Happy New Year! A
near year in the Church’s liturgical calendar has just begun with the First
Sunday of Advent!
The first Sunday of Advent, marks the beginning of a
liturgical year! This year is the Year B, in the three-year cycle of the
Catholic Church’s liturgical calendar.
The liturgical calendar has a 3-year cycle, consisted of
Year A, Year B, and Year C, reflecting the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and
Luke). During Year A, we primarily read Matthew’s Gospel for Sundays. Mark’s
Gospel for Sundays during Year B, and Luke’s Gospel for Sundays during Year
C. John’s Gospel is read on certain
Sundays across these years.
****
“Advent” means “coming”.
The world is derived from Latin word, “adventus”, and consisted of “ad”
(to) and “venire” (to come). It is
usually associated with the coming or arriving with importance. Obviously, in the Christian context, it is
the first coming and arriving of the Messiah. The second coming of the Messiah,
as the King of the Universe, at the end of time, is Parousia, which is a Greek word, meaning “presence”, consisted of “para” (beside) and “ousia” (essence of being). But, we tend to associate this time of
coming with a time of waiting and longing. It depends on which side we focus on. If we
focus on the one, who is coming, then, Advent sure is a time of coming. On the other hand, if our focus is on
ourselves, then, it is a time of waiting for the one, who is coming.
 |
| Advent Candles in the Advent Wreath : 1. Prophecy Candle - Candle of Hope, 2. Bethlehem Candle - Candle of Preparation, 3. Shepherd Candle- Candle of Joy for Gaudete Sunday, 4. Angel Candle- Candle of Peace. On Christmas Eve, a white candle will be placed in the middle and be lighted. This is the Christ Candle - the candle of purity, keeping the vigil for the coming (advent) of Christ, the Messiah. |
In the liturgical calendar of the Church, a liturgical year
begins with the First Sunday of Advent. As
this Sunday was the First Sunday of Advent, this week is the first week of this
liturgical year. It means that we have
begun this liturgical year with our waiting and longing for the coming (advent)
of the Messiah.
In fact, this sets the tone for the whole liturgical year,
which reflects how we are to prepare for the return of Christ, parousia, reflecting a lesson from the
time our ancestors in faith had waited and prepared for the coming of the
Messiah on earth, the Advent, as we follow the life of the Messiah, the Christ,
Jesus, throughout the liturgical year.
Toward the end of the last liturgical year, which ended with
last Saturday, the Saturday of the week of Christ the King of the Universe
Sunday, Sunday Gospel readings for the last two Sundays zoomed in on the end of
time and Parousia, which means the
return of Christ as the King of all kings, the King of the Universe, to fulfill
the prophecy in the Book of Revelation. It is also the ultimate redemption of
the Garden of Eden, which was lost with the Original Sin, committed by Adam and
Eve. But, this redemption will come as the Kingdom of God, which Jesus, who is
the Good Shepherd, leads us to. A
glimpse of the redeemed Eden, the Kingdom, is not only envisioned in Revelation
22, as our ultimate destiny that Christ leads to, but also glimpsed in
juxtaposition to the post-exilic restoration of Jerusalem (i.e. Ezekiel 47 and
Isaiah 35).
***
During the time of Old Testament, the Jews began waiting for
the coming of the Messiah to redeem what their ancestors have lost as
consequences of their sins against God. Ultimately, it is the Garden of
Eden. After being evicted from Eden,
they also lost their kingdom for good in 70 A.D., in less than 50 years after
the death of Jesus.
Advent hope for the Messiah’s coming means that we have not
lost our faith in God, whom we firmly believe to send the Messiah to redeem
what our ancestors have lost. Thus, Advent is a time to renew our trust in God,
who delivered their ancestors from the 400 years of Egyptian oppression into
the land of milk and honey. And, this hope for the Messiah’s coming was
projected into God’s deliverance of the Jewish captives exiled in Babylonia. The
context of Advent is traced back to this Old Testament historical background.
Advent is a season that is often associated with waiting
with hope. In this context, waiting is
an active preparation for the coming of the Lord as the Messiah.
In fact, the Lord has come already, as the Word became flesh
(John 1:14), for God loved the world and gave His only Son to us (John 3:16).
The Lord, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, came to this world through
the Holy Spirit that impregnated the immaculate Mary (Matthew 1:18).
