the Mysteries was imbedded in the popular religion of the Jews.
Christianity arose out of Judaism. We need not therefore be surprised
at finding engrafted on Judaism, together with Christianity those
mystical ideas which we have seen to be the common property of Greek
and Egyptian spiritual life. If we examine national religions, we find
various conceptions of the spiritual; but if, in each case, we go
back to the deeper wisdom of the priests, which proves to be the
spiritual nucleus of them all, we find agreement everywhere. Plato
knows himself to be in agreement with the priest-sages of Egypt when
he is trying to set forth the main content of Greek wisdom in his
philosophical view of the universe. It is related of Pythagoras that
he travelled to Egypt and India, and was instructed by the sages in
those countries. Thinkers who lived in the earlier days of
Christianity found so much agreement between the philosophical
teachings of Plato and the deeper meaning of the Mosaic writings, that
they called Plato a Moses with Attic tongue.
Thus Mystery wisdom existed everywhere. In Judaism it acquired a form
which it had to assume if it was to become a world-religion.
Judaism expected the Messiah. It is not to be wondered at that when
the personality of an unique initiate appeared, the Jews could only
conceive of him as being the Messiah. Indeed this circumstance throws
light on the fact that what had been an individual matter in the
Mysteries became an affair of the whole nation. The Jewish religion
had from the beginning been a national religion. The Jewish people
looked upon itself as one organism. Its Jao was the God of the whole
nation. If the son of this God were to be born, he must be the
redeemer of the whole nation. The individual Mystic was not to be
saved apart from others, the whole nation was to share in the
redemption. That one is to die for all is founded on the fundamental
ideas of the Jewish religion.
It is also certain that there were mysteries in Judaism, which could
be brought out of the dimness of a secret cult into the popular
religion. A fully-developed mysticism existed side by side with the
priestly wisdom which was attached to the outer formalism of the
Pharisees. This mystery wisdom is spoken of among the Jews just as it
is elsewhere. When one day an initiate was speaking of it, and his
hearers sensed the secret meaning of his words, they said: "Old man,
what hast thou done? Oh, that thou hadst kept silence! Thou thinkest
to navigate the boundless ocean without sail or mast. This is what
thou art attempting. Wilt thou fly upwards? Thou canst not. Wilt thou
descend into the depths? An immeasurable abyss is yawning before
thee." And the Kabbalists, from whom the above is taken, also speak of
four Rabbis; and these four Rabbis sought the secret path to the
divine. The first died; the second lost his reason; the third caused
monstrous evils, and only the fourth, Rabbi Akiba, went in and out of
the spiritual world in peace.
We thus see that within Judaism also there was a soil in which an
initiate of an unique kind could develop. He had only to say to
himself: "I will not let salvation be limited to a few chosen people.
I will let all people participate in it." He was to carry out into the
world at large what the elect had experienced in the temples of the
Mysteries. He had to be willing to take upon himself to be, in spirit,
to his community, through his personality, that which the cult of the
Mysteries had heretofore been to those who took part in them. It is
true he could not at once give to the whole community the experiences
of the Mysteries, nor would he have wished to do so. But he wished to
give to all the certainty of the truth contemplated in the Mysteries.
He wished to cause the life, which flowed within the Mysteries, to
flow through the further historical evolution of humanity, and thus to
raise mankind to a higher stage of existence. "Blessed are they that
have not seen, and yet have believed." He wished to plant unshakably
in human hearts, in the form of confidence, the certainty that the
divine really exists. One who stands outside initiation and has this
confidence will certainly go further than one who is without it. It
must have weighed like a mountain on the mind of Jesus to think that
there might be many standing outside who do not find the way. He
wished to lessen the gulf between those to be initiated and the
"people." Christianity was to be a means by which every one might find
the way. Should one or another not yet be ripe, at any rate he is not
cut off from the possibility of sharing, more or less unconsciously,
in the benefit of the spiritual current flowing through the Mysteries.
