Neal Chase

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Neal Chase
Neal Chase

Neal Chase (b. January 30, 1966) is the current disputed leader of a Bahá'í division known as the Bahá'ís Under the Provisions of the Covenant (BUPC). Chase claims to be the current Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith, seated on the Throne of David. The claims and beliefs of Chase and the BUPC are not accepted by members of the Bahá'í Faith, and the followers of both groups have mutually excommunicated each other.

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[edit] Background

Neal Chase was born a Jew in Bridgeport, Connecticut. After becoming a born-again Christian in his teens, Chase became a Bahá'í at the age of 19 while attending Michigan State University. After several years, he moved to Deer Lodge, Montana to investigate the prophecies of the Morrisites, a Christian group awaiting the return of Jesus. His research there was compiled into his book Ezekiel's Temple in Montana (1990).

He hosted a weekly call-in talk show on Missoula Cable Access Television every Friday night from 1992-2001 called Bahá'í Phone-in Live![1]. The format allowed callers to discuss issues ranging from religion, world events, politics, and special interests. He received attention for a number of predictions he was making about attacks on New York City and nuclear holocaust, and was invited to be a guest on the Art Bell radio show Coast to Coast AM on March 25, 1993, soon after the first World Trade Center Bombing. Chase was also satirized on Michael Moore’s TV Nation. His prediction of an attack on February 26, 1993 was discussed in Expecting Armageddon[2], and mentioned in the February 1995 issue of Harper's Magazine. Chase was also satirized on Michael Moore’s TV Nation. In an editorial in The Missoulian, editor Mark Matthews in his "A Time to Weep", written only days after the 9/11 attacks wrote:

"How could this have happened [the 9-11 attacks]? Some will say it's the beginning of the biblical End Times. For a number of years, members of… Bahá'ís Under the Provisions of the Covenant have predicted that the World Trade Center Towers would be bombed by terrorists." [3].

A year after the 9/11 attacks The Missoulian newspaper published a statement from Victor Woods, a BUPC member, that Chase had accurately predicted the date of the attacks.[4]

[edit] Guardianship claim

Leland Jensen and Neal Chase
Leland Jensen and Neal Chase

In 1960 Mason Remey claimed that he was the next Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith, resulting in his expulsion from the Bahá'í community. Among those that followed Remey was Leland Jensen, who founded the BUPC after the former's death. Jensen announced that he held a station higher than that of the Guardian, and taught that Remey's adopted son Joseph Pepe was the next Guardian after Remey, a point that Pepe publicly denied. The Second International Bahá'í Council (sIBC) that Jensen set up in 1991, with Chase as a member, functioned without the involvement of Pepe, who died in 1994.

After Jensen's own death in 1996, the council remained the head of the BUPC, but without a clear candidate for Guardian, and without Jensen, no new members could be appointed to the council.

In 2001, seven years after Pepe's death, Chase announced that he had been adopted by Pepe and appointed to the position of Guardian, quoting letters that he had received while Pepe was still alive.[5] Chase claims a relationship developed over the course of many years through written correspondence with Pepe Remey, which eventually led Pepe Remey to adopt and appoint Chase as his successor. Chase points to what he calls "written 'Aghsan' statements" [6] as evidence that Pepe adopted him in the same manner that he believes `Abdu'l-Bahá adopted Mason Remey, although these adoptions are not accepted by any of the other Bahá'í divisions. In one such letter Chase claims that Pepe asked: "shall I adopt you?"[5]

Chase's announcement to be the Guardian caused a division among the council members, with the majority (3 vs. 2) opposing Chase. His exercising the removal of funds and material of the council resulted in an unresolved court case in 2002. Chase declared the other dissenting council members to be Covenant-breakers, including his ex-wife, Dawn Mullally.[7]

[edit] Predictions

Throughout the 1990’s Chase made a total of 18 predictions which pertained to small-scale disasters that he claimed would lead step-by-step towards apocalypse, as well as dates for a nuclear attack on New York City by middle Eastern terrorists.[8] He claims that these predictions are derived from prophecies in the Bible, and denies his predictions come from seeing visions or having dreams.[9].

These 18 "predictions" were Chase's interpretations from the Bible's Book of Daniel chapter 7, Ezekiel chapter 5, and the Book of Revelation. The tribulations described in these Bible prophecies were interpreted by Chase to describe similar future apocalyptic events. Sociologist Robert Balch was observing Chase and the BUPC when he made his first prediction that the bombing of New York City would be on Nov. 29, 1992. Nothing happened in New York until the World Trade Center was attacked exactly three months later on 2/26/93. Chase released a press release where he subsequently cited that the verses he used to arrive at the date in Daniel 7 also says in verse 12, "their lives were prolonged for a season and a time". Claiming that a season is three months, he announced that "the predicted day of Nov. 29 plus the prophesied season of three months brought us to to Feb. 26, 1993, the day the World Trade Center was bombed" (August 4,1993)[10].

