www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Scripture and Patristic Writings Reincarnation of Elias?

The name Elias and Elijah, are the same. Elias was Elijah. The two names are used here by the translators, but both names refer to Elijah of the Old Testament.
Jesus used the personality, character, and representation of Elijah (Elias), to emphasize the importance and mission of these two great prophets. Especially how important John the Baptist was in likeness of fullfilling prophcy.
And the coming of this person, that would be an Elijah type forrunner for the Messiah's coming, who was Jesus.

Alex...

It appears that you do not have any direct personal experience with Fromm and you are giving us someone else�s mistaken opinion. Have you, yourself, read any of his books and if so - which?

I would be happy to discuss the apophatic character of Fromm. His book The Art of Loving is required reading in some seminaries. Anti-Christian? That is a laugh! He does at times give high praise to the Catholic church and he is definitely anti-fundamentalism - for some that would equal anti-Christian.


My "The Orthodox Myth" may just as well be "The Roman Catholic Myth" but it may be a few days as I have been very busy here with other things.

-ray

Dear RayK,

I read all the published works of Fromm, several times, and taught two university courses on his thoughts.

I have never said he was "Anti-Christian."

Fromm inspired me into sociology and my doctorate is based on a number of his perspectives.

It is you who are passing judgement on me before knowing all the facts.

Please ask me what my background and educational level is before making wrong and nasty assumptions that are untrue.

Fromm was not a Christian, period. He was not anti-Christian. There is much that we can take from his works that is positive.

Alexander Roman, BA, MA, PHD

Oh no. Hold on. Teaching it is not. It is just my opionion.

-ray

Now hold on� don�t be pinning on me what is shadows in your own head.

You were particularly nasty to me - again.

I am not denying that Christ will literally come again.

I am denying a fundamentalist and literarily interpretation of that event as popularly based upon a literal and fundamentalist interpretation of the book of the Apocalypse - as it if told of future geo-historical events to be played out at some future date - or anything similar to that effect. Please refer to the start of this thread called �Reincarnation of Elias?� to refresh yourself on the subject of this thread.

I AM saying that the mode in which He will come should not be taken as to be in the same public and historical way as he did already before he was crucified. I do deny a fundamentalist interpretation of a �Second Coming� in that way.

I do believe that his coming is in a way similar to the mystical marriage - but the individual�s reaction to it will be according to that individual�s conscience. I do believe that his �coming again� is primarily a perennial revelation for the individual human, and a universal event outside of time - for humanity as a whole. We can go to it voluntarily (cooperation with Providence now) or it will be forced our upon our consciousness us later in a judgment at death. After death time does not have the same meaning that it does now.

I understand it not to be taking place within history (a certain day, a certain hour, a certain location) but it will be beyond and outside of history. A spiritual event during the mystical marriage (not a physical event) and all we can say is it will be an event to our consciousness after death. Exactly what that means I am not dead certain except that if someone came to me and said �Hey - have you heard - Jesus came again last Thursday and we are going to the Mount of Olives to meet him.� I shall not go - and I would sell my plane ticket to you.

It is a matter of historical record that, throughout most of the church�s history, there has been two modes of interpretation of the Apocalypse, regarding if it speaks of the form and historical events of Christ�s �Second Coming� and that a fundamentalist interpretation of it, in a milleniarist fashion or variations, has been denied by the Church Council. Yet - it is consistently interpreted that way by many church members of both Orthodox and Catholic. Refresh yourself by reading the first few messages of this thread where it is discussed that Elias would be re-incarnated at some future date preceding the Second Coming - according to certain verses of the Apocalypse. Since I deny that Elias will be re-incarnated - and you say I deny 200+ years of church tradition - shall we understand that you claim a belief in re-incarnation is - church tradition??

On other matters you mention�

I do deny that there is any -intrinsic- infallibility to the opinions of early church fathers and I do deny that a majority consensus alone, and without Council, makes for infallibility of a consensus.

The differing opinions and arguments, political intrigues, and even violence against each other on the part of many of the early bishops of the church - including some of these we often call fathers - is a matter of historical record. That unjustified excommunications were issued - is a matter of record.