"The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost."
Henceforward even those who cannot yet share in initiation may enjoy
some of the fruits of the Mysteries. Henceforth the Kingdom of God was
not to be dependent on outward ceremonies: "Neither shall they say, Lo
here! or, Lo there! for, behold, the Kingdom of God is within you."
With Jesus the point in question was not so much how far this or that
person advanced in the kingdom of the spirit, as that all should be
convinced that that kingdom exists. "In this rejoice not, that the
spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names
are written in heaven." That is, have confidence in the divine. The
time will come when you will find it.
VIII
THE LAZARUS MIRACLE
Amongst the "miracles" attributed to Jesus, very special importance
must be attached to the raising of Lazarus at Bethany. Everything
combines to assign a prominent position in the New Testament to that
which is here related by the Evangelist. We must bear in mind that St.
John alone relates it, the Evangelist who by the weighty words with
which he opens his Gospel claims for it a very definite
interpretation.
St. John begins with these sentences: "In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the word was a God.... And the Word was
made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, a glory as of
the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
One who places such words at the beginning of his narrative is
plainly indicating that he wishes it to be interpreted in a very deep
sense. The man who approaches it with merely intellectual
explanations, or otherwise in a superficial way, is like one who
thinks that Othello on the stage really murders Desdemona. What then
is it that St. John means to say in his introductory words? He plainly
says that he is speaking of something eternal, which existed at the
beginning of things. He relates facts, but they are not to be taken as
facts observed by the eye and ear, and upon which logical reason
exercises its skill. He hides behind facts the "Word" which is in the
Cosmic Spirit. For him, the facts are the medium in which a higher
meaning is expressed. And we may therefore assume that in the fact of
a man being raised from the dead, a fact which offers the greatest
difficulties to the eye, ear, and logical reason, the very deepest
meaning lies concealed.
Another thing has to be taken into consideration. Renan, in his _Life
of Jesus_, has pointed out that the raising of Lazarus undoubtedly had
a decisive influence on the end of the life of Jesus. Such a thought
appears impossible from the point of view which Renan takes. For why
should the fact that the belief was being circulated amongst the
populace that Jesus had raised a man from the dead appear to his
opponents so dangerous that they asked the question, "Can Jesus and
Judaism exist side by side?" It does not do to assert with Renan: "The
other miracles of Jesus were passing events, repeated in good faith and
exaggerated by popular report, and they were thought no more of after
they had happened. But this one was a real event, publicly known, and
by means of which it was sought to silence the Pharisees. All the
enemies of Jesus were exasperated by the sensation it caused. It is
related that they sought to kill Lazarus." It is incomprehensible why
this should be if Renan were right in his opinion that all that
happened at Bethany was the getting up of a mock scene, intended to
strengthen belief in Jesus. "Perhaps Lazarus, still pale from his
illness, had himself wrapped in a shroud and laid in the family grave.
These tombs were large rooms hewn out of the rock, and entered by a
square opening which was closed by an immense slab. Martha and Mary
hastened to meet Jesus, and brought him to the grave before he had
entered Bethany. The painful emotion felt by Jesus at the grave of the
friend whom he believed to be dead (John xi. 33, 38) might be taken by
those present for the agitation and tremors which were wont to
accompany miracles. According to popular belief, divine power in a man
was like an epileptic and convulsive element. Continuing the above
hypothesis, Jesus wished to see once more the man he had loved, and the
stone having been rolled away, Lazarus came forth in his grave-clothes,
his head bound with a napkin. This apparition naturally was looked upon
by every one as a resurrection. Faith knows no other law than the
interest of what it holds to be true." Does not such an explanation
appear absolutely naïve, when Renan adds the following opinion:
"Everything seems to suggest that the miracle of Bethany materially
contributed to hasten the death of Jesus"? Yet there is undoubtedly an
accurate perception underlying this last assertion of Renan. But with
the means at his disposal he is not able to interpret or justify his
opinion.