About 700 years before the birth of Jesus, the Advent was prophesized at
least way back during the time of Prophet Isaiah (7:14), when Jews were living
in the divided kingdoms – northern kingdom, called Israel, led by the tribe of
Ephraim, and southern kingdom, called Judah, led by the
tribe of Judah. Samaria was the capitol of Israel, while Jerusalem was the
capitol of Judah. Rather than making
efforts to reunite their divided kingdoms, the descendants of Jacob, the
Israelites, the Jews, further antagonized each other, even to a point of Israel
attempted to conquer their southern brothers, Judah, by making military alliance
with Syria. In response, Judah established a military alliance with
Assyria. The divided offspring of
patriarch Jacob, the man God called Israel (Genesis 32:30), the northern 10 (Asher, Dan, Gad, Issachar, Joseph (Ephraim and Manasseh),
Naphtali, Reuben, Simeon, and Zebulun) against the southern 2 (Judah and
Benjamin), drove themselves to a point of mutual destruction, as each sided
with foreign nations to fight against each other. It was when God commissioned
Isaiah to prophesize in the hope that these divided offspring of Jacob would
reconcile and reunite.
***
To better understand the historical context of the prophecy
of Advent, the coming of the Messiah through the virgin birth, it is helpful to
go back to the time when the Israelites began to have their own kingdom, the
time of the Judge Samuel.
During the period of judges, the Israelites demanded God to
let them form their own kingdom, just like Assyria and Egypt (1 Samuel 8:1-22).
God was not in favor of it, preferred that they would rather continue to live
as confederate tribes, as their ancestors had maintained nomadic life. But, He
gave them a chance for them to unite themselves under their own king.
So, Judge Samuel was commissioned by God to anoint Saul as
the first king of the Israelites. However, Saul proved to be incompetent to
lead the Israelites as their king. Then, God led Samuel to anoint David to
replace Saul and as the second king of the Israel.
David, who draws the lineage of Patriarch Abraham, its 14th
generation, shaped the Jewish kingdom. During his reign, the kingdom rose,
though David struggled in fighting Israel’s neighboring enemy nations, with his
own sins (conspiring to murder Uriah and committing adultery with his wife,
Bathsheba), and with betrayal of his son, Absalom. The success of David is
attributed to his faithfulness to God.
As he wrote in Psalm 23, David always trusted God as his shepherd and
rod, personally and administratively.
David was succeeded by his son, Solomon. Blessed with unsurpassed wisdom, the third
king, Solomon, further raised the power of the kingdom. During his reign, the kingdom’s glory was in
its peak, commanding respects from other nations. Solomon enjoyed tributes from
these nations, amassing the wealth.
Though he was a great ruler of the kingdom, the prosperity
of the kingdom was rather more material than spiritual. Though he was also
spiritually gifted and faithful, Solomon’s taste for foreign women led Solomon
to grow less faithful and to turn to foreign pagan deities that his foreign
wives introduced. The later period of
his reign became plagued with scandals driven by his sins and the betrayal of
his servant, Jeroboam, as written in 1 Kings 11.
Jeroboam escaped Solomon’s hunt for execution by finding his
way into Egypt and remaining there until Solomon’s death, as written in 1 Kings
12. On his way to escape into Egypt from Jerusalem, Jeroboam met the Shilonite
prophet, Ahijah, who indicated to him to take away ten tribes among the
offspring of Jacob (1 Kings 11:31-32). As this prophesy materialized, Jeroboam
ended up becoming the first king of the seceded kingdom of Israel, as Rehoboam,
who succeeded Solomon was incompetent in keeping the ten tribes of the north to
him during Jeroboams exile in Egypt, as written in 1 Kings 12. King Rehoboam
was not like President Abraham Lincoln, who prevented the secession of the
southern confederate states from the Union, during the 1860s in the United
States. This was the beginning of the divided
kingdom of the Israelites – the northern kingdom, Israel, with its first king,
Jeroboam, who rebelled Solomon, and the southern kingdom, Judah, with its first
king, Rehoboam. And, this was a prelude
to the prophesy of the Advent in Isaiah 7:14
Because the northern kingdom, Israel, was formed out of the
northern ten tribes’ rebellion against the tribes of Judah, represented by
incompetent king, Rehoboam, the ten tribes of Israel proved to be rebellious
against God, as well. They became the first ones to corrupt themselves with
foreign pagan worship, led by their king, Jeroboam, carried on by other corrupt
kings, such as Ahab, who even married to Jezabel, who deeply corrupted Israel
with Baal worship during the time of Elijah, and Menahem, who began turning to
Assyria (2 Kings 19-20, Hosea 5:13) and Pekah, who allied with Rezin, the king
of Syria, in attacking Judah, which allied with Assyria (2 Kings 16:5) in the
Syro-Ephraimite War (736-732 B.C).
