- Harold Camping
Infobox Celebrity
image_size = 150px
name = Harold Camping| caption =
birth_date = birth date and age|1921|07|19
birth_place =Boulder , CO, U.S.
death_date =
death_place =
occupation =Civil Engineer ,Christian author , andtelevision andtalk radio personality.
salary =
website = [http://www.familyradio.com/ Family Stations, Inc]
footnotes =Harold Egbert Camping is an American radio and television broadcast host teaching an interpretation of Biblical and Christian doctrines.cite news|title=Christian radio host tells listeners to abandon church|date=2003-01-23|publisher=Associated Press|language=English|accessdate=2008-06-18] He is also the president of
Family Stations, Inc. , aCalifornia -based ministry with worldwide broadcast facilities, including more than 150 outlets in theUnited States , as well aWeb site. He is known especially for his teachings of the Bible as the sole and authoritative word of God; of the imminent end of the world, to occur in the year 2011; of the "end of the church age", which asserts that churches are no longer the vehicle of God for salvation;cite news|title=Depart Out! A call for Christians to leave their churches--the End Times may be here|last=Shiflett|first=Dave|date=2002-02-01|publisher=Wall Street Journal|language=English|accessdate=2008-06-18] and ofpredestination , according to which God determined before the beginning of the world the election of individuals to be saved. A number of his doctrines are considered controversial or heretical by various Christian denominations, especially since his doctrine of the "end of the church age" includes the ideas that Christian churches are currently ruled bySatan and that believers should leave the churches and pursue a Christian life through study of the Bible and conducting their lives in accordance with it. Camping does not consider his own movement a church and does not claim ordained or hierarchical authority within a church or institution.Harold Camping came from a
Dutch Reformed Church background and owned a construction company before founding Family Stations, Inc. (also informally known as "Family Radio") in 1958. Family Stations, Inc. began obtaining FM licenses on commercial frequencies before many Americans owned FM radios and now has affiliates in the New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore/Washington, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco radio markets which are on prime commercial frequencies.citation|title=Harold Camping's biography. and "Who or What is Family Radio?"|url=http://www.familyradio.com/english/connect/bio/haroldcamping_bio.html|publisher=Family Stations, Inc.] citation|title=Family Stations, Inc. fact sheet|url=http://www.hoovers.com/Family-Stations,-Inc./--HD__ffckkrfsy,src__dbi--/free-co-dnb_factsheet.xhtml|publisher=Hoovers, a D&B Co.] .Biography
Harold Egbert Camping was born in Colorado and moved at an early age to California. He earned a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering from the
University of California, Berkeley (1942). He and his family were members of theChristian Reformed Church until the year 1988. During this time he served as an Elder and Sunday school teacher at the Alameda Bible Fellowship. Mr. Camping earned his living from his own construction business, Camping Construction, which he began shortly after the end of World War II. In 1958, he together with two others formed the non-profit ministry of Family Stations, Inc. (Family Radio - a Christian educational network) in which he has served as President. Eventually he sold his business and became a full-time volunteer executive of Family Radio, serving without pay as President and General Manager.Family Radio
Camping's trademarks include his deep, sonorous voice coupled with a slow cadence. He runs many religious programs on his radio station. These programs can be heard by radio, satellite, television, or Internet broadcast.
