The ideas held by different nations as to the future of the human race and the world are only imperfectly known to us. It would, of course. be quite wrong to suppose that such notions have been cherished only where we are fortunate enough to have testimony as to their existence, or that they have held a place in the life of na tions proportionate to their prominence in such literary remains or other accounts as we may possess. But certain inferences can be drawn from the type of eschatological thought that comes to view. When the belief in a coining destruction of the world by a fire or a flood is found among uncivilized tribes in the Pacific, or American aborigines, it is not likely that it origi nated in astronomical speculation, but rather that it was engendered by some terrifying experi ence of the past. Though the medium through which the accounts have conic makes them some what doubtful, it is not impossible that the Spaniards found in Central America the belief in the coining of a white conqueror. if so. the history of the great American civilizations had prepared men for the possibility of the overthrow even of an ancient kingdom, and this apprehen sion had been fused with the vague rumor of white inen who had once settled in the New World. The notion of four great periods of the world, each lasting hundreds of years and end ing in a universal conflagration, also presup poses a longer historic development. The re markable stability of the Chinese Empire and the practical disposition of its people preclude the development of a flourishing eschatology. On the other hand, the brooding genius of India can's little for political independence• and is too deeply impressed with the infinite to have its attention absorbed by possible cat a st roph ie changes in the world. There are no last things to elahn enthusiastic interest in a pantheistic philosophy that sees in every form of life a manifestation of the divine. But the infinite stretches of divine sway are divided into periods; and those ko/pos or epochs give an eschatolog ical perspective. in the main, however, it is the future of the individual only that occupies the mind of Brahmin and Buddhist alike. Quite different was the attitude of the ancient Iranians. Those who adopted the teachings of Zarathnshtra seem early to have developed the simple notion of a coming destruction of the world by fire into the idea of a great moral ordeal. As an i»di vidual may prove the truth of his religion by undergoing an ordeal of fire, so at the end of the world the worshipers of the lord Mazda will he distinguished from all others by successfully enduring the ordeal of molten metal, and the good will then be recompensed. This conception is found in the Gathas, the earliest part of the Avestan literature. It is not certain that the idea of a resurrection from the dead goes back to the period represented by the Gathas. But Herodotus seems to have heard of such a Per sian conception in the fifth century B.C., and Theopompus, the historian of Philip of Mace donia, described it as a Mazdayasnian doctrine in the fourth century B.C., in a work of which excerpts have been preserved by Diogenes 1-ftertius and _Eneas of Gaza. Whether the resurrection was already at that time connected with the com ing of the Saoshyant is uncertain. In the later Avesta it is distinctly the work of the Saoshyant to raise the dead. A final revelation of charac ter, a brief period of punishment in a hell, and an ultimate restoration of all to blessedness, are here assumed. Characteristic of Mazdaism is the idea of a gradual evolution toward a rational and moral end, and of the preparation for this end by the work of the faithful. The world is conceived as lasting 12.000 years. The appear ance of Zarathushtra falls at the beginning of the last quarter, and at each of the following millenniums one of the three sons of Zarathushtra is horn, the last of these being Astvate•eta, the `restorer of the bodies,' or Saoshyant, `the sa vior.' This savior has no political character. After the final conquest of the serpent, Azi Dahaka, the reign of immortality begins. Dur ing the period in which the native religion was suppressed and gradually crowded out of its home by Islam, the hope of the persecuted turned to the future, as the apocalyptic sketches in the Pahlavi literature show, and the return of the old King Kai Khosru was ardently desired. The Homeric poems and flesiod show how the Greek mind occupied itself with the soul's fu ture in the Elysian fields or the darker realms of Hades. Through the Orphie and Eleusinian cults this thought was deepened, and the Chris• lion doctrines of heaven (q.v.) and hell (q.v.) are largely due to Greek speculation. That the future of nations and the world also played an important ride in Greek thought is evident from the prophecies of the Sibyls. For while the orig inal Sibylline Oracles have not been preserved, the references to them by lIeraclitus and Plato reveal their character, and this is also indicated by the imitations in our present Sibylline Gra des. The same source betrays the esehatological thought of the Romans. Sonic details of Vergil's description of the Golden Age may indeed have borrowed from our Pseudo-Sibyl, herself reminiscent of but it is quite likely that the conception itself goes back to a genuine Roman origin. An eschatological mood domi nates the epoch ushered in by Alexander's con quests, and Gr•en-Boman thought is fused with Oriental speculation in the outlook upon the world's future as in other respects. In a similar manner. the Scandinavian idea of a destruction of the earth by fire and its subsequent renovation under higher heavens, to be peopled by the de scendants of Lif and Lift racer, as set forth in ViAuspa, no doubt reflects a primitive Germanic conception. Even the twilight of the gods may have belonged