivalent of the
Capernaum of the gospels.
The Jewish War passage describes
a spring, not a town, namedKapharnoum or Kapharnaoun and tells about
the odd fish that lives in the spring.
Josephus says that Kapharnaoun has
been imagined to be a branch of the
Nile! If this were the Capernaum of
the gospels, JC and St. Peter would
have been walking on the waterall the
time - and sleeping on it as well.
The passage in Josephus' Life
mentions a town calledKepharnokon,
not Kapharnoum, and it is only a
blinding bias induced by Christian
ganglion-washing that makes almost
all scholars suppose that Josephus is
talking about the biblical town. But
Kepharnokon clearly is not Capernaum, and Capernaum, like Nazareth,
is unknown outside the gospels before
the end of the first century
The most common meaning given
to the name Capernaum as it appears
in the gospels is City of Nahum, although whether it refers to the prophet
Nahum or some other Nahum is not
agreed. Origen, like nearly everyone
else up to the the present, derived the
second part of the name from the same
root as that for the nameNahum, but
arrived at 'place of consolation' as the
meaning of Capernaum. It is important to note that Origen understood
clearly that the name Capernaum as other sacred names - had a symbolic meaning that befitted the stories
in which it was embedded.
While most scholars are correct in
tracing Capernaum to the root from
which Nahum derives, I think they
have all missed the crucial nuance in
that root's meaning which caused the
evangelists to choose it as the symbolic
name of the place where their nascent
cult's most important progress should
occur. When we see how this Hebrew
Winter 1996-1997

word was translated into Greek in several ancient versions of the Old Testament, we find that it could be translated as Paraclete, or Comforter. It is
this possible link to the Paraclete, I
believe, that reveals the symbolic intent of the New Testament writers
when they created Capernaum.As 'the
village of the Paraclete', Capernaum
would focus the idea that the Holy
Spirit was guiding the early church,
as well as the idea that the early
church (as symbolized by the Jesus
character) was fulfilling the role of intercessor or advocate.
Capernaum is mentioned sixteen
times in the gospels and nowhere else
in the New Testament. Despite the importance ofCapernaum during the alleged ministry of Jesus, the Apostles
seem not to have returned to the place,
if one may judge from the silence of
Acts. Certainly this is curious. One
would suppose that organizational ties
would have required at least some of
them to return to maintain the enterprise. Of course, if Capernaum were
merely symbolic, and not a geographic
entity, and if the apostles also were
symbols rather than people, this peculiar circumstance is easily understood.
Exhaustive analysis of all occurrences of the name Capernaum with
regard to the geography and topographic setting produces no convincing picture of a specific site. Not one
of the evangelists could have directed
a tour to the place. In the oldest gospel materials, even the location of
Capernaum in Galilee is not certain.
Capernaum could be located anywhere
around the Sea of Galilee. Both Mark
and John indicate that the city is located not too far from a shore of the
Sea of Galilee, and it contains a synagogue. That's it.
The lack of any clear indication of
where we should look to find the ruins of Capernaum, combined with the
fact that there is no site anywhere that
has a tradition unbroken from even
the second century of having been
called Capernaum, indicates that all
the archaeological ballyhoo about "discoveries at Capernaum" is of no importance. When they dig up the sign
Page 37

reading ''The Capernaum Chamber of

Commerce Welcomes You," we will reconsider the claims.
That a site so important in the
birth of Christianity should have been
lost to knowledge for several centuries
immediately after its moment of glory
is rather astonishing and requires an
explanation from those who suppose
Capernaum to have been historical.
The silence of Origen concerning its
location and physical features must be
explained also. For Origen lived at
Ceesarea, only 45 miles from the site
modern maps call Caperrraum, and he
travelled widely and frequently and
records that "We have visited the
places to learn by inquiry of the footsteps of Jesus and of his disciples and
ofthe prophets." Despite extended discussion of the chronological and geographic contradictions
concerning
Capernaum in the gospels, never does
he even hint that he actually knows
where the place is to be found. Capernaum's unknown physical location
clearly is a major factor in Origen's
argument that the gospels and the
gospel place names must be interpreted mystically, not historically.
With the absence of a continuous
Capernaum tradition connected to any
site, nowadays only one site is considered a candidate for the gospel village:
Telhum, 2.5 miles SW of where the
Jordan flows into the Sea of Galilee.
Indeed, Israeli maps call the place
Kfar-Nachum (the Hebrew equivalent
of Capernaum) , and both Catholic and
Israeli tourist agencies are absolutely
delighted.
The Telhum site has never contained a spring, however. This rules it
out as the site of the place mentioned
in Josephus' Jewish War, (the place
which in some Greek manuscripts is
spelled exactly the same way as the
Capemaum of the gospels) but not the
place mentioned in the Life (the place
called Kepharnokon
instead
of
Capernaum). Nor could it be the site
mentioned in Mt 4:13, which requires
Capernaum to be both in Zebulon and
Naphtali! While Telhum may be
within the ancient
territory
of
Naphtali, it most assuredly is not in
Zebulon. Just possibly, the FranPage 38

ciscans have found the place mentioned in the Life (the place called
Kephamokon instead ofCapemaum).
If so, it would rule out the place as the
site of the gospel Capernaum.
The fact that the site is owned and
operated by religious organizations organizations that have a vested interest in the results of archaeological
investigations - does not allow one to
read excavation reports from 'Capernaum' without healthy doses of skepticism. Indeed, the reports generated
by these motivated parties must be
scrutinized the way one deals with the
works offundamentalist "creation scientists." The Israeli archaeologists
Baruch Sapir and Dov Neeman5 have
given a revealing critique of the type
of 'science' that has been done at the
Telhum site - beginning with attempts to relate the remains ofa synagogue found there to the synagogue in
which Jesus is alleged to have taught.
Their criticism deals with the work of
Dr. Gaudence Orfali, a Christian excavator whose digs up to 1926 perhaps
made it forever impossible to recover
the archaeological truth concerning
the Telhum site:
Dr. G. Orfali ... concentrated on an altogether different research method, characterized by its singleness of
purpose and inspired by the
Franciscan Fathers, whose
sole aim was to rediscover the
synagogue ofKfar-Nachum ....
Their one and only goal was
to unearth the edifice which,
according to the Gospels, was
the earthly scene and backdrop for the greater part of
Christ's Galilean ministry ....
their aim was to prove ... that
the synagogue they excavated
was the building, built on the
very place and in the proper
historical setting.
... both the dig and the
very thorough report on it as
published by Dr. Orfali ... lost
the impartial and unbiased.
power of scientific analysis,
both of finds and results ....
Therefore the report does
Winter 1996-1997

not contain even the slightest

hint at an effort to establish
stratification through modem
methods ... Instead of relying
on actual archaeological evidence, Dr. Orfali chose for his
report a much simpler method: he either ignored completely or suppressed
anything discovered on the site
that was considered irrelevant
to the main purpose of the dig
or liable to disprove the underlying theory of the building
date. ... Orfali thereby withheld information which might
have changed the preconceived official theory and carefully avoided any statements
contradicting
the accepted
date of the building.
Sapir and Neeman also tell how
more than 2000 coins found in the
Capernaum dig were hidden away and
suppressed for over 40 years, apparently because they did not accord with
Orfali's expectations.
Although finding the remains of a
first-century synagogue is a prerequisite for establishing any site as a candidate for the biblical Capemaum, no
one except for some Franciscans any
longer thinks that the limestone synagogue ruins shown to tourists at
'Capemaum' date to the first century.
However, the Franciscan
Virgilio
Corbo, claims to have found the remains of an earlier synagogue, the
basalt walls of which lie almost exactly
aligned beneath the limestone walls
ofthe synagogue now on the surface,"
The implication, of course, is that
Corbo has uncovered the remains of
the first century synagogue. But Corbo
has not proved that the basalt "walls"
he found immediately under the limestone walls belonged to a separate
building, let alone a synagogue. It is
most probable that the basalt "walls"
are merely the massive footings for the
limestone walls.
Thus, the presence of a synagogue
dating to the first century at Telhum
remains to be proved. We must remind
ourselves that hundreds of synagogues
existed in Palestine during the first
American Atheist

