What were Edgar Cayce's most accurate predictions?
Executive summary
Edgar Cayce, the early 20th‑century “Sleeping Prophet,” made thousands of trance readings; a handful of those forecasts are commonly cited as having been borne out—most notably warnings about a major 1929 financial collapse, the rise of Axis powers before World War II, and some accurate historical claims about the Essenes/Dead Sea Scrolls—while many of his grander geophysical prophecies (polar shifts, Atlantis resurfacing, cataclysmic “earth changes”) remain unfulfilled or disputed [1] [2] [3]. Reporting from Cayce’s own Association for Research and Enlightenment highlights hits and future‑oriented claims, while encyclopedic and skeptical sources catalogue both corroborations and serious failures, so any assessment must weigh anecdotal accuracy against a larger number of ambiguous or incorrect readings [4] [5] [3].
1. The 1929 market warning and economic forecasts that landed closest to history
Cayce warned of “a great disturbance in financial circles” before the Wall Street Crash, with sources crediting warnings in 1925 and again six months before the 1929 crash; popular accounts and histories of Cayce repeatedly point to those pre‑crash predictions as among his clearest successes [1] [2] [6]. Proponents use these readings to argue Cayce showed precognitive economic insight, while critics note vagueness in phrasing—“disturbance” and “bear market” can be read broadly—and emphasize retrospective selection of hits among thousands of readings [1] [5].
2. Foreseeing the Axis alignment and aspects of World War II
Multiple contemporary retellings credit Cayce with predicting a militaristic alliance involving Germans, Austrians and later Japanese influence—an alignment that parallels the Axis powers formalized in the Tripartite Pact of 1940—and some reviewers point to Cayce’s 1935 visions as eerily prescient of the coming war [2] [6]. Supporters highlight the specificity of national actors mentioned in readings; skeptics and historians urge caution, noting that geopolitical tensions of the 1930s made predictions of conflict plausible and that post‑hoc attribution inflates perceived accuracy [2] [5].
3. The Dead Sea Scrolls / Essenes detail that surprised scholars
Cayce described the Essenes and material resembling the Dead Sea Scrolls before the scrolls’ public discovery in 1947, a coincidence often promoted by A.R.E. and sympathetic writers as a demonstrable hit [1] [4]. Skeptical sources acknowledge the timing and detail as notable but also point out reliance on later interpretation and the selective preservation of readings that appear accurate while downplaying many that were not [1] [5].
4. “Earth changes,” polar shifts, and large‑scale geophysical misses
Cayce’s most dramatic geophysical forecasts—global “earth changes,” polar shifts, submerging and rising lands, and the reemergence of Atlantis—are extensively documented in his readings and by A.R.E., but mainstream science and critical histories label these as unfulfilled or scientifically unsupported claims to date [4] [3]. New‑age accounts try to reconcile partial events (e.g., climate anomalies, seismic activity) with Cayce’s timeline, but encyclopedic and skeptical reporting records that predicted catastrophic planetary rearrangements have not occurred as described [4] [3] [1].
5. Why some predictions “stick”: selection, interpretation and institutional promotion
The Association for Research and Enlightenment publishes lists of Cayce’s prophecies that “came true” and keeps his readings as primary evidence, creating an institutional archive that amplifies perceived successes [4] [1]. Conversely, independent summaries and critical biographies document thousands of readings, a mix of medical diagnoses, spiritual counsel, and future forecasts, with critics arguing that hits are often broad or retrofitted and that promoters have incentives to emphasize successes for organizational legitimacy [5] [7].
6. Verdict: a mixed legacy where a few striking matches sit beside many misses
Assessing Cayce’s “most accurate” predictions yields a short list—pre‑1929 market warnings, pre‑war descriptions resembling the Axis, and his Essene/Dead Sea Scrolls detail—that have been repeatedly cited as strong fits by supporters and neutral chroniclers alike, while the majority of his high‑impact geophysical prophecies remain unverified or contradicted by later events; this mixed evidence profile is reflected across both promotional sources (A.R.E., Cayce‑aligned writers) and skeptical references (encyclopedic entries and religious critics), so claims of prophetic mastery rest partly on selective emphasis and institutional preservation of favorable readings [1] [4] [3] [5].