The Difference Between Biblical and False Prophecy

I once believed Nostradamus was able to somewhat predict the future. However, after careful study I found that he stole many of his “prophecies” from the Bible (which he read in secret), revised them, and claimed them as his own. For example, like the Bible, he made continual references to wars, earthquakes, famines, pestilences, and plagues; he speaks of the King of kings, “a kingdom divided,” and “the blood of innocents.” His predictions contain phrases such as “milk and honey,” “tribulation,” “God loosed Satan,” “anti-Christ,” “latter days,” “Gog and Magog,” “the sea shall be red,” etc. Today, as in his day, anyone who is ignorant of the Bible’s prophecies will be impressed with the writings of Nostradamus. His “predictions,” though, are incredibly generic (just as horoscopes and tarot cards are), and people can read into them any meaning they desire.

That is not the case with biblical prophecies, which are extremely detailed and precise. Unlike other religious books, the Bible offers a multitude of specific predictions—some thousands of years in advance—that either have been literally fulfilled or point to a definite future time when they will come true. No other religion has specific, repeated, and unfailing fulfillment of predictions many years in advance of events over which the predictor had no control. The sacred writings of Buddhism, Islam, Confucius, etc., are all missing the element of proven prophecy. These kinds of predictions are unique to the Bible.

“In all, there are over three hundred prophecies that tell of the ancestry, birth, life, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth. All have been literally fulfilled to the smallest detail.”

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Only one who is omniscient can accurately predict details of events thousands of years in the future. Limited human beings know the future only if it is told to them by an omniscient Being. God provided this evidence for us so we would know that the Scriptures have a divine Author: “For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done” (Isa. 46:9,10).

In addition, the Bible declares that prophets must be 100 percent accurate—no exceptions. If anyone claimed to be speaking for God and the prophesied event didn’t come to pass, he was proven to be a liar. The writings of Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses are littered with false prophecies, so we can know whether they are written by men or by God.

The Bible’s sixty-six books, written between 1400 B.C. and A.D. 90, contain approximately 3,856 verses concerned with prophecy. Even more important are the many prophecies of a coming Messiah. God said He would send someone to redeem mankind from sin, and He wanted there to be no mistake about who that Person would be. In all, there are over three hundred prophecies that tell of the ancestry, birth, life, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus of Nazareth. All have been literally fulfilled to the smallest detail.

A fact often overlooked by critics is that, even if most biblical predictions could be explained naturally, the existence of just one real case of fulfilled prophecy is sufficient to establish the Bible’s supernatural origin. Over 25 percent of the entire Bible contains specific predictive prophecies that have been literally fulfilled. This is true of no other book in the world. And it is a sure sign of its divine origin.

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