Balch's study notes that the second and third dates Chase gave didn't pass without incident, although the result was not the predicted nuclear attack. In his press release from 11/93 Chase wrote, "March 23rd, 1994 the veils will be rent asunder with the fiery holocaust of New York's millions of inhabitants. Forty days later the Battle of Armageddon will begin..."(press release 11/1/93). On March 23, 1994 a gasline exploded in Edison, NJ across the Hudson River from New York. Chase used the eyewitness accounts comparing the explosion to a nucleur blast to buttress the claim that the prediction came true. Then 40 days later there was an explosion in the Lincoln Tunnel on May 2, 1994, which he claims completed the days of the Siege of the City. Neither of these incidents were attributed to terrorist activity, although there were some reports about whether there was "foulplay" involve in both incidents[11].

Chase has released many statements over the years. In 1997, one titled World Civil War! predicted that a world war would break out over "oil and religion". It was based in part on his interpretations of the Book of Revelation and also Nostradamus where he drew a distinct parallel between the Nostradamus anti-Christ named "Mabus" and Saddam Hussein, as well as from information he gathered from an ABC Special Report by Peter Jennings titled “UNFINISHED BUSINESS: THE CIA AND SADDAM HUSSEIN”[2].

Chase predicted that the Clinton Administration would use tactical nukes to kill Hussein. This was to be followed, according to Chase, by the "Congress of Iraq of which Saddam is the president" retaliating by nuking the United Nations building in New York City. He predicted that this exchange would be the trigger to start World War III, a nuclear apocalypse in which one third of mankind will "be dead in ONE hour", and every US city with over 100,000 people will be destroyed by Russian missiles. He also emphasized the importance of Iraqi oil contracts with Russia and China, and the lack of US protection against a nuclear attack. No specific date for this scenario was given by Chase.

Saddam Hussein was executed on December 30, 2006, by the Iraqi government after being convicted of crimes against humanity.

[edit] Domain name dispute over UHJ.net

On February 24, 2005 the National Spiritual Assembly (NSA) of the Bahá'ís of the United States filed a complaint with the World Intellectual Property Organization Arbitration and Mediation Center against Neal Chase for his use of the domain name UHJ.net, which claims to be "The Official website of the Universal House of Justice" - a name for which the NSA has a United States federal trademark registration, issued in 1965.

The case resulted in Chase keeping the domain name on the basis that “uhj” as an acronym is not commonly used in the Bahá'í Faith to refer to the Universal House of Justice. The panel also concluded that the NSA was not attempting a reverse domain name hijacking. All other issues were deemed not necessary to address. (see WIPO document)

[edit] Works

Published:

  • Chase, Neal (1987). Lazarus the Sick World. Self-published. 
  • Chase, Neal (1990). Ezekiel's Temple in Montana. Self-published. 
  • Chase, Neal (2003). King of Terror. Self-published. 

Contributed to:

  • "Harper's Magazine" (February, 1995). 
  • Lapham, Lewis H. (1997). The Anthology, The End of the World. 
  • Chase, Neal. "Killing People to Get Elected", Phoenix Liberator, 1992. 

Referenced in:

  • Robbins, Tom (1997). Millennium, Messiahs, and Mayhem: Contemporary Apocalyptic Movements. 
  • Stone, Jon R. (ed) (2000). Expecting Armageddon: Essential Readings in Failed Prophecy. London & New York: Routledge. 
  • Bahá'í Faith Center. Harvard University, Committee on the Study of Religion. Retrieved on 2006-12-11.

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "Bahá'í Phone-in Live!" The Missoulian November 24, 2001
  2. ^ Stone, Jon R. (ed) (2000). Expecting Armageddon p.272.
  3. ^ The Missoulian, Editorial, September 20, 2001
  4. ^ Missoulian article September 16, 2002
  5. ^ a b From BUPC.org's Test of God [1]
  6. ^ Respondent brief (p.12)
  7. ^ Appellant brief (p. 8)
  8. ^ Balch states: "All eighteen predications in the 1990's were made by Chase…. Chase’s predictions pertained to small-scale disasters that he claimed would lead step-by step toward the apocalypse. Some of his predictions focused on upheavals caused by meteors, asteroids and comets, but most pertained to the destruction of New York City by a nuclear bomb that would be placed by Middle Eastern terrorists." (Balch et al, cf. Stone, p. 272)
  9. ^ From section titled “WE ARE NOT FALSE PROPHETS!” in World Civil War
  10. ^ Balch et al, cf. Stone, p. 274
  11. ^ Balch et al, cf. Stone, p. 274

[edit] References

[edit] External links