TYPOLOGY OF TRINITY
Introduction
In this work the striking correspondence between the psychoanalytic and the Biblical trinity is recognized. It shows that trinity represents a basic type of personage, in the Bible as well as in the “real” world, in a positive as well as in a negative sense. However, here, the developed typology has not only a personal, but also a macro/sociological application.
In the first section, the biblical typology of the person is expounded, while in the second section the psychoanalytic typology is expounded, followed by a synthesis of these two approaches at personal and sociological levels.
Divine Trinity
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
When I started to learn Ivrit (alias the Hebrew language) in the late 1980s, literally the first thing I noticed in the Bible was the trinity, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, which reminded me strongly of the Divine trinity; a direct hit. Indeed, when a linguistic-typological analysis is done, the results are interesting. Let us observe the scheme:
1. ABRAM - ABRAHAM
2. YITZHAK
3. YA'AQOV - YISRAEL
We have firstly Abram (exalted father), who then transforms into Abraham (father of the multitude). Here we have a typical example of the dialectic law of transition of quality into quantity. Abraham first had to build up his character (sublimity), and only then became the father of the multitude. Therefore, quality precedes quantity, which is shown by the Bible through its many examples. Moreover, he, as a friend of God, was ready to sacrifice, although with a heavy heart, his miraculously gotten “son, his only son Isaac, whom he loved” (Gen. 22:2) on the hill of Moriah, the same place as (according to tradition), the very Son of Living God was sacrificed about 1900 years later.
Yitzhak (he will laugh, in LXX Isaak), with his obedience until very death, like a sacrificial lamb, reminds of Jesus Christ:
But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave Me commandment, so I do. (John 14:31)
Jacob is an example of how under the influence of Holy Spirit a Jacob (imposter) becomes a Yisrael (God will wage war princely). He "struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed." (Gen32:29), the same as God’s Spirit disputes with men:
And the Lord said, My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh. (Gen. 6:3).
Like Berne’s Adult (v. PSYCHOANALYSIS AND BIBLE) Jacob is clever and devises various “tricks” both for getting blessed (Gen. 27) and in his contest with Laban over property (Gen. 30:25-43), as well as at the repeated meetings with his brother (Gen. 32:2-20).
The observed typology is the reason why the Lord says to Moses:
Moreover God said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel: ‘The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is My name forever, and this is My memorial to all generations.’” (Exod. 3:15)
Therefore, God’s eternal name is:
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This is certainly the most representative type of holy Trinity. I think that I have not seen yet through to a deeper understanding of their meanings and nature, and I don’t know if it makes sense to deal with the Most Holy in such an investigative way. I am reminded once again of the words that Moses heard from the Lord, which we should have in mind every time we deal with subject matter of this rank.
TAKE YOUR SANDALS OFF YOUR FEET,
FOR THE PLACE WHERE YOU STAND IS HOLY GROUND.
(Exod. 3:5)
Types of Father
Despite this example, I had not thought for long of regarding the trinity as a basic biblical type, for I had been, like others, satisfied with christocentrism – until december 1995, when the heavens “opened” to me. I simply began to look for the types of Father from the available data about Him in the Gospels. Then I thought of Jephthah who sacrifices his only daughter:
When Jephthah came to his house at Mizpah, there was his daughter, coming out to meet him with timbrels and dancing; and she was his only child. Besides her he had neither son nor daughter. And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he tore his clothes, and said, “Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low! You are among those who trouble me! For I have given my word to the Lord, and I cannot go back on it.” So she said to him, “My father, if you have given your word to the Lord, do to me according to what has gone out of your mouth, because the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the people of Ammon.” Then she said to her father, “Let this thing be done for me: let me alone for two months, that I may go and wander on the mountains and bewail my virginity, my friends and I.” So he said, “Go.” And he sent her away for two months; and she went with her friends, and bewailed her virginity on the mountains. And it was so at the end of two months that she returned to her father, and he carried out his vow with her which he had vowed. She knew no man. And it became a custom in Israel that the daughters of Israel went four days each year to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite. (Judges 11:34-40),
Then Mesha, king of Moab who, when besieged in the city of Kir Haraseth by the army of Israel, at the time of prophet Elisha, did the following:
Then he took his eldest son who would have reigned in his place, and offered him as a burnt offering upon the wall; and there was great indignation against Israel. So they departed from him and returned to their own land. (2 Kings 3:27)
Of course, the cited examples have negative connotations too, but some “Divine” features are still revealed in them – consistency and sacrificing out of love what is dearest, for a general benefit, which is a pale picture of God’s sacrifice:
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)
But perhaps the most beautiful example of the type of father in the Bible is, in my opinion, emperor Darius (Dan. 6), who greatly esteemed God’s servant Daniel, appointing him above all governors of his empire. However, caught in a trap, he had to allow, in spite of his own will, because of the fixity of the law of Media and Persia, that his dear servant Daniel be brought down to a lion’s pit. Here we may see also a type of judgment, on the righteous as well as on Satan and his assistants – Daniel gets out alive from the lion pit (death), while the evildoers are sentenced in the way they had judged others.
Types of Son
These types are inseparably connected to Fathers and vice versa. They always work in pairs. So with Abraham - type of Father, we have Isaac – type of Son. With Joseph – type of Son, which we dealt with in detail in the chapter about classical typology, we associate the pharaoh – who is the type of Father here, for he leaves the entire rulership over Egypt to Joseph. Jephthah’s daughter and son of the Moabite king, Mesha, are also types of son.
Son is characterized by obedience even to death, by mental suffering and pain, but also by definitive joy:
He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied. (Isa. 53:11)
Since this type is, in fact, the only treated one out of all the types of person in classical typology, we shall not dwell on him further.
Types of Holy Spirit
While the previous two types were easy to observe, the type of Holy Spirit looks like a real riddle. In order to solve it, we shall cite some of its characteristics:
But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. (John 15:26)
However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. (John 16:13)
And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. (John 16:8)
On the basis of the cited verses, an unambiguous conclusion is that everyone of God’s prophets represents a type of Holy Spirit. In order to show this, it suffices to look at any prophetic book, but for the sake of systematization we shall give here a couple of examples for each of the cited characteristics.
Prophets do not speak of themselves:
The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD (Jer. 40:1)
The word of the Lord that came to Micah of Moresheth in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem. (Micah 1:1)
The word of the LORD that came to Joel the son of Pethuel. (Joel 1:1)
Thus says the Lord (Is. 56:1, Jer. 22:1, Amos 2:1, Obadiah 1:1).
They say what they see and hear:
The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw (Isa. 1:1)
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. (Isa. 6:1)
I lifted up mine eyes again, and looked... (Zach. 2:1, 5:1, 6:1).
Prophets foretell the future:
At that time Michael shall stand up, the great prince who stands watch over the sons of your people; and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation, even to that time. And at that time your people shall be delivered, every one who is found written in the book. (Dan. 12:1)
In that day there shall be (Zah. 13:1)
And the name of the city from that day shall be, The LORD is there (Ezek. 48:35)
And it shall come to pass that from one New Moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me,” says the Lord.
And they shall go forth and look upon the corpses of the men who have transgressed against Me. For their worm does not die, and their fire is not quenched. They shall be an abhorrence to all flesh. (Isa. 66:23-24)
Prophets reprimand:
The burden against Babylon against Moab. (Isa. 13:1, 15:1)
The burden against Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite. (Nahum 1:1)
Finally, in Revelation, the last prophetic book of the Bible, we find the many times repeated slogan:
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. (Rev. 2:7.11.17.29, 3:6.13.22)
Perhaps the most beautiful example of “convicting the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment” is found in the case of Nathan the prophet when he appears before king David in connection with the latter’s adventure with the wife of Uriah Hitite. (2 Sam. 11:1-12:31). The scene itself develops in stages. At the first stage, the prophet presents an analogous example to David:
Then the Lord sent Nathan to David. And he came to him, and said to him: There were two men in one city, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had exceedingly many flocks and herds. But the poor man had nothing, except one little ewe lamb which he had bought and nourished; and it grew up together with him and with his children. It ate of his own food and drank from his own cup and lay in his bosom; and it was like a daughter to him. And a traveler came to the rich man, who refused to take from his own flock and from his own herd to prepare one for the wayfaring man who had come to him; but he took the poor man’s lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him.”
