The Millennium And The Market

Book Reviews by Conrad Goeringer

Questioning The Millennium, A Rationalist’s Guide To A Precisely Arbitrary Countdown, by Stephen Jay Gould (N.Y. Harmony Books, 1997)

End Time Visions, The Road To Armageddon? by Richard Abanes (N.Y., Four Walls Eight Windows, 1998)

Between Jesus And The Market, The Emotions That Matter In Right-Wing America, by Linda Kintz (Durham, Duke University Press, 1997)

The passage of time has a poignant significance for naturalist Stephen Jay Gould in his latest work, Questioning The Millennium: A Rationalist’s Guide To A Precisely Arbitrary Countdown. Gould, Professor of zoology and geology at Harvard and the author of provocative works such as The Panda’s Thumb and Dinosaur in a Haystack, has been fascinated by the subject of the millennium since, as a child during the 1950s, he began contemplating its approach. For moderns, the year 2000 has signified the future in popular culture, but it is also a temporal benchmark resonating with eschatological symbolism and meaning for a startling number of Christian fundamentalists and others. It can bring the return of Jesus, the End of the World, calamity and havoc, the arrival of benevolent (or marauding) aliens, a period of social collapse. The scenarios are abundant.

The millenarian spirit is a broad topic, and Gould wisely concentrates on a select dimension of this subject, namely, the cultural and mathematical aspects of “the millennium.” He explores how the biblical concept of the millennium, said to describe the thousand-year reign of Jesus on the earth as part of the Second Coming, metamorphosed into thousand-year segments of the human calendar. The calendar, of course, is part of our quest for meaning and sense of order in the universe; and as Gould informs us, there is a random element in all of this, though there are also rules which govern how we keep a record of time in order to make sense of anything! There is nothing special about the year 2000, and it is truly an arbitrary and capricious demarcation in that we can begin any calendric numbering system from any day or year - so long as those using it agree to the rules of its operation.

Gould begins by examining how the term millennium evolved away from its original eschatological sense in the two major biblical apocalyptic texts: Daniel in the Old Testament and Revelation in the New. While his accounts of how the modern calendar evolved and other temporal minutiae are fascinating, his claim that “the traditional Christian millennium is a future epoch that will last for one thousand years and end with the final battle and Last Judgment of all the dead,” is only partially accurate. The predominant view among modern fundamentalist Christians is a premillennialist position, wherein the faithful are to be transported to Heaven before the battle of Armageddon, and then return to earth to “rule and reign” with the Messiah. Gould is confusing the varieties of millennialists with the distinctions involving a somewhat different lens through which to view this whole matter - the question of the Tribulation. This period does not last a thousand years but rather involves a mere seven-year period of suffering. The sequence of events surrounding this Great Tribulation distinguishes still more eschatological camps, including pretribulationists and posttribulationists. Technically, the millennium refers to the thousand-year reign of the returned Christ on Earth. Gould neglects this and related crucial distinctions, but he redeems himself in providing readers with a compact summary throughout his work about how people in different times came to view the significance of this thousand-year period, the millennium. He skillfully links the apocalyptic millennium with the calendrical millennium and asks, “Has so much ever been based on so little?”

There is also a succinct discussion of that pesky eschatological problem, the six thousand years supposedly chronicled from the beginning accounts described in Genesis to the events foretold in Revelation. We have the late Bishop Usher to thank for this, a scheme which Gould rightly describes as “little more than an elaborate scholarly smoke screen for a preconceived conclusion.” By this account, Jesus was born in exactly Anno Mundi 4000, leaving us two thousand years until the apocryphal events of Revelation. There are myriad difficulties even if one accepts the validity of this scheme, however: slippage and mistakes in the calendric record, and recalculating generates dates such as October 23, 1996, as the Beginning of the End. Gould, also a baseball enthusiast, humorously links this to a “prominent miracle,” though not the sort anticipated by Pat Robertson or others. The New York Yankees, trailing 2-1 in the World Series with Atlanta, were down by a six-to-three score in the eighth inning, but managed to best the Braves in “one of the most miraculous and improbable come-backs in the history of sport.”