to the original myth. But the picture has unquestionably been retouched by Christian Among the Semitic nations, none has probably contributed more largely to the common stock of later eschatological material than the people of ancient Babylonia. Their creation myth and astrology, based on careful observations of the celestial bodies, furnished events to be expected and foretold when times and seasons might be looked for. Nevertheless, such of their literary remains as have been discovered and examined do not permit us to determine what the Baby lonians themselves thought of the world's future. It is among peoples to some extent dependent upon their civilization that we find the Marduk-Tiamat myth transferred from the beginning to the end of the world, and the millennial periods of the world's course elaborated. In early Israel the 'Day of Yahweh' was a clay of battle deciding the for tunes of a people. If the masses looked forward to it as a day of deliverance and victory, men like Amos and Hosea, Isaiah and Micah, Zeph aniah and Jeremiah feared that, the moral con ditions being what. they were, the advance of Assyria would bring destruction, complete or well-nigh complete, to Israel and Judah. They were prophets of doom. To one of the greatest among them, Jeremiah, this solemn forecast of coming judgment was the criterion of true proph ethood. In later times, the books containing their oracles were interpolated with prophecies of coming prosperity, which neither reflect their moral attitude nor are in harmony with their historic circumstances. But they are themselves significant signs of the expansion of eschatolog ical hopes. The establishment of the Achmeme Man Empire aroused among the Jews expecta tions of a return from Babylon, the restoration of the Temple, and improved social conditions, as Isaiah xl.-xlviii. indicates. During the numer ous insurrections that marked the beginning of the reign of Darius 1Tystaspes, and Zechariah fanned the hopes of Judean independence under a descendant of the old Davidic house, the present Governor of Judaea. Zerubbabel (q.v.) ; and Jeremiah (xxx., xxxi.) apparently shows that this hope still lived after the death of Zerub babel and found new nourishment in the great conflict between Persia and Greece. Alexander's phenomenal career, widening the horizons of men, inspired in Juthea, as elsewhere, serious thoughts concerning the destiny of nations. But the strongest impulses to eschatological speculation were furnished by the religious persecution under Antiochus IV. Epiphanes, and the Maecabean revolt. The book of Daniel, written B.C. 165, voices the hope that the kingdom of the world will be given to the saints of the Nest High—i.e. the Jewish people. Its celestial representative, probably 'Michael. after the destruction of the beast representing the Greek kingdom. comes with the clouds and receives the empire of the world. There is no Messiah in this apocalypse.
The first distinct appearance of this deliverer and king is in the Psalms of Solomon, written soon after the conquest of Palestine by Pompey, in B.C. 63. (See MF.ssiau.) During the century that lay between the Maccabean uprising and the final loss of independence to the Romans, the eschatological hopes centred upon the Asmonmean princes, by whom the conquest of the world was expected. as many a psalm in the Psalter testi fies. The longing for a descendant of the Davidic linc who would break the Roman yoke, establish the empire of the Jews, and rule as a righteous king over the subject nations. grew strong enough in the first century of our era to cause the rebel lion that in Atm. 70 led to the destruction of When Jesus proclaimed the cooling of the kingdom of heaven, it is natural therefore that, in spite of llis disavowal, Ile should be understood by sonic to be a claimant to the king ship of the Jews. Attracted by His wonderful personality, from love of Him and faith in the prophetic word. 11 is disciples were filled with the conviction that Ile would return as the Messiah upon the clouds of heaven. Apocalyptic writings, such as Fourth Ezra (see EsnaA S, BOOKS OF), Enoch xxxvii.-1xxi. (see Exocii, BOOK OF ) and the Jewish originals utilized and expanded in Matthew xxiv. (Mark xiii., Luke xxi.) and the Revelation of John, show that even in circles where the hopes of the future did not attach themselves to the personality of Jesus, the Messianic idea grew more and more transcendent. It is not probable, however, that the final judg ment and the raising of the dead were ever eon (pivot] by an adherent of the Jewish faith as functions of the _Messiah. While on many points the eschatological ideas of the early Church were far from being fixed, it seems to have been quite generally believed that the end of the world was approaching; that it would be heralded by an gelic trumpet-blasts and ushered in by the de scent of Jesus as the Messiah from heaven to establish His kingdom ; that the living saints would then be translated and the dead in Christ raised to reign with for a thousand years; and that after the final conflict with evil the list judgment would be held, the present world would be destroyed by fire, and there A'ould be a new heaven and a new earth in which righteous ness should dwell. As Christianity spread, through missionary activity or military con quests, the kingdom of God was identified with the Church, the doctrine of the millennium was largely abandoned. and esehatology occupied it self chiefly with the future of the individual in heaven, pnrgatory, or hell. The great creeds of Christendom, however, affirmed the belief in a return of the Son of God to judge the quick and the dead, and a resurrection of the just and the unjust. There does not seem to be sufficient docu mentary evidence to support the general assump tion that about the year A.D. I000 there was a widespread