US Christian drills for oil in Israel

[Turbineguy]

US Christian drills for oil in Israel
By ASSOCIATED PRESS

An American Christian named John Brown believes God promised Israel a wealth of oil, so he's drilling for it north of Tel Aviv.

Brown bases his quest on a Bible verse - Genesis 49:25 - where Jacob tells his son Joseph that God will give him "blessings of the deep that lie beneath."

Brown's Zion Oil and Gas Company has raised seven million dollars - mainly from evangelical Christians - and is now drilling in the area that belonged to the tribes descended from Joseph.

Brown says he "prayed and asked God for oil for Israel," and believes, "the answer was yes."

Israel has struggled with little success to find oil for more than 50 years. And large oil companies have been reluctant to join the search for fear of angering major Arab oil producers.

Here's the website: http://www.zionoil.com/

[CubsFan1982]

1. Moran. nt

[Iowa]

12. Love the photo! (n/t)

[jonnyblitz]

31. stop christian bashing.

:P

[fushuugi]

46. you have to admit....

that when he was conceiving this scheme he didn't exactly think through what he was going to tell potential investors beyond "the bible told me so" and/or "god has entrusted me with fulfilling his 'word'". the ramifications for his lack of foresight in the matter are not limited to big-money interests, but also the physical and political environment. in reference to his investors, when talking about the e.c.'s the rest of us have to remember the inherent gullibility factor, it doesn't take rational or logical thought to convince them of anything.

[whistle]

2. Will that mean a permanent U.S. military base in Israel....

[jpak]

20. Woopee!

Another oil-rich Middle Eastern "I" country to invade!

They's got erl

They's got WMD

They's threaten theys neighbors

They's endanger ME peace

If'n's we don't acts now, the smokin' gun will be a mooshrooom cloud...

etc...

[leesa]

48. Well, the only thing they are missing is the oil...all the rest is already

true.

[smoogatz]

39. Israel IS a permanent US military base.

Sheesh.

[Behind the Aegis]

41. yeah, ok. n/t

[flakey_foont]

3. they say that God always answers prayers

but sometimes the answer is NO

I agree with this guy..........screw all of those geologists, and engineers, and scientist with the advanced degrees, and a bazillion letters after their names! What the hell do they know? If the Good Book sez their is oil someplace, then, by golly, there is oil!!!!

[xxqqqzme]

4. these fundies will throw

what little money they have @ anything that says 'god told me 2 do it'. Pathetic

[gratuitous]

5. Hey John Brown!

Here's another well-known saying you might want to complete: "A _________ and his ___________ are soon parted." Fortunately, your investors haven't quite figured this one out, so you're probably on easy street whether or not you ever find any of that oil that's not there.

[Vanje]

6. Hey Bible -believing Investors!

God promised that if you write a great big giant check to John Brown c/o Zion Oil & Gas,God will reward you with a part share in an oil well.
Its in the Bible!

(John Brown stands to come out pretty well either way, though the Almighty may take a trouncing.)

[Barrett808]

10. It does seem like a pretty transparent scam

"We're sending Bibles to El Salvador." -- Repo Man

[Turbineguy]

13. "blessings of the deep that lie beneath."

OK, that was Genesis. After that Moses did not lead the Israelites to Saudi Arabia.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

7. This is a scam to get endtimers to part with their money

good for him..soak them

[annabanana]

25. It's not like they're gonna need it.......... eom

[Outrider]

29. Good

Means they got less money to give to repubs.

[Johnywolf]

8. lol

Oil? lol. If they hunting for oil in Israel where are they gonna be next? And no, I do not think Israel will allow permanent U.S. military there. Why would Israel need U.S. military?

[Johnywolf]

9. OiI rush!

You know what if there is oil on Mars? jk

[hatrack]

11. John Brown Fundie stands a-drilling in the dust

John Brown Fundie stands a-drilling in the dust
John Brown Fundie stands a-drilling in the dust
And his cash goes marching off!

[wallwriter]

14. Obviously I'm an idiot. I thought that the quote might refer

to some sort of spiritual riches. After all, what was it about a camel through the eye of a needle?

[Stuckinthebush]

17. See, there is your problem

You are assuming that the Bible and the teachings of Jesus are supposed to enrich us spiritually. You are so woefully ignorant of the real goal of Jesus - To make us wealthy in the physical life because we are such devout followers.

Come on! Get with the program! Unless you are one of those liberal religious types that are a danger to Jesus' teachings!