century, and successful demonstration

of the existence at Telhum of a synagoguefrom that time is necessary, but
not sufficient, to identify the site as
Capernaum. No inscriptional remains
capable of showing what the place was
called have ever been found.
The most outrageous claim made
by the Franciscan
excavators
of
Telhum is that they have found the
actual house of St. Peter beneath the
ruins of the fifth-century octagonal
church." They claim that the remains
they found of a plastered room with
Christian graffiti, some perhaps pertaining to St. Peter, shows the site was
venerated from the first century on.
Non-Franciscan authorities, however,
do not believe the evidence shows
Christian activity before the fourth
century. Certainly, by that time, we
may expect that enterprising tourguides had learned that they could get
money from credulous Christian pilgrims by showing them the places
where St. Peter's mother-in-law slept
when she had a fever, where Jesus
stood when he handed her the aspirin, where St. Peter tied up his boat,
and where Jesus had his picnic with
the five thousand.
But there is no
more reason to suppose Franciscans
at Kfar-Nachum own the remains of
St. Peter's House than to suppose that
reliquaries in Switzerland contain
splinters of the True Cross.
How wary must we be with regard
to work done by the Franciscans at
Telhum? In 1964, in an unsuccessful
effort to beautify the spot for the visit
of Pope Paul VI, a resident monk decided to make it look as though St.
Peter's basilica was really there, so
the octagonal structure was somehow
done up to resemble a basilical apse.
The Israeli Department ofAntiquities
put a stop to that!

Bethphage, Bethany, and

Bethabara
A careful study of the names of
other places of importance in the gospels shows that many of them have
highly symbolic meanings, are unknown in the Old Testament and in
pagan geographies, and - as was the
case with Nazareth and CapernaumAustin, Texas

archaeological evidence for them is

unconvincing or even counterindicative. Three such places, Bethphage,
Bethany, and Bethabara, can be considered together because of their intimate textual interrelations in the gospels.
Bethany, allegedly less than two
miles from Jerusalem, nevertheless is
unknown in the Old Testament; nor
is it known to Josephus or any other
ancient geographer or historian. According to John 1:28, however,
Bethany is located "beyond Jordan,
where John was baptizing" - i.e.,
Bethany is east of the Jordan River, in
contradiction to the statement in John
11:18 that it is west of the Jordan.
While this is confusing enough, some
ancient witnesses (including Origen)
indicate
that the name of the
Transjordan town of John 1:28 should
read Bethabara instead of Bethany.
Not surprisingly, 'Bethabara' also is
unknown in the Old Testament,
Josephus, and other ancient authors.
It is sometimes claimed that the
Talmud contains evidence of the existence of a place called Bethany, but
careful study forces one to reject the
claim.
Considering the confusing condition of the evidence, it is no wonder
that Michael Avi-Yonah, in his Gazetteer of Roman Palestine,8 had to indicate three different possible sites for
'Bethany'.
As would be expected if the name
Bethany were a geographic fiction
coined by New Testament authors as
a literary device, the first known appearance of the name is in the New
Testament, and the use of the name is
confusing and contradictory. We have
already seen according to the Gospel
ofJohn, Bethany must lie on both sides
of the Jordan at once. The confusion
only multiplies when we examine the
other New Testament occurrences of
the name.
Mark and Luke relate the position
of Bethany to Bethphage, another
town of gospel significance which was
unknown to the rest of the world. They
imply that both cities were located
along the Roman road running from
Jericho to Jerusalem,
and that
Winter 1996-1997

Bethany was closer to Jerusalem than

was Bethphage. In the parallel passage in Matthew, however, only
Bethphage is mentioned, and it appears that Bethany was a later addition to the text of Mark and Luke. Not
surprisingly, there are also biblical
reasons to put Bethphage closer to
Jerusalem, and so biblical maps show
Bethphage as a dot closer to Jerusalem than is the dot for Bethany. Where
were Bethany and Bethphage located?
You can't tell from the Bible, but I can
tell you that the Roman road from Jericho ran 2 km north of, not through,
the town now called Bethany!
We should note that Bethany and
Bethphage are related to the tale of
the miraculous cursing of the fig tree.
What better place for this to take place
than at The House of Figs, the literal
meaning of Bethphage in Hebrew?
It would appear that the original
version of this story in Mark mentioned only Bethphage (as symbolic
setting for the cursing of the figs which
was to follow). This was copied with
little change by Matthew. Later,
Bethany was added to the story. Since
'house of figs' is a possible etymology
for Bethany as well as Bethphage, no
damage was done to the symbolism of
the story. I believe, however, that
Bethany was meant to mean "house
of the poor" - alluding to the term by
which the early Christians as well as
the Qumran covenanters referred to
themselves. In any event, the symbolic
- not historic - use of the names
Bethany and Bethphage seems established by the evidence.
Origen expressed the opinion that
the site of John's baptizing in the
Transjordan
should not be called
Bethany, but rather Bethabara. In
Origen's Commentary on John we read
that (emphasis mine):9
'These things were done in .
Bethabara, beyond Jordan,
where John was baptizing.'We
are aware of the reading which
is found in almost all the copies, 'These things were done in
Bethany' .... We are convinced, however, that we
should not read 'Bethany', but
Page

39

It would seem that a tourist industry catering to

credulous Christians was flourishing and exploitation of
gullible pilgrims was a thriving concern already
before the end of the second century.
'Bethabara'. We have visited
the places to enquire as to the
footsteps of Jesus and His disciples, and of the prophets.
Now,Bethany ... is fifteen stadia from Jerusalem, and the
river Jordan is about a hundred and eighty stadia distant
from it. Nor is there any other
place ofthe same name in the
neighbourhood of the Jordan,
but they say that Bethabara is
pointed out on the banks ofthe
Jordan, and that John is said
to have baptized there .... "
Origen points out that the etymologies ofthe names of the places are
appropriate for the activities supposed
to have taken place there: "House of
preparation"
for Bethabara
and
"House of obedience" for Bethany. He
argues that an understanding of the
etymologies of toponyms is important
for understanding the deeper meanings of the scripture stories. Most significant for us, however, is the fact that
Origen - despite his long residence
in Palestine and his extensive travels
"to enquire as to the footsteps of Jesus
and His disciples, and of the prophets"had himself
seen neither
Bethabara nor Bethany. In the case of
Bethabara, our text is explicit: "they
say [Bethabara] is pointed out" - i.e.,
no one pointed Bethabara
out to
Origen. With regard to a Bethany near
Jerusalem, there is nothing in Origen's
account to make one suppose he had
seen it either. Nor had Origen ever
seen Bethphage. Thus, at the beginning of our inquiry into the written
history of Bethany, Bethabara, and
Bethphage, we find them utterly unknown as actual sites and considered
to be symbols.
It is worth noting that Origen ofPage 40

ten says that a certain place "is pointed

out." Pointed out by whom? By tourguides, no doubt. It would seem that a
tourist industry catering to credulous
Christians was flourishing already in
his day, and exploitation of gullible
pilgrims was a thriving concern already before the end ofthe second century. Study of all relevant records surviving from antiquity turns up nothing to show that in very early times
anyone
knew where
Bethany,
Bethabara, or Bethphage were located
or left any record of having been there.
The literary record bears witness not
to actual sites of gospel events, but
rather to the willingness of people to
deceive and be deceived.
While it is an obvious fact that no
archaeologist has ever unearthed an
ancient
city-limit
sign reading
"Bethany, no gentiles allowed," it is no
less a fact that absolutely nothing has
ever been excavated at any ofthe sites
today labeled as Bethany, Bethabara,
or Bethphage that could tie those
places to the biblical texts. To be sure,
numerous items are pointed out by
tour guides as the tomb of Lazarus, the
place where John baptized, etc., but
no archaeological thread relevant to
Christian tradition can be traced back
to the first century at any of these
spots. Nor can any of these sites be
reconciled with the inferences one
must draw from the various gospel
accounts. So Jesus never walked in
Bethany, Bethabara, or Bethphage.
The 'Iown Dyslexia Built
Although the names of most gospel towns were chosen for their symbolic meaning, at least one place name
got into the New Testament as a result of a misreading of a papyrus text
written in Greek. It is quite probable
that .tEnon- the place where John the
Winter 1996-1997

