The Lesser Signs of the Hour

A Reconstruction of the Islamic Apocalyptic Overture

Abstract

The article examines traditional medieval Islamic visions of the End and their modern interpretations. The focus, however, is an analysis of the contemporary Islamic eschatological imagination, as was impressively depicted in the reconstruction of the Lesser Signs of the Hour. In Arabic, the apocalyptic phenomena are generally known as c alāmāt al-sāc a, which means the Signs of the Hour (i.e., the end of the world) and Muslim theologians have divided these apocalyptic portents into two groups: the Lesser (sughrā) and the Greater (kubrā). The Lesser Signs of the Hour could be considered as “an apocalyptic overture,” since these moral, religious, social, cultural, political, and even natural, events are designed to warn humanity that the End is near and to bring people into state of repentance. Modern Muslim apocalyptic emerged from blending of classical medieval heritage, embodied by the work of Nucaym ibn Hammād al-Marwazī, a prolific master of this branch of literature, and an extensive set of “western borrowings.” If we might resort to this shortcut, the medieval Islamic sources provided a series of predictions meanwhile the modern times brought the way of presentation which could make that medieval material more comprehensible. To make this theme attractive, the modern Muslim apocalyptists strenuously tried to identify particular Signs, described by the Tradition ( Sunna), with specific historical events. Attention has been paid especially to this way of “the reconstruction of the apocalyptic overture.” Its analysis reliably enables us to better understand an important example of how Islam currently can face challenges of modern times.