Talk:False prophet

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Votes for deletion This article was nominated for deletion on 10 August 2005. The result of the discussion was Keep.
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[edit] Really stupid

I don't know who wrote this but it's really stupid. "The false prophet, used in St. John's Book of Revelation, is a personification of Satan, or the devil, from whom sulphur and fire will pour from his mouth. One can assume that the false prophet, taken literally, was the root of evil in a person's heart, telling them corruption and Satanic worship was the right path in life."

You can't take this literally! It's impossible to have sulphur and fire coming out of your mouth literally! And even if it were possible, it isn't logical to assume that this "literal" prophet is a "root of evil". Is the "root" literal as well? It would kill the person. A "literal" root in your heart (unless it was very small) would cause a heart attack, and/or blood poisoning. This article should be deleted!--ChadThomson 07:16, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

  • The whole article should be deleted because you dispute one statement in it??? Idiotic. — BRIAN0918 • 2005-08-10 15:22
I don't think you looked at the older version of the article which was, in fact, very stupid. Check the history. --ChadThomson 07:16, 24 August 2005 (UTC)
This is probably very old news, but I think you're nitpicking in general. I don't think the person in question was describing a literal "root" nor do I think the issue is whether or not someone breathing fire and brimstone is possible or not. However, I do agree the statement is disagreeable for the simple fact that it is based on a lot of assumptions and seems to be the writer's interpretation of the Bible instead of letting the text speak for itself. Drumpler 23:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
You misunderstand the term "root." "Root" in this context means origin or cause. Another note: the 'fire and brimstone' supposedly spewing from the character's mouth is not literal in meaning, just like most of the Bible. It is a metaphor, and Christians are supposed to understand that these 'false prophets' (anyone proselytizing in a religion other than Christianity) are spreading harmful falsehoods to the people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.175.205.67 (talk) 20:54, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Why Muhammed?

Sammydirectproduct 23:33, 9 August 2005 (UTC): Is there a reason for the Muhammed reference at the end of the article? There seems to be an oblique implication to mentioning that Muhammed is considered a prophet of God in Islam in an entry for False prophet. If no one minds I am going to delete this.

Robert A West 22:08, 10 August 2005 (UTC): Someone added the reference back to the completely-rewritten article in a way that makes more sense. I did some copyediting, since the He-was-a-good-man-who-never-claimed-to-be-what-his-followers-make-him school is out there, probably in no small part as a "Can't we all get along" gesture.

HumanJHawkins 17:33, 6 March 2007 (UTC): It seems that this article should either be ammended to include a long list of people accused of being false prophets, or the reference to Mohammed should be removed. Any such list would have to include Jesus Christ as he was certainly accused of being a false prophet during his time. However, this might be interpreted as a negative comment on Christ and put the site at greater risk for vandalism.

I am agreed here. If this obviously wants to stay here, we need statements about how Christ was viewed as a false prophet as well as Moses. I don't think its relevant to this discussion. If you want to do that, put it up as a counter argument on the Jesus Christ article, the Moses article or in this case, the Mohammed article. It doesn't belong here. Drumpler 23:38, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree with user HumanJHawkins. Much like in the debate in Florida education over whether to force teachers to say "the scientific theory of" in from of the term "evolution," so must we include all potential 'false prophets.'

[edit] Starting Over

The new stub is not great, but it is, I think, acceptable. Robert A West 08:45, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cite sources

I was in a hurry to replace the original article with a decent stub, so I wasn't careful about citations. The article is now getting long and complex enough that we need to get careful about this. Especially in a topic as potentially hot as this one. Yes, this applies to me too. Robert A West 22:11, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Examples from Kings

I think that it is vital for the reader to understand that the court prophets, or at least many of them, were guilty of idolatry, and that idolatry was one of the principal charges against Ahab. Why was this deleted? Robert A West 18:23, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

