Social media reacts to South African man’s Rapture prediction

Social media users have been circulating a specific end-times date tied to the evangelical Christian belief in the Rapture, reigniting familiar arguments about biblical interpretation and failed prophecy as the Sept. 23–24 window approaches. The latest burst of attention centers on Joshua Mhlakela, a South African man who told followers he received the prediction through an apocalyptic message he described in a widely viewed YouTube video posted about three months earlier.

In that video, Mhlakela described seeing Jesus on a throne and hearing him say that the return would occur on “the 23rd and the 24th, 2025” to take “my Church.” The prediction has been used as a talking point both by Christians who say they accept the timing and by others who mock it as another false claim by a false prophet, with debate playing out across platforms. The AP reported that the claim has drawn discussion from Christian commentators as well as jokes and criticism online, including on TikTok under the hashtag #RaptureTok.

The reactions have also included posts noting that Sept. 23 or Sept. 24 could overlap with the start of Judaism’s High Holy Days, which began this year on Sept. 22 with Rosh Hashana. Others said the timing would, if it occurred now, align with events including the wars in Gaza and Ukraine and the killing of U.S. conservative activist and evangelical Christian Charlie Kirk, according to the AP report.

Religion scholars say that the Rapture idea sits inside a broader tradition of apocalyptic thinking rather than only inside a single passage of scripture. Randall Balmer said Jesus’ return, also known as the Second Coming, is referenced in Daniel and Revelation, and he said early Christians who faced persecution in the Roman Empire saw Revelation as an assurance that God would ultimately prevail over evil. Amy Frykholm, author of “Rapture Culture: Left Behind in Evangelical America,” described how Rapture storytelling often hinges on who is “taken up” and who is left behind during a tumultuous tribulation period.

Kim Haines-Eitzen, a professor of ancient Mediterranean religions at Cornell University, said apocalypticism is an ancient Jewish worldview that predates Christianity and that apocalyptic ideology often surges during or after traumatic events. In that framing, she said modern Christians use early Christian texts in ways that support the idea that end-times events could be imminent.

Evangelical scholarship points to a feedback loop between expectations and consumption. Matthew Taylor, a senior Christian scholar at the Institute for Islamic-Christian-Jewish Studies, said there are “millions and millions of Christians” who believe in modern prophecy and consume media filled with “modern prophecies.” Taylor’s comments were used by the AP to describe why new viral end-times predictions can find an audience quickly, even when previous dates have not come to pass.

The Rapture belief is also widely described as a specific development within evangelical Christianity, and not as a phrase that appears directly in the Bible. The AP report said the word “rapture” does not appear in the Bible, but that commonly cited passages include references in 1 Thessalonians, 1 Corinthians and Matthew 24. It also said belief in the Rapture began in the mid-19th century in Britain and elsewhere in English-speaking countries, and that the idea spread through 20th century Bible conferences, evangelical media, and the Scofield Reference Bible, including through notes that detailed the Rapture.

The current prediction is arriving in a long line of other Rapture and Second Coming dates that have already failed. The AP report said California doomsday preacher Harold Camping predicted the Rapture would happen on May 21, 2011, and that he later gave up public prophecy after it did not occur. It also said William Miller, a U.S. farmer and Bible interpreter, began telling followers that Jesus would return sometime between 1843 and 1844, later setting another date for Oct. 22, 1844—an event Christian history calls the Great Disappointment after it did not happen as expected.

The AP report also described how the Great Disappointment helped reshape multiple Christian movements, including the origins of the Seventh-day Adventist Church and the growth of other groups such as Jehovah’s Witnesses. It said that some believers who did not interpret the disappointment as the end of the movement helped seed what became more broadly evangelical “secret rapture” beliefs.

When prophets and organizations fail to meet their predicted dates, Taylor said they can reframe the outcome. He told the AP that modern-day prophets often respond by describing the period as spiritual warfare in which they were right to reveal the prophecy but humanity failed to cooperate with God’s will, and he said failed predictors end up with “a lot of egg on their face.”

In the background of the latest viral date, scholars also point to a recurring question that followers and skeptics keep debating: what the Bible supports, what the word “rapture” means, and why the “end times” message keeps resurfacing in new formats, from Bible conferences and study Bibles to contemporary social media platforms.