The Book of Revelation: A Spiritual/Mystical Reading. Talk at St Bride's 21st July 2013 by Jon Jelfs
The Book of Revelation: a spiritual/mystical reading
INTRODUCTION The Book of Revelation has been interpreted in many ways. It is like a canvas on which we can paint our own meaning. Its fantastical images and events are capable of bearing own worst fears or our greatest hopes and dreams for the future.
Today we are considering the Book of Revelation as a spiritual or mystical text: one that may contain some deep truths or insights. Let’s start with a poem:
For Once, Then, Something
BY ROBERT FROST
Others taunt me with having knelt at well-curbs Always wrong to the light, so never seeing Deeper down in the well than where the water Gives me back in a shining surface picture Me myself in the summer heaven godlike Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs. Once, when trying with chin against a well-curb, I discerned, as I thought, beyond the picture, Through the picture, a something white, uncertain, Something more of the depths—and then I lost it. Water came to rebuke the too clear water. One drop fell from a fern, and lo, a ripple Shook whatever it was lay there at bottom, Blurred it, blotted it out. What was that whiteness? Truth? A pebble of quartz? For once, then, something.
Reading a text like Revelation can be a bit like looking into the well: it is natural to see ourselves and our own times in the text, interpreting the symbols and events as relating to us. And maybe that’s no bad thing if it leads to helpful and necessary action, if it encourages us towards being the change that we want to see in the world. The danger is that we do no such thing, reading the text as an observer of history with no intention of contributing to any solutions at all. That certainly was the case with me being brought up with an historicist reading of Revelation where it was enough to read the signs of the times as a passive observer. That’s like a superficial reading of the text, as the poem says:
“Gives me back in a shining surface picture Me myself in the summer heaven godlike”.
Such a reading allows us to remain apart, aloof, even complicit in apocalypse.
But is it possible to ‘look deeper into the well’ to ask “what is that ‘whiteness’, truth, a pebble of quartz? Within Revelation. I think so.
IN THE SPIRIT It is important to remember that Revelation (according to the writer) is a mystical text, an unfolding of words and visions heard and seen “in the Spirit”. And perhaps we should remind ourselves that this ‘Spirit zone experience’ has always been a part of Judaism and Christianity and perhaps a necessary part to “to see deeper into the well”? Mystical experiences were part of Jesus own life –remember his experiences at his baptism (when he saw the heavens opening and a dove descending and resting on him); his vision quest in the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights; his ability to perceive truth about Nathaniel or the woman at the well, for example; his healing miracles; his transfiguration. Jesus appeared to live his life ‘in the Spirit’.
If Revelation is a mystical text born of an experience ‘in the Spirit’ it is important thing to be aware that we interpret mystical states of consciousness, spirit zone experiences, according to our worldview. So for example, John at Patmos may interpret the violent chaos of his visions as an expression of the wrath of God. If we had such a vision we might interpret those events as the natural consequences of human environmental devastation, population explosion, terrorism, nuclear proliferation, and materialistic exploitation of each other and the earth. States of consciousness are interpreted by our worldview.
Revelation has often been interpreted in terms of outer events, political and otherwise. Of course there are always inner dimensions to outer events: the things that we do reflect our inner spiritual and psychological development. It is possible to read the Book of Revelation in an inner way. One of the examples of this way of interpreting is that of Edgar Cayce, a devout protestant Christian (1887-1945) who became known by some as a prophet, mystic and seer. Some regard him as the early founder of the New Age Movement. He offered an interpretation of Revelation that saw the whole book as the unfolding story of the journey of humanity to a higher consciousness and ultimately to union with God. Instead of outer events he saw inner transformations.
So for example, he saw the opening of the 7 seals as equating to the opening of the 7 energy centres of the body, the 7 chakras. As each spiritual centre is activated, various internal apocalyptic upheavals can occur as part of a purification process - mental, physical, and spiritual - the upheavals described symbolically in the seven seals.
The woman giving birth to a child (Rev 12) is seen as the birth of the consciousness and what he calls the ‘higher conscious mind’.
The dragon who wants to devour the child (the higher self) is the ego-self who wants to stay in self-centred ego-gratification mode.
Babylon is the symbol of the lust for power and material wealth at the expense of others, that which undermines the development of Christ consciousness and therefore delays equality, inclusivity, peace and harmony.
UNVEILING So much for Edgar Cayce and his mystical interpretation, but I want to take the conversation in another direction drawing on the insights of Rene Girard and others.
Revelation comes across as a violent book and because of that we often find it difficult to read. We recoil from the horror of it and especially the idea that this violence is the violence of God or of Jesus. The word Revelation or apocalypse means disclosure or unveiling – what is it that is being unveiled? The work of Rene Girard and others suggests that what is being unveiled is the role of violence in human history and the way in which violence is overcome through Christ. Veiled violence is violence which appears to be acceptable, necessary, justifiable from a political or from a religious point of view.
Veiled violence allows capital punishment, justifies hidden torture to gain information, supports secret drone strikes to take out enemies, and tolerates the killing of innocents in so-called just wars. The list of veiled violence could go on and on.
