When one reads the Book of Revelation, as was our task last week, it would seem that at the end times, everyone will suffer. Yet a peculiar recasting of this apocalyptic scenario took place in the Western world between the time of John’s strange visions and our modern moment, to the point of which only some suffer, while great numbers of others are totally excluded from the apocalyptic horror, and instead given something akin to a stadium box seat above the action, as the are “raptured” into heaven just before the things which must shortly come to pass, actually do (Kirsch 190).
This reading of Revelation seems a most convenient contrivance, and at the same time, a strange position for a supposed fundamentalist or biblical literalist to take. It is a reading derived not from the pages of Revelation, but from a combination of things assumed and a brief passage in the Letter of Paul to the Thessalonians. Yet the idea of a rapture has captured the imagination, and indeed is strongly believed, by many American fundamentalists today.
Rapture has its incentives for belief. It creates a dichotomy, a binary, between the saved and the (presumably) damned, that is concrete and apparent; the saved, after all, are never even exposed to the tribulations of the end times. The idea of a binary, or of a dichotomy, is useful in creating and maintaining a group, and what better way for an apocalyptic preacher to create an idea of specialness in her or his followers, and negative otherness in the rest, than to portray an image of an end times as a great show for them to enjoy, while they laugh and watch the sinners left behind pay. It is a powerful, accessible image, and one that works well with the American consciousness: if you do what is right, in the end, you win. It is simple, it is reductive, yes, but it is rather American-dream-like in its blush, that if you believe right, in the end times, you too get whisked away and win, and everyone else can suffer. Much the converse of Therese of Lisieux, hoping that she too can be mortified and mutilated as will those around for the Apocalypse, but perhaps ultimately, this Rapture recast just speaks to the malleability of the apocalyptic narrative of Revelation (Kirsch 191-4).
Hi Joe,
Your comments on why Darby’s concept of the Rapture took hold so readily in the United States is a good way to demonstrate why certain elements of Revelation (and other scriptural texts, as in this case) have been made relevant in various places over time—and why they can be used to foster certain attitudes. In the case of the Rapture, I’ve always been struck by the intense individualism at work—a concept that doesn’t pervade other cultures in the same way it does this one. The basic text is rich with enigmatic images and ideas and certain ones have been favored at certain moments precisely because specific cultural practices and beliefs have been available to tap them.
I think the final line of your post hits the nail on the head, and speaks to some of the frustrations that the entire topic of religious apocalypse present. There is a real flexibility to the ways in which we as individuals see our own place in the impending end times, if we believe that the end is near at all, versus how we see others, those outside of the group we agree with, experiencing the end of days.
It’s really interesting to me that so much of the apocalyptic “knowledge” that preachers of doomsday have is really some hybrid version of scripture and creative individual interpretation (often self-serving). I discussed in my post last week how people seem to blindly follow the word of someone who has been deemed worthy of professing the word of God. I think this voluntary “blindness” allows the more extreme apocalyptic preachers able to pass off new versions of what the apocalypse will look like without much dissent from members of the group that they lead.
Your statement about how Rapture works well with the American conscience got me to realize the prevalence of such ideas in our everyday lives. This idea that in the end, the good will get their reward and the sinners will be punished, is rather like a Christian version of karma (a Hindu and Buddhist belief in a fitting consequence for each action). In particular, your description of the Rapture as “a great show for them [the saved] to enjoy, while they laugh and watch the sinners left behind pay,” reminded me of this summer’s Casey Anthony trial. When she was deemed innocent of murder (much to everyone’s surprise), I heard a news reporter say something along the lines of, “She’ll get what’s coming to her.” Could he have been referring to God’s final judgment? We all sat back behind our television screens and watched the American justice system fail to punish her in the way everyone had expected. Now the only thing that gives us comfort is the thought that God will be the final judge. These ideas have been subconsciously rooted into American culture and I haven’t really noticed until now just how ubiquitous they are.
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I think that your notion of “malleability of the apocalyptic narrative of Revelation” is a very appropriate way to approach the massive cultural upheaval that has risen over the course of doomsday history. Obviously, prophets, clergy, and, for the most part, ordinary people have definitely tweaked the details of the Book of Revelation to suit the cultural time period and fulfill our underlying push towards this long awaited apocalypse. While some are set on believing that the new representation of Jesus (in accordance with the Revelation) foretells our predestined future, others such as Darby put more emphasis on the individual’s role in his/her end. It truly depends on who the man behind the mission was, the circumstances in which he set forth his beliefs, and the public that he intended to reach out to.