This war, their rebellion against their southern brothers in
Judah, ended up costing their nation, Israel, letting their land from Jacob
become contaminated by idol worshippers
(2 Kings 17:7-41). And, this pattern of sin soon engulfed Judah.
The inertia of the deuteronomic cycle of sins is so
powerful. And, this was the prelude to the Isaiah’s prophesy of the Advent of
the Messiah, about 700 years before the Advent took place. In prophesizing the Advent – the coming of
the Messiah, through the virgin birth, Isaiah wanted to enlighten
the heart of the Israelites in Judah, the only remaining Jewish kingdom,
to turn their hearts back to God, to break the deuterinomic cycle of sins,
before it would be too late.
So, Isaiah ministered
to the King of Judah, Ahaz, shortly before the Syro-Ephramite War, to turn him
to God, who spoke to the king during that time of crisis:
“Ask for a sign from the Lord, your God; let it be deep deep as the
nether world, or high as the sky! “
(Isaiah 7:11).
But, King of Judah,
Ahaz, defied to God, saying:
“I will not ask! I will not tempt the Lord!” (Isaiah 7:12)
At first, Ahaz’s
response to God’s words in Isaiah 7:11 sounds right, as tempting God is a sin.
However, this shows how corrupt and hypocritical Ahaz had become, only to rationalize his intent to side with
Assyria to deal with the threat from the military alliance of Israel and Syria
(the Syro-Ephramite alliance).
God was always against
making such a choice. As King David sung in Psalm 23, God wanted His people,
especially leaders of them to listen to Him and trust Him, rather than
foreigners. But, first, the king of
Israel (northern kingdom, the Ephramites), Pekah, defied God by making alliance
with the Syrian king, Rezin, to attack Judah.
Pekah and Ahaz were
extremely hostile to each other, letting Syria (Aram) and Assyria manipulate
them (2 Kings 15:27-16:20), though they were brothers to each other, as the
offspring of Jacob.
In response to King
Ahaz’s defiant answer, God said to him:
“Listen,
O house of David! It is not enough for you to weary men, must you also weary my
God!? Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be
with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel. He shall be living on
curds and honey by the time he learns to reject the bad and choose the good.
For before the child learns to reject the bad and choose the good, the land of
those two kings whom you dread shall be deserted. The Lord shall bring upon you
and your people and your father’s house days worse than any since Ephraim
seceded from Judah “(Isaiah 7:13-18).
Biblically, this is
the historical and political context behind the prophesy of Advent – the coming
of the Messiah -in Isaiah 7:14, with these words, “Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall
be with child, and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel”.
These prophetic words
of God to King Ahaz during the dark time of crisis was a sign of the light that
John wrote in his Gospel (John
1:1-34, 3:16-21,9:5).
God’s people were
divided and fighting against each other toward destruction by the foreign,
siding with foreign powers, such as Syria (Aram) by Israel (Northern Kingdom,
Ephraim )and Assyria by Judah (the Southern Kingdom ). By siding with foreign powers, God’s people,
the Israelites, both Israel and Judah turned their backs to God. It was far
from peace that God wanted. As both Israel and Judah refused to listen to God
through the words of prophets, including Isaiah, Israel was destroyed permanently
by Assyria and Judah became a puppet state of Assyria. Because of this, kings of Judah were forced
by Assyria to bring tribute to the kings of Assyria from the Temple’s treasures
and accept the Assyrian pagan worship. This way, Judah defiled, as Israel did
upon allying with Syria. Such a sin of Judah led to the Babylonian invasion and
exile to Babylon.
The historical and
political context of the dark crisis time when the Advent was prophesized in Isaiah
7:14 is summed up below:
And though the Lord warned Israel and Judah by
every prophet and seer, “Give up your evil ways and keep my commandments and
statues, in accordance with the entire law which I enjoined on your fathers and
which I sent you by my servants and prophets, “ they did not listen, but were
as stiff-necked as their fathers, who had not believed in the Lord, their God.
