Keskustelujen arkisto

BOB FOSTER WROTE:

> I just received this and thought I should pass it on without comment:
>
> Are you guys familiar with Nostradamus? This is a quote from one of his
> predictions:
>
> "In the year of the new century and nine months,
> From the sky will come a great King of Terror...
> The sky will burn at forty-five degrees.
> Fire approaches the great new city..."
>
> "In the city of York there will be great collapse,
> twin brothers torn apart by chaos while the fortress fall,
> the great leader will succumb,
> the third big war will come when the big city is
> burning..."

AND I RESPECTFULLY REPLY:

Before everyone gets excited about this "prophecy", I thought I would point
out that it is an example of a quatrain written by a student in a Canadian
university in imitation of similar writings attributed to Nostradamus.

I certainly don't mean to be insensitive or to belittle the importance of
the actual event that inspired the thousands of emails that are currently
flooding inboxes of readers worldwide. I have my own Biblical beliefs that
see the attack as evidence we are living in what the Scriptures call "the
last days." But we don't want to start a hysterical notion that World War
III is upon us based on a spurious quotation.

For those interested in the source of the quatrain, read on. The rest can
hit the "delete" key.

----------------------------------------

Claim: A 1554 Nostradamus prediction said World War III would begin with
the fall of "two brothers," a reference to the destroyed World Trade Center
towers.

"In the City of God there will be a great thunder, Two brothers torn
apart by Chaos, while the fortress endures, the great leader will succumb,
The third big war will begin when the big city is burning"
-- Nostradamus 1654

Origins: The turmoil of recent events has us all scrambling, some to look
for solace and meaning, others for the terrorists responsible, and yet
others for signs that what happened could have been prevented or at least
foreseen. The 11 September 2001 attack on America destroyed not only the two
World Trade Center towers in New York City, a chunk of the Pentagon in
Washington, and caused untold loss of life, it also shook America's sense of
invulnerability. No longer do Americans presume safety in an unsafe world.

For some, that realization is an eye-opener, unsettling but necessary, in
that a child's blissful unawareness has been replaced (at great cost) with
an adult's more clear-eyed view of the world and its sometimes horrifying
ways. For others, it spells the beginning of the end, in that they equated
an illusion of safety with its reality and thus now feel their world is
ending. It is the fears of that second group that are given voice in the
Nostradamus prediction circulated on the Internet even before the dust had
settled in New York.

The French physician and astrologer Nostradamus (1503-1566) penned numerous
quatrains populated by obscure imagery that the credulous have ever after
attempted to fit to the events of their times. These predictions can often
ring somewhat true in that the images employed are so general they can be
found in almost every event of import, but by the same token, the prophesies
are never a dead-on fit because the wordings are far too general. Not that
this stops anyone from believing in them; our society's need for mysticism
runs far too deep to ever allow for that.

Those looking for the certainty of a Nostradamus prophesy come true have
been known to sledge hammer the results to force a fit by inventing fanciful
translations from the original French, bend over backwards to assert one
named term is really another, and (as in this case) outright fabricate part
or all of the prediction.

Nostradamus did not write the quatrain now being attributed to him. (One
wonders how a guy who died in 1566 could have written an item identified as
being penned in 1654 anyway.) It originated with a student at Brock
University in Canada in the 1990s, appearing on a web page essay on
Nostradamus. That particular quatrain was offered by the page's author, Neil
Marshall, as a fabricated example to illustrate how easily an
important-sounding prophecy can be crafted through the use of abstract
imagery. He pointed out how the terms he used were so deliberately vague
they could be interpreted to fit any number of cataclysmic events.

It appears someone mistook Marshall's illustrative example for an actual
Nostradamus prophecy and, not content to let well enough alone, added "The
third big war will begin when the big city is burning." A fabrication was
thus further fabricated.

But that wasn't the end of it. More fakery was piled on in later versions
that now included all of the text quoted in the Example section above but
now concluded with:

"on the 11th day of the 9 month that...two metal birds would crash
into two tall statues...in the new city... and the world will end soon
after"

Similarly, another enhanced version incorporates the Example text into a
more detailed prophecy:

And Nostradamus predicted this (who knows how long ago):
"In the year of the new century and nine months,
From the sky will come a great King of Terror...
The sky will burn at forty-five degrees.
Fire approaches the great new city..."
"In the city of york there will be a great collapse,
2 twin brothers torn apart by chaos
while the fortress falls the great leader will succumb
third big war will begin when the big city is burning"

Needless to say, these versions are as fake as the first was.

I'd not hold much faith in the validity of the Nostradamus "prediction."
Please do not forward it. For more information on such made up predictions,
visit:
http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/weekly/aa091101b.htm
However, I would like the whole world to know of BFosterLA at aol.com's
inspiring first-hand stories and tributes. Thank you, thank you for sharing
them with us. My prayers are with everyone who is suffering at this time.

-- Wes

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Daniel van Eijmeren wrote:
> I wanted to include a link to VIDAR SVENDSEN's "Religion in Duckburg"
> site, but it seems that I only have an old non-working URL. On that site,
> Vidar lists religious references in Disney comics, but also in comics
> in general.

