Handy Definitions

eschatology: concerned with the end.

apocalypse: the catastrophic destruction of the world or current society.

millennium: the utopian age that begins once this world has ended.

millenarian, millenialist: includes the belief that the destruction of this world will bring about a better time, apocalypse with a compensation.

tribulations: the really bad things that occur during the apocalypse, outlined in Matthew 24: 1-51, and elsewhere; obviously, they include things about wars and false prophets and blood red seas and all the salient images that stay in one's imagination.

fatalism: all events are determined ahead of time and therefore are unalterable.

rapture: faithful believers will be summoned to Heaven; this is scheduled to occur either before, during, or after the tribulations of the apocalypse, depending on interpretation. The doctrine of the rapture is credited to 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17. Those faithful who have died previously to Christ's return will rise from their graves, and those faithful still living will be swept up to heaven without dying. Literal interpretations of the rapture (like those of Seventh Day Adventists or Hal Lindsey) have people literally being swept into the air like they were beamed up by Scotty, leaving un-piloted cars to careen off the road and possibly being separated from their not-so-faithful loved ones.

Why Apocalypse

Stories about the end of the world are included in almost every major system of belief that has ever existed, from Ovid's Metamorphoses to Native American mythology.

In traditional religious versions of the apocalypse, the end of the world was always redemptive in that it would usher in the utopian postapocalyptic millennium. Recently, or since the atomic age started, secular apocalyptic groups have become widespread. These groups don't see any divine intervention required to bring about the end, and often do not include an element of redemption. For these groups, the apocalypse is truly frightening, for it is just meaningless destruction. The form of this apocalypse is often nuclear, although pestilence has become more popular since AIDS, and even more so with theories of super viruses, like Ebola, emerging from the jungles.

An important distinction in the terminology is the difference between a millenarian or millennialist group, and an apocalyptic group. For our purposes here, apocalyptic groups are any groups which believe in the imminent end of the world or current society. Millenarians are apocalyptic, but more so, they believe in a meaningful end of the world which will be followed by a utopian period. All (or nearly all, I can't anticipate every exception) religious apocalyptic groups are millenarian. Secular groups can go either way.

Religious Apocalyptic Groups


Neo-postmillenialists
The George W. Bushes and Pat Robertsons of the world, neo-postmillenialists believe that before the Second Coming, the good (George W. Bush, Pat Robertson) must purify the world. Christ will not return until the faithful have set the stage through the preaching of the Gospel. Postmillenialism is usually the cause for things like bombing abortion clinics. If the stakes are high enough -- for example, ushering in the millennium and preparing to receive the second coming of Christ -- you might be willing to do just about anything.

Fundamentalist Premillennialism
All apocalyptic thinking requires some form of fatalism, but premillenialists have it bad. To the premillenialist, there is no use fighting against the sins of the world because the Antichrist will be along soon enough to make everything worse. Premillenialists believe that Christ will return suddenly and without warning, therefore, they must constantly be on their best behavior. But unlike postmillenialism, there is little a premillenialist can do to prepare for the Second Coming, which will come when it comes, regardless of the efforts of man.

Pretribulationists
The tribulations are the horrible trials that the world will be put through in the time of the Antichrist and the events leading up to the end of the world (see Matthew 24 for a basic account). Pretribulationists believe that they will be summoned to heaven before the tribulations, leaving the sinners to suffer the apocalypse alone, while the faithful will be returned afterwards to live in the millennium.

Posttribulationists
As the name suggests, posttribulationists believe they will need to suffer the tribulations along with everyone else, and that the rapture will only occur after Christ has returned. The belief that you might need to suffer "great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be" (Matt. 24:15–21), can lead to all kinds of fun stuff, like those guys holed up in bunkers in Montana.

Midtribulationsits
Midtribulationists believe they will have to endure part of the tribulations, so they also emphasize survivalism and preparedness. The Branch Davidians at Waco were midtribulationsist and they saw the federal agents raiding their compound as part of the tribulations they would need to endure.

Left-Wing Catholic Liberation Theology
Much like the neo-postmillenialist Protestants in this country, Catholic Liberation Theology seeks to actively build a more perfect kingdom on Earth, and in turn, either guarantee their place among the saved, or create conditions for the return of Christ. The obvious difference, of course, is that Liberation Theology comes from the left wing, interpreting Gospel to demand that the Church involve itself in the struggle for political and economic justice. Liberation Theology started in the 1960s and had since been criticized by both Catholics and Protestants as being Marxist.


Secular Apocalyptic Groups

Earth First! Version 1
An apocalyptic environmental group, the original Earth First!ers had at their core a philosophy known as "deep ecology," which is a biocentric philosophy. According to deep ecology, it is life-as-such which is important, not human life. The idea that humans are detrimental to biodiversity and the earth itself is the outcome of deep ecology. The apocalyptic Earth First!ers are dedicated not to preventing an apocalypse, but to preserving enough American wilderness so that biodiversity can be restored after humans have been wiped out.

Earth First! Version 2
Millenarian Earth First!ers also think that an environmental catastrophe is unaviodable, but they value human life as special and do not fall into biocentricism. Their charge, as they see it, is to usher in the end of these corporate/industrial times by educating people so they will be able to inherit the millennium and live in harmony with nature.

Nuclear Apocalypse
The vocabulary of apocalypse may change, but the ideas and themes are suprisingly solid. Cold War fears of nuclear apocalypse found their ways into the traditional form of the religious apocalypse: Christian doctrine allows that God may will man-made weapons to destroy the world. But there are also non-religious nuclear fears, which have split into predictable categories of non-redemptive apocalypse and millenarianism. For example, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament's mission statement announces, "CND campaigns nonviolently to rid the world of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction and to create genuine security for future generations." This is an obvious postmillenialist view: through the actions of a select few (the CND) humanity will be purified enough to usher in the new millennium, one of "genuine security for future generations."

Of course, on the other side are the people convinced that nuclear annihilation is inevitable and we are all fucked, or that only those with bunkers and bottled water will be able to survive it.

An interesting side note about nuclear apocalypse is the millennialist views of the characters in Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove. Once the activation of the Doomsday Machine was imminent, the president, his staff, and Dr. Strangelove are holed up in the war room, and Strangelove suggests that this might not be such a bad thing. He then outlines a view of the postapocalyptic millennium in which they are living in underground bunkers with scores of women, and their only job is to breed, and breed as fast as they can. While Strangelove himself seems content with his future as Stud of Mankind, this vision of the millennium could also be considered less than utopian. For some, global nuclear war will certainly usher in a new age, although this new age will be totally dystopian.

Christian Identity
By far the most ridiculous group in this list, Christian Identity followers believe that Aryans are the chosen people, the direct descendants of the Tribes of Israel, and that Jews are the direct descendants of Satan, having their origin in Satan's seduction of Eve. With roots in both religion and genetic theory, Christian Identity members come from a collection of different religions, with no central leadership within one specific church. In their view, the apocalypse will come when the Aryans engage in the final race war against the Jews and all other non-Aryan races. Christian Identity is a premillenialist group, who, like the Protestant Fundamentalists, see the apocalypse as imminent. But they are unique in seeing the eschaton in terms of race, not in terms of faith. This is why I have grouped them with secular groups: aside from some mythology which coincides with the Bible, they are fundamentally a racial group.