Christ in the world

Contents I. Christ in man II. Christ on earth a) Prophetic ministry b) High Priestly ministry Eucharistic presence of Christ in the world Holy Grail d) Enthronement of Christ ...and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age (Matthew 28:20) ... everything was by Him, and without Him nothing would be. In Him there was life, and life was light by man (John 1:3–4). The beginning of the appearance of Christ in the world, and together with the beginning of Christianity, is usually timed to coincide with the Nativity of Christ or Pentecost, as the foundation of the Christian Church (“the disciples in Antioch for the first time began to be called Christians” Acts 11:26). Both word usages, of course, have full justification, since they refer to such events in history in which the completed Incarnation of God, the power of God-manhood, is manifested. However, it would be completely wrong to limit this power and this accomplishment to only a certain historical era or event. On the contrary, it is necessary to establish from the very beginning that the Incarnation of God in the world does not know for itself either a beginning or an end, but is its most general basis, its alpha and omega. It is not at all just a certain episode in the history of the world, as a means (perhaps even one of the possible means along with others, as even some Fathers of the Church assumed), it is the very being of the world, its purposeful cause. And, first of all, the very creation of the world and man in it is not something as if accidental for God, which might not have happened, so that God might not appear as the Creator, remaining forever in the loneliness of eternity. To be the Creator of the world and man - as its center - is characteristic of God, who otherwise would not be the most perfect Being. The world in this sense is necessary for God, but not by that mechanical, compulsory necessity, which would be a limitation for Him, but by the absolutely free self-disclosure of the Divine. God is love, and love cannot help but love. However, in this necessity of love, not only is there no forced limitation, but on the contrary, the freedom of His self-determination is realized. God is the Wisdom that is revealed in creation. God is the perfect and holy Will, which wills in the fullness of its self-revelation. But such is not only the immanent being of God, the own life of the Divine, but also its created image. Thus, creation is given a place, as it were, in the very existence of God as a reflection and radiance of the glory of the Divine. The existence of God postulates the existence of the world, and vice versa, the existence of the world necessarily leads to the existence of God, creation to the Creator. Therefore, it is not enough and even incorrect to limit ourselves only to the visible juxtaposition of God and the world as two mutually alien, different and even mutually exclusive forms of being; on the contrary, it is necessary to establish their mutual relationship: God in the world and the world in God. Between God and the world lies the boundary of creation. This border is non-being, emptiness, “utter darkness,” nothing. It must be understood not in the sense of something, i.e., although undefined, yet an existential principle μὴ ὄν, but complete pre-existent nothingness (οὐκ ὄν). The creative act of Divine omnipotence fills the void, posits in it being, filled with everything. In itself, this act of creation, as an action of the omnipotence of God, is incomprehensible and transcendental for creation. The latter by its very existence presupposes this creative act as already accomplished. Creation can never know its own emergence, since in its being it is already on this side of it. It can only postulate it by the power of its own existence, make it the evidence of faith: “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that what is visible was made out of things that are visible” (Heb. 11:3). However, creatureliness for a creature is the internal evidence of the limitations of being, its non-absoluteness. Every image of created being is immersed in the emptiness of non-existence and in it finds a boundary for itself. But at the same time, beyond this boundary, he remains in connection with other images of creation, thereby entering into a cosmic connection, going beyond the limits of his own private existence into another, ceasing to be only a separate impenetrable atom of existence. This positive force of created being is divine in its origin, it is created by the “word of God” and the command of God: let it be, which always sounds in the universe. As divine, it has no beginning for itself in time, but exists eternally in God, and yet for the world, in creation, it is revealed in time, realized in a sequence of development. Our faith is told about the creation of the world by God in Revelation. He who exists in the Holy Trinity creates with His power and Wisdom (Prov. Sol. 8:22 and Great Sol. 7; Pres. 1, p. p. 1, 12). The hierarchy of creation is figuratively revealed in the Sixth Day (Gen. 1). In this hierarchy, all creation is elevated to man as its top, so that the entire six-day period is the sequential creation of man, and man is the “image and likeness” of God. This establishes not only the divine principle of creation, but also its concrete, positive principle: the humanity of the world, and, due to the direct relationship between the prototype and the image, also the conformity of the creation to the Creator, i.e. its divine humanity. The world was created divinely, the creation is in accordance with its Creator. God is not only above the world, being transcendental to it, but He is also immanent to it in His God-manhood. How can one more closely define this God-humanity of the world? What does it refer to and how is it implemented? According to the teaching of Revelation, adopted by Christian dogma, God is a personal being, that is, he has a hypostasis and nature. The image of hypostasis is realized in the personality of man (as well as the entire angelic world), while the image of natural existence determines human life. The fullness of the world was created by the Word of God: “all things were, and without Him nothing came into being” (John 1:2). The creation of the world is described as the words of God containing a creative definition, sealed with a creative let it be. Words have creative power; they are not only thoughts or symbols of it, but ideas of power, creative principles of being. The individual “days” of creation reveal its multiplicity, connected, however, in the multiplicity of stages of existence, so that everything previous is included in the subsequent: inorganic matter - in organic life, its lower types - in the highest. At the top of the ladder of the universe, as its generalizing whole, the macrocosm, is man. The world is human in the sense that it closes in man, in him it finds its completeness and highest meaning and justification. “And God created man in His own image” (Gen. 1:27, cf. 96), placing him above all creation, for possession” and “rule” over him (Gen. 1:28), which undoubtedly indicates the ontological hierarchy of creation with the primacy of man. By “naming” the entire animal world, man reveals himself as an all-animal, all-organism, standing at the same time above all creation and called upon to cultivate and preserve it. The stamp of humanity is placed over the entire world in its very creation; the world is ontologically a person. (Even the angelic world was created in relation to this human world and to serve it. Therefore, the world of disembodied spirits, although higher than man in its closeness to God, is ontologically poorer than it, for disembodied spirits do not have their own world, but “serve” the human). However, this humanity of the world already in its very creation conceals within itself God-manhood, just as the “first” Adam was created in the image of the “second Adam,” Christ, who is the human image of the God-man coming into the world. In the New Testament writings, this thought, which could find a hidden expression in the Old Testament writing, receives full and persistent disclosure. Here we speak of the beloved Son, who is “the image of the invisible God, the first begotten of all creation, for by Him were all things created, that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible... - all things were created by Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist” (Col. 1:15–17), and “in Him dwells all the fullness” (1:19; 2:9–10). This is also the main idea in the prologue of the Gospel of John (1:1-3). God made His Son heir of all things, “through whom He also created the worlds. This one, being the radiance of glory and the image of His hypostasis,” upholds “all things by the word of His power” (Heb. 1:2, 3). The Epistle to the Ephesians directly speaks of the economy of the mystery, hidden from eternity in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ (Eph. 3:9-16). 1 In the above texts we have a threefold application of the expression “image”: first, man is created in the image of God (and likeness); The Son of God is the image and radiance of glory and the image of the hypostasis of the Father, the invisible God; and, finally, also the God-man Jesus Christ. Therefore, the unity and identity of the eternal image of God is affirmed in heaven, in the Holy Trinity, and in Christ in His human appearance. With this unity, a comparison arises - the image of God in man, which obviously remains strong in the “Man Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:15). Now the question arises about the meaning of this unity and even the identity of the image of God in Adam and in Christ, in man and the God-man. How should we understand it: as an original, ontological human property, or only as the fullness of time, after the Incarnation of God receiving the force of a fact? Two different answers can be given to this question: in one of them, which is even predominant in theological writing, the Incarnation, and therefore God-manhood itself, was a deliberate means, only one of the possible ones, for saving man from original sin; therefore, in itself it might not exist. There is no direct identity between the image of God in man, given to him at creation and accepted in the Incarnation, and the Incarnation might not have happened; there is no ontological necessity in it; in a certain sense, its basis is only the fall of Adam, who needs deliberate Divine help. In this understanding, of course, a difference arises between the two concepts of the image of God in Adam before his fall and in Christ, in the first and second Adam. The meaning of this difference, as far as we know, none of the theologians who affirm it has attempted to explain, and we doubt that this would be possible. The second answer to the question is exactly the opposite; it lies in the recognition of the identity of the image of God in the first and second Adam: Adam, as an all-man, by whom “the ages were created,” is one and the same principle underlying both the creation of the world and the Incarnation. If there is a man of earth and a man of heaven (1 Cor. 15:47), Adam the old and the new, then this does not abolish the unity of their humanity. The question may arise about the relationship between the uncreated prototype of heavenly man and the created one (it also includes the general question about the relationship of the Creator to creation), however, here too the unity of man in heaven and on earth is assumed. If we accept this thought - and it cannot be ignored - both on the basis of Revelation and theological speculation, then a number of necessary conclusions are obtained regarding the primordial nature of God-manhood, as laid at the basis of the very creation of the world and the first Adam in the image of the Second, Heavenly. So, we should exclude in advance the idea that the incarnation of the Son of God is only a means, as if deliberately found, for the salvation of man after his fall, and this means might not have existed if there had not been this fall - “beata Adamae culpa.” On the contrary, the world was created as world-man, and man is the created image of the Heavenly Man, the Son of God. This image is destined for the world by creation. The Incarnation is not only a means of salvation, although thanks to the fall of man it became such, it is the fulfillment of the original, eternal creation of the world as the becoming God-manhood. The Logos, the Heavenly Man, the Son of God is already present in the world from the beginning in His image in the “first Adam”: the creation of the world is already His pre-incarnation. All humanity is destined to accommodate the God-man. This leads to a highly important conclusion, which is expressed in biblical, specifically New Testament language; The history of mankind before Christ is also His genealogy, a living bridge leading man from creation to the Incarnation. Here the deepest meaning of both Gospel genealogies is revealed: according to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. How is the “genealogy” of Christ the Savior even possible? What does it mean? In a narrow sense, it refers to the holy seed of the chosen people, there is the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham, and it is enclosed in three cycles of 14 genera: from Abraham to David, from David to the migration to Babylon and from the migration to Babylon to Christ. Here we are on the ground of the history of the chosen people, who represent the core of all humanity. But the second genealogy, according to the Gospel of Luke, is built on a completely different plan: it is not descending, like that of St. Matthew, but ascending. And further, although it also contains a historical ladder (with differences in individual steps), its plan is not historical, but primarily anthropological. It does not stop at Abraham, but rises higher, including the patriarchs. But most importantly, it contains the very original origin of man: “Seth, Adam, God” (Luke 3:38). What does it mean, this last one: “Adam, God’s”? This, of course, refers primarily to the very creation of man, Adam, by God. Here we are talking not only about human genealogy (within the limits of which the story of St. Matthew is limited), but about the very origin of man from God, of course, through creation by Him. It seemed that God, as the Creator of man, should not be included in his genealogy, for the creator is not the ancestor. However, it is precisely this inclusion that gives a very special meaning to this entire genealogy. If the Creator is included in the genealogy of man as his last ancestor, then this indicates the connection of God with man, not only through his creation by the omnipotence of God, but also in his uniqueness to God. Otherwise, it is impossible to understand the special meaning of the genealogy of Ev. Matthew. It refers to the general idea of ​​the humanity of creation in the image of God. That revelation of the creation of man in the image of God, which is contained in Genesis 1, is here applied to the God-man, whose birth is raised to God. (By the way, the genealogy of Ev. Luke sufficiently eliminates the idea that the Incarnation could be considered only as a means, or even as one of the possible means, for saving a person from sin: its basis is here raised not to soteriology, but to anthropology and related Christology). Understanding the genealogy of Christ as His connection through humanity with the human race cannot also be limited to just the chosen people, from which the direct ancestors of the Savior come, named in His special genealogies. It extends to the entire human race in its diversity, so that in the person of the chosen ancestors it is all blessed. Here our attention is drawn to the textual Words of God, in which this is evidenced. And, first of all, we find this in the repeated blessings of God to the forefather Abraham, from whom Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus Christ begins as the “son of Abraham.” Sending Abraham from Haran to the promised land, the Lord says to him: “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you; and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed" (Gen. 12:3)... To Abram (who had already been renamed Abraham), in the epiphany at the oak of Mamre it was said: “A great and strong nation will surely come from Abraham, and in him all the nations of the earth will be blessed” (18:18 / Compare Ps. 71 /72/, 17) in application to the Messianic king: “(tribes) will be blessed in him.” And after Abraham’s sacrifice, which was performed over a ram, instead of Isaac, the Lord once again says to Abraham: “In your seed all the nations of the earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice” (22:18). And once again the same blessing, after the death of Abraham, was given to Isaac: “I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and I will give to your descendants all these lands; In you and in your seed all families of the earth will be blessed” (28:14 // Wed. Acts 3:25). What does this blessing mean for all the tribes of the earth in the persons of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? It can be understood, of course, first of all in the literal sense of the genealogy of Christ: in Christ, who will come from the forefathers of the chosen people, those who enter the Church of Christ will be blessed, in which there is no Greek and Jew, but all nations are called. This refers to the coming church of Christ, prophetically foreseen from the depths of the Old Testament by the patriarchs. However, this future is also based on the past; it has its basis in the very creation of the human race in the person of Adam, as the earthly ancestor, who begins the earthly genealogy of Christ. In other words, without diminishing the significance of the chosen people as prepared to reveal the Savior's earthly ancestors, we must expand the human kinship of the Savior to include the entire human race, which is called, if not directly in the ancestors, then at least in the descendants, to be included in the humanity of Christ. This leads us to the idea that the Old Testament church contains not only the chosen people, bound by the establishment of circumcision, sacrifices and the law, but in a certain sense the entire human race (in the words of the church song: “the pagan barren church”). Some church writers (St. Justin the Philosopher, Clement of Alexandria) speak in this sense about “Christians before Christ,” as evidenced iconographically by the Orthodox Church (at least the Russian one), placing images of ancient sages - Socrates and Plato, Aristotle and Ptolemy, even Sibyls and others - in the vestibule of the church. Thus it is given “to the Gentiles also to be heirs together, being one body, and partakers of his promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (Eph. 3:6). “Is God really the God of the Jews only, and not of the pagans? Of course, also the Gentiles” (Rom. 3:29). And if in Christ “there is no longer Jew nor pagan” (Gal. 3:28), then in a certain sense they do not exist before Christ, or rather, before His earthly appearance: “If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed” (29), you belong to the genealogy of Christ the Savior, at least connected with it, for according to the testimony of the apostle. Peter, “God, who knows the hearts, gave them the Holy Spirit, just as he did to us, and made no difference between us and them (Acts 15:8). This appeal of the apostles, especially the apostle of tongues, with a sermon to the pagans, which was shocking and seductive even for the Judeo-Christian consciousness, has its basis in the well-known pre-establishment of languages, the destinies of which are intertwined with Christian ones, like the entire human race. “God created from one blood the whole human race to inhabit the whole world of the earth, appointing predestined times and the limits of their habitation, that they should seek God...” (Acts 17:26–27). The history of the human race represents a certain unity, which is also expressed in the Old Testament, where the destinies of the languages ​​are inseparably intertwined with the life of the chosen people and are the subject of the deliberate guidance of God with special prophecy. Only for the time being they remain, as it were, excluded from the Church, Old and New Testament, although they go through their own special path of preparation for Christianity. Magi from the East bring their gifts to the born Christ, and the Greeks come to see Jesus (John 12:21). It can be said without any exaggeration that everything good, and in paganism belonging to Christ, is the natural Old Testament in him. Pre-Christian and extra-Christian history at its depth is Christianity, the beginning of which lies in the very creation of man and his stay in paradise even before the Fall. Or who would dare to assert that the “first Adam,” who talked with God, did not already know Christ, of course, with the knowledge that was given to man, at least, for example, in the prophets? Or was it that he was not aware in himself of that divine image that constituted the very basis of his creation? The Fall was, of course, a catastrophe for his knowledge of God, but not to that final extent that would exclude any existence of it. In general, humanity, not only among the chosen people, but also in paganism, represents a distorted, sick state, but preserving its image, which is still the image of God, according to the prototype of Christ. This is the ontological meaning of the promise: in you all the tribes of the earth will be blessed - they will be blessed in Christ, in the world to come, to the incarnation. But from here it should be concluded that the Son of God is present in the world after its creation and before His descent from heaven and incarnation. Christ cannot be thought of as transcendent to the world if “everything was That and without Him nothing could come to be that was. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:3–4). One can object to this that the Word before the incarnation is not Jesus Christ, the God-man. However, the image of God existing in man is already the image of Christ coming in the world. In His image, He is present in the world before His descent from heaven and is revealed precisely in man. God's wisdom and power, the revelation of the Word and the Holy Spirit, reveals God in creation. The same idea about Christianity before Christ can be applied to that image of Christianity, so to speak, without Christ, which exists in the state of the pagan world already at the time of Christ’s coming into the world, His descent from heaven and His incarnation, although He remains unknown to all paganism. Christ lived, acted and preached in Palestine, but Rome and the East remained in His ignorance, as if before or outside of His coming. Neither Seneca, nor Philo, nor Marcus Aurelius, nor other luminaries of paganism knew him, not to mention the few of those who were then called by the apostolic preaching and awarded baptism. Does this mean that they too are completely excluded and rejected by the Christian Church, or, on the contrary, that in their ignorance of Christ they remained Christians before Christ, going through their own special path to Christ? If in Abraham all the tribes of the earth are blessed, then the appearance of the “Son of Abraham” has universal power, and not limited local and, so to speak, provincial. With the coming of Christ to earth, regardless of where He came, His kingdom on earth begins. The coming of Christ to earth is included in the facets of history and took place in a certain space and time. Does this mean, however, that it, as an event of earthly life, is limited by them? In a certain sense, this question can be answered in the affirmative: the concreteness of the descent from heaven and the incarnation of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, together with all its events up to and including the “crucifixion under Pontius Pilate,” presupposes this certainty, and therefore limitation. However, this limitation, even in a historical sense, is only apparent, for the power and significance of the coming of Christ extends beyond the boundaries of a given space and time, namely Palestine in the days of our era, but is valid for all times of all earthly existence. Strictly speaking, this can be said even about every human life and earthly event in the entire context of history. Caesar is still crossing the Rubicon for world history, which can never forget this event as a certain link in itself, and the same can be said in general about all events, great and small, in their indelibility. But in a special, unique and exclusive sense, this can and should be said about what represents the very core of human history, its spiritual center. We can say that the history of the earthly life of our Lord Jesus Christ continues and remains not only in the memory of the world and humanity, but also in their concrete reality. His word also applies here: “Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” This is expressed figuratively in the succession of the church year, which includes in its memory the events of the earthly life of the Savior and His words as regular Gospel readings. Even if we were not their contemporaries in the literal and immediate sense, then we include them in the fullness of our own lives. In this sense, we all, each in our own way and to our own extent, are contemporaries of Christ and His hidden ones. After all, even among His direct contemporaries, the approach to Him and the perception of His life differed among different individuals, and this same difference remains even now in the varying degrees of approach to Him and penetration by His life. But even beyond this, the influence of the power of Christ in the world, unknown and mysterious, spreads as the main impulse of history. He directs it along a certain path, without violating human freedom, but in combination with it, until the fullness of times is fulfilled “at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7, 13; 4:13; 1 Cor. 1:7; 2 Thess. 1:7; 1 Tim. 6, 14; 2 Tim. 1:10; 4:1, 8). Of course, this apparently applies only to Christians who have come to know the Lord, but unknown, this also applies to the whole world. Here we come face to face with the antinomian difficulty of the dogma of the Ascension of Christ, as a fact opposed to His descent from heaven. The Ascension is the removal of Christ from the world until the time of His second coming, or return to earth, comes. But at the same time, the Ascension is not disincarnation, but, on the contrary, the final completion of the incarnation through the ascension of Christ in the flesh. This ascension and sitting at the right hand of the Father does not mean the removal of Christ from the world. Only two evangelists, Mark and Luke (in the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles), speak of the ascension to heaven as a removal from the world, while the other two not only do not talk about this, but, on the contrary, directly affirm the presence of Christ with people all the days until the end of the world (Matthew 28:18) in a certain spiritual presence of Him: “I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you” (John. 14:18). We need to comprehend this coexistence of the Lord with us in His ascension. Dogmatic theology distinguishes three different ministries of the Lord: prophetic, high priestly and royal. The prophetic ministry is the Holy Gospel, those words and speeches of the Lord that, preserved in it, resound in the world with their power. The Lord still preaches today as He did during His lifetime, although we do not hear His sweetest voice. This preaching is available to us not only in the Gospel, but also in those apostolic epistles that are inspired by Christ and show the application and revelation of the preaching of the Gospel. But not only in the book of the New Testament, but also beyond it, in the writings of inspired men, we have the continuation of the prophetic ministry of the Lord, who sent twelve apostles, and seventy, and in their person an indefinite number of preachers, “to teach all languages... teaching them to observe everything that I commanded you” (Matthew 28:20). In this sense, the prophetic ministry of Christ, the gospel of the Gospel, continues now and at all times. The same can be applied not only to teaching, but also to prophecy in the proper sense of the word, as evidence of the future. Penetration into the destinies of the world and humanity, which is found in the Old Testament and New Testament prophecies, is accomplished through the prophetic perception of historical events. The last book of the Bible is “the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place” (Rev. 1:1) and “blessed is he who hears and reads the words of this prophecy” (1:3). Christians anointed by the Spirit are called to prophecy (Num. 11:29: “If all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would send His Spirit upon them”), for “others” God has appointed as prophets (though not all) (1 Cor. 12:29), “if you have prophecy, prophesy according to the measure of faith” (Rom. 12:6), “be zealous for spiritual gifts, especially to prophesy” (1 Cor. 14:1). The Apostle deliberately calls for prophecy (“it is better that you prophesy,” 1 Cor. 14:5), seeing in this gift of the Spirit a special ministry of Christ that continues in the Church. Unlike the priesthood, it does not have a special church rank for itself and is given to charismatics as a special gift. But such was the Old Testament prophecy, and Moses, and Elijah, and the Baptist. And God announced to His servant Moses about Christ’s prophetic ministry: “I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brothers, and I will put My words in His mouth, and He will tell them everything that I command Him” (Deut. 18:18). This corresponds to the word of Christ about Himself: “As the Father taught Me, so I speak” (John 8:26), “I say what I saw with My Father” (38), “I say as the Father told Me” (12:50), “I said everything that I heard from the Father” (15:15). Prophecy is connected with teaching: the Lord did not forbid calling Him Rabbi, Teacher and Prophet from Nazareth, and He commanded this ministry to the apostles. This and that include not only knowledge of the future and speaking about it, but also the teaching about God and the mysteries of God, not school theology, but inspired and inspiring. One should distinguish, but not confuse, the prophetic and hierarchical ministries. 2 The absorption of the former by the latter is an abuse of the priesthood, “clericalism.” Of course, the task of pastoral ministry in its highest bodies is to maintain the right faith and the corresponding authority of the church magisterium. However, this preservation of the already acquired and proclaimed truth (what are the dogmas, symbols and confessions of faith) should not be an obstacle to further dogmatic development. In contrast to Roman Catholicism, the Church does not have an organ of ecclesiastical infallibility except in the form of a conditional one: donec corrigatur, subject to acceptance by the Church, and the danger of absorption or strangulation of prophecy by the hierarchy always remains as a possibility of abuse of the hierarchical. It also remains always possible for personal combination of hierarchical and prophetic ministries. However, the power and authority of the judgment is not related to hierarchical position, but is based on the personal qualities of the person endowed with prophecy. In general, the relationship of teaching, as it is carried out through the priesthood and prophecy, has always been and is very delicate and fluctuating, leading to struggle and conflict. And if Christ, as the Teacher of the truth and the very embodiment of it, was condemned by the high priests for blasphemy, then this very possibility of a clash between the priesthood and prophecy remains in force for the New Testament Church and is not eliminated by the teaching of Roman and Romanizing theology about the primacy of hierarchy in prophecy and even its infallibility. 3 Regarding the prophetic ministry of Christ, one can also pose the following question: is it limited to the New Testament revelation or does it extend beyond its borders, as even Christianity itself? If Socrates and Plato are called “Christians before Christ,” then doesn’t this mean that they were accessible to the prophetic influence of Christ, they knew Christianity without knowing Christ? And is it not permissible to extend this thought even beyond the boundaries of Christianity itself to those great non-Christian religions (Confucianism, Buddhism, Brahmanism) in their highest achievements? Does the action of Christ’s prophetic ministry stop in powerlessness before this border, or is even such questioning itself impious, and it remains to be recognized that, although like a mirror in fortune-telling, partially and perverted, the truth proclaiming the Truth is accessible to these peoples? And if so, then we must understand the prophetic ministry of Christ even more broadly. A more general answer should be given to this question, based on the recognition of it before Christ and outside of Christianity, as an institution of the church, which in turn presupposes the knowledge of the image of Christ coming in the world, even before His coming. This idea is expressed in church teaching about the human prototypes of Christ, which are indicated in individual Old Testament persons (like Job, David and Solomon, Isaiah) and prophecies (as “about the suffering servant of God” Isa. 53), etc. All of them are erected and generalized in the human prototype of Christ, “the first Adam.” He was also characteristic of prophecy, at least before the Fall. It was included by virtue of the general blessing of God given to husband and wife, with which power over all creation is associated (“possess” the earth and “have dominion” Gen. 1:28). The prophecy of the first man about the creation was expressed in the naming of all animals “whatever a man calls every living soul, that is its name” (2:19), as well as direct prophecy about his wife (22:4). And even after the fall, we see the woman’s act of prophecy, “and Adam called his wife’s name Eve, for she became the matter of all living” (3:20). And a similar prophetic act was the naming of Seth (in contrast to Cain). Here the naming is especially clearly depicted as prophecy in direct comparison with the naming from God: God created man, “male and female he created them, and blessed them, and called their name man on the day of their creation.” Adam, having given birth to a son in his own likeness, in his own image, named him Seth (Gen. 2-3). Both of them, Adam and Seth, complete the earthly genealogy of Christ raised to God (Luke 4:38), and thereby the image of God is consolidated in man. If prophetic ministry is characteristic of Christ, then it is also characteristic of man. The genealogy of the patriarchs before Abraham (Luke 3:34–38) obviously does not have a restrictive meaning that can still be attributed to it after him (in the genealogy of Matthew 1); it has not only a Jewish, but a universal meaning. On this basis, the idea of ​​Christianity before Christ in all humanity, as well as the prototype of God in it, must be recognized in particular, and in application to the prophetic ministry, to those insights of truth that pious paganism achieved before the coming of Christ in the world and before His preaching to all languages. In relation to the prophetic ministry of Christ, it is still necessary to identify its pneumatological and trinitarian aspect. In His eternal procession, the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son, He rests on the Son as the perfect hypostasis in relation to the Word. In the incarnation and, in particular, in the prophetic ministry, Christ, as the anointed of the Spirit, acts in dyadic unity with Him, therefore in Old Testament prophecy it is said: “who spoke the prophets” when applied to the Holy Spirit. The Word of God is spoken by the Holy Spirit, in Their inseparable and unmerged unity. The Incarnation of the Word is accomplished by the Holy Spirit descending on the Ever-Virgin Mary (“incarnate from the Holy Spirit and Ever-Virgin Mary and becoming human”). But not only the incarnation itself is initially accomplished by the Holy Spirit, but it is accompanied by His descent onto the incarnate Christ (Lk. 2:40, 52), until Christ's Pentecost, the descent of the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove (and later in the Transfiguration), was accomplished over Him in baptism, so that He “returned from John full of the Holy Spirit” and Himself applied to Himself the words “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me” and further (Luke 4:18–19; Isa. 61:1–2). And, as the Lord Himself testified about Himself, He cast out demons by the Spirit of God. 4 This fact of the dual unity of the Word and the Spirit in the ministry of Christ has the significance that it even more definitely confirms the Old Testament prophetic ministry in its means and antecedents of Christ. Despite all the quantitative and qualitative differences in the ministry of the prophets and Christ, this is still the action of the same Spirit who acted in Christ after His incarnation. But can we limit the action of the Spirit only to the chosen tribe, or does it extend, although to a lesser extent, beyond it, on the general basis that man bears the image of God, the image of the coming or come Christ? Here we have that general confirmation of the idea that the pagans find in themselves the foreknowledge and presentiment of the image of Christ, which awakens in them at the first spiritual touch, already consciously (as was the case with the Samaritan woman and her companions, or with the centurion Cornelius, regarding whose invitation to the Apostle Peter “God revealed that I should not consider any person base or unclean” Acts. 10:28), and that “in every nation whoever fears Him and does what is right is acceptable to Him” (35). So, prophecy or prophetic ministry must be put in connection with the very humanity of man, which is in him and his God-manhood, as the power of the image of Christ. The Son of God is the Word of the Father, the Thought of God in God Himself, which becomes Divine Life and Reality by the power of the Holy Spirit resting on the Son. This is the eternal relationship of the Son and the Holy Spirit in heaven. The Word is the prophecy of God about God and in God Himself, the Holy Spirit is power and reality. But this is the same ratio in the created world. Christ is the prophetic Word in the world about the world, in man about man. But this Word resounds in the world as His reality and life by the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it was by the Spirit that the prophets “spoke,” although the Spirit is not the Word Itself. Therefore, the prophetic ministry of Christ is carried out by the Holy Spirit: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, He has anointed Me” and further (Isa. 61:1–2; Luke 4:18–19). But the creative word of the Word sounds throughout the world, as its ontological basis, and it also sounds in a person, becomes his word. That is why prophecy is inherent in a person according to the strength of his conformity with Christ on the basis of prophecy or verbal knowledge of the world. The prophecy of God, the word of the Word, is accessible to man only by the power of the presence in him of his own word, which is one in Christ and in man as the logos of the world. A prophetic word addressed to a person awakens in him the world’s own word about the world hidden in him (just as the sight of animals evoked their names in Adam). Knowledge and thinking are in this sense also “prophetic ministry.” But not only this, as evidence of existence, but also its inner strength, not only statics, but also its dynamics is embedded in man as a prophet of peace and about peace. Man has access not only to the present, which has already been revealed and in this sense said, but also to the future, which has not yet been revealed and unsaid, and yet already exists. This is the cognitive side of prophecy. But it also contains an effective and practical attitude towards the Truth, its fulfillment: “blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness...” This pathos of truth as Good, realized in life, is the beginning of human creativity: “I brought fire to bring down on the earth” (Luke 12:49), and the face of Christ is fiery from the jealousy that consumes Him, and this is the sacred zeal of the prophet, who is not content with words or thought, but calls to action. The Gospel must not only be heard, but also accepted for fulfillment. It is not only a book to read, but the Book of life, the eternal Gospel. And a person perceives it as truth because he hears it in himself and through himself, as such, as evidence of truth, as conscience. In a word, the prophecy of Christ is similar to human prophecy in general and should be perceived not as a command given from the outside, which requires obedience, although it does not convince, but precisely by the power of consonance with what is inherent in a person as his inner voice. “I am the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6), the sought-after truth of life, its inner light... “The Light of Christ enlightens all,” and “He came for testimony, to testify of the Light.” “There was the true Light, which enlightens every man who comes into the world” (John 1:7–9). This light of Christ in a person makes him a participant in the prophecy of Christ. b) High Priestly Ministry Christ's presence in the world is mysteriously realized in the Eucharistic sacrifice, in which He is both victim and priest, in the fullness of His praesentia realis. 