Thursday, February 22, 2024

A Nativity Shining Light of relevance to Israelite Magi

by Damien F. Mackey “Magi from the east came to Jerusalem”. Matthew 2:1 Part One: Were the Magi inspired pagans or Israelites? According to my recent article: Magi and the Persian factor (8) Magi and the Persian factor | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu the Magi of Matthew 2 definitely could not have been from Persia. Nor were they likely to have been, as I concluded, non-Israelites: “Now, from what has gone before, I think that there must be a very good chance that these, too [the Magi] - however many of them there may have been - must have been Israelites, albeit ‘enlightened’, rather than foreigners (gentiles), Persians or Nabateans”. Even the suggestion that the Magi were Zoroastrians may smack of a Hebrew element. Because, according to certain traditions, Zoroaster (Zarathustra) was actually the Jewish prophet Baruch: https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2562-baruch —In Arabic-Christian Legend: The Arabic-Christian legends identify Baruch with Zoroaster, and give much information concerning him. Baruch, angry because the gift of prophecy had been denied him, and on account of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, left Palestine to found the religion of Zoroaster. The prophecy of the birth of Jesus from a virgin, and of his adoration by the Magi, is also ascribed to Baruch-Zoroaster (compare the complete collection of these legends in Gottheil, in "Classical Studies in Honor of H. Drisler," pp. 24-51, New York, 1894; Jackson, "Zoroaster," pp. 17, 165 et seq.). It is difficult to explain the origin of this curious identification of a prophet with a magician, such as Zoroaster was held to be, among the Jews, Christians, and Arabs. De Sacy ("Notices et Extraits des MSS. de la Bibliothèque du Roi," ii. 319) explains it on the ground that in Arabic the name of the prophet Jeremiah is almost identical with that of the city of Urmiah, where, it is said, Zoroaster lived. However this may be, the Jewish legend mentioned above (under Baruch in Rabbinical Literature), according to which the Ethiopian in Jer. xxxviii. 7 is undoubtedly identical with Baruch, is connected with this Arabic-Christian legend. As early as the Clementine "Recognitiones" (iv. 27), Zoroaster was believed to be a descendant of Ham; and, according to Gen. x. 6, Cush, the Ethiopian, is a son of Ham. It should furthermore be remembered that, according to the "Recognitiones" iv. 28), the Persians believed that Zoroaster had been taken into heaven in a chariot ("ad cœlum vehiculo sublevatum"); and according to the Jewish legend, the above-mentioned Ethiopian was transported alive into paradise ("Derek Ereẓ Zuṭṭa," i. end), an occurrence that, like the translation of Elijah (II Kings ii. 11), must have taken place by means of a "vehiculum." Another reminiscence of the Jewish legend is found in Baruch-Zoroaster's words concerning Jesus: "He shall descend from my family" ("Book of the Bee," ed. Budge, p. 90, line 5, London, 1886), since, according to the Haggadah, Baruch was a priest; and Maria, the mother of Jesus, was of priestly family. …. [End of quote] The captivating tale of the Magi has been absorbed by other ethnicities-religions. For, as I wrote in my article: Magi incident absorbed into Buddhism? (4) Magi incident absorbed into Buddhism? | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu quoting Holger Kersten: “At last, in 1937, various expeditions were dispatched from Lhasa to seek out the holy child according to the heavenly omens, in the direction indicated. Each group included wise and worthy lamas of highly distinguished status in the theocracy. In addition to their servants, each group took costly gifts with them …”. Interestingly, too, “the holy child” was aged 2 (cf. Matthew 2:16). Which Israelites could the Magi have been? We know at least the when of the Magi, the beginning of AD time, reign of Herod. We also know the where, that they were “from the east” (Matthew 2:1-2): After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him’. If they were Israelites, as I believe they must have been, then what was their east? Presumably they, like the prophet Job, were living east of the River Jordan (Job:1:2): “[Job] was the greatest man among all the people of the East”. His home, traditionally, was in Hauran, Ausitis (Uz), where lived the bene qedem. In the Book of Tobit, it is called “Ecbatana” (Bathania) (Tobit 7:1), which is Bashan. According to Jewish Virtual Library, article “Kedemites or Easterners”: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/kedemites-or-easterners KEDEMITES OR EASTERNERS (Heb. בְּנֵי קֶדֶם (benei kedem, bene qedem), adjective qadmoni, קַדְמֹנִי; Gen. 15:19) is a general designation for the peoples living on the eastern border of Syria and Palestine, from as far north as Haran (Gen. 29:1–4) to as far south as the northern end of the Red Sea (Gen. 25:1–6). In Israelite ethnology, all these peoples, and the Ishmaelites as well, who ranged from the border of Egypt to Assyria (i.e., the Middle Euphrates), and who included the inhabitants of Tema and Dumah (Gen. 25:12–18), were all related. Their center of dispersion was the Middle Euphrates region – called Aram-Naharaim (Gen. 24:10; Deut. 23:5), Paddan-Aram (Gen. 28:2, 5, 6, 7; 31:18 (or Paddan, Gen. 48:7)), "the country Aram" (Hos. 12:13), or simply Aram (Num. 23:7). From here Abraham and Lot moved to Canaan (Gen. 12:5). Lot eventually moved to Transjordan and became the ancestor of Moab and Ammon (Gen. 19:30ff.), while Abraham became the ancestor of all the other Kedemites, including the Ishmaelites, and of the Israelites as well. His son Isaac and the latter's son Jacob-Israel married wives from Abraham's original home-land, where Jacob even lived for 20 years. Hence the confession, "My father was a wandering/ fugitive Aramean who migrated to Egypt" (Deut. 26:5). The Israelites acknowledged all those peoples as their kin in contrast to the Canaanites. The Kedemites enjoyed among the Israelites a great reputation for wisdom. Not only does David quote a Kedemite proverb which he characterizes as such, but the wisdom of the Kedemites is rated only lower than Solomon's though higher than that of the Egyptians (I Kings 5:10), and Isaiah represents the Egyptian king's wise men as seeking to impress him by claiming descent from sages of Kedem (this, not "of old," is the meaning of qedem in Isa. 19:11). …. [End of quote] Now, given my re-dating of the Nativity to the time of Judas Maccabeus: Religious war raging in Judah during the Infancy of Jesus (5) Religious war raging in Judah during the Infancy of Jesus | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu then we might expect to find the Magi amongst Transjordanian allies of the Maccabees. In I Maccabees 5 we read of Judas and his army crossing over the Jordan to deliver oppressed Jews, and there occurs the very interesting reference to “the land of Tobias” – that being (the Greek version of) the name of Job. Also mentioned here is Dathema, that is apparently right in Job-ian territory (Bashan): https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/hdb/d/dathema.html DATHEMA ( 1Ma 5:9 ). A fortress in Bashan. It may perhaps be the modern Dâmeh on the S. border of the Lejâ district, N. of Ashteroth-karnaim. And so we read (vv. 9-23): Now the nations in Gilead gathered together against the Israelites who lived in their territory and planned to destroy them. But they fled to the stronghold of Dathema and sent to Judas and his brothers letters that said, ‘The nations around us have gathered together to destroy us. They are preparing to come and capture the stronghold to which we have fled, and Timothy is leading their forces. Now then, come and rescue us from their hands, for many of us have fallen, and all our kindred who were in the land of Tobias have been killed; the enemy have captured their wives and children and goods and have destroyed about a thousand persons there’. While the letters were still being read, other messengers, with their garments torn, came from Galilee and made a similar report; they said that the people of Ptolemais and Tyre and Sidon and all Galilee of the gentiles had gathered together against them “to annihilate us.” When Judas and the people heard these messages, a great assembly was called to determine what they should do for their kindred who were in distress and were being attacked by enemies. Then Judas said to his brother Simon, ‘Choose your men and go and rescue your kindred in Galilee; Jonathan my brother and I will go to Gilead’. But he left Joseph, son of Zechariah, and Azariah, a leader of the people, with the rest of the forces in Judea to guard it, and he gave them this command, ‘Take charge of this people, but do not engage in battle with the nations until we return’. Then three thousand men were assigned to Simon to go to Galilee and eight thousand to Judas for Gilead. So Simon went to Galilee and fought many battles against the nations, and the nations were crushed before him. He pursued them to the gate of Ptolemais; as many as three thousand of the nations fell, and he despoiled them. Then he took the Jews of Galilee and Arbatta, with their wives and children, and all they possessed and led them to Judea with great rejoicing. Note, moreover, the likeness to the Book of Job 1:16, 17 and 18: “While he was still speaking, another messenger came and said …”, to: “While the letters were still being read, other messengers, with their garments torn, came from Galilee and made a similar report …” (I Maccabees 5:14). Did the Magi, like Job’s first generation of children, perish amidst turmoil, or were they still to be found living amongst those “rejoicing” Jews whom Judas Maccabeus led safely “to Judea”? King Herod no longer cast his dark shadow over the kingdom. Perhaps some Magi had perished at the hands of Timothy, and some had survived. One can only guess at this stage. Tobias (Job) had benefitted from family inheritances (Tobit 14:13): “He took respectful care of his aging father-in-law and mother-in-law; and he buried them at Ecbatana …. Then he inherited Raguel’s estate as well as that of his father Tobit”. He, as Job, would see to it that all of his surviving children likewise benefitted (Job 42:12-15): The LORD blessed the latter part of Job’s life more than the former part. He had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen and a thousand donkeys. And he also had seven sons and three daughters. The first daughter he named Jemimah, the second Keziah and the third Keren-Happuch. Nowhere in all the land were there found women as beautiful as Job’s daughters, and their father granted them an inheritance along with their brothers. Now, in my much shortened revision, there was not much time lapse at all between late Job and the Birth of Jesus Christ. There are common elements with Job and the Magi; the East; wisdom; purity of gold (e.g., Job 23:10); camels (presumably); expecting a Redeemer (Job 19:25); wealth. Job (Tobias), whose father, Tobit, had quoted the prophet Amos (Tobit 2:6), would surely have known the Messianic prophecy of Micah, who was this very Amos: God can raise up prophets at will - even from a shepherd of Simeon (8) God can raise up prophets at will - even from a shepherd of Simeon | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu Micah’s prophecy had famously been repeated to King Herod after the Magi had arrived in Jerusalem (Matthew 2:3-6): When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the Law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born. ‘In Bethlehem in Judea’, they replied, ‘for this is what the prophet has written: “But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel”.’ Of course the Magi already knew it, but they had gone directly to Jerusalem presuming (I think) that the royal Babe had now grown and would be ensconced in Jerusalem. Why did the Magi take so long to leave their home? Perhaps this was due to the turmoil of war that was raging in Israel at the time. Tobit (1:15) tells his son, Tobias, of the roads being unsafe for travel during the reign of Sennacherib, king of Assyria. Possibly, the Magi picked up (some of) their gifts for the Messiah in Jerusalem. It is interesting that the name of one of Job’s daughters, Keziah, or Cassia (42:14), has a close connection with frankincense and myrrh: https://www.earthsunessentials.com.au/product/cassia/ “Cassia features in folklore medicine often. It is even included in the Bible with Myrrh, Frankincense, and other oils and herbs”. Did Matthew (2:11) have Job 42:11 in the back of his mind when writing of the Magi’s visit to “the house”? All [Job’s] brothers and sisters and everyone who had known him before came and ate with him in his house. … each one gave him a piece of silver and a gold ring. The road taken by the Magi from “the land of Tobias” to Jerusalem was not to be the way that these wise men (and women?) would return (Matthew 2:12): “… having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route”, avoiding Jerusalem this time. Intending to head NE, did they make a switch eastwards from the Central Ridge Route to the King’s Highway? Readers with a good knowledge of ancient biblical roads may be able to help out here. Conclusion The when of the Magi - the beginning of AD time, reign of King Herod ‘the Great’ (Maccabean era in my revision). The where of the Magi - they were “from the east” (Matthew 2:1-2), the Bashan region. The who of the Magi - certainly enlightened Israelites, likely family of the prophet Job. Part Two: What was the bright Star that the Magi saw? ‘Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him’. Matthew 2:2 While some of the best efforts to interpret the Magi Star have concluded, as we have read in: Solid attempts to interpret the biblical sky (3) Solid attempts to interpret the biblical sky | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu that it was a planet, say, Venus or Jupiter, none, I think, has been able fully to explain it in its precise detail - for