belief in the impending end of the world. But the famous hymn, leaves no doubt either as to the eschatological mood of medimeval Christianity or as regards the source whence it was nourished. And of this there is testimony in the numerous apoca lypses that grew up. It is natural that the bibli cal language concerning the millennium in Revela tion xx. and the destruction of the world by fire in II. Peter should have occupied many minds. The more radical religious movement of the Renaissance period was strongly impregnated with esehatological thought. In the Baptist and anti-Trinitarian churches ardent expectations of the establishment of the kingdom of heaven on earth went hand in hand with the rejection of sacramental magic, devil, and hell. and practical attempts at founding a new social order, with hopes for the ultimate restoration of all souls after a period of unconscious sleep or limited punishment. In the great Lutheran, Anglican, and Reformed churches the rejection of the doc trine of a purgatory and of the intercession of the Virgin and the saints fixed man's destiny ir revocably at death, and therefore tended to ren der the closing scenes of judgment and resurree tion of less practical importance, to eliminate the pre-millennial coming of Christ. and to make the millennium the result of a long-continued development of Christian life. By an allegorical method of interpretation the natural import of biblical language was lost and scriptural sup port found for the new outlook upon the future. Since the days of the French Revolution and the career of Napoleon there have been repeated out bursts of eschatological enthusiasm. Where the reaction against allegorical interpretation has not led to the adoption of a historico-eritieal method, the belief that all biblical prophecies will be fulfilled has engendered an ingenious sys tem of exegesis by which the things expected by the Jews of the Maceabean period or the early Christians to occur in their own lifetime are transferred to the interpreter's own immediate future, sonic starting-point for the new cycle of fulfillments being arbitrarily chosen. Thus, an independent eschatological speculation not unlike that of old may flourish under cover of biblical authority, and keep alive the expectation of im pending judgment upon sin and fundamental changes in man's life and the interpretation of history in the light of eternal purposes.
Islam adopted from Judaism and Christianity the doctrines of a coining judgment, a resurrec tion of the dead, and everlasting punishments and rewards. Later contact with Persian thought greatly enriched its eschatology. Especially im portant was the thought of a reincarnation of some great representative in the past of Allah or Ilis prophets. Again and again the world of Islam has been stirred by the expectation of some Imam or Mandi to reveal more fully the truth or to lead the faithful into a better social condi tion on earth. Iran and Africa have been most fertile in such movements.
In modern Judaism the return of Tsrael to its land. the coming of the Messiah. the resurrec tion of the dead, and everlating retribution are still expected by the orthodox, while liberals look upon Israel's mission as connected with the regeneration of the race, and hope for an immortal life independent of the resuscitation of the body.
The criterion of exact science is its eapaeity to predict future things. In this lies to a lnrge ex tent the convincing force of astronomical theories through which our modern estimate of the uni verse has been •hielly formed. A science that un failingly foretells future events furnishes a new eschatology by suggesting that the earth's. life is but an episode in the never-beginning and never ending course of nature, and that, barring aeci dents. this planet must one day end its separate existenee in the arms of its celestial parent, the sun 'History. in its widest sense. teaches that the future of the human rave must grow out of its present life, and that the conditions of hu manity. ‘vlintever new revolutions may cone. are not to be affected by ehanges wrmodit from Nvilhout. but by forces :dready operating within. By observation of present tendencies it seems to many thinkers possible to predict that warfare will cease; that arbitration will take its place as a means of settling international dif ferences; that competition and monopoly, with the extremes of wealth and poverty to which they give rise, will yield to public administration of industry and commerce for the public good. or some form of cooperation involving a more equi table distribution of the bounties of nature and the products of toil ; that ignorance will be reduced by universal education fitting each individual for the highest service he can render to society; that disease and criminality will be stamped out by preventive and remedial meas ures; that the conflict between rival sects and religions will end in a fellowship no longer based upon ereed or cultic performance, but upon a common interest in the pursuit of truth and righteousness; and that thus the chief blessings associated with the millennium will conic, not through a radical change in man's nature wrought by supernatural power, but by a gradual amelioration of the race. Eschatological specu lation of this character, already seen in Plato's Republic and Thomas More's Utopia, has taken a strong hold upon the present generation. In the effort to realize the eschatological dreams of human society as it ought to be by strengthen ing the movements of thought and life that tend in the right direction, compensation is found by many for the silence of science concerning a sur vival of the individual, while they are ready to welcome any light that may be shed upon the mystery of death. See HEAVEN; HELL; IMMOR TALITY ; INTERMEDIATE STATE; JUDGMENT, FINAL; MILLENNIUM.