I would not have minded it if you had tried to poke holes in my posts - or taken me on with a civil attitude. But waiting to get to a boiling point of indignation before you burst on the sense with self-righteous accusations of �heresy� and the other insinuations - is YOUR anger problem - you mistake anger for indignation - and anger throws shadows across your mind.

This is the last time I waste my time talking with you.

No Cheers.
-ray

Dear Ray,

To opine in an intelligent manner on something of substance, publicly, while people are listening, is, in my book, teaching. Anyway, that is what one of the bishops told me recently (and he didn't tell me to stop ).

With love in Christ,
Andrew

My apologies. Having been recently accused of some very nasty stuff - I was on the defensive and too quick to interprate your words and jump to the defense of the good man Fromm. He is one of the great Jewish philosophers - in my book.

Moses - Moses Maimonides - and Fromm.

Please accept my apologies.

I myself do not interpretrate Fromm�s humanism as a desire to be the type of human God has designed us to be and wants us to be. A �state� which I also would describe much more in apophatic terms and attainable at our own human level by our active love of others. We can not ascend to God by our own human power but we can ascend to what is best in human nature through our own human powers. And that human love, to be real love, must be tied to reality and untied from our own immature psychological needs and physical wants.

Fromm�s underlying theme in all his books is - The Art of Loving. He presents that we can remain immature and seek security by trying try to return to the womb of nature that we knew as children (where love = others love me) or we can go forward into the liberty and freedom of love is = I love others.

Fromm speaks from his field, human psychology, and concerns himself with what we as humans have within our power to do. What God may or may not do - is not his bailey-wick. His subject is what we as humans have within our ability to attain on a human level.

In typical Jewish ways - probably due to the famous rabbis he studied under - Fromm spends very little time in defining God - but plenty of time in exposing the many ways in which we humans turn a concept of the living God into an idol, personally and historically, and are very willing to put violence on others in order not to have our security and our idol disturbed. Fundamentalism is not isolated to Islam or the killing of Jesus but has always been a struggle within Christianity too. A prime example is in the mistaken interpretation of the Apocalypse and the persistence of a Second Coming in terms of that literal and fundamentalist misinterpretation. I will readily admit that the narration initially lends itself to that type of interpretation is one is not well versed in Jewish context surrounding Daniel and Ezekiel (the two main prophetic books dealing with the coming of the Son of Man to Israel (which the Apocalypses makes extensive use of) and so a literal interpretation of future historical events is quite natural as a first impression. Enough of that subject. I close my part in that subject.

Your familiarity with him and being inspired by him may be that intuitive reason what I have often said I liked something about you.

I offer you my public apology.

Like you - I do not agree 100% with everything he proposes across the board - but I do think the main theme of symbiotic union is very insightful.

I would like to browse your writing on Fromm - is that possible?
-ray

My final post on the subject of the reincarnation of Elias and the false interpretation of the Apocalypse. I have added brackets [ ] and italic in some instances for context and clarification. For anyone who cares to do their own research into the mind of the Church.

On Reincarnation - from the Catholic Catechism.
1013. "Death is the end of man's earthly pilgrimage, of the time of grace and mercy which God offers him so as to work out his earthly life in keeping with the divine plan, and to decide his ultimate destiny. When 'the single course of our earthly life' is completed,[LG 48 # 3.] we shall not return to other earthly lives: 'It is appointed for men to die once.'[Heb 9:27 .] There is no 'REINCARNATION' after death."


