The Iranian Apocalypse is not the only presentation of conflict and victory in the widespread Indo-Germanic group. The Old Teutonic religion produced its Volospa, the seer's high song of creation and the overthrow of evil. Here is in brief the story of the great world-drama, the degeneracy of man, the conflicts of the gods. The universe slowly surges to its end; there are portents in the sky, disorders on the earth, till the whole frame of things dissolves and all goes up in flame. But a new vision dawns: "I behold earth rise again with its evergreen forests out of the deep; the fields shall yield unsown; all evil shall be amended; Balder shall come back. I see a hall, brighter than the sun, shingled with gold, standing on Gem-lea. The righteous shall dwell therein and live in bliss for ever. The Powerful One comes to hold high judgment, the Mighty One from above who rules over all, and the dark dragon who flies over the earth with corpses on his wings is driven from the scene and slinks away." There are possibly Christian touches here and there, but the substantial independence of the poet seems assured.
Above the theories of world-continuance and world-cycles must be ranked those of a world-goal, which imply more or less clearly the conception of a world-purpose. The supreme expression of this in religious literature is found in the Christian Bible. The prophecy of Zarathustra belonged to the same high ethical order as that of Israel. How much the Apocalyptic hopes of the later Judaism were stimulated by contact with Persian thought cannot be precisely defined: the estimates of careful scholars differ. But there is no doubt whatever of the dependence of Christianity upon Jewish Messianic expectation. The title of its founder, Christ, is the Greek equivalent of the Jewish term Messiah, or "Anointed." Its pictures of human destiny, of resurrection, of judgment, of one world where the righteous shine like the sun, and another full of fire that is not quenched, are pictures drawn by Jewish hands. Its promises of the Advent of the Son of Man in clouds of glory from the sky, who shall summon the nations to his great assize, are couched in the language of earlier Jewish books. For one religion builds upon another, and must use the speech of its country and its time. Its forms must, therefore, necessarily change from age to age, as the advance of knowledge and the widening of experience suggest new problems and call for fresh solutions. But it will always embody man's highest thought concerning the mysteries that surround him, and will express his finest attitude to life. Its beliefs may be gradually modified; its specific institutions may lose their power; but history shows it to be among the most permanent of social forces, and the most effective agent for the slow elevation of the race.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Out of the immense literature produced since Max Müller's Essay on Comparative Mythology (1856) only a small number of the most important books can be here named, and the list is limited to works in English. Superior figures attached to titles indicate the edition. [Transcriber's note: the superscripted edition numbers have been replaced with the edition in brackets.]
GENERAL INTRODUCTION.—Tylor, Primitive Culture (4th ed.) (2 vols. 1903); Max Müller, Introd. to the Science of Religion (1873), Hibbert Lectures (1878), Gifford Lectures (4 vols. 1889-93); W. Robertson Smith, Lectures on the Religion of the Semites (2nd ed.) (1902); J. G. Frazer, The Golden Bough (3rd editioin) (now in course of publication); A. Lang, Myth, Ritual and Religion (2nd ed.) (2 vols. 1899), The Making of Religion (2nd ed.) (1900), Magic and Religion (1901); Goblet d'Alviella, Origin and Growth of the Conception of God (Hibbert Lectures, 1892); Tiele, Elements of the Science of Religion (2 vols. 1897); F. B. Jevons, Introduction to the History of Religion (2nd ed.) (1902); Crawley, The Mystic Rose (1902), The Tree of Life (1905); Farnell, The Evolution of Religion (1905); Westermaarck, The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas (1906), 2 vols.; Hobhouse, Morals in Evolution (1906), 2 vols.; Marett, The Threshold of Religion (1909).
RELIGION IN THE LOWER CULTURE.—Ratzel, The History of Mankind, tr. Butler (1896), 3 vols.; Turner, Samoa (1884); Codrington, Melanesians (1891); A. B. Ellis, Ewe-speaking Peoples (1890); Yoruba-speaking Peoples (1894); Tshi-speaking Peoples (1897); Crooke, Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India (2 vols. 1896); Miss M. H. Kingsley, Travels in West Africa (1898), West African Studies (1899); Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899), Northern Tribes of Central Australia (1904); Howitt, Native Tribes of South-eastern Australia (1904); Dennett, At the Back of the Black Man's Mind (1906); Roscoe, The Baganda, their Customs and Beliefs (1911); Brinton, Myths of the New World (2nd ed.) (1878); McClintock, The Old North Trail (1910); Reports of the Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian Institution, Washington.
For the higher religions a few of the best English introductions are here named, in addition to the copious collection of materials in the Sacred Books of the East (50 vols.).