example, the fact that “it stopped” (Matthew 2:9): “After [the Magi] had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was”. At last I have found an article that, for me, makes proper sense of the Nativity Star. Matthew Ervin, in December 2013, explained it as the Glory of God. He uses the word, Shekinah, which, however, is not found in the Bible. I would prefer: Glory of the Lord (כְבוֹד יְהוָה), Chevod Yahweh (e.g. 2 Chronicles 7:1). Matthew Ervin writes: https://appleeye.org/2013/12/15/the-star-of-bethlehem-was-the-shechinah-glory/ The Star of Bethlehem Was the Shekinah Glory …. Theories as to what the Star of Bethlehem was are myriad. The usual answers look to celestial objects ranging from real stars to comets. Indeed, the inquiry has been so wide sweeping that virtually every object appearing in the sky has been posited as the Bethlehem Star. However, when Scripture is examined the identity of the Star is evident. The Greek ἀστέρα or astera simply identifies a shining or gleaming object that is translated as star in Matthew 2:1-10. The magi specifically referred to it as, “His star” (v. 2). In addition, the behavior of this Star alone is enough to discount any natural stellar phenomenon. The Star led the magi from the east to the west [sic] toward Jerusalem (vv. 1-4). Then the Star moved from the north to the south in Bethlehem (v. 9). The Star would disappear and then reappear before it finally came to hover over where Jesus was staying (vv. 7-9). If not a regular stellar object then what exactly was the Star of Bethlehem? The synoptic narrative in Luke’s Gospel provides an answer: And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. Luke 2:8-9 (ESV) The glory of the Lord here is a powerful example of the Shekinah Glory. This type of glory is a visible manifestation of God’s presence come to dwell among men. The Shekinah was often accompanied by a heavenly host (e.g. Ezek. 10:18-19) and so it was at the birth of Christ (Luke 10:13). The Shekinah Glory declared Messiah’s birth to the shepherds (Luke 2:8-11). The Star of Bethlehem likewise declared to the magi that Messiah had arrived (Matt. 2:9-10). No doubt this is because Matthew and Luke were describing the same brilliant light in their respective gospels. Although the Shekinah takes on various appearances in Scripture, it often appears as something very bright. This includes but is not limited to a flaming sword (Gen. 3:24), a burning bush (Ex. 3:1-5; Deut. 33:16), a pillar of cloud and fire (Ex. 13:21-22), a cloud with lightning and fire (Ex. 19:16-20), God’s afterglow (His “back”) (Ex. 33:17-23), the transfiguration of Jesus (e.g. Matt. 17:1-8), fire (Acts 2:1-3), a light from heaven (e.g. Acts 9:3-8) and the lamp of New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:23-24). It was the Shekinah Glory that dwelled in the Holy of Holies. It was last in Solomon’s temple but departed as seen by Ezekiel (Ezek. 9:3; 10:4-19; 11:22-23). Haggai prophesied that the Shekinah Glory would return to the temple in Israel and in a superior way (Hag. 2:3; 2:9). And yet it would seem that this never happened for the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. Perhaps though the Shekinah did return. The Star of Bethlehem was the Shekinah Glory declaring the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ and residing in His person. And why not? The Messiah was prophesied to come as a star (Num. 24:17), and Jesus is called the, “bright morning star” (Rev. 22:16). …. [End of quote] It would be most fitting for the prophet Haggai to foretell the return of the Glory cloud. For Haggai (an abbreviated name) was my Habakkuk, the Akkadian name of Tobias (= Job) from his years spent in Nineveh: Haggai as Job late in his life? (10) Haggai as Job late in his life? | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu And his father, Tobit, appears to have foretold the return of God’s glory in chapter 13, as I noted in my article (following a 2013 piece): Saint John Paul II on Tobit (10) Saint John Paul II on Tobit | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu I once read an intriguing article that valiantly attempted to identify Luke’s Shepherds, at the Nativity, with Matthew’s Magi. Upon examination, h0wever, the two entities appear to be really quite different – geographically speaking, for one. But what, I think, can now be identified as one, thanks to Matthew Erwin, is the Glory beheld by both the Shepherds and the Magi: … when Scripture is examined the identity of the Star is evident. The Greek ἀστέρα or astera simply identifies a shining or gleaming object that is translated as star in Matthew 2:1-10. The magi specifically referred to it as, “His star” (v. 2). In addition, the behavior of this Star alone is enough to discount any natural stellar phenomenon. The Star led the magi from the east to the west [sic] toward Jerusalem (vv. 1-4). Then the Star moved from the north to the south in Bethlehem (v. 9). The Star would disappear and then reappear before it finally came to hover over where Jesus was staying (vv. 7-9). If not a regular stellar object then what exactly was the Star of Bethlehem? The synoptic narrative in Luke’s Gospel provides an answer: And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear. Luke 2:8-9 (ESV) …. The shining Glory God’s glory had been manifest, according to Matthew Erwin, in the Flaming Sword of Genesis; to Moses, in the Burning Bush, to the Exodus Israelites in the Pillar of Cloud; and to Israel, again, in the first Temple. But it had departed at the time of the Babylonian Exile and had not returned when the second Temple was completed. Matthew Erwin has really sewn this up: It was the Shekinah Glory that dwelled in the Holy of Holies. It was last in Solomon’s temple but departed as seen by Ezekiel (Ezek. 9:3; 10:4-19; 11:22-23). Haggai prophesied that the Shekinah Glory would return to the temple in Israel and in a superior way (Hag. 2:3; 2:9). And yet it would seem that this never happened for the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. Perhaps though the Shekinah did return. …. The family of Job-Tobias knew, from what we now have written in Tobit 13, that the Glory of the Lord was going to return after the return from Exile. Job, as Haggai, now in his late old age, had advised the people, disappointed at the sight of the second Temple, that the Glory of the Lord would return. And return again it did, with the Birth of Jesus Christ, the New Temple, who would render obsolete the old stone Temple (pope Benedict XVI). In other words, the second Temple was only ever to be temporary, and would be dramatically replaced (destroyed even) by He who is the true Temple of God. The Shepherds saw the Light at close hand and were able to go directly to the stable. Their guiding Light conveniently stopped, just as the shining Cloud was wont to do during the Exodus (Numbers 9:17): “When the cloud moved from its place over the Tent, the Israelites moved, and wherever the cloud stopped, the Israelites camped”. The Magi saw it at a distance from Bethlehem. They had long been expecting it. Their ancestor, Tobit, had foretold its return, and his son, Haggai, confirmed it much later. The Magi, who - as descendants of Job, as I think - were undoubtedly clever and educated, did not really need, though, to be able to read the heavens and constellations (as Job almost certainly could, Job 38:31-33) to identify the Star. They were expecting it and they simply had to wait until they saw it. This was a manifestation for Israel, to be understood by Israel, which is a solid reason why I think that the Magi mut have been Israelites, not gentiles. The Nativity Star of relevance to Israel determines the ethnicity of Matthew’s Magi. Conclusion The when of the Magi - the beginning of AD time, reign of King Herod ‘the Great’ (Maccabean era in my revision). The where of the Magi - they were “from the east” (Matthew 2:1-2), the Bashan region. The who of the Magi - certainly enlightened Israelites, likely family of the prophet Job. The Star of the Magi - the Glory of the Lord. The resplendent Christ Child appeared again, with his holy Mother, at Pontevedra, Spain, 10th December, 1925 “elevated on a luminous cloud”. We read about it at: https://fatima.org/news-views/the-apparition-of-our-lady-and-the-child-jesus-at-pontevedra/ On July 13, 1917, Our Lady promised at Fatima: “If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved … I shall come to ask for the Consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays.” As Fatima scholar Frère Michel de la Sainte Trinité tells us, this first secret of Our Lady “is a sure and easy way of tearing souls away from the danger of hell: first our own, then those of our neighbors, and even the souls of the greatest sinners, for the mercy and power of the Immaculate Heart of Mary are without limits.” …. Circumstances of the Apparition …. The promise of Our Lady to return was fulfilled in December 1925, when 18-year-old Lucia was a postulant at the Dorothean convent in Pontevedra, Spain. It was here, during an apparition of the Child Jesus and Our Lady, that She revealed the first part of God’s plan for the salvation of sinners: the reparatory Communion of the First Saturdays of the month. Lucia narrated what happened, speaking of herself in the third person – perhaps, in humility, to divert attention from her role in the event: “On December 10, 1925, the Most Holy Virgin appeared to her [Lucia], and by Her side, elevated on a luminous cloud, was the Child Jesus. The Most Holy Virgin rested Her hand on her shoulder, and as She did so, She showed her a heart encircled by thorns, which She was holding in Her other hand. At the same time, the Child said: “‘Have compassion on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother, covered with thorns, with which ungrateful men pierce It at every moment, and there is no one to make an act of reparation to remove them.’ “Then the Most Holy Virgin said: “‘Look, My daughter, at My Heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce Me at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console Me and announce in My name that I promise to assist at the moment of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess … receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep Me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making reparation to Me.’” The Great Promise and Its Conditions As Fatima author, Mark Fellows, noted: “The Blessed Virgin did more than ask for reparatory Communion and devotions on five First Saturdays: She promised Heaven to those who practiced this devotion sincerely and with a spirit of reparation. Those who wonder whether it is Mary’s place to promise eternal salvation to anyone forget one of Her illustrious titles: Mediatrix of all Graces.” …. Our Lady promises the grace of final perseverance – the most sublime of all graces – to all those who devoutly practice this devotion. The disproportion between the little requested and the immense grace promised reveals the great power of intercession granted to the Blessed Virgin Mary for the salvation of souls. Furthermore, this promise also contains a missionary aspect. The devotion of reparation is recommended as a means of converting sinners in the greatest danger of being lost. Much has been written on the Five First Saturdays devotion. Therefore, here I provide only a brief summary of the conditions. For more information, see The Magnificent Promise for the Five First Saturdays (Section III, pp. 8-16). …. 1. The First Saturday of five consecutive months: This request was the culmination of a whole movement of devotion, consistent with a series of papal decisions giving the forerunners of this new devotion: a. The 15 Saturdays in honor of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary (plenary indulgence granted by Pope Leo XIII, 1889). b. The 12 First Saturdays of the month (officially approved by Pope St. Pius X, 1905). c. The Devotion of Reparation on the First Saturdays of the month (new indulgences granted by Pius X, 1912). At Pontevedra we see two new elements: the reduction of the number of Saturdays required; and assurance of receiving at the moment of death “all the graces necessary for salvation,” instead of merely indulgences for the remission of punishment for sins already pardoned. Knowing our inconstancy, Our Lady asks for only five Saturdays – the number of decades on our Rosary. 2. Confession: Though the confession is not required to be made on the First Saturday itself … it is preferable – as far as possible – that it be made on a day close to the First Saturday. 3. Communion of Reparation: Frère Michel tells us: “The Communion of Reparation, of course, is the most important act of the devotion of Reparation. All the other acts center around it. To understand its meaning and significance, it must be considered in relation with the miraculous Communion of autumn 1916; already this Communion was completely oriented to the idea of Reparation, thanks to the words of the Angel.” …. 4. Recitation of the Rosary: In each of the six apparitions of 1917, Our Lady asked the children to pray the Rosary every day. 5. The 15-minute meditation on the 15 Mysteries of the Rosary: In addition to praying the Rosary, Our Lady asks for a separate 15 minutes of meditation on the Mysteries of the Rosary. But, as Sister Lucia has explained, not all 15 Mysteries need to be meditated upon each month. One may, by their choice, meditate on only some of the Mysteries each month. …. 6. The intention of making Reparation: As Sister Lucia has written, this condition is the principal one, and concerns the general intention with which all the other five conditions must be fulfilled. They must each be accomplished “in the spirit of Reparation” towards the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Without this general intention, without the desire to make Reparation to Our Lady to console Her, all these external acts are by themselves insufficient to obtain the magnificent promise of obtaining, at the moment of death, all the graces necessary for salvation. ….

