The Late, Great Planet Earth

The Late, Great Planet Earth

Hal Lindsey, author of numerous fiction and non-fiction books, wrote The Late Great Planet Earth as a contribution to the non-fiction pre-millennialist dispensationalist body of literature. He published it in 1970 after writing it in the throes of the Cold War. He took the context of the Cold War and applied it to Biblical scripture, stating that the events of history, the Cold War specifically, fulfilled Biblical prophecy.

For example, he pointed to the restoration of Israel as a state in 1948 as the symbolic restoration of Israel prophesied in the Bible, and that after the restoration, people were literally living the times Ezekiel predicted in chapters 38 and 39. The central theme to Lindsey's work was that Russia is Gog, the invader of the north about which Ezekiel prophesies, one of the true proofs that Ezekiel was a true prophet and we can expect his other prophecies to come true.

Lindsey writes that there will be tribulation, including plagues, wars, and famines; and then, on a day unknown to man, Jesus Christ will appear at a period in dispensational history called the Rapture, and will take away all those who believe in him, leaving the rest of humanity to suffer through 7 more years of tribulation.

His work was a popular interpretation of the Bible and sold over 15 million copies in the 1970s. Some consider it to be a "scare tactic" by an evangelical.