Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Marks of the Beast

2004; University of California Press; Volume: 8; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1525/nr.2004.8.2.48

1541-8480

Glenn W. Shuck,

Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy

The Left Behind novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have become a major publishing phenomenon in recent years. The novels have succeeded in part because they address the anxieties of their readers, using apocalyptic language to depict a future world in which evildoers are punished, and the faithful reverse the tables on their cultural marginality. The novels, however, also speak to the "here and now," articulating in narrative form the beliefs and actions that place one among either the saved or the damned. The novels accomplish this through the issuance of marks. Both believers and the followers of Antichrist have distinctive marks, which prove less than reliable. At stake, ultimately, is an evangelicalism open to the ambiguity and uncertainty of contemporary life, and a reactive fundamentalism that insists, metaphorically, on the rigidity of marks—a quest for certainty ill-advised in a world characterized by relentless change.*