Editing Left Behind (section)

== Reception ==
Multiple books in the series have been on the [[New York Times Best Seller List|''New York Times'' Bestseller List]]. Starting in 2000, Books 7 and 8 reached number one on the list followed by book 10, which debuted at number one.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/11/books/best-sellers-june-11-2000.html|work=[[The New York Times]]|title=''New York Times'' Bestsellers|date=June 11, 2000|access-date=February 19, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170803133701/http://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/11/books/best-sellers-june-11-2000.html|archive-date=August 3, 2017|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 2016, several books in the series were [[bestseller]]s and 65 million copies were sold in various languages.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wilkinson |first=Alissa |date=July 13, 2016 |title=The 'Left Behind' series was just the latest way America prepared for the Rapture |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/act-four/wp/2016/07/13/the-left-behind-series-was-just-the-latest-way-america-prepared-for-the-rapture/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201005100421/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/act-four/wp/2016/07/13/the-left-behind-series-was-just-the-latest-way-america-prepared-for-the-rapture/ |archive-date=October 5, 2020 |website=The Washington Post}}</ref>

=== Critical response ===

==== Evangelical shift and views on non-Christians ====
In 1999, journalist [[Adam Davidson (journalist)|Adam Davidson]] placed the series in the context of a shift in evangelical views over the last several decades on non-believers. He argues that evangelicals went from "[not yet knowing] who they were in the American public sphere" in the 1960s and early 1970s to a "major shift in evangelical thought which allowed for political and social activism" by the late 1990s, more negative and divisive. Evangelicals, Davidson states, had previously been more separatist, with little interest in attempting to create large-scale religious, moral, and political change. He uses the 1972 Christian end-times film ''A Thief in the Night'' as an example of this former approach, with its compassionate view towards unbelievers: "This is a portrait of regular people who don't know what to do and happen to make the wrong choice".<ref name="Davidson">{{Cite web |last=Davidson |first=Adam |author-link=Adam Davidson (journalist) |date=April 8, 1999 |title=The Mean Spirit |url=http://www.feedmag.com/deepread/dr200.shtml |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20000614081304/http://www.feedmag.com/deepread/dr200.shtml |archive-date=June 14, 2000 |access-date=June 1, 2025 |website=[[Feed Magazine]]}}</ref> In contrast, ''Left Behind'', he contends, has a contemptuous and triumphant view of non-Christians and their suffering in the end times that he sees as symptomatic of a larger change in evangelicalism.
{{Blockquote|text=While predicting the apocalypse may be a constant, the way evangelicals think about it has undergone a massive overhaul. The progression (or regression) is the move from rural towns to the halls of power. It's the expansion of the evangelical sphere of concern from the very local (my friends, my church) to the national and global (my president, my international policy). It's a move from a complex view of the individual to an oversimplification that identifies everyone as either good-believer or bad-heathen. It's also a change in sentiment towards the unbeliever from sadness, caring, and invitation to triumph, judgement, and dismissal. It's a chilling mutation, and has entrenched evangelical Christianity in an antagonism to secular America that borders, at times, on cruelty.<ref name="Davidson" />}}
While writing that the series fulfills the norms of mass-market fiction, magazine writer [[Michelle Goldberg]] also characterized the books as an attack on [[Judaism]] and [[liberalism|liberal]] [[secularism]], and suggested that the near-future "[[Eschatology|end times]]" in which the books are set seem to reflect the actual worldview of millions of Americans, including many prominent [[Conservatism in the United States|conservative]] leaders.<ref name="goldberg">{{cite news |author=Goldberg |first=Michelle |date=July 29, 2002 |title=Fundamentally unsound |url=http://dir.salon.com/story/books/feature/2002/07/29/left_behind/index.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071214062956/http://dir.salon.com/story/books/feature/2002/07/29/left_behind/index.html |archive-date=December 14, 2007 |work=[[Salon.com|Salon]]}}</ref>