So David’s anger was greatly aroused against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die! And he shall restore fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and because he had no pity.” (2 Sam. 12:1-6)
Then, the prophet pointed to David the sin that he pushed completely out from his consciousness:
You are the man! (2 Sam. 12:7)
In this way, David determined his own destiny (“For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged” Matt. 7:2):
Then he pronounces "the righteousness" – David will be judged in the way he judged (“For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged” Matt. 7:2):
Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. ‘I gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your keeping, and gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if that had been too little, I also would have given you much more! ‘Why have you despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in His sight? You have killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword; you have taken his wife to be your wife, and have killed him with the sword of the people of Ammon. ‘Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me, and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’ (2 Sam. 12:7-10)
Finally, after David’s confession:
I have sinned against the Lord. (2 Sam. 12:13a)
the prophet points to the judgment:
And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die. (2 Sam. 12:13b)
But for David’s justification an innocent child had to die (type of Christ):
However, because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also who is born to you shall surely die. (2 Sam. 12:14)
That is why apostle Peter could say, inspired:
For prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2 Pet. 1:21)
Anti-Trinity
Revelation (chapters 12 – 13) describes the acting of Satan and his organization of rule, which, as it turns out, is an (un)clear copy of Divine trinity. So we read:
The first being
And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. (Rev. 12:3)
The second being
And I saw a beast rising up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his horns ten crowns, and on his heads a blasphemous name. Now the beast which I saw was like a leopard, his feet were like the feet of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion. The dragon gave him his power, his throne, and great authority. And I saw one of his heads as if it had been mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed. And all the world marveled and followed the beast. So they worshiped the dragon who gave authority to the beast; and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast? Who is able to make war with him?” And he was given a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies, and he was given authority to continue for forty-two months. (Rev. 13:1-3. 5)
The third being
Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. (Rev. 13:11-14)
Conclusion
It is obvious that we have an anti-parallel of the holy trinity. Satan – anti-father is a match of God the Father. The beast emerging from the sea is a match of God the Son. It is evident that the anti-son is a form of his father (they both have seven heads, but there is still a difference in diadems and crowns) The son emerges from the water which reminds us of:
When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water (Mat. 3:16)
Just as antichrist (anti-son) had received “the power and throne and great authority” so we have the original:
And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.” (Matt. 28:18)
Just as the Lord was killed, and then resurrected, so the beast was lethally wounded and revived. Just as Christ’s disciples were astonished at seeing him alive again, and praised the heavenly Father, so, but quite contrary, was with the beast.
Same as Jesus spent forty two months “teaching in synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom” (Matt. 4:23, 9:35) and threw the head of the enemy army to the Earth (Luke 10:18, Rev. 12:9), so, but in a negative sense, it was done by antichrist (Rev. 13:5.7, Dan. 7:21.25).
Likewise, we see that the third beast, anti-Holy Spirit (and, as we shall see the false prophet), behaves quite contrary to the Holy Spirit:
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you. (John 14:26)
He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. (Jovan 16:14)
Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit glorifies Jesus, so the anti-spirit glorifies the wounded beast. The text goes on:
When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.
Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts2:1-4)
The fire from the heavens here; the fire from the heavens there. On the basis of the known qualities of the Holy Spirit we can know the qualities of its anti-parallel. For the Holy Spirit it is written:
However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth... (John 16:13)
And I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, “See that you do not do that! I am your fellow servant, and of your brethren who have the testimony of Jesus. Worship God! For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” (Rev. 19:10)
The anti-holy Spirit is, therefore, the spirit of false prophecy, or "false prophet ", as it is written in Rev. 16:13, 19:20, 20:10. We conclude from this that the beast that emerges from the earth and the false prophet are the same “person”, this also being confirmed in the parallel verses:
And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. (Rev. 13:14)
Then the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who worked signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were cast alive into the lake of fire burning with brimstone. (Rev. 19:20)
Therefore, even Satan, despite all his efforts, cannot escape from the Trinity, but in a negative sense. It is not clear if the point is an intentional, subconscious or unconscious copying, but it is unambiguous that there is a relationship like there is between a positive and negative print of a photo. This is a confirmation more of the words of wise Solomon:
That which has been is what will be, that which is done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there anything of which it may be said, “See, this is new”? It has already been in ancient times before us. (Eccl. 1:9.10)
Anti-copy of God is Satan himself.
Anti-copy of Christ is false Christ, antichrist.
Anti-copy of Holy Spirit is the false prophet.
Typology of Anti-Trinity
Just as the holy Trinity represents an archetype of good, according to which the corresponding types on the Earth are built, so this “unholy” trinity represents an archetype of evil, according to which the corresponding types of people and social organizations originate.
Types of Anti-Father
The description of Satan’s ACTION is given through the type of a terrible and evil dragon (i.e. tyrannosaur and other terrible antediluvian creatures, by no means the benevolent dragons of animated films) or an old serpent (as a medium through which the evil came to the earth) found in Revelation chapter 12.
A typical example of a dragon (i.e. bloodthirsty tyrannosaurus) that pursues the woman who is to give birth to a male, we find in the events described at the time of the exodus from Egypt (Exod. 1-15).
The woman who is to give birth to a male symbolizes God’s people who are in Egypt. Like the woman, it suffers, because of the evils imposed on it by the pharaoh (dragon). The child may be represented by Moses, and also by the very faithfulness to God of the entire people. The dragon makes by his tail (false doctrine, false prophet) that God’s people degrade spiritually. Then the dragon tries to devour the child of the woman, by pharaoh trying to destroy Israel’s firstborns. But the woman (Israel) still gives birth to a male (Moses), who goes to the wilderness (i.e. Midian, Exod. 2:15) where he spends the next 40 years (Acts. 7:23.30).
We have something similar with Israel as a nation. When it was to be born in a spiritual sense, to become a nation devoted to God, the pharaoh of the time prevented its exodus, i.e. birth:
Then you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘Thus says the Lord: “Israel is My son, My firstborn. So I say to you, let My son go that he may serve Me. ’ ” (Exod. 4:22-23)
But when it was finally born (i.e. permission for exodus obtained), the woman (nation) escapes to the wilderness where she (it) stays for 40 years, too:
So the Lord’s anger was aroused against Israel, and He made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation that had done evil in the sight of the Lord was gone. (Num. 32:13)
After the exodus the dragon (pharaoh) releases the water as a river (Egyptian army) from his mouth, but the earth (Red Sea) helps the woman and devours the river released by the serpent from its mouth:
You stretched out Your right hand; the earth swallowed them. (Exod. 15:12)
Since the pharaoh himself (type of Satan) was in the water, the following verse can also be applied to this event:
And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. (Rev. 12:7-9)
in parallel with:
And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever.
The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” (Exod. 14:13-14)
After the battle the joy of liberation of God’s people takes place:
Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them (Rev. 12:12/a),
just as after the destruction of pharaoh’s army:
Then Moses and the children of Israel sang this song to the Lord, and spoke, saying:
I will sing to the Lord, For He has triumphed gloriously! The horse and its rider
He has thrown into the sea!
You stretched out Your right hand; the earth swallowed them.
Then Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took the timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances. And Miriam answered them:
“Sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously! The horse and its rider He has thrown into the sea!” (Exod. 15:1-21)
Of course, we must emphasize again that the type is never completely identical to the original, but has features that give it its predominant characteristic.
The description of the CHARACTER of Satan, given through a type – king of Tyre, is found in the book of the prophet Ezekiel:
Son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, ‘Thus says the Lord God:
Because your heart is lifted up, and you say, ‘I am a god, I sit in the seat of gods, In the midst of the seas,’ yet you are a man, and not a god, though you set your heart as the heart of a god
(Behold, you are wiser than Daniel! There is no secret that can be hidden from you! With your wisdom and your understanding you have gained riches for yourself, and gathered gold and silver into your treasuries;
By your great wisdom in trade you have increased your riches, and your heart is lifted up because of your riches),” (Ezek. 28:2-5)
Therefore, a real rival to god is depicted. The description goes on:
Son of man, take up a lamentation for the king of Tyre, and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord God:
You were the seal of perfection, Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; Every precious stone was your covering: The sardius, topaz, and diamond, Beryl, onyx, and jasper, Sapphire, turquoise, and emerald with gold. The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes Was prepared for you on the day you were created.
You were the anointed cherub who covers; I established you; You were on the holy mountain of God; You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones. 15 You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created, Till iniquity was found in you.
By the abundance of your trading You became filled with violence within, And you sinned; Therefore I cast you as a profane thing Out of the mountain of God; And I destroyed you, O covering cherub, From the midst of the fiery stones.
Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor; I cast you to the ground, I laid you before kings, That they might gaze at you.
You defiled your sanctuaries By the multitude of your iniquities, By the iniquity of your trading; Therefore I brought fire from your midst; It devoured you, And I turned you to ashes upon the earth In the sight of all who saw you.