Something of quite special importance must have been accomplished by
Jesus at Bethany, in order that such words as the following may be
accounted for: "Then gathered the chief priests and the Pharisees a
council, and said, 'What do we? for this man doeth many miracles'"
(John xi. 47). Renan, too, conjectures something special: "It must be
acknowledged," he says, "that John's narrative is of an essentially
different kind from the accounts of miracles of which the Synoptists
are full, and which are the outcome of the popular imagination. Let us
add that John is the only Evangelist with accurate knowledge of the
relations of Jesus with the family at Bethany, and that it would be
incomprehensible how a creation of the popular mind could have been
inserted in the frame of such personal reminiscences. It is,
therefore, probable that the miracle in question was not amongst the
wholly legendary ones, for which no one is responsible. In other
words, I think that something took place at Bethany which was looked
upon as a resurrection." Does not this really mean that Renan surmises
that something happened at Bethany which he cannot explain? He
entrenches himself behind the words: "At this distance of time, and
with only one text bearing obvious traces of subsequent additions, it
is impossible to decide whether, in the present case, all is fiction,
or whether a real fact which happened at Bethany served as the basis
of the report that was spread abroad." Might it not be that we have to
do here with something of which we might arrive at a true
understanding merely by reading the text in the right way? In that
case, we should perhaps no longer speak of "fiction."
It must be admitted that the whole narrative of this event in St.
John's Gospel is wrapped in a mysterious veil. To show this, we need
only mention one point. If the narrative is to be taken in the
literal, physical sense, what meaning have these words of Jesus: "This
sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of
God might be glorified thereby." This is the usual translation of the
words, but the actual state of the case is better arrived at, if they
are translated, "for the vision (or manifestation) of God, that the
Son of God might be manifested thereby." This translation is also
correct according to the Greek original. And what do these other words
mean, "Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he
that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live"? (John
xi. 4, 25). It would be a triviality to think that Jesus meant to say
that Lazarus had only become ill in order that Jesus might manifest
His skill through him. And it would again be a triviality to think
that Jesus meant to assert that faith in Him brings to life again one
who in the ordinary sense is dead. What would there be remarkable
about a person who has risen from the dead, if after his resurrection
he were the same as he was before dying? Indeed what would be the
meaning of describing the life of such a person in the words, "I am
the resurrection and the life"? Life and meaning at once come into the
words of Jesus if we understand them to be the expression of a
spiritual occurrence and then, in a certain sense, literally as they
stand in the text. Jesus actually says that He is the resurrection
that has happened to Lazarus, and that He is the life that Lazarus is
living. Let us take literally what Jesus is in St. John's Gospel.
He is "the Word that was made flesh." He is the Eternal that existed
in the beginning. If he is really the resurrection, then the Eternal,
Primordial has risen again in Lazarus. We have, therefore, to do with
a resurrection of the eternal "Word," and this "Word" is the life to
which Lazarus has been raised. It is a case of illness, not one
leading to death, but to the glory, _i.e._, the manifestation of God.
If the eternal Word has reawakened in Lazarus, the whole event
conduces to manifest God in Lazarus. For by means of the event Lazarus
has become a different man. Before it, the Word, or spirit did not
live in him, now it does. The spirit has been born within him. It is
true that every birth is accompanied by illness, that of the mother,
but the illness leads to new life, not to death. In Lazarus that part
of him becomes ill from which the "new man," permeated by the "Word,"
is born.
* * * * *
Where is the grave from which the "Word" is born? To answer this
question we have only to remember Plato, who calls man's body the tomb
of the soul. And we have only to recall Plato's speaking of a kind of
resurrection when he alludes to the coming to life of the spiritual
world in the body. What Plato calls the spiritual soul, St. John
denominates the "Word." And for him, Christ is the "Word." Plato might
have said, "One who becomes spiritual has caused something divine to
rise out of the grave of his body." For St. John, that which took
place through the life of Jesus was that resurrection. It is not
surprising, therefore, if he makes Jesus say, "I am the resurrection."