5 He is present as the high priest, administering the sacrament through a human priest, a priest. He Himself is offered to God as sacrificially slain on the altar, and He is given in communion to believers as the bread of life. In the Sacrament of the Eucharist we have the Eucharistic presence of Christ on earth, overcoming our separation from Him in the Ascension. To understand the full power and significance of Christ's Eucharistic presence on earth, we must understand the full power of His high priestly ministry as revealed in the book of Hebrews. And first of all, the high priestly ministry of Christ is here called eternal. The psalm verse (Ps. 109:4) applies to him: “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek” (repeated in the message: 5:6; 6:20; 7:17, 21). The question arises: what is this eternity? Is this only infinity (aeviternitas), which, however, has a beginning for itself, as is usually accepted in Catholic theology, 6 or is it also about the beginninglessness of Divine eternity? Here we must first of all note that in relation to Christ, expressions testifying to His high priesthood and priestly ministry are used with all force. He is “the great priest over the house of God” (10:21), “a merciful and faithful high priest before God to make propitiation for the sins of the people” (2:17), “the messenger (apostle - Greek) and high priest of our profession” (3:1), “the great high priest” (4:14), “a holy high priest, innocent of evil, blameless, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens" (7:26), "high priest of good things to come" (9:11). This high priest is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven (8:1). With all its force, the priesthood of Christ is contrasted here with the priesthood according to the order of Aaron with its temporality and relativity. The main definition of the high priesthood of Christ is that He is “called by God a High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek” (5:10), and He remains “a priest in person forever” (Heb. 7:3). We need to dwell on the meaning of this definition. What is the meaning here of the eternity of the high priestly ministry of Christ? Is this service of Christ ontologically accidental, which is only accepted as a means, even one of the means, so that it might not exist? However, it is directly related to the Incarnation of the Lord from heaven: 1 Cor. 15:47, “the Son of Man who came down from heaven, who is in heaven” (John 3:13), the prototype of the first Adam. The incarnation of the Lord in His descent from heaven is the realization of His image in creation, in the God-man, as the Son of God - the Son of Man. From here it is necessary to conclude that there is and cannot be anything ontologically new in man that is not in the heavenly prototype. And, therefore, His eternal high priesthood must be understood in the light of the high priesthood of the Son of God in heaven. “In the likeness of Melchizedek another priest is raised, who is such not according to the law of the carnal commandment, but according to the power of unceasing life, for it is testified: “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” (Heb. 7:16-17). And there the appearance of Melchizedek is interpreted in such a way that by this interpretation he is taken completely beyond the boundaries of earthly life: “without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither the beginning of days nor the end of life, being like the Son of God, remains a priest forever” (7:3). The image of Melchizedek is generally twofold in its meaning (as discussed below), but in this case it definitely takes on the features of heavenly eternity, not earthly. But in this way, the high priesthood of Christ is interpreted not only as temporary, that is, having a beginning for itself, albeit in the Incarnation, but also as eternal, supra-temporal or pre-temporal, “forever.” We must also delve into the general context of the Epistle to the Hebrews, its Christology. It begins, by analogy with the prologue of John’s Gospel, with the teaching of the Son as the beginning and end of creation: “The Son, whom He appointed heir of all things (the accomplishment of creation), through whom also He created the worlds (its eternal foundation)” (1, 2), and then His hypostatic image in the Holy Trinity is indicated: “this one, being the radiance of glory and the image of His hypostasis, and holding all things by the word of His power, Having accomplished the cleansing of sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (3). Logology (as in John) passes into Christology in order to then reveal itself in relation to soteriology. The psalm texts here once again confirm the general teaching about the Son as the anointed one, and the creator, and the provider (10–11) with His own immutability: “they (earth and heaven) will perish, but You remain... they will change, but You are the same” (12). Here the eternal fullness of God’s life is indicated with all force, revealing itself both in the life of creation and in the saving acceptance of atoning death: “It was fitting that He, for whom are all things and from whom are all things, bringing forth many sons to glory, should make the leader of their salvation through suffering, for both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from One, therefore He is not ashamed to call them brothers” (11, further: 12–13). “And just as the children partake of flesh and blood, so He also received the same” (14). “Therefore He had to become in every way like the brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest for the sins of the people” (17). Thus, here is given, as the main theme of the message, the original dual unity of the heavenly and earthly image of the Son of God; as the Word, from Whom are all things and by Whom are all things, “to whom all things were,” and as a co-man, calling people His brothers and accepting suffering for their salvation. And this duality is expressed in the idea of ​​a single high priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek. We must see the heavenly foundation of the high priesthood of Christ. It is impossible to understand that the eternal high priesthood arises in time, or, for example, even along with time. For it it is necessary to find a basis in intra-Trinitarian life, which is the sacrificial love of the Trinity. In it, each of the Hypostases gives Himself to the Others in mutual self-revelation: the Father expresses Himself not in Himself, but in the Son, Who is the Image of the Father. He eternally begets the Son, or the hypostatic Word. The Son is born from the Father or, what is the same, reveals Him by Himself, not as Himself, but as the Word of the Father. In the Holy Spirit, this self-sacrifice of love is revealed as the hypostatic unity of Life. "Amor initivus amborum" (Augustinus). 7 Thus, the hypostatic character of the Son is His eternal self-sacrifice, in which He brings His own hypostatic Word to the Father as His self-revelation, and to the Holy Spirit as the content of His life. Being everything, He has it all not for Himself, but only in Himself. This sacrifice of the Son is the heavenly prototype of the high priestly service, and this same relationship is reproduced in the created world, which receives its existence through the creative act of the Holy Trinity. The Father is “the Almighty and Creator,” Who, however, creates the world through the Son and in the Son: “all things came into being, and without Him nothing came to be” (John 1:2). The Son gives Himself to fulfill the creative will of the Father, and the eternal Word of the Father becomes the Logos of the world. He determines and holds together all created being, and this self-revelation of the Son receives the fullness of being in the Divine, let it be the Holy Spirit. The creation of the world by the Son and in the Son is a sacrifice of filial love. As the Creator of the world, the Son of God is already a high priest, offering a sacrifice - Himself: not the Father, to Whom He obeys, not the Holy Spirit, Who completely rests on the Son, but precisely the Son. By creating everything, He Himself, as it were, becomes impoverished in being in order to give place to it all. The creation of the world is an act of the high priestly ministry in itself, independent of redemption. It is already the kenosis of the Son, presupposing the presence of “suffering” as free self-abasement in love. Therefore, Christ did not appropriate to Himself the Glory of being a high priest, but He who said to Him: “You are My Son, today I have begotten You” (Ps. 2:7) (Heb. 5:5). The glory of the high priest is here first equated with eternal sonship. From here the transition is made to His ministry “in the days of His flesh” (5:7). And then both high priestly ministries, heavenly and earthly, are united, which are connected precisely with His Sonship: “even though He was a Son, He learned to obey through His sufferings, and, having been perfected, He became the author of salvation for all who obey Him, being called by God a High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek” (5:8-10). (And the apostle adds, as if hinting at the full depth and significance of the teaching about the high priestly service being presented: “about this we ought to speak a lot” - verse 11). This duality of the high priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek, heavenly and earthly, is further confirmed by the teaching of chapter 10 about the Incarnation as the sacrifice of Christ. Contrasting the Old Testament sacrifices with the sacrifice of Christ, the sacred writer further says (10:5-10): Christ, “entering the world, said: You did not desire sacrifices and offerings, but you have prepared a body for Me. Burnt offerings and sin offerings are displeasing to You. Then I said, “Here I come... to do Your will, O God” (Ps. 39:7–9). (And this same thought is further repeated once again and thus emphasized in the following verses: 8-9). Here, definitely, as a sacrifice, which is the fulfillment of His will pleasing to God (the Father), the acceptance of the body is indicated, 8 i.e., the Incarnation as such: the preparation of the body. This thought is also doubled here or, more precisely, it is consistently revealed first as the “preparation of the body” or the incarnation in general, and then as the sacrifice of it (10) to fulfill the will of the Father who sent the Son (John 5:30, 37; 6:39; 8:16; 14:24): “I do not seek My will, but the will of the Father who sent Me” (John 5:30). And this general response of the Son to the command of the Father, expressed in the psalm word: “Behold, I come to do Your will, O God” (Ps. 39:9; Heb. 10:7) and relating to the incarnation in general, is further confirmed by almost the same words in the prayer for the cup: “Thy will be done” (Matthew 26:42). But from this dual connotation it follows precisely the thought (common to many theologians: see above) that the incarnation in itself is already the acceptance of the high priestly service, which in the redemptive feat of Christ is carried out in death on the cross, but, however, in addition to atonement, would be accomplished in the incarnation, the manifestation of the Prototype in human image and likeness. The high priestly ministry of Christ is associated with the creation of man, the first Adam, in the image and likeness of the Second, forever united with Him and in this sense identified (“Christ lives in me” Gal. 2:20 - according to the word of the Apostle Paul) and further with his redemption. In this regard, the mysterious meaning of the “Order of Melchizedek” is revealed. What is Melchizedek already in the Old Testament? And here it is a kind of mystery, clothed in the symbolic image of a historical figure and yet mysterious in the incomprehensibility of its authority. His name is mentioned once in connection with the defeat by Abraham (however, then still Abram) of Kedarlaomer and those with him (Gen. 14). Upon his return, Abram was first greeted by the king of Sodom. “And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. He was a priest of the Most High God. And he blessed him and said: Blessed is Abram from the Most High God, Lord of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who delivered thy enemies into thy hand; Abram gave him a tenth of all” (14:18–20). That's all. And also, in ps. 109:4. This name is no longer found either in the Old or in the New Testament, except for the Epistle to the Hebrews, where the following interpretation is given to this mysterious image: “Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, the one who met Abraham and blessed him, returning after the defeat of the kings, to whom Abraham divided tithes from everything - first, according to the sign of the name, the king of righteousness, and then the king of Salem, that is the king of the world, without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither the beginning of days nor the end of life, being like the Son of God, remains a priest forever. You see how great is he to whom Abraham the patriarch gave tithes of his best spoils. Those who receive the priesthood from the sons of Levi have a commandment to take tithes according to the law from the people, that is, from their brothers, although these also came from the loins of Abraham. But this one, who was not descended from their lineage, received tithes from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. Without any contradiction, the lesser is blessed by the greater. And here the tithes are taken by mortal men, and there by the one who has a testimony about himself that he lives. And, so to speak, Levi himself, who receives tithes, in the person of Abraham gave tithes: for he was yet in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him” (Heb. 7:1-10) ff. The name Melchizedek appears unexpectedly in Ps. 109:4 as a definition of the order of Melchizedek, from where it is taken in the book of Hebrews. It is obvious that the exegesis of the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews significantly strengthens the features of the biblical narrative about Melchizedek, makes his image even more mysterious, and this theological interpretation has for us all the power of Divine revelation, which we must be guided in understanding the image of Melchizedek, as well as the “order of Melchizedek.” In this exegesis, what is first striking is that the absence of known indications is interpreted in a positive sense. This in itself cannot but seem arbitrary, unless one sees here a deliberate new revelation. It refers specifically to Melchizedek's genealogy, which is absent from the Genesis account. Here this absence is interpreted in the sense of originlessness and eternity: “without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither the beginning of days nor the end of life, being like the Son of God, remains a priest forever” (7:3). However, Christ also has a genealogy that traces back to Joseph, “the husband of Mary” (Matthew 1:16) (“he was, as they thought, the son of Joseph” - Luke 3:28). However, the genealogy according to the Gospel of Luke is dual: it, being the genealogy of “Jesus” (3:23), at the same time is raised directly to heaven; “Seth, Adam, God” ends with the birth from God, that is, the pre-eternal birth of the Son of God. Thus, it simultaneously contains revelations about the pre-eternal birth as well as about the Incarnation. And in this feature it is close to the Epistle to the Hebrews, which also speaks of Melchizedek’s “likening” to the Son of God, “remaining a priest forever” (7:3). In the same sense, another feature of the Epistle to the Hebrews should be interpreted, where it says not only: “without a father” (which, of course, can only refer to Jesus as the God-man), but also “without a mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life” (7:3) - all features that can only be attributed to the Son of God without regard to His incarnation. In it He, on the contrary, has a pedigree, like the beginning and end of the days of earthly life. What should be seen in this presentation - is it just an allegorical expression of the general thought about the mystery of the appearance of Melchizedek, which is, however, extremely difficult, or should we distinguish here the simultaneous testimony of both the Divinity and the humanity of the God-man, Who is endowed with service according to the order of Melchizedek? Should we see phraseology here or... Christology? Undoubtedly the latter. And this also confirms the statement that Melchizedek, being like the Son of God, remains a priest forever (3). This can no longer be said about Melchizedek as a historical image, but can only be attributed to his heavenly prototype - the Son of God. It is further characteristic that the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews used the names “king of righteousness” and “king of peace” in order to interpret the appearance of their bearer in a supernatural sense, as well as the combination of both features in him: the acceptance of the gift of the tithe and the blessing he gave to Abram, as a combination of royal and priestly service “according to the order of Melchizedek.” Abram, who received the blessing of Melchizedek, already had a prophecy about himself concerning the entire human race: “all the families of the earth will be blessed in you” (Gen. 12:3). Here it is especially explained once again “how great is he to whom Abraham the patriarch gave tithes” (Heb. 7:4), “without any contradiction the lesser is blessed by the greater” (7) and here it is contrasted in this sense with “a priest in the order of Melchizedek, and not in the order of Aaron” (11), “in the likeness of Melchizedek another priest rises, who is such not according to the law of the carnal commandment, but according to the power of life unceasing. For it is testified that you are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek” (16-17). And to this is also added the symbolism of origin from the tribe of Judah, and not Levi, although, obviously, in a concrete historical sense, this also could not have been discussed before the birth of both Levi and Judah. So, once again we ask ourselves, what is meant in the appearance of Melchizedek and in his order, who was Melchizedek? If in understanding this image we limited ourselves only to the narrative of Genesis 19:17–20, then we could see in him a historical person, although endowed with some features incomprehensible in their meaning and origin (“priest of the Most High God,” giving a blessing to Abraham and receiving tithes from him as a sign of respect). However, this specific historical image seems to melt and become transparent: in the interpretation of Hebrews 7, it takes on the features of a theophany. Abraham had a number of epiphanies, which are spoken of in the Bible: “and the Lord appeared to Abraham” (Gen. 12:7; 17:1; 18:1), as well as to other patriarchs Isaac and Jacob (6:3), and later to Moses (Ex. 3:2–11), Solomon (1 Kings 11:9; 2 Chron. 