That can explain the actions of people like Hiram Edson, who watched the prophecy fail and then decided, actually, the prophecy hadn’t failed at all. The Second Coming had instead been a purely heavenly event—Jesus had moved from the “Holy Place” to the “Most Holy Place” and began a new era of history, indiscernible from all previous eras of... See more

There’s a classic book called When Prophecy Fails where a trio of social psychologists join an apocalyptic UFO cult just before the supposed end of the world.