Violence unveiled is apocalyptic – it is disclosed for what it is and brought into the light. It can no longer be justified because we know that it cannot be sufficiently distinguished from violence it is there to oppose. Violence and killing begets violence and killing in an ever escalating cycle of the suffering of innocents. When violence is veiled it is justified by religion or politics with the delusion that it has purpose and is necessary. When violence is unveiled it is seen for what it is and we can “why is this killing necessary, how does it differ from the killing it is meant to stop?”
The gift of Judaeo-Christian spirituality to the world (among other things) is the disclosure of the role of violence in the way that we create human culture, and the means to its transformation. We are called to a conversion of the human heart that dispenses with violence through the confidence that comes from the resurrection which confirms that God is on the side of the victim and that non-violent love will ultimately prevail. This is coupled with the indwelling life and Spirit of God (however different traditions name that) that enables this ongoing conversion.
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ROLE OF JESUS IN HUMAN HISTORY AND EVOLUTION. The Book of Revelation highlights the anthropological role of Jesus in human history and evolution. The passage that we sang, Rev 5:2 “Who is worthy to open the book or scroll and break it’s seals?” suggests that Jesus, the Lamb of God, holds the key to human history, opening its seals to reveal its purpose and meaning. Jesus as the Lamb of God is the central figure of Revelation and is the one who has both embodied and enabled humanity’s necessary shift to a new way of relating to one another through love and non-violence.
As Christians we often fail to realise the pivotal role of Jesus in human history, from an anthropological point of view. The whole of the Biblical story, culminating in the death and resurrection of Jesus, is the gradual and progressive unveiling of the injustice of creating victims through violence of any sort. It has been working slowly like salt or leaven through 2000 years so that today society goes to great and increasing lengths on behalf of victims. Victims have steadily become visible as never before, flowing as a direct but hidden consequence of Jesus – his teaching, death and resurrection. But there can also be a paradoxical increase in violence. We now have the excuse to go to war on behalf of victims – as we have witnessed in our own lifetimes (Iraq, Afghanistan) – so creating more victims and the motivation for more violence.
The violence is overcome by the lamb. What are we to make of the phrase in Revelation “the wrath of the lamb”? The idea of a lamb be wrathful is unlikely if not ridiculous. Perhaps what we have in this phrase is an ironic undermining of the whole idea of a violent, wrathful God. The wrath of the lamb is a different kind of wrath – one that causes the withering of opposition in the face of immensity of the love offered.
Revelation 19 which we read has Jesus riding into battle on a white horse with a sword coming out of his mouth. The cry goes out “Come, gather together for the great supper of God”. The sword coming out of the mouth is the non-violent wrath of Jesus – the passion for peace and justice in the earth that is as incisive as a sword but which is the creative love of the Word of God, symbolically coming from the mouth. The great supper of God on the surface looks like a horrendous orgy of violence. But looking deeper into the well we see there the bread and the wine, “this is my body, this is my blood” and the dawning realisation comes to us that this is violence subverted: love and truth and peace.
It interest me that we are living at a time of great unveiling. So much continues to come to light about the hidden workings of our societies. We know so much more now about corrupt practices in politics, banking, corporate life, the media and so on. The unveiling continues – it is becoming harder to hide violence in all its forms that has shaped our culture. I want to give two recent examples.
Quote from Observe last Sunday, From Dr Gino Strada. The unveiling of violence…..
Another example: Don McCullin, photographer.
THE RELEVANCE OF REVELATION TODAY? There is a sense in which the violent imagery of revelation is more relevant today than ever before. We do appear to live in extraordinary times. Let me quote Rene Gerard: “Two world wars, the invention of the atomic bomb, several genocides and an imminent ecological disaster have not sufficed to convince humanity, and Christians above all, that the apocalyptic texts might not be predictions but certainly do concern the disaster that is underway. What needs to be done to get them a hearing? …..Today violence has been unleashed across the whole world, creating what the apocalyptic texts predicted: confusion between disasters caused by nature and those caused by humans, between the natural and the man-made: global warming and rising waters are no longer metaphors today….reality is beginning to resemble a truth that was not invented, since it was described 2000 years ago. Rene Girard describes what he calls the incredible paradox, the tendency to extremes, that the teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus has provoked violence at the same time as revealing love.
When violence is unveiled, seen for what it is there is a tendency to extremes. There is the leaven of love and compassion which slowly and steadily infiltrates society changing hearts and minds and ultimately leading to peace and harmony. But at the same time the dawning realisation that it is wrong to create victims unleashes wars on behalf of victims and can create further cycles of violence.
We live with a delicate balance which is a threshold. We can cross the threshold away from violence towards the way of love, compassion and mutuality – to create a new humanity through a cultural evolutionary shift. Or we can step across the threshold into the abyss portrayed in Revelation and the choice is ours. It’s not predetermined, everything is in the balance. We are the co-creators of the future. There is a progressive unveiling going on, it’s in the media every day. Things that were previously hidden are coming to light. The birth of a new way of being human is possible, as is destruction of nature and each other.
Revelation offers an invitation. Rev 22:16 “I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give youthis testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star.” The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let the one who hears say, “Come!” Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life.
The invitation is to turn from violence that leads to death to the water that leads to life.