Baptist supposedly plied his trade resulted from one of the authors ofthe
gospel of John misreading a papyrus
manuscript of Luke's gospel.
In John 3:23 we read: "And John
also was baptizing in .tEnon near to
Salim, because there was much water
there: and they came, and were baptized."
Where did "John" get his geographic information? .tEnon and Salim
are unknown in Mark, the oldest gospel. Did John just make up .tEnon and
Salim? Yes and no.
There is considerable evidence
that one of the authors of John knew
the gospel of Luke, and there are telltale signs that at times John took ideas
from Luke. A peculiar case in point
involves a rather strange manuscript
of the gospels and Acts known as
Codex Bezae. Although the actual
manuscript dates from the fifth century, most scholars agree that it reflects a very early condition of the
books it contains, perhaps having been
copied from an extremely old papyrus
text. Bezae is noted for the very great
number of places in which its Greek
text differs from the so-called Textus
Receptus (the "received text"). D. Paul
Glaue, formerly at the University of
Jena, has argued-? that the text of
Luke 3:18 reflected in Bezae was the
text read by John when he was making up his Baptist stories. Actually,
Glaue argued that this was the text
mis-read by John.
The Revised Standard Version
renders this verse as "So, with many
other exhortations, he preached good
news to the people."
For this verse, Codex Bezae differs
from Codex Vaticanus (one of the oldest surviving manuscripts ofthe Bible)
in a single Greek word - the word
rendered "exhortations" in the English
American Atheist

translation just given. Where Vaticanus has parakaltm, Bezae has

parainon. The meaning ofpara in on is
advising, urging, substantially
the
same thing as parakalon,
which
means urging, encouraging, summoning, comforting. Although the meaning ofBezae is substantially the same
as that of Vatican us and other manuscript texts of Luke 3:18, it presented
a problem for John that he would not
have faced had he been looking at a
manuscript
containing
the word
parakalOn. We have to remember that
Greek manuscripts of the early centuries were written all in
capital letters and that
words were not always
separated
from each
other. What John actually
saw when he looked at the
text of Luke was something like this:

he placed him "in lEnon near to

Salim." Although Salim is itself unknown to ancient geographers, spelled
with an e it is mentioned in the Old
Testament (Gen. 14:18) as the city of
the fabled Melchizedek.U
"And
Melchizedek king of Salem brought
forth bread and wine: and he was the
priest of the most high God." There is
no precise geographic context for Salem in Genesis, and we must note that
this Melchizedek, King of Salem, was
the subject of an active fable industry
at the time John was writing. The unknown author ofthe Epistle to the He-

I10AAAMENOlNKAlEf
EPAIlAPAIN.QNErIIITEAIZ
ETOTONAAON
Not-Gerasa

Where to separate
words? When he came to
the rather
rare word
nAPAINflN, he apparently
took it for two words, nAP
+ AINflN. To a person who
Not-Aenon
thought in Hebrew or
Not-Salim
Aramaic, the letters making up AINflN would seem
to be a Greek rendering of
Not- bethabara
Hebrew or Aramaic words
meaning fountains,
or
Not-Gethsemane
springs, a not inappropri NotBethphage
,:.:.:.:.:.:.:.:
JERUSALEM
ate supposition, given the

NotBethany
Not- calvary
context of John baptizing
people. Aenon might thus
be the name of a place
with springs. The nAP
would be interpreted as a
shortened form of a Greek
10
,
preposition meaning by,
in the vicinity of, from, or
something of the sort.
John thought
he was
reading that the Baptist was "in the brews (7:1-3) tells us he went Jesus
vicinity of lEnon." So when John got one better by having no mother as well
around to writing his own acount of as no father - and is still alive! (I have
the activities of the Baptizer [In 3:23], it on good authority that Melchizedek

..

Austin, Texas

Winter 1996-1997

is indeed still alive and is hiding in

Argentina.)
So John never dunked at lEnon,
and Jesus never swam at Salem.

Madalyns and Magdalenes

Just as we began with Nazareth,
a town whose name was made up under the false impression that it was
the source from which a name or title
was derived - Nazarene or Nazoree
- we may end with another New Testament town which had no existence
apart from the grammatical manipulation of a title. The town - rather,
the non-town
is
Magdala, the supposed
source of the supposed
hussy Mary Magdalene.
(I assume everyone here
knows that the English
name Madalyn derives
from the name Magdelene. Hopefully, our
Madalyn won't be too upset to lose both her namesake and her home-town.)
In the King James
Version, we read of a
place called Magdala
only in Matthew's gospel,
in 15:39. In most modern
versions of the Bible,
however, we find no trace
of the place. Instead, we
find the name Magadan .
Why is this? This is because all the oldest manuscripts of Matthew have
Magadan, not Magdala.
Where did Matthew get
the name
Magadan,
which (as you by now may
expect) is unknown in the
Old Testament and in all
pre-Christian literature,
and why did it get
changed into Magdala?
The first place to look for
20
,
a source is Mark's gospel,
the Greek text of which
Matthew plagiarized, reworked, and inflated to
produce his own infallible account of
what we today might call the Branch
Jesssean story. Amazing to say, however, Mark has Dalmanutha
in the
Page 41

place of Magadan. You guessed it, Dalmanutha

is just as unknown
as
Magadan or Magdala. It is interesting to note that Codex Bezae, which
has so many important primitive readings that disagree with the so-called
received text, renders
the name
Melegada instead of Dalmanutha. In
the margin of the text are instructions
left by a later scribe telling how to alter the word Melegada - which already had been converted into the
word Magada - to turn it into something more like Magdala. "Insert dal
after the g, erase the da."12 We seem
to be witnessing the birth of a star's
hometown.
By the time Codex Bezae was being altered, Mary Magdalene had certainly become a popular symbol in
Christian culture. If she was called
Magdalene, people thought it must be
because she came from a place called
Magdala - just as a Nazarene must
be someone who comes from a place
called Nazareth. And so the name
Magada, the closest thing to Magdala
to be found in the gospels, was turned
into Magdala. A thousand years later,
careful searching and consorting with
tour-guides located several sites for
the non-city on the shore of the Sea of
Galilee.
Although I know what the word
Nazarene was supposed to mean, and
why the name Nazareth is silly, I must
confess that I don't really know what
the word Magdalene meant to the
early evangelists. It could simply have
meant precious, and have symbolized
the precious ointments with which
Mary was preparing to anoint the body
ofthe messiah. Or it could derive from
the Egyptian town ofMigdol, the place
where the Israelites are supposed to
have encamped just before Moses
parted the waters of the Red Sea.
Since the evangelists
portray
Jesus as a second Moses and structure
much oftheir stories as a symbolic replay of the career of Moses, the probability that the title Magdalene was
intended to refer to the Exodus story
is rather good, but not at all certain.
We must accept the fact that the fevered minds that made up the Bible
may have thought thoughts that we
Page 42

could never experience - even with

the aid of magic mushrooms or LSD.

the Greek text. The Greek would better be

rendered "Jesus the Nazaree" or "Jesus the
Nazarene." Only later was it falsely coneluded that the Greek word involved was
derived from the name of a place.
4 J.-P. Migne, Patrologise
Cursus

