The Apocalypse of Empire - 9780812250404

The Apocalypse of EmpireImperial Eschatology in Late Antiquity and Early Islam\nAuthor(s): Stephen J. Shoemaker\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: University of Pennsylvania Press, United States\nImprint: University of Pennsylvania Press\nISBN-13: 9780812250404, 978-0812250404\nSynopsis\nIn The Apocalypse of Empire, Stephen J. Shoemaker argues that earliest Islam was a movement driven by urgent eschatological belief that focused on the conquest, or liberation, of the biblical Holy Land and situates this belief within a broader cultural environment of apocalyptic anticipation. Shoemaker looks to the Qur'an's fervent representation of the imminent end of the world and the importance Muhammad and his earliest followers placed on imperial expansion. Offering important contemporary context for the imperial eschatology that seems to have fueled the rise of Islam, he surveys the political eschatologies of early Byzantine Christianity, Judaism, and Sasanian Zoroastrianism at the advent of Islam a.