Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 2002. Vol. 8. Eger Journal of American Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 28)
Studies - Donald E. Morse: The End of the World in American History and Fantasy: The Trumpet of the Last Judgement
movement" (2). In addition, the Millerite movement "used truly modern professional methods of propagation: newspapers, itinerant speakers, and professional organizers, both lay and religious. Truly, Millerism was the religious analogue of the Whig's successful professionalization of American politics" (Rowe 2). Miller, himself, a devoted student of the bible, concluded from his study that the Second Coming of Christ was imminent. The world would end "on or about" 1843. This was no fantasy but an immanent reality. Miller based his predictions on carefully worked out, mathematically exact charts —all based on his thorough reading. "Miller transmuted history into eschatology, seeing the past as apostasy and the future as apocalypse" (Butler 191). Of course, there was the difficulty that all his assumptions about the bible, its contents, and his literalist reading of it were faulty —even though most of them remain popular today with a large segment of the United States population. Miller's fundamental error was attempting to read myth and story as a scientifically exact description of the origin and nature of the world, which for most people like Miller meant universe, since he and his followers equated planet Earth with the universe. Equating the Earth with the universe and reading the myths and stories in Genesis as literally true, Miller then added a symbolic reading of the "prophetic" biblical books. A day mentioned in the "prophetic" books was read as a year of current Earth time. Miller then compounded his error by making detailed, elaborate, and usually quite accurate calculations but all based upon similarly weak premises. The prophetic charts of his followers, Charles Fitch and Apollos Hale, like those of Joshua V. Himes were in turn based upon Miller's prophecies. They remain a marvel to read and interpret (see illustration in Arthur, 44-45). In making such elaborate calculations, Miller was following the well-tried method of several prophetic predecessors. The most famous, Archbishop James Ussher, in 1650 had gone through much the same process in Ireland. Ussher's predictions were destined to become almost synonymous with Apocalypse and millennialism well into the twentieth century. In Annals of the Old Testament , "by translating the myth/metaphor of the creation into the literal realm of calendar and clock time" Ussher calculated that creation occurred at exactly 9:00 in the morning, 26 October 4004 B. C. E. (Gifford 72) 226