I feel that the defining thing of a "false prophet" is not that he worships a fake god but that he speaks with fake authority. The prophets mentioned in 1 Kings 22 speak not God's message but the message of the "lying spirit" – with disastrous outcome; on the contrary, the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18 are not mentioned to prophesy anywhere. That's why I feel the present version to illustrate the point better. Idolatry isn't really the defining point, anyone can worship an idol. You don't have to be a prophet. Pilatus 16:01, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
A prophet of Baal falls under the condemnation of Deut 13:1-5 as false prophet. The fact that their prophesies are not recorded strikes me as irrelevant. Whether the court prophets in 1 Kings 22 are the same as (or similar to) the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18, or were in league with them, is something that I have long taken for granted, but I agree it is not obvious. One can view the lying spirit, and its consequences, as punishment for prophesy without authority, and so the fulfilment of Deut. 18:20-22, or as the natural consequence of involvement with idolators, if not idolatry on the part of the prophet. Either way, I think your version obscures the issue. Robert A West 18:38, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
Baal-worship is better subsumed under Deut 13:7-17, which is why Elijah has the Baal-prophets killed at the end of 1 Kings 18. On the other hand, the outcome of the "false prophecy" in 1 Kings 22 is death (for the king as substitute for the prophet). This is why I find the present version more suitable. Pilatus 22:12, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
I'm not convinced, but I will hunt up some commentaries and check this out more. Thanks. Robert A West 00:00, 15 August 2005 (UTC)
Cheers. I recently moved house, and most of my books are still in storage, 500 km from here. Pilatus 11:00, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] "God" vs "god" POV

It appears to be non-NPOV to have a distinction between "God" (who is, in this article, Islamic or Judeo-Christian) and "god" (who is not Islamic or Judeo-Christian) in the main article. I suggest that the word "god" be changed to "deity" except as part of a quote. Shawnc 05:09, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree entirely.

[edit] Jewish Views of Mohammed

"The status of Jesus outside of Christianity and of Mohammed outside of Islam is an important and controversial matter. For the most part Judaism does not regard either as a genuine prophet, but while some rabbis condemn them as false prophets, others deny that they prophesied at all, and blame their followers for misrepresenting their careers."

I've seen this view with respect to Jesus, but not Mohammed. Are there any citations?

Both have also been considered largely or entirely fictitious, views I consider unfounded but which should still be represented. A.J.A. 22:07, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The white horsemen?

The sentence about the white horsemen needs a proper citation. In Wikipedia, to state "It is thought that ... " without giving the "thought by whom" is just another way of disguising a POV. DFH 16:58, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Additional Citations

I have read, cover to cover, The Book of Mormon, The Qu'ran, and the King James Bible. Each had warnings similar to Matthew 7:15 - 23 cited here. Unfortunately, I can't recall the exact text and location of the related parts of these books. Hopefully one of you will. It would be great if additional quotations from these (and other) texts could be added to this Wiki. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by HumanJHawkins (talk • contribs) 22:16, 6 March 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Islam Section Biased

Is it me or does anyone else hint here a clear bias at the end regarding Islam? The article tends to make a particular argument as to why they believe Mohammed is a false prophet but doesn't directly deal with the issue of false prophecy and false prophets according to the teachings of Islam as it does the other two sections (which describe false prophecy and false prophets within the context of Christianity and Judaism). This seems to go against the tone of the rest of the article which reads more like a Christian tract than anything. Drumpler 23:06, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I'm proposing a rewrite for the first two sections. I'll probably do it. However, I will be fair in saying that I do not know enough about Islam to discuss how they view false prophets and false prophecy and so will then proceed to post up a neutrality dispute on that section instead. Drumpler 23:10, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unfulfilled Christian Prophecy Link?

I'm not a Christian by any stretch of the imagination, but I do think a counterlink should likewise be posted which shows arguments for fulfilled Christian prophecies in order to balance it out. In fact, does this even belong to this page at all? Maybe this is more appropriate for a page about Christian prophecies in general. Drumpler 23:29, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Updates

I heavily edited the first and second sections. The first section is a rewrite although I retained many of the original ideas from the previous edit. The section section is more or less intact, with a few thoughts interspersed in between to make it consistent. The third section I did nothing with (except throw up a neutrality dispute) because I know nothing of Islam.

I thought it would be useful to include the models outlined in the three religions' sacred texts in order to identify a false prophet (this is very important when one considers what their context is within that religion). I likewise changed all verses to the New International Version because, inspite of the popularity of the King James Version, it is in clear English and only has a 10% paraphrase rate (actually, all Bibles are paraphrases to one point or another -- if you got a LITERAL translation, it'd be difficult to determine).

I also realize that many people may not like how I presented their religions, but my aim and goal was to be as unbiased as possible -- as such, I do not speak of the religions in terms of who is "absolutely right" and who is "absolutely wrong". In developing the models I did for determining "true" prophets from "false" prophets according to each religion, I tried to get the sacred texts to speak for themselves with a small summary at the end of each point. This should remove much of the bias. I likewise removed much of the anti-Islam diatribe and removed speculations regarding the identity of the Antichrist (this isn't a tract). I have not cited all of my sources yet, but will do so when I get the time (unless someone else wants to do it). I likewise removed the article from the "anti-Gnostic" category (where is Gnosticism even MENTIONED in this article?).