Gould’s levity and perspective on this whole tedious issue is refreshing, but Questioning The Millennium remains a book rich in content despite its brevity - only 190 pages. He discusses such topics as the differences involving lunar and solar calendric years, and why Chanukah shifts according to the machinations of the Metonic cycle (named after the Athenian astronomer Meton) which describes the shortest sequence of years that reconcile solar and lunar calendars. He closes by declaring his attraction to all of these questions, noting that “they display all our foibles in revealing miniature.” For an insightful look into humanity’s penchant for such details and how it all relates to the millennium, Gould’s offering is useful and informative.

Where Stephen Gould has focused his inquiry on a narrow but important segment of the whole millennialist discussion, one that becomes more appropriate as we barrel toward the year 2000, Richard Abanes has joined the ranks of the generalists in attacking the subject - linking together so many of its component ideas, movements, and themes. His account is an exhaustive one, covering such topics as the alleged prophecies of Nostradamus, the Millerite movement, the rise of Jehovah’s Witnesses and like groups, and even the millenarian aspects of the contemporary “patriot” and militia movements. His chapter on the Witnesses is especially illuminating. After briefly reconstructing the history of the sect, Abanes then displays side-by-side quotes from different editions of the group’s doctrinal texts, beginning with Studies in the Scriptures. The 1906 edition, for example, clearly states that the “Kingdom of God will be accomplished by the end of A.D. 1914" - obviously a clear failure of prophecy. The 1913 edition, however, displayed some reticence concerning that claim - promising its readers instead that the “Kingdom of God will be accomplished near the end of A.D. 1915.” Future leaders of the Jehovah’s Witnesses displayed similar flexibility in altering both the substance of their texts and the apocalyptic timetable they claimed to divine from biblical scriptures.

In contrast to other books which examine both contemporary and earlier apocalyptic movements, Abanes does more than take for granted the a priori foolishness of some of the outlandish claims of doom, death, and destruction which are so often a crucial part of the millenarian narrative. He has done his historical research, for instance, in gathering ample empirical evidence to refute any claims that there exist compelling “signs and wonders” that humanity is in the End Times. To those who argue, for instance, that AIDS is a prophesied epidemic of unprecedented proportions, Abanes tracks down both historical and medical evidence putting the claim in a more reasoned perspective. He quotes Professor Sten lwarson, and international authority on AIDS based in Gothenburg, Sweden, who reminds us:

AIDS is the most dangerous disease today, but as a pestilence it is limited to certain risk groups. AIDS cannot be compared to the Black Death or the Spanish Flu in which people died by the millions. The way of transmission is different, and society is different...

Mr. Abanes then uses a similar, exacting method in analyzing claims of famine. If modern doomsayers perceive “signs” that starvation in the world today is new and fulfills a biblical prophecy, they do so at the risk of ignoring a considerable body of contrary evidence, including past famines. Abanes documents over a dozen which are known to have occurred from approximately 3,500 BCE through our century. A famine in Wales, for instance, claimed so many lives that the earth “was covered with dead bodies of men and beasts.” Pat Robertson may see evidence of that today, but the Wales famine took place in 836 CE. These and other data support a compelling argument which Abanes drives home to the reader: the “signs” of calamity supposedly foretold in apocalyptic texts can be discovered throughout human history.

Like Gould’s work, End-Time Visions discusses “Usher’s Miscalculation,” though in perhaps less detail. Abanes concludes by including discussion on failed prophecy in our time, those inevitable predictions of doomsday by “pole shifts,” comet impact, UFO invasions, or other mechanisms. As he points out, all of this covers a wide range of the American pop-culture terrain, from claims by televangelists like Pat Robertson and Jack Van Impe to the equally lurid predictions of Louis Farrakhan and even new-age spiritual gurus. Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam, has spoken of his belief in (and visits to) UFOs, including an enormous “Mother Wheel” operated by an advanced race of black aliens. He predicted in 1991 that the Gulf War would be the “War of Armageddon,” and that same event, riveting attention on the Middle East, was accorded similar eschatological status by others as well.

If there is an overarching message in Abanes’ book, it is this: the enterprise of prophecy and sounding the alarm over an approaching Armageddon is an old and seemingly never-ending one. No amount of contrarian evidence can quench the thirst of those who are ensnared in its clutches; like so much religious belief, pseudoscience and pop-culture hokum, it possesses an incredible immunity to truth and rational discourse.

