Why is studying millennialism important?
In the brief time of apocalyptic intensity, roosters find highly receptive audiences, and are capable of great feats of social creativity, launching new movements, new religions, new paradigms of thought and interaction, and new wars. They are especially imaginative in their uses of communications technology. Many of the movements set in motion by roosters become the ãnormalä institutions and religions of a culture. Millennialism can provide some of the most idealistically practical ãprojectsä for a culture (e.g., the earliest abolitionists were chiliasts), and some of the most devastating paths of self-destruction (e.g. Communist and Nazi totalitarianism). By understanding the peculiar dynamics of millennialism, we understand our origins, the social forces at work in the present (especially at millenniumâs end), and future such ãmoments.
In the brief time of apocalyptic intensity, roosters find highly receptive audiences, and are capable of great feats of social creativity, launching new movements, new religions, new paradigms of thought and interaction, and new wars. They are especially imaginative in their uses of communications technology. Many of the movements set in motion by roosters become the ãnormalä institutions and religions of a culture. Millennialism can provide some of the most idealistically practical ãprojectsä for a culture (e.g., the earliest abolitionists were chiliasts), and some of the most devastating paths of self-destruction (e.g. Communist and Nazi totalitarianism).
