NOSTRADAMUS (1503-1566)

Just about everyone will have heard of Nostradamus, the man who made all those famous predictions 500 years ago. You will no doubt have heard claims that he predicted such events as the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York, the death of Princess Diana, the assassination of just about anybody who has ever been assassinated, and so on.

I really do not intend to waste too much time on this, so to get straight to the point, its all a load nonsense. That's about it really. Any questions?

The predictions? Oh, all right, if you insist, but this is all so unbelievably stupid and tedious.

Nostradamus did not actually make any definite predictions. What he did do was to write (most famously) 942 verses of rambling doggerel that are purported to be prophesies, if you can find their hidden meaning! These ramblings, because that is all they are - the ramblings of someone who has obviously lost the plot - are contained in 10 volumes of predictions each containing 100 four-line poems called quatrains (bar one volume that contains only 42). The predictions cover the period up to the year 3797, but this is not to be taken as a predicted date for the end of the world, it's just as far as his predictions go.

Nostradamus started his career with a lot of promise. Born in St. Remy-de-Provence, France, in 1503 of a well heeled family he was educated at Montpellier University, where he illegally dissected corpses. Nostradamus began to attract attention when during a three year sabbatical his strategy of sterilising graves in quicklime and burning rat-infested refuse heaps helped staunch the spread of bubonic plague in Bordeaux. He also won wide acclaim for his plague-protecting potion of garlic and aloe; it may sound primitive, but garlic's antibacterial properties have since been acknowledged while aloe is noted for the immunostimulatory properties that increase the immune system's ability to fight infection and disease. Nostradamus was well on his way to becoming a founding-father of immunology, then, tragedy struck with the death of his wife and two sons due to the plague. The event spurred him onwards with his research, but his resulting theories on poor hygiene's contribution to the spread of disease conflicted with the Vatican's opinion that the plague spreading thorough Europe was the result of divine retribution. This one-sided disagreement led to his fall from official favour and saw him disbarred from medicine. It was after this that the disgraced medic began to lead a solitary existence during which he began sprinkling 'magic water' on his clothes for protection and started compiling prophesies. Having suffered the loss of his wife and children, and his job - together with his self respect - it is perhaps no wonder that the poor man became a little unhinged.

These so-called prophecies rely heavily on interpreting metaphors and numerical clues contained in the cryptic verses and then ascribing these to major events. In truth Nostradamus' style is so ambiguous that, like modern horoscopes, they can be shaped to fit practically any circumstance. As a result of this every significant international event from the death of Princess Diana to the Twin Towers tragedy has been quickly followed by tenuous claims of another hit for Nostradamus.

Let's have a look at a couple of popular examples to illustrate these points. You can check out their authenticity if you think I am making this up or exaggerating. http://www.Nostradamus.org

"The death of Princess Diana" Translation by Sollog Immanuel Adonai Adoni

Quatrain 2,28

God the Last but First the nickname of Nostradamus of the 90's

Takes the Goddess of the Moon for his Day & Movement

A frantic wanderer and witness of Gods Law

In awakening the worlds great regions to Gods will .

You may wonder how this can be taken as a prediction of Princess Diana's death. It does not mention her, or the time or place or manner of her death. It looks like nonsense, just meaningless drivel. So how is it claimed to predict these things? Here is the explanation, by Sollog:-

"Michel Nostradame was known to use medieval French, Latin, Greek and Hebrew in his poetic verses of Prophecy. The key to seeing if this verse belongs to Diana is the word Diane. Diane is Diana the Roman or Latin Goddess of the moon. It is interesting to note how Nostradamus (MN) used a nickname for Prophet in this verse. A Seer is a nickname of a Prophet. Rees is the lone survivor in the car crash that killed Diana. Rees is Seer in reverse, a classic MN usage of mirror image words. The biggest story on the net concerning Diana's death, is the claim of the Seer known as a Prophet with the nickname of Nostradamus of the 90's, in predicting Diana's death to jump start his movement.

Many of MN's quatrains had little date codes in them. As the 6:97 verse of an explosion of a plane over New York City related to TWA. It happened on 7/96 the reverse number he used. In verse 9/24 concerning Mother Teresas death, he used the phrase take away the 2. If you do, you have 9/4. Mother Teresa died on 9/5. One day off. In this verse he gives the month of Diana's death, it is the last number of the verse. If you add the 2 to 28, you have 30. Diana died on 8/31. We can create 8/30 by adding the numbers. Again, it is ONE day off. Coincidence? The Prophet known as Nostradamus of the 90's, is well known for being ONE DAY off in some of his most infamous prophecies!"