17:19). Regarding these phenomena, there is usually no mention of any image, however, except for the appearance of God in the form of three men at the oak of Mamre (18:2-12), which continued in Sodom (where, however, it is already spoken of “two angels” (19:2). Similarly, the theophany on Mount Horeb was first in the form of an angel of the Lord (Ex. 3:2), in a flame of fire from the midst of a thorn bush, burning and not burning. The epiphany to Abraham at the oak of Mamre (as well as to Moses on Mount Horeb) is described in such a massive image that is quite similar to the appearance of Melchizedek. Therefore, the concreteness of this last phenomenon in itself does not at all prevent it from being a theophany. But it is precisely this explanation of it that the interpretation of the Epistle to the Hebrews forces us to do. Even more than that. This Old Testament theophany receives a God-inspired New Testament interpretation, which has a special and unique feature of its own: it is explained in the light of the New Testament theophany, more precisely, the appearance of Christ, as the image of the New Testament high priest, who is the Son of God, who came from the tribe of Judah in His earthly incarnation. Melchizedek is the Old Testament appearance of Christ before His coming to earth, before the Incarnation. However, this is still not enough to fully interpret this image. We have seen that some features are attributed to him, even unusual for the Incarnation in all its specificity, for Melchizedek has neither father, nor mother, nor genealogy, nor the beginning of days, nor the end of life and is likened to the Son of God. These features truly liken him to the Son of God in His eternal existence, as “being a priest forever” (7:3), precisely as sacrificially offering Himself in intra-Trinitarian love as the Father’s Word. So, his features are twofold: some can be attributed to the Son of God, so to speak, before the incarnation, others - to Him as Christ, the Son of Man, who became man. This doubling, of course, is not an accidental misunderstanding, but deliberate, although clothed in the mysterious veil of revelation about the Son of God - the Son of Man, the high priest “forever” and “rising”, “shinning out from the tribe of Judah” (7:11, 14), a tribe “from which no one came to the altar” (13), but “in the likeness of Melchizedek another priest rises, who is such not according to the law of carnal commandment, but according to the power of unceasing life” (16). “He who endures forever has an everlasting priesthood” (24), “who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven” (8:1). So, we are forced to come to the conclusion that “the order of Melchizedek” or, in another expression, “the likeness of Melchizedek” (7:15), does not only mean the Son of God or the Son of Man, but refers to both. Melchizedek in their dual unity (the Chalcedonian union of two natures under one hypostasis) is the God-man, while the rank or likeness of Melchizedek is perfect God-manhood. In the darkness of the Old Testament it was contemplated primarily in its human nature, in the New Testament revelation in all the radiance of the Incarnation, and Melchizedek himself - as a mysterious image of Christ. And in this case, with all the historical concreteness of this image, which is given to it in Gen. 14, it must be interpreted as only a symbolic vestment of the order of spiritual theophany (and the “king” of Salem, “king of the world” - not as a geographical and historical justification, but only as an allegorical one). It should also be added that this theophany bears completely obvious features characteristic of the Second Hypostasis, which has to come into the world, become human and give Himself to be eaten as the bread of life, as a priest establishing the Divine Eucharist: (“and Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. He was the priest of the Most High God” (Gen. 14:18). (This feature of the offering of bread and wine is absent in Hebrews 7, but here it is evidently implied and, so to speak, absorbed in the general ministry of the priesthood, which is the main subject of attention). The last and most important and mysterious feature remains in the image of Melchizedek - this is the combination in him of the king of Salem and the priest of the Most High God, who is revealed outside the established religion. This is also characteristic of the Second Hypostasis of the Holy Trinity in Her special image - at the same time as kenosis and the kingdom: “all that was, and without Him nothing came to be.” “All things are through Him, by Him and to Him” (Rom. 11:36). Such a combination of the kingdom and the priesthood is not only unusual, but directly contradicts the establishment of the Old Testament. But something else in Melchizedek is revealed as the premium hypostatic property of the Son of God in the Holy Trinity and His service in incarnation as a High Priest and King from the tribe of Judah, born on earth as the King of the Jews. To this we must also add a thought, which, although not directly expressed, is undoubtedly contained in the order of Melchizedek: this is the prophetic ministry of Christ. By his very deed, by his appearance and the new priesthood associated with it, the king of righteousness and the king of peace is endowed with prophetic ministry, the establisher of the New Testament, about which reference is made to the text of the prophet Jeremiah (31, 31–34; Heb. 8:10–12). “I will put My laws in their minds and write them in their hearts, and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And every man shall not teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord. Because everyone, from the least of them to the greatest, will know Me.” In general, the prophetic ministry is not here deliberately distinguished in relation to the royal and high priestly; it is already implied in the very appearance of Christ, as His action “directly on souls, as spiritual enthronement and “knowledge” of the Lord. In this sense, Melchizedek, the king of righteousness and peace, is at the same time an image of the prophet, testifying to the blessing of Abram by God, who delivered his enemies into his hands (Gen. 14:19). This is the meaning of the Old Testament appearance of Melchizedek and his “order”: according to what has been said, it is the appearance of the God-man and God-manhood at the same time. But the question is, how is it possible or what does the appearance of the God-man mean in the Old Testament, that is, before the Incarnation? Is Melchizedek a man, a specific human personality, or an “angel” as the appearance of God in human form, like the appearance at the Oak of Mamre and other theophanic angelophanies? Obviously the latter. Moreover, in this case, this theophany has a very definite character as the appearance of the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, who has to be incarnated and become human, so that it is, as it were, pre-incarnated in the human image, which is the image of God in man, and therefore the human image in God. Here theophany is also Christophany. However, the main emphasis in this Christological revelation lies not so much on the hypostasis, but on the nature of the God-man, His ministry. Melchizedek in this sense is, first of all, the revelation of God-manhood, in which both natures, Divine and human, are united, mutually transparent. And what is most important, here the kingdom, priesthood and prophecy are united as one theophany, one ministry, as humanity glorified in suffering and obedience. The revelation of the Order of Melchizedek is a revelation of the sacrifice of Christ, by which He opened for us a new and living way through the veil, that is, His flesh (Heb. 10:19–20). The appearance of Melchizedek, in which both the Old and New Testament presence of Christ on earth is revealed equally, has paramount dogmatic significance, insofar as it confirms the very possibility of such a thing. Our main position is that Christ, just as he was in the world before His incarnation, remains in it now, after His Ascension to heaven. This stay is also connected with the resting of the Holy Spirit on Him. The same spirituality illuminates the image of the King-High Priest-Prophet in His kenotic revelation, according to the order of Melchizedek. Eucharistic presence of Christ in the world Let's stop at the beginning on the sacramental. It is carried out in all the sacraments, mysteries and sacred rites, which are performed by the power of the high priestly ministry of Christ, “according to the order of Melchizedek,” just as they were performed in the Old Testament according to the order of Aaron by the Old Testament priesthood. The celebrant is Christ, who “as he abides forever, has an imperishable priesthood” (Heb. 7:24). He is the High Priest of priests, doing all things in them and through them. At the same time, it must be said that all sacred rites and sacraments of the Church are performed by the grace of the Holy Spirit, who descended into the world and abides in the Church. “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever... He abides with you and will be in you” (John 14:16–17). But Christ also mysteriously abides in the indwelling of the Spirit according to the power of His promise: “I will not leave you orphans; I'll come to you. A little more and the world will no longer see Me; and you will see Me, for I live, and you will live” (18-19). The presence of the Son and the Spirit in the Church is inseparable. Christ, after the Ascension and Pentecost, abides in the Church by the Holy Spirit. Of course, this other, spiritual stay differs from the stay during His First Coming, as well as the Second, in parousia. But the duality of the Son and the Spirit, as revealing the Father, presupposes the sending down from Him, and thereby the whole secret action receives a trinitarian character. “In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me and I in you” (John 14:20). However, along with the spiritual presence of Christ in the Church as the High Priest, the Perpetrator of the mysteries, there is also His special, spiritual-bodily presence, namely the Eucharistic, which primarily refers to His high-priestly service, as offering a sacrifice, passing through the veil, that is, His flesh and blood (Heb. 10:20) Christ, Who through the Holy Spirit offered Himself blameless to God (14). The sacrament of the Eucharist was performed for the first time at the Last Supper by the Lord, who transposed bread and wine into His body and blood and communed with them to His disciples, and then established this to be done in His remembrance, when He was no longer on earth, “until He comes.” Therefore, in the Eucharistic presence of Christ, it is necessary first of all to highlight this His High Priestly mystery, which is expressed in the transfusion of the Holy Gifts. At the Last Supper, the Lord was personally present as the celebrant, who offered - “this is” - bread into the Body and wine into the Blood of Christ. The presence of Christ Himself was not mysterious, but obvious, and the very establishment of the sacrament of the Body and Blood was accomplished before the Calvary sacrifice itself was made - with the removal of the boundary of time. The Eucharist itself is performed only according to its power and, therefore, after it: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until He comes” (1 Cor. 11:26). The Lord, although in His personal presence instituted the sacrament and performed the sacramental transformation, He did not commune the disciples with His own Body and Blood, but with the mysteriously given bread and wine (“under the guise”). Therefore, the very communion of the disciples, although they were present at the Last Supper in the presence of Christ, did not differ in this sense from the communion that all Christians have until the end of the age, “in remembrance” and “proclamation” of the death of the Lord. Thus, the Last Supper continues in all the numerous liturgies, celebrated everywhere as a single sacrament given forever. However, the difference between the Last Supper and all liturgies remains that these latter take place after the Ascension of Christ, after the descent of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, here we already have the mysterious presence of Christ, as the Performer of the sacrament in the Holy Spirit, by whose power it is accomplished (this is expressed in Eastern liturgies in the epiclesis, as the invocation of the Holy Spirit after the utterance of the establishing words of Christ. And if at the Last Supper, in a certain sense, the Communion Christ is distinguished from the Communion He gives, although He is one and identical, then in the liturgical sacrament of the Eucharist we must distinguish between these two mysterious images of His Eucharistic presence: as the High Priest, the Performer of the sacrament, and His “praesentia realis” in His Holy Gifts. The first image of the presence of Christ corresponds to His priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek, although the “liturgical priest” is not identified here hypostatically with Christ and is not in this sense “in persona Christi” (according to Catholic teaching), but he accepts the power of God-manhood in the participation of his high priesthood “according to the order of Melchizedek” in the performance of the sacrament by the Holy Spirit. Christ, as the celebrant of the sacrament at the Last Supper, already has in Himself the anointing of the Holy Spirit, which is like an ordination into the fullness of His ministry. He also ordains the priest “according to the order of Melchizedek,” that is, through the action of the Holy Spirit he receives the power of Christ to perform the sacraments, in particular the Eucharist. However, the priest is only an intermediary between Christ, who is mysteriously present in the sacrament, and His Church. He accepts the power of the priesthood of Christ, but is not identified with His hypostasis. In this case, he could only give communion without receiving communion himself. The important conclusion that follows from this is that the performance of the sacrament by the power of Christ does not at all replace or eliminate the mysterious presence of Christ Himself as the High Priest offering the sacrifice. So, in the Eucharistic sacrament itself we have, first of all, the offering of a sacrifice by “the great Priest over the house of God” (Heb. 10:21) “who entered once with His blood, not into a sanctuary made with hands” (9:12), but into heaven itself, and this sacrifice in its uniqueness is not repeated in heaven, but becomes re-available on earth. At the same time, since the sacrifice was accompanied by the eating of the sacrificed meat, the Eucharistic offering includes the communion of all, the sacrament of the Eucharist in the proper sense. In the first sense, we have the High Priestly ministry of Christ, which is expressed in action, in the sacrifice itself, and in the second, He Himself is the Sacrifice: “for you are the one who offers and the one who is offered, the one who receives and the one who distributes” (prayers at the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom). Here the dual presence of the Lord at the Lord's Table is evidenced: as the sacrificer and the Sacrifice itself. However, the first presence, expressed only in an invisible action by the power of the Holy Spirit, differs from the second presence in the Holy Gifts, in the Sacrifice itself, to which the concept of praesentia realis is actually applied. Here, although mysterious, the real presence of Christ on earth is affirmed. This latter, of course, differs from the presence during His earthly ministry, in which He was visible and accessible in His Theanthropic image, as mysterious, that is, without this image. But at the same time it is connected with earthly matter, bread and wine, the flesh of this world. The question of the Eucharistic presence of the Lord is extremely confused and distorted in Western theology. During the first 1000 years, Eastern theology was content with the general statement that in the Eucharistic partaking of bread and wine, believers partake of the true Body and Blood of Christ and through this are graciously united with Christ. Eucharistic doubt, which first appeared in the West in the 11th century (in the Berengari heresy), refers to the truth of this belief, which has been replaced, rejected, and diminished in various ways, especially since the Reformation. The defense of this belief in the theology of Thomas Aquinas, and further in the definitions of the Council of Trent, is aimed at not only affirming, but also explaining (in terms of Aristotelian philosophy) that “transsubstance” occurs in the sacrament of the Eucharist. The dogma received the following expression: in sanctissimae Eucharistiae sacramento vere realiter et substantialer corpus et sanguine una cum anima et divinitate Domini nostril J. Christi, ac proinde totum Christum, 9 and in each separate part of it and under each species. 10 Therefore, in the sacrament of the Eucharist, the Only Begotten Son of God must be worshiped with external worship of God. 11 From this it follows that the Divine Eucharist can be preserved in the sanctuary after the consecration of the Holy Gifts, 12 not only for the communion of the sick (reservatio), but also for such worship. Church dogma meant here to affirm the full power and authenticity of the communion of the Body and Blood of Christ in the partaking of Eucharistic bread and wine, which was questioned and denied by opponents. However, during the century-long dispute, a substitution of its original topic (ignorantia nrzb.) quietly occurred. Instead of affirming the authenticity of communion according to the command of the Lord: “Take, eat, this is My Body” and “drink of it, all of you, this is My Blood,” they began to assert not only this, but also much more and even significantly different: the presence in every part of the Holy Gifts totus Christus. The Eucharistic dogma essentially refers to the truth of communion: the Lord, even after His ascension “to heaven,” that is, removal from the world, retains a connection with it, to such an extent that the substance of this world, by the power of the Holy Spirit, becomes the Body and Blood of Christ, are included in His humanity, and those who partake of this bread of life (John 6) are united with Christ. But in the Catholic doctrine of the totus integer Christus, as present in every part of the Holy Gifts with all the parts of the body that belonged to Him on earth and with which He resides in heaven at the right hand of the Father, there is a hidden rejection or, at least, a belittlement of the power of the dogma of the Ascension, and the Eucharistic presence of Christ is likened to His Second Coming, as a return to earth. In fact, “latria” – the deliberate adoration of the Holy Gifts as Christ on the throne – develops in an exaggerated manner. Here there is a significant difference in the practice of piety of the Eastern Church in comparison with the Western: the East, professing the authenticity of the Eucharistic presentation, although it preserves the Holy Gifts for communion outside the Liturgy, however, deliberately hides them from any special worship outside the Liturgy. On the contrary, the West increasingly develops the practice of “adoration” of the Holy Gifts, in which the Holy Gifts are equated with the “appearance” of Christ, which they are not, just as the Eucharistic Translation is by no means the descent of the Lord from heaven. As St. says John of Damascus: “the ascended body does not descend from heaven, but the bread and wine itself are transformed into the body and blood of God... just as bread through the manifestation, and wine and water through drinking are naturally transformed into the body and blood of the eater and drinker and become not another body different from his former body, so bread and wine, through the invocation and influx of the Holy Spirit, are supernaturally transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ and constitute not two body, but one and the same." 13 In understanding the Holy Gifts, the main emphasis should be on the fact that they are for communion, which is associated with spiritual union with Christ through the action of the Holy Spirit, and not on the fact that the appearance of Christ on earth takes place in them. Even this, insofar as it actually took place after the Ascension (to the first martyr Stephen, the Apostle Paul and various saints), remains spiritual and in this way differs even from those appearances of Christ that took place after the Resurrection, but before the Ascension: the Lord in these spiritual appearances did not offer to touch His body and His bones, did not eat food in front of them, as was the case in the appearance to the apostles, but was visible only with the eyes. At the same time, of course, one can even ask whether this vision with the eyes was similar to ordinary bodily vision, or whether it differed from it, remaining purely spiritual. At the Last Supper, the Lord Himself distinguished His personal presence from His presence in the Holy Gifts, with which He communed with the disciples. The Lord was visible and tangible, generally personally present at the Supper, but He gave the disciples sacramental communion. Therefore, in the sacrament of the Eucharist we do not have the appearance of Christ, but the transformation of bread and wine, which retains its entire natural “appearance”, nrzb. “instead” (according to the expression of the liturgy of St. Basil the Great), so that Christ in them remains invisible-visible. 