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It has been 43 years since our translations of the prophecy about the trampling of Jerusalem by Gentiles (see:
Luke 21:24)
have no meaning. In connection with the return of the Holy City under the rule of the Ancient Israel, this world did not end, and in general nothing ended. On the contrary, such great signs began from Heaven
(Luke 21:11)
that it is impossible not to see in them “σημεῖα τῶν καιρῶν”.
If it is unthinkable, impossible πεπλήρωται ὁ καιρὸς
(Mark 1:15)
to translate “the time is over”, then it is just as unacceptable to translate “times will end” in circumstances when life itself dictates the only possible translation: “until the appointed times are fulfilled…”.
In Greek καιρός the Evangelists translated the Hebrew
zman,
a noun of the same root with the verb
zimen,
which, in relation to time, means “to appoint” (See: Shapiro Dictionary).
As for the “signs of the predestined times”, then, according to the Gospel, to recognize them it is enough to be free from such a vice as hypocrisy (see:
Mat 16:3;
Luke 12:56).
Why did the Fathers make a mistake in interpreting
Luke 21:24?
The answer is like this. In this prophecy, the Savior foretold two fates for Jerusalem-city and “St. Cities” — the Church, which in the time of the Antichrist suffers “42-month” trampling by enemies, according to the Apocalypse (see:
Rev 11:2).
This humiliating enslavement is one of the consequences of the defeat of New Testament Israel from the
“seed of the serpent”,
which was predicted by both the prophet Daniel (see:
Dan 7:21)
and the Seer John (see:
Rev 13:7).
Please note that in the vision of the first verses of chapter 11 of Revelation, the New Testament Church is contemplated in the image of the Old Testament temple (with such details as “the altar and the outer court”)
in Jerusalem, trampled down by enemies, whose power extends to the “outer court” of the temple, the place where in Old Testament times people prayed. Does not this vision foretell the re-judgment of Christianity in the time of the Antichrist?
With careful reading of the prophecies about this time, it becomes clear that it is not terrible by the Antichrist, but by the state of the Church (the People of God), which suffers defeat, oppression, exhaustion, mortification and trampling by enemies during this period, i.e. extreme remoteness from that freedom, which is eternally inherent in Jerusalem on high (see:
Gal 4:26).
According to the Apocalypse, at the end of the “42-month” hard times, the very “millennium” that St. Irenaeus of Lyons interpreted as
“the sanctified Seventh Day”,
fiercely hated by the seven-headed and ten-horned dragon, because on this “thousand-year day” its seductive energy is completely paralyzed (see:
Rev 20:1-3).
It becomes clear that in the two-valued prophecy
Luk 21:24
in the subordinate clause “until …” there is also a promise of the “sanctified Seventh Day”, the “Sabbath Day of the People of God” (see:
Heb 4:8-9). And the loss of faith on this “Seventh Day” is predicted in the Apocalypse as the victory of the beast 666 over New Testament Israel (see:
Rev 13:7).
For the name 666 contains a threefold (in accordance with the threefold nature of the septenary time)
denial of the Seventh Day and a threefold affirmation of that Sixth Day, which the Savior called
the time … the power of darkness
(Luke 22:53).
Having blinded the Ancient Israel, headed by its God-established hierarchy, the power of darkness on the Sixth Day plunged them into Christ-murder. The redemptive feat of the promised
Seed of the Woman
inflicted a mortal wound on the head of this power (this
seed of the serpent)
(see:
Gen 3:15). But in the period of “half-week of times” this wound was healed (see:
Rev 13:3). And in the war with New Testament Israel, the power of darkness of the Sixth Day wins (see:
Rev 13:7).
There is only one way to overcome
all the people of God:
to distort the faith that they
unanimously
profess, so that it ceases to be “a shield that quenches
all
the fiery darts of the evil one” (see:
Eph 6:16). To do this, it is necessary to plant in the “land” of his religious consciousness the tares of heresies, the roots of which would go back to patristics.
In my opinion, these heresies are as follows:
-
Defeatist eschatology,
identifying
“the end of this age”
with the end of
“half-week of times.”
-
A paracentric ecclesiology
that allows the People of God to forget that it can become the “House of God”, the “Pillar and Ground of the Truth”, the “irresistible gates of hell” only when its ecclesiological
self-consciousness
is
Mariocentric
to the extent that the Bible is
“Jerusalem centric”.
For only under this condition can the People of God participate in the perfections that are promised to the Church by its Creator and Head, and which since the day of Pentecost have been fully realized in the fully deified person of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God. Forgetfulness of this condition brings down on us the formidable prophetic oaths of the Psalmist: “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand (impotence of work)
forget
her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth;
if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy” (see:
Psa 137:5-6).
The absolute inattention of the Eastern Patriarchs to the guiding ministry of the Mother of God at that historical milestone, which in the prophecy about the trampling of Jerusalem by Gentiles is predicted by the subordinate clause “until …” (see:
Luke 21:24), and which the Fathers of the Church did not recognize, is a clear manifestation of ecclesiological paracentrism.
In Zeytun (this name is the Arabic equivalent of the Greek Eleon), the Mother of God appeared from April 2, 1968 to May 29, 1971. In 1453, from April 2 to May 29, the siege of Constantinople continued. Doesn't this parallel hint at the second, more severe fall of “Tsargrad”?
In these circumstances, the topic of patristic chiliasm, to which the article sent to you is devoted, becomes extremely relevant.[1]
[1]
This refers to the article:
Hegumen Varsonofy (Khaibulin),
On the Chiliasm of the Holy Fathers.
See also
-
Sergij Bulgakov,
The Apocalypse of John
-
Hippolytus of Rome,
TREATISE ON CHRIST AND ANTICHRIST
-
Ιωάννης Χρυσόστομος,
Λόγοι Κατά Ιουδαίων/5
-
Saint John Chrysostom,
HOMILIES ON FIRST THESSALONIANS
[pdf]
-
Saint John Chrysostom,
Adversos Judaeos
[pdf]
-
Серафим (Роуз),
Православие и религия будущего
-
Seraphim Rose,
Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future
-
Blessed Augustine,
The City of God
-
Irenaeus of Lyons,
Against Heresies
-
Metropolitan Macarius,
Orthodox Dogmatic Theology
-
Vladimir Nikolaevich Lossky,
The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church
-
"Vladimir Lossky"
on
Google Books
-
Early Church Fathers
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