The Jesus of Not

And so, we come to the end of our
I ti
fth 0 lik I d fth
exp ora IOn 0
e z- I e an 0
e Completus, etc., Series Grteca Prior,
gospels and our tour of the places
Patrologiae
Grsecae Tomus XLI, S.
where Jesus never walked - sad that - Epiphanius
Constantiensis
in Cypro
we have not had time to show the Episcopus, Adversus Heereses, Paris, 1863,
mythical nature of other biblical
columns 389-390.
biggies such as Gethsemane
and
5 Baruch Sapir and Dov Neeman,
Golgotha or Calvary as well. Like the Capernaum (Kfar-Na~hum): History and
Wizard of Oz Jesus of Nazareth had Legacy, Art and Architecture, The Inter'B
h
h W
faith Survey Of The Holy Land (Israel),
no rea I h orne. ut w ereas t e . IZ. 1SitI es Library, nvo1. Nl/9 , m
des Th Hi t onca
re 1h
h
~r d can b e. s own to ave not existe
Aviv,1967, pp. 36-7, 41, 42. Italics in origim only a single non-place - Emerald
nal.
City-Jesus
can be shown to have not 6 Virgilio Corbo, "Resti della Sinagoga del
existed in a goodly number of non- Primo Secolo a Cafarnao," Studia
places. While one might be able to ig- Hierosolymitana III (SBF Collectio Maior,
nore as insignificant
for historical
30), Jerusalem, 1982, pp. 313-357.
Jesus studies the demonstration that
7 Virgilio Corbo, The House of St. Peter at
a single gospel locality is fictive the Capharnaum, Publications ofthe Studium
Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio Minor,
d emons t ra tiIOn th a t as many 'as a N
5 J
1
1969
liti
hi
al
b
em,
.
d ozen Ioca ties are myt IC cannot e 8 0.,Yl Yi erusa
ah
Mi
h

..M.
- on
, c ae,1 G aze tt eero [R oman
Ignor~d a~d ~as enormously impor- Palestine, QEDEM Monographs of the Intant implications. From now on, the stitute of Archaeology, The Hebrew Unisupposedly historical Jesus must be versity of Jerusalem, 5, 1976.
thought of as Jesus of Not-Nazareth,
9 Menzies, op. cit., pp. 370-371.
Jesus of Not- Caperna urn, Jesus of Not- 10 D. Paul Glaue, "Der alteste Text der
Bethany Jesus of Not-Gethsemane
geschichtlichen Bucher des Neuen Testaand not'least
Jesus of Not-Calva~
ments," Zeitschrift
fur die neutesThe historical Jesus will have to be tam~.ntliche W}ssenscha{t und die Kunde
. t
d
I
th
der alteren Krche, Vol. 45, 1954, pp. 90rec h rIS ene guess
e pun was 108
intended. Henceforth, he should be 11J'erusalem may have been called Salem
referred to as "the Jesus of Not." The (or Shalem) in Jebusite times, before Israpossibilities
remaining that Jesus
elite occupation.
might have walked in Sri Lanka or 12 D. Paul Glaue, op. cit., p. 103.
Tibet we shall not pursue.
A.

1Allan Menzies, Origen's Commentary on

John, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Translations of the Writings of the Fathers down
to A.D. 325, Original Supplement to the
American Edition, Vol. X, reprinted in

1980 by W. B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids,

~p. 381-382.
When referring to Jesus, Mark always
- except in a few cases where there are
strong grammatical reasons to prevent it
- uses the definite article with the name,
referring to the Jesus, not just Jesus. In
verse nine of chapter one, however, the
name is "inarticulate," unlike the more
than 80 cases in Mark where it carries the
article.
3 It should be mentioned that where the
English Bible gives the name "Jesus of
Nazareth," no such thing is to be found in
Winter 1996-1997

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ftp.atheists.org/pub/
http:www.atheists.org
A catalog of American Atheist
Press publications can be accessed
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can be placed on-line.

American Atheist

f~amining the .9lpoca[ypse

Revelation, the most

mind-boggling book in
the Christian Bible,
is not really. as insane
as it appears. The key
to understanding this
book is the realization
that it is actually an
astral allegory retelling
a story fancied to have
been written in the sky
- a story imagined to
be of great relevance to
early Christians.

James B. Pullen, Jr., is the

author of several books which
are expected to be published
soon. In addition to his Origin of
all Religious Myths, he has also
written Constellation Myths The New Testament Exposed, and

Constellation Myths - the Old

Testament Exposed. The latter
two works treat the old and new
testaments line-by-line showing
them to be astral myths throughout.

James B. Pullen, Jr.

Austin, Texas

he Apocalypse, or "Book of Rev the god of speed. Indeed, Jesus was

elation," is one of the most enig coming quickly! Any perusal of the
matic books in the Bible. It is Persian Bundehesh 1will show how the
believed by nearly everyone to be what church fathers, those grand thieves of
it is not, namely, a presaging ofthe end ancient constellation lore, painted
of the world. It shall be my attempt to their Christ as nothing more than an
show that this pretended "revelation"
allegorical figure of the sun.
is not a revelation at all, but is merely
What I shall now do is to cite texts,
an oriental poem about the "revolu- mostly from the Apocalypse, and protion" of the year, in which the constel- vide explanations
founded on the
lations playa part. Such great names
texts. In the absence of theological
word twisting, this should provide sufas Newton and Bossuet failed in their
attempts to explain this book simply ficient demonstration
of my thesis,
because they started off with a wrong simply because all should be clear-cut
assumption: that the book which they to anyone free of the theological blindsought to explain was inspired. This ers called "faith."
in itself was enough to sink their efLet us now see how the Christian
forts from the start, since there are no . mythology is nothing more than an
inspired books!
allegory of the procession of the year.
I would like to bring to the reader's
Before we examine the Apocaattention the fact that the ancient po- lypse, we may note that in Matthew
ets believed the world to be renewed
24:20, it says to "pray that your flight
when the sun was in Aries, at the be not in winter." We go to verse 22
spring equinox. Hence the expression
which explains that "except those days
that nature renews itself - meaning
be shortened, there shall be no flesh
that vegetation regrows at spring and saved." The explanation
of this is
all of nature seems revivified. Berosus, simple. The hours of daylight become
a Babylonian priest of Marduk, said shorter in winter, and this was marked
as much 300 years B.v.E. ("before the by the morning rising of the constellavulgar era"), when he said "The world tion Serpens (the Serpent) at fall (rewas created when the sun was in Ar- lated to the myth of the fall of Adam
ies," which marked the spring equinox and Eve). The ancient Persians called
2300 years B.V.E.
this evil serpent who issued in darkAll the major -Judeo-Ch ri st.ian
ness "the astral serpent." This is the
feasts fall on the seasonal points. For only darkness that a "serpent" issues
example, Passover and Easter are at in. There is no need to "spiritualize"
the vernal crossing, YomKippur at the whenever we find that (of course) all
Fall equinox, and Christmas is at the and everything is only natural.
winter solstice - where the sun god
Further, we should keep in mind
Mithra was allegedly "born," well be- that apocalyptic events cannot be put
fore the creation of the Jesus characoff indefinitely, because the "inspired
ter.
and unerring" text declares that ''Ye
Epiphanius
in his Adversus
shall not have gone over the cities of
Htereses (against heresies) said that Israel till the Son of Man be come"
the Apocalypse should be read imme- (Mat. 10:23). Does it take 1900-plus
diately after the Easter-eve celebra- years to go over the cities of Israel?
tions, simply because Christ was to Would the generation to which Jesus
"quickly return." This church father
was speaking have had so many years
misunderstood his religion - not know- at its disposal? Even the biggest fraud
ing that "Christ" was a composite of of a theologian would have to admit
many myths, including the god Mer- that it wouldn't. Our seer was not lookcury (also called the Logos), who was ing beyond his own time.
Winter 1996-1997

Page 43

Unveiling the Apocalypse

I shall now expose the Apocalypse
for the mass of constellation fables
that it is. I shall deal only with major
points, quoting particular verses that
demonstrate that the Apocalypse only
speaks of the revolution of the stars
throughout the zodiacal year. That
long periods of time were not contemplated by the ancient author should
be obvious from the opening verse,
which declares: The revelation of Jesus

Christ, which God gave unto him, to

shew unto his servants things which
must shortly come topass ... (Rev. 1:1)

10 (man, ox, lion, and eagle) only mark

the four cardinal points of the year:
winter (Aquarius or man), spring (Taurus or ox), summer (Leo or the Lion),
and fall (the Eagle next to the Scorpion). Hence, when the Scorpion sets,
the Bible says "death, where is thy
sting?" These four were stolen from
Babylonian star lore and incorporated
into a pretended inspired text. The
author of the Apocalypse
often
indicates
that what
he was

To say that the word "shortly" doesn't

mean "shortly" is to admit the Bible
is a lie.

the seven stars in his right hand, who

walketh in the midst of the seven
golden candlesticks ... (Rev. 2:1) The
seven candlesticks are only the seven
Pleiades inthe back of Taurus.