==== Anti-Catholicism ====
The books are written from an evangelical Protestant viewpoint.<ref name="Davidson" /> Some believe the books are [[anti-Catholic]], noting that many Catholics were not raptured, concluding that no religion is free of false converts<ref name="Anti-Catholics">{{Cite magazine |last=Olson |first=Carl E. |date=November 2000 |title=No Rapture for Rome |url=http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2000/0011fea2.asp |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070706152802/http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2000/0011fea2.asp |archive-date=July 6, 2007 |website=This Rock |publisher=[[Catholic Answers]] |volume=11 |issue=11}}</ref> and that the new pope establishes a false religion.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Chastain |first=Mary Ann |date=March 31, 2004 |title='Left Behind' Authors Begin Tour of the South |url=https://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2004-03-31-left-behind-authors_x.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121103090813/http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2004-03-31-left-behind-authors_x.htm |archive-date=November 3, 2012 |work=[[USA Today]] |agency=[[Associated Press]]}}</ref> While the fictional [[Pope]], John XXIV, was raptured, he is described as "promoting Lutheran reform", and it is implied that he was raptured for this reason.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gribben |first=Crawford |title=Writing the Rapture: Prophecy Fiction in Evangelical America |date=2009 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=9780199870257 |chapter=6: The Left Behind Phenomenon}}</ref> His successor, Pope [[Peter Mathews (Left Behind)|Peter II]], becomes [[Pontifex Maximus]] of Enigma Babylon One World Faith, an amalgam of all remaining world faiths and religions. ''[[Catholic Answers]]'' describes the series as anti-Catholic.<ref name="Anti-Catholics" /><ref name="Money">{{cite web |last1=Akin |first1=Jimmy |date=2008 |title=False Profit: Money, Prejudice, and Bad Theology in Tim LaHaye's 'Left Behind' Series |url=http://www.catholic.com/library/false_profit.asp |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080711172106/http://www.catholic.com/library/false_profit.asp |archive-date=July 11, 2008 |website=[[Catholic Answers]]}}</ref>

The co-author of the book, Jerry B. Jenkins, as well as LaHaye, stated that their books are not anti-Catholic and that they have many faithful Catholic readers and friends.<ref name="Apologetic">{{cite web |last=Olson |first=Carl E. |date=December 2004 |title=Tim LaHaye: The Left Behind Series |url=http://www.catholicleague.org/rer.php?topic=Book+Reviews&id=33 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070629105048/http://www.catholicleague.org/rer.php?topic=Book%2BReviews&id=33 |archive-date=June 29, 2007 |access-date=December 31, 2007 |website=Catalyst |publisher=[[Catholic League (U.S.)|Catholic League]] |quote=When a reader complained online that Tribulation Force was anti-Catholic, Left Behind co-author Jerry B. Jenkins vehemently insisted that the books are "not anti-Catholic" and that "almost every person in the book who was left behind was Protestant. Astute readers will understand where we're coming from. True believers in Christ, regardless of their church 'brand' will be raptured" (Amazon.com, August 26, 1999). LaHaye responded by insisting that "our books are not anti-Catholic. In fact, we have many faithful Catholic readers and friends" (Religion News Service, June 26, 2003). "The books don't suggest any particular theology," he said, "but try to introduce people to a more personal relationship with Jesus."}}</ref> According to LaHaye, "the books don't suggest any particular [[theology]], but try to introduce people to a more [[personal relationship with Jesus Christ|personal relationship with Jesus]]".<ref name="Apologetic" />

==== Violence and war ====
Some practicing Christians, evangelical and otherwise, along with non-Christians have shown concern that the social perspectives promoted in the ''Left Behind'' series unduly sensationalize the death and destruction of masses of people. [[Harvey Cox]], a professor of divinity at Harvard, says part of the appeal of the books lies in the "lip-licking anticipation of all the blood", and Lutheran theologian Barbara Rossing, author of ''The Rapture Exposed: The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation'', said the books glorify violence.<ref name="Rossing2007">{{cite book |author=Rossing |first=Barbara R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mK2fcw-GkMIC |title=The Rapture Exposed |date=March 1, 2007 |publisher=Basic Books |isbn=978-0-465-00496-6}}</ref><ref name="cloud" /><ref name="whitehead">{{Cite web |last=Whitehead |first=John W. |date=July 1, 2004 |title=God So Loved the World that He Gave Us World War III |url=http://www.rutherford.org/oldspeak/Articles/Religion/oldspeak-worldwar3.asp |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080112214410/http://www.rutherford.org/oldspeak/Articles/Religion/oldspeak-worldwar3.asp |archive-date=January 12, 2008 |website=[[The Rutherford Institute]] |series=OldSpeak}}</ref> Additionally, Paul Nuechterlein accused the authors of re-sacralizing violence, adding that "we human beings are the ones who put our faith in superior firepower. But in the ''Left Behind'' novels, the darkness of that human, satanic violence is once again attributed to God".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Nuechterlein |first=Paul |date=May 18, 2004 |title=Re-Sacralizing Violence in Left Behind |url=http://girardianlectionary.net/res/left_behind_resacralizing_violence.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071119140743/http://girardianlectionary.net/res/left_behind_resacralizing_violence.htm |archive-date=November 19, 2007 |access-date=August 6, 2023 |website=Girardian Lectionary}}</ref> ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' said "the nuclear frights of, say, [[Tom Clancy]]'s ''[[The Sum of All Fears]]'' wouldn't fill a chapter in the ''Left Behind'' series. (Large chunks of several U.S. cities have been bombed to smithereens by page 110 of Book 3.)"<ref name="cloud">{{Cite magazine |last=Cloud |first=John |date=June 23, 2002 |title=Meet the Prophet |url=http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020701/books.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081202151833/http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020701/books.html |archive-date=December 2, 2008 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|TIME]]}}</ref>

