What Are The Odds?

Where the prophets gathered

Jesus as the focus of Hebrew prophesy

Today, Frank Abagnale is sought after by governments and corporations as an expert on detecting forgery, embezzlement, and document falsification. But between the ages of 16 and 21, he was one of the world’s most successful con artists. He cashed $2.5 million in fraudulent checks in all 50 states and 26 foreign countries. He also successfully passed himself off as an airline pilot, an attorney, a college professor, and a pediatrician before being apprehended by the French police.

If this story sounds familiar to you, it’s probably because you watched the 2002 movie Catch Me If You Can, in which Abagnale was played by Leonardo DiCaprio (who passed himself off as an actor in Titanic).

What would it take to top Abagnale’s performance as a con man? Well, if Jesus Christ wasn’t the Messiah he claimed to be, there would be no contest. We’re not talking about conning thousands, as in the case of Abagnale. If Jesus Christ was an imposter, his con job has changed the course of 2,000 years of history and influenced billions.

So, could Jesus have been a fake Messiah, fooling even the most noteworthy religion scholars? Is it possible he was groomed by his parents or undisclosed mentors to become the long-promised king that Israel had been looking for?

In fact, if Jesus was an imposter, he would not be the first person in the history of Israel to have lied about being the Messiah. Through the centuries prior to Christ’s birth, and afterward as well, many self-proclaimed messiahs arose, only to be shown to be cons or lunatics.

Ancient Hebrew prophecies had clearly predicted the reign of a future king who would bring peace to Israel and be their Savior. A sense of expectancy filled the land and captivated Jewish hopes and aspirations. In such an atmosphere as Israel’s, could not someone less qualified have been pressed into, or conformed himself to fit, the mold of Messiah? The answer to that question hangs on the Old Testament prophecies pointing to the Messiah.

God’s mouthpieces

The God of the Hebrews spoke to his people through prophets, men and women who were especially attuned to God and who may or may not have been a part of the religious establishment. Some of the prophets’ messages were for the present; others, for the future. Either way, their role was to proclaim God’s declarations and disclosures to the people.

In general, being a prophet ranked up their with the meat packing plant for world’s most hazardous occupations. Even when they were telling the truth, prophets might be killed or thrown into prison by people who didn’t like what they were saying. (Some kings hated hearing bad news.) According to historical accounts, the prophet Isaiah was sawn in half.

So consider a prophet’s dilemma: death if he was proved wrong and the possibility of death if he was right. No true prophet wanted to offend God, and just as few wanted to be sawn in half. Thus most prophets waited until they were absolutely convinced that God had spoken, or else they kept their mouths shut. Kings began to shudder at their words. Their messages were never wrong.

Now here’s a question: how would the accuracy of these biblical prophets match up with today’s psychics?

Prophets as psychics?

To consider whether modern psychics’ accuracy approaches that of biblical prophets, let’s take Jean Dixon as a case study. This American psychic seemed to have a special ability to foretell events. But upon analysis her reputation seems unwarranted.

For instance, Dixon had a vision that on February 5, 1962, a child was born in the Middle East who would transform the world by the year 2000. This special man would create a one-world religion and bring lasting world peace. She saw a cross growing above this man until it covered the whole earth. According to Dixon, this child would be a descendant of the ancient Egyptian Queen Nefertiti. [1]

Where is this guy? Have you seen him? And how about that lasting world peace—it’s nice, huh?

In fact, an exhaustive search of her prediction yields two indisputable facts. Her rate of accuracy is equivalent to those guessing the future (about 11%), and her most publicized fulfillments were prophecies so intentionally vague as any number of events could have been hailed as fulfillments.

Even the widely publicized prophecies of Nostradamus have frequently been proved wrong in spite of his vague oracles, which are difficult to disprove.[2] For example, here is one of the predictions of Nostradamus:

Takes the Goddess of the Moon, for his Day & Movement:

A frantic wanderer and witness of Gods Law,

In awakening the worlds great regions to Gods will (Ones Will).[3]

This is said to be about the death of Princess Diana. (You were probably thinking Margaret Thatcher.) Prophecies like this are as nebulous as seeing images in clouds. Yet some insist this is evidence of a Nostradamus prophecy fulfilled. Highly suspect, but difficult to disprove.

And this is generally the track record of psychics. When “The People’s Almanac” researched the predictions of 25 top psychics, 92 percent of the predictions had proved wrong.  The other 8% were questionable and could be explained by chance or general knowledge of circumstances. [4] In other experiments with the world’s foremost psychics, their rate of accuracy has been shown to hover around 11 percent, which might not be a bad average except for the fact that people making random guesses about the future score at the same percentile. This doesn’t disprove all future telling, but it certainly explains why psychics aren’t winning the lottery.

The difference between psychics and prophets seems to be more of kind than degree. Prophets making specific declarations about future events, in relation to God’s unfurling plan, with unwavering accuracy, to a reluctant audience: while psychics are more mercenary, providing rather vague or ambiguous sketches of the future to a market willing to pay for their services—information with a significantly questionable track record.

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