Basics of Apocalypticism

Introduction to Multimedia CompositionSpring 2011

Origin

Genre of prophetic works written in early centuries after Jesus

A new kind of prophecy Classic example: Revelation, in the

Christian scriptures Predecessor in the Hebrew Bible: Daniel

Definitions

The word "apocalypse" means revelation, or unveiling

Refers to the disclosure of a hidden order or plan

Often presented specially to the writer

Classical

"A genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial insofar as it involves another, supernatural world" (J. Collins)

Doomsday

The Christian apocalypse reveals catastrophes that will lead to the end of the world

Tribulations Armageddon The millennium

Our world ends in destruction It is replaced by a perfect, permanent one

Pessimistic?

Written at desperate time Persecution and oppression for early Church

Suggests no hope for change in this world But to wait for salvation and endure suffering

Optimistic?

The millennium is 1000 years of peace on Earth Unclear when it will occur, or if it already has

begun The world to come is perfect

But only for believers

Narrative

In the Christian tradition, the hidden plan is historical

Thus the apocalypse becomes a narrative -- a story, a plot, or a sequence in time

About the future Adaptable

Rhetoric

Revelation's influence has gone beyond literal interpretations of events

A widely used framework for speaking and writing

About present problems About the future

"A mode of thought and discourse that empowers its audience to live in a time of disorientation and disorder by revealing to them a fundamental plan" (Brummett)

Conventional

"A kind of discourse having to do with the end of the world, with cataclysm and change, that both energizes audiences and is used by many people

"[About] the end, of final things ... [also about] the sense of disaster or crisis ... [and] the sense of a transition from this world, era, or state of being to another one" (Brummett)

Secularization

Apocalypticism may underly non-religious ways of thinking about time, change, and conflict

Progress Revolution Absolutism

The 20th Century

"World" wars: 1914-18, 1939-45 Cold War: 1945-1991

Nuclear arms race Environmental movement: since 1960s Progress?

Today

Many real, serious threats to contemporary Western way of life

US in decline? Environment? Technology?