:sarcasm:

[LibertyLover]

28. the camel and the eye of a needle

Years ago one of my professors explained that particular bit of text - the eye of a needle was the name for a small door in the walls surrounding a Biblical period city, roughly similar to the sallie ports in found in medieval castles that were large enough to permit a man to enter or exit. A camel might be able to pass through one, depending on the size, shape, whether the camel was loaded or unloaded, ext., but the chances were pretty good that the camel couldn't - so too are the chances of a rich man getting into heaven.

[EVDebs]

15. Please read End Time Delusions by Steven Wohlberg.

These pre-tribulation secret rapture dominionists are the loonies George Monbiot of the Guardian warned us about !

Big trouble if he finds it in the West Bank...

[Stuckinthebush]

16. "A fool and his money...."

That saying applies here, I do believe.

[Roland99]

18. Hey, if he hits it big and it's a gusher, I'll go to church!

:rofl:

"And by the Almighty who will bless you with blessings of heaven above, Blessings of the deep that lies beneath"

And what does he expect will come from above??

:rofl:




And check out this WorldNutDaily article from Hal Lindsey:

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37842

:rofl:

[krkaufman]

21. Wow, what a nutjob Lindsey is. n/t

[MisterP]

23. God's big, giant, Monty-Python foot?

[Roland99]

26. .

:rofl:

[3waygeek]

35. Actually it's Cupid's foot

[ozymandius]

19. Jacob foresaw the internal combustion engine? n/t

[Jacobin]

22. I love it!! Faith Based Drilling!!!!

The Israelis really have these fundie whack jobs by the short hairs!!

Unfortunately, since we have a fundie whack job in the WH, we are all fucked.

[formercia]

24. What, no dowsing rod?

Oh, sorry, that's a Satanic practice.

[Prodemsouth]

27. These fundamentalist Christians or "red state" idiots are

making me embarrassed to be an "American."

[struggle4progress]

30. Crap! Now who's gonna buy the Dorito I found shaped like Balaam's ass?

[The_Casual_Observer]

32. If they are dumb enough to support swaggart and robertson

and "Heritage USA" they are certainly dumb enough to pay the bills for "faith based geology"

[Xithras]

33. Geologically, it aint gonna happen.

Oil reserves develop in areas where biological material settles in large amounts...shallow seas, river deltas, that sort of thing. Most of the Middle Eastern countries with lots of oil, like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran, are oil rich because they were once at the bottom of a large and shallow sea. Likewise, Southern California, the North Slope, and much of the midwest have oil deposits because they were once underwater as well.

Israel, by comparison, is mostly land uplifted by the Dead Sea Rift. Much of modern Israel is made up of land that is either geologically young, are high enough to have acted as islands during the regions submerged period, or (for most of the country) were deeply submerged at the time the rest of the ME was shallow sea. It's still possible that some smaller deposits might be found there, but there's yet another problem: Oil is like water...it flows. Major deposits of oil are only found in places where the ground layers are relatively undisturbed. Flat, unbroken landscapes hold oil well, while jumbled and broken landscapes give oil plenty of cracks and fissures to leak off into. Israel, geologically, is as jumbled as landscapes come.

It's unlikely they'll find anything large.

[Turbineguy]

34. I'm not a geologist...

They talked about drilling horizontally, like maybe to Iraq!

[Internut]

36. Look at the map

it's a loooooong way to drill.

[Canuckistanian]

37. Next up - An expedition to find the land of milk and honey

It's in the Bible!

[PurityOfEssence]

38. Is this supported through our tax dollars by OPIC?

If he hits the gusher, he'll make all the profits; that doesn't even have to be said. If he loses money, will he be IN ANY WAY compensated out of our tax monies?

This is fantasyland. Childish delusions have been exalted well beyond reality now, and the ramifications are scary.

[IndianaGreen]

40. "blessings of the deep that lie beneath."

Perhaps the stupid Bible was referring to magma...

[daleo]

42. This sounds like fish in the ocean to me.

But, I don't know the context of the rest of the quote.

[daleo]

43. If they find oil, they can use Noah's Ark as an oil tanker

'Cause I think they will find them both at about the same time.

[Bake]

44. How totally ironic!

The Promised Land is probably the ONLY place in the Middle East that has no oil! Lots of milk and honey, but no oil.

Sigh.

Bake

[emald]

45. There's a gusher under my Alaskan ass...

please send money so I can just get to it. God told me it was here, no really.O8)

[Nihil]

47. Hmmm ... if I was him and wanted a bunch of instant converts...

... I'd start drilling above an oil pipeline ...

:evilgrin:

[fujiyama]

49. Fundy

geology at work.

This guy will be drilling for years, because the bible told him to do so.