14 Of course, this presence of Christ in His Body and Blood is inseparable from Himself, but we must not expand it more than it was given to us at the very establishment of the sacrament and explained by the Lord in Chapter 6. Ev. from John. Inseparability does not yet mean personal presence, like “totus Christus integer.” In communion we are united with Christ spiritually and physically, through eating, but we do not have His appearance, into which the Catholic interpretation of praesentia realis turns it with the corresponding practice of adoration. This is a pious abuse: the Holy Gifts are offered for communion, and not for the worship of the revealed Christ (for which purpose Catholics even prepare and consecrate a special host). From here comes an important general conclusion regarding the Eucharistic presence of Christ: in it we have not the personal appearance of the Lord, but His God-manhood, which in communion becomes ours and is hypostasized in us. This, in general, acts in the world by the power of the Incarnation: in it the Lord united with Him the entire natural world, which in this expanded sense is already the body of Christ, inspired by His blood, as this will clearly become at His Second Coming. The presence of the Holy Gifts in the world makes it Christ-bearing. But, of course, only in the Holy Gifts is this Christ-bearing accomplished in full through the sacramental transformation. In the next century, this Christ-bearing of the world will be realized in the universal appearance of Christ; “behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with us” (Rev. 21:3). “But I did not see a church in it, for the Lord God Almighty is its church, and the Lamb” (22). “And the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His servants will serve Him. And they will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads” (Rev. 22:3–4). Only then can one speak of praesentia realis in the sense that is now sometimes said, but inaccurately and incorrectly: in the sense of praesentia personalis, a personal and at the same time human phenomenon. Then it will take place in full and final force. The God-manhood of Christ, existing in the Holy Gifts, is given by Christ not only for the communion of heavenly bread, but also as a sacrifice, which only ends at the Last Supper and Calvary, but occurs throughout the entire earthly life of the Savior, according to the consistent interpretation of church writers and theologians of the East 15 and West. 16 The doctrine of the sacrifice offered on the altar in heaven is set forth in the last chapter. to the Jews in connection with the priesthood of Christ according to the order of Melchizedek. The God-manhood of Christ is offered on the altar not just as His nature, but as a Lamb slain, and the miracle of the transfiguration of the Holy Gifts includes this slaughter. 17 The Divine Eucharist is simultaneously the sacrifice of the Body of Christ, once slain, repeated on all altars, and the eating of the sacrifice: “Take, eat, this is My Body, which was broken for you...”, “Drink of it, all of you, this is My Blood... which is shed for you and for many...”, “as often as you eat this bread.” and you drink this cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until it comes” (1 Cor. 11:26). And in this eating the Church is united in Christ as the Body of Christ. 18 The indicated nature of the sacrifice does not change or add anything in relation to the Eucharistic presence of Christ. And in this sense, it does not become His personal manifestation, but remains a mysterious revelation in the action of the sacrificing High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek, and in His God-manhood as the Sacrifice. 19 The Roman idea of ​​the Eucharistic appearance of Christ, totus integer Christus, has no confirmation here either. The sacrifice made on earth ascends to Heaven as the only one and, in contrast to the sacrifices of the Old Testament, without repetition. 20 The high priestly ministry of Christ is directly related to the fact that He “sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens” (Heb. 8:1), “exalted above the heavens” (7:26), “once entered into the sanctuary and obtained eternal redemption” (9:12). Christ “entered into heaven itself to appear now for us in the presence of God” (9:24) and “to offer one sacrifice for sins, to sit down forever at the right hand of God” (10:12). From all that has been said, it follows that Christ in His high priestly, sacrificial ministry remains transcendent in heaven for the world, but gives us boldness “to enter into the sanctuary through the blood of Jesus Christ, in a new and living way, which He again revealed to us through the veil, that is, His flesh, and (had) a great Priest over the house of God” (10:19-21). By the power of this heavenly priesthood, earthly priests receive the power not to repeat this one and only sacrifice, but to fall again to it with the assimilation of its fruits, forgiveness and communion. In the patristic interpretation, the Divine Eucharist symbolically brings into “remembrance” the entire earthly life of Christ. It depicts the economy of the Savior, all of it “is, as it were, one image of the single body of the Savior’s kingdom, - an image representing all its parts from beginning to end in mutual order and harmony” (Nicholas Kavasila. Explanation of the Divine Liturgy, vol. 1). 21 And this is not only a subjective memory, but the fullness of the Lord’s earthly presence mysteriously remaining in the memory of the world and humanity. Similar to this is the meaning of the “Lord’s” holidays, in which the celebrated event is also reminiscently and realistically experienced, as if happening again, this becomes a kind of spiritual evidence for us. The secret action expands to the limits of the entire earthly life of the Savior, and not only in memory, but in power, in accordance with the special character and significance of each such event. The events of the life of Christ, so to speak co-Eucharistic, should be especially highlighted. These are the special cases of blessing of the Eucharistic elements, bread and wine, which, although it does not have the power of transformation, is mystically a certain step towards transformation, and even finds such an interpretation for itself in the corresponding words or actions of the Lord. This includes, first of all, cases of the miraculous multiplication of loaves and feeding them once to 5,000 (Matthew 14:17; Luke 9:13), and another time to 7,000 people (Matthew 15:36; Mark 8:6). In the first case, it is said that the Lord “looked up to heaven, blessed, and gave loaves to the disciples, and the disciples to the people” (Matthew 14:19; Luke 9:16; in Matthew the blessing definitely refers to the loaves, in Luke - in general loaves and fishes); in the second case, the blessing refers separately to the loaves (Mark 8:6: “giving thanks” and separately to the fishes (7: “blessing”). Does this blessing not correspond to the special church rite of blessing the loaves that exists in the Orthodox Church, with a direct reference to this in the prayer of the rite? But a similar case occurs after the Resurrection of Christ, namely the blessing of the loaves to two disciples on the way to Emmaus, which is especially emphasized in narration: Christ “blessed, broke and gave”, “He was recognized by them in the breaking of bread” (Luke 24:30, 35), is already closer to the Eucharistic blessing, precisely in proskomedia, as the preparation of the substance of the sacrament. The miraculous feeding of 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish in Chapter 6. The Gospel of John is further accompanied at “the place where they ate bread with the blessing of the Lord” (John 6:23), with a Eucharistic conversation, so that the first is placed in direct connection with the second, although one is not identified with the other. Regarding wine, we also have a Eucharistic-sounding narrative in the story of its multiplication in Cana of Galilee. “So Jesus began miracles in Cana of Galilee and showed His glory” (John 2:11). In all these cases, we have, as it were, a prototype of the Divine Eucharist in its various spiritual aspects. However, all this cannot be compared in importance and mysterious significance with the outpouring of blood and water from the pierced side of Jesus, which is spoken of in John’s account of His death on the cross (John 19:34): “one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water flowed out.” I have already given a theological interpretation of this event in the sketch “St. The Grail” and here it remains to present only its main conclusions in relation to our main topic about the earthly sojourn of the Lord. In general, we can say that this event remained and remains, as it were, unnoticed in theology, despite the fact that the Evangelist wants to draw special attention to it: “and he who saw it bore witness, and his testimony is true; he knows that he speaks the truth so that they may believe” (19:35). But what exactly does he say and what truth does he proclaim? What is he asking you to believe? He himself gives only a hint of this, citing two Old Testament texts as an interpretation (more on this below). But we would look in vain for an answer to this in theology; there is none and there has not been one for centuries. This event was dominated by the pious legend of the Holy Grail, in which the religious genius of Western Christianity, mainly England, responded to it. It was she who, according to legend, acquired the honor of receiving the holy cup into her land, into which, according to legend, the venerable Blood poured out from the side of Jesus. According to legend, St. collected it into this cup from the Cross. Joseph of Arimathea. Eastern Christianity still leaves without interpretation this feature of the narrative about the death of the Savior, which, of course, is at least as important and precious as all the others. True, mention of him is included in the Eucharistic symbolism, namely: in the succession of the proskomedia, these gospel words are pronounced when the Lamb is “pierced” with a spear, which is accompanied by the pouring of wine into the Eucharistic cup. However, it is obvious that this symbolism takes the event only from the external side, but in itself it does not have Eucharistic significance and is not connected with the Last Supper. 22 The question is, what is contained in the authentic interpretation of the event in question, the truth of which the Evangelist assures with such exceptional persistence, based on the two Old Testament texts he cites. The first of them, from the 12th chapter of Exodus, which relates entirely to the regulations regarding the Passover lamb, obviously confirms the sacrificial nature of the death of Christ as the Lamb of God: “Christ is the new Passover, the living Sacrifice, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (Paschal hymn). In the symbolism of the indestructibility of bones, one can also see an indication that each composition, which determines the structure of the body, remains indestructible, even when meat is eaten. The Lamb-Christ dwells in some special sense among His people. Another text refers to the messianic prophecy about Israel and its glorification (Zech. ch. 12), namely the royal greatness of the house of David and its ministry: “The house of David will be like God, like the Angel of the Lord before them... And I will pour out the spirit of grace and compunction on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and they will look at Him, whom they have pierced, and will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only begotten son, and grieves, as one mourns for the firstborn” (8, 10). The general context from which the prophecy is taken refers to the earthly kingdom of Israel, the house of David, which seems to be embodied in one person, and for the Evangelist this is Christ. Thus, the “perforation” on the Cross is unexpectedly interpreted in the sense of victorious earthly royal service, overcoming enemies, universal recognition and love. Thus, if the first text refers to what in the epistle to the Hebrews is interpreted as the high priestly ministry of Christ, in which He is both the Offering and Offering Priest, then in the second He is not witnessed as the King of the Jews in His royal ministry. The first interpretation is obvious and, as it were, self-evident, while the second, on the contrary, is unexpected, indicating a special mysterious meaning of the event. In my essay The Holy Grail I look at this outpouring of blood and water from the pierced side of the Savior from different angles, and I cannot repeat myself here. The main fact that attracts here is that the shed blood and water of Christ remain in the world, as if at a distance from His body, buried, resurrected, ascended into Heaven and sitting at the right hand of the Father. The human nature of Christ here seems to be split into two parts: heavenly and earthly. Like all the events of the earthly life of the Savior, it also has a lasting significance, moreover, of special, exceptional importance in the series of events of the Incarnation. Death on the Cross, Resurrection and Ascension carry out the removal of Christ from the world, which, however, does not abolish His connection with it (“I am with you”). This same connection, even after the removal of Christ from the world, is realized in the Divine Eucharist as a “memory,” but also in the outpouring of blood and water from the side of Jesus, as being in the world, through the Holy Grail. In no way can this outpouring be understood only as a sign of the completed death of Jesus, although the soldiers “came to Jesus and saw Him already dead” (John 19:33). Death is the separation of the spirit, which He delivers into the hands of the Father (Luke 23:16; John 19:30), from the soul and body, which was not abandoned by the spirit of Christ and therefore remains incorruptible (Acts 2:31; Ps. 15:10). The soul does not die in natural death at all, but only freezes, exhausted for life. But the soul is blood, according to the teachings of Moses (Gen. 9:5; Lev. 17:14; Deut. 17:14), it expresses the mediation and connection between spirit and body, the energy of life. In the blood shed in the world resides the human nature of the life of Christ, while “water” is the primary element from which the universe was created (Gen. 1:26), the living corporeality of Christ’s body. In a word, the outpouring of blood and water means that the Lord, even in His death, leaves His humanity in the world in the state that is characteristic of it on earth before glorification in the Ascension. The world does not part with the God-Man even after His removal from the world by the power of His glorification, but retains this humanity of His. He himself is the Holy Grail, having within himself the coming Christ. This outpouring of blood and water from the side of Jesus would therefore be impious and blind to consider only as the moment of the death of Christ. On the contrary, it is a special mysterious image of the preservation of Christ’s humanity on earth along with its glorification in the Ascension (as is testified by the Orthodox Church in the kontakion of the Ascension: “Having fulfilled your vision for us, and having united us on earth with the heavenly, you ascended in glory, Christ our God, in no way departing, but remaining persistent, and crying out to those who love You: I am with you and no one else like you"). To correctly understand the Holy Grail cup, it must not be identified, but distinguished from the Eucharistic cup. The difference here lies not only in the deliberate purpose of the Eucharistic Gifts (“take, eat,” “drink of it, all of you”), but also in the fact that the Eucharistic Gifts mysteriously belong to the glorified humanity of Christ, while the cup of the Holy Grail belongs to His natural humanity. The Blood of Eucharistic Communion at the Last Supper was already this glorified Blood, with which - anticipating the events of glorification, with the removal of the boundaries of time - the Lord gave communion to the disciples even at a time when His own blood was still in the same state in which it poured out from His side when pierced by a spear, i.e. before His glorification. Otherwise, we can say that the Communion Blood was given through the mysterious transformation of wine, in contrast to the natural blood of human nature, which was characteristic of Christ Himself at the Last Supper, and later appeared from His side from a blow with a spear. These two images of the saving blood of Christ correspond to different images of His presence in the world after the Ascension. The first, the sacramental Eucharistic, as praesentia realis through partaking, unites believers with Christ, instills them in Him or Him in them by the power of the Holy Spirit - this is a spiritual unity with Him, which is realized, however, through the spiritual-physical act of communion: Christ and the Holy Spirit in the Duo of transposition are united inseparably and unmerged, just like the human and Divine nature in Christ Himself. Praesentia realis, the completed transformation, provides the possibility of communion, that is, the Eucharistic presence of Christ in the world, invisible and visible, mysterious and tangible, but only in communion and only for him. But there is also another presence of Christ in the world, invisible, but tangible, not mysterious (sacramental), but secret, unknown, heard by the heart, visible only with the eyes of faith, His earthly presence, as continuing His earthly service “according to the order of Melchizedek” not only as a high priest-king, but a king-high priest, in ongoing human life, in history. This corresponds to His stay on earth outside the Last Supper. It is absurd and wicked to consider the blood and water poured out from the body of Christ after His death as dead or mortified, for the death of Christ was not the final death characteristic of all people, but only a break or fainting of life, since the body of Christ, which retained the connection with His Divine spirit even in the grave, did not know decay. Thus, the outpouring of the blood of Christ into the world, which, having received it, became in this sense the Holy Grail, means the presence in the world of the life of Christ and the power of Christ in this blood. If the rite of Melchizedek already existed in the Old Testament, i.e., before the coming of Christ to earth, and exists forever in heaven, then after the Ascension this same ministry continues on earth. Ascension with removal from the world means the accomplishment of the saving work of Christ in its fullness, the integral of history, but it does not remove its differential series, i.e., ongoing history. We must accept the praesentia realis of Christ in the world, not only what is mysterious, sacramental, but also what is secret to the world. As the Word, in whom all things were, as Wisdom, Christ is immanent to the world, while remaining, like God, transcendental to it; being in eternity, He is present in every moment of time. His saving life on earth, from birth to ascension, contains in itself the fullness of its redemption with the entire weight of the Cross and the Cross “completed”, intensively, so that in the three years of earthly service all the times of the world came together, and the radiance of the Cross with its rays penetrates to the depths and to the limits the darkness of his sin. However, this intense fulfillment does not exclude the extensive accomplishment of Christ’s work in the world, not only the noumenal, but also the phenomenal His everywhere-and-always-presence, and therefore always-action, this radiation of the Holy Grail, the light of Monsalvat. But if we recognize that Christ is invisibly present in the world in His human nature, then doesn’t this also mean that He shares human sorrow and suffering, for what else could this presence in the world be, if not ongoing humiliation? Doesn't this thought seem strange, almost blasphemous? However, isn’t this exactly the opposite thought? If the Calvary Sacrifice is recognized as continuing in its offering, then does Christ’s presence in Heavenly Glory contradict this? And if the Lord ascended into heaven and sat down at the right hand of the Father, then does this contradict His presence with us always, now and ever and forever and ever? Doesn’t He share our suffering, all human