There Will Be Blood : Was Eli a false prophet?

Was he just trying to earn money and fame in Gods name all along, or did he start out with good intentions and led astray somewhere down the path?

I think Eli always was. Even before he started making money and becoming more famous, he was definitely putting on a show in his church in order to give himself power overy the people of Little Boston. If he ever did start out with good intentions (and I don't believe he ever did) then it was before the events of the film.

cool, thanks for the reply! Again for me its hard to conclude wheter or not he was a "bad guy" from the beginning or not. He certainly looked like he was suffering on behalf of the towns people when Plainview started working the oil. Maybe Plainviews oil operations was the start of Eli's personal descent (seeing the evil of what men are capable of).

He's a con man. When we meet him, we find out he's been telling all the people in his church that god talks to him and has given him healing powers. He knows that's not true, hence he's definitely a bad person. He's just a good actor in a very rural small town that has likely never once seen an actor on stage in their lives, and he uses religion to gain respect and standing, and then later to gain wealth.

He was a con man through and through.

That's like asking if David Copperfield's magic is real, or just an illusion.

I think he was a con from the start, and that's part of why he and Daniel disliked each other instantly: they could see behind each other's masks immediately, and they saw they were in many ways the same.

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