Apocalypse soon

As Israel batters Lebanon, some prophetic souls hear the trumpets sounding -- but why? Is it the end of the world as we know it? And do evangelicals feel fine?

By Jason Boyett

Read more: Religion, War, Israel, Christianity, Life

Aug. 7, 2006 | Ask any student of biblical prophecy to name the most important date on any end-of-the-world timeline, and you'll be referred to an event nearly six decades ago: The reestablishment of the state of Israel in 1948, after centuries of Jewish dispersion. Evangelicals who read biblical prophecy from a premillennialist perspective -- which we'll get to later -- see the creation of Israel as the direct fulfillment of Old Testament passages in Ezekiel 36 and 37, in which God promises to restore his Hebrew people to their homeland right before a period of intense judgment and warfare.

To these believers, that means any Israeli-focused conflict in the Middle East has the potential to become the war to end all wars.

That's why Israel's current conflict with Lebanon has set apocalyptic alarms buzzing across the United States. Newsweek, in its Aug. 7 "Beliefwatch" column, asks whether this could be "the end." Chuck Raasch, writing in USA Today, worries about "glimpses of the apocalypse" in the headlines. On July 27, "Good Morning, America" even brought in "Left Behind" coauthors Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins to comment on the prophetic nature of the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict.

Meanwhile, Internet chatter has had many citing recent events as evidence that the long-awaited Second Coming of Christ is near. The Rapture Index, a meticulously categorized barometer of end-times activity posted at the popular Web site Rapture Ready, hovers around the mid-150s. (Compare that to its apex of 182, reached in September 2001.) Postings on its message board vary from giddy expectancy -- "Can you hear the soft tread of the Messiah's footstep? Can you feel the soft beating of your heart in anticipation of His soon return?" (Cricket55) -- to more nuanced geopolitical analysis, sans freaky Jesus romanticism.

While the mainstream media continues to give air time to Christian eschatology -- loosely defined as the branch of theology that deals with the end of the world -- the left-leaning side of the Web is growing increasingly uneasy. Last week, media watchdog Media Matters called out CNN for using apocalyptic religious language in discussing the war and for turning to religious novelists like Jenkins for insight. Posters at Daily Kos agree, wondering where the experts are who could, for instance, identify such religious ravings as "a bunch of crap." And William Rivers Pitt, worrying about the Bush administration's die-hard support of Israel under the influence of its Revelation-reading supporters, scolds "right-wing Christian[s] who cannot wait for the Apocalypse."

Which brings us to several questions: Why are so many evangelicals so passionate about Israel? What is it about the current conflict that so intrigues the Bible prophecy squad? And finally, are any of them really "cheerleading the Apocalypse," as Pitt describes? Does your average evangelical Christian actually get excited about the potential of World War III?

The answer to the first question is deceptively simple: Evangelical Christians love Israel because they believe God loves Israel. "And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed," God's promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:3, is the driving force behind that belief, according to David Brog, author of "Standing with Israel: Why Christians Support the Jewish State." "The real motive behind Christianity's support for Israel is the promises of Genesis, not the prophecies of Revelation," says Brog, a practicing Jew who once served as chief of staff to Republican senator Arlen Specter. To Christians, those promises indicate that Israel's continued existence as a nation is God's will.

That's a primary reason many believers supported the establishment of Israel. It's also why substantial numbers of the American faithful stood by Israel during the Six Days' War in 1967, after which Israel captured Jerusalem, occupying the Gaza strip, the Sinai Peninsula and beyond. After all, this was the territory the Bible says God promised Israel after delivering the Hebrews from Egypt. The Bible maintains that God was, and is, on the side of Israel. That's as good a reason as any to throw political support Israel's way. "If America wants God's blessing," Brog says, "you bless the state of Israel."

A desire for God's favor may explain the philo-Semitism of many evangelical Christians. But there's another element of theology that has fueled the passionate attention given Israel, especially within the past few weeks. A significant amount of end-times prophecy concerns the future of Israel. A literal reading of these biblical passages -- and there are many, from Ezekiel and Daniel in the Old Testament to Revelation in the New Testament -- has convinced adherents of an interpretive system called "dispensational premillennialism" (the theological framework behind "Left Behind") that the restored nation of Israel is one of God's primary signs of the last days. To them, turmoil in and around a re-gathered Israel can mean only one thing: Human history is headed for its final chapter. "Israel is the most important signal on God's prophetic timeline," says Terry James, general editor of Rapture Ready and the author of "The Rapture Dialogues," an end-times novel. "It will be the center of controversy at the end of time."

The history of dispensational premillennialism is nearly as complex as the book of Revelation itself, and that's saying something. A second and third century form of Christian eschatology designated "historical premillennialism" read Revelation as a message that Jesus would soon return to earth to save the early church from its Roman persecutors. It fell out of favor, though, when the persecution stopped in the fourth century, when Constantine established Christianity as the official religion of Rome. Premillennialism made a comeback in the 19th century, thanks to an Irish Anglican named John Nelson Darby. It was Darby, a tireless traveling preacher, who popularized a theory known as "dispensationalism." He believed God's historical dealings with humankind fell into different epochs, or "dispensations," within which God offered a different avenue to salvation. (God dealt differently with Adam and Eve than he did with humankind after the flood, and God's relationship with the church today is different from his Old Testament relationship with Israel.) Darby concluded that humankind will enter a new dispensation at the end of time, and that in those final days, Israel -- which fell out of God's favor upon rejecting Jesus as the messiah -- will regain its position as God's elect.

Next page: "Bible prophecy plainly teaches that Israel will be a nation forever"