I think it would be nice to add other major religions, although I can understand why one would focus on the three Abrahamic religions because they are more or less a staple of Western culture. There also might become a problem if every religion is listed. What would we do then? Make a disambiguation article with links to such things as "false prophets in Christianity", "false prophets in Judaism", etc? This page could stretch on and on forever if such an undertaking was attempted. You could likewise just make it according to the Abrahamic religions with other religions listed in their own articles. I think this needs to be considered.

Although, one might want to consider merging it with the prophets article as well, both as a balance/counter-balance issue. The two could very well go hand-in-hand.

Just some ideas. Drumpler 04:42, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Stubbed the article to encourage adding to it. :) Drumpler 14:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I am proposing making this a disambiguation page after all. What does everyone think? It could have the summary at the top followed by links to several articles detailing false prophets according to different religions. Drumpler 22:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Although if we were to disambiguate, I'd suggest taking the first two sections and make a page about "false prophets in the Bible" and not particularly in Christianity or Judaism, since both go hand-in-hand regarding their tests of a false prophet. Drumpler 22:46, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
Actually, "false prophets (Bible)" might be a better way to handle this.
Sorry, forgot to sign. Drumpler 22:53, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Restructured with sub-sections

Rather than repeat the verbose Theology and prophetic models surrounding false prophets as part of the title for each of the 3 main sections, it seemed sensible to me to use this a level-2 heading, and make the others into level-3 sub-sections. I have also removed the capitalization from the headings. DFH 14:38, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, that was very sensible. However, I still think the Islam section is heavily biased (coming from a non-Muslim persuasion) and the neutrality dispute on that section should remain. Drumpler 08:03, 11 March 2007 (UTC)


This biased rewrite is nothing but vandalism. This is not the place to waste space with definitions of old and new testament or absurd models made to forgive one of the subject's on the page. The bible quote that was removed and edited was replaced with an incorrect reference as well as a lecture about referencing??


The biblical definution of a false prophet is given in both the old and new testament as "judge a tree by its fruit", does the prophesy come true? There is no need for long winded stories of extensive speculation. The stories from the NT were placed in their own section, where they belong, as stories of false prophets.

A basic definition was a good place to start on this page. Confusing the simple self evident definition only serves self interested reasons. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.24.120.2 (talk) 01:29, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Islam: Undue Weight

I put a "neutrality dispute" in the Islam section. Might be best to mention that its better categorized as possessing "undue weight", but I do not know how to do this. Drumpler 09:11, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
You do not make a case for the dispute on the talk page beyond saying that you tagged the section. Make your case if you have one then. IN the meantime I have removed the tag.--CltFn 16:46, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Needs complete rewrite

This article should deal with False prophet. It doesn't give a clear definition of a "false prophet", but instead defines it in terms of the ambiguous word "prophet". And then why does it start with the Tanach? It should instead start with an overview of the definitions (per religion). Every single prophet has been called a false prophet by one person or another. Buddhists, for instance, would consider all the Abrahamic prophets to be false prophets. This should be discussed in the article. The current format of Judaism, Christianity, Islam seems to be as a result of systematic bias. Also, it should give explanations as to when the term has been used. Jews, for instance, used the term false prophet to refer to Jesus, and Muhammad. But the article as it is right now seems to rely heavily on OR and synthesis of sourced material. I'll be fixing it up at User:Kirbytime/False prophet. --Ķĩřβȳ♥♥♥ŤįɱéØ 21:00, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I'm more in favour of the idea of writing a separate article for each religion's definition of a false prophet because I fear this article could get unnecessarily huge as people contribute their own beliefs as to what a false prophet is or isn't. What you might do is make a disambiguation page pointing to differing religions' views of a false prophet with an accompanying short definition. You might want to make a format similar to this page: List of Fullmetal Alchemist episodes.
What I initially tried to do was go into the religions that were already on this page and use their sacred texts to give a bare minimum definition of how each religion views a false prophet. I do not know Islam so I left that religion alone.
I'll be watching your page and will contribute in anyway that I can. Drumpler 07:15, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
I wanted to add that the explanatory paragraph, "In particular this article . . .", was only included because that's all the information that was available on the article at the time, but the view was to include that paragraph until some other editor came in and provided information on other religions. Look at the archives. I think its in much better shape than it was before. Drumpler 07:17, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
That actually sounds like a good idea. False prophet could be a disambig page, leading to False prophet (Judaism), False prophet (Christianity, False prophet (Islam), etc. etc. That sounds very good. --Ķĩřβȳ♥♥♥ŤįɱéØ 18:17, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nehemian the prophet

I am wondering if nehemia is a false prophet —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.125.208.249 (talk) 17:36, 27 April 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Women Preachers

Why do so called Christians say they follow GODs words, but contradict what the Holy Scriptures say. Its plainly written in I Corinthians 14:34-35 That women are to keep silent in the church....That makes that preacher a Hypocrit.


