Apocalypse Soon
Jan. 18th, 2009 03:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vovatI've seen a few mentions recently of the idea that the world would end in December 2012, based on the Mayan calendar. The only problem is that there's no indication the Mayans actually intended this to be the end of the world; it was simply the end of the Long Count, the non-repeating calendar used for dating monuments and such. And even if they HAD thought the world would end in 2012, why would we consider this to be accurate information nowadays? The thing is, it's likely that this apocalyptic concept didn't come about until the twentieth century, when some people who were alive then would be likely to live that long. Of course, there have been a lot of failed predictions for the year in which the world would end. There were a fair number of people who thought it would end in 1000, and the idea that it would end in 2000 was given some secular credence by the Y2K paranoia. The Jehovah's Witnesses thought the world would end in 1844. Harold Camping said that the world would end in 1994, and then changed it to 2011 when this didn't come to pass. It seems like most of the more popular predictions either set the end times in round-numbered years (even though the modern calendar is said to have been based on a reading of an approximate time in the Book of Luke as an exact time, meaning that the two thousandth anniversary of the birth of Jesus most likely took place BEFORE 2000 anyway), or in years that are coming up pretty soon.
I have to say that I've always found end-of-the-world predictions fascinating. One of the best college courses I took was based around various concepts of the apocalypse. What I have to wonder, however, is why people are so eager for the end. Revelation is one of the most interesting books in the Bible, but does it really fit in that well with the rest of the New Testament, and with modern Christianity? The book seems to have been written in a time when Christians were a persecuted minority, so we can forgive somewhat their revenge fantasies against the Roman rulers. And, like a lot of Jews of that time, they thought the end was coming very soon. It didn't, though, and Christians have had to reinterpret these prophecies over the centuries. Now, of course, Christians are no longer a persecuted minority (in most of the world, anyway), making the "you'll get yours, persecutors" tone of the book rather out of place. And really, could the Jesus riding the white horse with a sword in his mouth and battling the wicked be the same guy as the wandering ascetic who urged his followers to turn the other cheek? Sure, people are large and contain multitudes, but it doesn't say too much for Jesus' teachings if he isn't even planning on following them himself. Actually, this puts me in mind of the Hindu Trimurti, in which the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer are all forms of God. But in the Christian Trinity, if the Father is the Creator and the Son the Preserver (in fact, I learned in my Religions of India class that some Hindus actually consider Jesus to have been an avatar of Vishnu), then who is the Destroyer? I'm not entirely sure as to the role of the Holy Spirit, but I don't think it's a destructive one. Oh, well. All that stuff about different gods all being aspects of a single one are purposely confusing anyway. But getting back to the topic at hand, the idea that people go to Heaven or Hell immediately after they die has become mainstream, so why is an apocalypse even necessary? Eternal bliss for the good and eternal torment for the evil are somehow not quite enough?
I have to say that I've always found end-of-the-world predictions fascinating. One of the best college courses I took was based around various concepts of the apocalypse. What I have to wonder, however, is why people are so eager for the end. Revelation is one of the most interesting books in the Bible, but does it really fit in that well with the rest of the New Testament, and with modern Christianity? The book seems to have been written in a time when Christians were a persecuted minority, so we can forgive somewhat their revenge fantasies against the Roman rulers. And, like a lot of Jews of that time, they thought the end was coming very soon. It didn't, though, and Christians have had to reinterpret these prophecies over the centuries. Now, of course, Christians are no longer a persecuted minority (in most of the world, anyway), making the "you'll get yours, persecutors" tone of the book rather out of place. And really, could the Jesus riding the white horse with a sword in his mouth and battling the wicked be the same guy as the wandering ascetic who urged his followers to turn the other cheek? Sure, people are large and contain multitudes, but it doesn't say too much for Jesus' teachings if he isn't even planning on following them himself. Actually, this puts me in mind of the Hindu Trimurti, in which the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer are all forms of God. But in the Christian Trinity, if the Father is the Creator and the Son the Preserver (in fact, I learned in my Religions of India class that some Hindus actually consider Jesus to have been an avatar of Vishnu), then who is the Destroyer? I'm not entirely sure as to the role of the Holy Spirit, but I don't think it's a destructive one. Oh, well. All that stuff about different gods all being aspects of a single one are purposely confusing anyway. But getting back to the topic at hand, the idea that people go to Heaven or Hell immediately after they die has become mainstream, so why is an apocalypse even necessary? Eternal bliss for the good and eternal torment for the evil are somehow not quite enough?
