Word: prophetizer
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Sports and weather are only the two most glaring beats whose coverage is profoundly colored by the prophet motive. Fashion news is primarily about things that have not yet happened, and the writer who dwelt on the reportable facts of the present would be viewed as quaint. The book reviewer, though stuck with palpable volumes of the moment, is happiest when proclaiming how posterity will treat a work. The food critic verily feeds on the unreliable assumption that a future meal, whether in a restaurant or out of a recipe, will be as palatable as the past one. Political writers...
Like a biblical prophet, Christopher Lasch appears at the gates of our culture with dire pronouncements: "Storm warnings, portents, hints of catastrophe haunt our times ... Defeat in Viet Nam, economic stagnation, and the impending exhaustion of natural resources have produced a mood of pessimism in higher circles, which spreads through the rest of society as people lose faith in their leaders ... As social life becomes more and more warlike and barbaric, personal relations, which ostensibly provide relief from these conditions, take on the character of combat ... a desperate concern for personal survival, sometimes disguised as hedonism, engulfs the middle class...
...identified with Dean, therefore, did so very strongly, a minority cult whose time had not yet come. The fact that Dean died in a motorcycle crash at the age of 24, only served to intensify the cult of Dean. He began to be looked at as some sort of prophet rather than simply an actor; someone who had he lived would have not only portrayed, but solved many of the problems. People tried to get in touch with Dean's spirit; there were rumors that Dean was not really dead, but would one day return; red James Dean jackets became...
...keys of St. Peter for little more than a month, he took the name John Paul II. In California a retired industrialist, Howard Jarvis, saw the state's voters approve his tax-slashing Proposition 13?a symbol of widespread middle-class anger at Big Government. A crazed cult prophet, Jim Jones, imposed a poisonous "white night" of murder and suicide on his followers that left 913 dead in the jungles of Guyana...
...demonstration came near the climax of the holy month of Muharram, on which Iran's devout Shi'ite Muslims traditionally take to the streets in a frenzy of self-flagellation to mourn the Prophet Muhammad's grandson Husain, who was martyred in the 7th century. This year the critical days, Sunday and Monday, had a special meaning: they were to be the occasion for mass protests against the Shah. From his headquarters outside Paris, Khomeini called again for a general strike and the Shah's downfall. "Paralyze the regime," he urged the faithful. "Flee your barracks...