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COPYRIGHT 2004 Blackwell Publishers Ltd.
{God} may be preparing to confound our language, to jam our
communications, scatter our efforts, and judge us for our sin and rebellion against His Lordship. We are hearing from many sources that January 1, 2000, will be a fateful day in the history of the world --Jerry Falwell, Old Time Gospel Hour TV show. (qtd. in Kellner, "Secular")
IT IS PARADOXICAL THAT IN THE UNITED STATES--ONE OF THE MOST technologically advanced industrialized economies in the world today--a significant minority of the population are biblical literalists who contend that God created the heavens and the earth in six days, Jonah survived in the belly of a fish, and the world will be destroyed in a series of catastrophic events as foretold in the Bible (Bruce 1; Halsell; Mojtabai). Moreover, eschatological beliefs about the end of the world, while more pronounced among conservative Protestant Christians, pervade the wider cultural landscape. And as the new millennium approached, apocalypticism gained momentum. Televangelists such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, among other evangelical elites, warned that the Y2K computer problem was a likely omen that foreshadowed impending disaster. Pundits predicted that widespread computer failures could lead to massive disruptions ("chaos"), or even Armageddon, the final cataclysmic battle between good and evil portended in the Bible. Trusting that God would save his faithful remnant, born-again believers prepared for the possibility of societal collapse by hoarding food and water, stockpiling gold and cash, and acquiring handguns.
Premillennial tension is not a new phenomenon, of course, nor are fundamentalist fears about expanding technologies, reflecting deep-seated anxieties about modernity and secularization (Wuthnow, Restructuring; Marsden). However, what is intriguing about the responses to Y2K among evangelicals (1) and fundamentalists (2) is the extent to which a potential computer glitch heated up endtime speculation, and the actions taken by some prophecy believers in accordance with their convictions. Thus, the aptly named "millennium bug" had an unexpected side effect: exposing the pervasiveness of apocalyptic thinking in contemporary American society in the countdown to January 1, 2000 (Wojcik 3; Boyer x, 338-39).
Apocalyptic Nightmares/Millennialist Dreams
From the Greek meaning "veiled," an apocalypse initially referred to passages of text in which the events leading up to the Day of Judgment could be deciphered (Boyer 23). Over time, "apocalypse" came to connote "disaster," becoming a core tenet of eschatology (E. Weber 29). Biblical apocalypticism, derived from ancient Hebraic thought, is found primarily in the books of Daniel, Ezekiel, and Revelation. Moreover, "apocalypse" became associated with "millennium," the thousand-year period of peace and justice when Christ would return (parousia or "second coming") to reign over his earthly kingdom. Afterward, the dead would be resurrected and the Last Judgment unleashed (Cohn 24-25).
Although apocalypticism was rejected officially by the rabbinate, and later by the Catholic Church, biblical literalism regarding the endtimes survived in the folkways of both Jewish and Christian traditions (Cohn 23, 29; Luebbers; Wojcik). (3) Alongside eschatological visions of calamitous destruction, millenarism (4)--the view of salvation as collective, this-worldly, imminent, total, and miraculous--persisted, sparking movements from the Middle Ages onward (Cohn 13; Barkun, "Language" 159). (5) Promoted outside the sanction of clerical authority, popular belief in apocalypticism thrived, and in fact is part of America's founding myth. An avid student of biblical prophecy, Christopher Columbus interpreted his New World "discovery" as part of a divine script. And the Puritans, animated by the idea that they had been chosen by God to carve out a New Jerusalem in the wilderness, likewise held apocalyptic beliefs, striving to build a Godly society in anticipation of Christ's return (Wojcik 21).
