The Little Book of the End of the World (7 page)

Most of the Muslim beliefs about Jesus (or ‘Isa’) portray Jesus as the right hand of Mahdi and therefore instrumental in the events of the Endtimes.

Mahdi himself is not explicitly mentioned in the Quran, but is revered throughout the Muslim tradition. Like the Messiah, there are different beliefs as to how and when Mahdi
will appear, whether he will be born of humanity like Jesus, or if he will descend from Heaven alongside Jesus’ Second Coming.

THE FORCES OF EVIL

Just as the classical religions and mythologies pitted gods against each other, giving enemies to our heroes and saviours, the Abrahamic religions have done the same thing.

In fact, most of these enemies are descended from the gods of ancient religions, being the embodiments of some natural event that mankind doesn’t fully comprehend. In other cases, this evil is the embodiment of some sin, attempting to corrupt humanity.

With these enemies in mind, the idea of an Antichrist was born, a figure that will stand against the Messiah and saviour. Different religions have different interpretations of the Antichrist, from a sinister evil to a simple nuisance, but he is a common figure throughout Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Christians, Jews and Muslims believe that all things were created by God, who continues to have power over all things: evil becomes a complicated concept, something that was once affiliated with God but is now a force or an individual that works against God’s will.

Like the Messiah, the different versions of the Antichrist have been coloured by politics and location. In some cases, the Antichrist is a false Messiah who will corrupt humanity and lead them astray, taking a back seat in the final events of the Apocalypse; others describe him as a Man of Sin with unnatural powers who will be brought into direct conflict with the Messiah.

This vision of the Antichrist is unique to the religions we have been discussing: typically, evil beings in other religions were simply a misunderstood god of mischief, a monster or beast, or a force or energy that runs through all things. This form of the Antichrist is, instead, a physical entity that is as connected to humanity as the Messiah himself: he is a figure to be both feared and revered, whether his role is an active one or one of more subtle corruption.

Most visions of the End of the World incorporate the Antichrist or a similar evil force: if the Messiah is to arrive in order to save humanity from evil, it makes some sense that this evil might be the Antichrist. As some Churches look for signs of the Second Coming as the trigger for the Endtimes, others suggest that the Antichrist will arrive first, becoming the reason for the Messiah’s necessary return.

The Abrahamic religions have a host of enemy-like figures to stand alongside the Antichrist in opposition to God, with the Bible openly acknowledging demons as enemies of Heaven. Through miracles, Jesus and the saints have faced these demons, casting them out of human bodies.

There are some encounters within the Bible which suggest that these demons exist in great numbers and cannot be simply overcome by prayer alone. During one such exorcism conducted by Jesus among the Gerasenes, a demon confronts Jesus directly, suggesting that its name is ‘Legion’, because it is one of many.

Various writers have attempted to examine the Bible and other religious texts in order to discover more about these demons – the results have been terrifying.

Johann Weyer, Alphonso de Spina and Gregory of Nyssa have all suggested that there are actually millions of demons, operating in a complex hierarchy that involves dukes and generals. These same writers suggest that some of these demons were once agents of God, fallen angels who were cast out after rebelling against Him.

The leader of these fallen angels has given us a name that has become synonymous with the Antichrist, while suggesting some much darker evil: Satan.

Satan and Lucifer

Lucifer and Satan are words used throughout the Bible to refer to the same person, the most active of the fallen angels and the one who has since become associated with the figure of the Antichrist. The Devil is treated as the chief of the demons of Hell, and therefore a force of evil that will rival God. Typically, these are discussed in the same breath, with the fallen angel of Satan having taken on the identity of the Devil after falling from God’s favour.

There are many different stories about the fall of these angels. Fictional accounts such as John Milton’s epic poem
Paradise Lost
paint Lucifer as a proud character who has much in common with the tragic heroes of Shakespearean and Greek tragedy. However, within the Bible, Satan’s villainy is a lot more obvious, and he is an active corrupting force of humanity in both the Old and New Testaments.

In the Old Testament, Satan appears in the Garden of Eden, taking the form of a snake to urge Adam and Eve towards sin. The duo challenge God’s authority by eating the fruit of a forbidden tree and are cast out of Eden, condemning their descendants, humanity itself, to forever be haunted by Original Sin. Satan also appears to Jesus directly in the Gospel, tempting him during the forty days and nights of solitude that he spends in the desert. As Jesus prepares to accept his fate as the Son of God and preach, Satan’s manipulations are more subtle as he encourages Jesus to use his divine nature to escape his self-imposed fast.

