Evolution Impossible (30 page)

Up until the 19th century, the name of this king had not been found in any writings outside the book of Daniel, and some scholars doubted the historical accuracy of the account. Then from the 1860s onward, a large number of cuneiform texts were discovered that confirmed that Belshazzar, who as a co-regent with his father, Nabonidus, was the king of Babylon at the time when the Persian general Gobryas took the city without resistance.
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It is revealing that the ancient Greek historian Xenophon declares “the impious king” of Babylon, whose name is not mentioned in the account, was slain by his throne in the banquet hall when Gobryas entered the palace. Xenophon also relates that the night the Persians took the city a certain festival had come round in Babylon, during which all Babylon was accustomed to drink and revel all night long.
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These independent records support the accuracy of the account of events recorded in the Book of Daniel.

There is also evidence that the book was definitely in existence before 332
B.C.
when Alexander the Great invaded Judah. The first-century Roman historian Josephus writes that when Alexander’s armies were approaching Jerusalem, Jaddua, the high priest at the time, prayed to the God of heaven for protection for the city. He subsequently had a dream that the priests should put on their priestly garments and open the gates and march out, followed by the people, to meet Alexander. They did this and Alexander dismounted and bowed before them. When Alexander was later asked why he did this, he replied that in his youth he had a dream in which a man dressed in the identical priestly garments had invited Alexander to come to Asia and that he would be assured of conquest. Josephus writes that when Alexander entered the city, the priests showed him the Book of Daniel containing the description of a Greek who would come and destroy the Persians.
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As a result, the Jews were treated very favorably by Alexander.
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Another well-documented historical account of supernatural intervention would be the events surrounding Joan of Arc, a 17-year-old girl who led the French army to victory against the English forces in 1429
B.C
.

Joan of Arc was born in the French village of Dromremy in 1412. According to history, she was a hard-working, simple, and exceptionally pious child. From the age of 13 years she began to hear a “voice,” which was accompanied by a great light. As time went on, she believed that the voice was that of an angel. On later occasions she was able to see this angel and other “angels” who also spoke to her. These “voices” were to guide Joan throughout her life.

At that time, the crown of France was in dispute between the dauphin Charles, the son of the late king of France Charles VI, and the English king Henry VI, whose armies were occupying nearly all the northern part of the kingdom.

The apparent hopelessness of the dauphin’s cause by 1427 was exacerbated by the fact that, five years after his father’s death, he had still not been consecrated at Rheims, the traditional place for the crowning of French kings, as Rheims was well within the territory held by the English. In 1428, the English had laid siege to the loyalist city of Orleans, surrounding it with forts. The “voices” told Joan that she would raise the siege of Orleans and lead Charles VII to his coronation at Rheims.

Following the directions of her “voices,” Joan had unparalleled success in leading the French army to a momentous victory at Orleans. Still only 17 years old, she marched the victorious soldiers to Rheims, where Charles was crowned in great splendor. These achievements were a decisive factor in the revival of France during the crisis of the Hundred Years’ War.

Joan continued to lead the French armies but was captured on May 23, 1430, by the Burgundians, who had allied themselves with the English. At the request of the University of Paris, Joan was handed over for judgment by Pierre Cauchon, the bishop of Beauvais, in whose diocese she had been captured. Joan was tried not for her offenses against the English king but because of her faith and morals. It was charged that Joan had claimed divine revelation, had prophesied the future, and had immodestly worn men’s clothing.

The records of Joan’s evidence under oath at her trial in 1431 are still preserved. It is clear from these documents that her “voices” were accompanied first by light and sometimes by figures that spoke clearly and could be seen clearly, just like ordinary people. The “voices” came mainly when she was awake and sometimes when she was aroused from sleep. One of the predictions that she received from her voices was that there was a rusty sword with five crosses on it behind the altar in the Church of St. Catherine of Fierbois. She sent for it and it was found and given to her. None of the clerics or the townspeople knew of its existence, and the coffer in which the sword was found had not been opened for 20 years, that is, before Joan of Arc was born. The voices also warned her that she would be captured before midsummer’s day. She was unhorsed during a battle and taken prisoner on May 23, 1430. It is revealing that during her trial there was no serious attempt by her judges to invalidate her clairvoyance.
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The events of her trial are complex, but Joan maintained her testimony concerning her voices to the end even though it would mean death. The final outcome was that she was burnt alive at the stake. Yvonne M. Lanhers, Keeper, National Records Office, Paris, asserts that Joan exhibited the basic characteristic and stamp of a genuine prophet, following the tasks laid upon her by divine command.
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The records of the trial of Joan of Arc, who fought for the freedom of her people, provide strong evidence that she really did experience communication from a supernatural intelligence.

A medical doctor in my locality, Dr. Merlene Spear, told me this interesting story some years ago. One morning in 1984 she was traveling to work at Wingham Medical Centre in north New South Wales when she had an experience she has never forgotten. As Dr. Spear approached a winding section of the road, she heard a voice behind her ear say in clear musical tones, “Slow down.” Totally surprised and amazed, she exclaimed out loud, “Pardon?” The beautiful voice repeated the audible command, “Slow down.” Totally overwhelmed by the experience, she braked toward a stop just before a bend. Within seconds, a yellow Ford Mustang appeared, traveling at a very high speed around the corner on her side of the road. Dr. Spear believes that if she had not obeyed the voice, she would have been very seriously injured, if not killed.

