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rfmcdonaldIt's been a busy news week, news month, news season. Over at his blog The Long View, John Reilly took note of the ways in which the standard institutions and conventions of the world--the durability of the Catholic Church as a moral standard given the catastrophic ridiculosities relating to the clerical abuse scandals, the destabilization of the global financial system in 2008 and the dampening down of expectations, and the ongoing Fukushima reactor crisis--were breaking down. This, Reilly suggests, fits into a broader trend of general breakdown and fear of some impending radical transformation.
There might be parallels with these collapses in conventional thinking in our decade and the "apocalypse culture" of post-Tito Yugoslavia, when all the pieties and successes of the Socialist Federal Republic were gone and people were left to devise their own replacement ideologies and activities and beliefs: punk rock, European integration, ethnic purity. And as Reilly notes, "apocalypse culture" thinking isn't active only in Western democracies: "Iran is a lively supporter of the overthrow of Colonel Gaddhafi. This may put them on the side of the angels (which angels we need not pause to consider), but such a policy is a little suicidal. The government of Iran is one step away from being decapitated by a flashmob." China and Russia, too, he argues.
What say you? Is this just a busy period in the news? Or is something more radical afoot? Is something slouching to Jerusalem to be born?
Discuss.
What is one to say about such a dismaying constellation of events? Well, one might ask what a substantial number of Wall Street Journal readers are asking, The Bible is Coming True. Anyone Notice?.
To that I would say no, it isn't, at least not in the sense that it would have been possible to use the Bible to forecast these meltdowns. On the other hand, for several decades now I have taken apocalyptic anxiety very seriously. It is an important historiographical marker. Whenever a society thinks the age is about to end, it is usually onto something, if not necessarily the something it supposes. Thus, one of the cultural indicators I follow most closely is The Rapture Index. I do not believe in the Pretribulation Rapture (as distinguished from the Rapture of the Parousia), but that is as good a numerical measure of societal disquiet as you are likely to find.
The commentary that appears on the website is an acquired taste. However, we may note the estimable webmaster Todd's remarks about recent changes to the traffic his site has been receiving. This was posted a week before the Japanese earthquake:If you think we might be a seeing a sharp rise in end-time activity, you would be correct. I've never seen a time when so many headlines are being ripped right from Bible prophecy. Over the past two months, Rapture Ready has had a 40-percent rise in its traffic load. A large portion of the hits come from thousands of people looking to see what Bible prophecy has to say about ongoing current events. Many of the key search subjects are related to earthquakes, the weather, the Middle East, and the economy... There is something very interesting about what is happening with the index now versus how it behaved in the past. A decade ago, the increases occurred in spikes.
The index would rocket up and then quickly fall back. Prophetic events would occur, then a low would follow. What we are seeing now is a relentless period of continuous activity.
Such sentiments are not confined to Christian chiliasts, of course, as we see here:In his fiery style, Ahmadinejad, showed his messianic beliefs Friday, saying the world was witnessing a revolution managed by Imam Mehdi, the 12 Shiite imam who disappeared as a five-year-old in the 10th century and who Shiites believe would return on the judgement day."The final move has begun. We are in the middle of a world revolution managed by this dear (12th Imam). A great awakening is unfolding. One can witness the hand of Imam in managing it," said Ahmadinejad, wearing his trademark jacket.
There might be parallels with these collapses in conventional thinking in our decade and the "apocalypse culture" of post-Tito Yugoslavia, when all the pieties and successes of the Socialist Federal Republic were gone and people were left to devise their own replacement ideologies and activities and beliefs: punk rock, European integration, ethnic purity. And as Reilly notes, "apocalypse culture" thinking isn't active only in Western democracies: "Iran is a lively supporter of the overthrow of Colonel Gaddhafi. This may put them on the side of the angels (which angels we need not pause to consider), but such a policy is a little suicidal. The government of Iran is one step away from being decapitated by a flashmob." China and Russia, too, he argues.
What say you? Is this just a busy period in the news? Or is something more radical afoot? Is something slouching to Jerusalem to be born?
Discuss.
