Millennialists through the ages have looked forward to the apocalyptic moment that will radically transform society into heaven on earth. They have delivered withering critiques of their own civilizations and promised both the impending annihilation to the forces of evil and the advent of a perfect society. And all their promises have invariably failed. We tend, therefore, to dismiss these prophets of doom and salvation as crackpots and madmen, and not surprisingly historians of our secular era have tended to underestimate their impact on our modern world. This book offers analysis of this wid ... More

Millennialists through the ages have looked forward to the apocalyptic moment that will radically transform society into heaven on earth. They have delivered withering critiques of their own civilizations and promised both the impending annihilation to the forces of evil and the advent of a perfect society. And all their promises have invariably failed. We tend, therefore, to dismiss these prophets of doom and salvation as crackpots and madmen, and not surprisingly historians of our secular era have tended to underestimate their impact on our modern world. This book offers analysis of this widely misunderstood phenomenon. This book shows that many events typically regarded as secular—including the French Revolution, Marxism, Bolshevism, Nazism—not only contain key millennialist elements, but follow the apocalyptic curve of enthusiastic launch, disappointment and re-entry into "“normal time. ” Indeed, as the book examines the explicit millennialism behind such recent events as the emergence of Global Jihad since 1979, it challenges the common notion that modern history is largely motivated by secular interests. By focusing on ten widely different case studies, none of which come from Judaism or Christianity, the book shows that millennialism is not only a cultural universal, but also an extremely adaptive social phenomenon that persists across the modern and post-modern divides. At the same time, the book also offers valuable insight into the social and psychological factors that drive such beliefs.