suffering? The image of indifferent cold contemplation from heaven to earth, where the pitiful human race is swarming in the immeasurable spaces in the icy desert - doesn’t it terrify with its indifference to human life? Or does the redemption that has already been accomplished open up the possibility of a triumphant contemplation from heaven to earth, on which the human race passes its sinful, but also sorrowful path? But such a conclusion would be natural if the completed redemption had already been realized in the accomplished salvation, which, however, does not yet exist, but is only to come in the future. In the earthly life of mankind, we have only the commandment about the cross: “let everyone deny himself and take up his cross and come after Me” (Matthew 16:24; Mark 8:31; Luke 14:27). It is even a mystery of the future century that some will be glorified in the Kingdom of God, while others will burn in “eternal fire.” How will this be included in the love of God, which concluded everyone “in disobedience in order to have mercy on all” (Rom. 11:32)? But even leaving aside this eschatological mystery of God’s saving love and limiting our questioning only to the edge of that century, we ask ourselves in bewilderment: the universal salvation accomplished in Christ, given for all, does it now leave heaven indifferent and indifferent to the suffering of the earth? Is redemptive suffering in its intensity sufficient to remove it from the world, leaving it to its own fate until the Second Coming, or does redemption, in its fulfillment, which took place on the Cross once and for all, continue in its accomplishment through time? But this question means: will Christ, ascended and sitting in heaven at the right hand of the Father, have compassion for earthly humanity? From a rational-empirical perspective, this question seems to have to be answered negatively, since a positive answer includes contradictions. Here you have to choose either-or, and not connect as both-and. However, rational reasoning is not always sufficient when applied to Divine matters, when antinomic thinking is used, overcoming logical inconsistency. The general relationship of God to the world, which is defined as God-human or God-created, is thoroughly antinomic, for it combines the motionless fullness of eternity and formation in time. This is the creation of the world by God, as combining being and non-being, the fullness of Divine power and the limitations of all created things; such is the Incarnation of God, uniting in God-manhood God and man, Creator and creation, pre-mundane God and created humanity; such is the Ascension of Christ into heaven and presence in the world always, now and ever; such is the removal of Christ from the world and the Eucharistic praesentia realis. The same is true of the redemption that has already taken place, the redemption that has already been given, and the same thing that is still taking place. This series of antinomic relationships, which is by no means exhaustive, should also include the question that is of particular interest to us now: the relationship between the humanity of Christ in heavenly glorification, the state of ascension and seat at the right hand, and His earthly humanity. This refers to His mysterious presence in humanity in the Sacraments - and not only through Eucharistic Communion, but also through Baptism (“as many as were baptized into Christ, put on Christ”) - Gal. 3:27, “all are one in Christ Jesus” (28); Repentance (as we read in the prayer of repentance: “Behold, child, Christ stands invisibly, accepting your confession”); The priesthood, where there is a deliberate union with Christ, according to the order of Melchizedek; in Marriage, as “a mystery in Christ and the Church” (Eph. 5:32); Blessing of Anointing, as a miracle of Christ's healings; Blessing of water, as an action of Christ's baptism. This also includes the spiritual and mystical sojourn with Christ, which received its most general expression in the words of the Apostle: “It is not I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal. 2:20), “we are one body in Christ” (Rom. 12:5), “put on our Lord Jesus Christ (13:14). This also includes the co-existence of Christ with earthly humanity: as the God-man, Christ is a co-man with the entire human race, for “from one blood God made the human race” (Acts 17:26), which is therefore “the race of God” (29). In this regard, we must also understand the earthly genealogy of Christ in both of its presentations: the first (Matt.) indicates the central place of Christ in the chosen human race as “the Son of David, the Son of Abram” (Matt. 1:1); the second (Luke) is the ladder of God-manhood, the lower end of which is established on earth (“as they thought, the son of Joseph” Luke 3:23), but ascends into heaven: “Seth, Adam, God” (Luke 3:38), is the revealed God-manhood itself. But besides this deliberate genealogy, there is also a common participation of Christ in the entire human race in the unity of His blood. The Gospel speaks, as a matter of course, about the “brothers and sisters” and the Mother of Jesus (Matthew 12:49–50; Mark 3:32–5; Luke 8:19, 21), in general about the “genealogy” of Jesus Christ. Christ in His humanity is a relative in the flesh of all humanity, the whole Adam, is the all-man. And this vitally confirms His presence on earth both after the Ascension and independently of it - this is the fullness and power of His incarnation. This blood connection has the power of forgiveness regarding the human race: “Behold, man.” Of course, this connection now, when the ascended Lord remains in His glorified body, is different from what it will be after the general resurrection, when all human corporeality becomes like Him. However, this difference does not abolish the possible connection between them, since man is given the opportunity to partake of the Eucharistic Body, that is, to unite with the glorified humanity of Christ. This possibility, in any case, testifies to their ontological unity: the glorified humanity of the New Adam is, in any case, one and the same as the humanity of the Old Adam. But this bodily co-humanity of Christ with us is not only an objective-natural unity with us, which does not yet presuppose a personal connection between each individual person in his inclusion in the life of Christ. This inclusion of all human life in Christ (or vice versa) is directly affirmed in Christ’s speech about the Last Judgment, although it remains unknown and incomprehensible to man, as is clear from the answers of both the righteous and sinners alike. But it is known to Christ Himself, Who directly affirms the reality of His earthly life in humanity: “Truly I say to you, just as you did it to one of the least of My brothers (this very expression about people as the brothers of the Lord is significant), you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40) and vice versa. Here is evidenced of the well-known praesentia realis of Christ in humanity, other than the Eucharistic, not through communion, but as shared suffering. This must be dogmatically understood more deeply than has been done so far. Theology knows only redemptive suffering for us, but does not know the suffering of Christ with us, His compassion with humanity, what is evidenced in the final summing up of both all individual human lives and all of humanity as a whole. One can discern a twofold consequence of Adam's fall: the sinful weakness of all mankind, as well as the personal sins of each person and his own illness; and suffering and death as personal destinies. The first are redeemed by the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. He reconciles man with God and gives him immortality and opens the gates of heaven. The path of earthly life, like bearing the cross and following Christ, is an image of the personal assimilation of this redemption. But the life of one who has fallen away from God, an arbitrary world that has become the kingdom of the prince of this world, is also a tragedy, filled not only with sin, universal and personal, but also with suffering, which is not only a direct or indirect consequence of sins, but also a fate, incomprehensible and irrational in each individual case. The world is a place of torment that cannot find any personal interpretation. Their meaning, if it can be found at all, lies in the transcendence of the future century, in the mysterious connection of all individual destinies in one common destiny. But within the limits of this existence, we have suffering as an evil fate, and evil as a force that rules the world. Here, first of all, the thought comes to mind of the suffering, illness, and death of innocent children who do not know personal sin and who seem to be atoning for sins through this suffering throughout the immeasurable time of heredity: “the fathers ate sour things, but the children’s teeth were set on edge.” Children's suffering appears in all its irresponsibility. This is followed by diseases of adults, which, gradually intensifying, end in the disease of diseases - death. This is followed by all sorts of crimes and atrocities, wars, famine, poverty, enslavement, epidemics, untimely death on land, sea and air from the elements, animals, earthquakes, and so on and so forth, which is innumerable and immeasurable in thought and beyond imagination. And in the face of all this we ask: where is Christ now, where is the love of God? Did He leave us in His Ascension? The Lord Himself responds to this bewilderment with His testimony at the last Judgment, when the results of the world's destinies will be summed up: I was with you hungry, thirsty, I was in prison, I was naked and a stranger, I was sick; I shared with people all the suffering in their earthly and temporary life. The Lord testifies here not only about His sacrifice of atoning death (“My body is broken for you,” “My blood is shed for you and for many”), but also about His compassionate love: your sufferings are also My sufferings. 23 The Creator of the world shares with him his sorrowful fate. Christ, in His seat at the right hand of the Father, contemplates the earthly sufferings of people, not from a cold and indifferent height, but He shares them with us with His compassionate love. This means that His earthly life continues and He is present on earth, despite His removal from the world in Ascension. Christ is with us not only in life, but also in death; He dies with us in His death of deaths. This is the antinomy of the Ascension, as it is given in the Gospels and confirmed in church writing (kontakion of the Ascension). Of course, this compassion in all its pan-human scope can only be accommodated in the heart of the God-Man, just as He alone can accommodate in His heart, having suffered, mourn and atone for all human sins separately and the entire force of pan-human sin as a whole. All this can be characteristic of the One who is not one of many, limited and contained in personal human nature, but the All-man, Who knows and loves everyone. And about this antinomy of the Ascension, about this continuing life of Christ on earth, it is said that “His bones will not be broken” on the cross. This is the power of Christ's God-manhood in His Incarnation. Here, as His earthly humanity, His blood and water, poured out from His side before the Resurrection, remain with us. This is earthly blood for ongoing earthly life. Having poured into the earth, it remains in it, just as Christ mysteriously remains on earth through it even after His Resurrection. The Gospel does not say that blood and water poured out of Jesus’ side completely, without any residue, and it is more natural to believe that it was, as it were, divided into two parts: one remained on the earth, the other belongs to His resurrected and glorified body. However, “Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8). But this self-identity manifests itself in different images: Christ is the coming “Melchizedek” before the Incarnation; who came into the world - after the Incarnation; resurrected and heavenly - after the Ascension. And therefore there is not one, but two cups of Christ. The first is the cup of His earthly life and human suffering, and it was for it that He prayed in the struggle of Gethsemane, in sweat like drops of blood falling to the ground: “Let this cup pass by Me, but not Mine, but Thy will be done” (Matthew 26:39–44; Luke 22:42–4). This is the Holy Grail. And the second cup is the Eucharistic cup, of His “remembrance” being created, in all the power of the completed redemption, glorification and sitting at the right hand of the Father. And these two cups are the single Cup of Christ. There are two images of praesentia realis: the invisible and secret presence of Christ in the world and man - the Lord incarnate, and His mysterious presence in the Holy Gifts, visible and invisible, through sacramental transformation. So, we distinguish the twofold presence of Christ in the world: glorified in Heaven, which is communicated to us through His mysterious dwelling in us in the Eucharistic Transfiguration - this is His new coming in it, the descent to earth by the Holy Spirit; and His presence in the natural world, co-humanity, in history and the mysterious basis for this, as if the place of this presence is the blood and water poured out from the Savior’s rib, St. Grail. Christ's stay in Heaven, transcendent to the world, ends with the overcoming of this transcendence, the Second Coming of the Lord in a clear image, like lightning visible from the east and west and “all will see His face” (Rev. 22:4). This is the action of God over the world, which is performed according to the will of the Father. The presence of Christ on earth, in history, is dynamic, like His power acting in the world and human history, which is an apocalypse, that is, a confrontation between the forces of the prince of peace and the Kingdom of God. Its completion is expressed in the victory of Christ over the beast and the false prophet at the end of history, which merges with the end of this world and the beginning of the next century. The Apocalypse dissolves in an eschatological accomplishment (as is given in the prophetic images of the last chapters of Revelation, 21–22, as well as in the “little Apocalypse” of the Synoptics: Matthew 24–25; Mark 13; Luke 21). Eschatology is transcendental for us, it is not given, but given to our faith, as a Christian hope: here, come, Lord Jesus. But history as the Apocalypse is, in a certain sense, given to us; it is its mysterious content. It is nothing other than the accession of 24 Christ in history, the approach of the Kingdom of God, culminating in its complete triumph. The God-man ascended in glory with flesh, but He also remains with flesh, in His blood and water in the Holy Grail. The Kingdom of Christ was accomplished in His glorification and Ascension, as the basis for His reign in the world, revealed in the parousia. However, it has not yet come into the world, but is only coming. The times of history, symbolized in the images of the Apocalypse, must still pass before the historical time comes, which will be testified by voices in the sky: “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and His Christ, and will reign forever and ever.” (Rev. 11:14), and the 24 elders, sitting on their thrones before God, glorify and thank God for the fact that “You have received Your great power and reigned” (17). However, in response to these heavenly voices, “the pagans became even more furious” (18) and the struggle against Christ on earth still continues until His victory is accomplished and Satan is bound for 1000 years and the 1000-year kingdom of saints appears on earth. But even this will not be the final reign of Christ, because the unchained Satan will raise up Gog and Magog for the last time, until his times are over and the kingdom of Christ is revealed, transcendentally, eschatologically, and finally, historically on earth. We must understand these images of the Apocalypse in the light of the revelation of His royal ministry, which is His enthronement in history, or rather, through history. How does Christ reign? We must understand that the royal ministry of Christ is accompanied by His humiliation and bearing the cross, as was the case during the days of His sojourn on earth. Christ, who shares the humanity of every person, according to His own testimony of Himself, suffers with this humanity in all the images of its suffering, and this is the image of His enthronement. If it is said: what is not accepted by Christ in His incarnation is not redeemed, then with the same reason we can say: what Christ did not suffer through His compassion with humanity, He does not reign over it. And if there are no limits to enthronement, then there are also no limits to compassion. And this applies not only to individual human destinies, but also to the history of nations. All great historical events and accomplishments: wars and natural disasters, spiritual movements, quests, errors of creativity, are connected with the power of Christ, either inspired by it or opposed to it. Even in His accession, Christ leaves humanity the freedom of self-determination. However, humanity no longer belongs to itself alone, for it is united with Christ: the peoples are non-Christian and in this sense still pre-Christian, unconsciously, as if in the Old Testament; Christian peoples - consciously, in obedience or confrontation. The power of Christ in them, as well as in individuals, acts not only through direct inspiration, but also through the internal logic of life. 25 It accumulates in history as its hidden potential. Moreover, in historical life there is the participation of not only human forces, but also co-human forces - the spiritual world, light and fallen spirits (as revealed in the Apocalypse), as well as departed people. History is depicted in Revelation as a struggle with Christ against the forces of Christ (the beast and the false prophet), but all of it takes place under the sign of Christ, as His reign in the world through the Church. This reign in the world reaches its limit when transcendence occurs with the coming of the King Christ in His glory with all the holy angels. Christ, who is in the world kenotically, in a state of humiliation and struggle, comes into it victoriously from the open heaven to “smite the nations,” as “King of kings and Lord of lords” (Rev. 19:11–16). The wedding supper of the Lamb arrives. 26 The royal ministry of Christ ends as the enthronement, and the kingdom of God begins, and “the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His servants will serve Him... and they will reign forever and ever” (Rev. 22:3-4). This presence of Christ with us on earth now, “always, now and ever,” is the greatest joy of faith. It is a mystery, which, however, by the will of Christ, is revealed to man as He pleases, but it is also dogmatic knowledge, the promise of Christ Himself. This is His compassion with us, and our joy with Him and about Him, our strength and strengthening. Christ, who unites with us Eucharistically, and Christ, who reveals himself to us through the Holy Grail, is one Christ, “the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). But Christ reigns in victorious humiliation, which was spoken of by the prophet (Isa. 42:1-9) and repeated by the Evangelist (Matthew 12:18): “I will put My spirit on Him and will proclaim judgment to the nations; He will not contradict or cry, and no one will hear His voice in the streets; he will not break a bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax, until he brings victory to the court; and in His name the nations will trust.” For in the humility of His humiliation He forbade the people to “announce Him” (12:16), when He Himself was clearly on earth, and He reveals Himself in secret, staying now and visiting His chosen ones. These visits also include appearances of the Lord. This issue is subject to special consideration. 27 Here it is necessary to distinguish, first of all, the appearance of the Lord to the disciples and people after the Resurrection and before the Ascension, and then after the Ascension. As for the first, they must be attributed to the not yet completed earthly ministry of the Lord. True, the Lord no longer lives with His disciples, as before the Ascension, but only appears with special properties inherent in phenomena (“closed doors” (John 20, 19 and 26), with the suddenness of appearance and disappearance (Luke 24, 31). However, in these appearances the Lord testifies to His bodily presence on earth, in this world, for He eats food (Luke 24, 41–43), gives To see and touch oneself. 