3 The Sunrise of a New World!

click: Passion 3, Passion 5 

"This death takes place in the shadow of new life, the sunirise of a new creation." Romans 6:3-4, quote from Star Trek

A Paulinian-Christian website, dancing around the concordant studies of Martin Zender and André Piet; proclaiming that ALL of us will be saved: 1 Cor. 15:28. Based on the books of Dr. Heleen Keizer: The Greek Word Aion, Bob Evely: At the End of the Ages and Adolph E. Knoch, The Mystery of the Gospel.

* 2000 years have passed; proclaiming the Millennial Kingdom of Christ at hand! A Sabbat Journey is 2000 cubits = 2000 years. Jozua 3:4, Hosea 6:1-3, 2 Peter 3:8, Acts 1:12.

Eonian Life; an aionian reformation

Gods great calendar exists of aions/eons, which are periods of time. This scriptural word “eons” appears about 75 times in the New Testament, but has been obscured by bad translations such as “worlds,” “forever” or “eternity.” Every human born will live endlessly with God, because God eventually abolishes death (1 Cor. 15:24-28) through Christ. A few people chosen by God, however, will live with God before He abolishes death, during the 2 future glorious eons. This is known as eonian life.” - Martin Zender

* Also: Professor Heleen M. Keizer: Life, Time, Entirity: A Study of AION in Greek Literature and Philosofy and Philo(Universiteit van Amsterdam,1999); Bob Evely, At the End of the Ages

* Aion is: a limited time. The coming aion, Matthew 12:32, Mark 10:30 will completely replace the present one. - Dr. Heleen M. Keizer: "Life, Time, Entirety: A Study of ΑΙΩΝ in Greek Literature and Philosophy and Philo."

* The tabernacle of Moses and temple of king Salomo reflect the 5 aionian times of our creation.

* Aion is the equivalent of saying, "Emmanuel, God with us."

* A word is something living

* The New testament (better New Covenant) begins at Acts 13:46 when Paul brings his message to the rest of the world. 1 Cor. 15:28 is the end of the Bible, NOT Revelation, - Bob Evely, At the End of the Ages.

* In Paul’s writings alone we find the doctrine, position, walk and destiny of the church (Scofield Reference Bible, page 1252). The Evangel was for the Jews! Peter is NOT a member of the ekklesia. - Cyrus Ingerson Scofield (1843-1921)

* The Ekklesia is seated with Christ already NOW among the celestials, Ephe. 2:6.

* The Great Commission, Matthew 28 refers to the next (4th) aion when the disciples continue their task and go to the nations to baptize all. Christ will be with them to the end of the next 2 aions.

* The ongoing reformation is the process of sorting out the pagan myth (such as "Eternal Torment" or trinity) from the truth.”

* Aion could never mean "eternity." Entirity is a better word; Jona was for aion - forever - at the sea bottom. Forever was only for 3 days. - Jona 2:6.

---------------------------------------------- 

What I believe 

John Gavazzoni 

I believe in the one, true God, eternal in Being, whose essence is love; the I Am, who is internally relational and who, in and by Their Pure Relational Being, becomes the Family of God, the God-Family. This procession from Being to Family is by the impregnation and conception within the I Am who knows His Spouse as integral to His own Being, the Complement of His Person and in that pure coitus of perfect love, the Son is eternally begotten.

The Son of His love is the exact representation of the Divine Nature and in Him dwells all the fulness of Deity. God, the Primal "Us," self-described plurally as the curtain of biblical revelation opens; the One who becomes Father and Mother by conjugal love, by Divine pursuit and surrender, by Divine assertion and reception, by the combining of the DNA of Deity, the gender complete Deity, becomes and is Family by the communion of the Holy Spirit, who is the life of Deity and is He who constitutes the flow of Being and Personified transmission of love within and among the God-Family.

The Sperm of God, which is His Word, the Christ, sent forth by and in the ecstasy of divine love, seeks and penetrates the yielded Ovum of God in the climax of God's own Self Knowledge eternally generating the Son of God, who Being the perfect Image of His Parental Source, the Radiance of the Parental glory, like His Father, seeks union with His internal bride, and thereby is the family of God infinitely multiplied out from the One Seed, the Christ, the Single-begotten Son.

I affirm that the Son is singularly and uniquely, the Christ of God, yet by Him, many sons are begotten all proceeding processionally out from the One Seed, the result being many sons consituted by One sonship. Family-constituted, Family-defined Personhood, eternally proceeds forth from our Primal Origin, Love. From the Single-Begotten proceeds many sons, many brethren, one New Humanity, One Body.