During the second half of the nineteenth century and into the twentieth, postmillennial optimism about the progressive march of history toward a more just and humane society, linked to positive beliefs about modernity, lost ground against premillennial pessimism. In contrast with the reform movement of Social Gospellers that put social improvement above individual piety, premillennialists saw society as irreversibly evil. Interpreting social problems in light of apocalyptic prophecies, they focused on proselytizing and "soul saving" strategies (Smith 8). Thus, the dispute over the meaning of millennialism helped to fuel growing doctrinal divisions between liberal and conservative Protestants, out of which a fundamentalist movement emerged.
Popular belief in apocalypticism is commonly associated with evangelical ideas about premillennial dispensationalism, which gained currency at the Niagara Bible conferences beginning in 1875. Attributed to John Nelson Darby (1800-1882) and the Plymouth Brethren in Britain, dispensationalism was popularized in the United States by the urban revivalist Dwight L. Moody and enshrined in Cyrus Scofield's (1843-1921) Reference Bible (1909). Expecting Christ's return before the millennium, (6) they conceptualize history as a pattern of seven periods, or "dispensations," in which God's plan for salvation tests humankind. Because humanity repeatedly fails, each period ends in divine judgment and retribution: the expulsion from Eden (first era), the Flood (second), the Tower of Babel (third), and so on. The present Church Age (sixth) is likewise ill-fated, destined to end with the (imminent) Tribulation--a seven-year period of discord, destruction, and disaster--culminating in the Lord's return, triumph over the Antichrist and his minions at Armageddon, and millennial reign (Marsden 40; Boyer 87-88; Noll 376-78). Scofield's Bible, replete with dispensationalist commentary inscribed in the margins, remains popular among prophecy believers and is available today at Christian bookstores (Halsell 85-88; Wojcik 35; T. Weber 16-24). According to folklorist Daniel Wojcik, "{p}remillennial dispensationalism ... is the predominant form of popular apocalypticism in the United States today" (37).
Although most devotees are "pretribulationists" who expect to be divinely rescued or "Raptured" (7) (physically transported from earth) before the tumult, there are also mid-and posttribulationists (Clouse 415-17). The latter (a small minority) assume that they must suffer through the turbulence along with the unsaved. Adopting survivalist tactics, they create their own remotely located communities to wait out the seven-year storm (Barkun, "Language" 172, fn. 3). Whether pre-, mid-, or postoriented, tribulationists anticipate that Bible prophecy is being fulfilled in a literal sense (E. Weber 172). Thus, historical and current events are filtered through the interpretive lens of prophecy belief, recast, and situated as part of a divine drama. According to this worldview--running counter to modernity's optimism--society is irredeemably corrupt, destined to spiral downward into degeneracy, apostasy, and violence, and ultimately, annihilation (Marsden 41). Consequently, God's historical plan for a backslidden world demands a righteous purge of the planet before Christ's earthly reign can begin. It is little wonder, then, that believers remain alert for endtime signs, described in Matthew 24: 3-14 as wars, rumors of wars, pestilence, and disaster.
Of course, a preoccupation with eschatological signs is nothing new, nor is assigning a date for the world's end; history is filled with examples, along with corresponding disconfirmations. (8) What is surprising is that, in the United States, a highly modern society in many other respects, ancient ideas of apocalypticism and millennialism remain commonplace, according to leading scholars, while "Endism" accelerated in the run-up to 2000 (E. Weber 221-22; Boyer 337; Barkun, "Afterward" 352).
Y2K--An Endtime Sign?
The Y2K computer problem originated in the 1960s when programmers used two digits to designate a year, such as 65 for 1965. It was feared that some computers would misread 2000 when the rollover occurred, initiating a cascade of system failures that could disrupt services ("Read It and Weep"). The reaction among evangelicals to Y2K, inextricably linked to the calendrical millennium (as popularly conceived), was understandably mixed (McMinn; "Group Focuses"). According to their worldview, cataclysmic upheaval was expected, even necessary, as we have already seen, and yet many apparently found the prospect of "apocalypse now" unsettling.
Despite the highly publicized efforts of governments and businesses to correct the problem, the fears of many Americans were not assuaged....
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