In the 1970s Dr. John Taylor, professor of mathematics at King’s College in London, made a study of the evidence for supernatural events, including dreams warning of impending disasters. For example, after the Aberfan mine disaster in Wales in 1966, in which coal slag from a mine slid down a hill and covered a school, killing 144 children and teachers, 76 reports were collected from people who claimed to have had premonitions of the accident. Twenty-four of these premonitions had been witnessed by a second person before the tragedy.
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University of Virginia research psychiatrist Ian Stevenson has made several studies of reported premonitions of a number of natural disasters.
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It seems that at times when a disaster is impending that involves a large number of victims, several people have received premonitions. One outstanding example involved the sinking of the
Titanic
on April 15, 1912. On her maiden voyage across the icy waters of the North Atlantic in the dead of night, the ship struck an iceberg and went down, with the loss of some 1,523 lives. Stevenson collected reports of 19 individuals who had premonitions of the tragedy.
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Dr. Robert Van de Castle, the former director of the Sleep and Dream Laboratory at the University of Virginia Medical School, has researched dreams for more than 30 years. He points out that historians have generally ignored achievements originating from these revelations, yet dreams have had a dramatic influence on almost every important aspect of our culture and history.
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He gives examples where dreams revealed major advances in advanced mathematics number theory,
¹⁵
the structure of benzene,
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archaeological discoveries,
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and the location of oil in Kuwait after years of unsuccessful exploration.
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Dr. Van de Castle also found that warnings of death or danger
were the most prominent theme in dreams revealing the future.
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The very compelling results of his research convicted him that dreams give us a basis for believing in a nonmaterial component to our existence.
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In the 1990s, I devoted some time to research the available evidence of individuals’ experiences of revelations of the future. Work colleagues related three quite outstanding personal experiences to me.

A research technician named Paul told the first account to me. When he was a high school student he had a particularly vivid dream. He saw himself walking alongside his twin brother, Stephen, who was on a stretcher being wheeled down a corridor past the school auditorium. Paul looked up and saw a physical education class in progress. One of the girls in the class recognized Paul, then smiled and waved her hand. Some months later Stephen received serious head injuries during a metalwork class. Paul, who was in the same class, remained with his twin brother until ambulance officers arrived. Then he walked beside the stretcher as his brother was wheeled to the ambulance. As they passed the auditorium, Paul looked up and realized he was seeing the same scene as in his dream. At that moment, the same student Paul had seen in his dream smiled and waved.

Paul commented to me that he has never forgotten the experience because the dream was so specific. The girl, the way she looked up, smiled and waved, and the activity of the other students was exactly as he had seen in his dream months beforehand.

In another account, a young lady described to me how in 1981 her father, while working in New Guinea, had a dream where he saw an angel showing him the book of his life. He noticed that each page represented a year and that there were only a few pages remaining. When he woke up he could not remember exactly how many pages were left in the book. He decided to write to each of his children, telling them how much he loved them, and also took out a life insurance policy. In 1990, while back in Australia, he had the same dream again, but this time he confided to his wife that the book was on the last page. Soon afterward he went to the Solomon Islands to help with an aid program and was killed in a building construction accident.

The third account was a dream experienced by Joe, one of the former staff in the engineering department of the research organization where I work. He told me that when he was 18 years old and living near Mullumbimby in New South Wales he had an unusually vivid dream. It was different from the other dreams he had, and he still remembers it clearly even though the incident had occurred ten years earlier.

He dreamed that he was out in the surf on his surfboard when suddenly someone yelled, “Shark!” Everyone in the surf quickly got out of the water. That part of the dream ended abruptly and he dreamed that he was now standing on the bank of a river. On either side of him stood people that he recognized from the church he attended. Suddenly, part of the bank gave way and a girl to the left of him slipped and fell into the water, disappearing out of sight. Then, almost immediately, he saw the girl being pulled out of the river on the opposite bank by a man with a beard wearing a white robe. The man’s face was not distinguishable, but he could see the girl’s face clearly. She was no longer wearing her original clothes but was wearing a white robe the same as the bearded man. The girl gave a cheery smile and a wave and then walked away with the bearded man. Meanwhile, on this side of the river everyone was crying because the girl had slipped under the water and they could not see her anymore. It was as if they could not see the other side where she was pulled out. There the dream ended.

Joe told me that a couple of days later he went to surf before going to church. Sharks were often seen on the North New South Wales Coast where he was, but this time while he was surfing he saw two shark fins surface a mere 20 to 25 feet away. Without hesitating, he and another older surfer nearby hastily paddled for the shore.

Later that day when he went to church he learned from tearful friends of a terrible tragedy. The very girl he had seen in the dream had been killed in a freak car accident during a storm the night before.

I continued my research and found a large number of similar examples reported in historical and scientific literature. My findings were published in the book
The Seventh Millennium: The Evidence That We Can Know the Future
.
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During my lifetime, I also have heard many personal testimonies of miraculous interventions in people’s lives. In my local church, just a few weeks before writing this chapter, an older man told how when he was about six years old he was playing with his cousins at his grandparents’ place. His grandmother was washing clothes on a scrubbing board when suddenly she jumped up and ran over to where he and the other children were playing with an inflated tractor tube. Grabbing the tube, she ran off down the road.

He later learned that while his grandmother was washing the clothes, she suddenly saw a vision on the surface of water in a basin beside her of her husband drowning. Knowing that the grandfather had gone fishing at a reef about two kilometers (over a mile) away, she ran with the tube to the spot, to find him struggling to swim in heavy seas that had swept him off the reef. She threw the inflated tube into the water, and her husband was able to keep afloat until rescued by some nearby fishermen.