David Carlson, a Professor of Religious Studies and a member of the [[Greek Orthodox]] Church, wrote that the theology underpinning the ''Left Behind'' series promotes a "skewed view of the Christian faith that welcomes war and disaster, while dismissing peace efforts in the Middle East and elsewhere—all in the name of Christ".<ref name="Carlson">{{cite web |last=Carlson |first=David |date=2003 |title='Left Behind' and the Corruption of Biblical Interpretation |url=http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles/CarlsonPremillenial.php |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150602001404/http://www.orthodoxytoday.org/articles/CarlsonPremillenial.php |archive-date=June 2, 2015 |access-date=May 12, 2015 |website=Orthodoxy Today}}</ref>

B. D. Forbes "locates the series in the context of a well-established tradition of American popular culture...that presents the good-evil struggle as 'evil [coming] from the outside' with 'the solution [as] the destruction of the evil-doers".<ref>{{Citation |last1=Serazio |first1=Michael |title=Right Behind 'Left Behind': The Conservative Geopolitics of Christian Apocalyptic Entertainment |date=2008 |pages=9 |series=Conference Papers |publisher=[[International Communication Association]] |last2=Hardy |first2=Bruce |via=[[EBSCOhost]]}}</ref>

==== Relationship to believed prophetic events ====
Several scholars comment on the series' setting in time and relationship to perceived real, future events: religious studies scholar [[Mark Juergensmeyer]] argues that the ''Left Behind'' books are seen as fictional representations of future events, drawing a connection between the future violence portrayed in the books and "the violence in imagined worlds in the here-and now".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Ingersoll |first=Julie |author-link=Julie Ingersoll |date=2022 |title=America's Holy Trinity: How Conspiracism, Apocalypticism, and Persecution Narratives Set Us up for Crisis |url=https://www.pdcnet.org/jrv/content/jrv_2022_0010_0001_0073_0088 |journal=[[Journal of Religion and Violence]] |volume=10 |issue=1 |pages=81–82 |doi=10.5840/jrv202281698 |issn=2159-6808 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> Similarly, Andrew Strombeck additionally links the books to Derrida's "spectral time": "neither the future nor the present but a kind of ghostly future that haunts the present".<ref name="Strombeck">{{Cite journal |last=Strombeck |first=Andrew |date=2006 |title=Invest in Jesus: Neoliberalism and the Left behind Novels |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4489261 |journal=[[Cultural Critique]] |issue=64 |pages= |issn=0882-4371}}</ref> [[Glenn Shuck]] also contends that ''Left Behind'' "does not...describe an other-worldly dystopia: it provides the shock-value of uncanny recognition of the present in a different form."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gribben |first=Crawford |date=2007 |title=Review of Marks of the Beast: The Left behind Novels and the Struggle for Evangelical Identity |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40006389 |journal=[[Journal of the American Academy of Religion]] |volume=75 |issue=2 |pages=455–458 |doi=10.1093/jaarel/lfm020 |issn=0002-7189 |jstor=40006389 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> Doris Buss and Didi Herman write, "While there is clearly some element of drama and 'play' to the 'Left Behind' opus...the series remains, at its core, a statement of how the authors and many other conservative Christians believe this world will end and a new one begin. In their detail, the 'Left Behind' 'novels' are indistinguishable from many works of ostensible 'nonfiction' penned by other [Christian right] writers."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Buss |first=Doris |title=Globalizing Family Values: the Christian Right in International Politics |last2=Herman |first2=Didi |date=2003 |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |isbn=978-0-8166-9517-1 |location=Minneapolis, MN |chapter=Introduction}}</ref>