They rejected His statues, the covenant which He had made with their fathers,
and the warnings which He had given them. The vanity they pursued, they themselves
became: they followed the surrounding nations whom the Lord had commanded them
not to imitate. They disregarded all the commandments of the Lord, their God,
and made for themselves two molten calves; they also made a sacred pole and
worshiped all the hosts of heaven, and served Baal. They immolated their sons
and daughters by fire, practiced fortune-telling and divination, and sold
themselves into evil doing in the Lord’s sight, provoking Him till, in His
great anger against Israel, the Lord put them away out of His sight. Only the
tribe of Judah was left. Even the people of Judah, however, did not keep the
commandments of the Lord, their God, but followed the practice by Israel. So
the Lord rejected the whole race of Israel. He afflicted them and delivered
them over to plunderers, finally casting them out from before Him. (2
Kings 17:13-19)
After about 700 years
from the time of Isaiah, the first prophet, and about 400 after the time of Malachi,
the last prophet, what was prophesized in Isaiah 7:14 – Advent – began to
become reality when Angel Gabriel announced to Mary , as Luke describes:
Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel
was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, to a
virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of
the descendants of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And
coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored
one! The Lord is with
you.” But she was very perplexed at this statement,
and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The
angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will
conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall
name Him Jesus. He
will be great and will be called the Son of the
Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the
throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and
His kingdom will have no end.” Mary
said to the angel, “How can this be, since I am
a virgin?” The angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will
come upon you, and the power of the
Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy
Child shall be called the Son of God. And
behold, even your relative Elizabeth has also conceived a son in her old age;
and she who was called barren
is now in her sixth month. For nothing
will be impossible with God.” And
Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; may it be done to me
according to your word.” And the angel departed from her (Luke 1:26-38).
 |
| "Annunciation", Paolo de Matteis |
This
is to fulfill the Advent prophesy in Isaiah 7:14 and reflects Genesis 3:19 and
Revelation 12:1-6, and is echoed in John 1:14 and 3:16. And, it was when the House of David was run
by a corrupt puppet king, Herod the Great, who was subject to the Roman Empire,
as it was when this last remaining Jewish kingdom existed only as a colonial
state of the Roman Empire after 63 BC.
 |
| Peter Paul Ruben's rendition of Revelation 12:1-6 |
About
100 years before the last remaining Jewish kingdom – Judah – became subject to
the Roman Empire in 63BC, the mighty Jewish army of Judas Maccabeus won the
much-longed independence and sovereignty from the Seleucid Greek Empire, which
oppressively ruled Judah. This victory meant the full independence of the
Jewish nation ever since when King Menahem of Israel subjected Israel to the
Assyrian power, by giving tributes to King Pul of Assyria by squeezing his own people (2 Kings
15:19-20, Hosea 5:13) even before the Assyrians wiped out the northern kingdom,
Israel, during the reign of King Hoshea,
the last king of Israel, after the reign of King Pekah (2 Kings 17).
During
the 8 days of Chanukah, the Jews celebrate the Maccabean victory that led the
Jewish kingdom regain its complete independence after about 600 years of
foreign power domination, though the sovereignty only lasted about 100 years,
until the Roman Empire took over in 63BC.
Similar to the eight candles on menorah for Chanukah, Advent
is also a time to light candles, one after another. In fact, as John’s Gospel
describes (John 1:1-34, 3:16-21,9:5) that Advent, the coming of the Lord Jesus
Christ, as the light in the darkness of the world to enlighten the people of
the world so that they can turn their hearts back to God. Thus, lighting Advent
candles during the first four weeks of a liturgical year, during Advent season,
symbolizes how the darkness of sins in the world will be transformed with the
light of the coming Messiah – how our hearts will be enlightened with the
coming (advent) of the Lord.
With the “advent “(coming, arrival) of the first Sunday of
Advent, we lit the first Advent candle. Then, likewise, with the arrival of the
second Sunday of Advent, we light the second Advent candle, followed by the
third candle with the third Sunday of Advent and the fourth candle with the
fourth Sunday of Advent. Once these candles are lit, they are kept burning
throughout the entire Advent season. This way, as Advent progresses and as
Christmas draws nearer, the light from Advent candles becomes brighter. This
symbolizes that the world becomes brighter as the advent (coming) of Christ
becomes imminent.
Christ has already come, according to the Old Testaments
prophecies. Some of these Old Testament prophecies of the advent of Christ, the
Messiah, are given in the post-Exilic context, because hope is a common theme
for the Advent, the coming of the Messiah, and the post-Exilic period. And, the lighting of the Advent candles
symbolizes the increasing hope with the coming of the Messiah – also reflected
in brighter images of the post-Exilic restoration of Jerusalem, as in the
post-exilic prophetic books, such as Ezra and Nehemiah.