While Satan is often mentioned in the same breath as the Antichrist, there are many interpretations of the Bible that make sure to treat both of these individuals separately; in fact, the Book of Revelations, the main source for Christian thoughts on the End of the World, mentions multiple distinct beasts and enemies during the End of Days. There is little doubt that Satan and the Antichrist will be in league, but attributing their evil to one figure alone implies that they will be individually more powerful than the Bible suggests.

In some places, Satan is called Lucifer, although this adds some complications to the concept of Satan as an ‘evil’ figure as the name Lucifer has not always been treated as an evil name in Christian thought.

Lucifer of Cagliari was a fourth-century bishop in Sardinia, Italy, and even though the Church does not recognise him as a saint, the locals nonetheless refer to him as Saint Lucifer.

Lucifer is also called the Morning Star, or Lightbringer, a figure associated with the planet Venus and the sun itself. The stories of the fallen angels, with Lucifer at their head, could actually be a reference to the worship of false gods, with the God of the Abrahamic religions displacing the sun gods of pagan mythology. This interpretation acknowledges some importance for these gods: rather than dismissing them completely, they become fallen angels who were doomed to fall through their own pride, only to be replaced by God directly.

The Antichrist in Judaism

Because the Jewish Messiah is yet to arrive, Judaism does not recognise an Antichrist as a rival to Jesus. Instead, the Antichrist is any one of the many false prophets, or
pseudochristos
, who will distract humanity and lead them astray from the path of the true Messiah. It is possible that the word ‘Antichrist’ has been created by an error in translating this word, adopting some of the other negative elements in the process.

In Jewish belief, Jesus would actually fulfil the role of a
pseudochristos
, or Antichrist, in that he is seen as a false Messiah.

There are still references throughout Jewish texts from the Middle Ages to an evil figure, a king and leader called Armilius who would be born of the union between Satan and a virgin. Armilius would rise to become a king, coming into conflict with the Jewish Messiah. Since Armilius is missing from the Bible and other canonical texts, he is not accepted as a legitimate Antichrist figure and may even have been used as a metaphor for Jesus in antichristian propaganda.

The Antichrist in Islam

Contrary to Judaism, the Antichrist plays a very specific role in the Endtimes of Islamic beliefs, although his origins are closer to the Jewish
pseudochristos
than Satan or the Devil.

The Muslim Antichrist is named Al-Masih ad-Dajjall, literally meaning ‘false prophet’ or ‘deceiver’, and he is the last in a line of thirty such deceivers. He has no right eye, and his left eye sparkles like a star.

The coming of the Dajjall coincides with a period of decadence amongst society when governments become corrupt and prayers are no longer spoken. The Dajjall becomes the leader of these corrupt forces until he comes up against Jesus and Mahdi
.
In fact, in some schools of Muslim belief, it is Jesus, not Mahdi, who is ultimately victorious over Dajjall.

6

THE BOOK OF REVELATIONS

With all the similarities between the Abrahamic religions, there is little truly unique to the Christian Apocalypse; however, the size and breadth of the numbers practising Christianity has meant that this Christian flavour to the End of the World has become the most pervasive and lasting. This vision has also become the easiest to adopt and manipulate by other sources, creating no end of movies, books and other media that attempt to portray the End of the World. This uniquely Christian version of the Endtimes mostly comes from the Book of Revelations, the last book of the New Testament. This is the book that lends us the word apocalypse, linking the word forever with the world-ending events that the book describes.

Although the Book of Revelations provides a near-complete resource in Christian eschatology, the imagery found within is actually collected from other sources: some elements of Revelations make it a sequel to the Old Testament’s Book of Daniel, with this book expanding on some references and adding much more detail.

The Book of Revelations takes the form of a dream and a possible series of events that lead to the End of Days. However, because the book highlights its own nature, calling attention to the dream within it, it has led to many different interpretations, with different Churches and beliefs responding to the book in different ways.

With all these different interpretations, little about the Book of Revelations can be taken at face value and trusted, although there are still people who read the book as a literal guide to how the End of the World will come about. The imagery and events described in the book have taken on a life of their own, discussed outside of a religious context and taking on meanings to people who would not identify themselves as Christian.

The writer of the Book of Revelations identifies himself as John, with some theologians thinking that this is the evangelist of the same name, one of Jesus’ Twelve Apostles and writer of the Gospel of John. However, John was a common name during this time, with many taking the name in honour of either the Apostle or John the Baptist.

John’s dream describes the many tribulations that will come in the End of Days, outlining what will happen to both those who remain faithful to God and those who rise up as enemies. Revelations also collects some of the Bible’s most explicit references to an enemy of God, discussing several beasts that are linked to Satan, the Devil and the Antichrist:

  A dragon with seven heads who throws the stars to the Earth, and is revealed to be Satan.

  A seven-headed leopard – that the dragon gives power to – emerges from the sea and blasphemes against God.