All who knew you among the peoples are astonished at you; You have become a horror, And shall be no more forever.’ (Ezek. 28:12-19)
The type of Satan described by the King of Tyre is represented by Absalom, son of king David:
Now in all Israel there was no one who was praised as much as Absalom for his good looks. From the sole of his foot to the crown of his head there was no blemish in him. (2 Sam. 14:25)
Using his gifts, Absalom then quietly prepares the terrain for dethroning his father, organizing open rebellion eventually, like his archetype, and drawing with him a great part of the priesthood, army and people. He was finally hung on a tree:
Then Absalom met the servants of David. Absalom rode on a mule. The mule went under the thick boughs of a great terebinth tree, and his head caught in the terebinth; so he was left hanging between heaven and earth. And the mule which was under him went on.
Then Joab said, “I cannot linger with you.” And he took three spears in his hand and thrust them through Absalom’s heart, while he was still alive in the midst of the terebinth tree. (2 Sam. 18:9.14),
compared with:
But when they came to Jesus and saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs. But one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out. (John 19:32-33)
But we see here an even more beautiful type of God-Father impersonated by king David, who nevertheless mourns his impudent son:
Then the king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept. And as he went, he said thus: “O my son Absalom—my son, my son Absalom—if only I had died in your place! O Absalom my son, my son!” (2 Sam. 18:33)
This is probably how the Heavenly Father mourns Satan.
Types of Anti-Christ
Just as it is difficult to observe the difference between God the Father and God the Son:
Jesus said to him, Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? (John 14:9)
I and My Father are one. (John 10:30),
compared with:
You have heard Me say to you, ‘I am going away and coming back to you.’ If you loved Me, you would rejoice because I said, ‘I am going to the Father,’ for My Father is greater than I. (John 14:28),
so it is difficult to observe the difference between Anti-father and Anti/Christ. Still, some finesses can be discerned. Just as the types of son were most often positive persons in a position close to a ruler (Daniel, Joseph etc), so Anti-son usually represents a negative person in a position close to a king. Let us take, for example, Haman Agagite from the Book of Esther:
After these things King Ahasuerus promoted Haman, the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, and advanced him and set his seat above all the princes who were with him. And all the king’s servants who were within the king’s gate bowed and paid homage to Haman, for so the king had commanded concerning him. But Mordecai would not bow or pay homage. (Est. 3:1-2)
The picture is complete if we take for granted that Haman descended from Agag king of the Amalekites (1 Sam. 15:32), as it says Jewish tradition. His life was spared by the king Saul, in spite of God’s will, but was killed the next day by the prophet Samuel. According to the Jewish tradition, Haman’s ancestor was conceived right in the middle of the night, presented to him by king Saul, all this reminding us strongly of the “mortall wound” (Rev. 13:3) that was, in this case, healed at the time of Persian king Artaxerxes (Ahasuerus), but just in order that he (i.e. Agag’s line) was crushed finally and definitely.
The fate of Haman and his sons represents an antitype (in a negative sense) of the fate Christ had to suffer together with the criminals on Golgotha. The next example of Anti/Christ could be Ahitophel, Absalom’s counselor, as well as Judas Iscariot, who both ended on a tree, but as traitors, negatives:
Now when Ahithophel saw that his advice was not followed, he saddled a donkey, and arose and went home to his house, to his city. Then he put his household in order, and hanged himself, and died; and he was buried in his father’s tomb. (2 Sam. 17:23)
We find the CHARACTER of Anti-Christ in the description of the Babylonian emperor:
Take up this proverb against the king of Babylon, and say:
How the oppressor has ceased, the golden city ceased!
The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers;
He who struck the people in wrath with a continual stroke, He who ruled the nations in anger, is persecuted and no one hinders.
The whole earth is at rest and quiet; they break forth into singing.
Indeed the cypress trees rejoice over you, and the cedars of Lebanon, Saying, ‘Since you were cut down, No woodsman has come up against us.’
Hell from beneath is excited about you, to meet you at your coming; It stirs up the dead for you, All the chief ones of the earth; It has raised up from their thrones All the kings of the nations.
They all shall speak and say to you: ‘Have you also become as weak as we? Have you become like us?
Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, and the sound of your stringed instruments; the maggot is spread under you, and worms cover you.’
How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations!
For you have said in your heart: ‘I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation On the farthest sides of the north;I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.’
Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the Pit.
Those who see you will gaze at you, and consider you, saying: ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms,
Who made the world as a wilderness and destroyed its cities, who did not open the house of his prisoners?’
All the kings of the nations, all of them, sleep in glory, everyone in his own house;
but you are cast out of your grave like an abominable branch, like the garment of those who are slain, thrust through with a sword, who go down to the stones of the pit, like a corpse trodden underfoot.
You will not be joined with them in burial, because you have destroyed your land and slain your people. The brood of evildoers shall never be named. (Isa. 14:4-20)
Just as Christ and his faithful people have an "iron scepter" (Rev. 19:15, 2:27) whereby they rule over pagans, so does the Babylonian ruler and his supervisors. Just as at Christ’s first coming many spiritually dead were converted, and the fate of many earthly princes was sealed in a negative sense, we have a similar situation, but in an opposite sense, at the fall of the anti-Christ.
Same as Christ did not dwell in the grave because he had given his soul for his people, so did anti-Christ, but in a quite different context – because he had destroyed his people.
While Christ humiliated himself, taking on a human form, even until the humiliating death on the cross, to be then exalted and sat at the right hand of Father, anti-Christ, because of desire do raise to the level of father (by his attributes, not by character) is thrown into “lowest depths of the Pit”.
Types of Anti-Holy Spirit
With respect to all God’s prophets representing types of Holy Spirit, all false prophets represent types of anti-holy Spirit. And since in Revelation, as we have already said, the false prophet is identified with the beast with two lamb horns that emerges from the earth, and thereby also with the anti-holy Spirit, our hypothesis of God’s prophets being a type of holy Spirit is thus confirmed. (Formally seen, a confirmation is not the same as a proof. Confirmation agrees with an assumption, while a proof shows unambiguously that the concerned hypothesis is correct.)
Since it is spiritual gifts that are associated with Holy Spirit, anti-spirit is linked to every kind of materialism. It can be recognized by the terms: money, salary, interest, to buy and to sell. Spirit of God glorifies Christ (John 16:14), while the other (anti-spirit) disdains him. Perhaps the most beautiful and complete description of the type of false prophet is given in the entire second chapter of Second Peter’s epistle:
But there were also false prophets among the people
By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words
But these, like natural brute beasts made to be caught and destroyed, speak evil of the things they do not understand, and will utterly perish in their own corruption, and will receive the wages of unrighteousness
having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls. They have a heart trained in covetous practices, and are accursed children. 15 They have forsaken the right way and gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness;
but he was rebuked for his iniquity: a dumb donkey speaking with a man’s voice restrained the madness of the prophet.
These are wells without water, clouds carried by a tempest, for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error. While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning. For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them. (2 Pet. 2:1-22)
On the basis of the cited and similar description from the Bible, we can obtain a picture of the main characteristics of the types of false prophet:
1. first, like Balaam the prophet (Num. 22:1-24:25), and also Simon the sorcerer (Acts 8:9-24), he deals with prophecies for money, for material interest;
2. secondly, like the locusts from Revelation (9:4-5), he is not permitted to deceive and inflict evil upon God’s people, "but just to the people ho have not God’s seal on their foreheads ", and
3. thirdly, despite the truth having been revealed to him, he returns to his usual practice because of his weakness for material gain.
PSYCHOANALYSIS AND THE BIBLE
Introduction
If the Bible is not a collection of a concocted stories and tales, and if man is created in the image of God, one of whose basic characteristics is triplicity of nature, and if even Satan’s kingdom is based on an anti-trinity, then the triplicity of human nature should be shown in man, too, regardless of his character, spiritual level, religious affiliation or nationality. I had known for a long time the elements of Freud’s psychoanalysis, especially the division of the psyche of every man into three subpersons: ID, EGO and SUPEREGO. However, on the one hand because of the language of the theory, which was complicated for me at the time, and, on the other hand because of the label of “godlessness” usually attached to Freud and his followers, psychoanalysis had long been for me just a theory on paper. My first revelation happened in 1994, when I read the book on Transactional Analysis - “How to Choose a Mate”, by Mavis Klein (this section being written under the direct influence of this book). As it is put by Eric Berne, the “father” of Transactional Analysis, in his book “What do you say after you say hello”, this direction in psychoanalysis has its roots in Freud’s teaching, but possesses a vocabulary “unique in precision, concision and lucidity, enabling even very little children to understand and use the profound psychological notions that elude the awareness of most people”.
The atheism of Freud, Berne and others can, actually, serve as an argument for their impartiality in the revelation of biblical truths, and by no means for their "godlessness" (Mat. 25: 34-40).
Elements of Transactional Analysis
On the basis of observations he made in his wide practice, Eric Berne (and company) noticed that all human beings have three basic common characteristics:
1. The complete "I" of every human being consists of separated lesser “I’s”, which are named EGO-STATES. These are our “I” that feels, our "I" that thinks and our "I" that believes.
