The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament, written around the end of the first century CE. It is an apocalyptic prophecy that predicts the intersection between heaven, earth, and hell in a final confrontation between the forces of good and evil. The book is one of the most controversial Biblical texts, and widely varied interpretations of its meaning, messages, and symbols abound. Read literally, Revelation is an epistle, or letter, from the prophet John of Patmos to seven churches in Asia, each of which is given a specific message from the Spirit (2:1-3:22). The basic prophecy comes from God and Christ via angelic messenger to John, who writes down predictions about a period of chaos on earth, Christ’s second coming and thousand-year reign of peace, Satan’s imprisonment and ultimate destruction, and the Last Judgment, when the wicked are cast into a lake of fire (6:1-20:15). According to John, a new heaven and a new earth will replace the old, and the faithful will live with God and Christ for eternity in a heavenly city called New Jerusalem (21:1-22:5).
The apocalyptic prophecy of the Book of Revelation has a history of encouraging powerless groups to seek deliverance in the promise of ultimate divine judgment against their perceived oppressors. It has traditionally been understood as a reassurance that God has a master plan and will eventually deliver the chosen believers from their current experience of suffering and chaos. Elizabeth Rosen, author of Apocalyptic Transformation: Apocalypse and the Postmodern Imagination, calls this apocalypse story “an organizing principle” which offers “a means by which to understand the world and one’s place in it” from “a mythology about endings that hovers in the cultural background and is just as real and influential as our myths of origin” (xi). Central to the message of the Book of Revelation is a hierarchical, dualistic vision of moral and immoral absolutes like good and evil. The binary nature of the myth establishes order in part by mandating the superiority of some people, the saved, over others, the doomed. Rosen believes the apocalyptic myth is more powerful than other organizing principles theorists have used to make sense of social conditions (like conspiracy theory or chaos theory) precisely because “it encompasses a moral dimension” and “is naturally a vehicle for the analysis and criticism of behavior, whether of the individual, nation, or cosmos” (xiii).
In the introduction to Apocalyptic Transformation, Rosen is careful to define the difference between the apocalyptic myth and the apocalyptic narrative (xxi). The apocalyptic myth of the Book of Revelation assures the faithful they will be rewarded, but it also condemns “the other,” sinners, to eternal damnation and rejects any notion of a middle ground between these two extremes. This rigid, binary morality creates a hierarchical value system and limits identity to a dualistic classification that establishes one as the ideal and the other as inferior. The apocalyptic narrative, however, merely refers to the use of five essential plot elements that define the traditional apocalypse of the Book of Revelation. These five elements are divine authority, receiver of a prophesy, the end of the world, judgment day, and transcendence; together they create a “general plot [that] is discernible whether we examine the Christian apocalypse of John or more ancient, cyclical versions of cosmic destruction and renewal” (Rosen xxi-xxii).
Divinity scholar Adela Yarbro Collins of the Yale Divinity School explains, “The Apocalypse handles skillfully the hearer’s thoughts, attitudes, and feelings by the use of effective symbols and a narrative plot that invites imaginative participation. This combination of effective symbols and artful plot is key to the power of apocalyptic rhetoric” (145). What Collins calls “effective symbols and artful plot,” Rosen calls the apocalyptic narrative. This narrative, according to Rosen, can be separated from the Book of Revelation’s myth and “the power of apocalyptic rhetoric” can be appropriated by postmodern authors to promote alternative, non-dualistic moral paradigms. To support her argument, she examines several examples of late twentieth century apocalyptic fiction, including The Matrix trilogy, Watchmen and other graphic novels by Alan Moore, Terry Gilliam’s films, Kurt Vonnegut’s Galápagos, Robert Coover’s metafiction and several of Don DeLillo’s novels. All of these artists implement the plot structure of the five apocalyptic narrative elements of the Book of Revelation but rework the myth “to use it as the most effective vehicle for their social critique” (Rosen xx).
Like the authors of apocalyptic literature mentioned above, J.K. Rowling recognized that the apocalyptic narrative of the Book of Revelation has been a successful tool for social critique and moral education for the past 2,000 years. Rowling’s use of the five basic narrative elements of the Book of Revelation throughout the Harry Potter series offers a subversive critique of the traditional myth from within the structure of the apocalyptic narrative itself. This is the defining characteristic of a sub-genre of apocalyptic literature Rosen calls “postmodern apocalyptic fiction.” According to Rosen:
Postmodernism challenges traditional sense-making structures, which it calls grand or metanarratives, refusing to impose one point of view or privilege one kind of “culture” over another…Yet postmodernists have remained interested in the apocalyptic myth, even as they reject the myth’s absolutism or challenge the received systems of morality that underlie it. (Rosen xx)
The novels and films Rosen analyzes use the apocalyptic narrative to make readers question their “sense-making” beliefs and assumptions, and challenge their understanding or acceptance of the world. They also “possess narrative traits that we recognize as ‘postmodern’–indeterminacy, irony, unstable identity, the mixing of high and low culture, pluralism and multiplicity, skepticism of authority, and skepticism about grand narratives” (Rosen xxvi).
My examination of how J.K. Rowling in particular retells and revises the apocalyptic myth of the Book of Revelation to deliver a decidedly non-dualistic moral message shows that Harry Potter provides a postmodern critique of, and an alternative to, the binary apocalyptic moral system ingrained in modern-day American society. To provide additional context for my argument, I will first discuss the biblical foundations of apocalyptic dualism and a brief summary of apocalyptic thought in America, where the Harry Potter series faced vehement opposition from evangelical Christian groups. Then, I will address how postmodernism interacts with apocalypticism, and how Harry Potter in particular tells both a postmodern and apocalyptic story. Finally, I will examine each element of the apocalyptic narrative in the context of the Harry Potter series, and show how each undergoes a postmodern twist to undermine traditional apocalyptic dualism.
