The outbreak of COVID-19 contagion revealed different shades of opinions of people about the world and its inhabitants. As people died in their thousands and the world was panic-stricken, the end-time theorists and apologists of the apocalypse saw an opportunity to propagate their doomsday prophecy of mass suffering and death both for all humanity and planet earth.
There was this weird calculation based on another weird and speculative formula of 1 year = 1000 years by a popular general overseer of a sprawling Nigerian Church which pinned down the date of the apocalypse to be 2048! How fickle the mind of man can be.
My question is: must we give our fixed opinion in everything? Can’t we accept that there are some phenomena beyond the grasp of our finite intelligence to which we can only speculate?
I laughed my heart out after reading the message which was broadcast to hundreds of thousands of his followers across the world, and wondered if another Pastor Jones is not in the making.
My other question is: what if the world did not end in 2048 as it definitely must not, will he in shame and ignominy, like the infamous Pastor Jones in Johnstown, U.S.A, assemble his followers for mass suicide?
Many opinions which people hold to be true and sacrosanct may not be necessarily true. This is because very little percentage of the population of the world think out of the box. They do not seek to find out actually what the truth is.
I must not fail to add that bemused by the teachings of some ‘man of God’ who hype the urgency of Christ’s second coming and the apocalypse, some old generation Christians in Nigeria actually stopped working out the material, intellectual, and financial needs of the present. I have seen families whose long-time goals have been ruined materially and their children misguided because parents put more emphasis on the second coming of Jesus Christ than they put in working out their lives.
There is nothing wrong in preparing to meet Christ. What is wrong is abandoning responsibilities in the guise of waiting to meet Christ. By living a righteous life even without the prompting of any ‘man of God’ you live well on earth and prepare to live in hereinafter with Christ in heaven.
It is great irony and human deceit that some of the things which some ‘men of God’ preached against several decades ago including the use of electronic tube (television) have become veritable and essential channels of their message especially during this COVID-19 pandemic period.
This deceit consistently throw the question in my mind: where are the previous generations of ardent followers of some of these ‘men of God’ during the seventies and eighties? Apart from the close associates of these ‘men of God’ who co-own the churches with them, these generations of their followers have been lost in the obscurity of abject poverty before the messages of the ‘men of God’ changed in priority from making heaven to prosperity.
Most of the information upon which some people build their knowledge are simple rested on the ‘conventional’ and generally-accepted belief systems which may not necessarily be true.
Secondly, a large percentage of the population of people anchor their world views predominantly on religious myths and fictions, without ever bordering themselves on the investigation of the channels of transfer to the present generation of people, of these religious myths and fictions.
This is probably because it is regarded as apostasy or blasphemy to go outside the ‘convention’ to query the foundation of an accepted religious belief system and some opinions generally held by majority of the people to be true.
Yet, this does not give a whole-sale certification of these belief systems as unquestionably true.
Let us quickly get it clear that many of the things which man experience in life are beyond his control and influence. Though he cannot control or influence these things, for which reason the generic words of destiny, fortune, luck or karma found their ways in the English lexicon, man can remotely affect the conditions that shape up the things that happen to him.
Man can positively affect the conditions that shape up his life through obedience, unalloyed obedience to natural principles and laws of life. These include physical and natural laws to achieve the needed balance.
I fault the opinion of the end-time theorists because I understand that nature exudes life. The fact that we are both alive and conscious to witness the beauty of nature is a testimony to this impeccable truth. Every death in nature in whatever perspective if is viewed, is transient. Life is both permanent and eternal. Periodical deaths happen within life.
“Being”, which our planet earth is an integral part of, has no beginning… neither shall it have an end! What many people don’t understand is that the universal law of pre-destination appropriates to the world and every unfolding concept, phenomenon, and processes in nature (including human beings) their respective and individual wheels of existence, rendering both the world, these concepts, phenomena and processes expiable systems in the collective master plan of God. The expiration of the world, any concept, phenomena and processes marks the beginning of another. There is no vacuum therefore in nature which is not weaved in this divine configuration.
There is always a hidden factor in all phenomena. The hidden factor always conceals the identity of an unfolding aspect and a new expression of nature.
Periodically through the hidden factor, the new nature of things reveal the mysteries that direct or re-direct God’s ordained plan for everything on earth. This slight view and glimpse of the mechanism of life is what scientists quickly put down, analyze and sum up as scientific laws and formulae.
The best efforts of man in both science, technology and the arts manifest positive results when they synchronize with the collective master plan of God for the ends to which they are applied. Wrong application of scientific laws lead to wrong results and conclusions in much the same way that wrong application of the natural laws guiding our lives lead to false, failed or uneventful lives.
