But if your “visions” are highly disturbing and you become paranoid about your neighbors trying to kill you, it’s more likely schizophrenia than divine inspiration.
“The angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt.”
Does it actually make sense?
I work in a psych hospital, and the delusional patients there uniformly believe that their delusions make sense.
Run it by other people
This is the most likely to work. The delusional people I know are aware that other people disagree with their delusions. Relatedly, there is great disagreement on the topic of religion.
“The angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt.”
Good point. Of course, this one does make a testable prediction, and as opposed to what might be more characteristic of a mental illness, the angel tells him there’s trouble, he avoids it and we have no further evidence of his getting any more such messages. That at least makes schizophrenia a much less likely explanation than just having a weird dream, so that’s what to try ruling out.
“The angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt.”
I work in a psych hospital, and the delusional patients there uniformly believe that their delusions make sense.
This is the most likely to work. The delusional people I know are aware that other people disagree with their delusions. Relatedly, there is great disagreement on the topic of religion.
Good point. Of course, this one does make a testable prediction, and as opposed to what might be more characteristic of a mental illness, the angel tells him there’s trouble, he avoids it and we have no further evidence of his getting any more such messages. That at least makes schizophrenia a much less likely explanation than just having a weird dream, so that’s what to try ruling out.