Friday, February 16, 2024

Divine Mercy loathes tepidity, lukewarmness

‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold— I am about to spit you out of my mouth’. Revelation 3:15-16 For the ninth day, Christ asked Saint Faustina to pray for the sake of all the souls who have become lukewarm in their belief. She recorded the following words of Our Lord in her diary: “Today bring to Me the Souls who have become Lukewarm, and immerse them in the abyss of My mercy. These souls wound My Heart most painfully. My soul suffered the most dreadful loathing in the Garden of Olives because of lukewarm souls. They were the reason I cried out: ‘Father, take this cup away from Me, if it be Your will.’ For them, the last hope of salvation is to run to My mercy.” Divine Mercy Novena Taken from: https://www.thedivinemercy.org/articles/when-lukewarm-soul-reheated When a Lukewarm Soul is Reheated MAY 07 2019 David Van Sise, a recovering lukewarm soul, knows all about that particular character flaw that keeps some souls from stepping out in faith. He knows, for instance, what Jesus told St. Faustina about lukewarm souls - that "My soul suffered the most dreadful loathing in the Garden of Olives because of lukewarm souls" (Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska, 1228). And how does the Lord define lukewarm souls? As "souls who thwart My efforts" (Diary, 1682). Thwarting Jesus' efforts certainly was never David's intention. But in retrospect, a spiritually lukewarm David Van Sise meant that, among other things, Jesus' Divine Mercy message wasn't reaching certain hardened criminals in a New Jersey maximum security federal prison. That's no longer the case. David, an insurance industry executive from East Windsor, New Jersey, now engages in prison ministry, each week going cell to cell helping the greatest of sinners come to know of God's love for them. His own lukewarm faith began heating up in 2014 when he discovered a Marian Press pamphlet explaining the Divine Mercy Chaplet. "It spoke to my heart," said David. "I said to my wife, Chrystyna, 'This St. Faustina - she has a Diary, too.' Chrystyna said, 'I know,' and she pulled it out and handed it to me. I just kept reading and reading the Diary. I'm still reading it." He felt the call to learn every-thing he could about Divine Mercy. Eventually, he learned of the National Shrine of The Divine Mercy. He and Chrystyna visited. During Mass, he felt the Lord speak to his heart, telling him to come to the Shrine on the first Sunday of every month and to bring people with him. He's been doing that ever since. "I went from being a lukewarm Catholic, raised in the faith, but I didn't live my faith," he said. "I lived as if I wasn't worthy of God's love. But then I read the Diary and came to know that God's mercy is for everybody - the greater the sinner, the greater the right I have to His mercy (see Diary, 723). I realized He never turned His back to me. He was waiting for me with His arms stretched." During the Church's extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy three years ago, David vowed to obey the command Jesus gave to the world through St. Faustina when He said, "I demand from you deeds of mercy, which are to arise out of love for Me" (Diary, 742). He decided to spend the year engaging in each of the works of mercy. But when he got to "Visit the imprisoned," he seized up. "That's just not for me," he concluded. But he eventually went to a workshop led by prison ministers and felt called to help out. Now he looks forward to his weekly prison visits. Each week, in the prison's toughest section, he goes cell to cell and offers himself as a merciful presence and listening ear. He offers the inmates materials on Divine Mercy and Our Lady. He offers to pray for them. "I make the Sign of the Cross, and I do my best to ask the Lord to speak through me and give me the words that are going to bring some light to them," David says. "And many times afterwards they're like, 'Wow, man. Thanks a lot. That was really good.'" Why does he choose to minister to an inmate population whom society has declared the worst of the worst? "What I see is that they thirst for something," David says. "They have an emptiness in their hearts, and many of them have spent their whole lives filling that with drugs, alcohol, pornography, and other vices, and there's never been an opportunity for them to put anything good inside that emptiness." He has witnessed conversions. Mostly, he's witnessed inmates finding comfort in the simple fact that someone cares and that Jesus never gives up on us.

