🇬🇧 Glory be to Jesus Christ! 🌞
A continuation of yesterday’s reading, which
refered to here:
09102023.html
Philippians I, 10 – ‘ημεραν’ – ‘emeran’ – ‘day’.
Philippians I, 12 – ‘εμε’ – ‘eme’ – ‘me’ ((to) me, (with) me).
Philippians I, 14 – ‘περισσοτερως τολμαν αφοβως’ – ‘perissoteros tolman aphobos’ – ‘excessively (extremely, exceedingly) boldly (courageously and) fearlessly’. These words indicate several things: 1) Paul did not expect the believers to be so inspired to preach because of his imprisonment for Christ; 2) Paul could have thought of a more moderate way of preaching to the believers, but they showed zeal and daring.
We can say from the whole description (today and hereafter) that in
one word (or two): the sermon was fervent, passionate
.
The example of Paul’s own boldness and courage as an apostle inspired others to do the same, especially the situation of Paul’s imprisonment. What he writes about. There have been many such cases in the history of the Church, in particular, such references are often made when describing the suffering of the saint martyrs for Christ.
There is also an important lesson here for everyone – we need to preach with faith, also boldly, but also have wisdom, which Paul speaks about implicitly – we need to show reason in everything.
Luke VIII, 2 – ‘πνευματων πονηρων και ασθενειων’ - ‘pneumaton poneron kai astheneion’ – ‘evil spirits (bad) and diseases (sicknesses)’.
The reading tells us that women served Jesus, accompanied Him and the apostles and helped them with their money (property). In particular, three women are mentioned by name, all of whom later became myrrh-bearing women, including my beloved saint woman, the Co-Apostolic Mary Magdalene. There have been attempts to understand under this name the forgiven woman-sinner at the end of the previous chapter, but there is no real evidence for this, but there are weighty objections. In particular, there is no hint of unclean spirits in the forgiveness of the repentant sinner (and if there were, the Lord would have delivered the woman from them along with such an instructive example of forgiveness and love, and it would also be strange if the spirits continued to remain in the woman after Jesus’ forgiveness). It would also be strange if a wealthy woman (Mary Magdalene was, at least wealthy enough to be able to help a community of men for a long time, such as the community of Jesus and His apostles) was both possessed and a known sinner (this is a weak argument, but it is a very real one, because in those days it would have been difficult for a woman who was possessed and a publicly known sinner to be really wealthy among the Jews, or at least her possession and public sinfulness would have made it very difficult for her to be really wealthy without being connected to a ruler). Given the latter consideration, it is quite possible that the seven demons did not manifest themselves too noticeably and explicitly, so that the woman suffered from them mainly internally, but this was not very evident externally.
In general, these women (and those who are not named) later became myrrh-bearers. Among them are two of my favourite saints, Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus.
I also note that many people point out that the women did not oppose Jesus. That is, the Incarnate Son of God was worthy in the eyes of all women of his time.
Glory be to Thee, our God, glory be to Thee!