==== Apocalypticism, conspiratorialism, and militias ====
The series' focus on apocalypticism, totalitarian conspiracies, and militias has been noted by writers including [[Gershom Gorenberg]], [[Michael Joseph Gross]], and Andrew Strombeck. They note themes such as fear of [[One-world government conspiracy|one-world government]] (in the form of the United Nations led by the Antichrist), global religion, and global currency – fought against by militias "structurally equivalent to Christians".<ref name="Strombeck" /> Didi Herman places the series' depiction of the United Nations as an anti-Christian organization intent on implementing globalism, and thereby the New World Order, in the context of [[Christian right]] end-times scenarios, along with [[Pat Robertson]]'s ''[[The New World Order (Robertson book)|New World Order]]'' and [[Hal Lindsey]]'s ''[[Late Great Planet Earth]]''.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Buss |first=Doris |title=Globalizing Family Values: the Christian Right in International Politics |last2=Herman |first2=Didi |date=2003 |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |isbn=978-0-8166-9517-1 |location=Minneapolis |chapter=Constructing the Global}}</ref> University of Notre Dame religion scholar Jason Springs regards the series' apocalypticism as one aspect that would later feed into the evangelical adoption of [[QAnon]].<ref name="Springs">{{Cite web |last=Springs |first=Jason |date=2021-06-16 |title=QAnon, Conspiracy, and White Evangelical Apocalypse |url=https://contendingmodernities.nd.edu/theorizing-modernities/qanon-evangelical-apocalypse/ |access-date=2024-08-04 |website=[[University of Notre Dame]]: Contending Modernities}}</ref>

Laurie Goodstein, writing in 1998 for ''The New York Times'', placed what she called the "''Left Behind'' phenomenon" in the [[calendar|calendrical]] context of the approaching year 2000. Goodstein noted a 'proliferation' of similarly apocalyptic texts appearing at that time, by authors such as [[Jim Bakker]] and [[John Hagee]]. Goodstein cited the opinion of University of Wisconsin historian Paul Boyer, who described such authors as "cashing in on the public preoccupation with the year 2000".<ref>{{cite news |last=Goodstein |first=Laurie |date=October 4, 1998 |title=Fast-Selling Thrillers Depict Prophetic View of Final Days |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1998/10/04/us/fast-selling-thrillers-depict-prophetic-view-of-final-days.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180131044007/http://www.nytimes.com/1998/10/04/us/fast-selling-thrillers-depict-prophetic-view-of-final-days.html |archive-date=January 31, 2018 |access-date=January 29, 2018 |newspaper=[[The New York Times]]}}</ref>

==== American Century and American exceptionalism ====
Marisa Ronan places the series in the context of the [[American Century]] and [[American exceptionalism]], "proving at the fin-de-siècle that not only was the twentieth century American, it was Christian". Ronan notes that American evangelicals are portrayed as taking center stage in the apocalypse, fighting a spiritual battle against the UN's successor – headed by the Antichrist – which in part seeks to usurp the superpower status of the United States.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Ronan |first=Marisa |date=2015 |title=The American Century and Its Evangelical Christian Fiction Legacy |url=http://op.asjournal.org/the-american-century-and-its-evangelical-christian-fiction-legacy/ |url-status=live |journal=[[American Studies (journal)|American Studies Journal]] |series=Occasional Papers |volume=9 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241104055708/http://op.asjournal.org/the-american-century-and-its-evangelical-christian-fiction-legacy/ |archive-date=November 4, 2024 |access-date=January 28, 2025}}</ref>