Thursday, February 15, 2024

Edith Stein and the Science of the Cross

“She had been able to empathize with the participation of her friend in the redemptive power of Christ: this became her own personal driving force and the core of her philosophy of the person. In teaching us how to attain full personhood, she teaches us a Science of the Cross”. Freda Mary Oben …. We can picture a little German Jewess of the 1890s, sitting with her mother in a synagogue, formally dressed in black as they attended the Sabbath service. It is our Edith Stein, or little "Yitschel" as she was then called. Perhaps, she is listening to the words of the prophets or the psalmist as they admonish the faithful to be led by the holy spirit of God, to do good and avoid evil. Edith tells us that, even when she was growing up and had become somewhat skeptical about religious matters, she knew that it was more important to be good than to be smart. But in her teens, she fell away from the Jewish faith, and when she was in high school her wit was apt to be very caustic at times; the best that could be said for her critical way is that she could be "deliciously malicious." At college, she found Christ, and after five years of hesitating as to what church to join, she became a Catholic, accepting him absolutely without reservation. Immediately she wanted to be a nun, but her spiritual director advised against that because, as a well-known philosopher, she was too valuable as a laywoman. She turned inward towards changing herself. Undergoing a real conversion, her entire personality changed. Instead of telling people off in that "delicious, malicious manner, " she developed a spirituality, which bade her look inwards. In a full attempt to imitate Christ, she became a holy woman. In fact, her definition of a holy person is to become "an other Christ." But, she writes, this invitation to holiness is for everyone, and it is a person's primary vocation. Because she had turned to teaching young Catholic women and nuns, she analyzed not only woman's nature but also the man's, and the differences between them. Also, she applied her training under the master philosopher Edmund Husserl and her study of St. Thomas Aquinas and came up with answers pertaining to the constitution of the person. What makes a person? How is a person formed to best advantage according to the purpose of our Creator? What makes for personal happiness? She writes that God has actually simplified this whole problem: He has created each human being as an image of himself. There is a seed within each of us pushing blindly towards fulfillment of this goal for which we are created. We can think of the plant, which reaches constantly for sun, air and water, which will flower to its own perfection. We, too have instilled that awaiting perfection = holiness = as a unique image of God. Edith Stein is considered one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century, even by our Holy Father who, like her, is the product of both phenomenology and scholasticism. One of the reasons he lauds her is that Stein exemplifies the journey taken by a modern day scientific agnostic into the world of faith: She describes herself as once guilty of the radical sin of disbelief, for, she tells us, at the age of fourteen and a half years, she "deliberately and consciously stopped praying" until her early twenties. But this self-declared atheist finally emphasizes that, in the confused and hungry world today, scientific answers are not enough: rather, the way of faith provides a wisdom that is unattainable through philosophy and reason alone. In her university course taught on the person, she developed a method of philosophical anthropology; here in her lecture notes, she tells us that faith has a double significance in scholarship: it is a measuring rod by which we are kept free from error; also, revealed truth is able to answer many questions which natural reason cannot. (See Introduction to Der Aufbau der menschlichen Person) (Structure of the Human Person). Even in her day, there was high promiscuity, personal alienation, stress, mental illness, and loneliness. Let us remember, she died through the so-called scientific methods of the gas chamber. And today, science is still killing off innocent lives, quite methodically. How can we be formed to this holiness, this person who images God? Edith Stein teaches us how, through her life and writings. In her conversion, she experienced Christ Incarnate. She also tells us that the birth of Christ is an announcement of the struggle between good and evil. His birth must be followed by the cross. She writes in an essay "The Mystery of Christmas": The Christian mysteries are an indivisible whole . . . Thus the way from Bethlehem leads inevitably to Golgotha, from the crib to the Cross. (Simon's) prophecy announced the Passion, the fight between light and darkness that already showed itself before the crib . . . The star of Bethlehem shines in the night of sin. The shadow of the Cross falls on the light that shines from the crib. This light is extinguished in the darkness of Good Friday, but it rises all the more brilliantly in the sun of grace on the morning of the Resurrection. The way of the incarnate Son of God leads through the Cross and Passion to the glory of the Resurrection. In His company the way of every one of us, indeed of all humanity, leads through suffering and death to this same glorious goal. For, she writes, the teaching of the cross would be lost if it did not express one's own personal existence. Through love, we are each to combat evil, and love triumphs over evil. The amazing fact remains that it was an early awareness of this power of the Crucified Christ that worked her conversion. She tells us that her search for truth had been a constant prayer. Then she visited a Christian friend who had recently lost her husband, and in her friend's peace attained through acceptance of the cross, Edith met the Crucified Christ. At that moment, she tells us, Judaism paled and the Cross loomed high. She had been able to empathize with the participation of her friend in the redemptive power of Christ: this became her own personal driving force and the core of her philosophy of the person. In teaching us how to attain full personhood, she teaches us a Science of the Cross. Why is this? First of all, we can perfect all of our personal faculties only by knowing, loving, and serving God. It is the only way to total perfection of our own unique personality, the very reason for which we are created as an image of God. So, God is the Supreme Educator. And Christ, as God's most perfect image, is the ideal personality — Gestalt — by which we are to be formed. She writes in Essays on Woman, To begin with, where do we have the concrete image of total humanity? God's image walked amongst us in human form, in the Son of Man, Jesus Christ . . . We therefore achieve total humanity through Him and, simultaneously, the right personal attitude. Whoever looks to Him and is concentrated on Him sees God, the archetype of all personality and the embodiment of all value. Frequently in her lectures and writings, Edith says that if there were only one thing to tell her audience and readers, it would be to counsel them to live as God's child, in his hands. This means to surrender oneself totally in perfect trust and humility. It means to do God's will, not one's own, to put all sorrows and hopes in his hand. Such surrender is the highest act of freedom available to the person. And, in keeping with her mentor St. Teresa of Avila, she writes that only by this emptying of self can one be filled by the presence of God. This free act of spiritual poverty is mandatory for union with God. God resides in each one of us, and it is the Triune God. The divine life within us is the divine Trinitarian life. She writes in The Science of the Cross: The soul in which God dwells by grace is no impersonal scene of the divine life but is itself drawn into this life. The divine life is three-personal life: it is overflowing love, in which the Father generates the Son and gives him his Being, while the Son embraces this Being and returns it to the Father; it is the love in which the Father and Son are one, both breathing the Holy Spirit. By grace this Spirit is shed abroad in men's hearts. Thus the soul lives its life of grace through the Holy Spirit, in Him it loves the Father with the love of the Son and the Son with the love of the Father. What a powerful statement! She also writes that our meeting with the Crucified Christ within us creates a further kind of trinity: the intentions of Christ, ourselves, and those we serve. "One's own perfection, union with God, and works for the union of another person with God and his/her perfection absolutely belong together." Because, in our perfect love, we can act as proxy for Christ in his redemptive action. Empathy, respect and love for the other person as an image of God constitute the core of Edith's writings. Her political philosophy presents the spiritual person as nucleus of a just society. Edith struggled with all problems of existence, its meaning, its social inequities and political problems. She evidences to a holy degree the ordinary person's desire to contribute to human rights and social justice. True to her Jewish heritage, she describes humanity as one family, one organism, in the process of growth. The individual is responsible for all and all are responsible for the one. A person's role is society thus becomes a religious concern. Her own example provides a gleaming stepping stone in the pilgrimage of humanity towards the Kingdom of God. But not only is action of a communal nature, but prayer itself. In the prayer of perfect love, we are to beg God to bring the sinner to contrition. This constitutes the nature of the Church as community. We can even offer ourselves as proxy for the sinner, requesting that the punishment due the sinner be visited on ourselves instead. We can do this for the enemy as well as friend because God gives us the power to do so. Of course, Edith is describing what she herself is doing. When Hitler came on the scene, she became a Carmelite in order to pray for the evil ones — the Nazi oppressors — as well as for the innocent ones, the Jews and all souls everywhere suffering in World War II. Shortly before her death she said to a priest, "Who will do penance for the evil that the Germans are inflicting?" On the way to her crucifixion, the gas chamber at Auschwitz, she spoke of her suffering as an offering "for the conversion of atheists, for her fellow Jews, for the Nazi persecutors, and for all who no longer had the love of God in their hearts." There is an exquisite passage in her essay, "The Natural and Supernatural in Faust". It reads: The battle wages over the human soul; heaven and hell wrestle for it. If we could see this soul in its loneliness and need, conscious of its way only in dark distress, its way shrouded in foggy night, if we could witness its struggles, its fallings and recoveries, we would be engulfed by a trusting certainty that the soul is signified in the hand of God, that its way and end lie clear as day before the gaze of the Almighty, and that He has commanded His angels to lead it from error to light. Edith describes evil as a living power and perverted being. She calls Hitler "the Anti-Christ" and offered herself up for his downfall. An important factor that brought about her death was the disclosure of her Jewish identity when she refused to vote for Hitler at a fixed plebiscite. She declared his ideology to be of Satan. But Edith is keenly concerned with the workings of evil in the person. In this author's essay "Good and Evil in the Life and Work of Edith Stein" in Logos (Winter 2000), some of the thoughts found in her text Endliches und Ewiges Sein (Finite and Eternal Being) are presented: Until the end of time when God intervenes, Adam's sin continues in the war of flesh versus spirit, the darkness of the human intellect, the laziness of the will, and the evil inclination of the heart. Satan disavowed the difference between himself and God in a disobedient denial of truth. He rebels not only against God but against his own being, for in saying "no" to God, he destroys the harmony of his own being: love, joy, willing service. This denial of being simultaneously becomes hatred — of self, of all others, and of God. Thus evil is a being contrary to its own nature and direction, a perverted being . . . And for the person vacillating between good and evil there is the possibility of conversion, of cooperation with God's call to justification and grace. God can see the repentant sinner in Christ and accept Christ's expiation for the sins. For Christ is the only proxy for all sin before God; through His merit, the sinner attains contrition and grace. This is God's compassion for the sinner, that He justifies the sinner through redemption worked by Christ. The mystery of the cross makes possible a restoration of the original order of grace as the "highest good." And the fullness of humanity leads to God's ultimate goodness — eternal life. Edith Stein suffered a martyr's death in 1942 at Auschwitz. She had been convinced from the beginnings of National Socialism that it was the cross of Christ being laid on the Jews, a continuation of His crucified humanity in time. She wanted a share in that for two reasons: she was a born Jewish recognizing the sacred link of Judaism and Christianity, and she believed that only the Passion of Christ could save humanity. So her redemptive role was unique in its duality: as a Jew, she suffered for her people and as a Christian, she imitated Christ her Lord, united to him as he suffered for Jews and gentiles alike. And her cross was intensified by the anguish she herself was bringing to her family by her conversion and entrance into the religious life. How could they understand that it was their suffering that had helped put her in Carmel? Yet, in a letter after her mother's death, she is able to write concerning her family: But I trust that from eternity, Mother will take care of them. And (I also trust) in the Lord's having accepted my life for all of them. I keep having to think of Queen Esther who was taken from among her people precisely that she might represent them before the King. I am a very poor and powerless little Esther. But the King who chose me is infinitely great and merciful. That is such a great comfort. Such is the prayer of a saint. And as she writes of others so is it true of her, that the saints have always desired to suffer: united to Christ's sufferings on the cross, their suffering also wields redemptive action. But this role is not for the saints alone, but for each one of us. How did she, how can we find the strength to do this? Solely through prayer, which she names as the most sublime of all human acts. Edith's studies of prayer and the interior life are works very important to anyone trying to develop in spirituality. She writes, "every person who seeks the inner life knows that he / she is drawn to it in a stronger way than to the outer world because they experience there the dawn of a new, powerful, sublime life — the supernatural life, the divine life." And it is this inner life, which motivates us to act through a world of values instilled by God. In fact, it is only from within out that one is capable of relating to and serving the outer world. "This mystical stream of prayer is the lifeblood of the Church." Edith's own prayer life was so intense that she has been described as exemplifying ecclesia orans — the prayer of the Church. As a laywoman during her years of teaching, she spent Christmas and Easter at the Benedictine Abbey in Beuron. A priest who was to become an Abbot there, and whom I later had the privilege of interviewing, writes of her: When I saw her for the first time in a comer of the entrance in Beuron, her appearance and attitude made an impression on me which I can only compare with that of the pictures of the ecclesia orans in the oldest ecclesiastical art of the Catacombs. Apart from the arms uplifted in prayer, everything about her was reminiscent of that Christian archetype. And this was no mere chance fancy. She was in truth a type of that ecclesia, standing in the world of time and yet apart from it, and knowing nothing else, in the depths of her union with Christ, but the Lord's words: "For them do I sanctify myself; that they also may be sanctified in truth." How different is Edith's philosophy of life from the modern refusal to accept suffering and the crosses of life. We live in a world of illusion and escapism. As both scientist and mystic, Edith knew intimately the greatest reality there is — God. In her holy life and writings, we find God and are brought closer to him because we see an absolute manifestation of our faith. To make this great treasury of love and faith our own — St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross — is to take a journey into holiness. Freda Mary Oben, T.O.P., was followed into the Church by her family. Her doctorate was earned at the Catholic University of America in 1979. While teaching (St. Joseph's College, Howard University, The Washington Theological Union), she was involved with race, poverty, and Catholic-Jewish relations. Her almost forty years of research on Edith Stein include writing, lecturing, appearing on radio and television and CD Rom. Her major works are: a translation of Stein's Essays on Woman (Institute of Carmelite Studies); Edith Stein: Scholar, Feminist, Saint (Alba House); an album of tapes, Edith Stein: A Saint for Our Times (ICS); The Life and Thought of Edith Stein (Alba House, 2001). © Ignatius Press 2002. by Freda Mary Oben, Ph.D DESCRIPTION Edith Stein teaches us through her life and writings how we can be formed to holiness, a person who images God. LARGER WORK Homiletic & Pastoral Review PAGES 20 -24 https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=4743