2. The second peculiarity common to all human beings is the need for touch and care that we feel all our lives.
3. All human beings have an innate need for sense, i.e. to understand the world and human relationships in it, i.e. to understand the world and people around them as something that has its order and is more or less predictable, rather than something chaotic or unpredictable.
Our “I” that feels is called our Child ego-state, our “I” that thinks is called our Adult ego-state, and our “I” that believes is called our Parent ego-state.
Characteristics of ego-states
Our PARENT is our conscience. It cares, on the one hand, about us and other people, while on the other it likes to criticize and control. For the Parent, moral principles are above all else, and it often understands life in the sense of "righteous - unrighteous", "good - evil", "truth - lie". People of this type often look older than they are. They treat other people both educatively and protectively, and like to command. Other people obey or respect them, or angrily resist. Our Parent builds our opinions and system of valuation and ideas about life in general – our CHARACTER. On the basis of the data in our Parent, our character, we act automatically in certain situations, without any hesitation. A man without the Parent in himself has no feelings of shame, bad conscience, confusion or guilt, for these feelings are switched on when the Parent is activated. A good Parent cares and protects both himself and others, while a bad Parent is a PERSECUTOR who maintains his authority by fear and terror.
The ADULT is characterized by rationality and objectivity. People of this type are like “real computers with good databases”. They are clever, practical, well-informed, competent and intelligent conversationalists. Our Adult builds our intelligence and spheres of interest. The more skills and interests our Adult has, the less we depend on whether another gives us the care we need, and therefore we are more able to be satisfied with ourselves. A man without an active Adult goes to extremes in his feelings, unable to control himself. He tends to be extremely euphoric and a bit aggressive, or falls into total depression. A good Adult speaks the truth, while a bad one lies.
The CHILD reacts according to how it feels at the moment (it is impulsive). It is our biological, instinctive “I”, which is a bearer of the need for food, drink, touch and care. These needs cannot be satisfied without the Parent or Adult, whether one’s own or somebody else’s. The basic feelings of the Child are pleasure and pain, and the corresponding experiences of "good" and "bad". Through good contacts provided by our parents in certain situations, our Child acquires a system of PERMISSIONS, while through bad contacts it acquires a system of BANS (inhibitions). Permissions are acquired by the example of our parents and other authorities who give "messages" to our Child in this way, while bans are given mostly verbally. The more "permissions" we acquire in our education during childhood, the richer is our repertoire in expressing emotions, and the more often will we feel life as a joy. The system of bans determines the TYPE of an individual's personality. Child can be OBEDIENT OR DISOBEDIENT (spiteful) to his Parent, i.e. to the bans the latter imposes on it, i.e. it can be sensitive or insensitive, depending on whether it is selfish or unselfish. A man without an active Child is too serious and insensitive.
Trinity in Action
In a complete person, the “ego-states” can act independently or cooperatively with another ego-state. When cooperation is concerned, there are often impasses, i.e. temporary disagreements, which may turn into blocks ("contaminations"), or will be solved, usually with help of the third ego-state, or they are suppressed and become chronically repressed. An honest solution of some "desperate" situation can induce us either to change our judgment (correction of Parent) or to accept reality we cannot change (correction of Adult) or, less voluntarily, some our desires (correction of Child), which changes our functioning in daily life. The best solutions are obtained by equal COOPERATION of ego-states, not by blind obedience or disobedience.
The result of the cooperation of Parent and Adult is JUDGMENT. A block in this relationship causes INDECISIVENESS, which if not solved turns to chronic UNREST. An "honest" solution of this block can produce a correction of judgment (if the Parent is not right) or correction of thinking by the Adult, if it is not right. As a pseudo-solution of the block, indecisiveness can turn into either PREJUDICE, if an incorrect Adult is accepted, or into DECEPTION (which is a step toward doing evil – sin) if an incorrect Adult is accepted on the account of a negative correction of the Parent.
The result of the cooperation of Adult and Child are ALTERNATIVES. A block in this process produces STRUGGLE, which, if not solved, turns into chronic DESPAIR or DEPRESSION. An "honest" solution of this block can discover a new alternative (if the Child is right) or the rejection of Child’s desire, if it is not right. A pseudo-solution of the struggle can be ILLUSION (deception) if Child does not want to accept the reality of the Adult, or FRUSTRATION if the Child is deprived because of a false Adult.
Cooperation of Adult and Child results in COMPROMISE. A block in this process produces CONFLICT, which, if not solved, turns into chronic CONFUSION. An "honest" solution of this block produces giving in by either Parent or Child, depending on which of them is not right. A pseudo-solution of the conflict can be FRUSTRATION if a bad Parent is accepted or SIN if the greed of the Child is satisfied.
Decisions - the Essence of Our Being
Human FREEDOM is reflected in making decisions by our own will. On the basis of the "messages" of Parent and Adult and of the desires of the Child, we OURSELVES decide what to do. We decide whether we shall encroach a bit on our Parent (moral principle), to close our eyes at clear facts of the Adult, or permit our Child to enjoy freely, without taking care of others.
***
Persons in the Bible
On the basis of analysis of the persons described in the Bible, we shall see that a correspondence can be established between the trans- (psycho-) analytical trinity and the trinity described in the Bible, which, as we have seen, can be of divine or satanic type. The correspondence would, therefore, look as it is shown in the Table Tab. 3-2.
Type of Father
For Abraham, who, as we have observed, represents the type God-Father, it is written:
And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness. (Gen. 15:6)
Because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws. (Gen. 26:5)
Similarly, if we take also other examples of Father – Darius, Jephthah etc, we see that they are characterized by love, law and faith. Therefore, the correspondence can be established:
Good Parent (TA) – type of heavenly Father.
On the other side, if take the example of the pharaoh from the time of the exodus from Egypt, we find a disbelief that even today confuse many sincere researchers of Holy Scriptures. Even when his priest came to believe, we read:
Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart grew hard, and he did not heed them, just as the Lord had said. (Exod. 8:19)
Besides, although he gave the Israel nation permission to leave, pharaoh is not consistent like Darius, king of Medes and Persians:
Now it was told the king of Egypt that the people had fled, and the heart of Pharaoh and his servants was turned against the people; and they said, “Why have we done this, that we have let Israel go from serving us?”
So he made ready his chariot and took his people with him. Also, he took six hundred choice chariots, and all the chariots of Egypt with captains over every one of them.
And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the children of Israel; and the children of Israel went out with boldness. (Exod. 14:5.8)
Inconsistency is also a characteristic of Laban, Jacob’s father-in-law, who, like the dragon, lunged at God’s seed to destroy it:
and you have changed my wages ten times. (1 Moj. 31:41b)
or Herod who told one thing to mages, while intending to do quite another.
A good father imposes bans for he cares about the wellbeing of his every child, while an evil father does it for his selfish interests, thereby limiting the freedom of others.
Type of Son
The basic characteristic of the psychoanalytic Child is feelings. That is why the name of patriarch Isaac, (JITZHAK) who is a type of Christ, means in Hebrew: “he will laugh” (i.e. rejoice). And his son Jacob speaks emphatically about "fear of Isaac" (Gen. 31:42.53), as a sign of obedience to his father Abraham, even until very death, same as Jesus, despite the mental struggles in Gethsemane remained obedient to his Father:
But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave Me commandment, so I do. (John 15:31)
The Child in Jesus is compassionate:
When Jesus had said these things, He was troubled in spirit, and testified and said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, one of you will betray Me.” (John 13:21)
Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say? (John 12:27)
Therefore, when Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her weeping, He groaned in the spirit and was troubled. And He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to Him, “Lord, come and see.”
Jesus wept. (John 11:33-35)
It was only Child in Jesus that could shout:
Father, I thank You that You have heard Me. (John 11:41/b)
or say:
“Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Mat. 27:46)
Here we also see that Jesus' relationship to his father was not reduced to blind obedience, but to equal cooperation. When critical situations occurred, Jesus spent entire nights speaking with his Father
We see Jesus in Gethsemane in a “conflict” with his Father, which was solved "honestly" with Jesus’ agreement to drink his cup completely, i.e. he renounced the desires of his Child completely for a universal benefit.
On the other side, we have Haman Agagite, a type of anti-Christ, who also passes from one temper to another, but with a negative connotation:
So Haman went out that day joyful and with a glad heart; but when Haman saw Mordecai in the king’s gate, and that he did not stand or tremble before him, he was filled with indignation against Mordecai. (Esther 5:9, v. also 3:5)
We see further on that related to Haman are the terms characterizing the Child: "merry" (5:14), " mourning" (6:12), " terrified" (7:6).
Just as the Lord falls before his father to avoid the cup he had to drink, so Haman falls before Esther for the same reason (Esther 7:7).