NOW you see how those four lines of nonsense become a clear and precise prediction of Princess Diana's death! It's all in the mind of the interpreter of the quatrain. Here is one that predicts the death of Mother Teresa.

"The death of Mother Teresa"

Near the death of the Pillar of a palace,

An Indian people, take away the 2, a petite royal,

Way of a saint, a deliverer of the mud, a French Saints order,

a dwarf nun, deformed, a traveler, worm of the fruit.

And here is the explanation, again by Sollog:-

"Mother Teresa was named for the French saint Theresa, an interesting way to refer to a French Saint was his using Denis the patron saint of France, who was well known in MN's time. Saint Theresa wasn't a saint in MN's time, so a reference to her would have probably seemed odd or unclear. Although a saint, she isn't a major figure in history. Major figures he saw more clearly. I believe MN probably knew of the future saint Teresa, since he did refer to a saint at her area in another quatrain. Perhaps, he just chose to not use her name, or didn't see her name. He referred to her geographically though, in a quatrain about a nun from her area."

Well, that's cleared up that one then!

Another site this time http://www.alumni.caltech.edu/~jamesf/nostradamus.html

Century 1, 81 - "Space Shuttle Disaster" (Challenger, destroyed on take-off on January 28th 1986)

"From the human flock nine will be sent away,

Separated from control and advice

Their fate will be sealed on departure

K-Th-L make a error; the dead banished"

And the explanation why this relates to the space shuttle is given as:-

"..nine will be sent away -.> Actually, there were 7 crew members.

Separated from control and advice -> The ground controllers could do nothing.

Their fate will be sealed on departure -> Videos show that flame was escaping while the rocket was still on the pad. Their fate was sealed from the instant of departure.

K-Th-L -> ThioKoL - manufacturer of the defective rocket engine. Vowels are omitted and two consonants transposed."

So, to sum up, we have a prediction concerning NINE people, and the shuttle had SEVEN, and the last line - as originally written reads "Kappa, Thita, Lambda mors bannis esgarez." And this becomes K-Th-L, which becomes "Thiokol" which becomes "Morton Thiokol Corporation", which is just one of the many companies involved in the manufacture and construction of the Solid Rocket Boosters. Amazing! (The manufacturers actually made no error, they advised against launch because it was too cold, it was NASA that made the decision to launch.)

Okay. You must have got the message by know. If not then I'm afraid you never will. Take four lines of rambling nonsense written by a man who was in a sorry state of mind and read into it anything you want to make it fit a current news story. The connections can be as vague and tenuous as you like, as long as it sort of very loosely fits, even just a single hint at a first name will do. The name does not need be specifically mentioned. The actual translation of the original - written in French with a bit of Italian, Greek, and Latin thrown in for good measure - can be used to your advantage. Nostradamus intentionally obscured the quatrains through the use of symbolism and metaphor, as well as by making changes to proper names by swapping, adding or removing letters, so you will find plenty of room for manoeuvre as you 'translate'. You can use 'secret number codes' to bolster your claim, such as using the quatrain verse number as a date for the event, but as that usually doesn't work anyway, try reversing it and it may be only a day out. If it is still not close enough then juggle about with it until it is. If you still can't get a useful date out of it then drop the date part. The parts of the quatrain that do not seem to be at all relevant, just studiously ignore and hope no one notices. There you have it, a prediction. Easy isn't it.

If you still think Nostradamus made definite predictions, then look them up, study the actual quatrain used, and see if you can see the prediction. If you can only see it after having it explained to you, then that should tell you something. Okay, I do realise that some predictions must look better than the examples I have given here, but with 1,000 goes at getting a prediction right, by the law of averages alone you would expect some hits.

Nostradamus wrote his famous verses 500 years ago, and that is where this primitive middle ages superstition belongs. But sadly there is today an interest in such nonsense and we have seen revivals in everything daft from astrology, snippets borrowed from Eastern culture, a voodoo market place for everything from Hopi Indian dream catchers and healing crystals to lessons in Feng Shui, the ancient oriental art of separating fools from their money. We even have witches, warlocks, remote healing and people that can give you messages from the dead. What the hell is going on? What do these people use for brains?

Please feel free to register your vote and post a comment if you wish. But just take on board that if you vote "Yes" then what you are really saying is that the future has already been determined. This would mean we have no free will, no choice of actions, because what will be will be. In that case we may as well all stay in bed!

I must admit to being keen to see how the voting goes. My vote has been cast, as ordained.

Nostradamus (and other seers)

Can the future be predicted? Yes No Don't Know

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