St. John of the Cross commenting upon Paul in the epistle to the Hebrews in which Paul tells that there is only one public revelation of Jesus Christ within time and human history.
�In giving us his Son, his only Word (for he possesses no other), he spoke [past tense] everything to us at once in this sole Word [one and only occasion of God the Father publicly �speaking� his Son] - and he has no more to say . . because what he spoke before to the prophets in parts, he has now spoken all at once by giving us the All Who is His Son. Any person questioning God or desiring some vision or [further] revelation would be guilty not only of foolish behavior but also of offending him, by not fixing his eyes entirely upon Christ [that has already been revealed in his human nature] and by living with the desire for some other novelty.�

(((It is clear that Paul and St. John are saying that God the Father will NOT be �speaking� the Word - again - within public history. All was said. All was revealed. No new revelations of the Word (Jesus) to come into the normal human sense perception of public history. ray)))


The Catholic Catechism on the same subject
73 God has revealed himself fully by sending his own Son, in whom he has established his covenant for ever. The Son is his Father's definitive Word [complete and final]; so there will be no further Revelation after him [his time on earth].

On Infallibility and to the exclusion of any supposed infallible majority consensus of early church fathers outside of proper church councils
100 The task of interpreting the Word of God [the transfigured and resurrected Jesus Christ] authentically has been entrusted solely to the Magisterium of the Church, that is, to the Pope and to the bishops in communion with him.

On a concept of a �Second Coming� within public history
667 deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope [his coming] which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgment. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism�

On Second Ecumenical Council - binding on Catholic�s and Orthodox - to the addition to the creed of the words �and of his kingdom there shall be no end.� in order to counter the idea that the kingdom of God has yet to be established at some future date in history[/b]
The original Greek Cannons of this council have been lost but written commentary on the proceedings and comments on the cannons adopted do exist. It is clear from the existent commentaries that "chiliasm" (milleniarism based upon a future and further revelation of Jesus Christ into public history) was condemned and the words �and of his kingdom there shall be no end� were added to the creed to indicate that the kingdom was already fully established with the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is nothing further to establish and that kingdom (the person of Jesus Christ) still exists and shall not end nor need re-establishing nor be perfected at some future date.

On Matt 24 which is mistaken for a Apocalyptic �coming� accompanied by geo-historical events yet to take place at some future date in history when Jesus will be revealed, again, in his human nature to the public again

Matthew 23:36
I tell you the truth, all this will come upon this generation.

Matthew 24:34
I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.

Clearly - whatever the �mode� of this �coming� - Jesus said it would happened within the life time of those then living.. This �coming� WAS his own arrest, trial, crucifixion and resurrection by which God the Father made public and historical revelation of Jesus as being - the Son of God.

From the Catholic Catechism regarding Tradition.
Tradition is to be distinguished from the various theological, disciplinary, liturgical or devotional traditions, born in the local churches over time. These are the particular forms, adapted to different places and times, in which the great Tradition is expressed. In the light of Tradition [the great Tradition], these traditions can be retained, modified or even abandoned under the guidance of the Church's Magisterium.

((The Magisterium is NOT subject to either local traditions or even the �great Tradition�. Tradition (either local or �great) is subject to the Magisterium - as its author.

On the progressive development and maturing of understanding the faith - Catholic Catechism
66 "The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation [beyond and outside of public history] of our Lord Jesus Christ." Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries."

(((Does our understanding of the items of faith change?? Yes I think it does if we are interested in it - to make it our own - our earlier understanding should mature and become more explicit in meaning.. maturing from what we first understood them in shallow and fundamental ways into a deeper and more robust meaning. If we understand the faith in the same way as we understood it when we were children - we remain immature in our faith. We are passing the time or relying on a set of rules we fulfill in order to fell secure.


On the question of: Can we can know the transfigured and resurrected body of Jesus Christ? if he were to come a second time into public history?
Paul claims we can not know, while in our unrestricted bodies, the resurrected and transfigured (no longer figured to our human senses as the common human body we are normally used to) - at all. �We do not [can not] know what we shall be like but we know [when it takes place] that we shall be like him [his own transfigured body].

The Catholic Catechism comments of the how� of it taking place and how it will be.
1000 This �how� exceeds [is beyond our ability to know] our imagination and understanding. It is only accessible by faith.

And on the other hand the Church claims that Jesus, in his glorified body - has never left here - that it should return here. "I am with you always."

