Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight.
Man has always sought, searched, and longed for God. For many people this has even been seen as a proof of God. Marcea Elliade the great 20th century scholar of religion spoke of the uniqueness of man as his religiosity and that homo sapien is really homo religiosus. Many have argued that all human longing, questioning, searching, and all of its greatest achievements; art and architecture, ethics and philosophy, acts of compassion and sacrifice, have all risen from this longing and inclination of humanity.[1] In fact the recent discovery at Göbekli Tepe provides evidence that it was man’s religious impulse that led to the creation of the city which is the locus of human civilization. Religion, rather than being opposed to “science-knowledge”, is that which allows us to make sense of science. In ancient societies man had phenomenological and existential experience of the world in which he lived (as primitive and incomplete as this knowledge may seem to us today). When this knowledge was put into the context of the search for the divine and Primordial Being mythology was developed, i.e. science/knowledge was put in a way that it made sense. The way in which these myths imposed themselves upon the people and the ways in which people interacted with them is religion. This is the Ur-religion, primitive religion- in which authority rests upon the myth, its antiquity, and its absolute character which is often expressed through ritual or scriptural fundamentalism.
The God of Israel and His religion is radically different[2], we begin by seeing a God that is not reflected upon through the medium of narrative/ritual but a God who regardless and apart from man’s search for Him reveals Himself. This is the God that led Abraham from Ur, who chose a man with a speech impediment to lead His people, who chose David the least of his brothers to be king, who chose Jonah to go to Nineveh, and who chose fishermen, tax collectors, and harlots to be his disciples…[3] He always acts Apocalyptically, He is known through epiphany and revelation.
“… the truth does not appear as a product of the spirit but as a "visit" and "scene" (see John 1:14) of the eschatological and meta-historical reality, which infiltrates into history in order to open it to the fact of communion. This creates a vision of the truth, not in the sense of the platonic or mystical viewing, in which the soul or the mind of man links to the divine, but in the sense of reproducing new relations, a new world, the destination of which is taken up through a community.”[4]
However as we speak about theophany we must also remember that man seldom recognizes God within the context of the theophany. Examples of this include, Jacob as he wrestled, Abraham at the Oaks, the parents of Samson, the Story of Eli and Samuel, Elias, etc… Always alongside His revelation there is a hiddeness as is apparent in the very revelation of His name, in which we again encounter ambiguity (“I am”). When Moses asks God to show Himself, He is placed in the cleft of a rock, and God’s glory passes by letting Moses have but a trailing glimpse. Even when God’s Glory takes up a “permanent” abode upon mount Zion, His Glory remains hidden within the inner darkness of the Holy of Holies. You might have noticed that when we speak about revelations, we are not speaking about God Himself, but revelations of His glory, his presence, His name, all of which are true and personal encounters yet God in Himself remains unknown.[5] The God at the Incarnation is equally hidden, in fact this is the divine revealed as hidden in way beyond anything encountered thus far. He is no longer hidden in the dark cloud (Sinai), the dark inner sanctuary, or the heights of heaven (all places that we can expect/accept God) He is now hidden in humanity that He received from a woman named Mary. Hidden behind a face like any and every other…[6]
How are we to make sense of this hiddeness, this Mystery, and the transcendence of God? There are I believe five distinct yet interconnected ways in which we can approach God as theophany and Mystery.
- Firstly, the tension between revelation and unknowing prevents us from subjecting God to any book, myth, philosophy, or system. He is totally free. This is in Contrast to gods who were confined to their myth (Near East, Egypt, and “primitive” religion in general), to fate (Greco-Roman), or even to ways of thinking(Plato’s world of ideas or Aristotle’s nature.)
- Secondly, it shows us that ours is not a God created in our image, He is wholly Other, we cannot see, conceive, or understand Him even as He reveals Himself and we encounter Him. “God cannot be expressed and even less can he be conceived.”[7]
- Thirdly, it teaches us that ours is a God of patience, understanding, and love. He bears with us, He never reveals more then we can handle or need, He is hidden so as not to pressure or force us. He leaves us free, so that we love Him, not out of fear, for his beauty, for his power, but that we love Him because He is (“I Am”).
- Fourthly, He remains hidden so that we go out of ourselves (ek-stasis) and discover Him within a matrix of relations. He is always and forever the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He is the God of Israel, the man and the nation (notice the ambiguity). He is revealed not walking down the street with us, but in the breaking of the bread.[8] We Orthodox know God not through private mystical experience (which is true in so far as it is confirmed by and conformed to the community)[9], my private reflection upon revelation, scriptural or iconographic (true again in so far as it is confirmed by and conformed to the community), we know God through our common life and common faith, not as it is studied or taught, but as it is lived.[10] Even our private spiritual life is not divorced from the community; my prayer flows from and to our “synaxis” and it is done in and for the community. In fact it is only as a member of the community, the body of Christ, that I can call God Father…[11] An interesting footnote is the fact that God in the midst of theophany is revealed together with and through messengers and or witnesses. Confining myself to New Testament examples[12], Gabriel at the Annunciation, John the Baptist beginning within the womb, Angels, Shepherds, and Magi at Christ’s birth, Moses and Elias on mount Tabor, the very nature of death by crucifixion, the angel at the tomb, the myrrh bearers, the apostles and the many other witnesses of the Risen Lord, and even the resurrection will be preceded by a Prophet, a blowing of the trumpet, and the call of the Archangel, and at the final judgment Christ will be surrounded by the apostle upon 12 thrones.[13]
-Fifthly, it is a revelation of God as Trinity. God remains hidden and is revealed as a communion of Persons. The Father is the hidden cause of the Spirit (procession). The Spirit never points to itself, but makes present the Son (Annunciation), points to the Son (Epiphany), and reveals the Son within the life of the Community (Pentecost). The Son who is incarnate does not speak for Himself but for the Father from whom He is eternally begotten. Even as He is seen it is the Father that He reveals.[14] As the one of the Trinity who was Incarnate (Theophany par excellence) He ascends (is hidden) to make room for the Spirit sent by the Father. Our God is hidden yet manifest because the very mode of being of the Persons of the Trinity is Humility and Love. Fr. Maximos an Athonite Monk has written,
“We expect, and perhaps demand, that every revelation be an unveiling, a drawing aside of the curtain, a lifting of the veil. But when the object of revelation is not an object at all, but that which is invisible and beyond predication, then it can give itself to us only through an event or appearance that is also a concealing. Divine transcendence, divine hiddenness, remains absolute, and yet providentially reveals itself by concealing itself in a sacred veil, which is at once the revelation of, and means of participation in, the very life of God” (“Symeon of Thessalonike and the Theology of the Icon Screen”, Thresholds of the Sacred, ed. Sharon E. J. Gerstel [Harvard University Press, 2006], p. 183)."
I will conclude this short discourse on theology as theophany and Mystery with the words of Saint Maximos, perhaps the greatest seer of hidden Mysteries…
“The great mystery of the Incarnation remains a mystery eternally. Not only is what is not seen of it great then that which has been revealed- for it is revealed merely to the extent that those saved by it can grasp it- but also even what is revealed still remains entirely hidden and by no means in known as it really is… Let us contemplate with faith the mystery of the incarnation and in all simplicity let us simply praise Him who in His great generosity became man for us.”
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