Type of Spirit
Between the psychoanalytic honest Adult and Holy Spirit there is also a one-to-one correspondence. Just as the Adult, with his reason and intelligence, helps solve problems of the Child, so we read for Holy Spirit:
The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. (Isa. 11:2)
Just as the Adult helps the Parent to make right judgments, so:
And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. (John16:8)
Just as the Adult is unbiased, so, for example, prophet Nathan, a type of Holy Spirit, despite all his sympathy for king David, goes and reprimands him for his secret sin (2 Sam. 12), as if they had never known each other. Like the Adult which struggles to solve a conflict situation between Parent and Child, so Jacob, a type of holy Spirit, fought bravely with both God (i.e. the Father) and people (i.e. His children) and resisted.
Therefore Jesus’ words:
Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven men. (Matt. 12: 31)
we can actually translate as:
Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but closing eyes on clear proofs of Adult will not be forgiven men.
False Prophet
Just as bad data which the Child may get from the Adult produces later complications on a spiritual level, so through "liar and father of lie" a chaos entered our planet. Let us observe just that hidden transaction:
Has God indeed said? (1 Moj. 3:1)
Formally, the point is the transaction of the Adult of the serpent - the Adult of Eve, and essentially the “wise” Adult of the serpent targets the Child of Eve, in order to disrupt Eve’s Parent-Child relationship that still held thus far.
Just as the Adult under the influence of the Child creates illusions, which lead to disappointment or depression later on, so the false prophets, prophesying lies, lead Israel’s and Judas’ kings to ruin.
Bible – Key of Psychology
On the basis of the reflections presented in this part of the book, we can confidently say that the Bible is a key for understanding psychology.
While classical psychoanalysis is mainly oriented toward the negative characteristics of person (neuroses, psychoses etc), and classical psychology toward "ideal" persons (i.e. types of divine trinity), it is concluded here that all of us are, in reality, a mixture of both. The more we know our bad sides, the more shall we, with God’s help, get rid of them
Sigmund Freud, the “father of psychoanalysis”, a pessimist by nature, noticed mainly negative characteristics in men, and presented them through his famous trinity: ID, EGO and SUPER EGO. The transactional analyzers (Mavis Klein) were first to notice also positive traits in human character.
God’s and “Satan’s” Church
Now we shall have an opportunity to become familiar with very interesting types of Trinity and anti-Trinity.
The basic driving force of God’s kingdom is love, in other words the desire for good, desire that someone else shares our wellbeing, unselfishness, sacrifice in all its forms, from patience to "giving one’s soul for his friends". The basic driving force of the opposite side is a desire that SELF is “well”, well under quotation marks for it leads to evil. To be sure, as it is put by Scott Peck in his book “The Road Less Traveled”, unselfishness becomes extreme selfishness in extremis, for by doing good we grow spiritually, thus doing good to ourselves. Of course, the opposite also holds, since we degrade with our selfishness.
That every way toward good leads through suffering, i.e. some form of sacrifice, is a cruel reality. Even the Lord himself is not exempt from it. We refine ourselves with suffering and sacrifice, while other “shortcuts” always function at the expense of somebody else. Thereby we actually break our spiritual progress, imposing it on the other:
Woe to the world because of offenses! For offenses must come, but woe to that man by whom the offense comes! (Matt. 18:7)
Satan’s Church
For (we) all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23)
As the main representatives of the Satanic trinity on the earth here are cited: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. What is the matter? All these institutions actually represent political/religious institutions that “shook” the history of the Earth (especially of the Holy Land) in the past couple of thousand years. All of them, under a pretext of "piety", actually pursue some of their personal interests. Differently from Divine Trinity that is united and exists in love and mutual respect (John 15:10 etc), Satan trinity exists thanks to mutual hatred and enmity. It is only when they need to unite with another against the third side, that two members of this trinity can make something like an alliance, which has happened several times in history and to which we bear witness even today. While God works through love by building inner man, Satan always works through selfish interests by building institutions, through which he achieves his goals.
Judaism
As it has been said in the Gospels several times, the Jews of Jesus’ time called themselves children of Abraham, who is, as we have seen, a main representative type of God Father. From him (father) both Christianity and Islam emanated. However, similarly to the king of Tyre, Judea became conceited concerning their origins, disdaining all other nations. Like the red dragon from Revelation, so, in the frame of Judaism, Herod Edomite (Edom = red) sought to kill the just born Messiah, while the Jews themselves persecuted bloodily the just born Christian church. Once "heavenly people", bearers of God’s truth, they were thrown to the earth at the time of the Roman Empire.
Today, as well as during former centuries, a satanization of the Jews is actual. Whenever plague or some other epidemic broke out in Europe during the Middle Ages, the Jews were the culprit “on call”. Since the plague did not spread to their ghettos because they held to the hygienic rules prescribed by Moses’ books, they were accused as initiators of the pestilence and, as a rule, encountered pogroms. When the Jews are mentioned today, as a rule the associations occur to masons and similar organizations, “The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion”, etc.
Christianity
From the church of Christ’s persecuted followers, Christianity turned into a persecuting organization, which defended Christ’s rights by “fire and sword”, agreeing to all possible compromise on a spiritual level just in order to grab secular rule and respect. The well known history of Papacy testifies to the level to which the organization that calls itself VICARIVS FILII DEI (deputy of God’s son) descended. Similarly to Haman Agagite from the Book of Esther, papacy does not choose means to force peoples to obedience. Just as Christ preached for three and half years, so this force was also given three and half prophetic years (3, 5 x 360 = 1260 years) to show its character. If the typology of Haman Agagite is faithful, anti-Christianity is to issue a (hypocritical) decree similar to that written in Septuagint’s variant of the Book of Esther.:
The great King Ahasuerus writes to the satraps of the hundred and twenty-seven provinces from India to Ethiopia, and the governors subordinate to them, as follows:
When I came to rule many peoples and to hold sway over the whole world, I determined not to be carried away with the sense of power, but always to deal fairly and with clemency; to provide for my subjects a life of complete tranquillity; and by making my government humane and effective as far as the borders, to restore the peace desired by all men.
When I consulted my counselors as to how this might be accomplished, Haman, who excels among us in wisdom, who is outstanding for constant devotion and steadfast loyalty, and who has gained the second rank in the kingdom,
brought it to our attention that, mixed in with all the races throughout the world, there is one people of bad will, which by its laws is opposed to every other people and continually disregards the decrees of kings, so that the unity of empire blamelessly designed by us cannot be established.
Having noted, therefore, that this most singular people is continually at variance with all men, lives by divergent and alien laws, is inimical to our interests, and commits the worst crimes, so that stability of government cannot be obtained,
we hereby decree that all those who are indicated to you in the letters of Haman, who is in charge of the administration and is a second father to us, shall, together with their wives and children, be utterly destroyed by the swords of their enemies, without any pity or mercy, on the fourteenth day of the twelfth month, Adar, of the current year;
so that when these people, whose present ill will is of long standing, have gone down into the nether world by a violent death on a single day, they may at last leave our affairs stable and undisturbed for the future.” (Septuagint, Esther, chapter 3.)
This decree reminds much of the account of Daniel, who because of disobeying the LAW of Medes and Persians had to go to lion pit. On the other hand, it also reminds of the verse in revelation:
He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. (Rev. 13:15)
Islam
Islamic theologian use the following ayet (verse), from Islamic holy book Qur’an:
[61.6] And when (Prophet) Jesus, the son of Mary said: 'Children of Israel, I am sent to you by Allah to confirm the Torah that was before me, and to give news of a Messenger (Prophet Mohammad) who will come after me whose name shall be Ahmad.' Yet when he came to them with clear proofs, they said: 'This is clear sorcery.' (Qur’an, ES-SAFF 61:6)
as an evidence that Jesus had prophesied Mohammad’s arrival on the stage of the struggle of good and evil. Here is clearly recognized Jesus’ message written in the Gospel (Injil) by John:
And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever— the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you. (John 14:16-17.26).
This just shows how Mohammad had a superficial knowledge of the New Testament writings. The following citation from the book by Walter Beltz, “Sehnsucht nach dem Paradies” (“Longing for paradise”), explains how a blunder could have occured that the immortal person of Divinity, which we cannot feel by our senses but only in its effects (John 3:8), is replaced with an earthly mortal:
It is quite possible that the Prophet did not know the Gosopel according to John, but only a vulgar-christian notion about outpouring of Holy Ghost, being that it’s Greek term PARAKLETOS in border parts of Christian world could be changed to PERIKLYTOS, which corresponds to Arabian AHMED = praise-worth. It is just from this verse (ES-SAFF 61:6) that Islamic sects even today hope that Ahmady should come after the prophet Mohammad (=praised).
