Cosmos, Chaos & the World to Come – The Ancient Roots of Apocalyptic Faith (Nota Bene)

by Norman Cohn (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2001

  $3.31

  In this engrossing book, the author of the classic work The Pursuit of the Millennium investigates the origins of apocalyptic faith - the belief in a perfect future, when the forces of good are victorious over the forces of evil. Norman Cohn takes us back two thousand years to the world views of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and India, the innovations of Iranian and Jewish prophets and sages, and the earliest Christian imaginings of heaven on earth, and he illuminates a major turning point in the history of human consciousness. For this second, corrected edition, the final chapter, on Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians, has been wholly rewritten and extended.

• Used

  Hardcover
  1993

  $3.31

  This is a study of the origins of the idea of the world to come . Cohn takes the reader back 2000 years to look at the beliefs of ancient religions and civilizations and their view of the future of man. The millennarian view that the world is moving towards an ideal and perfect future is fundamental to most societies today, but it has not always been so. Cohn shows how the Egyptians, Sumerians, Babylonians, Indo-Iranians and pre-exilic Israelites, among others, believed in a static world in which a divinely pre-ordained order existed, despite the threats of evil, destructive forces like drought, famine or plague. Around 1500 BC, Zoroaster broke with this secure but anxious world-view, arguing that man was moving, through incessant conflict, towards an absolute, safe and divinely-appointed order. That view has dominated religious vision every since, as well as idealist ideologies such as Marxism-Leninism, and remains fundamental to man's philosophy. Cohn's book is therefore an investigation into probably the greatest turning-point in the history of human consciousness.

• New

  Paperback
  2001

  $21.40

  In this engrossing book, the author of the classic work The Pursuit of the Millennium investigates the origins of apocalyptic faith - the belief in a perfect future, when the forces of good are victorious over the forces of evil. Norman Cohn takes us back two thousand years to the world views of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and India, the innovations of Iranian and Jewish prophets and sages, and the earliest Christian imaginings of heaven on earth, and he illuminates a major turning point in the history of human consciousness. For this second, corrected edition, the final chapter, on Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians, has been wholly rewritten and extended.