28 The Ascension of Christ is described precisely as a bodily removal from the earth and from the disciples. 29 From this we have to conclude that His bodily appearance has become impossible: the Lord “ascended into heaven and sat down at the right hand of the Father” (Mark 16:19). But here a further question arises regarding the presence of Christ on earth. Usually His stay on earth, “with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20), is interpreted “spiritually” or allegorically. However, such a simplified interpretation is opposed by the fact of the repeated appearances of the Lord after the Ascension, which requires, in any case, a dogmatic interpretation. What are such phenomena? And, in particular, the question arises: are they all equivalent to each other? In other words, is it always the same thing that is meant when speaking about the appearances of the Lord in a visible form, or are these phenomena different in nature? This question should be answered in the affirmative in the sense that among them there are various phenomena, heavenly as well as earthly. There were actually two such undeniably heavenly appearances of Christ in glory: the first - to the martyr Stephen, 30 and the second - to the apostle. Paul on the road to Damascus. Regarding the first, Stephen himself testifies that Heaven was opened to him by the action of the Holy Spirit, and he saw the Son of Man at the right hand of God (the Father), that is, the revelation of the Holy Trinity in the light of Glory, the Divine Sophia. Although this phenomenon is concentrated around the image of Jesus as the Son of Man. Doesn’t it remind us of the appearance of Glory to the prophet Ezekiel with “the likeness of a man above him” (1:26), as well as the theophany of the prophet. Isaiah (6, 1–5)? In any case, it cannot be understood as a sensory phenomenon, with bodily eyes, but as a spiritual phenomenon, “by the Holy Spirit.” In this sense, it cannot be brought closer to the earthly appearances of the Lord after the Resurrection. 31 Rather, we have here a theophany rather than a Christophany, just as in the appearance of the Burning Bush (Exodus 3) and the manifestation of the Glory of God to Moses (Exodus 33:18–23; 34:5–35). Isn’t this also where the testimony of St. Paul 32 about “visions” and revelations of the Lord? This is a vital transcendence beyond the boundaries of our world - “whether in the body or outside the body, I don’t know”, in which the possibility of distinguishing our sensory experience is lost, but the field of spiritual science opens up. In relation to these revelations of the transcendental world, the judgments or impressions of the “body” or “flesh” are actually immutable, and the very expressions “saw” ἔκ δεξιῶν τοῦ θεού or θεωρῶ τοὺς; τὸν υΐον τὸυ ἀνθρώπον ἔκ δεξιῶν εστῶτα τοῦ θεοῦ) (Acts 7:55–56) or “heard” (ἤκουσεν ἄρρητα ρήματα) (2 Κορ. 12, 4), of course, sensory seeing and hearing have no meaning, no matter how they are connected with spiritual knowledge and perception. Here the line between one and the other is removed: “whether in the body or outside the body I don’t know.” The cases under consideration, thus, differ from the “appearances” of Christ on earth even after the Resurrection, which still remained earthly and bodily, sensory (“touch Me”). If we have Christophany here, it is a vision of the glorified Christ in Heaven, seen with spiritual eyes. They testify precisely to the glorification of Christ in Heaven, and not to His presence on earth, these “visions and revelations” (ὀπτασίας καί ἀποκαλύψεις κυρίου) (2 Cor. 12:1). Among these visions, a special place is occupied by the calling of St. Paul by the Lord on the way to Damascus (which the newest researcher [architect Cassian] also refers to as the earthly appearances of Christ. 33 The story of this calling is given in Acts 9:3–7 and twice in the speeches of the Apostle Paul himself: Acts 22:6 and 26:13). According to the story, there was no actual appearance of Christ here, but there was an appearance of light (Heavenly Glory, Sophia) and a voice from heaven speaking in the name of Jesus, and the people walking with him heard the voice, but saw no one (9, 7). In his own story. Paul in his Jerusalem speech is the opposite: “But those who were with me saw the light and were afraid, but they did not hear the voice of Him who spoke to me” (22:6). In the speech before Agrippa, the heavenly light is again spoken of, “which shone upon me and those who walked with me” (26:13), but the voice is only said: “and I heard a voice speaking to me in the Hebrew language” (26:14). Thus, the appearance of Christ (in the sense in which the ap. Paul lists the appearances of Christ both to individuals and to “more than 500 brethren”) was not here (although “appearance” in a special sense is included in a number of others, however, by no means exhaustive: there is no appearance to Mary Magdalene and other myrrh-bearers, as well as to the two disciples on the way to Emmaus). The mystical phenomenon of light and the heavenly voice refer to special experiences of spiritual shock, hence the confusion and even external inconsistency in the description of their perception by the companions of the apostle. Pavel. The vision is confined to Christ only by a voice that spoke on behalf of Christ: Jesus, whom you are persecuting” (Acts 9:5). But it was an inner voice without a vision. So, on the one hand, the event on the way to Damascus cannot be placed in the series of earthly appearances of Christ after the Ascension: although it is placed in a different, special meaning, in this series of apostles. Paul, but in the exact sense it does not belong to them. This is a heavenly vision, like the vision of Stephen. Also, Pavlovo’s vision in its meaning and meaning was accessible only to himself, while his companions experienced only a reflected shock. And from here we conclude that the event was purely spiritual, and not the appearance of Christ in the exact sense, similar to how He appeared before the Ascension. 34 A person can have access, by the will of God, to Heavenly vision, which takes him beyond the limits of earthly existence into the supermundane, there is a transcensus into the world of the future vision of God and knowledge of God, which is spoken of in Revelation, ch. 21, 22, “His servants... will see His face” (“God and the Lamb” (22, 4)), and “God will be all in all” (1 Cor. 15, 19). This special heavenly character of the “vision and revelation” on the way to Damascus is further clarified through comparison with other appearances of Christ by the apostle. Paul, so different from him. There are three named in the Acts of the Apostles. First 28:9: “The Lord in a vision - δί οζάμτος - said to Paul at night: “Do not be afraid, but speak and do not be silent, for I am with you, and no one will harm you, because I have many people in this city.” Second 22, 17-21: “When I returned to Jerusalem and prayed in the church, I went into a frenzy and saw Him saying to me (ἐν ἐκστάσει καί ίδετε αύτον λέγοντα μοι): “Hurry and come out of Jerusalem quickly,” and so on. Third 23:11: “The next night the Lord appeared to him and said: Be of good cheer, Paul,” and so on. What happened to the disciple Ananias in Damascus is completely close to this same revelation: “The Lord in a vision said to him: Ananias! He said: Here I am, Lord! The Lord said to him, “Get up and go” (Acts 9:10-11) to Paul. All these appearances of Christ described in the Acts of the Apostles: three apostles. Paul and one Ananias - differ in the same character: they are personal phenomena, accessible through vision and hearing only to those to whom they are addressed, and at the same time they are characterized by concreteness, characteristic of the earthly appearances of the Lord. About them we can say that they differ from the appearances of Christ between the Resurrection and Ascension, they remain above-ground, although not heavenly, like the revelation on the road to Damascus. They are characterized by the character of a kind of mediation between heaven and earth, in which the supermundane is combined with empirical concreteness. It would not be an exaggeration to assert that the appearances of Christ to the saints, which are described in hagiography (appearances of Christ at the Liturgy to St. Seraphim, fire in the chalice to St. Sergius, stories about visions of a slaughtered baby during the celebration of the Eucharist, visions of the stigmata of St. Francis of Asiz, etc.) are distinguished by the same character. They remain accessible only to the chosen ones for whom they are intended, and for them they have a certain specificity, similar to the appearances of the Lord on earth. However, they take place after the Ascension, and therefore the question arises about their dogmatic understanding. For clarity, they should be compared with the Eucharistic presence of the Lord on earth. The Holy Mysteries have, on the one hand, a sensual concreteness of appearance: they are visible, tangible, tasteable, and in this sense we can say that they belong to the things of this world with all others, just as their substance belonged to it: bread and wine, before and beyond their mysterious transformation. But even after it, they retain their graininess and wineiness with all their properties (even to the point of physical change - spoilage 35 - and destruction). And yet the presence of the Lord in the Holy Gifts, praesentia realis, is limited: it is associated with a specific goal - communion, and communication with Him, the perception of His presence is given only through this latter. Of course, the holiness of the Body and Blood radiates from the Holy Gifts, and divine adoration befits them. However, this presence of Christ remains mysterious, and it is not the appearance of Christ. We can say that in the Holy Gifts we contemplate only Holy Communion, the bread of life, but not Christ Himself, as He was seen on earth. And therefore it is an arbitrary exaggeration, not consistent with the institution of the sacrament, that image of the worship of the Body of Christ, which is practiced in Catholic piety (Christus in puride). Based on the correct thought - to profess faith in praesentia realis, that is, the truth of the sacramental transformation, Catholics interpret the Eucharistic presence of Christ as His earthly appearance, completely analogous, if not directly equal, to His presence in the days of His earthly ministry - until the Ascension. Through this, there is opposition to both the dogma of the Ascension, which testifies to the removal of the Lord from earth to heaven, and the dogma of the Eucharistic Translation, which relates to the Sacrament of Communion. The Wisdom of Orthodoxy limits this worship, confining it only to this latter. The Holy Gifts are preserved here for communion, but not for worship, regardless of it. In the Eucharist we do not have the appearance of Christ; He is hidden in it, present, but not appearing. The Lord gave the promise to be with us “all the days until the end of the age,” and St. Paul, for his part, confirms that the “remembrance” of Christ, “proclaiming the death of Christ,” will take place “until He comes” (1 Cor. 11:25-27), - until His second glorious coming. However, this promise does not refer to the earthly appearances of Christ, but speaks only of the sacramental presence of Christ on earth. However, it is wrong to equate the Eucharistic presence of Christ with His appearance. This appearance on earth, which at the same time will be His true presence (praesentia realissime), will take place only when “the Son of Man comes in His Glory” (Matthew 25:31), as was said by the angels at the Ascension: “This Jesus, who has ascended from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him ascending into heaven” (Acts 1:11). And “then all the tribes of the earth will mourn and see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory” (Matthew 24:30). But how can we understand those appearances of Christ that take place between the Ascension and Parousia, starting from the event on the road to Damascus? To put it briefly, here we have not physical phenomena, not spiritual visions: the divine touches of the heart are clothed in visual images, visions. Visions can also be subjective products of the productive ability of the creative imagination. This equally includes both images of artistic creativity, which can achieve subjective persuasiveness for the artist, without however having in themselves the power of reality, and genuine touches of the spiritual world, which are clothed in visual images and thereby translated into the language of physicality. Visions in the latter sense are the fruit of communication with the spiritual world, light or dark. Openness and defenselessness before the dark world is a state of hallucination, earthly inspiration, which plunges into mental illness. The image of vision is created by the human imagination; the spiritual touch is clothed in images. Something else must be said about spiritual visions belonging to the Divine world, its revelations. They are characterized to the highest degree by the reality of the content, which corresponds to the reality of the images themselves, although the latter are characterized by a certain anthropomorphism, apart from which what is revealed would be inaccessible and untranslatable into the language of human perception. Images of visions, as a rule, are not limited to the features of earthly, human concreteness, as we have regarding the appearances of Christ after the Resurrection. Apart from the special image of the appearance, and then hiding from the eyes of the Appearing One, everything here is simple and, one might even say, ordinary: a procession along the way, fishing, a meeting and a conversation. However, all this is different in the appearances of the glorified Christ. Here there are no longer earthly images, but super-earthly or directly heavenly: the appearance of Christ in glory to Stephen, light from heaven and the voice of the apostle from the same place. Paul, and, finally, all the visions to the seer in the Apocalypse: ch. 1, 10–11, ch. 4–6 (throne and Him who sat on it, four six-winged animals, the Lamb opening the book); Ch. 12 (woman clothed with the sun); Ch. XIX (the wedding supper of the Lamb and the war of Him riding on a white horse); Ch. 20Χ-22 (images of the latest achievements). All this, of course, is not the essence of the appearance of Christ, not the vision, or the heavenly world, or the future (“what must soon be”: 1, 1). Here the problem of the Gospel appearances of Christ expands, for it includes the possibility of prophetic theophany, centered in the image of Christ. And what is especially important here is that the spiritual nature of these revelations is directly indicated here. “I was in the spirit - ἐν ύματι (1, 10) on the day of the Lord,” it is said as an introduction to a whole series of visions." And again before the heavenly vision: “And immediately I was in the spirit” (4, 2) “and he carried me up in the spirit to a great and high mountain” (21, 10) to show Jerusalem coming down from Heaven. The prophetic spirituality of theophany was characteristic even of the Old Testament, the appearance of the burning bush to Moses (Exodus 3) and the glory of God to him (34), the theophany of the prophet. Isaiah (chapter 6), and the manifestation of the Glory of God to Ezekiel (chapter 1) and the vision of the prophet. Daniel (7). Humanam sarah divini and theophany are possible through the action of the Holy Spirit, in the gift of prophecy. And if we add to this the manifestation of this gift in direct prophecy, about which it is usually said: “and the word of the Lord came to me,” “the hand of the Lord was on me,” “and the Lord spoke to me,” then we will finally be convinced that man, in the person of his chosen ones, is capable of spiritual manifestation of theophany. The appearance of Christ from heaven after the Ascension should be attributed to this image of the revelation of God. 36 True, the images of these theophany are already connected with the earthly appearance of the incarnate Son of God, but they exceed it, since they relate to Christ in glory. So, there were no appearances of the Risen and Ascended Christ in the exact sense; His glory hides and removes Him from the earth until the time of His Second Coming, which, on the contrary, will take place in glory and will be dyadic, that is, it will be accompanied by the hypostatic appearance of the Holy Spirit. He is this Glory of Christ and He will be revealed in the Hypostasis Image (although this is not incarnation or Incarnation) in the face of the Mother of God, coming along with the Son. On the contrary, the kenotic coexistence and compassion of Christ with His humanity is unknown to Him until the Last Judgment. However, the question is whether it really and always remains hidden for a person, or whether it can become and slowly becomes available to him in a moment of insight that is associated with the deepest suffering. Here we touch upon a certain sacred secret, the dearest and most comforting. We are with Christ in our suffering, as well as in our dying, in grief, as well as on our deathbed. Now, in the days of strange disasters of war, satanic madness, on the battlefields we are not alone, He is with us... And to us, according to His will, it may be given to see this and know this. And this also fits into His promise: “Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age...” Behold, I will sympathize with you in all your sorrow... This is a different vision and knowledge than that given by Christ to the glorified, heavenly signs to the saints. These are parched human lips calling on Christ, opening to meet Him in the acceptance of His Eucharistic coming. This is the voice of blood and water pouring out from His side. And He is not alone with us then, for His presence is inseparably (albeit unmerged) connected with the presence of the “other Comforter” resting on Him and sent by Him, with the consolation of the Holy Spirit. And this presence confirms to us that suffering, since it is the action of an evil force or its consequence (“Satan bound this daughter of Abraham” - Luke 13:16), is not a final evil, for it leads to good. Was the persecution that Satan brought against Christ through his blinded servants evil or immeasurable good? Was Job’s suffering evil, which opened up for him the path to future redemption, as well as any unrequited suffering? Doesn’t it call us to that bliss in suffering, the bliss that Christ teaches to the persecuted and suffering in the Beatitudes? And to the extent that we are imbued with the truth of the presence and closeness of Christ in suffering, it becomes brighter and... more blissful. And when the cry emerges from our hearts: “My God, He has forsaken Me everywhere,” we do not have a feeling of abandonment by Christ even in this God-forsakenness. Here is the mysterious antinomy of the Cross of Christ, in suffering with Christ. This is the secret of Christianity. 37 The measure and fullness of human suffering must be fulfilled in order for the times and seasons of the approach of the Kingdom of God to ripen, which “from the days of John the Baptist until now it has been taken by force - βιάεζται - and those who make the effort delight it with force” (Matthew 11:12) Lk. - “and everyone enters it by force” πας είς αύτη βιάζεται). This thought about the effort that must be carried out for the advent of the Kingdom of God shows us another side of Christ’s presence on earth, namely its significance not only in the personal destinies of each person, but also of all of humanity, in human history, which must take place before voices are heard in the sky: “the kingdom of the world has become (the Kingdom) of our Lord and of His Christ, and will reign forever and ever” (Rev. 11:15) (although even then the story does not end yet, but is already entering the final, decisive phase). This human history is the enthronement of Christ on the cross, which takes place in struggle and suffering. Its different stages are figuratively expressed in Revelation. But only from a certain time, with the onset of its fullness, the hidden-kenotic participation of Christ becomes direct and obvious (Rev. Chapter 19 - the marriage of the Lamb and the appearance of the King of Heaven and His army). And then, with the end of history, comes the transcendental action of God’s omnipotence: the transformation of the world, the general resurrection, the descent of the Heavenly Jerusalem. The kenotic and hidden presence of Christ on earth gives way to the accession in the world of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Rev. 19:16) with the beginning of a new, second zone, which is spoken of only in the prophecy of the apostle. Paul: “Christ for the crown, then Christ’s at His coming. And then the end, when He transfers the Kingdom to God and the Father, when He abolishes all rulership and all authority and power... When He has put all things in subjection, then the Son himself will submit to Him who put all things in subjection to Him, so that God may be all over all” (1 Cor. 15:23–25, 28). This victorious appearance of the Royal Lamb, like this conquest itself, will be the action of the Holy Spirit resting on Him. The Son is Christ, the anointed one of the Holy Spirit, who enthrones the King of Kings, as His Glory, at His coming in Glory. 