((We can not sense it, we can not imagine it, and we can not understand it. Any notion we may imagine for it - is not it. If we imagine a human form but with supernatural powers - this is not it. It shall not be like that. Anything our imagination pictures for us has no likeness to it. Any knowledge of the transfigured and resurrected human nature of Christ is totally NOT within the capability of our senses, understanding, or imagination. So niter are we able to senses, understand, or imagine - the current transfigured human nature of Jesus Christ. It is impossible to know him in some imagined future date of a further public appearance. ))


And lastly - it seems to me that the "end of the world" Jesus talks about - takes place at the moment that the kingdom of God begins within us. The "end of the world" does not bring Jesus with it - but at anythime Jesus comes - he occations the end of the worldly ways and the beginning of the Kingdom of God. A perrenial revealation if you will. I have already said that the world ends for us - most porofundly - in two ways. In the mystical marriage - and at the moment of death.


My last post on the subject.
-ray

Alex... I am serious - I would like to read your views on Fromm. There are somethings about Fromm that do perplex me.

-ray

Dear RayK,

I apologise as well - I'm sorry, I have been jumped on lately as well!

Actually, I was a Fromm "groupie" like some people are Marxists, Freudians etc.

I never really wrote to comment on Fromm's work, but only quoted him extensively as an authority in my academic stuff.

For me, Fromm was a mentor and guide and he was the final authority to settle things for me. I would often compare questions with what he wrote or said etc.

He did, at one point, say that we "should never submit to Christ God" or words to that effect and it was at that point that I finally parted company with his thought, and it was at that point as well that I began to view him more critically.

Toward the end of his life, I do believe he became very mystical and grew especially fond of Meister Eckhart (who has, as you know, been rehabilitated by the Church).

My own sociological perspective is oriented, I like to think, by Fromm who had a much more positive view of Catholicism than Protestantism as he expressed in his Sane Society, I believe.

I am sorry that you are sometimes not appreciated here or feel you are under attack.

You are a scholar with penetrating views and the fate of such in history has sometimes been to be labelled a "heretic."

In any event, God bless you.

Alex

Alex...

I was not aware. And it is hard to tell how he meant that. No matter. What was good in Fromm we maintain.

Like leaves in the street - these words are here today and gone tomorrow. That is my frustration. Perhaps I am sensitive about it. Once I cool - I think to myself - what in me distrurbed my peace? that I could not just chuckle on the nasty worods and move on. Sometimes this board gets - to important - when it is not.

I would like to corrospond with you privately. But I did not find your email address. I believe I have something for you which you have wanted to understand - for a long time.

I don't mean to sound esotric. You seem to have all the nessesary background - that I might show you the structure of the first four narrations of Genesis. It is an ennead. If we have sucess you will be reading Genesis much better than Eckhart, Augustine, or Miaimionides.

That is - if you are interested.

Mine is rkaliss1@cox.net

-ray

LT,

John is to Elias (Elijah) as Jesus is to Eleseus.

There are two major traditions in the John-Jesus relationship: (1) the second-born son and (2) the carrying on of the power of Elias.

Until Abraham, the first-born son held an important position in relationship to his Father. After Abraham, the second-born son seemed to always take privy to that privilege. Jesus, in relationship to the first-born, John, assumes the privilege. Their conceptions, and later births, are competitive. The Infancy Narratives portray their stories side by side. We hear later how John was to recede while Jesus grew in stature and power, akin to Elias handing over his power to Eleseus.

Jesus was second-born on in the typological sense, seeing how he was the First-born son of God in the real sense.

The first part of the Gospels have many direct connections to the book of Genesis: Genealogies, first-born vs. second-born, competition between �brothers,� and miraculous births with women who were barren or virgin. Other typologies such as Jesus being the New Moses is also reflected in the parallel infancy narratives between the two.

I wouldn�t think that John was actually a �reincarnation� of Elias, even though he is described as such, but like Jesus, is based on a typology of Elias, a separate historical figure from a different time.

Joe Thur

Dear RayK,

I've been away for a while so I'm sorry to get back to you so late (we're in an eLection up here, you know).

I'll get back to you on your kind offer after things have settled following the eLection.

