Instructions: For this revision, in which you expand your first paper, be sure to cite at least two sources from the first five weeks of the course. (I define one source as one chapter from Boyer, the C.S. Lewis article, a lecture other than mine.) as You might also need to enhance your work with additional study on the Internet or in the library. I do not have a specific concept of the organization of the paper, but you will need at least a next set of paragraphs on the material from Novak and Prothero.
If you’re citing from our course materials you can use parenthesis in the text as references–e.g., (Paul Boyer, When Time Shall Be No More, Harvard University Press, 1994, p. 105). If it’s not one the assigned texts, parenthesis are still fine (Harold Kushner, To Life! Warner Books, 1993, p. 45). You can also use a reference system like MLA, APA, or Turabian.
I’ll be grading on the following rubrics (each approximately 1/3 of the grade)
- How well did you integrate additional course material from the first five weeks? How well do you understand this material? Do you make references and quotations to demonstrate your knowledge?
- Is your thinking and thus writing clear? For example, does the essay have a unity and logical progression of thought?
- Did you integrate the comments on your first essay and improve it in this revision? How effectively did you answer the main question, “What is your experience with end times thinking and what are others’ views?”
Teacher corrections: This is a good paper in which you clearly state your perspectives. It’ll be instructive to engage these convictions and experiences with the course material, and it’s probably worth assessing that the entirety of the theological and biblical points you mention about the end of the world is certainly well-represented in our country, but the majority of Christians does not hold to the dispensational, premillennial views that Boyer presents.
As you move into the revision of this essay and to strengthen this paper further, I’d like you to review how well the paper holds together, that is, its coherence. Take another look at whether all the elements hold together around one idea. It’s always good to ask, “Does this paragraph possess a unifying theme?” One tip I use is to read a paper out loud to myself or others.
Another key way to improve this paper is to work at achieving a more rigorous analysis and clarifying further your meaning through revising sentence structure and logical progression. Take another look and see how well the elements connect to each other. You can keep asking, “How does the idea in this sentence follow what was in the previous sentence?” And “Is there something I’m assuming that my reader needs to know?” One tip is to read a paper out loud to yourself or a friend–somehow that helps me hear the gaps. The writer C.S. Lewis once commented, ““The way for a person to develop a style is to know exactly what he wants to say, and to be sure he is saying exactly that. The reader, we must remember, does not start by knowing what we mean. If our words are ambiguous, our meaning will escape him. I sometimes think that writing is like driving sheep down a road. If there is any gate open to the left or the right the reader will most certainly go into it.” We must remember, as authors, we know where you’re headed, but the reader does not, and so we have to work hard at a clear progression of ideas. I hope these comments make sense, but please talk with me if you have questions. In the revision, you’ll set this paper and put it in conversation with the material through week 5. It’s due February 23. More on that in Blackboard… Greg
Material from week 5:
http://archive.ttbook.org/book/revelations-elaine-pagels
First draft: The thoughts and beliefs that I have about the end of the world are connected to a Christian point of view. I was raised in a Christian household and went to a Christian school my entire life until I went to college. My understanding of the end of the world is described in the bible as Judgment day and the rapture. My knowledge about the end of the world is described in the Scripture and comes in two stages. First, God will destroy all false gods and all organized false religions; this is illustrated as a symbol of a prostitute called “Babylon the Great.” Babylon the Great is a symbol describing anything that leads you away from the true God. Next, God will focus on all of the “kings of the entire inhabited earth” and all of the wicked, which will be destroyed in the “the war of the great day of God the Almighty.” This war is known as Armageddon in the book of Revelation. Armageddon is the final war between the human ruling and God. All who are associated with the human government and all who support it are seen as refusing to submit to God and His rulership. Jesus Christ will lead the heavenly army in the victory of this battle and will destroy all of God’s enemies. God’s enemies are all those who oppose God’s authority and reject Him with contempt. During this battle, God will have; lightning, flooding, fire, earthquake, disease, and all-natural disasters at His disposal. After this battle, not all will die, and it will not be the end of the earth. The battle of Armageddon does not destroy humanity but saves it because all those who serve God will survive. So, what I believe to be the end of the world is more like starting a clean slate with all those who believe and serve God and has wholly whipped out all things wicked.