Thus, similarly to the founder of famous Manichean heresy Mani (III c. A.D.), Mohammad ascribes to himself the role of PARAKLETOS. On the basis of previous considerations, it can be unambiguously said that Mohammad as a prophet really represents a type of spirit, and it is not by chance that he is so related to Holy Spirit. Moreover, the Qur’an is a book of a psychoanalytic Adult which relies on intellect so that the sintagma “clear proof(s)” is mentioned in more then twenty places (even the chapter 98 has the name “The Proof” /Al-Bayyina/):
[3.184] If they belie you (Prophet Mohammad), indeed other Messengers before you were belied who came with clear proofs, and the Psalms, and the Illuminating Book.
[4.174] O people, a proof has come to you from your Lord, and We have sent down to you a clear light.
[6.57] Say: 'I am upon a clear proof from my Lord, yet you belie Him. I do not have that which you seek to hasten; judgement is for Allah alone. He narrates the truth and He is the Best of deciders.'
[6.104] Clear proofs have come to you from your Lord. Whosoever sees clearly it is for himself, and whosoever is blind, it is against himself. I am not an overseer for you.
[47.14] Is he who has clear proof from his Lord to be compared to him whose evil deeds are made to seem fair to him, so that they followed their desires?
It is indisputable that Mohammad has characteristics of Holy Spirit. Namely, he reprimands for sin (idolatry and disregard of diet and hygiene with Christians, greed etc.), he points to the Doomsday and God’s just judgment. He also points to the second Christ’s coming, and the events described in the Old and New Testament. (Tevrath and Injil). He points to justice, mercy and faith as basic elements of piety (Matt. 23:23).
Just because "mercy" is one of the main characteristics of Qur’an and Islam in general, we could equal the orthodox Muslims by their character with "merciful Samaritan" (Luke 10:29-37), and the relationship of Christian and Muslims corresponds pretty much to the relationship of the Jews and Samaritans of Jesus’ time. Holding to the rules of Qur’an, Muslims did not disturb Christians during Arab domination. Moreover, many Christians welcomed the Arab army as liberators from the tyranny of "Christian" (Byzantine) emperors. Islam is tolerant toward other religions, and it was not until the Crusaders who ravaged Moslem countries, that Moslem-Christian antagonism started. But Christians, as individuals, still had guaranteed some personal rights.
Besides, while the mediaeval Christianity estranged God from ordinary people by clerical hierarchy and the system of saints, Mohammad’s Allah is linked directly to every man.
However, it is the fact that there are some verses in Quran, like those cited above, which are poorly interpreted or are really of a doubtful value. So, for example, the symbolism of the sacrifices in the Old Testament and Jesus Christ as their fulfillment is overlooked completely, and even Jesus’ death on the cross is denied:
[4.157] and for their saying, 'We killed the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger (and Prophet) of Allah.' They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but to them, he (the crucified) had been given the look (of Prophet Jesus). Those who differ concerning him (Prophet Jesus) are surely in doubt regarding him, they have no knowledge of him, except the following of supposition, and (it is) a certainty they did not kill him.
[4.158] Rather, Allah raised him up to Him. Allah is Almighty, the Wise. (Qur’an, EN NISA 4:157-158)
Moreover, unknown are elementary characteristics of the person of Jesus Christ, his Divinity and preexistence, although his supernatural conception is not denied:
[3.42] And when the angels said to Mary: 'Allah has chosen you and purified you. He has chosen you above all women of the worlds.
[3.43] Mary, be obedient to your Lord, prostrate and bow with those who bow.'
[3.44] This is from the news of the unseen. We reveal it to you (Prophet Mohammad). You were not present when they cast their quills to see which of them should look after Mary, nor were you present when they were disputing.
[3.45] When the angels said: 'O Mary, Allah gives you glad tidings of a Word (Be) from Him, whose name is Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary. He shall be honored in this world and in the Everlasting Life - and he shall be among those who are close.
[3.46] He shall speak to people in his cradle and when he is aged, and shall be among the righteous.'
[3.47] 'Lord,' she said, 'how can I bear a child when no human being has touched me?' He replied: 'Such is the Will of Allah. He creates whom He will. When He decrees a thing, He only says: "Be," and it is.
[3.48] He will teach him the Book, the Wisdom, the Torah and the Gospel,
[3.49] to be a Messenger to the Children of Israel (Qur’an, The Family of 'Imran - Aali 'Imran 3:42-49)
Allah is not one who sympathizes, but an insensitive God who just commands what must be obeyed, willy-nilly. This illustrates the characteristics of an insensitive Adult from Transactional Analysis. According to Mohammad, Allah uses the “method of stick and carrot”. The infidels and those who do not kill on Allah’s path deserve hell (Gehennem, i.e. GE HINOM /= valley Hinom/ in Hebr.). The descriptions of gehennem, exceed even the most horrible horror movies:
[44.43] The food of the Zakkum tree
[44.44] shall be the food of the guilty sinners.
[44.45] Like molten copper boiling in the belly
[44.46] as the boiling of the hot water.
[44.47] 'Seize him and drag him into the center of Hell.
[44.48] Then pour the punishment of boiling water over his head. (Qur’an)
But the faithful deserve paradise (Jennet, i.e. GAN /= garden/ in hebr.) with wonderful "virgins untouched by either jinn or man " and tasty foods and drinks. The bodily enjoyment will be infinite:
[44.51] Indeed, for those who feared (Allah) is a secure place
[44.52] amidst gardens and fountains,
[44.53] dressed in silks and brocade, set face to face.
[44.54] As such, We shall wed them to wide-eyed houris (the virgins of Paradise).
[44.55] There in security, they will call for every kind of fruit.
[44.56] There they shall not taste death, except the first death, and He will shield them from the punishment of Hell,
[44.57] as a bounty from your Lord. That will be the mighty triumph.
while according to Jesus’ words:
Jesus answered and said to them, “You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.” (Matt. 22:29-30)
Further on, like the Christian of that period, Mohammad’s Allah is God who fights for world domination, differently from:
Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here.” (John 18:36)
Beside all the above listed, we could say that the nonexistence of typological structures, which like a woof goes through the entire Bible, is perhaps the main argument against Qur'an's inspiration.
Earthly Anti-Trinity
In conclusion, we can say that the main type of anti-trinity on the earth represented by:
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Despite the obvious differences between the members of this trinity, we find some common characteristics whereby they are, anyway, distinguished from the divine:
1. Salvation means to belong physically to a religious community. In other words, the individual's spiritual relationship to God is put in the background, and the stress is put, in Nietzsche’s words, on belonging to the same “flock” where believers feel safe. The priests (i.e. rabbis, imams etc) are those charged with the relationships with the Most High, while the role of others is reduced to blind obedience to their “holy” will.
2. The relationship to God, if any, is reduced to rituals. According to Berne and other analysts of transactions, rituals represent a type of superficial (but not useless), auxiliary, introductory relationship between persons, different from a sincere, open and close relationship. It is clear that if our interpersonal relationships are also reduced to rituals, those relationships do not exceed a level of mere acquaintance, while a sincere relationship is a characteristic of true friendship. That is why we find in the Gospels that Jesus call his pupils FILOI (= dear friends, John 15:14), while he addresses Judas in the moment of treachery with HETAIRE (= "comrade" Matt. 26:50).
Even prayer, which should be the most close, most intimate relationship to the Lord, is reduced to pronouncing some ritual formulas.
3. All these, we can say, world powers began their action as, if nothing, destroyers of the basic principle of Satan’s kingdom – the law of desintegration (i.e. the second law of thermodynamics, the law of growth of entropy /entropy = disorder, chaos/), but went on fitting well in it.
In the first place we have Jews again, who began as God’s "promised" nation, the nation through which God gave his scripture, and went on to be killers of their Messiah and prosecutors of his followers.
In the second place are Christians, who began voluntarily giving their lives in the name of Christ, and just go on taking others’ lives “in the name” of the same Christ.
Finally we have Islam, which began as a force that demolished idolatry at last, and introduced science and reason (type of Holy Spirit) into the superstitious Christian world of the time, and then went on to be one of the most primitive world institutions (absence of Holy Spirit).
All this reminds me of the notion of three-phased current in electrical engineering. While the spiritual fall of Judaism (on Golgotha, about 31 AD.) meant the birth of Christianity, and the spiritual fall of Christianity (VII century) meant the birth of Islam - the physical fall of Islam (siege of Wienna) meant a resurrection of so-called Christian powers, while the fall of papacy (French Revolution) meant resurrection of Judaism as a world power.
All this hints that no one of these powers can be dyed black or white only, which we shall prove in the following lines.
God’s Church
God’s church is presented symbolically in Revelation, as a basic type, i.e. archetype, and represents all God’s people, including angels and other beings, if they exist, lamb’s bride, whose head is Christ himself. However, the premonition of that type of woman can be already felt here on the earth.