Alex

Ray
I suggest that you read the Catholic Catechism 676 in the light of what follows, namely 677 the Church it is true does and rightly so condemn "any form of millenarianism" or "secular messianism.
However at the end of time known only to God, God's triumph over the revolt of evil will take the form of the Last Judgement after the final cosmic upheaval of the passing world.
681
"On the Judgement Day at the end of the world Christ will come in glory to achieve the definitive triumph of good over evil which, like the wheat and the tares, have grown up together in the course of history.

The Church has always taught a personal and historic return of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior and at the same time it has condemned any crass millenarianism as to the establishment of an earthly kingdom.To teach otherwise is heresey.

Stephanos I

However at the end of time ...

the Last Judgment after the final cosmic upheaval of the passing world ...

On the Judgment Day at the end of the world Christ will come in glory ...


My dear Stephanos, thank you for your civil ways. My next flippancy is not meant personally but is meant to jar you a bit so you can see what you are looking at but missing the meaning of.

What part of �at the end of time� do you not understand?

End. Gone. No more. Done. Not within it. Outside of it. After it is gone, finished, no more.

What part of �after� do you not understand?

After the final upheaval of the passing world means - after the world has past. Gone. Done. Finished. No more.

What part of �end� do you not understand.

At the end of the world - gone, done, finished, is no more.

All these quotes reiterate my stance that this return does not take place -within- our experience of time - but rather outside of time when time has ended. For the return to be within history it must take place within time (where history is made).

May I further aide you in the biblical meaning of a few words used here - because that is our (not yours alone) problem. We automatically assume these words are used as they would be used today - and they are not - they are used in the biblical sense which is pinned to the time and the cultures in which they were first used.

There are two meanings of the world �world� of the Greek and the Hebrew. Neither of these uses have a meaning of a physical place - as we use the word today. Both meanings have to do with the governing of creation - and not the creation or created things themselves.

The first Greek word that has been translated to the one English word �World� means creation governed by fate and necessity. This meaning is probably closest to our meaning of today in that it indicates �the way the creation seems to work� as a mechanical thing - run by its own laws - and devoid of the reality of God�s providence. It is what later philosophy has called �necessity�. Early philosophy called it �fate� and destiny. This - is the �world� which will come to an end. Let us for the sake of clarity call this �world-A� for now.

The second word that is also translated to the single English word of �world� means the governing of creation by God. It is what we generally call �Providence� today. This is the �world without end� that we pray �Glory be to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be - world without end.� Let us for the sake of clarity call this �world-B� for now.

Both - are specifically - human experiences. The Hebrew language is a language based upon human experience. Our later use of language after the 17th century began to shift away from being defined by human experience into a objective language devoid of human experience.

We either experience the world (the way things work) as being driven by laws and physics and mechanical necessity (world-A) or we can experience the way the world works as all things and events being directed by God (world-B).

Our progress in sanctification - is a movement from world-A to world-B. It is a change in the way we - experience - creation.

When we die physically - time ends. Because time does not exist outside of human experience. Time - IS - a human experience. And experience tied to the body (in association with body nature).

The Hebrew term �Judgment Day� of �day of judgment� or simply �the day� (it is referred to in several similar ways in the prophets) means and undefined and un-dated - moment. The word �day� itself, in biblical Hebrew means �Now� - this moment - now.

�If today you hear his voice - harden not your hearts� - if we use the use of the word �today� in the modern sense we may thing �Today is Monday - if I hear his voice at any hour of today - I should not harden my heart. So I will wait and see if I hear his voice at any time today.� The REAL meaning and a better translation would be �If, at any moment of �now� - you hear his voice - harden not your hearts�. Another way to say it would be �If you now hear his voice harden not your hearts�. To the Hebrew the meaning of this is - the experience - not the �day�. The only time indicated by this line is - right here right now.

The �day� of Judgment is then - an experience. An experience in the �now�. When that experience is - now - it is here. By understanding it in this way you can now understand that there is no date and no �time� associated with it. And you can understand why Jesus said we can not know a date and time for it - because - there is no date and time - to it. When it is here in our experience of it - it is - Now!