Abanes saves a critical gem for the appendix section of his work; and it is an invaluable piece of intellectual ammunition for any of us seeking to put a more sensible light on the whole discussion of the millennium. His “Timeline of Doom” is a wonderful chronology of ill-founded prophetic utterances, beginning with Clement in the first century CE, into our own era. William Miller attracted hundreds of thousands of followers in mid-nineteenth century America with his forecasts of an impending Final Judgment; but he was carrying on a tradition which included the likes of the Spanish monk Beatus, who in 798 CE prophesied the arrival of the antichrist in two years, or Joachim of Fiore who predicted the same event for the year 1260. Abanes has assembled a considerable list of similar prophetic faux pas for our own century: the Witnesses, Herbert W. Armstrong (founder of the Worldwide Church of God), even a “respected physician at Michigan State College” with the unlikely name of Charles Laughead all predicted imminent doom.

Richard Abanes is what might be called a “Christian-recovered-fundamentalist” who still embraces religious beliefs - but certainly not in the destructive and apocalyptic fashion he did as a former cult member. His religious credentials, though, should not discourage readers from perusing his carefully researched and well-written book.

Indirectly related to the subject of millennialist fervor is the cultural terrain explored by Between Jesus And The Market, The Emotions That Matter In Right-Wing America, by Linda Kintz, Professor of English at the University of Oregon (Durham, Duke University Press, 1997). This is a much-needed examination of the highly energetic Christian right-wing movements that in the past decade have defined so much political discourse from a psychological perspective. It is also a work that delves into the even less explored region, that of Christian women who, in seeming contradiction to their own feminist interest, have taken up the banner of an authoritarian and patriarchal ideology espoused by movements like the Promise Keepers. What Kintz tells us is that in order to comprehend this dynamic movement, we need first to set about obtaining not so much a philosophical comprehension of the theological underpinnings of this phenomenon, but more of an appreciation for “the emotions that matter.”

Kintz dissected the internal texts and other materials of groups like Concerned Women for America, Christian Coalition, and writings by a number of religious-right luminaries seeking a deeper understanding of how these narratives resonated with fundamental and deep-seated emotional biases. Her analysis, all 313 pages of it, demands focused consideration. At times, though, Kintz succumbs to the jargon encountered in the academy and in scholarly-press offerings, which threatens to numb the reader with a mind-deadening cant of terminology. What exactly is “the relation between a rich complexity of beliefs, on one hand, and the reductive clarity available from a structure of vaguely symmetrical layers, on the other”? This sort of prose repeats itself through the work, perhaps offending and discouraging a less patient audience.

Still, Kintz makes insightful and important points. Much of her work is really about the power relationships between men and women, beginning with “Sacred Intimacy,” and the writings of Beverly LaHaye of the group Concerned Women for America. LaHaye is certainly no stranger in the writings of books dealing with the modern religious right, but while these works, such as Sarah Diamond’s Spiritual Warfare concentrate on the political role played by women like LaHaye, mavens organizing their sisters against the progressive changes in modern society, Kintz digs deeper. “Sacred Intimacy” analyzes this “antifeminist reconstruction of motherhood” and links it to a specific definition and sense of the body - a belief that there is a biological destiny and, more important, that it is a special creative anointing from a god. What, essentially, the antifeminist religious right has done is to re-sanctify, to make sacred again, a whole cultural and sexual geography which has been changed by the rise of secular beliefs, attitudes, and institutions. It is not so much that LaHaye and her ideological compatriots have “taken back” motherhood in the classical sense - it was never “stolen,” only changed by an evolving culture - as they have linked it to a cosmic imperative from god and a specific religious and social agenda. And more: all of this has been identified with a particular vision and emphasis on the body. This is “body politics” at a near-primal level. Women are designed as part of a cosmic matrix by god - with a biological destiny. Alternatively, the gruesome depictions of abortion, stock-in-trade strategy for the anti-choice movement, dwell on the physicality and invasiveness of those procedures. Kintz later discusses the pro-life video The Silent Scream, where viewers witness the dichotomy between the “unborn child” as a “fully formed, absolutely identifiable human being” which is “moving quietly in its sanctuary” and the abortion procedure. Kintz notes that the latter employs “phantasmatic, apocalyptic images” where a fetus is “torn apart, dismembered, disarticulated, crushed, and destroyed by the unfeeling steel instruments of the abortionist.”