The Christ in the Head of the Body, but in union with the Head, the Body, with Him, is also the Christ of God. This corporate Christ includes a Bride, and together They are the perfect and complete image of Father-Mother God. Those that are begotten by the union of the Son with His Bride are also truly sons of God having their origin in the Primal Seed.

Such progression is not to be understood "under the sun," but as the eternal unfolding of God, our Family. I believe in God as both Progenitor of all Being and the Creator of all things, initiating all His/Her offspring by His Seed, the Word, the Christ, and releasing forth and forming all creation from His Substance. In creation, Deity becomes existential in the eons, immanently in all creation, but particularly in man. In this Way, beyond carnal understanding, God, in the eons, becomes what He is not, while never ceasing to be all that He is eternally, and in overcoming what He is not, by what He is, He draws forth out of His depths otherwise hidden dimensions of His glory.

From this ultimate quandary there develops the tension, ambiguity and finally, perversity of existence. Thereby the Essence of Being, which is Love, becomes to creation what creation cannot be to itself. This is grace. And in His Son, He returns all things in His Son to the glory which He, the Son, had before the world began. The grain of wheat has fallen into the ground and died, and will not abide alone. Full Family glory requires the Family crisis of all Fulness being subjected to deprivation, the deprivation of death by sin, and all that death includes.

By this contrarianism, and the conquering of the same, the Family of God realizes its greatest potential so that principalities and powers, by beholding such wonders, are taught the manifold wisdom of God. This wisdom is necessary for the administration of the kingdom of God that begins at the highest level of sons down to the lowest level of angels. At the heart of this divine wisdom is the ordering of death and resurrection, life out of death, which eternal reality was historically demonstrated by Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and Son of Man, our Savior, in His earthly passion.

THAT WHICH IS BEING, must be subjected to that which CLAIMS independence of being, and that which claims independence seeks the death of Him upon whom they are dependent. It is in this struggle that divine love is seen at its best as it yields to the attack of the those who owe all to Him, and yet who wish to break "free" from Him and be gods in their own right.

This rebellion is conceived not by any initiation of the creature's will, but by the will of the Creator who deprives the creature of light and thereby creates the unimaginable in the creatures imagination.The creature must experience how alienated and hostile it will act toward God and itself when left to itself. This alienated "self" is the false persona, the alter ego that we must all bear so that by becoming what we are not, we shall fully come to know who we are. When the independent "self" is left to itself, it resentfully affirms its independence through rebellion, waiting to see how its Father-Creator will react. Deep within the heart of the rebel is the cry, "will you love me even in my rebellion.It seeks the crisis.

It seeks to know, once and for all if it is unreservedly loved. Hence Golgotha, hence Calvary, hence the passion of man meets the passion of God and we know, we see, we understand that we are loved. It is as love that God must be known. This is the administration of His Family-kingdom. And love can only be fully known in its response to attack. Love can only be fully known when It refuses to act in retaliatory vengeance, but instead submits to the infamous hostility of crucifixion with unflinching grace.I believe that man is the image and glory of God for he is only to be known, in truth, as in the Christ, who is the Primal image and glory of God.

The Christ does not grasp nor keep the glory for Himself alone, but as the Seed become the Son, He gives His glory, the glory of the Father to all His brethren. The glory is hidden within their creaturehood, yet it is in their creaturehood that the glory shall finally be fully expressed.

I believe that a transcendent, normative, divinely inspired record of the above administration has been given us in Holy Scripture by which we are turned to Christ, the living Word of God, who declares His Father and our Father to us. When exposed to its pages a providentially ordered interplay of penultimate revelation and yes, with it, an ugly distortion of the face of God occurs, for Holy Writ serves, on one hand, to lead us to the ultimate revelation, Christ Himself, but to that end it paradoxically hides God from us and demonstrates that, left to ourselves, we will read into it all the perversity of our fallen imagination.Without it we are deceived, yet by its letter we also deceived, in preparation of the true Light that lighteth every man, coming into the world.

The Bible is given to us, full of the shadows of Truth, to demonstrate the vanity of our knowledge of Him.What is the final conclusion? The Book of books, like all things and with all things, works together, or is worked together by God for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose. Without it, we are helpless. With it we are helpless, but through it help comes and we abuse the help until the help overcomes our abuse.