Book of Job and “Moby-Dick”

by Damien F. Mackey The well-known tale of ‘Moby Dick’ appears to have been inspired by the Bible. I have already suggested, following others, that it was inspired by the Book of Jonah: ‘Moby Dick’ inspired by Book of Jonah? (3) ‘Moby Dick’ inspired by Book of Jonah? | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu Some, though, prefer to liken it - in its Leviathan description - to the Book of Job. William A. Young, for instance, has written an article entitled, “LEVIATHAN IN THE BOOK OF JOB AND "MOBY-DICK"” (JSTOR, Vol. 65, No. 4 (Winter 1982), pp. 388-401), which begins as follows: THE IMPORTANCE OF THE BIBLE as a source for Herman Melville’s novels has long been recognized … and the crucial impact of the Book of Job on Melville’s masterpiece, Moby-Dick, has been widely observed and discussed. …. Although some interpreters dismiss Melville’s us of the Book of Job as casual and occasional, others have concluded that “the influence of Job [is] pervasive and controlling, basic and thematic, the most informing single principle of the book’s composition”. …. The present study focuses on Melville’s use of the mysterious Leviathan of Job in Moby-Dick. However, unlike other studies of Melville’s use of the Book of Job in Moby-Dick, the primary purpose is not to further the interpretation of the novel. The chief aim of this work is to add some insights to the question of Melville’s Biblical hermeneutic. What does Melville’s use of the Book of Job, especially the Leviathan symbol in Moby-Dick, suggest about this fundamental approach to the interpretation of the Bible? …. [End of quote] Nathalia Wright had earlier considered both Jonah and Job in her article, “Moby Dick: Jonah’s or Job’s Whale?” (JSTOR, Vol. 37, No. 2 (May, 1965), pp. 190-195). The two prophets, Jonah and Job, were actual contemporaries, if I am right in identifying Job as Tobias, son of Tobit, during whose exile in Nineveh the prophet Jonah (variously Nahum) made his appearance there. Thus old Tobit tells his son, Tobias (Job): ‘… I surely believe those things which Jonah the prophet spake of Nineveh, that it shall be overthrown …’ (Tobit 14:4). Nathalia Wright begins her article: THAT MELVILLE MADE SIGNIFICANT USE in Moby-Dick of both the Book of Jonah (containing the most celebrated account of a whale in the Bible) and the Book of Job (the classic Hebrew presentation of the problem of evil in human existence) is obvious enough and has often been commented upon by critics. ….

Monday, February 12, 2024

Jesus is the Alpha and Omega

“Jesus is God incarnate. Because of his human nature, he is the only human being who can say he is the Alpha and the Omega. Jesus is the person who is, who was, and who always will be”. Carolyn Humphreys Taken from: https://www.hprweb.com/2020/07/alpha-and-omega/ Alpha and Omega JULY 2, 2020 BY CAROLYN HUMPHREYS, OCDS Francis of Assisi is known to have said: “Sanctify yourself, and you will sanctify society.” On the Christian map, there are many roads to sanctity. Whatever the road, there is only one major and very necessary guide for this journey. His name is Jesus Christ. Jesus is known by many fascinating titles. One of the most captivating titles is the Alpha and the Omega, which are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. The Alpha and Omega are familiar church symbols that we see on altars, candles, vestments and walls. Because Jesus is the incarnation of God, the Alpha and Omega are also used as a monogram for Christ. During Jesus time, the Jewish rabbis commonly used the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet to signify the wholeness of anything from beginning to end. Because it was the common language of the Eastern Mediterranean people, the New Testament was first written in a form of Greek, and eventually translated into English. The words alpha and omega are introduced to us in the New Testament in several places in the Book of Revelations. They symbolize the oneness in the divine nature of God the Father and Jesus his Son. Their divine nature is exactly and entirely identical. Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.” Because of the oneness of their divine nature, what is said about God the Father can also be said about God the Son. Their divinity is limitless and unbounded, transcending every human comprehension or description. The Alpha and the Omega are a sign that the beginning and end of everything is God. Paul the apostle refers to Jesus as the first born of the new creation and the end or goal of our lives when all creation will be drawn up into him. In other words, God is the all; the first and the last, the beginning and the end of everything, and of everything in between. God is the source and the conclusion of life on earth. Jesus is God incarnate. Because of his human nature, he is the only human being who can say he is the Alpha and the Omega. Jesus is the person who is, who was, and who always will be. Actually, he always is. Was and will be are descriptions of, and changing characters within, the past and future in time, as we know them to be. God, and his Son, however, are ever existing, and have neither a beginning nor will they ever have an end. Augustine describes God as “an infinite circle whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.” When Jesus came to earth as man, he was born, lived for only thirty three years in Judea, showed us the way to God the Father and died. In the natural realm, we know about him through a time and in a place in history. However, there is so much more to Jesus than what we understand from a historical perspective. In the supernatural realm, he existed before and after his earthly life. Jesus, the infinite, omnipotent, omnipresent God became man for us to redeem us. Jesus is the beginning of all created temporal life and this will remain so until he comes again at the end of time. His second coming will be the beginning of the end of creation as we understand it on earth. Heaven is eternal and Jesus is as eternal as God the Father. The middle space between alpha and omega indicates that Jesus encompasses all history. He is historically present in the New Testament, and in the movements of grace, throughout all phases of history up to the present day. At the beginning of time, as God, he was the one through whom all the world, the universe and all its complex mysteries came into being. Jesus said that he existed before Abraham was born and identifies himself with other statements from the Old Testament. He is the “I am” of Exodus 3:14. He is the good shepherd of Psalm 23. He is the Lord of the Old Testament and will bring history to a close when he comes again on the last day. The wholeness of the Alpha and the Omega refers to Jesus the Christ as the word of God, and the wholeness of God’s revelation, to all humankind in every era. On a personal level, Jesus is the beginning and the end of a Christian’s spiritual journey in this life. Jesus is the fullness of truth, beauty, goodness, and wisdom. We need him throughout our faith journey while on earth, and will rejoice with him when we reach our heavenly goal. At the center of our hearts, Jesus is dynamic in the presentation and orchestration of all our good behavior, actions and pursuits. However, we must respond positively to what we believe he wants of us, both as a unique individual, and together with the people of God in his one, holy Catholic and apostolic Church. He is the head of his mystical body, the Church. Jesus is the reason why we live as we do, the master teacher in our Catholic Church, and the end for which we were made. This brings to mind the words of an old hymn by Samuel J. Stone: “The Church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord. She is his new creation by water and the Word. From heav’n he came and sought her to be his holy bride. With his own blood he bought her and for her life he died.” The Spectrum The first and the last are two opposing points. In temporal terms, they can be seen as a spectrum. When experiencing daily feelings this connection is not a straight line, but rather a line that has many peaks and valleys. A phone call can bring grief to a happy day. Laughter can lighten a sad occasion. Ever changing feelings are a normal part of daily life. They can flare up when least expected and can change in an instant. Can we control the severity of our feelings? An old Native American story is told about a grandfather who said to his grandson: “I feel like I have two wolves fighting in my heart. One wolf is mean spirited, angry and attacks everything. The other wolf is forgiving, loving and kind.” “Which wolf will win the fight in your heart?” the grandson asked. “The one I feed,” said the grandfather. Which wolf do we feed? Within sadness and joy, Henri Nouwen wrote: Our life is a short time in expectation, a time in which sadness and joy kiss each other at every moment. There is a quality of sadness that pervades all the moments of our life. It seems that there is no such thing as a perfectly unadulterated joy. Even in the happiest moments of our existence can be tinged with sadness. In every satisfaction, there is an awareness of limitations. In every success, there is the fear of failure. Behind every smile, there is a tear. In every embrace, there is loneliness. In every friendship, distance. And in all forms of light, there is the knowledge of surrounding darkness. . . . But this intimate experience in which every bit of life is touched by a bit of death can point us beyond the limits of our earthly existence. It can do so by making us look forward in expectation to the day when our hearts will be filled with perfect joy, a joy that no one shall take away from us. And this perfect joy is only possible by being with Jesus. Therese of Lisieux understood this well: “Life is passing, Eternity draws nigh, soon shall we live the very life of God. After having drunk deep at the fount of bitterness, our thirst will be quenched at the very source of all sweetness.” The Dove and the Serpent Jesus asks us to be as wise as serpents and as simple as doves. If we go below the surface meaning of these words, they are more of a blending than a balancing act. The serpent and the dove can indicate when to stay put and when to fly away. We discern to stay or fly when we are able to judge our abilities and strength with the situation at hand. The wisdom of the serpent sustains us in seeing potential danger in people, events and situations that could weaken our friendship with God. The simplicity of the dove maintains a gentle but firm spiritual orientation that is evident in our goodness and kindness to all we meet. We aim to combine the shrewdness of the serpent with the sensitivity of the dove by cultivating a steadfast mind and a tender heart. It is said that serpents are wise, have keen eyesight, and are quick to learn. Their tongue protects them from nearby predators, and is useful in following trails, identifying prey, and locating shelter. Serpents are crafty in their use of resources or skills. To be wise as a serpent means to have sound, basic knowledge of what areas we should and should not be. This helps us guard the most precious part of being, our soul. Serpents are quick to get out of the way of trouble. If someone or something evil lunges at us, we step aside. Like serpents, we must always be watchful for snares, traps and deceptions that can subtly take us away from God’s love. There are dark sides of people, and society, that can be inconspicuously present to us, and can take us off our course, or enslave us in dark areas, if we are not vigilant. Doves are meek, innocent, gentle, harmless and are universal symbols of peace. Jesus said he was meek and humble of heart. Meekness draws from humility, the truth that reminds us from where we came, who we are, and where we are going. As doves, we avoid duplicity and keep our conscience clean. We maintain sound Catholic priorities in private and in public. We assume risks as vulnerable, non combative persons. We forgive easily. Difficulties are managed with patience and gentleness. If we are as simple as doves, our demeanor is soothing and has an approachable softness. We discover the splendor of God’s truth, beauty, and wisdom in humankind and all his creation. As doves, we gently bring the peace of Christ to others and therefore infuse it into society. How are we signs of peace to those with whom we associate? Because Jesus is our beginning and our end, he sustains us amid the ups and downs, gains and losses, clarity and confusion, comforts and hardships and, above all, the mysteries in life. He is our “lift” that transcends what is disturbing during dark times, and enhances the beneficence we find during times of light. A Christian way of life can be envisioned as a scale that keeps all things in balance with Jesus’s love and mercy. We let go of things that distance us from Christ and embrace the habits and experiences that bring us into union with Christ. Jesus, Alpha and Omega, God before the world began, First and last, beginning, ending, Mighty Word and Son of Man, Great Creator, Liberator! Author of salvation’s plan! You have loved us! You have freed us! Made of us a chosen race, royal priesthood, holy nation, your own people, born of grace! Ever living King forgiving, soon we’ll see you face to face! With the clouds return in glory; you have sworn it! Come and stay! God who was and is and will be, Strengthen us to watch and pray! Find us steady, faithful, ready! Hasten, Jesus! Speed that Day! Keith Landis

