Christ Is Risen! 🌞
Acts V, 13 – ‘εμεγαλυνεν’ – roughly ‘emegalÛnen’ -
were magnifying
.
In general, I will note that others did not dare
to join the
community of apostles, that is, there were no false apostles
, but only
real ones who had the gift of the Holy Spirit.
The shadow of Peter healed
is the only such mention (there is also
a similar one about the shawls of the Apostle Paul). It is about the
connection with Peter’s personality. The shadow is not separated from
Peter, it is a kind of continuation
and therefore grace acted through
it, although it would seem that the shadow always carries the meaning of
the absence of something (first of all light), but here it carries the
meaning of the presence of grace and the power of the Holy Spirit.
Another image of God’s power in human weakness.
It is also interesting that in many languages to overshadow yourself
with the sign of the cross
– overshadow
– is to overshadow, cover
with a shadow
. You can understand what I wrote about a long time ago,
that this is a parallel with the Annunciation (The power of the Most
High will overshadow you
, that is, it will cover, protect you from the
excess of God’s glory). The cross manifests the Power of God through
connection with the true Power of God, which is Christ.
John XX, 20 – having seen the Lord
– literally
having carefully looked at the Lord
, that is, they had a good real
opportunity to be convinced of the reality of the bodily Resurrection of
Jesus. Thomas did not have such an opportunity then. Therefore, his
question is not so much a manifestation of real unbelief as a desire to
see for himself what the apostles were convinced of.
Jesus’ answer about faith / unbelief has a slightly different meaning
- Thomas wanted to build his faith on his own experience, the kind that
the other apostles had, accordingly to his environment. Instead, Jesus
calls blessed
those whose faith is not built on the similarity with
their environment, but rather on internal coherence, on harmony with
themselves, with life. After all, there are people who, even before
knowing Jesus, live like real Christians (they received the general name
Christians before Christ
). It is about such people that Jesus says
that they are blessed. Because having believed in Him, they are already
ready for a truly Christian life. On the other hand, those who want to
build faith on a certain experience, on similarity to the environment,
are internally different, and they still need to become like Christ
Himself, which is why they are not called blessed
in comparison. See
also about the environment and dependence on it in the post at the link:
03032023.html
John XX, 22 – the original root ‘εμφυσαω’ — to breathe into, breathe
unto (someone)
.
John XX, 23 – leave, remain
is literally a word that means to use
strength, hold, keep
, that is, if the apostles retain sins
by the
power of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, that is, in the truth,
then they will remain. This, obviously, does not include all kinds of
speculation, nor falsification, nor political anathemas
and the like,
because they do not have the Holy Spirit.
The confession of Thomas clearly shows Who Jesus is.
On the manifestation of Jesus in general, see a good essay at the
link:
19042023.html
Glory be to Thee, our God, glory be to Thee!