It is one of many good and holy things which must finally decrease that He might increase.I believe in Christ as the Head of His church, a church not constituted by creeds, dogma and hierarchy, but the church, the organic fellowship of members joined in One body, edifying itself in love and knowing its Head in the measure that it knows the love that flows from that headship. I do not believe in the faith as a body of doctrine, but I know it as the gift of the faith of the Son of God to His church, the only faith without mixture which is the Son's response to the Father's faithfulness.

I believe in the communion of the saints which is not a mutual admiration society composed of similar thinking individuals who congratulate one another that they are right in their understanding of God, but rather is a grant by grace of communion in and with Deity through the glorified humanity of our Lord.I believe in the forgiveness of sins, firstly as it is grounded in the immutable disposition of God toward sinners whereby He refuses to disqualify any man or woman from the purpose of His love for them, while He corrects that in them which is not worthy of their sonship and His kingdom.

I believe in the forgiveness of sins secondarily as the communication of the Divine disposition to the human heart whereby the pressure of forgiveness as it flows from the heart of God to our hearts causes the opening of our hearts so that what is subjectively in the heart of God becomes subjective in us.So great is the love. which by nature will not reckon sin against us that the human heart cannot finally resist and turns to God in grateful reception of that which is held in the heart of God for us.I believe in eternal life, which is God Himself, who becomes eonion life in Christ, abiding in the eon(s) till all death is swallowed up by the victory of His resurrection. I believe that in the death and resurrection of Christ, Father God acted, and in that action historically carried out in time that which is eternally sealed in His heart.

He acted, reconciling all men by His death and saving all men by His life from the dead.He continues to act to make men aware of the love which constitutes the Christ event and as He was successful in the first, he shall be successful in the second. This we know as the good news of the glory of Christ. As His son, I know and believe the love God has for us. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the personal Spirit of the communion of the Family of God.

I believe in the resurrection of the body, the mortal body; for that which is immortal needs no resurrection. Our very body, which the apostle calls into the service of God with its instrumental members of righteousness, presently carries the burden of alien mortality.Existentially it is mortal, but as the expression of Being it shall come forth out of its affliction of death to bring the glory of God to final consummation. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body.Paradoxically it, singular, is sown in dishonor and raised in glory, for there is One Body.

4 Een Aionische Reformatie 1

"Ook minder heldere sterren kunnen we zien. Dan moet je net naast de betreffende ster kijken. Vanuit de ooghoeken. Omdat daar de meeste zenuwen zitten. Misschien kunnen de we waarheid ook alleen zien vanuit de ooghoeken!" - Janna Levin

----------------------------------------------------

De tijd is nabij!

Olijfberg - Jeruzalem, een sabbatsreis

Het was de veertigste dag na zijn opstanding dat Jezus vanaf de Olijfberg ten hemel voer en onttrokken werd aan de ogen van zijn dicipelen. Juist op die dag hadden zij Hem nog de vraag gesteld: "Here, hersteld U IN DEZE TIJD het Koninkrijk voor Israël?" (Handelingen 1:6). De vraag was niet OF het Koninkrijk voor Israël hersteld zou worden - dat stond vast. De vraag was, of de dicipelen dat nog in hun dagen zouden beleven. Het antwoord van Jezus was, dat het hun niet toekwam dit te weten.

Of de terugkeer van Jezus Christus in de dagen van de dicipelen zou plaatsvinden, wordt in Handelingen 1 dus open gelaten. Inmiddels weten wij wél allang het antwoord op de vraag van de dicipelen: het Koninkrijk werd door Israëls ongeloof niet in die tijd hersteld. Dat lezen we ook expliciet aan het einde van het boek Handelingen. "Ga heen tot dit volk en zeg... het hart van dit volk is vet geworden en hun oren zijn hardhorend en hun ogen hebben zij toegesloten, opdat zij niet... zich bekeren en Ik hen zou genezen" (Handelingen 28:26,27).

I.v.m. "de belofte van zijn komst" schrijft Petrus aan het einde van zijn leven: "doch dit ene mag u niet ontgaan, geliefden, dat één dag bij de Here is als duizend jaar en duizend jaar als één dag" (2Petrus 3:8). Uit wat hij in dit hoofdstuk schrijft blijkt dat het hem inmiddels wél toekwam om antwoord te weten op de vraag van Handelingen 1. Petrus refereert onmiskenbaar aan de cryptische woorden in Hosea 6:1-3, waar staat dat de HERE "na twee dagen" tot Israël zal komen. Hoezo "twee dagen"? Wat is voor de Heer een dag? Wel, dát mag ons niet ontgaan, schrijft Petrus. Het doelt op twee dagen van elk duizend jaar.

