Lostprophets

(Originally posted about four months ago. #repost)

A prophet in religious terms is a person who has been contacted by God or other supernatural being, that only they can see or hear.
The prophet would be spoken to and sometimes would converse with the supernatural being. The prophet would then pass on the information that was given to them to humanity, because they believed everything that was told to them. This is called a prophecy.

Some prophets were ridiculed for not making sense and contradicting what was understood of a religion or deity.
Some prophets were followed and admired and their word was taken as law.

Meanwhile, schizophrenia is a mental disorder. It's most common symptoms for a sufferer are paranoid or bizarre delusions, auditory hallucinations and problems with thoughts, feelings and behaviour.
So, in short they can hear things that do not exist, can believe in something although it is not true and can be emotionally and physically unstable.

Alternatively a con man takes advantage of people by exploiting characteristics of human nature such as honesty, dishonesty, compassion, vanity, greed, naivety and so on.
As a result there is not one definitive description of a victim of a con man.
The victim simply relies upon the good faith of the con artist.