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Part of Summary of articles/ Barbarzyńca 2005 nr 10
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SUMMARY O F ARTICLES
Steven Matthews
FRANCIS BACON'S SCIENTIFIC APOCALYPSE
Very little has been said about Bacon's apocalypticism, or his
religious disposition in general, but given Bacon's influence on later
generations of thinkers, and particularly on the development of early
m o d e r n s c i e n c e , this a s p e c t of B a c o n ' s w r i t i n g s b e a r s real
consideration. The development of scientific method was, for Bacon,
a fulfillment of Old Testament Prophecy which would reestablish the
conditions of earthly paradise. Prior to the events of 1620 leading to
his impeachment, Francis Bacon regarded Britain as the land of
promise, and his generation as the first in a glorious scientific age
when pain and suffering would be overcome. This was to be the
"instauration," or restoration of man's Edenic mastery over nature.
However, Bacon's fall from worldly grace led to significant modifications
in his philosophical and scientific writings. After the impeachment
Bacon could no longer rely upon the patronage of King James for his
program of Instauration. Neither was Britain necessarily the land of
the fulfillment of apocalyptic promise, at least in his lifetime. The
timetable for the restoration of man's mastery over nature was
lengthened considerably. God now played a much stronger role in
bringing the Instauration to be (new obstacles had to be removed that
would require divine intervention), but the degree to which prelapsarian
perfection could be recovered in this world remained as great as it
was before Bacon's own political demise. Bacon's faith in the
inevitability of of scientific progress remained unshaken. This essay
concludes with the suggestion that the pattern of thinking established
by B a c o n ' s archetypal mutation f r o m an i m m i n e n t a p o c a l y p t i c
fulfillment to an eventual Utopia has left a strong mark on popular
images and expectations of science down to our present day.
Maria Leppakari
THE END IS NEVER JUST AN END. THE ATTRACTIVENESS
OF THE APOCALYPTIC MYTH IN CONTEMPORARY RELIGIOSITY
This article attempts to capture the dynamics of symbolism when
it comes to the city of Jerusalem. The focus here is on the use of the
term apocalyptic representations
to refer on one hand on individual
perceptions, on the other hand to socially shared conceptions. As a
symbol of war and peace Jerusalem has drawn strong attention, even
further it motivates religious individuals and groups to perform actions
according to an envisioned end. An analysis of the tension that
apocalyptic representations create in religious individuals and groups
h o p e s to c o n t r i b u t e to the u n d e r s t a n d i n g of h o w a p o c a l y p t i c millenahan themes work within a religious mind setting and how such
representations can become motives for performed action.
Paweł Barabasz
APOKALYPT1SCHE LANDSCHAFTEN. REFLECTIONS ON THE
END OF THE WORLD IN FOLK CULTURE
The author points out that a relatively low presence of eschatological
myths in the preserved ethnographic cultures tradition is compensated
by a great number of diffused fragments containing ideas about the
end of the World. This kind of reflection does not appear marginally in
folk culture; rather it infiltrates this culture as an etiologie narrative
shadow. Drawing on folk tradition, the author brings out texts of
apocryphal apocalypses and epigraphic predictions from the famous
„Sybille prophecy" to highly popular a p o c r y p h a l versions of the
revelation in Fatima. Their interpretation leads him to a conclusion that
fear of the end of the World undoubtedly has a beneficial social effect: it
makes people aware of borders that when crossed bring punishment.
Mariusz Czaja
"IF THERE IS IMPROVEMENT, THERE WILL BE EXTENSION".
APOCALYPTIC DISCOURSE IN CONTEMPORARY CULTURE-THE
CASE OF THE SUWAŁKI REGION.
The article is an attempt at extending Stephen O'Leary's theory of
apocalyptic discourse by means of the interpretative a p p r o a c h
proposed by Clifford Geertz. For this purpose, the author draws on
the results of his fieldwork in the Suwałki region in North East Poland.
Using as his starting point the standard formula of the local apocalyptic
discourse: "If there is improvement, there will be extension", he
reconstructs structures of signification in this discourse concerning
mainly time and evil and their tragic and comic dimensions. Particular
attention is given to concepts of the deterioration of time, G o d ' s
punishment, portents of the end, and the end as a new beginning.
Analyzing them, the author also discusses Mircea Eliade's theory of
archaic ideas of time and evil and s h o w s its i n a d e q u a c y in the
contemporary apocalyptic discourse.