It is heady stuff, and it is only one small example of how the “emotions that matter” to so many who have enlisted on the side of righteousness in the culture-war battles are so passionately mobilized, even against their own apparent self-interests. These emotions drive so much of the culture-war discourse, tapping into a raw physicality that most of us on the other side of this ideological divide simply do not comprehend or sufficiently appreciate.

Gender also looms large in Between Jesus And The Market, which is crucial in understanding why the religious right is so furious and, indeed, fixated with the issues of homosexuality and the profound changes in the relationship between men and women. Kintz deconstructs the claims of George Gilder, a neoconservative theorist who, despite his “image as a cyberspace guru in the socially liberal world” of high tech and “Third Wave” economics, echoes a highly religious and traditionalist social agenda. In his book Sexual Suicide, for instance, Gilder declared the primacy of “the redemptive joys and crucial functions of marriage and family, the roots of human civilization.” As Kintz points out, such a claim assumes and demands “a logic of purity in which gender absolutes are recognized and revalorized, while mixtures of dialectical relationships are demonized, then forcibly eliminated.”

Any rational observer concludes that there are obvious and important differences involving sex. Fetal brains are awash in different hormonal baths during gestation. Obviously, these differences drive the process of human procreation, and they may affect our interactions and institutions in ways not readily obvious. But the notion that the “is” of sexual differentiation must dictate a cultural and political “ought” is truly a leap of faith, as well as a failure of logic - a naturalist fallacy.

Once that logical gap has been crossed (even on the shakiest of assumptions), however, anything becomes possible, as Kintz demonstrates. Hyperbolic claims can abound, when one is seeing culture and politics through the lens of a “gender war” that is tinted with religious overtones and even conspiracy paranoia. Again, making use of textual materials that are not readily known to most who disagree with the religious-right crusade, Kintz discusses her experiences at an April, 1992, meeting of Human Life International (HII) in Ottawa. Headed by Father Paul Marx, HII emulates the tactics of its American counterpart, Operation Rescue. While its concerns dwell on an issue involving the biological and medical options for women (and, on a deeper level, the taboo area of feminine psychology and the reproductive process), the leadership and participation is heavily male. It is also a ground for demonization. Father Marx sees a social universe populated by villains: “The enemies of life and family are always the same: feminists, Freemasons, Communists, secular humanists, and the ubiquitous International Planned Parenthood Federation.” This reminds us of a similar rhetoric espoused by Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson in his offerings, such as “The New World Order.” Father Marx employs “an anti-Semitic subtext of such conspiracy [which] then becomes much more overt.” Robertson has done the same, drawing on classical anti-Semitic conspiracy sources, but deftly masquerading his cast of villains behind somewhat more respectable labels.

If there is a shortcoming in this book, it is Kintz’s problematic understanding of economics and the agora. Her attempts to link these more primal attitudes concerning gender, sexuality, and religious discourse with the dynamics of the marketplace fall short in chapters like “Riding the Entrepreneurial Frontier,” or trying to bond the ideology of Newt Gingrich, Arianna Huffington, or even Rush Limbaugh to the “logic of the market.” It’s quite true that most social conservatives embrace a form of market capitalism; but one can argue with equal force that the rise of consumerist culture with its giddy preoccupation with material indulgence and the “here and now” has both reinforced and eroded traditional modes of social organization. Industrial capitalism was the death knell of the feudal world with all of its stagnation and religiously rooted oppression, a fact obvious to thinkers as diverse as Bastiat and Marx. It eroded the power of the aristocracy and church, while simultaneously creating new elites. A global, consumerist economy brings with it the promise of similar widespread and problematic disruptions. Pat Buchanan is as skeptical about NAFTA or other globalist projects as are religious and government interests in, say, the Middle East who fear the intrusion of westernized pop-culture and, with it, a myriad of subtle messages and novel modes of thought. Free expression, anyone?

While tedious and very complex at times, Linda Kintz’s book is worth the read. The research background and bibliography is considerable, and many of her source texts have remained largely unexamined by academic critics. It is too easy to dismiss the religious right or groups such as the Promise Keepers as “extremists” or “crank fundamentalists” without understanding the profound roots and motivations which anchor them. In this case, Between Jesus And The Market begins to provide us badly needed insight into those emotions that do indeed matter in the right-wing America of our time.