Saturday, February 10, 2024

Immaculate Conception made visible at Lourdes

We read at: https://militia-immaculatae.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Lourdes_Booklet_EN.pdf …. In 1914, as a clerical student Saint Maximilian was miraculously cured by means of water from Lourdes. To have lost his right thumb could have prevented him from receiving priestly orders. His miraculous cure was a visible sign of Mary’s care of his priestly vocation. During his life Saint Maximilian Kolbe visited Lourdes only once. It was on the 30th of January 1930, before undertaking his mission to the Far East. In Lourdes Saint Maximilian celebrated the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the Basilica, he prayed the rosary in the Grotto, he drank the miraculous water and he sank his finger in the water, he kissed the rock in the Grotto and he commended his prayers to Mary. Summarising his visit to Lourdes, he stressed the experience of a great love of His "Mamusia (Mammy)", as he fondly called the Immaculata. The apparitions in Lourdes had a special place in the Marian treaty begun by Father Maximilian (which he never completed). The Saint gave a description of the apparitions. However, most of all, St. Maximilian discussed the meaning of the name 'Immaculate Conception': "The Immaculate Conception — this privilege must be particularly dear to her if, at Lourdes, this is how she herself wanted to be called: I am the Immaculate Conception. These words must indicate accurately and in the most essential manner who she is." "'Immaculate Conception' — these words came out of the mouth of the Immaculata herself. Therefore, they must indicate accurately and in the most essential manner who she is. Who are you, O Immaculate Conception? Not God, for He has no beginning; not an angel, created directly out of nothing; not Adam, formed with the mud of the earth; not Eve, taken from Adam; and not even the Incarnate Word, who existed from eternity and is 'conceived' rather than a 'conception'. Prior to conception, the children of Eve did not exist, so they may be better called 'conception'. Yet you differ from them also, for they are conceptions contaminated by original sin, while you are the only Immaculate Conception." Also, in Lourdes, the Immaculata did not define herself as 'Conceived without sin', but, as St. Bernadette herself recounts: "At that moment the Lady was standing above the wild rose bush in the same way in which she is depicted on the Miraculous Medal. Upon my third question her face took on an expression of gravity and at the same time of profound humility… Joining the palms of her hands as if in prayer, she lifted them up to her chest… turned her gaze toward Heaven… then, slowly opening her hands and bowing to me, she said in a voice in which you could notice a slight tremor: 'Que soy era Immaculada Councepsiou!' (I am the Immaculate Conception!')". The whole meaning of the life, sufferings and death of Saint Maximilian was to underline the answer given by the Most Holy Virgin Mary to Bernadette, when she asked the Lady to reveal her name. Saint Maximilian had a desire to live by that answer as well as to feed others with it. Countless times and without rest Saint Maximilian repeated: "The Most Holy Mother, asked by Bernadette what her name was, replied: 'I am the Immaculate Conception'. This is a definition of the Immaculata." In her apparition at Lourdes, in 1858, the Mother of God held in her arms the rosary, and through Bernadette, recommended to us the recital of the Rosary. We can conclude, therefore, that the prayer of the Rosary makes the Immaculata happy. St. Maximilian Maria Kolbe Mugenzai no Sono, before October 1933 Father C.B. Daly The Meaning of Lourdes While Lourdes and its apparitions add nothing to the Church's dogmas, they do deepen our appreciation of her teachings and enliven our response to them. The need for prayer and penance, an awareness of Jesus truly present in the Eucharist, the duty of fraternal charity — all this has ever been part of Christian life. At Lourdes, however, we are confronted with these things anew. Mary there shows us their importance as a mother would, by making them more actual, one might even say tangible. By bringing us face to face with human weakness and misery in the pilgrims who come to that shrine, she pleads that we make prayer and penance, love of Jesus and charity for others the very fabric of our daily existence. It is here that she lets us see the significance of her Immaculate Conception and know the extent of her Co-redemption. The first privilege kept her free from sin and therefore empowered her to love both God and man perfectly. The other gave her the responsibility to aid us, her children, in working towards that same freedom and attaining that same love. Mary's concern at Lourdes is, then, to help us bear witness to the realities that lie hidden in the truths of faith. Lourdes and Revelation In investigating the meaning of Lourdes, one has to begin by eliminating some mistaken hypotheses. We know, for example, from general theological principles, that Lourdes cannot be intended to teach us any new truth about Mary or about the divine plan of salvation. No apparition or private revelation, however approved by the Church, could reveal to us any new truth of faith or morals, or add any truth to what is to be believed by Catholic faith. Pope Benedict XIV, as Cardinal Lambertini, in his classic work on "The Beatification and Canonization of the Servants of God", says, speaking of private revelations: Such an ecclesiastical approbation is nothing else than a permission to publish (a narrative) after mature examination, in view of the instruction and utility of the faithful... The assent of Catholic Faith to revelations thus approved is not merely not obligatory, but is not possible; (such revelations) demand only an assent of human credence in conformance with the rules of human prudence which represents them as probable and piously credible. …. Jean Guitton, speaking of mariophanies and places of Marian pilgrimage, has well said: The veneration of the faithful is not directed to the place itself, but to the mystery that is conceived to be connected with the place... It may happen that the seer of the vision is canonized; if so, it is not for his visions alone, but for the heroic virtues of his life... Suppose the worst: imagine facts come to light which throw serious doubt on the genuineness of the vision... That would take nothing at all from the truths this particular vision represented. These would not depend on any new vision; the Church already possessed them in her deposit of faith. Nor would it detract from the graces received where the vision occurred. These statements only repeat fundamental theses of the theology of faith and of revelation. In their light it is evident that it is only with qualifications that we can speak of Lourdes as having been intended by God as a miraculous confirmation of the truth of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception defined four years earlier by Pope Pius IX. This is indeed a very natural way to speak and it contains important truth. The episcopal document whereby Mgr. Laurence in 1862 gave official ecclesiastical recognition to the apparition already pointed out that, by appearing at Lourdes, and calling for a sanctuary to be built there, Our Lady seemed herself to have wished "to consecrate by a monument the infallible pronouncement of the successor of St. Peter." The popes themselves have spoken in this way. Pope St. Pius X, in his encyclical for the fiftieth anniversary of the Definition of 1854, wrote: Pope Pius IX had hardly defined as of Catholic faith the truth that Mary was from her conception exempt from sin, when there began at Lourdes the marvellous manifestations of Our Lady. Pope Pius XII in his encyclical for the centenary of Lourdes recalled a statement from his earlier encyclical, Fulgens Corona, that the Blessed Virgin Mary herself wished, it would seem, to confirm by a marvellous event the definition which her Son’s Vicar on earth had a short time before proclaimed. However, the Pope in the same centenary encyclical noted that The infallible word of the Roman Pontiff, authentic interpreter of revealed truth, needed no heavenly confirmation in order to command the belief of the faithful. But yet, he continued: With what emotion and what gratitude the Christian people and its pastors received from the lips of Bernadette the reply coming from Heaven, "I am the Immaculate Conception." These words of Pope Pius XII are the most accurate expression of the matter. In one sense Lourdes cannot confirm the truth of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, because we are more sure of the truth of the dogma than we are of the reality of the apparitions. For the former we have divine authority; for the latter we have strictly only human credibility. Yet, in the concrete case, these distinctions seem somewhat academic and unreal. Lourdes does not add any new ground of objective certitude to the dogma of the Immaculate Conception; but it does confirm our personal apprehension of that truth. Perhaps we might use Newman's formula, and say that Lourdes helps to change our attitude towards the dogma from a notional into a real assent. Mary's mission at Lourdes was not to reveal new truths, but to give us a deeper realization of the truths revealed by her Son once and for all time, the truths she kept while on earth and pondered in her heart. It is, therefore, theologically inexact and inadvisable to speak of Lourdes and the other great Marian manifestations of modern times as marking a new and Marian epoch in the economy of redemption. Preachers sometimes speak of this as the Age of Mary and develop their theme by suggesting that God first sent His Son to draw mankind to His love; and when men refused to come to His Son, He in the last times sends them Mary. Frequently implicated with this theme is another and probably more serious aberration which crept into certain mariological expressions and images since the sixteenth century. This trend of thought would have it that, as between Jesus and Mary, Mary provides the pity and the pleas to Jesus for mercy, and Jesus the rigour of divine justice and wrath towards sinners. Such language and imagery are, of course, devotional rather than theological, and it is perhaps unfair to assess them by rigorous theological criteria. Rightly interpreted, the apparitions at Lourdes and a century of Lourdes devotion stand opposed to these aberrant concepts and constitute a recall to the traditional and true theology of Our Lady. "I am the Immaculate Conception" It is natural to look for some centre of unity amid the diversity of facts and words associated with Lourdes. There can be no doubt that this centre was provided by Our Lady herself when on the 25th of March 1858 she at last spoke the word that all had been waiting, praying and hoping for. She spoke her name. She said: "I am the Immaculate Conception." Nothing more surely attests to the doctrinal soundness and the supernatural origin of the apparitions than these words. Bernadette did not know what they meant. Her cousin, Jeanne Vedere, who had the story directly from Bernadette at the time, describes how Bernadette had to repeat the words over and over again on her way to tell them to the Curé for fear of forgetting them; and that when M. Peyramale asked her what the words meant, she confessed that she did not know. This apparition was always the climax of Bernadette's narration of the events of Massabielle. She accompanied her narration with a re-enactment of the gestures of Our Lady as she spoke the words. Our Lady had had her hands joined, with the Rosary hanging from her right arm. In response to Bernadette's thricerepeated appeal to her to declare her name she smiled, then extended her arms downwards in the attitude of the Virgin of the Miraculous Medal, so that the Rosary slipped towards her wrist; then joined her hands again upon her breast and with eyes raised towards Heaven, spoke with indescribable humility and tenderness the words, "I am the Immaculate Conception." Bernadette's repetition of these gestures and words made an unforgettable impression on all who witnessed it. The sculptor, M. Fabisch, who had already executed the statuary of La Salette, and was chosen to make the first statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, came in 1863 to hear from Bernadette herself the description of the Lady of her visions. He asked her to describe the scene of the Lady's self-revelation. He later wrote: The girl stood up with perfect simplicity. She joined her hands and raised her eyes towards Heaven... But neither Fra Angelico, nor Perugino, nor Raphael has ever created anything so gentle, and at the same time so profound as the look of that little girl... I shall never forget, as long as I live, the beauty of that expression. There is no doubt, then, that the sixteenth apparition, and Our Lady's words on that occasion, are the heart of Lourdes and the key to its whole meaning. Bernadette herself, who deplored the fact that too many people skim over the surface of things, remarked: "I would like to see emphasis placed on the apparition in which the Blessed Virgin declared her identity." Everything in the story of Lourdes is related to and made meaningful by the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. The grammar of Our Lady's words is strange and cannot be accidental. The authenticity of the words has been questioned on theological grounds: how could Our Lady be her Immaculate Conception? But the construction surely invites juxtaposition with two sentences from the New Testament. The first is that in which St. Paul says of Our Lord: "Him who knew no sin (God) hath made sin for us, that we might be made the justice of God in him" (2 Cor. 5:21). The second is that in which Our Lady herself says, "Behold the handmaid of the Lord"; in other words, "I am the slave of the Lord; I am nothing but the fulfiller of His will." St. Paul says that God made Christ sin, that we might be made the justice of God in Christ. But in Mary and in her alone the divine plan of redemption is already and fully and finally realized. Through Christ, her Son, she is already made "the justice of God." She is the justice of God accomplished. She is the Immaculate Conception, in whom through Christ sin is totally defeated. Christ was made sin that she might be sinless. Christ was made sin for us; she is made "anti-sin" in order that she may be the model of the sinlessness that we, poor sinners, must painfully, penitentially labour to achieve in Christ. But Mary's sinlessness is not merely a state which she passively receives. It is also a total, dedicated disposition of will which she actively lives and is. In this sense also she is her Immaculate Conception; that is to say, she is the justice of God; she is the complete fulfiller of all the justice of His just will. "I am the Immaculate Conception" was Our Lady's repetition, on the Feast of the Annunciation, 1858, of the words she spoke at the Annunciation itself: "I am the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to Thy word."

