An apocalyptic narrative “resists the crisis of change by inculcating change into its very vocabulary, assuring its reader that “the parent disorder of history, will finally affirm order”. –Lois Parkinson Zamora
In a system, the process that occurs will tend to increase the total entropy of the universe. –Second Law of Thermodynamics
Out of all the statements made in Elizabeth Rosen’s “Apocalyptic Transformation”, it was this one that struck me as the most crucially important—one that summarized the very psyche of the apocalyptic notion, and its broadest impact on society throughout the ages. The successful dissemination and widespread influence of apocalyptic thought is no doubt attributable to certain innate psychological and behavioral characteristics of mankind. What Zamora suggests is that humans have a tendency to create (or envision) order out of their otherwise highly entropic daily lives–and that this quest for order out of disorder, for an intelligent plan behind abject chaos is at the root of the apocalyptic sensibility.
The psychology behind the adoption and the secularization of the Book of Revelations as a dominant ideology reveals that throughout history humans have found themselves in situations survivable only through belief in divine aid to make right all that has gone wrong—that this great “disruption” they currently deal with, was a part of the grand plan. More than a promise to end all suffering or to elevate the righteous to the highest rungs of moral certitude, the apocalyptic myth is also a sort of contextualization of the unknowable, providing a concrete reference frame for history through which denizens of a certain time period may better understand their own times.
Our ancestors were plagued with questions regarding the creation of the world they saw around them, and when organized religion began to develop—and along with it the idea of a benevolent creator, it was also not that far astride from their imaginations to also consider a destruction of that very world, as it indeed seemed during the Greco-roman era that things could not remain as they were. From the moment it began to circulate in the early-Christian world, the book of revelations (the first apocalyptic narrative) was helping people make SENSE of the world around them—finally and entirely convincing them that the days of tribulation were indeed near, and during their own lifetimes. So began the quest of endless numbers of men, and entire societies at that, over countless centuries to attempt to derive greater meaning from the suffering or sacrilege they were experiencing.
If we focus further on the wording Zamora uses, we note that the apocalyptic narrative and the eschatological sentiment (certainly the product of a society with these beliefs) has all to do with change. Every century has had its tumultuous period of change, and as we read in “History of the End of the World” those periods were often held to be divine signs of the coming tribulation. Just as history has shown us that mankind looks towards divine plan and apocalyptic prophecy in times of dire disorder, so too does the apocalyptic narrative use eschatological mores to confront the feared issue of “change” and “disorder”. The last part of Zamora’s statement reaffirms the irony that it is the greatest disorder in history (i.e the apocalypse, tribulation), the parent of all disorders, that will finally create order (moral order?) in the universe. And what an irony it is…
Now, the parenthetical claim for “moral order” inherent within the end of all things is a stretch of the imaginations for those skeptics who do not believe in organized religion, but for those societies throughout the years that were wholly and religiously deistic, the apocalypse (or the divine judgment) represented just that—a moral judgment which condemns those agents of disorder to fiery annihilation, and gifts those morally superior souls with eternal life in the “New Jerusalem”. As important an ending as te apocalypse is, it is JUST AS important a beginning. Like a graduation ceremony being aptly titled commencement (i.e. the beginning), so too is the tribulation the beginning of something anew. The new beginning is endless making the years of the secular world seem like seconds. It is perhaps this promise of eternal life and glory that led many to actively hope for the end of days, for an end to suffering, and an end to injustice. Experiencing the end meant also experiencing a new beginning; perhaps the greatest beginning of them all.
After all, God hath decreed “I am the alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last”. For different people, this means different things. For those who have not obeyed the word of God, He is the end. For those who have been righteous, he is merely a promise of an even greater beginning.
