The Estuary of Theology 22 

The Book of Revelation and the Twofold Spirituality of the Holy Spirit

The disciples, who were trained directly by Jesus, experienced the life of living with God while they were sharing time with Jesus. They shared the worldview of Jesus, who was divine and human, that is, they shared the worldview of the Kingdom of God. They became accustomed to knowing “God's plan” and equipped with it by being trained by Jesus in the worldview of the Kingdom of God, which was his own. Gradually, they began to separate and distinguish “God's plan” from the information of the “serpent” (accidental information). It was great progress they achieved that the disciples, at the last supper, could say, “Ah, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure! Now we know that you know all things, and need none to question you; by this we believe that you came from God” (John 16:29-30). As Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58), Jesus’ training kept his disciples remain in the knowledge of eternal life of God and enabled them to wait for the descent of the Holy Spirit and to become a community which received the spirituality of the Holy Spirit.

In the Acts of the Apostles, after the descent of the Holy Spirit, we read, “And all who believed were together and had all things in common; and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed them to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2:44-47). On the other hand, many wonders and signs were done through the Apostles, and fear came upon these people (cf. Acts 2:43). Even if it was out of reverence for God, this “fear” prevented neither the incident of Ananias and his wife Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11) nor the trouble between the Hellenists and the Hebrews (Acts 6:1), that arose soon.

As John looked after his community pondering these incidents, he must have come to believe that for all Christians who are connected to the spirituality of the Holy Spirit the worldview of the Kingdom of God with which Jesus had trained his disciples for Pentecost was indispensable. He asked God for it and was given the Book of Revelation. In this way, the worldview of the Kingdom of God, which Jesus had given to his disciples through his training, came back to life in the Revelation.

As we discussed last time, when a trainee reads aloud the Revelation and hears his/her own voice of reading it, the words of it enter his/her senses (the five-sense data) and give him/her the worldview of the Kingdom of God with which Jesus trained his disciples. This training is essentially a solitary exercise. It is because saying something with voice and confirming it hearing our own voice, makes the level of consciousness of our brain rise, and we will become capable of quickly experiencing the worldview of the Kingdom of God hidden in the Book of Revelation.

In this way, we can experience the world of Jesus’ training, which the disciples experienced, and acquire a sense of it. What is important in this exercise is to listen carefully to and concentrate on our own voice as we recite. We must not try to imagine or understand the scene, lest our knowledge of good and evil may create a fiction (cf. The Estuary of Theology issue 18, 21) and do some discernment. Jesus’ parents, as well as his disciples, had the experience of “not understanding” even being with him (cf. Luke 2:50, 9:45, 18:34). The Revelation washes the feet of the trainees, just as Jesus did on the night he was betrayed (cf. John 13:1-15). Then, Jesus said to Peter: “What I am doing you do not know now, but afterward you will understand” (John 13:7).

Jesus made all the preparations so that “afterward you will understand.” Jesus, the Word of God, who created man as well as created the knowledge of good and evil and the senses (the five-sense data), knew every detail of the structure of the human brain. So, Jesus, who had come with the whole “God’s plan”, became the Kingdom of God itself and trained his disciples. The incident that happened when Jesus met the disciples of John the Baptist who were following him clearly illustrates his intentions. He showed the worldview of the Kingdom of God to the disciples of John the Baptist, who already had an image of the Messiah according to Jewish tradition and decisively wanted the Messiah to come; that is, he made them experience the worldview of the Kingdom of God, about which they already had the knowledge.

“Jesus turned, and saw them following, and said to them, ‘What do you seek?’ And they said to him, ‘Rabbi’ (which means Teacher), ‘where are you staying?’ He said to them, ‘Come and see.’ They came and saw where he was staying; and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour. One of the two who heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. He first found his brother Simon, and said to him, ‘We have found the Messiah’ (which means Christ). He brought him to Jesus” (John 1:38-42).

Thus, for Christians to decide to begin the training of reciting and hearing the Book of Revelation, their knowledge of good and evil must judge that this training is valid. For this reason, we have tried to interpret the Revelation in the last two issues, so that the Christians may be convinced that it is rigidly connected with the Gospel and is worth reposing absolute trust in being committed to it. This trust enables them to fully share in Jesus’ worldview of the Kingdom of God and becomes the basis for them to receive the twofold spirituality of the Holy Spirit.

The fact that Jesus made all the preparations for the disciples so that “afterward you will understand” means that he prepared everything for the Holy Spirit who was to descend. So, the Holy Spirit fulfilled the word of Jesus: “He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (John 16:14). The Holy Spirit brought his space there (the first spirituality), as it is written in the Acts of the Apostles: “And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting” (Acts 2:2). He also connected himself with the disciples who were all together in one place (the second spirituality) as it is written: “And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them” (Acts 2,3). The Holy Spirit gave glory to the risen Jesus by fulfilling his last words which he had spoken on earth, through the disciples, who had partaken in this twofold spirituality, in the way as follows.