After the ten tribes of the northern part of the Jewish
kingdom broke away from the southern two tribes (1 Kings 12), they established
the Northern Kingdom, also known as Israel, while the rest remained as the Southern Kingdom, also known as
Judah. This was like – what if the
Southern pro-slavery states seceded from the rest of the United States, the
Union, during the Civil War, forming the independent Confederate States, to
compare to American history. And, this
division, following the reign of Solomon, marks the notable sign of the kingdom’s
irreversible fall. Aesop’s these words from the fable of “The Four Oxen and the Lion”, “United
we stand, divided we fall”, proved to be true through the history of the
Jewish kingdom. Not to mention, Jesus reminded this, too (Matthew 12:25, Mark
3:25,Luke 11:17).
As the saying, “United,
we stand, divided, we fall”, goes, the divided Jewish kingdom fell – first,
with the Northern Kingdom (Israel), and then, Southern Kingdom (Judah). The first fall of the north, in fact, prompted
the second fall of the south.
Though the Northern Kingdom was never recovered, thus making
the ten tribes of Israel lost, the southern kingdom, Judah, was restored, after the captive Jews in Babylon were allowed to
return to Jerusalem, which was heavily ruined. This was the time of the
post-Exilic restoration of Judah, which managed to survive only as a colonial
provincial kingdom of the Persian Empire, the Greek Empire, and the Roman
Empire. However, during the time of the
Maccabee brothers, Judah revolted against the Greek colonial power, because of
the religious oppression they imposed, and won independence, until conquered by
the Roman Empire. This was prophesized
in Daniel 2 and 7.
In this Jewish historical context, Jesus, the Messiah, the
Christ, came to this world, being born in Bethlehem, near Jerusalem of Judah,
during the time Judah was a colonial province of the Roman Empire. Because it
was a colonial province, its king, Herod the Great, was subject to the power of
the Roman Empire. This was like how
Korea was to China for centuries, as a China’s provincial nation and how
Manchuria was to the Empire of Japan from 1932-1945. The monarch of Korea had
no power the Chinese emperor, and the monarch of Manchuria was subject to the
power of the Empire of Japan.
As not only biblical history but also the world history have
proven, earthly nations and kingdoms come and go. Once-the-super-power Egypt, Assyria,
Babylonia, Persia, Greece, and Rome, which manipulated and oppressed the Jewish
people and their kingdom are all gone today. The Chinese imperial dynasties are
gone, the Spanish Empire is gone, the British Empire is no longer as dominating
as it used to, and Japan does not call itself an empire any more today, though
it maintains its original imperial lineage.
But, the Kingdom of God, for which Jesus Christ reigns as the King of
the Universe, prevails permanently. This Kingdom is what the Advent of the
Messiah, Jesus the Christ, brings to us. And, this is the Good Tidings that
comes with the Advent.
With the above review of the historical and political
context of the Advent, based on the scriptures, and world history, let us
prepare ourselves for the coming (advent) of the Lord!
The below, I present a biblical chronology of “waiting” of
God for our conversion to God, in the parallel to our “waiting for the
Messiah’s coming (Advent) and our “waiting” for the Christ’s return (parousia) to see Advent in a
comprehensive perspective and in relation to parousia and the end of time.
In this comparative time line, you can see Advent, in parallel to Parousia, in the long spectrum of God's patient and hopeful waiting for us to turn our hearts back to God. As we began the deuteronomic cycle of sins with the Original Sin, committed by Adam and Eve, resulting in the eviction from the Garden of Eden, God has been waiting and waiting for the "advent" of our hearts in him - waiting for our conversion, which Filipino Catholic theologian, Jose DeMesa calls in Tagalog, "pagbabalik-loob" (returning essence - "ousia" in Greek), echoing these words of St. Augustine: Our heart is restless until it rests in you (God), because "pagbabalik-loob" means returning to our ultimate home, where God resides, what we have lost, the Kingdom of God, as found in our inner being (loob) in God - as Paul said, " I
live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me" (Galatians 2:20).
Conversion of our hearts back to God through repentance, is a way to free ourselves from the vicious cycle of sins, called the deuteronomic cycle, which is like what Buddhists call the Samsara cycle. This is what God has been waiting and waiting. But, God is not simply waiting for us to turn back to Him. To help us turn and return home in Him, He has sent His only begotten Son, who has come (Advent) , died, resurrected, ascended, and made the parakletos (the Advocate - the Holy Spirit - John 14:26) be sent to us, to remain present among us to continue to guide us into the Kingdom (envisioned in Revelation 22, and as promised in Matthew 28:20), and parakletos was poured upon us with power on Pentecost. With this, we have been waiting for parousia, remembering the critical lesson of preparedness with repentance from the Advent about 2,000 years ago.
What the below chart sums up is this spectrum: Genesis : Original Sin - Deuteronomic Cycle of Sins - Advent -
Christmas - Crucifixion - Resurrection - Ascension- Pentecost -Parousia: Revelation.