There can be no doubt that the occurrence at Bethany was an awakening
in the spiritual sense. Lazarus became something different from what
he was before. He was raised to a life of which the Eternal Word could
say, "I am that life." What then took place in Lazarus? The spirit
came to life within him. He became a partaker of the life which is
eternal. We have only to express his experience in the words of those
who were initiated into the Mysteries, and the meaning at once becomes
clear. What does Plutarch (_vide supra_ p. 26 _et seq._) say about the
object of the Mysteries? They were to serve to withdraw the soul from
bodily life and to unite it with the gods. Schelling thus describes
the feelings of an initiate:
"The initiate through his initiation became a link in the magic chain,
he himself became a Kabir. He was admitted into an indestructible
association and, as ancient inscriptions express it, joined to the
army of the higher gods" (Schelling, _Philosophie der Offenbarung_).
And the revolution that took place in the life of one who received
initiation cannot be more significantly described than in the words
spoken by Ädesius to his disciple, the Emperor Constantine: "If one
day thou shouldst take part in the Mysteries, thou wilt feel ashamed
of having been born merely as a man."
If we fill our souls with such feelings as these, we shall gain the
right attitude towards the event that took place at Bethany, and have
a peculiarly characteristic experience through St. John's narrative. A
certainty will dawn upon us which cannot be obtained by any logical
interpretation or by any attempt at rationalistic explanation. A
mystery in the true sense of the word is before us. The "Eternal Word"
entered into Lazarus. In the language of the Mysteries, he became an
initiate (_vide_ p. 132 _et seq._), and the event narrated to us must
be the process of initiation.
Let us look upon the whole occurrence as though it were an initiation.
Lazarus is loved by Jesus (John xi. 36). No ordinary affection can be
meant by this, for it would be contrary to the spirit of St. John's
Gospel, in which Jesus is "The Word." Jesus loved Lazarus because he
found him ripe for the awakening of "the Word" within him. Jesus had
relations with the family at Bethany. This only means that Jesus had
made everything ready in that family for the final act of the drama,
the raising of Lazarus. The latter was a disciple of Jesus, such an
one that Jesus could be quite sure that in him the awakening would be
consummated. The final act in a drama of awakening consisted in a
symbolical action. The person involved in it had not only to
understand the words, "Die and become!" He had to fulfil them himself
by a real, spiritual action. His earthly part, of which his higher
being in the Spirit of the Mysteries must be ashamed, had to be put
away. The earthly must die a symbolic-real death. The putting of his
body into a somnambulic sleep for three days can only be denoted an
outer event in comparison with the greatness of the transformation
which was taking place in him. An incomparably more momentous
spiritual event corresponded to it. But this very process was the
experience which divides the life of the Mystic into two parts. One
who does not know from experience the inner significance of such acts
cannot understand them. They can only be suggested by means of a
comparison.
The substance of Shakespeare's _Hamlet_ may be compressed into a few
words. Any one who learns these words may say that in a certain sense
he knows the contents of _Hamlet_; and logically he does. But one who
has let all the wealth of the Shakespearian drama stream in upon him
knows _Hamlet_ in a different way. A life-current has passed through
his soul which cannot be replaced by any mere description. The idea of
_Hamlet_ has become an artistic, personal experience within him.
On a higher plane of consciousness, a similar process takes place in
man when he experiences the magically significant event which is bound
up with initiation. What he attains spiritually, he lives through
symbolically. The word "symbolically" is used here in the sense that
an outer event is really enacted on the physical plane, but that as
such, it is nevertheless a symbol. It is not a case of an unreal, but
of a real symbol. The earthly body has really been dead for three
days.[5] New life comes forth from death. This life has outlived
death. Man has gained confidence in the new life.