The mystery of the seven stars

which thou sawest in my right hand,
and the seven golden candlesticks. The
seven stars are the angels of the seven
churches: and the seven candlesticks
which thou sawest are the seven
churches (Rev. 1:20). The
seven ancient churches are equal to
the seven celestial
spheres

And in the midst of the seven

candlesticks one like unto the
Son of man, clothed with a
garment down to the foot,
and girt about the paps
with a golden girdle.
His head and his hairs
were white like wool,
as white as snow; and
his eyes were as a flame
of fire (Rev. 1:13-14).
This obviously is a mixing of two constellations in one astrological
''house" or month. Perseus as the son of man is
near Andromeda
(depicted with breasts exposed
on all uranographical
charts),
who
wears the golden girdle of
Mars, the planet that has its
"domicile" in Aries (anciently occur.ing in Marchl.Aries (the Lamb)
is the "ancient of days" in Daniel,
with white hair like lamb's wool!

And his feet like unto fine brass,

as if they burned in a furnace ... (Rev.
1:15) The burning furnace is only Ara
(the altar) which is opposite Aries.
We see that the lamb and not the
lion, shall open things, i.e., Aries instead of Leo (the Lion) opens the year.
Hence we read of a lamb ''having seven
horns and seven eyes" (Rev. 5:6) which
was "worthy to take the book, and to
open the seals thereof" (Rev. 5:9). Incidentally, the four beasts in Ezekiel
Page 44

then
believed
to exist.
"seeRev. 3:3 has
in g"
Jesus
saying "I'll
was in the
Northem Hemisphere
come on thee as a thief."
sky. Of course!
The god Hermes (Mercury)
And astronomy
was called the Logos (vide
Justin Martyr's first Apology) and
still preserves what he saw up there.
The Apocalypse repeats the number
Mercury was the god of thieves and of
twelve (the number of zodiacal signs) death. This is also why it is said that
fourteen times, and the number seven Jesus will come "tojudge the quick and
(the number of "planets'S) twelve
the dead "- all which equates the
times.
Jesus myth with the god Mercury/
These things saith he that holdeth Hermes - the good shepherd.
Winter 1996-1997

American Atheist

The four and twenty elders fall

down before him that sat on the
throne, and worship him that liveth
for ever and ever,and cast their crowns
beforethe throne... (Rev.4:10). This refers to the constellation of King Cepheus above Perseus and Aries. The
twenty-four elders are the twenty-four
hours in one complete day.
The Four Horsemen of the
Apocalypse
Chapter 6 tells of the
terrifying
Four
Horsemen of the
Apocalypse,
featured
on
the
cover
o f

from the earth, and that they should

kill one another: and there was given
unto him a great sword (Rev. 6:4). ''The

is Centaurus,
who is near Scorpio
(death where is thy sting?).
Other Images

red horse" refers to the war god Mars,

the red planet, which is domiciled in
Aries near Pegasus, the heavenly
horse.

And the name of the star is called

Wormwood:and the third part of the
waters became wormwood; and many
men died of the waters, because they
were made bitter (Rev. 8:11). Readers

And I beheld, and lo a black

horse; and he that sat on him had a
pair of balances in his hand (Rev.
6:5). This refers to Saturn, whose astrological

will note, first of all, that the text itself admits it is talking about a celestial object, not a terrestrial one. The
wormwood and the waters are explained by "the worm that never dies,"
i.e., Draco never sets and is opposite
the constellation of Eridanus, the celestial river in Taurus.

And to them it was given that they

should not kill them, but that they
should be tormented
five
months: and their torment
was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a
man (Rev. 9:5). Start at
Scorpio,
count
five
months, and you will return to Aries again!

And his tail drew the

third part of the stars of
heaven, and did cast
them to the earth: and
the dragon stood before the woman which
was ready to be delivered, for to devour her
child as soon as it was
born (Rev 12:4). Again,

this
maga-

zine.

And I
saw, and behold a white
horse: and he that
sat on him had a bow;
and a crown was given
unto him ... (Rev 6:2) This

color
is black;
Southern Hemisphere
the scales refer to the constellation Libra.
refers to the constellation of the Ar- Verse 6 speaks
of wheat and
cher, (Sagittarius) with the associated
barley, which Virgo (near Libra) holds
constellation Corona Australis (the in her hand (the star Spica).
Southern Crown).
And I looked, and behold a pale

And there went out another horse

that was red: and power was given
to him that sat theron to take peace
Austin, Texas

horse: and his name that sat on him

was Death, and Hell followed with
him (Rev. 6:8). The pale horse/death
Winter 1996-1997

note the admitted astronomical character of the

verse! The dragon and the
woman
simply
refer
to
Serpens Ophiuchus, near Virgo.
Rev. 13:3 speaks of a sevenheaded beast, one of whose heads
was "wounded to death" but healed.
Readers, note that near Virgo just spoken of is Hydra, the monster with
heads that grew anew when cut offby
Hercules. (By the way, the beast with
the crowns to which the dragon gave
power is only Serpens Ophiuchus with
the Northern Crown above his head!)
Rev. 13:8 speaks of "the lamb slain
from the foundation ofthe world." This
is Aries sitting on the celestial cross,
i.e., the intersection of the ecliptic and
the celestial equator, the equinoctial
point at which the sun seems to pause
Page 45

three days and nights before marching on to its northern-most declination

or summer solstice. (This also explains
why Jesus was supposed to be in the
tomb three days and nights before "rising" and why he could not come down
from the cross at the beckoning of the
centurion, simply because the sun was
at its ascendant.) This lamb slain from
the foundation ofthe world proves the
lamb to be celestial and not any
earthly slain lamb. Going on to verses
16-18, we read of the much-feared
mark in the hand and on the forehead.
This has to do with Medusa's head in
Perseus' hand. Medusa is like the
triple Hecate, and her notation on the
astrological charts is the number six
(tripled, 666).
In Rev. 14:2, the harps (admitted
to be in the sky) are merely Lyra a
northern constellation. In verse 10,
"the cup of indignation" is one with the
bottomless pit, being Crater the Cup
which, when Aries is at meridian, is
at its nadir or lowest point.
And I looked, and behold a white
cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like
unto the Son of man, having on his
head a golden crown, and in his
hand a sharp sickle (Rev. 14:14). This
alludes to Bootes with his Scythe, near
the Northern Crown, and this is in
Virgo already spoken of.
And another angel came out from
the altar, which had power over fire;
and cried with a loud cry to him that
had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in
thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her
grapes are fully ripe. And the angel
thrust in his sickle into the earth, and
gathered the vine of the earth, and cast
it into the great winepress of the
wrath of God (Rev. 14:18-19). The vine
and winepress allude to Vindemiatrix
Virginis (the Winepress, in the constellation Virgo, which heralds the grape
harvest). The altar is Ara, the celestial altar below Virgo.
And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat
upon him was called Faithful and
True, and in righteousness he doth
judge and make war (Rev. 19:11).The
rider on the white horse refers to Perseus above white Pegasus, in Aries the
Page 46

