Apocalypse

In popular usage, the word apocalypse refers to a cataclysmic event that results in the devastation or utter destruction of humanity. However, the technical use of the term is reserved for a genre (or type) of literature found in the biblically based religious traditions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam). Examples of this literature surface in times of anxiety, when a community is experiencing great change or persecution. [Page 11]The authors use evocative imagery and stock literary techniques to encourage their readers to remain true to the faith as the day will soon come when God will intervene and restore order. On that day the faithful will be rewarded, and the wicked will be punished.

Apocalypses receive their name from the Revelation (apokalypsis in Greek) of John, found in the Christian New Testament. However, the Revelation of John is not the only apocalypse, nor is it the first. Scholars who seek the origins of apocalyptic literature look to the writings of two sixth-century B.C.E. Jewish prophets: Ezekiel and Zechariah. Writing at the time of the Babylonian Exile (587–538 B.C.E.), when the Jerusalem Temple had been destroyed and many of the residents of Judah (southern Israel) had been deported to Babylon, the authors of these texts describe ecstatic visions in which they are transported to the throne of God and shown that the current tribulations will end and Israel will be restored to peace and prosperity. The Judahites were indeed returned to their homeland.

In the second century B.C.E., writers drew upon the techniques of Ezekiel and Zechariah to describe new visions to provide hope for their readers. The book of Daniel and the noncanonical 1 Enoch, both written in response to attacks on Jewish culture by the Syrian king Antiochus IV Epiphanes (ca. 175–164 B.C.E.), are the first true apocalypses. These texts are similar in form to Ezekiel and Zechariah but include additional literary techniques that are used in later apocalyptic texts such as Revelation. These techniques include pseudonymous authorship (the visionary, and thus the narrator of the text is a legendary figure of the past); an other-worldly journey (the visionary is taken on a journey through the heavens and/or to the throne of God); an overview of history (from the beginning of time to the period of the visionary, followed by detailed “prophecies” of the recent past from the visionary's time to the time of the book's composition, and then a set of ambiguous prophecies of the real author's own future); eschatology (descriptions of the “end time” when God will destroy the author's and his community's enemies and bring about a new age of peace and prosperity); elaborate imagery (angels and demons proliferate, and various kings and kingdoms are represented symbolically as composite beasts); and a promise of personal salvation (those among the community who have died will be rewarded for their faith in the afterlife). All of these techniques, though often misunderstood by modern readers, can be found in other literature of antiquity. Their general use, then, ensured that readers of the time would be able to “de-code” an apocalypse, and see in it a plea to remain faithful until the time when God will bring an end to the current tribulation.

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