 Just before a hunting trip in 1962, William Branham said it was "Thus Saith The Lord" that he would shoot an enormous brown bear. This vision never came to pass. William Branham shot a silver-tip grizzly bear while hunting in British Columbia in May of 1961. In a sermon called “Presuming” in June 1962, William Branham tells this story and then says, “Now, I'm going back into the country, that you might know, when I come back next year. I'm going to get a brown bear that's almost twice that size. You see if it's right or not. …God's perfect and never fails.” A month earlier, in a sermon called “Possessing All Things”, William Branham said that the vision of the brown bear was “THUS SAITH THE LORD.”
William Branham returned to British Columbia in July of 1962 and preached six services on Vancouver Island, but did not fulfill the vision at that time. He returned to British Columbia again in October of 1964 with Pearry Green, but did not fulfill the vision at that time either. When William Branham passed away on December 25, 1965, the vision had never been fulfilled.
What does this mean? It means that when William Branham said in 1962 that he would shoot a brown bear in British Columbia, and that this was “Thus Saith The Lord”, he spoke presumptuously.
And if you say in your heart, ‘How shall we know the word which the LORD has not spoken?’
— when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD,
if the thing does not happen or come to pass,
that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken;
the prophet has spoken it presumptuously;
you shall not be afraid of him. ~ Deuteronomy 18:20-22
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The 1962 Vision of the Brown Bear, by William Branham
April 1, 1962, in the sermon "Wisdom versus Faith":
- Coming home the other night, or the other day, or just 'fore I come home, I was--fell into a vision; and I seen some little fellows, thin, looked like young boys or something, had on caps. And we were standing hunting. And I'd shot a mammoth, big, brown-looking bear. And then, they turned around and said to me, said, "But there's some confusion about the meeting." And I said, "No matter what the confusion is, if I was supposed to go, wherever it was, I'll go anyhow. (See?) It doesn't matter." And the vision stopped. I don't know where that's at, but this is on tape. It's going to happen. See? Just remember; it's going to happen; it's a vision.
May 6, 1962, in the sermon "Possessing All Things":
- Many of you remember the vision that I had, where I had shot the grizzly bear, nine-foot grizzly bear (And the church remembers me telling it here.) and the caribou. I had another. Remember it's on tape here, I seen a great huge brown bear. That might be a Kodiak and it wouldn't have worked down there in Canada, 'cause they're not there. You see? But wherever it will be, it'll be. It will be; that's THUS SAITH THE LORD. It will be. See?
June 10, 1962, in the sermon "Presuming":
- Now, I'm going back into the country, that you might know, when I come back next year. I'm going to get a brown bear that's almost twice that size. You see if it's right or not. I seen it. When we was standing, put my hands on his haunches laying on the ground, like that. And I could put my hands on his hips like that, and him laying down. Now, you find out if that's right or not. There's a whole lot to that. But I just happened to think, I'm supposed to be teaching Sunday school. See? Oh, friends. You all see these little visions around here? No wonder you minister brothers sometimes get suspicious. "Well, it might be mental telepathy. It might be psychology." Show me somewhere else it's going on. What about these great psychologists, telepathists? They guess. It sometimes happens, sometimes it never. And it's this, that, or the other. But God's perfect and never fails.
Explanation for the failed vision
People who believe that William Branham is a true prophet explain away this vision in the following ways.
- Some claim that he will rise from the dead to fulfill this vision.
- Others defend William Branham by saying that a failed prophecy has a Biblical precedent in the prophet Jonah, because God told him to prophecy the destruction of Nineveh and it never came to pass.
- A third group believes that William Branham’s disobedience resulted in the vision not being fulfilled.
- Lastly, there is a group that will ask, "What vision?". This group is the 'faithful' group whose pastors have just never preached on this vision (and likely never will).
There are a few problems with these explanations:
First: William Branham died in 1965, and a large stone pyramid now sits on top of his grave in Indiana. He is not raising from the dead just to travel to British Columbia to shoot a bear.
Second: “God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon” the people of Nineveh (Jonah 3:10) because they repented. Applying this scripture to William Branham’s life might make sense in the context of the vision of the destruction of Los Angeles (although there was no mass-repentance in L.A. as there was in Nineveh). However, this scripture does not work in the context of the hunting vision, as it would mean that the brown bear repented of its evil ways.
Years before the Jonah went to Nineveh, the prophet Jeremiah said that God would withhold his judgement to a Nation that would repent. "The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it." (Jeremiah 18:7-8) There is no scriptural precident that says God will relent of a vision that involves the destruction of a brown bear.
Third: “Thus Saith The Lord” should be stronger than an individual’s lack of obedience. Does God permit a prophet to say, "I did something wrong personally and that is why the vision did not come to pass"? There is no example in scripture that suggests this is the case. There is only one exception for a prophesy not to be fulfilled – and this involves repentance by the person (or nation) being judged. If it was acceptable for one prophet to say "Oops! I made a personal mistake, and that’s why the vision was not fulfilled," then every false prophet would claim this easy-out excuse. For this reason, the Word of God only permits one explanation for a failed vision, because repentance satisfies the wrath of God. That is why Ezekiel says, “Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin.” (Ezekiel 18:30)
We also looked in the scripture for the spiritual significance of shooting a bear, and could not find one. This vision was only to promote William Branham’s own ministry, and it failed.
So what will you do with this failed vision? Will you succumb to cognitive dissonance and trivialize an obvious wrong?
The 1961 Vision of the Grizzly Bear
People are sometimes confused by the story about the vision of William Branham shooting a grizzly bear with that of him shooting a brown bear. William Branham told the vision of shooting a grizzly bear several times. The first time that he tells the story of this vision was on October 1, 1961, five months after he had shot the grizzly bear.
- About two months ago, or hardly that long, I was woke up one morning. I believe, I'm not sure... I told it to most of the church. There's many here has heard me tell this before it come to pass. And in the--a vision I saw, that I'd saw a great animal, looked like a deer. And it had great high horns. And it was... I had to go around a side shale, like this, to get to it. And it was a very famous animal. It was a great trophy animal. And there was a man that I saw that had on a green checkered shirt. And then on the road, after I'd got the animal, I'd heard a--a voice say that, "Those horns are forty-two inches high." That's about this high. And it was a mammoth animal. And on the road back, I saw a great huge silver-tip grizzly bear. Now, that's the famous bear. There's four in the grizzly family. One is the silver-tip, which is the famous. Next is called, the native name, kadish, which is a black with a round ear; the second. Third is the regular grizzly, which is between black and brown, a huge bear. And the next is the Kodiak, which is only found on Kodiak Island and--and western Alaska; he's great, mammoth, biggest of all bears, but he's a grizzly. But the silver-tip is black, and the white is on--the silver is on the end of the tip of the hair. He's the famous one, very high-strung, ill-tempered bear. I shot the bear with a heart shot, killed him. (William Branham, October 1, 1961, It becometh us to fulfill all righteousness)
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