38 The Revelation of the Holy Grail about Christ suffering together on earth, as well as the Revelation of John about Christ reigning in history, do not contradict each other, but are completely compatible with one another. They refer to the actions and manifestations of the life and power of Christ in different planes and forms. It would not be enough only for the transcendental and sacramental action of Christ to be apart from His proximity to us, immanent in our life. We have been given to live in Christ and with Christ, to do deeds and obediences in history in His Name, to serve Him and work with Him: “go to the whole world and preach the Gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15). More is said here than about preaching the Gospel only to people, but also to all creation, about a universal, world-historical matter. This also contains the commandment about the Holy Grail. Christians are called to become warriors of the Heavenly King in earthly humiliation, heeding the inspiration of both Comforters, giving one Consolation. 39 Hitherto there is no theology of the Holy Grail, and the outpouring of blood and water from the side of Jesus is practically perceived only as an episodic detail of death on the cross. But here there cannot be such episodic details that would not have the deepest meaning, each in its own way. These are the words of the Lord to His Mother and beloved disciple, and “I thirst” for the last bitter taste, and the original “is finished.” And among these details, the outpouring of blood and water is narrated with particular solemnity, as evidence of the continuing bodily, but non-Eucharistic stay of Christ on earth. 40 It does not belong either to the appearances of the Risen or Heavenly Christ, or to the sacramental transformation, in which the earthly nature is united with the Heavenly and is raised to it. No, this is evidence that Christ, both after the Resurrection and in the Ascension, remains with us to remain in earthly temporary existence, in our human activity, in our human history, until the very difference between earthly and heavenly is abolished, and the whole world passes through the fire of mysterious transformation. True, διὰ Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, included in the Russian translation, is only in the Kpl manuscript and is missing in the E. Nestle edition. Stuttgart 1930. P. 493. However, this meaning remains. Wed. Eph. 3:10–11: “the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose, which he fulfilled in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Eph. 3:1). True, we have a well-known reason for assimilating a certain infallibility of a mechanical type (reminiscent of the Roman one), according to the Gospel of John, when applied to Caiaphas specifically as a high priest: 11:49–52, 18:14. “Now He did not speak this on His own, but, being high priest that year, He prophesied that Jesus would die for the people, and not only for the people, but that He might also gather together the scattered children of God.” However, it is quite possible to see here not a manifestation of the general charisma of the high priesthood (moreover, the Old Testament), but a deliberate gift of God, manifested for a given occasion in a given judgment. The interpretation of it as a general and permanent gift of infallibility is contradicted by all the blindness that turned out to be inherent in the high priests when they heard the confession of Christ as the Son of God and the Son of Man, sitting at the right hand of the Father (Matthew 26: 63–65; Mark 14: 60–64; Luke 22:67–67). They answered with cries: He is guilty of death, crucify Him. On the contrary, Catholic theology tends to associate the manifestation of the prophetic ministry of the Church with the “infallible magisterium of the Church” Pohle. Lehrbuch der Dogmatik. Bd. II, 1, 2-es Kar. Prophententhum Christi (forsetzsich in unfehlbaren Lehramt der Kirche), i.e. infaillibile magisterium of the Pope. Thus, prophecy here is subordinated and even absorbed by the priesthood (which was not even the case in the Old Testament, where Moses in his prophetic dignity remains along with the high priesthood of Aaron). See in general “The Comforter”, the corresponding chapters. Real presence (lat.). A. Michel. Jesus Christ (...) Michel says that although Christ, from His birth and even conception, possessed in full all three ministries, he was only later introduced into each of them by the special actions of God. In this sense, Christ in His baptism was introduced into the prophetic and high priestly ministry, and in the resurrection - into the royal ministry. The uniting love of both (Augustine) - (lat.). In Heb. 10:5 verse ps. 39:7 reads not according to the Hebrew text: “You have opened my ears” (obviously for obedience), but according to the LXX, where a certain image of this obedience is indicated - the adoption of a body, incarnation: (He presented the body to me. - Greek) a body He prepared for Me. It is this expanded and somewhat modified interpretation that is authorized by the New Testament letter. "Const. Trident. Seg. (XIII c. XIV), canonas de ss. Eucharistia, can: “in the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist the Body and Blood, together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore the whole Christ, are truly, really and substantially contained.” The opinion is anathematized that... Unigenitum Dei Filium non esse cultolatriae etiam externo adorandum (Canon 6, Euch. 888). Sacram Eucharistiam in sacrario reservari (Canon 7, Euch. 89), cf. commentary on this in nrzb. 2. 1340–1355. St. John of Damascus. An accurate exposition of the Orthodox faith, book. IV, ch. 13. Similar thoughts are also found in St. Gregory of Nyssa, in the Great Catechetical Oration, ch. 37. For an analysis and presentation of the entire set of issues of Eucharistic theology, see my study: “Eucharistic Dogma” (Put, 1930, No. 1–2). Nicholas Cabasilas in the “Exposition of the Divine Liturgy” in ch. 28 poses the question of why we believe in the sacrament, and answers that the Lord gave power to perform the sacrament, and this power is “the Holy Spirit, the power from above resting on the apostles, according to what the Lord said to them: but you sit in the city of Jerusalem until you are clothed with power from above” (Luke 24:49). This is the work of that descent: for having once descended, He will not leave us, but remains with us and will always be. And not only did the Lord send us the Holy Spirit to remain with us, but the Lord Himself promised to be with us until the end of the age. But the Comforter is with us invisibly, because He does not wear a body, and the Lord is both visible and allows Himself to be touched in terrible and sacred mysteries, because He has accepted and carries our nature forever. This idea is developed in detail and abundantly confirmed by the testimony of St. Fathers of the Eastern and Western Churches in L. Thomassinus. Dogmata theologica, T. IV, l. x. ab exortu suo sacerdos fuit Christus, et incarnatio ipsa juge quoddam est sacrificium. The universal character of Christ’s sacrifice is defined by a modern Anglican theologian: “The sacrifice is not the death alone; nor the pleading with the blood alone; nor the offering upon the altar “in haeven”; nor the act of communion alone... It would be equally accurate to call our Lord’s coming into the world and His earthly or the communio feast sacrifice. Each stage is sacrificial. “All together make the One sacrifice” (Hicks. The Fullness of sacrifice, 1930). According to the words of Nicholas Kavasila, “through this transformation the true sacrifice is made, for the bread is not broken in the form of slaughter, but in the slaughter itself, - into the very body of the Lord, sacrificed; since this sacrifice is not accomplished through the slaughter of the Lamb at that time, but through the breaking of bread into the slain Lamb, it is clear that then there is transfiguration, but there is no slaughter” (Op. cit. ch. 32). “If anyone could see the Church of Christ in the very form in which it is united with Christ, then he would see it as nothing other than the body of the Lord.” For this reason, Paul writes: “you are the body of Christ, and individually members” (1 Cor. 12:27) (Cabasil. Op. cit. ch. 38). Hebrews states four times that the slaughter of Calvary was a Sacrifice (7:27; 9:14; 9:28; 10:14). And although twice (7:27; 9:14) it is said that Christ offered Himself, to designate this offering it is also spoken of here as the offering of the Body of Christ (10:5–10), the Blood of Christ (4:9; 9:14), “Who by the Holy Spirit offered Himself blameless to God, will cleanse our conscience” and further. And this is the “Blood of the Covenant” (10:29). This thought is expressed with particular persistence in various forms in the Epistle. to Hebrews up to 9 times: 4:14; 7:27; 9:12, 25, 26, 28; 10:10, 11, 12. This general thought is expressed in a short Eucharistic prayer, secretly said by the priest after pronouncing the establishing words, before the epiclesis: “who remember this saving commandment and everything that happened about us (“His saving suffering” - Liturgy of St. Basil the Great): the Cross, the Sepulcher, the three-day Resurrection, the ascension to Heaven, sitting on the right hand, the Second and glorious coming again,” and further. Paisius, Patriarch of Constantinople (XVII), in his Summary of the Divine Liturgy, gives another version of the Eastern legend about the Holy Grail, which, as we see, differs from the Western one in its explanation of the order of the proskomedia: “because from it (from the “Lamb,” i.e., the Eucharistic bread) the Savior gave forth blood and water, and John, who was present at the same time, Having seen them, he took them (as some write) into one of the vessels that contained bile and ocet, and in them he preserved the Blood of Christ and water - and they are preserved in some places and even to this day, then the Church has St. in the image of that vessel. the chalice into which wine and water are now poured at the beginning of the Liturgy (later, after the consecration (of the Gifts), it becomes the image of the chalice in which the Lord taught His Blood to the disciples" (See: Writings of the Holy Fathers and Teachers of the Church, relating to the interpretations of Orthodox worship. Vol. III. St. Petersburg, 1857, pp. 434–5). The very entry of Christ into the world is connected and paid for with the blood of martyrdom, and above all the infants of Bethlehem, killed by Herod. “Rachel weeps for her children and does not want to be comforted” (Jer. 31:15; Matt. 2:18), but is this crying really not reaching the ears of the Infant of God Himself? And His earthly life is spoken of as a service to suffering humanity, a feat of compassion. He walked through all the cities and villages, “healing every disease and every infirmity among people.” Seeing the crowds of people, “He had compassion on them, because they were exhausted and scattered” (Matthew 9:35–6; 4:23–4). Then he regretted and had compassion, he could shed tears at the grave of Lazarus and listen to the sorrows of the widow of Nain and Jairus, he was a healer and comforter, a doctor of souls and bodies, and after His Ascension and removal from the world, did He remove this pity and compassion from Himself, did He become deaf to this cry of the suffering land? The enthronement of Christ is the subject of the last chapter of The Lamb of God. We refer the reader to this book. The words of the Apostle that he said about himself: “It is not I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Gal. 2:20) apply not only to him, but also to all humanity, to the spiritually chosen, but to all - dynamically, as the overwhelming force of life, in a certain sense, its regularity. The Apostle speaks of the mystery of Christ (Col. 1:27; 11:2), about “the image of the Creator of man, where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all” (3, 10-11), for from the head the whole body, being united and held together by joints and bonds, grows with age God" (2, 19). This thought can also be expressed in the language of Eucharistic theology as the completed transfusion of the blood and water of the Holy Grail into the glorified body and blood of Christ, with which Christ appears in glory on earth. In this His presence in the world, the Holy Grail and the Eucharistic cup are already identified, heaven is united with earth, “God will dwell” (21:3) with His people and all life will be the Last Supper, (nrzb) the cup of the Holy Grail remains in the world the sacred pledge of the new, second coming of Christ! This question will be dogmatically examined in a special study on the work of the architect. Cassiane La Pentecôte Johannique (John 20, 19–23). Here we will not dwell on the particular issues that arise from this. The Lord says to the disciples: “Look at My hands and My feet, it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see Me. " And having said this, He showed them His hands and feet" (Luke 24:39-40). Compare the appearance of the Lord to the disciples, first without Thomas, and then with Thomas, when the Lord once again "showed them His hands (and feet) and His side" (John 20:27). “And when he blessed them, he began to move away from them and ascend into heaven” (Luke 24:50). “He was lifted up before their eyes, and a cloud took Him out of their sight” (Acts 1:9). Stephen, “being filled with the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the Glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of God” (Acts 7:55-56). True, these phenomena are posed by the ap. Paul in a general sense in one series of events: “Christ appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve, then to more than five hundred brethren at one time... then he appeared to James, also to all the apostles, and after all he appeared to me, as to a certain monster” (1 Cor. 15:8). "I know a man in Christ, who was fourteen years ago—whether in the body I don’t know, whether outside the body I don’t know; God knows—he was caught up to the third heaven. And I know about such a man, I don’t know whether in the body or out of the body: God knows that he was caught up into paradise and heard unspeakable verbs, which it is impossible for a man to tell" (2 Cor. 12:1-4). Formal confirmation of this view seems to come from placing this appearance of Christ among other earthly events and His appearances: 1 Cor. 15, 4–8: “...he appeared to James, and also to all the apostles, and after all he appeared to me.” But here the emphasis is not on the same character of the phenomenon itself with others, but on its meaning as the seal of his equal apostleship: “I am the least of the apostles... but by the grace of God I am what I am” (9–10). True, in the speech of Ap. Paul sets out Ananias’ words to him as follows: “The God of our fathers has chosen you so that you might know His will, see the Just One, and hear the voice from His mouth, for you will be a witness before all people of what you have seen and heard” (22:14-15). However, these general expressions - “saw the Righteous One” - spiritually contain the idea of ​​​​the meaning of the vision and revelation given to Paul, and not of its individual specific features. This speaks of his calling to the apostolic ministry, the legitimacy of which is the apostle. Paul makes a deliberate statement here. Therefore, in the Teaching News, in the appendix to the Service Book, a number of instructions are given to the priest regarding various cases, however possible. In general, about the appearances of Christ after His Resurrection, see: N.V. Sweete. The Appearances of our Lord after the Passion. 1915. However, the author limits himself to considering each of them, but refrains from theological interpretation of their meaning. It is not for nothing that suffering with Christ is spoken of in a number of texts that lose their meaning outside the context of the teaching about the Holy Grail. These are the texts: “We always bear in our body the death of the Lord Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are continually being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our mortal flesh, so that death works in us, and life in you” (2 Cor. 4:10-12). “Let no one burden me, for I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus on my body” (Gal. 6:17). “We are heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ, if only we suffer with Him in order to be glorified with Him” (Rom. 8:17). “I have been crucified with Christ; it is not I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal. 2:18-20). What suffering with Jesus is being talked about here? About what death of Him, about what plagues? Is it about what has already been accomplished and has lost the power of being in His Glory? But it is not such ulcers, together with the death of the Lord Jesus, that the apostle bears. Paul in his body, so that through this deadness and wounds he might obtain the life of Jesus in the resurrection. What can be said about the establishment of the Feast of Christ the King in the Roman Catholic Church (December 11, 1925 by Pope Pius XI)? Liturgically, it cannot be timed to coincide with any event in the earthly life of Christ, and it is not for nothing that the Gospel reading included in the service of this day refers to... the question of the Lord by Pilate: Are You a King? (John 18:33–37). The entry of the Lord into Jerusalem seems to be more in keeping with the idea of ​​the holiday, however, this royal entry takes place not for accession to the throne, but for suffering on the cross. The powerlessness to find an appropriate event for this celebration testifies to the falsity of the plan itself, for, although Christ is the King, He did not reign, but only reigns on earth (Rev. 11:15), and this reign is a work of the future, which takes place only at the end of earthly history. The Kingdom of Christ has come in Heaven in His glorification, but on earth we pray only for His coming. The ministry of Christ on earth is kenotic, like bearing a cross. Therefore, if such a celebration can be included in the sequence of the church year, then it should most likely relate to the days of Holy Week or to the day of deliberate worship of the Cross, which in the Orthodox Church is associated with the memory of its acquisition by Queen Helena, and the Exaltation. But for this, the boundaries of this celebration must be expanded, and it must be freed from its exclusive connection with this memory. But it is the cross that is the royal scepter of King Christ, and this holiday can only be kenotic in its meaning. At the Second Coming of King Christ (Matt. 25, 37), His royal sign of St. will appear in heaven. Cross, and He will “sit on the throne.” But, obviously, a liturgical celebration of the coming Last Judgment is impossible, but the memory of this promise is timed to coincide with the Week of Cheese, when this particular Gospel of the Last Judgment is read. Isn’t this what the Apostle is talking about: not only “the whole creation groans and suffers together until now, and not only she, but we ourselves, having the firstfruits of the Spirit (τήν απαρχήν τού πνεύματος), and we groan within ourselves, awaiting adoption, the redemption of our body. For we are saved in hope (τή γάρ έλπίδι) and we wait in patience. Likewise, the Spirit also strengthens us in our weaknesses” (Rom. 8:23-26). But isn’t this also related in its significance to another outpouring from the body of the Savior even in His earthly life, which also remained on earth and sanctified it: “and being in struggle, he prayed more diligently; and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground" (Luke 22:44)?