Falling not in consonance with the hidden factor, we fail. Very often, our failures manifest either as a result of simple mistakes, oversight, et al, but the point is that we have failed after being careful because we have fallen out of the plan of God for us. This is why very careful people, sometimes, make stupid mistakes. In spite of their extreme carefulness, some of them make ‘simple’ mistakes that lead them to ‘untimely’ death.
Yet, God has given man enough space to maneuver, and grace to swim through this complex riddle of life. God has given man a natural link to access the hidden, divine factor and fall in line with God’s master-plan through an active conscience driven by a good-intentioned will. The conscience is the guardian of the threshold.
The ‘signs of the end’ as prophesied in the Holy Bible have always been visible on earth through the antediluvian, B.C, or B.C.E periods. The birth of Jesus Christ hyped it as a result of the expectations of the Jews for freedom from their slave masters. The ‘signs of the end’ have also been in the world from the first century A.D after the death of Jesus Christ.
As a matter of fact, world history shows that, contrary to the belief in most religious quarters, the world political scene is becoming increasing peaceful and stable by the years. Science and the endeavors of man and international co-operation and understanding amongst nations are making the world more peaceful than it used to be.
The world is getting more organized, peaceful and stable by the year as the rule of law has effectively taken over from the brute force and coercive ways of governance of people yesteryears, including during pre-and post- Christ era.
There are still, though, a few isolated cases of coercive governments around the world but the excesses of these few isolated cases where maximum rulers ride roughshod on their people are periodically checkmated by the combined effort of the international community.
In the same message by the ‘man of God’ he talked about one religion, one government, et al, mentioning the old story of the 666 and sign of the beast.
Who is afraid of one religion of love and one government on earth bonded in love and by love? Is this not the way the world started with the peace that reigned in paradise during the time of Adam and Eve? Though there are snippets of wickedness in North Korea and a few other locations around the world, I see a grand prospect of peace and amity in the world. Solving the fraternal problem of the sons of Abraham descended from Syria will open up a floodgate of peace in the world.
It is instructive to remember that after detailing the signs of the end to his disciples, Jesus Christ made it clear that nobody, not even himself knows when the end will be. To elaborate his statement, he further said that the end of all the world systems shall come in the same manner that thieves operate – that is, sudden, swift and unannounced. This means that it will not be in the same manner as some people will want us to believe.
The world is getting more organized, peaceful and stable by the year as the rule of law has effectively taken over from the brute force and coercive ways of governance of people yesteryears, including during pre-and post- Christ era.
There are still, though, a few isolated cases of coercive governments around the world but the excesses of these few isolated cases where maximum rulers ride roughshod on their people are periodically checkmated by the combined effort of the international community.
Early this year 2020, there was palpable fear amongst scientists of a retreating space rock which they identified as Asteroid 52768/1998 OR2, hitting and pulverizing the earth on or around April 28th and 29th 2020. The fear was grounded on the fact that scientists had calculated and found out that a collision of a retreating asteroid with the earth about 65 million years ago is suspected to have caused the destruction of an earlier civilization of man on earth.
But scientific figures do not add up all the time. Sometimes, an exception will crop up. Like I did say earlier, there is always the hidden factor, and scientists themselves know and understand this to be so. They call it the margin of error.
This exception and margin of error which sometimes occur was actually what happened in March when scientists in National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the American self-appointed policeman of the things that happen in the out-of –the-earth environment called space, published their latest findings.
Here below is my lay-man’s summary of NASA findings;
- On April 29, the space rock (asteroid 52768/1998 OR2) will approach planet earth from a safe distance of approximately 0.04205 astronomical units.
- One astronomical unit is the one-way distance from our planet earth to the sun and this equals about 93 million miles (149.6m km).
- This means that asteroid 52768/1998 OR2 will miss the earth by 3.9 million miles (6.29 million km).
- The conclusion was that asteroid 52768/1998 OR2 will pass by the earth without hurting the earth from a distance of over sixteen times farther than our moon, the divine clock for planet earth that regulates the timings, the seasons, and the ecosystem in planet earth. By the way, the moon is perfectly located from planet earth at a distance which, if it were to be closer or farer from what it presently is, will destabilize whatever thing we understand to be the seasons, the ecosystem, biological and botanical food chains and hence the presently known pattern of life on earth including the lives of human beings. What a perfect God beyond all human science!
What came to space scientists as a surprise was not new to alchemists, esoteric scientists and transcendental artists. This is why I do not agree completely with the world renowned theoretical physicists, Stephen Hawking, that residents of the earth has only one hundred years to locate another planet for their habitation.