In 1961, Family Radio began the Open Forum program, a live weeknight call-in program that he hosts. Listeners call in primarily with questions about the meaning of certain passages from the Bible, and Camping answers them by means of interpretations, often with reference to other Biblical passages. Occasionally the questions pertain to general Christian doctrine, such as the nature of sin and salvation, and to matters of everyday life conduct, such as marriage, sexual morality, and education. This program has continued to the present time and is broadcast on the more than 150 stations owned by Family Radio in the U.S. The Open Forum is also translated into many foreign languages and together with other Family Radio programing is broadcast worldwide via shortwave station
WYFR , a network of AM andFM radio stations, a cable television station, and the Internet.Teachings & Beliefs
Central to Camping's teaching is the belief that the Bible is the Word of God and completely true. However, he emphasizes, this does not mean that each sentence in the Bible is to be understood only literally, as stated. Rather, the meaning of individual Biblical passages also needs to be interpreted in the light of two factors. The first is the context of the Bible as a whole. The second is its spiritual meaning: in Camping's words, "the Bible is an earthly story with a Heavenly meaning." In Camping's latest publication,"We are Almost There!"citation|title=We Are Almost There!|url=http://www.familyradio.com/graphical/literature/waat/contents.html|author=Harold Camping|publisher=Family Stations, Inc|Publication date=February, 2008|accessdate=2008-04-10] , he states that certain Biblical passages point unquestionably to May 21, 2011 as the date of "
Rapture ", and October 21, 2011 as the end of the world.Since leaving the Reformed Church in 1988, Camping has taught doctrines that may conflict with doctrines of the Reformed Church and other church denominations. The principles of
Biblical hermeneutics upon which Camping frames his present teachings are:# The Bible alone is the Word of God.
# Every Biblical passage must be interpreted in the light of the Bible as a whole.
# The Bible normally conveys multiple levels of meaning or significance. [cite web|title=First Principles of Bible Study|url=http://www.familyradio.com/graphical/literature/study/study_contents.html
author=Harold Camping|publisher=Family Stations, Inc|accessdate=2008-06-23] Examples of how Camping's teachings vary from past conventional doctrines are:* Departing from
Calvinist doctrine, Camping teaches relative free will of humanity, and that humans are not totally depraved. However, he subscribes to the idea that salvation is unmerited, cannot be achieved by good works or prayer, and is a pure act of God's grace.* Departing from the doctrine of eternal punishment for the unsaved in a place called
Hell , Camping teaches that life will end and existence will cease for the unsaved soul.* Departing from doctrines stating no one can know the time of Christ's second coming, he teaches that the exact times of the Rapture and the End of the World are to be revealed sometime towards the end of time: (Daniel 12:9-13)
prophecy .Calendar of History
In 1970, Camping published "The Biblical Calendar of History" in which, by some unconventional calculations, he dated the Creation of the world to the year 11,013 B.C. and the Flood to 4990 B.C. This was in stark contrast to Bishop
James Ussher 's popular chronology, which placed creation at 4004 B.C. and the Flood at 2348 B.C. Camping argued that Ussher's dates "agree neither with the Biblical nor the secular evidence" and thus Ussher's methodology was flawed.cite journal|url=http://www.asa3.org/asa/PSCF/1970/JASA9-70Camping.html|author=Harold Camping|publisher=American Scientific Association: A Fellowship of Christians in Science|volume=22|date=September 1970|accessdate=2008-07-14|title=The Biblical Calendar of History|journal=JASA|pages=98-105]Camping reasoned that "begat" did not necessarily imply an immediate father-son relationship, as was assumed by Ussher. Camping noted the use of the phrase "called his name" (Hebrew "qara"'), found three times in Genesis 4-5, which he characterized as a "clue phrase" to indicate an immediate father-son relationship.
Controversy
Camping's Biblical study regarding time and Christ's
second coming is based on the cycles of:
* Jewish feast days in theHebrew calendar , as described in the Old Testament,
* thelunar month calendar (1 month = 29.53059 days), and
* theGregorian calendar (1 year = 365.2422 days).He projects these into modern times and combines the results with other information in the Bible [cite web|url=http://www.timehasanend.org/contents.html|title=Time Has an End: A Biblical History of the World 11,013 B.C. - 2011 A.D.|accessdate=2008-04-09|author=Harold Camping|Publisher=Family Stations, Inc.] citation|title=excerpt from “God's Magnificent Salvation Plan” |url=http://www.quoteland.com/author.asp?AUTHOR_ID=2328|author=Harold Camping|publisher=Quoteland.com|accessdate=2008-04-11] [ cite web|author=Camping, Harold|title=A Biblical Calendar of History.|publisher=Family Radio|url=http://worldwide.familyradio.org/zusa/graphical/literature/calendar/calendar_contents.html] [cite web|author=Camping, Harold|title=The Ultimate Terror: Judgment Day.|publisher=Family Radio|url=http://worldwide.familyradio.org/zusa/graphical/literature/terror/terror_contents.html]
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