lamb, who is ruled by Mars, the god of heal and was lost until found by Jason. This lamb is also used as the lost
war. This is why the Christian astrolosheep
of Israel, a fiction stolen from
gers make Jesus bring peace - but
the
Jason
myth.
then, not peace, but the sword and war.
Lastly,
the name Yahweh ("JehoFor the Jesus who brings peace is Aries; the not-peace-but-a-sword Jesus is vah") numerically evaluated according
Perseus. The warrior Mars is domi- to the Hebrew system of letter-number equivalents isyod-10, he-5, veciled in Aries, the Lamb of heaven.
In Rev. 20:3 the devil is bound but
6, he-5, and adds UP. to 26, or onemust be loosened "a little season" - the half the weeks in a year. Jehovah diseason of Fall. He is the serpent who vides the light from darkness, which
led the tiller Bootes (a.k.a. Adam) and is only the superior or light hemisphere from the dark, inferior hemiVirgo (Eve). Note that in the Genesis
sphere - the infernal regions. The
myth, the term "subtle" (a description
ofthe serpent's cunning) is the Hebrew Hebrew bara' (as in Genesis 1:1)
Carum - manifestly a steal from the
doesn't mean "create," but "divide" or
"cut," and refers to the separation of
Persian evil-serpent god Ahriman !
And there came unto me one of the superior and inferior regions.
Astronomy - or astrology - is the
seven angels which had the seven vikey to understanding the Apocalypse,
als full of the seven last plagues, and
talked with me, saying, Come hither, I as well as Genesis and all bible myths.
Expressions such as "it shall pass
will shew thee the bride, the Lamb's
wife (Rev.21:9). The Lamb's wife is An- over," "there will be a sign," "he asdromeda, Perseus' wife, in the astrocended," "he descended," "he aplogical house or mansion ofAries. Pro- peared" all have to do with astronomicalor astrological jargon and nothing
ceeding to verses 19 and 20, we read
of the twelve precious stones forming more. The church father Irenasus
the foundations of the walls of the
states that the Gnostics asserted that
heavenly Jerusalem. With the first
what took place on earth originally
and last stones switched in order,
took place above. I agree! And this also
these are the Arabian zodiacal birth
exposes the true meaning of the statestones. Heavenly City! What a hoax!
ment that the Lord's ways are "above
And he shewed me a pure river of ours," and that these are ''heavenly''
water of life, clear as crystal, proceedstories. I believe I have shown that
ing out of the throne of God and of the they are.
Lamb (Rev. 22:1).The water of life is
Nothing will happen when the
the celestial river Eridanus, appearyear 2000 begins. The Apocalypse is
ing at springtime when nature alle- all an astral myth, as I have explained.
gorically returns to life. (Note that
Aristobulus, 150 B.V.E., inseparably
linked the Passover with the vernal
1Editor's note: The Bundehesh
("Creequinox.P
ation") is a medieval Persian compoThe next verse speaks of twelve sition composed in the Pahlavi lanfruits of the tree of life, one for each guage after the Arab conquest ofIran.
month. These are equivalent to the Although the Bundehesh itself could
twelve fruits, six on each side of the not have influenced the author of the
tree, in the apocryphal Gospel of Eve. Apocalypse, it does reflect and incorThe six fruits on each side represent
porate some very ancient Persian trathe six warm summer months con- ditions which very well could have
trasted with the six cold winter
reached the Mediterranean rim and
months. In Rev 22:7, Jesus is made to influenced the writers of what became
say "I come quickly" - another aspect
the Christian scriptures.
of the Logos Mercury, the god of speed. 2 Editor's note: To the ancients there
The Lamb returns, the year is re- were seven "planets": the sun, the
newed. This is the Lamb Jesus who moon, and the five actual planets vishealed, being the lamb of the golden- ible to the naked eye.
fleece myth that also had the power to 3 See Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History.
Winter 1996-1997

American Atheist

Poetry
An Atheist's Faith
Spiri tualism

(for Kurt Vonnegut)

So death is not dying-it's rebirth

In a spirit world over the EarthBut every medium
Conveys deadly tedium
With a message of minimal worth.

heaven is a word for a field full of

un-pulled weeds
that we each the living are
when remembering memories
oflives pulled like weeds

Calvinism

until we go gray ourselves

like old dandy lions sending
what science maybe calls spores
in all sorts of directions

The doctrine of predestination

Means that there's no more salvation,
Yet Calvinists act
As though God in fact
Were open to retropersuasion.

to land and take root in the thoughts

of another for some time less than
forever.

Barbara Smoker

J.T. Whitehead

And I ThoughtI played good piano at gospel meetings,

And thoughtAnd sang the hymns loudly,
And thoughtPrayed the prayers,
And thoughtRecited the scriptures in unison,
And thoughtGave my tithe,
And thoughtListened to "the faithful,"
And thoughtObserved behind-the scenes inner-workings,
And thoughtHeard the automatic-expected-identical
testimonies,
And thoughtWinced at the status-snobbery of the "righteous,"
And thoughtCried inwardly at "born-again" holy rejection,
And thoughtTook in the bigotry, religious and racial,
And thoughtMarveled at the narrow-mindedness,
And thoughtWas mystified at the aversion to probing questioning,
And thoughtConsidered why my "salvation" seemed empty,
And thoughtWhy am I not helped by all this?
Why these inconsistencies?
And finally, why am I still here?

The sweat ran freely down my face;

Yet there was none upon the Newer Amish
speaker's brow,
As he was shaded by his straw derby brim.
Unlike the Old Order folk, he wore no beard;
His people worshipped in a church
And not on benches in the homes.
He farmed, and crafted all the coffins for his flock
And other sects of country Mennonites.
Together with his sons, he made the polished boxes,
Emplaced the cushioned liners,
And laid them across sawhorses
In the ready room.
And just that year he had become the minister,
-And how was that decided-by election?
We paused so long so he could track a red-tailed hawk
That soared beyond his freely ranging chickens,
That I almost forgot the question.
Well no; we don't elect; each member thinks
of all the qualities the preacher needs,
And writes the name of him who most nearly
lives that way
on a slip of paper
and drops it in a hat,
Then all the others drop their slips in, too;
Someone reaches in,
And God makes the choice.

Samuel Evins Brown

John W.McLure

Austin, Texas

God is Chance

Winter 1996-1997

Page 47

Social Psychopathology
E.nd- Times Faith

Simple thirst for

vengeance, complex
conspiracy theorizing, and the
postmodern conflict
between exoteric
and esoteric forms
of religious expression combine to
produce the
millennialist social
psychopathology.

Conrad Goeringer is an antiquarian bookseller and freelance

writer who lives on the cape of
NewJersey. Afrequent speaker at
American Atheists national conventions, he is director of American Atheists On-line Services and
a contributing editor ofAmerican
Atheist.

