Predicting the Future

There are many great trends in human history that one could take interest in and further delve into with study and research, and with so many topics to choose from—one could become confused as to what to write about. For instance, it would be easy to choose to write about human population and how it has grown exponentially over the years, from the very ancient history to the present. Another popular topic could be human civilization itself and its trend in growth and expansion—from the gathering of peoples into tribes, villages, cities, city states, and finally empires with a central government and an advanced culture; this happens to be a far cry from the nomadic hunter gatherers that we apparently were about 9,000 years ago. One could choose to explore these trends in history, and fail to catch the interest of anyone who has previously read about the common subject in a magazine, watched a documentary on television, or read about it online; therefore it is necessary to discuss a particular trend in history, a more is specific one.

This historical trend is in fact one that will be recognized by many, but unlike the more popular and common trends like the ones above—it is not as frequently discussed, not even in the history textbook, where it isn’t the author’s intention to focus on something that apparently isn’t a relevant purpose of general historical study. The trend, as it is most commonly identified, is the human affinity with predicting (or attempting to predict) what is to come, prophesize, clairvoyance, or in other words, to claim knowledge of, or at least have an intuitive idea of the future. Although it is not quite recognized as a trend in a history textbook, it is a recurring subject within the pages; which makes it apparent that some many people’s have an interest in what the future holds, and some even venture to go far enough as to assume an event will occur in the future. Examples of this are often seen in religious texts and historical records of many a person (or persons’) prophecy, where they estimate that a certain event will occur at some point—or a specific time, in the future.

There have been many prophecies that were established well before 500 B.C.E and extended well through 1500 C.E., but the most well known prophecies are the ones that are seen as messages sent from the a God to a chosen one—a man designated to spread his word; known as a prophet. An example of a well-known prophet (even though he is not called one often) is Jesus; often known as the Messiah, Christ, Holy Ghost, Jesus of Nazareth, or God. Although it is disputed that Jesus was a “God sent to earth in human form” and that he possessed supernatural powers, such as the ability to heal illness, control nature, walk on water…etc, he is most certainly a prophet; self proclaimed and believed to have been by others. There is biblical evidence that tells us that Jesus was indeed a prophet, such as the story of a Samaritan woman whom Jesus encountered one day; she was astonished to find that Jesus could speak of the events and conditions concerning her life, knowledge that he otherwise couldn’t have known. According to the Bible she told him: “sir, I can see that you are a prophet” . Jesus spread his prophecies as a minister, communicating God’s word to the common people, and offering them a description of the Kingdom of Heaven, which would be the reward after living a life of faith and morality on earth. Near the end of his life, Jesus came with his disciples (twelve in all) to Jerusalem where he attended a festival, where they created a disturbance. Later that night Jesus celebrated the Passover meal with his disciples (The Last Supper) and during which was said to have predicted that he would be betrayed by one of his disciples. His capture by Roman authorities was attributed to him being indicated to the guards by a kiss from Judas Iscariot—one of his apostles.