Mr. Hawking’s assumptive fear may be one of the reasons for the hushed plan by space administrators to scout for volunteers who will be the first set of human beings to habit planet Mars – a development which may have been responsible for the most recent private-sector supported expedition to the outer space.
Let me quickly say that the hurried and deliberate effort of human beings to transfer their habitation from planet earth to the not-yet-well-known planet Mars shall end in disaster.
There shall not be any end of the world in the manner conversed by scientists and the religions. The earth has the capacity, like our body, to heal itself if only given the chance, as a result of the primary creation principle of ‘as above, so below’. The human body is the microcosm within the concept of the macrocosm that is the earth
My worry is that, for this heading of the earth to take place, the world population must desist for a moment, from incinerating the earth through depletion of the ozone layer, bush burning, and unhealthy environmental conducts. Once the incineration of the earth is checked by her inhabitants, our earth, like our bodies, will heal itself.
I am aware that Mr. Hawking and his colleagues employed abstract intelligence – scientific reasoning – to attain their conclusions. But the complex nature of the universe makes it impossible for the universe to yield solely to understanding via abstract intelligence. There is a deep spiritual nature to life and the universe yet to be assessed by man. The gradual assessment of this deep spiritual nature by man is actually one of the major reasons for the existence of man on earth.
Whether or not the earth gets destroyed through incineration as a result of the depletion of the ozone layer and global warming or by pulverization by gigantic asteroids dropping from the space, truth is that the earth is getting old, and will naturally die out, but not in an accidental occurrence, but through the natural process of being uninhabitable by human beings as life sustaining ingredients and natural endowment of the earth gradually disappear.
With this, human beings will be fragile and more susceptible to diseases. Life expectancy will decrease as mortality rate increases. The end of the present earthly cycle seem as it will be a gradual descent than a steep and quick rush as speculated in many quarters.
Another planet may eventually become habitable, but not through a conscious and planned effort of the people of the earth to switch their residence to Mars. Certain operations of the cosmic mind are beyond the grasp and influence of the finite human mind. What the human mind does in such circumstances is to simply study, analyze, and interpret within his finite understanding.
Because nature heals itself like the human body, the earth can never be destroyed accidentally as Stephen Hawking and other scientists opine, if human beings stop henceforth from abusing the earth.
I think there is already an empirical scientific evidence that the earth heals itself when scientists observed the natural healing of a formally caved-in ozone layer in the Middle Eastern region of the earth.
This knowledge has been recorded in the archives of the alchemists, esoteric scientists and transcendental artist of the ancient scientific era.
The point I am making is that the abuse on the earth must not go beyond the limits where it becomes difficult for the earth to heal itself, just like a disease can kill a host human body if it is not quickly checked.
The problem with humanity as regards keeping the earth alive as in keeping a human being alive without abusing the body, is in the lack of discipline in the management of the leaps and bounds that human beings have achieved through science. It is like crashing in a top speed with the car you have made to ease your movement.
Misuse of scientific advantages by man is the most serious factor that constitutes a terminal danger to the continued existence of planet earth. If human beings succeed in habiting the planet Mars (which is impossible) after destroying the earth, how are we sure that they will not destroy Mars too.
Disobedience to the laws of nature by man which may appear in the form of bush burning, sand fillings, excavators, wrong acquisition of land from the seas and such-like offences committed against nature are some of the major factors that may cause a universal upheaval that may upturn human existence on earth.
Not only is the world threatened by the depletion of the ozone layer as a result of global warming and the emission of dangerous substances to the atmosphere, the world is also presently threatened even the more with this condition that is worse than the atomic holocausts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki of the second world war.
This time bomb needs only a little provocation on either side to unleash the demon of terror and catastrophe on humanity and the earth.
This is the fear of a biological war of mass destruction between China and her allies on one side, and America and her allies on the other side. Not until this matter is addressed by the United Nations, the world will be sitting between the cliff and the abyss fearing a little push to oblivion.
This is still another agent of the apocalypse that is worth mentioning. If the covert political struggles between powerful economic blocs in the world during the outbreak of the pathogen called COVID-19 is anything to go by, economic greed is presently threatening world peace, which, oscillating in the pendulum of time, gears up to give way. Mass scale biological warfare between China and America, if it is eventually precipitated by the accusations and counter accusations between Beijing and Washington DC as a result of COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, will spell doom for the survival of the earth.
