Isaac Newton was, as we all know, the most outstanding scientist and mathematician of the 17th and 18th centuries. He is considered the father of physics and the founder of the law of gravity. But was he really the rational thinker as we would have it today? Far from it. As it turns out, Newton was also a religious fundamentalist who devoted himself to intense Bible study and who wrote over a million words on biblical subjects.

Newton’s aim was to unravel nothing less than God’s secret messages. According to the great scientist, they were hidden in the Holy Scriptures. Above all Newton was intent on finding out when the world would come to an end. Then, he believed, Christ would return and set up a 1,000-year Kingdom of God on earth and he—Isaac Newton, that is—would rule the world as one among the saints. For half a century, Newton covered thousands of pages with religious musings and calculations.

Three hundred years later, toward the end of 2002, the Canadian historian of science Stephen Snobelen of King’s College in Halifax found a significant document among a convoluted mass of manuscripts that had been left in the home of the Duke of Portsmouth for over 200 years. They had been kept from public scrutiny until 1936, when they were sold at an auction at Sotheby’s. The collection was acquired by the Jewish scholar and collector Abraham Yehuda, an Iraqi professor of Semitic languages who, upon his death, left them to the State of Israel’s Jewish National Library. Ever since, they have been gathering dust in the archives at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

When Snobelen assessed the manuscripts, he chanced upon a piece of paper on which the famous physicist had

calculated the year of the apocalypse: 2060. Newton arrived at this date based on razor-sharp conclusions. From his readings of the Book of Daniel (Chapter 7, Verse 25) and the Book of Revelations, the physicist concluded that the time span of three and a half years signified a critical time period. Basing a year on 360 days—a simplification that comes easy to a mathematician—this time span corresponds to 1,260 days. By simply replacing days by years, the illustrious Bible researcher easily concluded that the world would come to an end 1,260 years after a particular commencing date.

So now the critical question was, what was the commencing date? Newton had several dates to choose from, each of which was somehow connected to Catholicism, a religion he loathed to the core. Richard Westfall, author of the definitive biography on Newton, pointed out that Newton had singled out the year 607 as a significant date. It referred to the year in which Emperor Phokas bestowed on to Bonifatius III the title of “Pope Over All Christians.” This edict elevated Rome to “caput omnium ecclesarum” (head of all churches)—truly a worthy occasion to mark the beginning of the end. Since 607 + 1,260 = 1,867, Newton predicted that the end of the world would occur in the year 1867. But today we know with absolute certainty that the world did not come to an end then.

Newton had prepared for such a problem with a fallback strategy. During his research in Jerusalem, the Canadian professor also came across the year 800. This is a significant date in history since on Christmas day of that year Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne at St. Peter’s in Rome. It was the beginning of the “Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.” And 800 plus 1,260 equals 2,060. Another half century or so, and the world as we know it will call it quits. Quod erat demonstrandum.

If one or the other reader has started to feel slightly queasy after reading the last few lines, let him or her heave a sigh of relief. Newton had another fallback position. According to further calculations of the eminent physicist, the end of the world could be somewhat delayed and take place at the latest in the year 2370.