(Lamar McPherson) (May 30,2007 12:11pm)

This is irrelevant to the discussion at hand. I recommend reading WP:Verifiability when you get time. :) Drumpler 17:18, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Modern day false prophets

I can't understand anything in the part about the mormons. And that make no sense to look for a proof in religion : when there is a god, nothing is impossible, nothing is logical... Kromsson 16:49, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

False is false, if someone does not think this is NPOV, then start a thread about it. It is vandalism to keep bias deleting properly referenced views. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.114.95.219 (talk) 04:01, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
NPOV is more than just references. The wording you have used, putting forth your own POV from one side, is why this keeps getting reverted. Adding more balanced information, such as those from the July 1988 issue of the Ensign magazine [1], may help out your article addition. Joseph Smith has not been proven to be a false prophet. That is your opinion and you are welcome to it. But Wikipedia is not the place for it. Alanraywiki 04:12, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Are you really arguing that a publication of the LDS is MORE balanced than scientific examination of the papryi or a Utah newspaper which states these are the real papyri?? There are 100s if not 1000s of references that clearly state Joe Smith is a false prophet and you expect me to use a source from

his church with claims that there are parts of it missing? 1st the LDS tried to claim they don't exist at all, and then when a museum comes up with them, they try to claim there are other parts missing?? The Museum of Modern Art is a very objective source. They know if they have all of a collection or a fragment of a collection. They have been in the collection business a long long time. The inventory of a museum belongs in an encyclopedia long before the pure speculation of other papyri with no proof whatsoever that they exist. http://www.lds.org/portal/site/LDSOrg/menuitem.b12f9d18fae655bb69095bd3e44916a0/?vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=a8c1d7630a27b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&hideNav=1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.114.95.219 (talk) 03:38, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Moreover, for atheist, all prophets are false prophets, so one should always tell who think one particular prophet is false. And if you're alone thinking Joseph Smith is a false prophet, the world doesn't care.Kromsson 16:39, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Alone? there are 5 pages of google hits BEFORE you get to the wiki page on his false prophesies. Anyone who dares to make a prophesy and it does not come true is a false prophet. It is the very definition of the words. I proved Koresh made a false prophesy with a reference, not an opinion, so he belongs here. I proved Smith made a false prophesy with 3 references so he belongs here. These deletions are vandalism, pure and simple and some of them have been ruled as such, which is why this page and the others are staying put. The real prophets of the world, like Daniel, deserve to have the fakes exposed in real reference works. I really could not care less what an atheist, or anyone else's OPINION is on this call. Prove a false prophet by proving false prophesies.

Thanks for the comments, you have made the page much better by prompting me to post the bilbical definition of a false prophet. Prophetic status is like virginity, once you lose it, you can NEVER regain it!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.114.95.219 (talk) 03:52, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Let's take an exemple :
"Primary to proving a prophet false is to prove they made false prophesies."
This is wrong. Many prophets are said to be false prophets before the time their prophecies should happen. This is a question of dogma. Joseph Smith is a false prophet for people who aren't mormon, but for the mormons, Joseph Smith is as true as a prophet can be. There is no logical proof to be done here. You think (and X billions websites say) that Joseph Smith lied and all, but you have zero authority on the mormon's dogma. I think Jesus was a false prophet, but I'm not Benoit XVI, so I shut the f*** up and don't mess up Wikipedia's page about Jesus. This is why I removed certain parts of the article. Kromsson 02:13, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

This is a page on false prophets, so by claiming your religion makes you an expert here really proves the point convincingly. It still does not give you any right to vandalize this page. Wiki is not for 1 side to bully their opinion with such tactics. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.24.120.2 (talk) 00:31, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I deleted the section on "modern day false prophets." To be NPOV, one would have to add "alleged" or "claimed" which is against wikipedia policy. It was only meant to be inflammatory, and served little real purpose. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 168.122.153.183 (talk) 03:37, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

If we start giving specific examples of "false prophets" (defined by the common-sense criterion of "people alleged to have made predictions that didn't pan out"), then we would have to include Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and Jesus (and maybe a few others I've forgotten). And this will get very ugly, very quickly. --Robert Stevens (talk) 12:59, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Phelps Family

Just because everybody hates them, doesn't mean that they should simply get tacked to the end of an article which makes them appear unfavorably. They do that well enough themselves. 168.122.153.183 03:42, 7 November 2007 (UTC)