Conrad F. Goeringer
Page 48

of

taken over, exploited, and raped by

For nearly all religious believers
and mystics, apocalyptic faith can play science, technology, capitalism, and
a vital social and psychological role, materialism. N ew-age-kitsch beliefs
one even more pronounced as we ap- such as Atlantis conjure a long-gone
proach the millennium. With their big- golden age, a society said to be based
ger-than-life
chic, End-Times sce- on magic and wizardry rather than
narios are often exciting and colorful. "what we know today." Did Egyptians
use UFOs to build the pyramids? Did
Believers can fmd their own otherwise
ancient civilizations reach pinnacles of
dull and repetitive - even marginallives vitalized and rendered signifi- knowledge and spiritual mastery uncant. They have been selected by his- known to us, only to be devastated by
an Apocalypse of their time - perhaps
tory to live in this unique age; they
have the promise of standing witness
a rogue asteroid? Despite any good
to monumental events, and with pro- anthropological or historical evidence,
per faith could even experience most the seductive appeal of such pop-culofthe apocalyptic action from a front- ture mythology can be as powerful as
row vantage in heaven, or perhaps the the Garden of Eden story in the Bible.
secure confines of a cult citadel.
''Vengeance is Mine"
Doomsday chic also bifurcates the
Another psychological and social
world of experience into black and
white, us versus them, the godly locked need which is met through the apocain holy battle against Lucifer and his lyptic faith is vengeance. For gun-totarmies of whore mongers, harlots, and ing posttribulationists, the god of apoother sinners. Some anthropologists
calypse isn't some flaccid, sandalwearing hippie who preaches love and
have suggested that apocalyptic faith
forgiveness. The flock has endured
arises in social groups which have
been "colonized" by larger cultural
enough vice and blasphemy for so tolentities. Cargo cults in the Pacific, or erant a deity. Their god can be one of
the ghost-dance ceremony of the west- retribution, vengeance, and justice
ern plains Indians can be cited as ex- who comes armed with a sword.
amples. Likewise, numerous fundaA vengeful-god is appealing to
mentalist Christians believe that their
those who have experienced the frusown culture has been "colonized" and trations inherent in a problematic,
taken over by secularism. Much of changing world. No amount of cash
their social agenda is peppered with sent to TV evangelists, no volume of
phrases about "bringing back" certain
prayer and sacrifice appears sufficient
values and institutions, or "returning"
to smite Satan. Secular culture - the
to god. It is the older and presumably
postmodernist Babylon populated by
time-tested
ways of the biblical
money-changers, doubters, blasphemlifestyle which confront the Antichrist,
ers, and other sinners - needs a whipthe False Prophet, and the corrosive ping.
influences of secular modernity. The
Sin is ever-present in the form of
complexities of the present can be temptation; the devil is an active agent
seducing people with the delights of
neatly slotted into easily-understood
modern life, even food. "The devil
categories for future reference.
wants me fat!" declares one ministry's
The "colonization" theory might
even apply to many new-agars as well, booklet about diet and prayer. Resisespecially in the context of their
tance to temptation is often depicted
millennialist Angst and expectations.
in terms of "doing battle" with the
For them, the "natural world" has been weakness of the human flesh. With
Winter 1996-1997

American Atheist

seductive ads, movies, and magazines,

and a cornucopia of tasty cuisines, it
is a difficult battle indeed.
The "final days," despite their
frightful bloodletting, can serve as an
emotional vent for all this, and more.
The righteous will either no longer be
tempted or may even indulge their
cravings with god's approval in a modem-day chiliastic orgy. Sinners will be
"getting theirs", as the Lord's just
wrath descends on enemies.
Conspiracy Theories for
Believers
Millennialism can also constitute
part of a social or theopolitical agenda.
Apocalyptic belief frequently demonizes certain ethnic, social or cultural
groups. Jews, Freemasons, humanists,
libertines, Atheists, abortion-rights
activists - they are no longer
simple individuals with a different lifestyle or point of
view,but agents of Satan.
This "mean streak" in

Austin, Texas

the millennialist fervor is embodied in

numerous end-times movements ranging from the Christian Identity sects
to ultra-nationalist fascist groups in
the former Soviet Union and elsewhere. It is a theopolitical conspiracy
theory running deep in the consciousness of apocalyptic cults, fringe sects,
and crank movements who feel that
"their time" is just a few more pages
on the calendar away.
Millennialist visions of doomsday
or utopia can meet vital psychological
and social needs for a spectrum of
groups, even those which manage to
fuse diverse, contradictory elements
into their apocalyptic road map. Some
new-age groups manage to incorporate
Bible prophecy with the more esoteric
tenets of modem occultism. Benevolent aliens in flying saucers replace
Jesus Christ in the momentous
task of rescuing humanity
from itself. The cosmic
age

Winter 1996-1997

when humans evolve to a "higher spiritual plane" serves as a surrogate for

the more traditional vision of the New
Jerusalem, and the posttribulation
reign of the returned Messiah. Love,
peace, and benevolence rule; war is
abolished, conflict resolved. We live "in
harmony with nature" while developing fantastic powers of ESP or telekinesis. "We shall be as gods!"
The millennialist
parallels run
even deeper. Christianity speaks of a
lost golden age, the Garden of Eden.
For the new-age, it is Atlantis,
Lemuria, perhaps the post-Armageddon world destroyed by fire (asteroid
impact, global warming, nuclear war)
presided over by an enlightened cult.
The Savior can descend on a golden
throne, or some glittering
space
ship. As we head relentlessly
toward 2000, both
Jesus
and E.T.
are expected to
call home.

Page 49

As we head relentlessly toward 2000,

both Jesus and E. T. are expected to call home.
A Postmodern Conflict:
Exoteric vs. Esoteric Religion
Many developments which have
been transforming religious groups
over the past two decades have implications for any millennialist outburst.
One is the conflict noted by Walter T.
Anderson in his book on deconstructionist thought (Reality Isn't What It
Used Th Be) between what he terms
exoteric and esoteric religions.
Esoteric religions are characterized by organization structures, doctrines, and a priesthood which usually
serves as the intermediary between
believers and the deity. These religions
serve to locate society and individuals within a cosmic order, and often
reflect social and class assumptions
about how the world is said to operate. Morality and salvation are linked
to a rote learning and acceptance of
doctrine, an external body ofteachings
accessible in the form of holy books
and other sacred texts.
Esoteric religions focus more on
the primacy of individual belief and
development than on external structures. They emphasize spirituality as
opposed to religious hierarchy, along
with inner mental states and exercises
as facilitating the revelation of truth.
Esoteric systems can encompass everything from Zen and twelve-step
programs to new-age crankery and
cannibalized "eastern wisdom." The
near-addictive faddism of self-help,
group therapy, and twelve-step regimens for a seemingly endless array of
dysfunctions and ills is testament to
the rampant popularity of esotericism.
Religious movements are rarely
either totally exoteric or esoteric; the
latter can easily degenerate into the
former, when a "teacher" or "master"
is transmogrified into priest, leader,
or cult-commander. Exoteric religions
are now challenged by esoteric philosophies, which in turn can quickly
degenerate into pop-culture psychobabble and vehicles for uncritical belief, in an "Anything-goes"
atmoPage 50

sphere. While the sheep in exoteric

religions often fail to question rigid
doctrines, believers in esoteric systems
fail to ask: Is there anything which isn't
true?
Differing Visions: "God" and the

Last Days
Esoteric, new-age beliefs tend to
picture the millennium in terms of
vague, amorphous, mystical events;
their exoteric counterparts see the endtimes as a titanic struggle between god
and Satan, a cosmic drama played out
in both the spiritual and worldly
realms.
Powerful cultural and technological forces allow and even encourage the
exoteric and esoteric doctrines to comingle and interpenetrate.
Andres
Tapia, a staff writer for Christianity
Today, asked in a recent issue: "In
multicultural America, the question is
not is there a god, but which god?
Young adults especially are redefining
spirituality in very personal terms.
And today's theological NAFTA combines Buddha, Mohammed, Jesus, Isis,
Gaia, and the four winds ..." One Christian market researcher observes that
36% ofyoung adults "do not define God
in orthodox Judeo-Christian terms."
Tapia extends his arguments on the
vacuous nature of "spirituality " by noting the popularity of movies like Angels in the Outfield, or even the nondenominational Lion King which has
attracted the wrath of the Southern
Baptist Convention and other fundamentalists for its alleged "nature worship" themes.
It remains to be seen whether the
spiritual smorgasbord in the postmodernist religious marketplace is really any larger and diverse than, say,
a century or two ago. Many Christian
and even Jewish groups are nevertheless undergoing subtle changes, including renewed emphasis on what they
term "spirituality" and psychic fulfillment, as well as unconditional acceptance of certain crank, pseudoWinter 1996-1997

