WAn apocalypse is a disclosure or revelation of great knowledge. In religious and occult concepts, an apocalypse usually discloses something very important that was hidden or provides what Bart Ehrman has termed, "A vision of heavenly secrets that can make sense of earthly realities". Historically, the term has a heavy religious connotation as commonly seen in the prophetic revelations of eschatology obtained through dreams or spiritual visions. It is thought by many Christians that the biblical Book of Revelation depicts as an "apocalypse" the complete and final destruction of the world. However, there is also another interpretation of the Book of Revelation in which the events predicted are said to refer to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 by the Roman armies of Titus. This second view is known as the Preterist view of eschatology.
WApocalypticism is the religious belief that there will be an apocalypse, a term which originally referred to a revelation, but now it usually refers to the belief that the end of the world is imminent, even within one's own lifetime. This belief is usually accompanied by the idea that civilization will soon come to a tumultuous end due to some sort of catastrophic global event. These views and movements often focus on cryptic revelations about a sudden, dramatic, and cataclysmic intervention of God in history; the judgment of all men; the salvation of the faithful elect; and the eventual rule of the elect with God in a renewed heaven and earth. Arising initially in Zoroastrianism, apocalypticism was developed more fully in Judaic, Christian, and Islamic eschatological speculation.
WThe 2012 phenomenon was a range of eschatological beliefs that cataclysmic or transformative events would occur on or around 21 December 2012. This date was regarded as the end-date of a 5,126-year-long cycle in the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, and festivities took place on 21 December 2012 to commemorate the event in the countries that were part of the Maya civilization, with main events at Chichén Itzá in Mexico and Tikal in Guatemala.
WAccording to the Book of Revelation in the New Testament of the Christian Bible, Armageddon is the prophesied location of a gathering of armies for a battle during the end times, which is variously interpreted as either a literal or a symbolic location. The term is also used in a generic sense to refer to any end of the world scenario. In Islamic theology, the Armageddon is also mentioned in Hadith as the Greatest Armageddon or Al-Malhama Al-Kubra.
WAleph , formerly Aum Shinrikyo , is a Japanese doomsday cult founded by Shoko Asahara in 1984. It carried out the deadly Tokyo subway sarin attack in 1995 and was found to have been responsible for the Matsumoto sarin attack the previous year.
WThe blood moon prophecies are a series of prophecies in the Bible preached by Christian preachers John Hagee and Mark Biltz, which state that a tetrad which began with the April 2014 lunar eclipse is the beginning of the end times as described in the Bible in the Book of Joel, Acts 2:20, and Revelation 6:12. The tetrad ended with the lunar eclipse on September 27–28, 2015.
WThe Pic de Bugarach or Pech de Bugarach is the highest summit (1230 m) in the Corbières Massif in the French Midi.
WThe Ntabelanga Massacre commonly known as the Bulhoek massacre occurred on 24 May 1921, in the Union of South Africa in the village of Ntabelanga in the Cape Province. After a dispute over land in Ntabelanga, dating back to 1920, an 800-strong police force from the Union of South Africa and led by Colonel Johan Davey and General Koos van der Venter gathered at Ingxingwa Ye Nkunzini, in the Bulhoek valley, and Ingxingwa ka Stivini, Steven's Valley. At the same time 500 men known as the "Israelites", armed with spears and knobkerries, and led by Enoch Mgijima, gathered in an open field, ready to defend their families and community. After failed final negotiations between the two parties, a battle ensued. The 20-minute battle, which left an estimated 163 Israelites dead, 129 wounded and 95 taken as prisoners, became known as the Bulhoek Massacre.
WA climate apocalypse is a hypothetical scenario involving the global collapse of human civilization and potential human extinction as either a direct or indirect result of anthropogenic climate change. The scenario posits some or all of the Earth being rendered uninhabitable as a result of extreme temperatures, severe weather events, an inability to grow crops, and an altered composition of the Earth's atmosphere.
WA Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America is a 2003 non-fiction book written by Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.
WDabiq is a town in northern Syria, about 40 kilometres (25 mi) northeast of Aleppo and around 10 km (6.2 mi) south of Syria's border with Turkey. It is administratively part of the Akhtarin nahiyah (subdistrict) of the A'zaz District of Aleppo Governorate. Nearby localities include Mare' to the southwest, Sawran to the northwest, and Akhtarin town to the southeast. In the 2004 census, Dabiq had a population of 3,364.
WPredictions of apocalyptic events that would result in the extinction of humanity, a collapse of civilization, or the destruction of the planet have been made since at least the beginning of the Common Era. Most predictions are related to Abrahamic religions, often standing for or similar to the eschatological events described in their scriptures. Christian predictions typically refer to events like the rapture, the Great Tribulation, the Last Judgment, and the Second Coming of Christ. Many religious-related end-time events are predicted to occur within the lifetime of the person making the prediction, who often quote the Bible, and in particular the New Testament, as either the primary or exclusive source for the predictions. Often this takes the form of mathematical calculations, such as trying to calculate the point where it will have been 6000 years since the supposed creation of the Earth by the Abrahamic God, which according to the Talmud marks the deadline for the Messiah to appear. Predictions of the end from natural events have also been theorised by various scientists and scientific groups. While these disasters are generally accepted within the scientific community as plausible "end of the world" scenarios, the events and phenomena are not expected to occur for hundreds of thousands or even billions of years from now.
WInstitutiones Divinae is the name of a theological work by the Christian Roman philosopher Lactantius, written between AD 303 and 311.