Terug naar Handelingen 1. Hoewel niets bekendgemaakt wordt over het tijdstip van Christus' terugkeer, vinden we niettemin achteraf, een verborgen aanwijzing. Wanneer de dicipelen ná Jezus' hemelvaart vanaf de Olijfberg weer terugkeren naar de stad, dan lezen we:

Toen keerden zij terug naar Jeruzalem van de berg, genaamd de Olijfberg, die dicht bij Jeruzalem is, een sabbatsreis daarvandaan.Handelingen 1:12

Een sabbatsreis is de afstand die een Jood mag afleggen op de sabbat: 2000 el. Het is dezelfde afstand waarvan we ook lezen i.v.m. de doortocht door de Jordaan (Jozua 3:4). Toen ging eerst de ark door de Jordaan waarna het volk Israël de ark moest navolgen... op een afstand van ongeveer 2000 el. In type zien we hier Christus (> de ark) die als eerste door de doods-Jordaan trekt (> dood en opstanding), waarna Israël weliswaar volgt, maar op aanzienlijke afstand. Een afstand van ongeveer (!) 2000 jaar.

In Handelingen 1 staat de Olijfberg voor de hemelvaart. Daar werd Hij door een wolk aan de ogen van zijn leerlingen onttrokken. De stad Jeruzalem staat daarentegen voor de vervulling van de belofte. Het is de stad van de grote Koning, de stad waar Hij straks zichtbaar zal regeren. De afstand tussen de Olijfberg en Jeruzalem staat (typologisch) daarmee dus voor de tijdspanne tussen Christus' hemelvaart en zijn wederkomst. 2000 el = 2000 jaar. Het hoeft ons dan ook niet te verbazen dat het profetisch decor in onze dagen volop in aanbouw is. Want de tijd is nabij!!

---------------------------------------------------

AANGAANDE GOD

• God is GOD, d.w.z. Degene die alles een plaats geeft. Nooit gaat er iets bij Hem mis. Ook het kwaad in de wereld (zonde en lijden) vervult een noodzakelijke rol in Zijn plan der aionen. meer..
• Er is één God, de Vader, de Onzienlijke, UIT Wie alles is. Jezus Christus, Gods Zoon, is het Beeld en de Gestalte van God, de Eerstgeborene van elk schepsel, DOOR Wie alles is. meer...

HET EVANGELIE

• Het Evangelie zoals Paulus dit predikte, is de boodschap dat Christus Jezus, de beloofde Messias, door zijn dood en opstanding Heer en Redder van allen is. meer...
• God is de Redder van alle mensen. Zoals alle mensen zondaren en stervelingen zijn, zo zullen ook alle mensen gerechtvaardigd en levendgemaakt worden. meer...
• Het kruis van Golgotha bewijst: geen vijandschap zo groot of Gods liefde overtreft altijd. God zal door het kruis elk schepsel met Zich verzoenen. meer...

DE SCHRIFT

• Al de Schrift is van God geïnspireerd. Paulus is degene die het Woord van God gecompleteerd heeft, d.w.z. de 70 boeken van de Bijbel voltooide. meer...
• Het is onnodig de Bijbel te verdedigen daar zij zichzelf bewijst en uitlegt.

DE TEGENWOORDIGE TIJD

• Paulus is de apostel en leermeester der natiën, gedurende de tegenwoordige (tussen-)tijd van Israëls ongeloof. Het "Evangelie van de voorhuid" dat aan Paulus was toevertrouwd, is nadrukkelijk onderscheiden van "het Evangelie van de besnijdenis" dat "de twaalf" predikten. meer...
• God is in de tegenwoordige tijd niet uit op de openbaring van het Koninkrijk. Integendeel: Hij roept in het verborgene, door de prediking van het Evangelie een ekklesia uit, het lichaam van Christus.
• De ekklesia is een gemeenschap van gelovigen die samenkomt in vrijheid, buiten de dwang van menselijke systemen. Zij wordt middels het Woord van God, gevoed en geleid door Christus haar Hoofd.
• Rituelen (b.v. de waterdoop) en speciale dagen (b.v. de sabbat) die voor Israël een belangrijke rol spelen, zijn voor de ekklesia volstrekt onbelangrijk. .