Let us start from the description of the bride of lamb, the real God’ church given in revelation:
Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of twelve stars. (Rev. 12:1)
The sun is a symbol of Christianity. The day of the sun (Sunday) has been chosen as a day of rest and blessing. The calendar is purely solar.
The moon is a symbol of Islam. The day of prayer which turned into the day of rest today, has been moved a day back from God’s day. The calendar is purely lunar.
The star (MEGEN DAVID) is a symbol of Judaism. The day of rest is between Friday and Sunday. The calendar is lunar-solar.
And shall intend to change times and law (Dan. 7: 25)
Table 4-1 helps us to identify even more easily the said powers. Each of these powers has introduced a calendar too, especially the day of rest, by a kind of legal decree.
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|
Symbol |
Day of rest |
Calendar |
|
Judaism |
STAR |
SABBATH |
LUNI-SOLAR |
|
Christianity |
SUN |
SUNDAY |
SOLAR |
|
Islam |
MOON |
FRIDAY |
LUNAR |
|
Table 4-1. Tabular presentation of the symbols and time signs of three main world religions. |
Sabbath as the seventh day has been introduced by the Lord himself at creation (Gen. 2: 3), which was confirmed within Ten God’s Commandments pronounced on Mt. Sinai about 2500 years later (Exo. 20: 9-11). These things are similar with lunar-solar calendars and holidays (Gen. 1: 14-18, Exo. 12: 2, see section CALENDARS and BIBLE).
The solar calendar was introduced by legal decrees of Roman emperors (first Julius Caesar, in 45 BC, then pope Gregory VII in 1582), as well as observing the first day of the week (emperor Constantine issued on March 7 321 AD the famous edict about observing "the honorable day of the sun"), despite the Christians also gathering on that day to commemorate Christ’s resurrection.
Mohammad introduced a purely lunar calendar to Islam a few years before his death, having introduced Friday as a day of prayer, a bit earlier..
Comment
There may be no hope for human race, but there is chance for individual members of it. (Eric Berne, Games people play)
Trinity is realized not only through persons, but also through sociological categories. As we have seen with persons, that they are a mixture of divine and anti-divine (lest we reduce again all to Satan), in a proportion known solely by the Lord, and whose premonition is felt in some places in the Bible, so it is with earthly human communities. Even the apostolic church was not ideal.
The difference between the level of spirituality of a person and of a social institution lies in the fact that we find in all institutions people striving for positions, and therefore they therefore represent an easy prey for the forces of evil. An individual person is more able to struggle and rely on the Lord. That is why Satan is called prince of this world.
The Lord is by Whose providence Judaism, Christianity and Islam have been created. Satan is he who governs Judaism, Christianity and Islam. And God has his children in Judaism and Christianity and Islam. When they are with the Lord, the Jews are the head of the church. They have given the Messiah himself and his first pupils (apostles). When against the Lord, they are first with Satan. It was only from Judas that the Messiah could have emanated. It is only from Judas that Judas, Annas and Caiaphas, traitors and killers of Messiah, could have emanated. In modern history, we have such "good-evil" mixture of prominent individuals: Marx, Einstein, Trotsky, Freud...
Many wonder why there are so many “religions”, especially today, when we have a multitude of various sects and subsects. Every denomination, despite its negativities, stresses some specific dimension of “piety”. In the first place we have Judeans, who stress the Law written in Moses’ books, having forgotten its essence and imposing, like an austere and intolerant father, rules of all kinds:
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. (Matt. 23:23)
After them Christians come, as an antithesis to the Jews. They try to make as many differences as possible from the Jews, even at the cost of paganism. Thus we obtain a paganism painted by christianism. The form given by the Lord to his people is rejected, with the rationale that it is purely Jewish, and the stress is on what is “the weightier” - Christ. However, we are witnesses ourselves that even “the weightier” gets its form finally: priests, temples, seventh day and the system of holidays, being a mixture of the Jewish with the pagan. As a matter of course the Roman, purely solar calendar of time, was accepted. Soon we see that, similarly to the Jews, who, little after the solemn declaration of commandments on Mount Sinai and their promise of loyalty, seeing that Moses delayed coming down from the mountain made a golden calf and proclaimed it to be their redeemer (Exod. 32:1), so also Christ’s church, having seen that Christ had not come for his people for long been, introduced a system of saints as its redeemer and vicars before God.
As a synthesis, or rather compromise, or even a link between Judaism and Christianity, Islam appears. Thus we have it that Muslims, so-called adversaries to Christianity, in many points stick to the Bible and Christ even more that Christians. Islam also preaches morality and belief in one holy God, but here also they entered spiritual changes reflected in their calendar and system of holidays.
All that happens in the world happens according to God’s providence and is beneficial to God’s people, for it serves their spiritual perfection. We all serve sometimes one force, and sometimes the other. The Bible contains many examples confirming even the most faithful God’s persons served as Satan’s tools at some time - from David, Moses’ sister Mary, to the apostles, Peter and especially Paul. On the other side, God sometimes used even such people as the prophet Balaam, and even Judas Iscariot, who, along the other apostles, healed and practiced exorcism. Therefore, each of these "monotheistic" groups has some dimension of spirituality, which the others miss. It is ideal, of course, to contain all that is positive, but that is, naturally, very hard for sinful human beings to realize.
It is hard to determine which of the cited types has greatest advantage – it depends on individual characteristics, but it can be said with certainty that the “ideal” can be obtained by a synthesis of the positive sides of institutions, even including those that are not cited here. It must be repeated that every institution, despite all its negative characteristics, has, according to God’s providence, some positive sides missed by the others.
The above-mentioned trinity serves as an example of Satanic, i.e. God’s trinity on the earth. All other peoples, too, as nations, outline characteristics of some of the Satanic trinity, and, as individuals, of the Divine trinity as well. Outside this, there is no choice. It is not accidental, for example, that the dragon is a symbol of Chine, or the sun the symbol of Japan, stars of America, or, let us say, even the wreath of stars, the symbol of European Union, etc.
All this reveals to us an encouraging fact that, regardless in which “satanic” environment we live, we have opportunities to achieve a similarity to God, but all this also warns us not to justify our misses through our environment. Neither must we identify a man with the environment in which he lives, whatever it be.
While Satan, the prince of this world, occupied with politicized institutions, through which he achieves his goals, God, on the other hand, works on building the inner man:
For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them. (Matt. 18:20)
Southern Slavs – Type of (Anti)Trinity
We (I mean: Serb, Croats and Moslems who now calls themselves Bosnian) are a marvelous example of the realization of trinity (unfortunately, much more of the evil than the good one) on a sociological level. In order to understand it, we first must reconcile ourselves with some “obvious” facts.
The present Serbs, Croats and Muslims are descended from one people that inhabited the Balkans at the time of the migration of peoples, in the second half of the first millennium of our era, and certainly mixed with the peoples that had been there previously. This is confirmed first of all by the same language (of course, here the newly composed, synthetic Croat language in the time of Pavelic and Tudjman is neglected), and practically the same surnames, and then also historical data (which are, unfortunately, of little relevance, since the Balkans has been for a long time a “hot” international theme, so that even the most relevant domestic as well as foreign scientists cannot remain unbiased.)
The division of that people into three present peoples derives from the three types of religion. This is confirmed by many data about catholicizing of the orthodox part of that people in Dalmatia, Slavonia and Krayina, as well as more rare opposite cases (Croat duke Branimir became Catholic in IX century, which ensued a great celebration in Vatican). The most drastic example is our Muslims, whose origin is generally known, but still recognized by only a minor proportion of them.
On the basis of our previous consideration of a representative type of satanic and God’s church, it is easily concluded that Croats (catholicized southern Slavs are a type of anti-son mixed with a little of Son, and Muslims (islamicized southern Slavs are) a type of false prophet mixed with a little of true prophecy. The greatest problem is with Serbs (orthodox southern Slavs). Why should they represent a type of anti-Father mixed with little Father (i.e. the same type as Jews)?
However, let us peer a bit into the terminology of the Serbs. It is, beyond doubt, burdened with notions like justice and injustice (remember “God of justice” - Serbian national hymn, “unjust sanctions”), truth and lie, faith and unfaith etc. This is, to be sure, a positive terminology, terminology of Father, but the point is that the Serbs allot these terms mostly to themselves. They call themselves “heavenly nation”, “the most ancient nation” etc. Only the Serbs out of the three groups of peoples founded an association of friendship with Jews (type of Father and anti-Father). And on the other side, it is only with Serbs that the name Zmaj (i.e. dragon) is glorified. The similarities are also visible when history is observed. Just as the Jews betrayed their Messiah, so the Serbs betrayed their leader (Karadjordje) for “it is expedient that one man should die for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish.” (John 11: 50). Just as the Jews had the prophet Daniel, second man in Babylonian (and later Persian) kingdom, who protected their interests at the imperial court in the period of Babylonian (and later Persian) bondage, so the Serbs had grand vizier Mehmed Pasha Sokolovics (alias, Mehmed Sokollu, who was the right hand of Süleyman the Magnificent), who provided them with great privileges during the Turkish occupation. Interestingly, both Daniel and Mehmed had been taken forcibly while child from their homeland to ocupant's court.