God waits for us to come back to Him – Repentance and Conversion and Reconciliation
|
We wait for the first coming (advent) of the Lord - Advent
|
We wait for the second coming (advent) of the Lord – Parousia
– the Second Advent
|
God’s waiting begins with the
Deuteronomic Cycle of Human Sins
Humans, as represented by Adam and Eve, were with God in the Garden
of Eden , which means “delight”, “bliss” and “abundance”.
God’s waiting began when the deuteronomic cycle of sins began with
the Original Sin, committed by Adam and Eve.
Though God evicted humans out of Eden, God’s desire to be reunited
with humans remains throughout history in the entire Bible – from Genesis to
Revelation. In this sense, the Bible is a collection of stories of how God
longs and waits for humans to turn back to God for good.
*****
Antediluvian Period
Having lost the Garden and free access to the Tree of Life, which is
synonymous to the paradise and the Kingdom of God, suffering and death have
entered in human life. And, this
continues until Christ returns and we pass the Judgement to sit for the
heavenly wedding table and enter into the Kingdom, which is envisioned in
Revelation 22.
In the meantime, we have been in a vicious cycle of repeated sins, in
spite of repeated reconciliations.
This cycle is called the deuteronomic cycle.
In the period of this deuteronomic cycle, which began with the
Original Sin, God first attempted to wipe out all humans, out of
disappointment (Genesis 6) but decided to save some good ones – Noah and his
company (Genesis 7-8), hoping that these “good seeds” will bring forth
generations of people, who will never rebel against God. Though God gave humans a fresh start with
Noah and his sons (Shem, Ham, and Japheth), Ham sinned and was cursed (Genesis 9:22-25). Thus, the vicious cycle
of sins – the deuteronomic cycle was carried over the cleansing flood.
*******
Postdiluvian Period
After the flood, God made the covenant with Noah through the Ark, in
the hope to bring humans back to Him.
However, as evidenced with Ham’s sinful act against his father, Noah,
the cycle of sin continued on.
The Period of the Patriarchs
God renewed the covenant with humans through a righteous man,
Abraham. Because of Abraham’s
faithfulness, his offspring became ancestors of the Islamic faith (from
Ishmael ) and the Judeo-Christian faith (from Isaac).
Isaac’s younger son, Jacob, was called Israel by God and had 12 sons,
becoming the ancestors of the twelve tribes of Israel. However, Jacob’s older sons sinned against
Joseph, selling him to the Ishmaelite, as Jacob himself sinned against his
older brother, Esau.
Joseph, who became a slave in Egypt, ended up saving his family – the
Israelites, when they suffered famine in Canaan. However, the Israelites in
Egypt became slaves and suffered for about 400 years.
Passover – Exodus: The Period
of God’s Deliverance
God chose Moses to lead the Israelites out of the oppression in
Egypt. Passover into Exodus.
Exodus was to cleanse the Israelites. However, during journey of
trial, the Israelites sinned against God. Because of this, laws were entered
by God through Moses on Mt. Sinai. However, in spite of the laws (Torah), Israelites
continued to sin – keeping on the deuteronic cycle.
The Period of the Judges
God set judges, such as Samuel, to keep His people, the Israelites,
on right track. However, humans, as represented by the Israelites, did their
own ways, defiling and rebelling against God.
******
The Period of Prophets – The Rise and Fall
of Jewish Kingdom
The Israelites demanded God to let them form their own kingdom, like
Assyria and Egypt. Though God was in in favor of such an idea, God gave them
a chance. Thus, God commissioned Judge Samuel to anoint Saul as the first
king of Israel. But, Saul proved himself as incompetent to meet God’s
expectation as a king. Then, God let
Samuel to anoint David to take over the Jewish kingdom.
Though David sinned against God, he humbled himself and repented through Prophet Nathan’s clever intervention, using a parable. He reconciled with God and proved to be a king worthy of God’s trust. David was succeeded by his son, Solomon. This was the peak of the Jewish kingdom. However, during his later reign, Solomon’s sinfulness became serious, as having 700 wives, including a spiritually unclean foreigner, its consequences haunted the Jewish kingdom forever.
Many of Solomon’s successors in the following generations turned out
to be corrupt kings, turning the kingdom rebellious to God.