==== End-times theology and premillennial dispensationalism ====
Along with some other rapture fiction novels, the ''Left Behind'' series demonstrates a specific interpretation of the Gospel and the Christian life, one with which many have taken issue theologically. The books have not sold particularly well outside of the United States.<ref name="boston">{{cite web |last1=Boston |first1=Rob |date=February 2002 |title=If Best-Selling End-Times Author Tim LaHaye Has His Way, Church-State Separation Will Be... Left Behind |url=http://www.au.org/church-state/february-2002-church-state/featured/left-behind |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111118111636/http://www.au.org/church-state/february-2002-church-state/featured/left-behind |archive-date=November 18, 2011 |access-date=April 1, 2015 |website=[[Americans United for Separation of Church and State]]}}</ref> [[Dispensationalism]] remains a minority view among theologians.<ref name="dart">{{cite magazine |last1=Dart |first1=John |date=September 25, 2002 |title='Beam me up' theology—The Debate Over 'Left Behind' |url=http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2600 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402123910/http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2600 |archive-date=April 2, 2015 |access-date=April 1, 2015 |magazine=[[The Christian Century]] |pages=8–9 |via=Religion Online}}</ref> For instance, [[amillennialism|amillennial]] and [[postmillennialism|postmillennial]] Christians do not believe in the same timeline of the Second Coming as [[premillennialism|premillennialists]], while [[preterism|preterist]] Christians interpret the Book of Revelation as events that have already been fulfilled in the 1st century. [[Brian McLaren]] of the [[Emerging Church|Emergent Church]] compares the ''Left Behind'' series to ''[[The Da Vinci Code]]'', and states, "What the ''Left Behind'' novels do, the way they twist scripture toward a certain theological and political end, I think [[Dan Brown|[Dan] Brown]] is twisting scripture, just to other political ends."<ref name="Brian">{{cite web |last1=McLaren |first1=Brian |date=May 9, 2006 |title=Brian McLaren on the Da Vinci Code |url=http://forgodsfame.org/2006/05/09/brian-mclaren-on-the-da-vinci-code/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402114248/http://forgodsfame.org/2006/05/09/brian-mclaren-on-the-da-vinci-code/ |archive-date=April 2, 2015 |access-date=April 1, 2015 |website=Grace Fellowship |publisher=Sojourners Magazine}}</ref> John Dart, writing in ''Christian Century'', characterized the works as "[[Beam me up, Scotty#Legacy|beam me up]] theology."<ref name="dart" /> Jason Springs argues that evangelical beliefs on the role of the modern state of [[Israel]] have been shaped by the books.<ref name="Springs />

==== Neoliberalism ====
Andrew Strombeck focuses on the series' [[neoliberalism]]: "in the midst of the apocalypse, good is privatized and evil state-run"; he notes the characters' depictions as "rational market actors first, Christians second".<ref name="Strombeck" />

==== Pacing ====
One reason cited for the books' popularity is the quick pacing and action, and that they reflect the public's overall concern and fascination with the Apocalypse as portrayed in the biblical book of Revelation.<ref name="Davidson" /> [[Michelle Goldberg]] has written that, "On one level, the attraction of the ''Left Behind'' books isn't that much different from that of, say, [[Tom Clancy]] or [[Stephen King]]. The plotting is brisk and the characterizations [[Manichaeism|Manichaean]]. People disappear and things blow up."<ref name="goldberg" /> The ''New York Times'' also compared the series to Clancy's works.<ref>{{cite book |author1=LaHaye |first=Tim |url=https://archive.org/details/authorizedleftbe00laha |title=The Authorized Left Behind Handbook |author2=Jenkins |first2=Jerry B. |author3=Swanson |first3=Sandi |date=2005 |publisher=[[Tyndale House Publishers]] |isbn=9780842354400 |page=[https://archive.org/details/authorizedleftbe00laha/page/n345 336] |url-access=registration |via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref> However, those views are not universally shared. Other reviewers have called the series "almost laughably tedious" and "fatuous and boring."<ref name="dreyfuss">{{cite news |author=Dreyfuss |first=Robert |date=January 28, 2004 |title=Reverend Doomsday: According to Tim LaHaye, the Apocalypse is now |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/5939999/reverend_doomsday/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070806102443/http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/5939999/reverend_doomsday/ |archive-date=August 6, 2007 |magazine=[[Rolling Stone]]}}</ref><ref name="haber">{{cite news |author=Haber |first=Gordon |date=August 23, 2004 |title=The Ministry of Fear |url=http://www.nysun.com/article/681 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130130134009/http://www.nysun.com/article/681 |archive-date=January 30, 2013 |work=[[New York Sun]]}}</ref>

==== Impact ====
[[Jerry Falwell]] said about the first book in the series: "In terms of its impact on Christianity, it's probably greater than that of any other book in modern times, outside the Bible."<ref>{{cite news |date=February 7, 2005 |title=Tim and Beverly LaHaye |url=http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101050207/photoessay/15.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050203012258/http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101050207/photoessay/15.html |archive-date=February 3, 2005 |access-date=September 8, 2007 |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|TIME]]}}</ref>