The Holy Spirit descended, connected himself with the disciples whom Jesus had trained, and gathered in the space which he had brought about a great multitude of “devout men from every nation under heaven” living in Jerusalem, who had heard the sound. The disciples began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance, and every one of those who had gathered heard the mighty works of God being spoken in the language of his own country (cf. Acts 2:1-12). This was a sign that the following commands of risen Jesus’ had already been fulfilled: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19) and “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15).

Then Peter, standing with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them, “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this which you see and hear” (Acts 2:32-33). This first testimony by Peter in Jerusalem corresponds to the following word of risen Jesus: “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things” (Luke 24:46-48).

“So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls. And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers” (Acts 2:41-42). What is described in this statement is the fulfilment of the following word of risen Jesus: “Go… baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20).

This space, brought about by the Holy Spirit, appears clearly in the liturgy of the Mass. This is because this space, where the Mass is celebrated, is identical to the large upper room where Jesus had the last supper with his disciples and where he instituted the Eucharist, and at the same time, because of the continuation of time, it is connected to the upper room where “Mary the mother of Jesus”, the Apostles and the other disciples prayed together waiting for the Holy Spirit (cf. Acts 1:13-14). This space continues to expand as a place where Christians who have been baptized in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and have joined the community are always accepted, and this space itself forms the Christians in it. This is the first spirituality of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Eucharist is the visible sign of the fact that the Body and Blood of Jesus, the Word who became man, and the will of the Holy Spirit, who makes the Word recognition, are united into one with the will of the Father, that is, with “God’s plan,” in cooperation with the priest. The worldview of the Kingdom of God given by Jesus through the training of the Book of Revelation makes Christians aware that this space, where the Eucharist is placed, is open to the Second Coming of Christ.

The knowledge of good and evil of a person, when it gets connected with the “tongues as of fire” in the presence of the Eucharist, experiences darkness in which both the information of God and the information of the self become void as if it has been connected with a bundle of light. This very darkness of no-information is the sign of the fact that he/she has been connected with the “tongues as of fire.” This is the second spirituality of the Holy Spirit. This experience makes the meaning of the following word of Jesus clear: “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).

Relying on Jesus’ word, “I will give you rest,” Christians come before the Eucharist. Then, many of those who have received grace there say, “I was invigorated by the Eucharist.” But there is a narrow gate ahead for one who wants to go further. He/she will sit up straight before the Eucharist with a clear consciousness of its presence and with an indication of the intention to participate in its formation of his/her own accord. This trainee takes the following invitation of the Lord literally: “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart,” and concentrates on the Eucharist in an attempt to be connected with the Lord’s “yoke.” The Eucharist is the gate. He/she is the one who voluntarily stepped forward to find the hard way of which Jesus said, “Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few” (Matthew 7:13-14).

In the darkness of no-information of God, any knowledge of “God’s plan” that he/she may have had will become unrecognizable as if it has been swallowed up by this light. In the state in which he/she has no information about God despite having been connected to the light, he/she, when not used to it, will become uneasy and undo the connection quickly getting out of the darkness of no-information of God. However, the memory of the knowledge of “God’s plan”, which was gained while he/she was being directly connected with the spirituality of the Holy Spirit, even if its time was truly short, remains in his/her memory of the knowledge of good and evil, and its contents will be played back whenever the Holy Spirit wants. Sometimes they are played back on the spot, and sometimes after a time. Then he/she will be filled with the spirituality of the Holy Spirit and will realize that he/she has seen “God's plan” in the darkness of no-information of God.

As he/she becomes accustomed to the darkness of no-information of God, he/she begins to concentrate more and more on the Eucharist. The power of the Eucharist, which has the plan of the Cross built-in, greatly helps him/her to concentrate on it. It is the drawing power of Jesus, which on the Cross became one with the power of the Father. When he/she, keeping consciousness of this drawing power of the Eucharist, regulates his/her breathing to be as peaceful and regular as in sleep, he/she will find him/herself becoming calm and quietly lowered. His/her knowledge of good and evil will try to bring him/her into balance with the Eucharist, as he/she faces it. This means that it will adjust him/her to the humanity of Jesus at the time when he said, “for I am gentle and lowly in heart.” In the meantime, he/she will experience the darkness in which he/she has no information even about him/herself. This simultaneous experience of the twofold darkness of no-information of God and self, even if it may last only for a moment, is a prerequisite for receiving the next moment of bearing Jesus’ spirit, the union of the will of the Holy Spirit and the Word. The burden about which Jesus said, “my burden is light,” was indeed the spirit of Jesus.

To be continued.

Jan. 2021 in Hiroshima

Maria K