Eschatology in Theology is something that refers to the ultimate destiny of man, humanity and the universe (eschatological doctrines).

This doctrine therefore concerns the ultimate destiny of humankind and of the single individual. It is a part of the beliefs coessential to the very idea of religion and this explains why eschatological beliefs meet both among the so-called primitive populations and among the superior religions.

1. Religions of Ethnological Interest

Conceived nature as a unitary organic whole, eschatology is configured in primitive religions as a representation of a reality outside of time, reconstituted in unity after the struggles cyclically caused by evil in the world of nature, caused and definitively overcome by the intervention, at the peak of a series of cosmic cataclysms, of a Divine Being. Often associated with the idea of a reconstitution of a new world, where disease, death, and where the new earth will not have ferocious animals or evil men.
Eschatological representations of a return of a divine being can also be found among the pygmy populations of Gabon, or the tatar populations of Altai and others. In the new world happiness will be complete, there will no longer be a “land of the spirits” (= dead) and the divinity will live like a mother with her children.

2. Eastern religions

In Hinduism and Buddhism eschatology is essentially a reaction to a negative empirical worldview. A common premise for the two religions is the theory of the uninterrupted succession of states of life, conditioned by conduct in the preceding phases. The vision of the ultimate state, therefore, can only be the liberation from the contingent, through ascetic practice, the acquisition of true science, until the bliss of nirvana, motionless and indistinct non-being, the ultimate term of an eschatological vision in which the emphasis is given to the individual position, on a level of substantial devaluation of history, understood as linear development.

3. Jewish eschatology

The Jewish eschatology, the most typical example of the conception of ultimate ends regarding the position of an entire community, that of the chosen people of GOD, has completely fallen into history. The eschatology is not so much the prospect of the end of the world, but the representation of a triumph, even political, of the part of the chosen people who have remained faithful to GOD, who will become the savior and reign in a new Jerusalem over all the nations of the world.

Particularly important, in this nationalistic-political context, is the “vision” contained in the Book of Daniel, in which the final triumph of Israel takes place by the “son of man”. Between the 1st century B.C. and the 1st century A.D., this figure of a redeeming messiah, understood as a warrior king, becomes increasingly prominent. In some sectors of Judaism, however, eschatology goes beyond the pure nationalistic perspective and draws a universalistic dimension concerning the problem of evil in general.

4. Christianity

4.1 Parusia and messianism

The messianic idea was taken up and developed in a Christian environment, for the evangelical announcement of the imminent coming of the Kingdom of God. The assumption of the eschatological element in the terms of messianism helped to spread, especially in the persecutions suffered by Christians in the early centuries, the expectation of a parusia, understood as the return of Christ himself as the restorer of a messianic kingdom on earth. The spread of millenarianism is explained by the need to give a precise dimension to the postponement of the parusia, justified by the possibility offered to all to save themselves, establishing in a thousand years the duration for the intermediate messianic kingdom. This eschatological dimension, nourished by elements taken from the Apocalypse, had numerous followers in the 2nd century (e.g., Pope of Hieraples, St. Justin, St. Irenaeus, Tertullian etc.). Already in St. Paul, and even more so in St. John, however, the spiritualization of eschatologism was clarified in the sense of an eschatology of realization, as opposed to that of expectation. In the East, in the work of Origen, the eschatology freed itself of every Jewish apocalyptic element to give rise to a cyclical conception of the history of humanity and the world, which allowed the clarification, for the first time, of an individual eschatology, even in the admission of the achievement of a collective apocatastasis (a return to the original state) through the intervention of the Redeemer, with the suppression of evil.

4.2 S. Augustine

A new perspective is given by St. Augustine with the doctrine of the two cities, that of the world and that of GOD, which lives in the reality of the world, but does not identify with a temporal society and constitutes the historical realization of Christ’s triumph in the Church. Augustine describes in detail the characteristics and the premonitory signs of the Church.

Augustine describes in detail the characteristics and premonitory signs of the parusia, transmitting a whole eschatological baggage to meditation in the Middle Ages, which also included elements of Judaic messianism, with the figure of the emperor of recent times, and of the Apocalypse, with the figures of the peoples of Gog and Magog.

4.3 The contemporary debate

Regarding the value of eschatology within the very essence of Christianity, a lively controversy between Catholics and Protestants developed in the 20th century. For some of these (A. Schweitzer) eschatology is only the external dimension of Christ’s thought, assumed as essential by the primitive Christian tradition as a result of the Jewish environment; for others (K. Barth) eschatology still has importance in Christianity, but in an intemperate sense, remaining the object of an expectation and hope founded on the promise of Christ, on the certainty of the redeeming action operated by him; for others (R. Barth) eschatology is still important in Christianity, but in an intemporal sense, remaining the object of an expectation and hope founded on the promise of Christ, on the certainty of the redeeming action operated by him; for others (R. Schweitzer) eschatology is still important in Christianity. For others (R. Bultmann) eschatology is totally transferred from the future to the present, to daily existence, realized through the action of grace, which makes present in everyone, outside of a true temporal dimension, the fact of Christ’s coming into the world, which occurred in the past.

5. Islam

Islamic eschatology is the aspect of Islamic theology concerning ideas of life after death, matters of the soul, and the “Day of Judgement,” known as Yawm al-Qiyāmah (Arabic: يوم القيامة‎, “the Day of Resurrection”) or Yawm ad-Dīn (يوم الدين, “the Day of Judgment”). The Day of Judgement is characterized by the annihilation of all life, which will then be followed by the resurrection and judgment by GOD. Multiple verses in the Qur’an mention the Last Judgment.

The main subject of Surat al-Qiyama is the resurrection. The Great Tribulation is described in the hadith and commentaries of the ulama, including al-Ghazali, Ibn Kathir, Ibn Majah, Muhammad al-Bukhari, and Ibn Khuzaymah. The Day of Judgment is also known as the Day of Reckoning, the Last Day, and the Hour (al-sā’ah).

Unlike the Qur’an, the hadith contains several events, happening before the Day of Judgment, which are described as several minor signs and twelve major signs. During this period, terrible corruption and chaos would rule the earth, caused by the Masih ad-Dajjal (the Antichrist in Islam), then Isa (Jesus) will appear and with the help of the Mahdi, will defeating the Dajjal and establish a period of peace, liberating the world from cruelty. These events will be followed by a time of serenity when people live according to religious values.

Similar to other Abrahamic religions, Islam teaches that there will be a resurrection of the dead that will be followed by a final tribulation and eternal division of the righteous and wicked. Islamic apocalyptic literature describing Armageddon is often known as fitna, Al-Malhama Al-Kubra (The Great Massacre) or ghaybah in Shī’a Islam. The righteous are rewarded with the pleasures of Jannah (Paradise), while the unrighteous are punished in Jahannam (Hell).

According to a 2012 poll by Pew research, found 50% or more Muslims in several Muslim-majority countries (Turkey, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Tunisia, Lebanon, Morocco) expect the Mahdi to return in their lifetime.