Across cultures and centuries, the idea of the world ending has captivated people’s imaginations—and nearly every religion has something to say about it. While details differ, common themes remain: justice, renewal, and the hope that something better comes after.
In Christianity, the end is marked by the return of Jesus, a final judgment, and the creation of a new heaven and earth. Islam shares a similar structure: a day of resurrection, divine judgment, and eternal reward or punishment. Both imagine a final reckoning where wrongs are made right.
Judaism, on the other hand, focuses less on apocalyptic doom and more on transformation. The coming of the Messiah is expected to usher in an era of peace and justice. In Hinduism and Buddhism, time is cyclical. We’re currently in a dark age (Kali Yuga), but it won’t last forever. Hindus believe the avatar Kalki will restore balance, while Buddhists await the future Buddha, Maitreya, to revive the Dharma.
Even Indigenous and folk religions often include myths of great floods, fire, or cosmic battles that end the world, but follow with rebirth. These stories remind us that the idea of “the end” is more about starting over.
Religious end-time beliefs aren’t so different from modern doomsday predictions. The coursework reviewed recent panics, such as in the year 2000, when people feared technology would collapse society. There was also another panic around 2012, based on a misinterpretation of the Mayan calendar. These moments sparked a kind of secular hysteria fueled more by fear and speculation than facts, much like religious prophecies do when taken to extremes. In both cases, people searched for meaning and control anywhere they could.
I still remember how scared I was in 2012, even though I was old enough to know better. The internet was filled with ominous countdowns, documentaries claiming the Mayan calendar predicted global destruction, and friends whispering what-ifs. I didn’t totally believe it, but the fear was contagious. It wasn’t until much later that I realized I’d experienced a form of collective anxiety, something psychologists call mass hysteria.
The end of the world often reflects the anxieties of the time, and it is important to keep a level head.
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I love how you broke down what the end of the world means and looks like for different religions. It shows that the end of the world can mean different things for different people.
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