NOTES for Rev 1:10

The Revelation is given to John when, during the persecution of Christians, he had been exiled to the island of Patmos. This was in the first decades of Christianity, yet even in this text we find mention that for those who believed in Christ, the day of resurrection had become the Sabbath day, that is, the day devoted to God. The Messiah appears before the apostle as the High Priest, the Intercessor for the world, and the Judge who is to come, clothed in a long robe—the vestment of a priest—and girded with a golden sash symbolizing royal dignity. The keys of Hades and Death, and therefore power over them, are now in the hands of Christ, who passed through death and became for us the source of life.

The revelation received by John begins with a meeting, a meeting with the risen Christ. According to the apostle's testimony, it happened on the "Lord's day" (in the Synodal translation, "Lord's day" became "Sunday"). It is hard to say exactly what kind of day this was: the phrase could refer both to the day of the Savior's resurrection and to certain traditional Yahwist feasts. But whatever feast was meant, in any case the day of the Lord was understood by the faithful as a day of God's direct intervention in the events taking place, as a day of theophany, and therefore, on the one hand, of Judgment, and on the other, of the visible and obvious triumph of God. For John, this day is revealed as the day of the triumph of the Messiah who rose from the dead.

Moreover, the Messiah appears before him just as He once appeared on the Mount of Transfiguration: clothed in shining garments, at least one of which, the long robe, has a direct relation to the Levitical priestly vestment. Christ clearly appears before the apostle first of all as the High Priest, as the High Priest who sanctifies the world. And this is no surprise: when the Kingdom enters the world, it first of all sanctifies it, and does so in all the fullness possible for creation.

Even before Christ's coming, sanctification had been the main goal of believing Yahwists. For its sake they came to the altar, for its sake they offered sacrifices and took part in sacrificial meals, for its sake they kept spiritual, moral, and ritual purity. But then, before Christ's coming, sanctification could only be temporary and incomplete. People changed when they approached the altar, and the world around them changed too, but only for a time; then, returning to ordinary, everyday life, they again became what they had been before. And the world was transformed only around the altar, around the Tabernacle, around the Temple. Now, however, the age has begun of the complete transformation of both the human person and the world as a whole.

A transformation capable of changing nature itself, returning it to the fullness proper to the world on the first day of creation, when evil did not yet have power over it. And then moving further, according to the plan God has in mind when He creates the world. For He has a certain plan connected with the future of His creation, and it is not at all like the future that fallen humanity is able to secure for itself. And now the King of God's Kingdom, appointed by God, appears before John, ready to act.

John describes his state at the beginning of the revelation and of his encounter with the Risen One with the words, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day" (v. 10; in the Synodal translation, "on the day of resurrection"). It is hard to say exactly whether this refers to the Sabbath day, or to Sunday, as the Synodal translation interprets it, or to one of the feast days traditional in the Judeo-Christian tradition. The only thing that is clear is that it was not an ordinary weekday.

The expression "to be in the Spirit" is traditionally used (from the time of the early prophets) to designate a special kind of ecstatic state, when God's nearness is experienced directly, when a person senses His presence like a gust of wind rushing in from outside, or like a mighty breath entering within and merging with his own breathing. At the same time John, as we see, hears the voice of the Risen One, who calls Himself "the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last," and commands him to write down what he has seen and send it (clearly for reading and study) to the churches of Asia Minor, with which the apostle's ministry was chiefly connected (vv. 10-11).

Turning around, John sees the risen Savior and recognizes Him, though He looks nothing like He did during those forty days after the resurrection, when He associated with the disciples and when John had to see Him for the last time. Now His appearance recalls not the first days after the Resurrection, but the Transfiguration: this is how Peter, James, and John saw Him on Mount Tabor, shining with the light of transfigured humanity (vv. 12-15; cf. Matt 17:1-2). Such a transformation is clearly not accidental: immediately after the Resurrection the history of the Kingdom had not yet begun, and the Savior Himself had not yet taken His place in it. But now, after the Ascension and Pentecost, the Kingdom has entered the world, and Jesus appears before His apostle already as its head, set by His heavenly Father in the place that He prepared for His Son before the creation of the world. As for the Church, its task in our world, which is being transfigured but has not yet been transfigured to the end, is to sanctify this world just as, before the coming of Christ, it was sanctified by that presence of God with which God blessed His people. Now this role has been given to the Church, which, according to God's design carried out by the Messiah He sent, is to become the living expression and embodiment of the Kingdom opened to the world so that everyone who seeks may share in it.

That is why John sees Jesus dressed in a long priestly robe, against the background of the menorah (the sacred seven-branched lampstand that stood in the Temple, after whose pattern the special lamps still used in synagogues are made). And just as the light of the menorah symbolizes the radiance of God's presence, in John's vision the light of the menorah, against which Jesus appears before the apostle, symbolizes the light of the new life with which the Risen One shines and with which the life of the Church, sanctifying the world, must be permeated. But, as we see, things are not so simple with specific church communities, and through His apostle Jesus conveys to them something important for their spiritual life and witness (vv. 17-20).