In this ongoing sinfulness, the ten tribes in the northern part of
the kingdom seceded from the rest of the tribes in the south. They called
their northern kingdom, Israel, and set Samaria as its capitol. The remaining
kingdom was called Judah, with its capitol in Jerusalem. Though corruption
was more evident in the north, Israel, the south, Judah also followed its
northern brothers’ suits. In Ezekiel 23, this phenomena is described with a metaphor
of twin prostitute sisters, Ohola and Oholibah. In Hosea, such a corrupt
Israel is described with a metaphor of a prostitute, named, Gomer.
As consequences of sinfulness of Israel and Judah (or Ohola and Oholibah), Israel was first attacked by the Assyrians
(723-722 BC) and wiped out of map forever. Thus, the northern 10 tribes of
Israel have become the lost 10 tribes of Israel. Though Judah was spared from the Assyrian
assault, it was attacked by the Babylonians (587-586 BC). Unlike the case with
Israel, God gave the Jewish people another chance to restore their remaining
kingdom, Judah, after 70 years of their Babylonian exile.
Throughout the time of Jewish kingdom, God sent prophets,
including 3 major prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel) and 12 minor prophets
(Hosea (Osee) , Joel, Amos, Obadiah (Abdias), Jonah (Jonas), Micah (Micheas), Nahum, Habakkuk (Habacuc), Zephaniah (Sophanias), Haggai (Aggeus), Zechariah (Zacharias), Malachi (Malachias)), as well
as Elijah and Elisha, to humans, as represented by the Israelites on the
right path. However, despite God’s
continuous efforts to turn sinful humans back to God, we, as represented by
the sinful Israelites, treated prophets with disrespect and continue to defy
God. Because of this, God decided to teach humans in a more intimate way by
sending His Son, Jesus, as His way of sending Godself. And, the coming of
this Son, Jesus, through Mary’s immaculate flesh, through her virgin birth, is Advent into
Christmas.
This is reflected in Jesus’ parable of the tenant vineyard worker
(Matthew 21:33-43, the Gospel reading for the 27th Sunday in Year
A Ordinary Time).
After Prophet Malachi, the Israelites
had no prophet to guide them. As
Daniel 2 and 7 suggest, the post-exilic kingdom of the Jews, post-exilic
Judah, never regained complete sovereignty as it survived only as a powerful
foreign empire’s provincial kingdom. However, there was an exception as the
Maccabean revolt (167-160 B.C.) resulted in regaining independence from 110 –
63 B.C., as the Jewish kingdom of the
Hasmonean dynasty. This victory for independence has been celebrated
in Chanukah.
After the Babylonian Exile, the Jewish kingdom, Judah, was a colonial province for the Medo- Persian Empire, the Macedonian Greek Empire, and the Roman Empire, until it was completely destroyed by the Roman Empire in 70 A.D..
Advent
took place during the time when Judah was ruled by the Herodean dynasty, as a
colonial province of the Roman Empire.
It was about 400 years after the last
Old Testament prophet, Malachi, when John the Baptist alluded to Advent by urging to repent and to be
baptized in the Jordan River in the region of Galilee. In fact, about 30 years before Jesus came
to John to be baptized,
*****
The
Second Post-Exilic Period
The Jews were forced to go on exile
throughout the world, becoming diasporas, in 70 A.D., when the Romans
destroyed Jerusalem in response to Jewish revolts. It did not work as it did
when Judas Maccabeus led the Jewish revolt against the Greeks about 300 years
before. The Jews had been on exile for
more than 1,800 years, having lost their homeland – as the northern 10 tribes
lost their northern kingdom to Assyria in 722 BC.
In 1948, through British and American
maneuvers, the current nation of Israel was established in the land of
Palestine by the United Nations, for the resettlement of the Jews, who have
been diaspora for almost 2,000 years, since 70 A.D..
Though the Jews now have their own sovereign nation in their
ancestor’s land, they still wait for the Messiah to come, since they do not
believe that Jesus is the one. On the
other hand, Christians are waiting for parousia,
the return of the Messiah, Christ’s second coming (second advent), as
prophesized by Jesus himself and as envisioned in the Book of Revelation.
|
The First Advent begins with
the Annunciation to Mary, followed by the visit by shepherds and the visit of
the three wise men from the East. upon the virgin birth of Jesus, accented by
John the Baptist’s preaching on repentance and baptism
Given Revelation 12, Genesis 3:15 can be considered as the earliest
implication of Advent – the coming of the Messiah.
The Advent of the Messiah was prophesized centuries before Jesus – at
least during the post-exilic time of Isaiah (Isaiah 7:14 – Isaiah 52-53),
juxtaposed to the post-exilic restoration (Isaiah 35), which can be
understood as a pretext for the advent of the Kingdom, as envisioned in
Revelation 22.