My homepages were mysteriously gone. I'm uploading it now.
I can't remember any duck stories based on Revelation.
You find the page about religion in Duckburg (English version) at:
http://members.home.com/vsvendsen/comics/disney/religion/intro.htm

Besides 'Duckburg religion' I have a page about the Bible in Asterix.
I guess that's what Daniël means with religious references... also in
comics in general."
I'm planning a page about religion in Lucky Luke though (hope I'll
finish it before the 2. coming....)
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Vidar Svendsen http://members.home.com/vsvendsen/

And he said all those numbers
made him numb,
which (he thinks) is why
they're called numbers

Dear everyone,

I also want to express my concern and grief about what is happening in
the world since last Tuesday. I am deeply shocked by what I have seen
on television and (how can I hide it?) very scared of the future as it
looks today.

My heart, tears and thoughts are with the victims, their friends
and family.

I don't think that anyone here should think of being "off-topic"
when talking about this horrible situation. We are not just a few
comic book collectors, we are people. And I think that we now need
each other more as *people* than as comic book fellows.

This is more than any sensible person can bear. We cannot prohibit
each other to talk about it freely, just to have a nice discussion
of about ducks and mice. Looking at the emails so far, there isn't
much interest in that anyway. I think it's top priority that we
keep in *contact* with each other. Being concerned about each other
and about the world is IN-TOPIC. Everything else is inferior.

At this moment, I can't read a duck comic, even if I would be
forced to do it.

Love and hope to all of you,

--- Daniel

This, from a Canadian newspaper, is worth sharing.America: The Good
Neighbor.Widespread but only partial news coverage wasgiven recently to a
remarkable editorial broadcastfrom Toronto by Gordon Sinclair, a Canadian
televisioncommentator. What follows is the full text of histrenchant remarks
as printed in the CongressionalRecord:"This Canadian thinks it is time to
speak up forthe Americans as the most generous and possiblythe least
appreciated people on all the earth.Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent,
Britainand Italy were lifted out of the debris of war by theAmericans who
poured in billions of dollars andforgave other billions in debts. None of
thesecountries is today paying even the interest onits remaining debts to
the United States.When France was in danger of collapsing in 1956,it was the
Americans who propped it up, and theirreward was to be insulted and swindled
on thestreets of Paris. I was there. I saw it.When earthquakes hit distant
cities, it is theUnited States that hurries in to help. This spring,59
American communities were flattened by tornadoes.Nobody helped.The Marshall
Plan and the Truman Policy pumpedbillions of dollars into discouraged
countries.Now newspapers in those countries are writingabout the decadent,
warmongering Americans.I'd like to see just one of those countries thatis
gloating over the erosion of the United Statesdollar build its own airplane.
Does any othercountry in the world have a plane to equal theBoeing Jumbo
Jet, the Lockheed Tri-Star, orthe Douglas DC10? If so, why don't they
flythem? Why do all the International lines exceptRussia fly American
Planes?Why does no other land on earth even considerputting a man or woman
on the moon? You talkabout Japanese technocracy, and you get radios.You talk
about German technocracy, and you getautomobiles. You talk about American
technocracy,and you find men on the moon - not once, but severaltimes - and
safely home again.You talk about scandals, and the Americans puttheirs right
in the store window for everybody to lookat. Even their draft-dodgers are
not pursued andhounded. They are here on our streets, and most of
them,unless they are breaking Canadian laws, are gettingAmerican dollars
from ma and pa at home to spend here.When the railways of France, Germany
and India werebreaking down through age, it was the Americans whorebuilt
them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and theNew York Central went broke,
nobody loaned them an oldcaboose. Both are still broke.I can name you 5,000
times when the Americansraced to the help of other people in trouble. Canyou
name me even one time when someone elseraced to the Americans in trouble? I
don't thinkthere was outside help even during the San
Franciscoearthquake.Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I'm oneCanadian
who is damned tired of hearing themget kicked around. They will come out of
this thingwith their flag high. And when they do, they areentitled to thumb
their nose at the lands that aregloating over their present troubles. I hope
Canadais not one of those.""Stand proud, America!"

Because e-mail can be altered electronically,
the integrity of this communication cannot be guaranteed.

Jonathan Markoff wrote:

> Please, all who wish to express anger, sadness and disgust about the
> homicidal bull**** done by those ******** on Tuesday, feel free to
> do so. A holocaust like the one we've lived to see is far more important
> than printed stories about some talking ducks and rhetorical questions
> about the true name of the mythical ancient city of Xanadu.

< remainder snipped>

And I reply:

You are geographically very close to the subject, and I understand your
pain. You have been deeply hurt, and you did not deserve it.

But please realize that offensive language is an assault on the very people
you are trying to join in sympathy. You can make your point just as well
with more carefully chosen vocabulary that befits the intelligence of
yourself and your readers.

I was properly chastised by a fellow DCML member for responding to this
off-topic thread, and here I am doing it again. But please realize that I
am just as displeased with what has happened as anyone else -- but
responding in kind will not fix anything. Perhaps we need to pick up an old
comic and get a little humor back in our lives to prove that, while we are
not ignoring or approving what has happened, neither will we let it kill our
enjoyment of life.

Barks managed to teach me many wonderful things through his words and
pictures, including how I should view other cultures. And he did it all
with wholesome language.

Dan Shane
(danshane at bellsouth.net)

Hi all!

Just a few comments about a, in my opinion, stupid mail.

> This, from a Canadian newspaper, is worth sharing.America: The Good
> Neighbor.

I've read this "article" before, it is passed around on the internet and
probably as much hoax as the Nostradamus-thing.

Just one example:

> Does any othercountry in the world have a plane to equal theBoeing Jumbo
> Jet, the Lockheed Tri-Star, orthe Douglas DC10? If so, why don't they
> flythem? Why do all the International lines exceptRussia fly American
> Planes?

Ever heard of the Airbus?

Norbert