Just as the murder of the heavenly heir to the throne (Jesus Christ) justified the open war of heavenly and satanic forces on a cosmic scale, when the Jews were expelled from their homeland, so the murder of another heir to the throne (Franz Ferdinand) was a justification for the first global conflict on the Earth, when the Serbs were forced to emigrate from their homeland (here this heir to the throne could be rather compared with Anti-Christ, especially taking into account his resurrection in the form of another Austrian - Adolph Hitler). Just as the resurrected Christ sent his Spirit from heaven in the form of fire to the Judean capital, so this resurrected Anti Christ sent (napalm) bombs on the Serbian capital. Strangely enough, after the first World War Turk occupational forces were expelled from Paslestine, while after the II World War (which was just the continuation of the first) the Jews get their state (after two milleniums of longing for it).
Just as Biblical Canaan (usually named wrongly as "Palestine") represents literally a holy land for the Jews, so Kosovo does for the Serbs. Just as the Jews were expelled from the center of their physical and spiritual life, so were the Serbs from Kosovo. Just as the Muslims inhabited and multiplied in Canaan, so it was with Kosovo. Just as the Jews migrated again to the Holy Land, so the Serbs wish to go to Kosovo. Just as muslims in Near East use overreproduction as a war tactics, so it is in Kosovo. Both Kosovo and Canaan are presently considered to belong to the most critical conflict foci on entire Earth.
Croats are a maritime nation, and submitted to strong Catholicism in order to defend themselves from the older brothers from the south at the time of duke Branimir in IX century. Similarly to Babylon, where a confusion of languages took place, here also, strange, to say the least, linguistic exhibitions are made (Croats often insist on domestic expressions, making most strange compound words), with the intention to differ themselves from Serbs.
Same as Catholics expelled Jews from Spain on 9th Av (August 2) 1492, so the Croats expelled the Serbs from Krayina on 9th Av (August 5) 1995, except those who remained loyal.
Muslims are followers of the "great prophet", and can have a double origin. They descend from Bogumils (descendants of Manichean sect, sharing with Islam several common characteristics), who were changeable when endangered (remember how Kulin ban compromised when threaten by Hungarian army, differently from, for example, Czech protestants who resisted for long the attacks of the far superior army of united Catholics). Or they derive from their orthodox or catholic brethren who get Islamized for some material, earthly interest (property, life and even woman).
Examples and Morals
Adam and Eve
When God created Adam, he brought before him animals so that he named them. Thereafter, the Child in Adam felt sorrow, melancholy, because he had not an appropriate match like the animals had (Gen. 2:20). Since "a broken spirit dries the bones" (Pro. 17:22), God had to react immediately, creating a life companion for him. With the creation of Eve, the situation changed drastically. Although one rib was taken from him, Adam did not protest or complied, but in his delight sang the first song in the history of mankind:
This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” (Gen. 2:23)
The following critical situation occurred when the Lord determined for Adam a repertoire of edible foods, and deprived him of the tree of knowledge of good and evil:
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Gen. 2:16-17)
Therefore we have here the transaction Parent (God) - Child (Adam), with support from Adult, who warns of consequences. The Adult had a crucial role here, maintaining the potential conflict between the desires of the Child and the limitation by the Parent.
However, when Eve approached the fatal tree, a false Adult enters the scene in the form of the serpent:
Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’? (Gen. 3:1)
This is a typical example of a composite transaction. At first glance, the Adult of the serpent asks the Adult of Eve for ordinary information, but actually the "sophisticated" Adult of the serpent targets the fragile Child of Eve: "Then, could God be such?", and then it inserts the false information:
You will not surely die. (Gen. 3:4),
mixed with a little of truth:
For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. (Gen. 3:5)
We have a hidden transaction again. It looks like the Adult of the serpent gives the Adult of Eve “new” information, but, in essence, it targets the already disrupted Adult-Child relation in Eve, this having been, as is visible everywhere around us, a "bull's-eye".
Real People in the Bible and outside It
Real people in the Bible are, as we could feel premonition of from the previous discussion, predominantly types of some person of the trinity, whether divine or satanic. So we obtain six main types of men. However, differently from the persons from ”Hagiographies”, who are faultless saints or incarnation of Satan, biblical persons are a mixture of those types. Thus, even with the most spiritual persons (except Jesus), we see also their “satanic” traits.
So we have David, a model of faithfulness, who spent almost his entire youth fleeing from the apostate king Saul. But this very David, in a critical moment, became himself a persecutor, adulterer and murderer
Then we have Mary, Moses’ sister, used by the Lord as a means to spare baby Moses. This very Mary, later on, grumbled and opposed her brother, so that she deserved leprosy.
What to say for apostle Paul? With him, indeed, we have an opposite case. He first was a persecutor, then even an apostle, but it changes nothing. He showed his true face during the whole of his life.
We could even take it as a measure of faithfulness and similarity with God:
How much are we in our lives with the Lord, and how much with Satan?
People usually say, "Eh, I'll just do this, and then I will surrender to the Lord." However, we are also what we were before that surrender. The more time we have spent with the Lord in our lives, the more we are similar to him. The Lord receives us, even if we surrender on our deathbed. However, we have lost the blessings prepared for us by the Lord before our deathbed, too.
God also receives us when we sin and then repent. However, we lose by our sin the blessings he wishes to deliver to us. How many were slaves in Babylon and Persia? And how many remained faithful, like Daniel and his friends? What about those who bowed to idols, ate unclean food, and then “bitterly” repented in themselves?
They all are, of course, saved. But, on the other hand, NO ONE of them was bestowed the blessings received by Daniel and his friends!
In my opinion, hidden here is the main problem of justification by faith!
People are obsessed with their salvation, i.e. how to please God in order to get eternal life. God, of course, also accepts such a motivation for rebirth. However, He prefers those obsessed with salvation of the others, and with his holiness they ponder, day and night, not for some interest, but for attractiveness, refined beauty and sublimity, all of which are related to God’s true character.
How to Acquire Intelligence?
The Bible gives wonderful examples showing us how to acquire the gift of Holy Spirit (i.e. Adult or intelligence). The best examples are probably Joseph and Daniel as well as the Lord Jesus himself.
In the book of the prophet Daniel we see a gradation of spiritual gifts received by the prophet. At the beginning (chapter 1), Daniel shows faithfulness in a "trifle", holding to health reform, and encouraged his three friend to do the same. As a result we read:
As for these four young men, God gave them knowledge and skill in all literature and wisdom; and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams. (Dan. 1:17)
Therefore, all were rewarded, and Daniel, as an initiator, was also given an ability to understand dreams. Later on, on the basis of the gift of interpretation of dreams (certainly of faithfulness too), Daniel was elevated to be the second person in the kingdom, just next to the king. We find a similar thing with Joseph (Gen. 39 - 41). Since he refused to commit sin to the Lord (Gen. 39:7-23), Joseph gets the ability of interpretation of dreams, and then, on that basis, rule over all of Egypt:
And Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find such a one as this, a man in whom is the Spirit of God?” Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Inasmuch as God has shown you all this, there is no one as discerning and wise as you. You shall be over my house, and all my people shall be ruled according to your word; only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you.” And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt.” (Gen. 41: 39-41)
The cited events can help us to discern the notions of justification by faith and justification by deeds, mentioned in apostles’ epistles, and even more by theologians during all the history of Christendom. Both Daniel and Joseph had the faith in God they received from their parents. But the faith was not of a theoretical character; it occupied their complete beings, and as such it had to be in conflict with the environment. Remaining faithful, even in the hardest circumstances (with their deed), they acquired wisdom, advantage and even rule over the environment. It is God’s gift, and maybe a heavenly law.
Neither Daniel nor Joseph knew which gifts awaited them. They remained faithful for reasons of principle, not for some gain. Here is hidden the main difference between salvation by faith and salvation by deeds. Our deeds that result from faith are rewarded according to heavenly laws. Our deeds that do not result from faithfulness, knowledge of God and love (but from greed or any other base motive) remain fruitless.
We have quite a opposite situation with Adam and Eve. They did not remain faithful concerning the fruits from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and therefore lost spiritual gifts and also their rule over the Earth.
The most representative example of a positive application of the cited law we find in the case of the Lord himself. After his resurrection, he said:
And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.” (Matt. 28:18)
If we take into account that all following epithets are actually gifts of Holy Spirit (v. Is. 11:2), we understand the fullness of the gift received by our Lord on that occasion:
Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing! (Rev. 5:12)
Amen
Updated:
January 2006
December 2007