scientific, and even occult esoteric doctrines. For instance, the Church of St.
John the Divine has assisted in publishing the writings of mystic Alice
Bailey. This pillar of American establishment-style religion stages trendy
solstice and Earth Day masses, complete with a procession of animals and
celebrants in outrageous costume.
Many congregations are "greening" sponsoring twelve-step meetings for
everything from drug and alcohol
abuse to sexual dysfunction and incorporating beliefs which just a generation ago were consigned to the locked
closet of the occult and the bizarre.
All of this naturally fosters a reaction. The postmodernist religiousbelief bazaar is a dialectical process,
setting up conflicts of opposites - in
this case, the fundamentalist
backlash. All of the different factions and
sects have a unique slant, a peculiar
interpretation,
a different view of
"their reality." The confluence of esoteric and exoteric religions thus produces a dizzying array of possible theologies and eschatologies, a marketplace of competing beliefs.
For new-agers, biblical fundamentalists, and others, there is no one concrete vision of millennialism or even
doomsday.
A Lack of Critical Faculty
There remains another factor in
the explosive popularity of the mystical bazaar - the lack of critical reasoning in so many areas of life, including the mass media. There are many
prime-time programs, as well as special and bogus "documentaries" about
flying saucers, alien abductions, angels, reincarnation, near-death experiences, Noah's Ark, miracles, apparitions of the Virgin Mary or Jesus, and
other related topics. Most of this programming fails to present critical arguments which question these unusual claims and mystical-religious
beliefs; one rarely sees Atheists, skeptics, and reputable scientists given
American Atheist

equal time to question or refute what

is being asserted. This is not so much
the result of a conspiracy to promote
religion and pseudoscience, but the
result of tacit assumptions concerning
the existence of the supernatural,
along with a singular interest in catering to fashionable,
pop-culture
spirituality.
In his chapter aptly titled "The
Magic Bazaar;" Anderson noted in his
book:
Some people really believed that the modem era
was going to bring an end to
religion, the final triumph of
reason over superstition ... instead, we seem to be in a world
with more religion than there
has ever been before. Never
before has any civilization
openly made available to its
population such a smorgasbord ofrealities ...never before
has a society allowed its people to become consumers of belief, and allowed belief - all
beliefs - to become merchandise ...

While some may delight in this

religious pluralism, the darker side of
this becomes evident when we ask:
"What about us? What about Atheists,
or non-believers who aren't on the belief-bandwagon?"
Some 25,000,000
Americans describe themselves
as
Atheists, freethinkers,
rationalists,
Humanists, or religious skeptics of
some kind. While that is a considerable number of people (larger than
many mainstream
religious groups
such as Jews, Methodists, Episcopalians, or even Southern Baptists), the
tolerance of non-belief remains problematic and precarious. What impact
does the emergent and pluralistic "culture ofthe irrational" have on society
in general. Religious belief of just
about any kind is often touted as an
anchor for those hungry, thirsty, and
starved for spirituality and adrift in a
sea of post modem alienation. How far
will people go to satisfy this craving?
What will they do? Whom will they follow and serve to quench the thirst for
belief?
Austin,

Texas

Another Epistle of Brother Josiah

By Josh Karpf

November 6, 1996
3 years til Armagedon
Judge-ment is soon!

Dear Presidents

Clinton

and Dole!

I am riting to suport the religious Equality Amenment

to the CONSTITUTION. I am a taxpayer and a Christian
and I object to the Godless Hell-bound wastland that
is this butiful nation. I do not hav enuf religious
Equality. When I get in a car to tell sinners about
Jesus Christ our LORD or I go to SINagogs to show
Jews if you are saved you can eat pork I am put in
jail like Jesus. I am not Jesus so why do they put me
in jail. They shuld stop puting me in jail.
Also I have a litle truble teeching Jesus unto ALL
nations and wuld like your help (Relevations 28:19).
I visit New York City were no one will be saved. So I
try to save other nations here but they wont be saved
to! I go to Chinese Restarants and tell the Chinese
to go to China with the Holy Bible but they do not
lisen. Are they still commies. If they are commies I
know where they are. Can I have a nucler missle but
small. I go to Japanese Restarants and they harden
ther hearts and kick me out. The sinners in the
Japanese Restarants look exacly like the Chinese
Restarants sinners. Why is Chinese in the Japanese
Restarants, Did they folow me and trick me or is it
commie take over or Satan and his devil way. If you
worship God give me Secret Servise men to heolp order
the Chinese to pray. And help me find Japanese. We
won the War so they must do our biding. Its in the
CONSTITUTION wich you shud reed if you are American.
Also pleas stop leting colored people
Think why God called it White House!

in Wite House.

I vote like Jesus did,

Brother Josiah
Winter 1996-1997

Page 51

One, Two from page 30

A reporter for The New York

Times tracked down Anna Cornwall

frantically grinding out a torrent of

pamphlets, books, videos and other
materials concerning Armageddon
and the end of the world. Hal Lindsey
was right about one thing when he
told the Mysteries of the Millennium
television program that "many
people feel that we are living in a
time when there is a confluence of
events, building up for some unknown purpose. ~We may expect to
encounter more of this millennial
Angst as we barrel down Apocalypse
Road.
But if Armageddon, meteoric
impact or reptilian invasion isn't
your thing, you will be pleased to
know that already the entertainment
industry is gearing up for the ultimate New Year's Eve celebration to
ring in the next century and millennium. Millennium Celebrations, Inc.
is organizing a series of bashes
around the globe, and has already
scheduled events in restaurants and
even on cruise ships. Forget Manhattan hotels around Times Square
- they're already booked!
What about that famous "morning after, ~ when the human race
wakes up from its New Year's bash
to find itself living in the third millennium? (Since there was no "year
zero" in our BC-AD calendric system, some argue that won't happen
until Jan. 1, 2001.) Gail and Dan
Collins in The Millenniwn Book remind us all of the story of a Miss
Anna Cornwall, who was born in
1838. When she was twelve, she
clipped an editorial out of a local
newspaper which read:

five decades later. She still had the

yellowed,
worn clipping.
The
Collinses tell us that Anna, looking
back on the previous half-century,
thought that progress had not accomplished all it promised, and that
"the old ways might have brought
more happiness after all.~Anna went
on: "There is nothing original in that.
It is the way that nearly all feel and
I suppose children of 1900 will be
saying the same thing when they
have seen the end of the next half
century."
Envoi
The turn of a century - and certainly the transition to a new millennium - is an event of profound
psychological and social significance. It brings out and amplifies
yearnings, fears, and expectations.
It prompts us to take stock of where
we have been and where we are going. A flip of the calendar, though,
w1l1not suppress the human impulse to look back and then forward,
to see the centuries laid end-to-end,
stretching on past the symbolic milepost we call the future, and to predict what it might hold. Tales of millennium and apocalypse - expressions of the deepest mythos of humanity - will persist, offering us the
collective promise of a New Jerusalem or the dreaded prospect of Armageddon.

Blessed be the young

eyes that shall see the future
through 50 years! Blessed be
the ears that shall hear the
clock strike the century
hour... and blessed be the
eyes that shall look futureward from the sublime
standpoint
and see what
God has prepared for human
vision within the horizon of
that distant day.

evangelical Christians, and blissedout new-agers, the millennium is pregnant with the promise that something
momentous and significant is about to
transpire. Those who stand believing
on"the threshold of the year 2000 are
ready for the Last Tango on Planet
Earth; and the choreography is found
amidst biblical passages, artifacts of
new-age kitsch, or a ready-mix, apocalyptic doctrine that has yet to hit the
streets - or perhaps all three.

Page 52

Are you an
Atheist who
wants to write?
Future issues of American
Atheist will carry a Letters
to the Editor department
where you can respond or
comment on items in the
present issue or on other
matters of concern to
American Atheists.
We also will carry the
departments Me Too and
Talking Back.
Me Too is for essays of 650
to 1,500 words expressing
opinion on topics of
general interest to the
Atheist community.
Talking Back is for short
answers to "Typical"
questions religionists ask
Atheists. Two suggested
questions:

Countdown from page 10

Winter 1996-1997

How can you be moral

if you don't
believe in a god?
Without god, all is
permitted.
Don't you know that
-Iesus loves you? Why
don't you open your heart
and let him come in?
American Atheist

Go beyond the headlines

for the inside stories that will

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Aj'Him'~''''''4'Otm
~,"IOCJoM~

Il:~tttoo.~~.~,

ItWM"'~
~.~~"':I!te:.

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