Do you see?

�To teach otherwise is heresy�

It is a good thing that the authority of the church has reserved for herself (in the cannons of both East and West) both the determination and the declaration of heresy. This makes all other opinions - void. In her cannons she alone may do this on a case by case and person by person basis. She has also made a distinction between error and heresy. While I may be in error - I am not in heresy until the authority of the church may determine and declare me to be.

We (you and I) who are outside of the authority of the church and do not have the power to apply the steps of her cannons - are free to say to someone else �you are wrong - you are in error� but we are not free to declare anyone else to be in heresy. And it may yet be that we - have misunderstood - an in saying �you are in error� it is we who are in error.

Heresy must - be tied to a person. It is an act of a person�s -will- tied to a doctrine or teaching. It exists only after - the church has officially demanded the person cease - and the person continues. The teaching itself is - error. It is the willful defiance of direct church authority by a member of the church - that can be heretical and -his- teaching (meaning being done by him) as heresy.

For example - while the current teachings of the Protestant Churches - may be in error - they are no longer heretical for the simple fact that they are not being dome by members of the Catholic Church who are acting in defiance of a direct declaration to cease.

I may be in error - and you may be in error - but neither of us have been investigated by the church and have refused to cease by a direct and personal request of church authority - neither of us may be heretics or in heresy or teaching heresy.

I think I am right and I think you have subconsciously assumed that the �end of time� takes place - before - time ends. I think you assume time to be something other than a personal and human experience only had within the body.

The experience of world-A (fate, necessity, the governance of the creation without Providence) can only be had �within� the body. When we die and that association with the body is cut or changed - world-A - can not be had anymore. The �veil� is lifted and we see that world-B was all that ever really existed (God was always the governing of creation). World-B was all that ever really was - it was reality. And world-B was an illusion on our part.

The �end days� (moments) began in history when Christ was crucified and resurrected (his coming) in as much as the Church was born (the holy spirit given to the first Christians). When ever Jesus or the Holy Spirit is with us or �in� us - the end days are - here - in a personal way. The �end of world-A� is happening and will be culminated in our mystical or spiritual marriage to Jesus - which personal event is preceded by the event of the Dark Night that spiritual writer�s describe. In as much as the concept of daily Providence has been forgotten and the path of spiritual transformation as described by the church�s Doctors has also been forgotten - not many people know what this means anymore. Nor do they know that it is the prime event that the church calls us to - something that should take place within this life - but will be forced upon us after death.

Before death - it can be voluntary on our part. After death - if we had not been well along voluntarily (before death) then it will be involuntarily done - and that - will hurt like hell (pun intended). When �time� and world-A are gone - world-B will be all there is. And it will be according to the personality that we developed (either with or without God) that will be our condition for time-without-time (eternity).

Note to that whenever Jesus uses the words �life� and �death� he seldom if ever is referring to the state of the body but rather to the state of the soul. In the Hebrew (I do not know about the Greek) there are three words that we translate to the one English word of �death�. I do not remember the third but the first means �death� of an animal nature (the body) and the second means a dead soul without vital spiritual life (and your body can still be alive while in this). Note that Jesus and his disciples differed on what it meant that Lazareth had �died�. Jesus finally gives in and uses it their way only when they refused to look at the definition of death - his way.

Lastly the term 'glory' is nothing we can expereince with any of the senses of the body. It means a spiritual and governing power. In a practical and human way it means "all things working out in our favor" as opposed to having difficulties and troubles. When applied to Jesus in this way it means the same thing as being "at the right hand of the Father" and it means to be entirely united to the will of God which will is the governing of Providence. A thing - outside of our sense perception and having nothing to do with a - body.

Do you now see what a danger and what damage it would do to the purpose of the church (to spread the gospel) if God did not reserve the declaration of heresy and heretic - to the authority of the church and had given it to us??

Thank you for the discussion. It forced me to examine and think which probably did me more good than I did anyone else.


-ray