Guest Articles >> My Views on Nostradamus
Author: Natarajan K
For a long time, I wanted to share my views on Nostradamus. Due to heavy work, I could not find time to put my hands on the keyboard. Now, I am able to breathe a bit. So, I thought why not take up the work.
I was reading a lot of books before marriage. One such book which I read was "Prophecies of Nostradamus" written / interpreted by Erika Cheetham. I admit that even before reading it, I was skeptical and I read it only to find out how they really fool people. For those of you who know me very well, it is no news that I don’t believe in all these things.
A lot of humans like to trust in emotion and superstition rather than logic and common sense. It will always be thrilling to know the future and people across the globe approach various people to know the future. In our part of the globe, it is 'Kili josiam', 'Naadi josiam', 'sozhi josiam' ('Josiam' is the Tamil equivalent of Astrology. Kili Josiam, Naadi Josiam etc. are various ways of astrology that are practiced in India.) that thrives on such ignorance. The people in the West (in the so called developed nations) are also equally naïve and ignorant. The West is very good in packaging anything and creating hype. Our own 'naadi josiam' is packaged and given through the name of "Nostradamus".
Nostradamus is a one-man industry in the West. Publishing houses will never go broke printing non-sense claiming to be the latest predictions culled from the manuscripts of Nostradamus. As long as there are people to believe, the business will go on. A lot of people seem to enjoy believing that there are supernatural forces always at work in the Universe which science cannot explain. Whether that is true is a great philosophical question, however the point is that when Nostradamus' writings are put to the test (scientifically analysed), it shows that he really isn't as much as he has been built up to be.
Before getting into details, let us see the background of this guy called Nostradamus. Let me assume that a guy like that existed and he really did write whatever has been credited (!) to him.
Michel de Nostredame, better known as Nostradamus, is believed to be a famous astrologer who lived in the 16th century, to be precise between 1503 and 1566. He made many prophecies, both for his current era and the distant future. Most famous are his Centuries, a series of 942 verses, grouped in sets of 100, describing future events. A single verse is commonly called a quatrain and 100 quatrains a Centurie.
His writings were in French and lot of people have taken pains to translate these verses and interpret these verses in such a way to emphasise that he had amazing powers that allowed him to see into the future.
Now, let us come to the verses, which he has written. These verses are ABSTRACT to the core. You can interpret these verses in whichever way you want according to one’s own whims and fancies.
For example, he writes something like this:
The goat will kill the lion when the brothers unite. (Of course, I coined this to make it simple. I don’t attribute this to Nostradamus)
In this verse, what does lion stand for? Who does goat refer to? Who are the brothers referred here? 'n' people could interpret this in n+1 ways. People like Erika Cheetham, John van auken, John Hogue interprets such verses in the ways in which it suits them so that their book gets the status "No.1 Best Seller".
Just after Diana’s death a mail was circulating saying that Nostradamus indeed predicted Diana’s death. The mail was quoting Century 2, Quatrain 28
Original French version:
'La penultieme du surnom de prophete
Prendra Diane pour son jour et repos
Loing vaguera par frenetique teste
En deliverant un grand peuple d'impos.'
The interpretation given:
The last son of the man with the Prophet's name
Will bring Diana to her day of rest
At a distance they wander in frenetic grief
Delivering a great people from ruin.
The explanation given:
The father of Dodi al-Fayed, the owner of Harrod's department store, is named Mohammed, the name of the Islamic Prophet. The last son of Mohammad has brought Diana to her day of rest.
After reading this, I was curious to find out what was the explanation given to the same verse in Erika Cheetham’s book that I read before Diana’s death. I went to Landmark and took a copy of the book and referred it there. The explanation, which was given earlier to the same verse, was obviously different.
It was something like this:
The last but one to bear the Prophet's name uses
Monday as a day of rest from his incessant travels
to free a great people from tribute.
I also found out that the word "Diane" was referred to as some Roman goddess of moon and hence interpreted to mean "Monday". Later when it suits them, they change the same word "Diane" to refer to "Diana".