Friday, February 2, 2024

Zodiac, Twelve Tribes - and a Divine pattern

by Damien F. Mackey There is a false astrology, condemned by the Bible (e.g. Deuteronomy 18:10-12; cf. Leviticus 19:26; Isaiah 47:13-14; Jeremiah 10:2), and a true astrology based on God’s structural design - from the beginning - of the heavenly bodies for “signs and seasons” (Genesis 1:14). Since everything that God has created through his Wisdom has been effected with marvellous precision and meaning, there must be a profound significance to the structure of the universe. Wise souls down through the ages have sought to make sense of it all, with the wisest - those prepared to be instructed by the Designer - such as King Solomon, being able to claim, as Solomon did, a ‘sure knowledge’ and an ‘understanding of the structure of the universe’, and of much more besides (Wisdom 7:17-21): He it was who gave me sure knowledge of what exists, to understand the structure of the universe and the action of the elements, the beginning, end and middle of the times, the alternation of the solstices and the succession of the seasons, the cycles of the year and the position of the stars, the natures of animals and the instincts of wild beasts, the powers of spirits and human mental processes, the varieties of plants and the medical properties of roots. And now I understand everything, hidden or visible, for Wisdom, the designer of all things, has instructed me. Dr. Ernest L. Martin (RIP) has concluded, from scrutinising the biblical data, that there was a common Divine pattern regarding the structure of the universe; the ancient Garden of Eden; the Hebrew camp in the wilderness; and the Temple of Yahweh built by King Solomon. Others have attempted to do the same. What I like about this sort of approach regarding the universe - whether any given effort be actually correct, or not - is that it is at least a search for a meaning that must surely be there, rather than one’s simply considering the universe as a vast and unintelligible mass. We read of Dr. Martin’s particular view in Roger Waite’s “The Lost History of Jerusalem” (pp. 37-38): http://www.rogerswebsite.com/articles/TheLostHistoryofJerusalem.pdf Another way we see this pattern between what is on earth and what is in the heavens is in the comparison between the three general compartments within the Temple and the three heavens noted in scripture. …. This is what Ernest Martin writes about the similarities between the three compartments of the Temple and the three heavens: The Temple and its environs were further patterned after God's heavenly palace and its celestial surroundings that existed in the north part of the heavens …. The Bible shows these "three heavens." Numerous texts show that the "first heaven" is the atmosphere where the birds fly and where all weather phenomena take place. The "second heaven," however, was beyond the earth's atmosphere and embraced all the visible planets and stars, including the sun and the moon. The "third heaven," that the apostle Paul referred to in 2 Corinthians 12:1-4 that he called Paradise, was that of God's official residence in his heavenly region which was separate from the other two heavens. These "three heavens" were symbolically pictured in the Temple at Jerusalem. In fact, the three main sections of the Temple were designed to show these three heavens. When an Israelite entered the main Temple from the east, he or she would first be within the Court of the Israelites. This first section of the Temple (which continued westward up to the eastern portion of the priests' court in which was the Altar of Burnt Offering) was not covered with a roof. The first section was open to the sky and to all weather phenomena. Birds could also fly within it. This area of the Temple answered in a typical manner with the "first heaven," which was like our atmosphere surrounding the earth. The "second heaven" in the Temple in a symbolic sense began at the eastern curtain in front of the Holy Place. Josephus tells us this curtain had the principal stars of the heavens displayed on it in tapestry form. It represented the entrance into the starry heavens beyond our atmosphere. Josephus tells us that west of this curtain, one could witness the center of the zodiacal circle with the seven [visible] planets displayed on the south side in the form of the Menorah (the seven lamps) with the twelve signs of the Zodiac denoting the twelve months displayed on the north side by the twelve loaves of the Table of Shewbread. This second court of the priests represented all the starry heavens above the earth's atmosphere. But beyond this "second heaven," there was yet a "third heaven." This "third heaven" was the Heaven of Heavens, or in Temple terminology, the Holy of Holies, which equaled God's celestial abode where his palace and divine precincts were located which the apostle Paul called Paradise (Temples, p.253). Signs of the Tribes Each one of the twelve tribes of Israel had a zodiacal sign associated with it. “Moses positioned each of the twelve tribes of Israel as representing a particular zodiacal sign in its regular astronomical order”. We read the following in Roger Waite’s “The Lost History of Jerusalem” (p. 28): http://www.rogerswebsite.com/articles/TheLostHistoryofJerusalem.pdf In addition to the symbolism of the three compartments of the tabernacle and Temples, according to Ernest Martin, there was also an astronomical pattern in the design of the camp in the wilderness and where each of the tribes of Israel were placed in relation to the tabernacle. This pattern was also established around the environs of Jerusalem itself. Ernest Martin writes the following about the position of the tribes around the tabernacle: Though the Holy Scriptures in other areas utterly condemn the use of Astrology as conceived by the Gentiles and when the celestial motions are used for wrong purposes (Isaiah 47:11-13), the placement of the twelve tribes of Israel around the Tabernacle was intended by Moses to provide the authorities in Israel with a knowledge of God's plan for the nation of Israel .… The Gentiles actually corrupted the prophetic teaching found in the design of the "Camp of Israel" and placed on it a hodgepodge of heathen interpretations that completely obliterated the true prophetic meaning that God gave to Moses… So, what about this astronomical design of the "Camp"? The outer boundary of this zodiacal design was an imaginary circle positioned by the Jewish authorities to be 2000 cubits (a radius of about 3000 feet) from that central point in the Holy Place of the Temple. It is important to realize that the outer boundary of this circle denoted the limits of the "Camp." Moses positioned each of the twelve tribes of Israel as representing a particular zodiacal sign in its regular astronomical order. The tribe of Judah was given the prime position in this zodiacal design by being located directly east of the entrances to the Tabernacle and the later Temples. Let me explain. Four principal tribes were selected to denote each of the four seasons of the year. Judah was first, Dan was second, Reuben was third and Ephraim was fourth. The positions of these four prime tribes were arranged 90 degrees from each other (within a 360 degrees circle) to accord with those four seasons of the year. Judah was selected to be the tribe directly east of the Tabernacle and it was given first place... The zodiacal story is a prophetic account that actually centers on the Messiah of Israel who was destined to come from the tribe of Judah. For this reason, Judah was reckoned as the chief tribe and it was located in Moses' arrangement of the "Camp" directly east of the Temple. The tribe of Judah had for its tribal symbol the Lion (called Leo today). Judah had a subsidiary tribe of Israel located on each of its sides. As the chief tribe, Judah (Leo) and its sign was positioned to dominate the summer season in prophetic and calendar matters…The twelve tribes in their arrangement in the encampment also represented the twelve months of the year. The next pivotal tribe proceeding counterclockwise around this zodiacal design of this "Camp of Israel"… was Dan with a subsidiary tribe of Israel located on each of its sides. It was positioned on the north side of the Temple and Jerusalem as a venomous creature, sometimes displayed as an eagle with a snake in its talons (called Scorpio, the venomous scorpion today). It dominated the autumn season in the prophetic calendar of Israel. Reuben…with a subsidiary tribe of Israel located on each of its sides was placed on the west side of the Temple and Jerusalem in the original arrangement. Reuben was connected with water, as a Man bearing water (called Aquarius today), and it dominated the winter season in the original prophetic calendar…. And finally there is Ephraim…with a subsidiary tribe of Israel located on each of its sides. He was on the south side of the Temple and Jerusalem as a bullock (called Taurus today). It was positioned to dominate the spring season in a prophetic and calendar sense. And, of course, if one continued…another 90 degrees, one would then return to Judah (Leo) for the start of another calendar or prophetic year… Another form of this astronomical arrangement surrounding the Temple and Jerusalem (and patterned after God's abode in heaven) was the four sides of the cherubim mentioned by Ezekiel (1:4-14) and the Book of Revelation (4:6-7). The cherubim were reckoned by the biblical writers as encompassing the throne of God in heaven. These angelic cherubim also had the four zodiacal signs representing the seasons of the year associated with them (Lion, Eagle, Man, Bullock which are today called Leo, Scorpio, Aquarius, Taurus and they were analogous to the four principal tribes of Israel: Judah, Dan, Reuben and Ephraim) …. The above view is supported by what we read in the following intriguing article: http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2005/12sons.html Twelve Sons, Twelve Constellations by John P. Pratt There is a strong Hebrew tradition that each of the twelve tribes of Israel was associated with one of the twelve constellations of the zodiac. The precise identification of which constellation goes with which of Jacob's sons has only been known with certainty for four of the tribes. Each of the twelve carried a banner or flag, and the many of those flags are believed to have displayed one of the zodiac symbols. Thus, those figures came to symbolize the entire tribe to a large degree, much as the eagle represents the United States. This article proposes a correspondence of each of those tribes to one of the zodiac emblems, based on proposed dates for the birth of each. Knowing those dates then leads to greater understanding of the holy days on the Hebrew Calendar, and testifies of the Lord's foreknowledge of all things and of his great plan of salvation. What does the zodiac have to do with the twelve tribes of Israel? Aren't the zodiac signs the basis of astrology, and isn't that a false belief system? Wasn't Israel admonished over and over not to worship the hosts of heaven? Why would Israel put zodiac figures on their flags? It is not surprising if these are your first questions as you read this article, especially if this is the first you've read on the subject. As has been pointed out in numerous earlier articles … the Book of Enoch records that an angel revealed the constellation figures to the prophet Enoch some 5,000 years ago, and many scholars claim they symbolize the key features of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Last month's article proposed that each of the twelve constellations of the zodiac, through which the sun appears to travel during the year, represents one of the twelve principal roles of the Savior. …. Satan twists truth and perverts it for his own purposes, which he has clearly done with the zodiac signs. That causes many to avoid the entire subject, but the symbolism of these figures is so rich that it would be a tragedy not to learn of the beauty of their meaning, and the clarity of their symbolism. So my articles on the subject attempt to ignore the perversions and focus on the good. My position is that the sun, moon, and planets are like the hands on a huge clock, with the twelve zodiac constellations through which they move being the 12 numbers on the clock face. The Lord uses his clock to time key events in world history. But when Israel began to worship the hands on the clock, as did the pagan nations, then they were told they had missed the whole point, and to desist. Similarly today, if someone believes the planets are controlling his life, rather than merely keeping time, then Satan could falsely convince him that he is not responsible for his actions. Having that disclaimer in mind, let us look at the evidence, even from the Bible itself, that the twelve sons of the prophet Jacob were each identified with a different sign of the zodiac. First, consider the dream of Jacob's son Joseph, of the sun, moon and 11 stars (11 constellations?). He dreamed that they all bowed down to him (Gen. 37:9). When he told the dream to his family, they immediately knew that the 11 stars referred to his 11 brothers. Was that just because of the number eleven, or what it also because they already knew that each was associated with a different zodiac constellation? Evidence for answering this question affirmatively comes from noting that most of their names have close ties to the zodiac constellations, as discussed below. Secondly, when the tribes received blessings under the hands of their father Jacob and many years later by Moses, many unmistakable references were made to zodiac constellations. Moreover, visions such as those of Ezekiel and John, describe figures with the heads of a man, lion, ox, and eagle, which just happen to match the four "cornerstone" constellations (Ezek. 1:10, Rev. 4:7). …. It is precisely these four key figures which are the most easily matched with the four principal sons of Israel because each is mentioned in the blessings. Reuben is compared to a man and to water, Judah is compared to a lion, Dan to a serpent (counterpart of the eagle), and Joseph's two sons to the horns of the wild ox. Those link to the constellations of the Water Bearer, the Lion, the Scorpion, and the Bull, respectively (Gen. 49: 4, 9, 17; Deut. 33:17). Those four sons are each also assigned to four directions (Num. 2:3, 10, 18, 25), and those four constellations are evenly spaced around the circle, as are the four points of a compass. And even non-Israelite prophets, such as Balaam, have used the same figures to represent the tribes (Num. 24:7-9). All of this has been discussed in detail in earlier articles, and is summarized here only as review and to make it clear that the Lord himself uses the symbolism. There is something very profound going on here, and it is certainly seems worth investigating. Until now, the identification of the constellations associated with the other eight tribes has not been known with any degree of confidence. The other references to the zodiac are sketchy, and different scholars have proposed a variety of associations based on scriptural clues. But historical evidence of exactly what emblems were shown on which flags has been weak, and is based mostly on tradition. Thus, the information about the zodiac associations has been lost. This article proposes a correlation based on the "brute force" method of actually determining the birth dates of the twelve sons, and then looking at which constellation the sun was in at their birth. …. Zodiac and the Messiah “Jesus was born of Judah … Leo the Lion … and the first sign in a counterclockwise direction that anyone within the camp would encounter would be Virgo, the Virgin …. And certainly, Jesus was accepted by Christians as being born of a virgin”. We read the following in Roger Waite’s “The Lost History of Jerusalem” (p. 28): http://www.rogerswebsite.com/articles/TheLostHistoryofJerusalem.pdf In fact, the design of the biblical Zodiac that the tribes of Israel displayed in their encampment prefigured the history of the Messiah of Israel as certainly interpreted by the early Christians… Jesus was born of Judah (Leo the Lion, the month of Ab) and the first sign in a counterclockwise direction that anyone within the camp would encounter would be Virgo, the Virgin (Elul, the 6th Hebrew month). And certainly, Jesus was accepted by Christians as being born of a virgin. Then, in the New Testament narrative, Jesus at the start of his ministry then met Satan for his temptation as shown by Dan (the sign of the venomous serpent or scorpion). He later came into deep waters (e.g. Psalm 124:4) through his apprehension, trial and crucifixion at Jerusalem (which is symbolized by Reuben, the sign of the Water Bearer a man carrying water). But then comes the Springtime (as indicated by the Joseph tribes, particularly Ephraim, Taurus the Bull) and this represented the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Finally, one returns in this circular (or celestial) journey within the camp to the first part of the tribe of Judah (Leo the Lion, back to the first fifteen degrees of the month of Ab) where the chief star called Regulus the King Star is located (which happens to be the closest star in the heavens to the ecliptic, the path of the Sun), and this represents the Christ being crowned King of Kings and sitting on the right hand of the Father, whom the Sun represents (Malachi 4:2). The four cherubim which represent the four seasons (and the four principal tribes) are the primary actors in this zodiacal or celestial design of the fortunes of the Messiah within the Camp of Israel. It is reflected in the story found in Psalm 19 where the Sun comes forth as a bridegroom and begins to tell a prophetic history that Israel can understand. Indeed, the apostle Paul quoted Psalm 19 (Romans 10:18) and referred it to Jesus and his message as going forth like the messages in the sun, moon and stars into all the world. The early Christians saw the astronomical message found in the zodiacal arrangement of the tribes of Israel within their encampment as giving highlights of the career of Jesus in his role as the Christ of God (Secrets of Golgotha … p.53-60). E.W. Bullinger in his book “Witness of the Stars” has gone into much detail about how the plan of God can be seen in the various constellations in the heavens. One can't help but wonder about that and the evidence of design in the heavens when one sees the Southern Cross. Two of the brightest stars, Alpha and Beta Centauri, point to it and seem to highlight how Christ died on the cross to pay for our sins. ….