Paulina Niechciał
APOCALYPTIC VISIONS OF THE INHABITANTS OF THE
SUWAŁKI LANDSCAPE R E S E R V E - THE WHYS AND
WHEREFORES.
The article was written based on the ethnological field work dealing
with the apocalyptic notions of present-day inhabitants of the Suwałki
region in North East Poland. It reveals factors that shaped apocalyptic
ideas of the locals such as stories recounted by elders and sibylline
prophecies. It presents catastrophes, meteorological phenomena,
changes in human behavior, and contemporary lifestyle that are
regarded as portents of the impending end of the world.
Rafał Nahirny
Andrew Gow
JEWS AND JUDAISM IN CHRISTIAN END-TIME SCENARIOS:
HARD-WIRED HATRED OR IRENIC ITINERARIES?
The "Left Behind" series of books, pamphlets, and 'ministries',
both by the spoken word and on the internet, is reaching millions of
A m e r i c a n s - a n d it is b o t h f o r m u l a t i n g a n d reflecting s o m e very
disturbing ideas. The "Left Behind" series has sold over 50 million
copies, mainly in the United States, and the title Desecration was the
number one best-selling hardcover fiction title for 2001. Scholars who
study popular religion have been slow to recognise the growing
influence and spread of fundamentalist publicity and ideas, partly
because academics rarely share the cut-and-dried world-views and
u n e q u i v o c a l belief in t h e Divine A u t h o r s h i p of S c r i p t u r e that
characterise this s p e c t r u m of the Christian right. 'Pre-millennial
dispensationalism', as this theological direction is known, also has
real-world corollaries: support for Israel from this group of evangelicals,
including a recent subsidy of $2 million to help resettle American Jews
in Israel as part of a 'Christian Zionist' project, is designed to 'accelerate'
the End Times by making it possible for a central feature of this
theology's timetable for salvation to be fulfilled, namely the rebuilding
of the Temple at Jerusalem so that it can be desecrated, as in the new
Left Behind best-seller, Desecration: namely, so that the Antichrist can,
as they believe the Bible prophecies, enter and desecrate it in his role
as adversary of Jesus in the final End Time battle for the souls of
humankind.The anti-Judaic eschatology of the „Left Behind" series
and the pre-millennial spectrum of evangelical Christianity in America
are not 'merely' religious p h e n o m e n a , especially since they are
religious views about a group that defines itself in both religious and
ethnic terms, without separating neatly as most westerners do. If the
discourse about Jews in the Left Behind series were couched in secular
or social terms, it would be actionable; and if it should ever spill any
farther over the rather tenuous and arbitrary boundaries we have set
for 'the theological' and enter 'the secular'-say in the event of a major
eschatological d i s a p p o i n t m e n t - there might well be real trouble
between conservative Christian supporters of Israel and the Jews who
make common cause with them.
64
THE EXPERIENCE OF SURVIVAL. AN ATTEMPT AT ANALYSIS.
Katarzyna Czuban
THE JEW AS A SYMBOL OF S T R A N G E N E S S . P O L E S '
ATTITUDE TOWARD THE EXTERMINATION OF JEWS
Małgorzata Budrewicz
MEMORIES THROUGH BODY. THE EXPERIENCE OF WOMEN
PRISONERS OF A CONCENTRATION CAMP
Ewa Jupowiecka
ABOUT THE FATE THAT YOU CAN'T COME TO TERMS WITH.
(IMRE KERTESZ)
Joanna Sobolewska
SURVIVORS BLEED HISTORY. HOW TO LIVE AFTER THE
HOLOCAUST EXPERIENCE.
Katarzyna Podolec
CHILDREN OF THE HOLOCAUST. LOSS OF IDENTITY AND
ATTEMPTS AT BEING ONESELF AGAIN.
The foregoing texts were written during a seminar conducted at
the Chair of Cultural Studies at Wrocław University between March
and April 2003 by a visiting professor Dorota Głowacka from University
of King's College, Halifax, Canada. The seminar focused on issues
broadly related to the Holocaust and subjects such as memory and
forgetting (including intergenerational memory), traumatic experience
(also one inherited by second generations), forgiveness, the survivor
syndrome, and anti-Semitism on the basis of various accounts and
memoirs of Holocaust survivors (including children), philosophical and
journalistic texts, and works of art. The seminar papers presented below
are the result of reading, conversations, heated discussions and
moments of reflection that not only took place in a class but also
extended beyond university walls. The subject matter left no-one
indifferent, and the seminar was a truly memorable intellectual and
emotional experience.
Numer 10/2005