Who can resist the allure of a specific and spectacular prediction? In 1997, I took delight reviewing Michael Drosnin's inane Bible Code, where he unerringly foretold, for example, that Binyamin Netanyahu would not live out his term as prime minister. Now I have the pleasure to convey the speculations of one Ziad Silwadi of Silwad on the West Bank, as reported by Khaled Abu Toameh in the Jerusalem Post.
By reading the Koran carefully, Silwadi found that the United States will succumb in 2007 to a tsunami far larger than that which struck the Indian Ocean in December 2004. "The tsunami waves are a minor rehearsal in comparison with what awaits the US." He reached this conclusion by interpreting references in the Koran to heinous sinners as applying to the United States, due to America's many sins against mankind, especially the Americans Indians and blacks, its use of nuclear weapons, and so on. "All these actions have been documented by Allah in a big archive called the Koran," he helpfully points out.
As an example of his work, Silwadi notes that the Spider Sura, verse 40, has God sending down "a violent storm" that caused people "to be swallowed up by the earth." Indeed, the Koran mentions at least 12 times that Pharaoh was punished by drowning for his evil deeds, which Silwadi sees applying no less to the United States, which shares his sins of arrogance and excessive pride,.
As for the date of 2007, Silwadi applied his numerological skills to numbers and letters (Arabic letters have associated numerical meanings) in the suras (chapters) supposedly referring to American sins, he produced the number 1776 (year of the country's independence) and 231 (how many years it will exist). Adding the two numbers together, presto, produces 2007.
Despite Silwadi's decisively negative view of the United States, he is not entirely happy about his forecast. "The world will certainly lose a lot if and when this disaster occurs because of the great services that American society has rendered to the economy, industry and science."
Abu Toameh reports that Silwadi's lengthy oeuvre "is being circulated in many Muslim countries."
Comment: One of the most curious dimensions of modern Islamic eschatology is its having adopted the Christian solar year for measuring time rather than sticking with the Islamic lunar year (which is about 10 days shorter). David Cook wondered about this in his pathbreaking article, "Muslim Fears of the Year 2000":
The year 2000 is a Christian date that should have no apocalyptic significance for Muslims, and especially not Islamists; it corresponds to the years 1422-23 in the Muslim calendar. Nonetheless, many Muslims believe it is a significant date for Jews (for whom in actuality it is meaningless), and have therefore ascribed to it a demonic significance as the date when Jews intend to rebuild the Temple—which they assume means pulling down the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque.
In keeping with this nonsense, Silwadi executes his numerological wizardry by counting Koranic verses with solar years. (March 29, 2005)
April 8, 2005 update: For an in-depth analysis of this topic, see Yoel Natan's "Analysis of the Koran-based Numerology that Says the U.S. Will Cease to Exist in 2007."
Jan. 1, 2008 update: Well, 2007 has passed into history and the United States is yet going strong. Silwadi will need to figure out how to account for this.