Main news for 16 November 2020

King James Version (en)

Revelations, Chapter 22, verse 5

⁵ The light of the city of God is himself

⁵And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever.

NOTES

The heavenly Jerusalem is shown to the apostle in a vision in considerable detail. And at the foundation of its architectural dimensions lies the number twelve, a number, of course, symbolic, connected both with the fullness of the people of God, consisting of twelve tribes, and with the fullness of the messianic community, consisting of twelve apostles.

The fullness of the Church is shown to John as the unity of the fullness of the people of God and the fullness of the messianic apostolic community that grew out of it. There can be no doubt that the heavenly Jerusalem is an image of the heavenly Church: it is called "the bride of the Lamb," and in the New Testament books this is precisely what the Church of Christ is called. The precious stones mentioned in the book, with which the foundation of the city is adorned, are the same sacred stones used to adorn the Tabernacle: thus the whole city is revealed to the apostle as one great sanctuary.

The river of living water mentioned in the book recalls Ezekiel's vision, in which he sees this river flowing from under the foundation of the Temple; in John's vision it flows through the city, sanctifying it and giving it life. The trees along the riverbanks are the same as in Ezekiel's vision. There is no uncleanness, "nothing accursed," in the city: the Kingdom and abiding in it are incompatible with any evil and any sin.

But purification and transfiguration are possible for everyone who wants them, and only those who are "devoted to abomination and falsehood," who have chosen them and do not want to part with them, remain outside the Kingdom. As for the Temple, the sanctuary, there is no sanctuary in the earthly sense in the Kingdom; it is not needed there. The sanctuary of the Kingdom is that very Throne of glory which some saw in the Temple during worship as if from afar and through a barrier. Now there is no barrier, and the Throne of glory as the spiritual center of the Kingdom is open to everyone. In this way, in the form of the Throne, the point in creation where God's will meets the world created by God, determining its being, is revealed to the inhabitants of the Kingdom.

This point is the spiritual center not only of the Kingdom, but of the whole universe. And the King of God's Kingdom becomes the Messiah risen from the dead - now, at last, no longer hidden, but manifest to everyone. And the light of the heavenly Jerusalem is not the physical light of the untransformed world, but the light of God's presence, the very light that permeated the world on the first day of creation. The world regains the fullness of being and is transfigured by the breath of the Kingdom, which has become the center and meaning of its existence.

God's presence in the yahvism revealed itself very often to the people of God and its particular representatives as the light or as the halo. The shining cloud indicated the place of God's presence already in the time of Moses, who saw it at Horeb, where he met for the first time with the God of his fathers. Moses from far took this halo for fire, but, having approached closer, he understood that he made a mistake: the real fire would have burned the bush, on which the cloud came down in no time. And later this shining cloud was seen over the Tabernacle, in the Holy of Holies of the Temple of Jerusalem, saw seen leaving the Temple, where there was already no more a place for God (as it was revealed in the vision of Ezekiel), was seen on the Ascension Day (exactly in such a shining cloud Jesus disappear from the eyes of His affected disciples).

And in the poem on the creation, in the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, in the description of the first day of the creation, is mentioned the world created this day by God, quite flooded with the light, penetrated by the halo of God's presence. It is not surprising that there is not a place for the darkness in this world shining by the light of God: God separates the light from darkness, putting the difference between light and darkness.

And here is, afterward, when the chaos will penetrate into the world, and God will stand the forces, which led this chaos into the world, afterward, when the creation of God will become such or almost such, as it will appear to us, day and night, the light and the darkness begin to alternate in the world. And it will be like that until its total transformation, until the day, when its nature itself will change qualitatively. Of course, it will not change by itself, it is God Who changes it with His breath, this breath of the Kingdom, that penetrated the world the day of the Pentecost. And when it will take place, the world will be penetrated again by the light of God's presence, as in the first day.

So the world becomes the Kingdom: because the Kingdom of God is not the world, where God hides behind the veil of nature, but the world, where He is seen from anywhere, seen clearly and distinctly. And the halo is only the consequence of this proximity. Without it there is no Kingdom, quite as there is no Kingdom without the breath of God penetrating into the Kingdom till the very limits. Because it is in particular it that gives to the Kingdom and light, and life. Beyond its limits, we have only what the Savior calls the external darkness.

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