It happened thus with Lazarus. Jesus had prepared him for
resurrection. His illness was at once symbolic and real, an illness
which was an initiation (_cf._ p. 132 _et seq._), and which leads,
after three days, to a really new life.
Lazarus was ripe for undergoing this experience. He wrapped himself in
the garment of the Mystic, and fell into a condition of lifelessness
which was symbolic death. And when Jesus came, the three days had
elapsed. "Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead
was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, 'Father, I thank thee
that thou hast heard me'" (John xi. 41). The Father had heard Jesus,
for Lazarus had come to the final act in the great drama of knowledge.
He had learned how resurrection is attained. An initiation into the
Mysteries had been consummated. It was a case of such an initiation as
had been understood as such during the whole of antiquity. It had
taken place through Jesus, as the initiator. Union with the divine
had always been conceived of in this way.
In Lazarus Jesus accomplished the great miracle of the transmutation
of life in the sense of immemorial tradition. Through this event,
Christianity is connected with the Mysteries. Lazarus had become an
initiate through Christ Jesus Himself, and had thereby become able to
enter the higher worlds. He was at once the first Christian initiate
and the first to be initiated by Christ Jesus Himself. Through his
initiation he had become capable of recognising that the "Word" which
had been awakened within him had become a person in Christ Jesus, and
that consequently there stood before him in the personality of his
awakener, the same force which had been spiritually manifested within
him. From this point of view, these words of Jesus are significant,
"And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people
which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent
me." This means that the point is to make evident this fact: in Jesus
lives the "Son of the Father" in such a way that when he awakens his
own nature in man, man becomes a Mystic. In this way Jesus made it
plain that the meaning of life was hidden in the Mysteries and that
they were the path to this understanding. He is the living Word; in
Him was personified what had been immemorial tradition. And therefore
the Evangelist is justified in expressing this in the sentence, "in
Him the Word was made flesh." He rightly sees in Jesus himself an
incarnated Mystery. On this account, St. John's Gospel is a Mystery.
In order to read it rightly, we must bear in mind that the facts are
spiritual facts. If a priest of the old order had written it, he would
have described traditional rites. These for St. John took the form of
a person, and became the life of Jesus.
An eminent modern investigator of the Mysteries, Burkhardt in _Die
Zeit Konstantins_, says that they "will never be cleared up." This is
because he has not found out how to explain them. If we take the
Gospel of St. John and see in it the working out in symbolic-corporeal
reality the drama of knowledge presented by the ancients, we are
really gazing upon the Mystery itself.
In the words, "Lazarus, come forth," we can recognise the call with
which the Egyptian priestly initiators summoned back to every-day life
those who, temporarily removed from the world by the processes of
initiation, had undergone them in order to die to earthly things and
to gain a conviction of the reality of the eternal. Jesus in this way
revealed the secret of the Mysteries. It is easy to understand that
the Jews could not let such an act go unpunished, any more than the
Greeks could have refrained from punishing Æschylus, if he had
betrayed the secrets of the Mysteries.
The main point for Jesus was to represent in the initiation of Lazarus
before all "the people which stood by," an event which in the old days
of priestly wisdom could only be enacted in the recesses of the
mystery-temples. The initiation of Lazarus was to prepare the way to
the understanding of the "Mystery of Golgotha." Previously only those
who "saw," that is to say, who were initiated, were able to know
something of what was achieved by initiation, but now a conviction of
the Mysteries of higher worlds could also be gained by those who "had
not seen, and yet had believed."
FOOTNOTES:
[5] This and other circumstances connected with the so-called raising
of Lazarus from the dead are to be understood in the light of the fact,
that Lazarus' death-sleep was at the same time symbolic and real--it
was in other words a symbolic reality, a reality symbolising other
realities, and but for the action of Christ, Lazarus would have
remained dead.
IX
THE APOCALYPSE OF ST. JOHN