WDivine Truth is a new spiritual movement based in Queensland, Australia. It was started in 2007 by spiritual teacher Alan John Miller, also known as A.J., who claims to be the returned Jesus of Nazareth. In a seven-minute interview which aired on A Current Affair, Miller claimed that Divine Truth is God's truth and is the "absolute truth of the universe".
WElohim City also known as Elohim City Inc., and Elohim Village is a private community in Adair County, Oklahoma, United States. The 400 acres (1.6 km2) rural retreat was founded in 1973 by Robert G. Millar, a Canadian immigrant, former Mennonite and once one of the most important leaders in America's Christian Identity movement, a theology common to an assortment of right-wing extremist groups. The community gained national attention for its ties to members of The Order in the 1980s and with convicted Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh in the 1990s.
WIsaac Newton was considered an insightful and erudite theologian by his contemporaries. He wrote many works that would now be classified as occult studies and religious tracts dealing with the literal interpretation of the Bible.
WTel Megiddo is the site of the ancient city of Megiddo, the remains of which form a tell, situated in northern Israel near Kibbutz Megiddo, about 30 km south-east of Haifa. Megiddo is known for its historical, geographical, and theological importance, especially under its Greek name Armageddon. During the Bronze Age, Megiddo was an important Canaanite city-state and during the Iron Age, a royal city in the Kingdom of Israel. Megiddo drew much of its importance from its strategic location at the northern end of the Wadi Ara defile, which acts as a pass through the Carmel Ridge, and from its position overlooking the rich Jezreel Valley from the west. Excavations have unearthed 26 layers of ruins since the Chalcolithic phase, indicating a long period of settlement. The site is now protected as Megiddo National Park and is a World Heritage Site.
WOn or near January 1, 2000, a series of Islamist terrorist attacks linked to al-Qaeda were planned to occur in the context of millennium celebrations, including bombing plots against four tourist sites in Jordan, against the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) and USS The Sullivans, and the hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight 814. In Lebanon, dozens were killed in clashes in the Dinnieh district between radical Islamists with connections to the Jordan plots and the Lebanese Army. The plots in Jordan and against LAX were foiled by law enforcement agencies, while the attempted bombing of The Sullivans only failed because the boat filled with explosives sank before detonating. The revelation of the plot linked to the LAX "Millennium Bomber" Ahmed Ressam led to unprecedented investigations into possible other terrorist cells in the United States, dubbed Operation "Borderbom", and security measures around millennium celebrations. Other al-Qaeda-linked millennium attack plots may have been planned or foiled around the same time.
WThe New World Order (NWO) is a conspiracy theory which hypothesizes a secretly emerging totalitarian world government.
WProject Megiddo was a report researched and written by the United States' Federal Bureau of Investigation under Director Louis Freeh. Released on October 20, 1999, the report named followers of white supremacy, Christian Identity, the militia movement, Black Hebrew Israelites, and apocalyptic cults as potential terrorists who might become violent in reaction to the new millennium.
WThe Kremna Prophecies or Prophecy from Kremna are a collection of prophecies purporting to have been written before the twentieth-century events that they describe.
WPyramidology refers to various religious or pseudoscientific speculations regarding pyramids, most often the Giza pyramid complex and the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt. Some "pyramidologists" also concern themselves with the monumental structures of pre-Columbian America, and the temples of Southeast Asia.
WIn Norse mythology, Ragnarök is a series of events, including a great battle, foretold to lead to the death of a number of great figures, natural disasters and the submersion of the world in water. After these events, the world will resurface anew and fertile, the surviving and returning gods will meet and the world will be repopulated by two human survivors. Ragnarök is an important event in Norse mythology and has been the subject of scholarly discourse and theory in the history of Germanic studies.
WThe Waco siege, also known as the Waco massacre, was the law enforcement siege of the compound that belonged to the religious sect Branch Davidians. It was carried out by the U.S. federal government, Texas state law enforcement, and the U.S. military, between February 28 and April 19, 1993. The Branch Davidians were led by David Koresh and were headquartered at Mount Carmel Center ranch in the community of Axtell, Texas, 13 miles northeast of Waco. Suspecting the group of stockpiling illegal weapons, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) obtained a search warrant for the compound and arrest warrants for Koresh, as well as a select few of the group's members.
WWaiting for Armageddon is a 2009 American documentary film that studies Armageddon theology and Christian eschatology. Some evangelicals in the United States believe that bible prophecy predicts events including the rapture and the Battle of Armageddon. The documentary raises questions regarding how this theology shapes United States and Middle East relations and how it may encourage an international holy war.
WWhen Prophecy Fails: A Social and Psychological Study of a Modern Group That Predicted the Destruction of the World is a classic work of social psychology by Leon Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schachter published in 1956, which studied a small UFO religion in Chicago called the Seekers that believed in an imminent apocalypse and its coping mechanisms after the event did not occur. Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance can account for the psychological consequences of disconfirmed expectations. One of the first published cases of dissonance was reported in this book.
WThe Yellow Turban Rebellion, also translated as the Yellow Scarves Rebellion, was a peasant revolt in China against the Eastern Han dynasty. The uprising broke out in 184 AD during the reign of Emperor Ling. Although the main rebellion was suppressed by 185 AD, pockets of resistance continued and smaller rebellions emerged in later years. It took 21 years until the uprising was fully suppressed in 205 AD. The rebellion, which got its name from the colour of the cloths that the rebels wore on their heads, marked an important point in the history of Taoism due to the rebels' association with secret Taoist societies. The revolt was also used as the opening event in the 14th-century historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms.