Category Archives: Apocalypse

Maranatha!

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Christ, vested as a medieval bishop, distributes the Holy Communion to the apostles: on one side, St. Peter leads six others to receive the Holy Bread while St. Paul, on the other side, leads five others to receive from the Holy Cup. In the Didache, the celebrant invites the faithful to Holy Communion: “Let grace come and this world pass away.” The faithful answer: “Maranatha!”


If anyone does not love the Lord, let him be anathema. Maranatha! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love for all of you in Christ Jesus. (1 Cor. 16:22-24)

These sentences are part of the postscript, the “P.S.” that St. Paul adds in his own handwriting at the end of this first letter to the parish in Corinth. “Anathema” is “cursed” and is the same word the ecumenical councils use when denouncing the teachings that were condemned: “If anyone teaches that the Word is not divine in the same way the Father is divine, let that person be anathema!” Anathema marks those who are excluded from the fellowship of the Church, the Body of Christ.

Although St. Paul had difficult and challenging things to say to the Corinthians, he repeatedly stresses his love for them and that he does not want any one of them to be lost or cast aside. His love for the Corinthians–as a parish community and for each of them personally–is always his prime motivation.

“Maranatha!” can be translated several ways, which is why many translations today leave it untranslated. It can mean, “Come, our Lord!” Or it can mean, “Our Lord comes!” Both meanings are appropriate and maybe St. Paul meant the Corinthians to hear both meanings at the same time. Liturgical practice–described in the Didache— from about the same time that St. Paul was writing these words used “Maranatha!” as the people’s response to the invitation to receive Holy Communion at the Eucharist.

By this one word–Maranatha!–Paul strikes fear into them all. But not only that: he points out the way of virtue. As our love for God’s coming intensifies, there is no kind of sin which is not wiped out.

St. John Chrysostom (4th century), Homily 44 on 1st Corinthians

St. Paul expected his letter to be read at the Eucharist so his comments about the holy kiss and “Maranatha” are also connections to what the parish is about to do: pray together, exchange the Kiss, give thanks, and receive Holy Communion.

“Maranatha!” indeed.

Apocalypse Epilogue: The Tree of Life

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One of the best-known representations of the Cross as the ‘Tree of Life’ is the 12th century mosaic in the Basilica of San Clemente, Rome. 
The cross is decorated with white doves, taken to represent the Apostles who will soon fly to all corners of the world carrying the message of Christ’s victory (Psalm 19:4; Acts 1:8).
At the foot of the Cross four rivers flow out  (Genesis 2:10) and two deer drink deeply of the river of the water of life (Ezekiel 47:1-12; Revelation 22:1-2); the deer that yearns for running streams (Psalm 42:1-3) quenches its thirst  at the fountain of living water that is Christ (Zechariah 12:10; 13:1; John 4:10; 7:37-39; 19:33-37).

Blessed are those who wash their robes, so as to have the right of the tree of life, and may enter the city by the gates. Outside are the dogs, sorcerers, and fornicators, the murderers and idolators, and all who love and practice deceit. (Apocalypse 22:14-15)

This epilogue of the Apocalypse summarizes the message of the book: Christ is coming soon to judge the world and vindicate his saints. The text concludes with the usual threats against anyone who would tamper with the book as the seer has written or dictated it.

Those who wash their robes (in the blood of the lamb) and have access to the tree of life are the faithful members of the Church. They remain faithful despite the persecution described throughout the Apocalypse. The “tree of life” is both a reference to the Cross and Christ himself who transformed the Cross into the antidote for the Tree of Knowledge by which Adam and Eve sinned in Eden. Blood, which typically stains clothing, here washes clothing clean; in the Old Testament, blood both purifies (the sacrifices in the Temple, especially the Day of Atonement) and makes those who touch it unclean.

The list of those “outside the gates” of the New Jerusalem are an interesting summary of all those who personify opposition to God. “Dogs” were a common nickname for the priests of the Cybele, the “great mother” goddess; these “dogs” would castrate themselves in a fit of ecstasy and then wander the streets in groups, singing and praying and asking for alms. In many ways, they sound like the first century equivalent of the Hare Krishna groups that were so common in the 1970s (except the self-castration, of course).

Sorcerers practiced “magic,” which was the usual way to describe illicit religious practices. “Fornicators” practiced porneia (lit. “dirty living”), which included fornication but also could mean a wide variety of other behavior or activities, not all of which we would consider sexual. But it was a quick and easy way to refer to those who misbehaved sexually. Murderers and idolators clearly misapprehended the image of God inherent in each human person. All those who love or practice deceit? That sums up all evil-doing nicely, doesn’t it?

The world is neatly divided into those who have washed their robes vs. those who love and practice deceit. If only life situations and predicaments pre-apocalypse could be so clearly and easily identified!

New Jerusalem

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A Russian icon of the New Jerusalem, showing the apostles–the Twelve–surrounding the Mother of God in the midst of the city. She is the personification of Zion-Jerusalem-the Temple. Christ is immediately above the Holy Virgin, blessing the world. St. John the Divine is dictating to his disciple-secretary, who is writing down what St. John sees and the words of the angel speaking with him.

So [the angel] carried me away in the spirit … and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, possessing the glory of God. It had the radiance of a precious jewel…. (Apoc. 21:10-11)

The new heaven and the new earth are complete when the new Jerusalem descends from God. The city is described as being in a constant state of descending; it is always “coming down.” It is not static. It is always arriving. This movement indicates the city itself is alive. It is itself the Temple of the new heaven and new earth and therefore encapsulates the new creation which is intensely alive, just as the Temple built by Solomon was thought to encapsulate the world–the old world which, although it was currently alive, was always in the process of dying. The new Jerusalem is always coming down, always new, always becoming.

The new city has twelve foundation stones. Each is a precious jewel. These twelve stones are associated with the apostles, the Twelve; in Ephesians we read about the Church “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus being himself the chief cornerstone.” (Eph. 2:20) If Peter is the rock (Matt. 16:17-19), the Twelve are the foundation.

The new city has twelve gates. Each gate is fashioned from pearl. Pearls in the ancient world were thought to be the result of lightning striking an oyster; the translucent pearl was born of fire and water, uniting these two opposite elements.

In Genesis 2, we are told that gold and jewels were found near the river Pishon. Often translated as “aromatic resin” or “pearls,” as well as “carbuncle” (a generic term meaning “a small, precious stone”), this is generally understood to refer to frankincense. (Frankincense was a particular resin/incense whose import and sale was a monopoly of the Franks in early medieval Europe, hence “the Frank’s incense.”) The resin was obtained by scoring—making slices in—the bark of certain trees. Sap would ooze from these wounds in the bark and congeal into the resin which would be scraped away and then these chunks of resin would be broken up to be used as incense. When the resin is sprinkled on hot charcoal, it melts and releases the fragrant smoke. The resins from various sorts of trees would produce a variety of fragrances which could be combined in different mixtures; myrrh, an especially bitter scent, was obtained in the same manner as frankincense but from another species of tree.

The particles of frankincense are customarily referred to as “pearls,” so that identifying Havilah–the land watered by the river Pishon–as the source of both frankincense and pearls is not necessarily a contradiction. There is also the later medieval Christian association of the round, white host at the Mass as a “pearl” as well as the eastern Christian practice of referring to the communion-particle as a “coal” (similar to the coal used by the seraphim to touch Isaiah’s lips to purify the prophet).

The jewels, pearls, and incense associated with the new city underscore its role as the temple of the new creation, the house of God in which the sacrificial worship of the Lamb is consummated.

There is a “New Jerusalem” monastery in Russia, built directly north of Jerusalem and an exact imitation of the church of the Holy Sepulchre for pilgrims who could not travel to the Middle East. It was closed by the communists and heavily damaged by the Nazis. I saw it in the early 1990s when it was still in ruins before the current restoration began.