Nancy
Favorite Answer
Yes. Hitler is one example. The reason for keeping Jews in concentration camps instead of simply killing them all straight-away was that he planned to return a good number of them to their ancient home of Judea in order to then destroy them in a war he'd then declare on them called "Armageddon" that St. John prophesied, that plan being called "The Final Solution" by Hitler. In accordance with how he interpreted that prophesy, and certainly how he'd propagandize it, he leading that war would make him the Second Coming of the Messiah, i.e., God incarnate. He literally wanted to become God to the world.
Roman Emperor Caligula is another example. He literally declared himself God. And history has most definitely not been kind to him. In present day, we have the Kim dynasty of North Korea, which has claimed to be God incarnate, Kim Jong-il was God, and when he passed on, God left his body and went into the body of Kim Jong-un, who currently rules North Korea, and history isn't being at all kind to the Kim dynasty. Pharaohs are other examples.
By the way, people who play God and get people to believe them and follow them, there's a term for that: cult of personality. History has never been kind to cults of personality, whether they be Jim Joneses or Qin Shi Huangs or Pharaoh Akhenatens or Fuhrer Adolf Hitlers.
Jimmy C
James Bond was neither a great philosopher nor a real person.
Anonymous
James Bond is a fictional character who more appropriately belongs in the P&S category. Having said that history isn't too kind to the vanquished. It's the victors who write their own history and they could, quite justifiably, be considered as far from impartial
j153e
While God is in control, there is considerable honoring by God of individuals' ability to make choice, to realize Truth, Light, and the One.
"Playing" God is more like taking away others' ability to make choices, even interposing between God and Man.
On a microscale, an individual's "carnal mind" may play the dictator or false god in her life, keeping her from divine Love, Soul, God.