Cohesion in international politics was at its lowest ebb as the countries of the world on the verge of precipice in diplomatic relations between the former eastern bloc and former western bloc countries either praised or condemned the actions of the United Nations in the whole sage. It took the shock of mass death across the nations of the world to bridge the mutual distrust in the spirit of a common threat unifies the bitterest enemies. One can only hope that the accusation and counter accusations of a biological warfare between American and China will be interred with the remains of the victims of COVID-19.
One of the latest stores in the agencies of the apocalypse came out, believe it or not, from China again.
In 2019, a Spanish, Juan Carlos Izpiaua Belmonte, a biologist, led a team of Chinese researchers with the end goal of creating monkeys which have entirely human organs such as kidneys and livers with a view to harnessing these organs for human transplant and use.
He had earlier experimented on adding human cells to embryos of pigs but that experiment was unsuccessful. It was believed that his new experiments with monkeys have greater chances of success because of the primates’ genetic proximity to human beings.
Defending his Frankenstein monsters creation, Mr. Belmonte was quoted to have said, “history shows time and time again that, over time, our ethical and moral standards change and mutate, like our DNA and what yesterday was ethically unacceptable, if this really represents an advance for the progress of humanity, today it is already an essential part of our lives.”
My comment is that Mr. Belmonte is partially right but basically wrong. He is partially right because man has been given the authority by God to probe nature, advance it, and himself with it. But he is basically wrong because if this probe achieves a negative result which means allowing it to make man bereft of all the ethical and moral standards upon which his life revolves, the entire purpose of probing will be defeated. Mutation or no mutation, it is not good to allow the moral and ethical standards of human beings to degenerate so low to the point where there is no more a difference between human beings and the beasts which man is meant to exercise control over. Man was not created by God to destroy himself and the earth. He was created to nourish the earth, enjoy himself and honor God.
I must not fail to add that bemused by the teachings of some ‘man of God’ who hype the urgency of Christ’s second coming and the apocalypse, some old generation Christians in Nigeria actually stopped working out the material, intellectual, and financial needs of the present. I have seen families whose long-time goals have been ruined materially and their children misguided because parents put more emphasis on the second coming of Jesus Christ than they put in working out their lives.
There is nothing wrong in preparing to meet Christ. What is wrong is abandoning responsibilities in the guise of waiting to meet Christ. By living a righteous life even without the prompting of any ‘man of God’ you live well on earth and prepare to live in hereinafter with Christ in heaven.
It is great irony and human deceit that some of the things which some ‘men of God’ preached against several decades ago including the use of electronic tube (television) have become veritable and essential channels of their message especially during this COVID-19 pandemic period.
This deceit consistently throw the question in my mind: where are the previous generations of ardent followers of some of these ‘men of God’ during the seventies and eighties? Apart from the close associates of these ‘men of God’ who co-own the churches with them, these generations of their followers have been lost in the obscurity of abject poverty before the messages of the ‘men of God’ changed in priority from making heaven to prosperity.
Finally, I have heard and read the one English word for ‘mercy killing’. This word is called ‘euthanasia’. Can anybody teach me the one English word for ‘honor killing’?
‘Wicked Killing’ (not honor killing?) is the reason which the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran gave for not arresting and prosecuting a man who killed his daughter because the daughter expressed her freedom to love and be with whom she chose.
This verdict was reached by a ‘fatwa’, a randomly-selected group of Islamic scholars who studied and researched the peculiar perspective of the crime (or is it honor?) within the context of Islamic Sharia laws. They adjudicated the matter and came up with the conclusion of an ‘ honor killing.’
With this development, it is very clear now that some modern Islamic Scholars interpret Islamic Jihad (literally meaning defense of Islam), and Islamic Dawa’a ( literally meaning evangelism in Islam) to absurd ends. One thing is certain with this interpretation. It does not augur well both for the future of the religion and that of humanity, whose unity and cohesion is threatened by this judgment.
The truth is that any law enacted by man, be it religious or secular or in whatever form, that contradicts the primary laws of God, which include, “Thou Shall Not Kill” is evil, no matter whoever that interpreted it for whatever authority and in whatever guise it is delivered. This terse command from God descended from the Hebrew document (the Old Testament scriptures) and it is still there in the three extant religious scriptures that descended from Abraham, notably the Sacred Torah (Judaism), the Holy Bible (Christianity), and the Glorious Quran (Islam).
The blatant abuse of the natural laws of love, freedom equity and justice upon which the world was created by God, and the wickedness of man to man are some of the reasons for which mother earth will one day snap in revolt, and human beings with it!
This is my concept and understanding of the core reasons and meaning of an apocalypse – that is, when the world in wickedness runs itself dry of love.
Abuchi Obiora can be reached at abuchiobiora@gmail.com