Hal Lindsey, who authored the best-selling nonfiction book of the 1970s in “The Late, Great Planet Earth,” has died at 95.
His death was announced on his website, but did not specify location or cause.
Lindsey became a pop culture phenomenon by writing a book that claimed the world would soon end, followed by the return of Jesus Christ.
Originally published in 1970 by the small religious press Zondervan, the book pointed to things in the world that foretold the second coming.
An editor at Bantam Books acquired the mass-market paperback rights, and that touched a nerve with the public. “The Late, Great Planet Earth” became the best-selling nonfiction book of the 1970s, selling an estimated 35 million copies by 1999.
Lindsey’s book arrived three years after Israel’s win in the Six-Day War of June 1967. He predicted that victory would bring on the apocalypse, a war escalated when Russia would invade Israel, drawing in other nations under the command of the Antichrist.
The war would embrace other countries around the world, with the end result being the second coming of Jesus Christ.
The book was eventually made into a movie narrated by Orson Welles in 1978, but Lindsey continued in the same vein in subsequent books, which did well, but never attained the sales of his first venture.
In recent years, Lindsey featured a website that offered commentary on the spiritual state of the world. It was based in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Survivors include his wife, three daughters, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
