World Ends Today?

Harold Camping, the US evangelist holding a Holy Bible

If an evangelist radio host in the United States, Harold Camping, is to be believed, then organizers of programmes and other social activities who have planned from today and beyond have picked the wrong dates.

This is because today, May 21, 2011, at exactly 6pm, the world will come to an end, according to the 89-year-old with Christian Family Radio in Alameda County in California.

It all started when Evangelist Camping, 89, leader of Family Radio, an independent ministry which spreads its word via a network on 66 radio stations and online broadcasts, began espousing the idea that the end of the world would take place in May 21, 2011.

He said he based his findings on elaborate calculations dating back to the flood that only Noah's Ark rode out. He arrived at the 7,000-year time frame by juxtaposing biblical passages and calculating the exact date, using his own mathematical formula.

According to him, the first passage comes from the Book of Genesis that states: “And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were upon the earth. In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.”

Using a second biblical passage from Peter, Camping theorized that each of the seven days mentioned in Genesis was equivalent to 1,000 years.

The preacher further explained that since the great biblical flood, which prompted Noah to build the Ark, occurred in 4990 B.C., the 7,000-year mark is the year 2011. He did not explain his method for reaching the date of 4990 B.C.

“Amazingly, May 21, 2011, is the 17th day of the second month of the biblical calendar of our day. Remember, the flood waters also began on the 17th day of the second month, in the year 4990 B.C,” Camping explained.

According to Harold Camping, only about 200 million people or 3 percent of the world's current population will be saved and “will be caught up [ruptured] into heaven.”

He seems to have garnered international attention with his claims that May 21 marks the beginning of the end.

Evangelist Camping had previously written a book called '1994?', in which he wrongly predicted the end of the world in that year, and was later forced to apologize for a mathematical error.

The Rapture is supposedly the time when God's chosen people ascend to heaven and the rest are left behind to face apocalyptic scenes of earthquakes and fire.

A period of 'trial' on earth for non-believers is forecast to follow and could last six months, but by October 21, all those who have not been saved will be dead, goes the prophecy.

The concept of Judgment Day is a long-standing one, but the idea of the Rapture is more modern, having first appeared in Christian teaching in the 19th century.

However, this predicted date is entirely the work of Camping and his followers, who have spent decades studying the bible for coded messages.

So certain is he of his revised date, following on from his 1994 embarrassment, that he and his followers have spent millions of dollars on billboards across America that have been warning for weeks: 'Judgment Day is coming May 21st, 2011 - The Bible guarantees it!'

According reports monitored by DAILY GUIDE , Evangelist Camping, a civil engineer who once ran his own construction business, plans to spend the day with his wife in Alameda, in Northern California, and watch doomsday unfold on television.

A number of people have heard about the rumor and it seems to be causing uneasy calm, fear and panic among people across the world, and some Ghanaians who believe in the rumour have not been left out.

By William Yaw Owusu