There had been about 400 years of absence of prophet, since Prophet
Malachi, which was still a period ruled by the Persians. These years could be seen as a time of
“darkness”, as if God had left His people without His messenger
(prophet). However, God sure showed
His care for His people by commissioning certain faithful people, such as
Esther, to ensure the well-being of His people during a time of being ruled
by the Persians. The Book of Esther and the Jewish festival of Purim reflect
this.
Additionally, God led Judas Maccabeus to revolt against the
Selucid-Greek Empire’s oppression victoriously, to ensure of His care for His
people.
However, a seed of the next problem was planted during this period,
as the Israelites made alliance with the Romans in order to expel the Greek
oppressor, setting a way for the Romans to conquer the Israelites in 63 BC
during the reign of the Roman Emperor Pompeii. This tells that the Israelites
did not learn a critical lesson on why their ancestors lost the northern
kingdom, Israel, to Assyria during 723-722 BC. The loss of the northern
kingdom, Israel, and the ten tribes, stemmed from Israel’s alliance with
Assyria in order to protect it from Egypt and Babylonia, as this choice was a
folly of human wisdom. This tells that they did not learn a lesson from Hosea
5:13.
Obviously, from 63 B.C., the Israelites were, once again, ruled by a
powerful foreign power – the Romans, this time, losing a short period of
independence. And, this dark period is
the historical context of Advent.
During the Roman rule, John the Baptist was leading the Israelites to
prepare the way of the Lord’s coming, as mentioned in Mark 1:2-8, evoking a
sense of urgency of Advent – the coming of the Messiah by
misinterpreting but cleverly
juxtaposing Isaiah 40:3, which is
about the post-exilic restoration of Jerusalem, into Advent – the coming of
the Messiah and the Kingdom of God.
|
The second Advent waiting
begins with the Ascension of the Lord
Jesus was born. He grew up. He was baptized by John the Baptist
because baptism is not simply for cleansing but for commissioning. Thus, the
baptism of Jesus marked the beginning of his public ministry, which the
Gospels focus on.
As the Gospels describe, we treated Jesus with disrespect and
eventually killed him, as the tenant vineyard workers killed the son of the
land owner in Jesus’ parable in Matthew 21:33-43 (also the Gospel reading for
the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A). But, Jesus resurrected
on the third day and reappeared to his disciples. Upon his resurrection,
Jesus was able to fortify the disciples’ understanding of his teaching.
Knowing their understanding, he had to return to the Father in
heaven. It was the Ascension (Mark
16:19, the Second Glorious Mystery in the Rosary).
Shortly before the Ascension, Jesus assured that he would not leave
his disciples like orphans. He
promised to remain with them in the Holy Spirit – as Parakletos.
During the Last Supper, Jesus
indicated to the disciples that he would depart from them, referring to his
death, but he also hinted his return, referring not to the resurrection but parousia to
marry the Church and to share the heavenly wedding banquet, by saying,
“Drink from it, all of you, for this is
my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the
forgiveness of sins. I tell you, from now on I shall not drink this fruit of
the vine until the day when I drink it with you new in the kingdom of my
Father”(Matthew 26:27-29), pointing to Revelation 19:5-18.
If the Last Supper is viewed
as a precursor to the heavenly wedding banquet in Revelation 19, then,
Parousia already started on the night before Jesus’ cricifixion.
Jesus died on Good Friday to
reopen the gate of heaven, as the curtain of the Holy of Holies in the Temple
was torn open at the moment of his death. On the third day, which is Easter
Sunday, he resurrected. Then, Jesus
was with the disciples for the next 40 days until the Ascension. 10 days from the Ascension, 50 days from Easter Sunday, as Jesus
promised before the Ascension, the Father in heaven sent parakletos, the Holy Spirit as Advocate in place of Jesus’
physical presence after his return to heaven – until parousia, his return, at the end of time. This is why Jesus said
he is with us always until the end of time (Matthew 28:20). This event was Pentecost. On this day, the
Holy Spirit – parakletos came with
power (Act 1:8, 2:2, just as Isaiah prophesized that the Messiah would come
with power in Isaiah40:10). With this power of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost,
the disciples were charismatized to build the Church until the time of parousia, so that the Church will be
presented as the bride for the Lord, the Lamb of God (Revelation 19:7, 2
Corinthians 11:2, Ephesians :25-27). We must be ready for parousia not only by building the
Church as our community but also to keep it spiritually clean as a virgin to
betroth the Lord. For this, our hearts
must be clean through the Sacrament of Penance (Psalm 51).
|
No comments:
Post a Comment