by Robert W. McDonald

Created on: January 01, 2010

If anyone happens to be holding a contest to decide which “myths” should be “dispelled,” may I nominate the myths collectively known as “end times prophecies?” This essay will describe the particular myths, out of many, that are the motivations behind this request.

The myth: the last half of the book of Daniel

As I have argued in other essays, no reputable Biblical scholar will claim that chapters 7-12 of Daniel are anything more than a postscript that was added hundreds of years later (during or shortly after the Maccabean Revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes ca 170-160 BCE) to a short book written around the time of the Babylonian Exile.

The only reason that the book of Daniel is read anywhere other than in Sunday School classes is that, no matter what the “question” may be, you can always find an “answer” in Daniel. It is also an excellent source of “prophecy” that can be cited after the event has occurred, trailing only the scribbling of Nostradamus and the book of Revelation in this category.

 The myth: the entire book of Revelation

I firmly believe that if the entire Bible, with the exceptions of the gospels, Daniel, and Revelation were to disappear overnight the change would go unnoticed by a majority of Fundamentalist Christians since these appear to be the only parts that they bother reading.

If such is indeed possible, this is the only book in history that has produced more conflicting interpretations, by more people, that have absolutely no idea what they are talking about than Marx's “Communist Manifesto.” As alluded to above, the book of Revelation also enjoys a comfortable lead over the book of Daniel in the “prophecy after the event happens” category.

The myth: dispensationalism

Dispensationalism is a thesis of Biblical interpretation which holds that we're are rapidly approaching the end times. In arriving at this conclusion, it uses the most obtuse passages from the books of Daniel and Revelation and then applies the most unlikely interpretations in order to “prove” dispensationalism itself. Naturally, the arguments “supporting” dispensationalism are to be found in the books of Daniel and Revelation.

The myth: December 21, 2012

The New-Agers love this one because it gives them the opportunity to be just as obnoxious as the other “end-timers.” The logic behind the myth runs like this: the Mayan calendar runs out of days on December 21, 2009. Since there is no provision in the Mayan calendar for December 22, 2009, then time must logically end on the 21st. Those believing in this myth practically always fail to mention that there seems to have been no provision for the Mayans themselves for about a thousand years

The Fundamentalist Christians don't like this particular myth because 1) it conflicts with their most cherished myths, 2) on the outside chance that this one is true, the Fundamentalists will have to explain why God gave the secret to a tribe of “godless heathens” rather than giving it to “good Bible-Believing Christians” such as themselves  and, 3) they would only get 6 weeks to hear the words that they have been waiting on for almost 5 years: “former president Barak Obama.”

I can think of no better way to close this brief essay than with the words of Ambrose Bierce, who defined “myth” as “the body of a primitive people's beliefs concerning its origin, early history, heroes, deities and so forth, as distinguished from the true accounts which it invents later.”

If you can find a better definition of “end times myths,” I would like to hear it.

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