• God rekent geloof tot gerechtigheid. Geloof betekent: vertrouwen op Gods belofte. Geloof staat tegenover ieder eigen pogen van de mens (werken). Leven uit geloof betekent: God danken voor wat HIJ geeft en bij machte is in en door ons te doen. meer...

DE DOOD

• Dood is geen andere vorm van leven maar het tegenovergestelde van leven. De Bijbelse verwachting is gericht op levendmaking en opstanding van doden. meer...

• De ekklesia, het lichaam van Christus zal haar Heer in de lucht ontmoeten, wanneer ze zal worden geëvacuëerd (weggerukt) voor de toekomende toorn. Die dag zal haar niet overvallen als een dief in de nacht omdat ze op de hoogte is van de tijden en gelegenheden. meer...
• Als de ekklesia haar hemelse bestemming zal hebben bereikt, zal God weer de draad oppakken met het volk Israël. De Messias zal terugkeren op de Olijfberg en het volk Israël herstellen en alle profetieën aan dit volk vervullen en haar tot een zegenkanaal maken voor de gehele volkenwereld.
• De Bijbel spreekt over Gods oordelen en gerichten. Deze kunnen heftig zijn maar nimmer eindeloos. God heeft het heil van al zijn schepselen op het oog. meer...  
• Bij de komst van Christus vangt niet een eindeloze eeuwigheid aan, maar beginnen "de toekomende aionen" waarin Christus zal heersen. Wanneer Christus uiteindelijk ook de dood als laatste vijand zal hebben teniet gedaan, zal Christus het Koninkrijk overgeven aan God de Vader en God zal worden, alles in allen

5 Een Aionische Reformatie 2

“Het kon me in die tijd geen bal schelen wat zo’n groepsleider van me vond, ik veegde met de meesten mijn reet af!” – Isabel uit Verbinding Verbroken (geertje van egmond) 

------------------------------------------- 

Evangelie was voor de JODEN 

Beste Henk,

Lees Exodus 19 vers 3 - 6. Wie is daar het koninkrijk van priesters? Antwoord: HET VOLK ISRAËL!!!Deze tekst wordt geciteerd in 1 Petrus 2: 9 - 10. Over wie gaat het daar? Het gaat over het VOLK ISRAËL, eerst niet zijn volk (meer), dan weer wel (zie Hosea 1: 3-12, 2: 20-22). Petrus was de apostel der besnijdenis en hij richtte zich enkel tot de Joden of het volk Israël.

Als hij schrijft aan de vreemdelingen in de verstrooiing (1 Petrus 1: 1) dan schfijt hij tot de buitenlandse Joden in de diaspora.De geadresseerden in de bijbelboeken Petrus en Openbaring zijn niet de gelovigen in Christus of de Kerk, amar is het volk ISRAËL. "Het Koninkrijk Gods is in u" is een bijbeltekst die te onpas wordt gebruikt door de gnostiek/Gnosis. Jezus is koning in mijn hart en regeert aldaar - Col 3: 15, maar dat wil nog niet zeggen dat DAT nu de volle openbaring is van HET Koninkrijk waar de profetieën en de evangeliën en niet in de laatste plaats Openbaring vol van staan. 

Is er nog een tweede komst?Wat is nu de verwachting die uitgesproken wordt in het laatste bijbelboek?Antwoord: kom, Here Jezus! (Openb. 22: 20).Het laatste bijbelboek is geschreven, dat staat wel vast, NA Pinksteren. Het Koninkrijk van God is hoofdzakelijk het Rijk dat God gaat vestigen hier op aarde (Genesis 15: 18 - van de rivier van Egypte tot aan de grote rivier, de Eufraat).

Het nieuwe Jeruzalem wordt zeer beeldend in Openbaring beschreven. Het geeft vooral aan dat het een stad is die onze verbeelding overstijgt.

Lees eens hoe de geliefde in het boek Hooglied beschreven wordt: allemaal beelden maar ze geven wel een concrete persoon aan.Ik word moe van het idee dat het Koninkrijk alleen in ons zou zitten, dat je het Oude Testament geestelijk moet lezen (de profetieën die spreken over een aards Rijk) en dat de Kerk vanaf Adam zou bestaan. Aan het begin van het boek Handelingen wordt gevraagd naar het Koninkrijk (of het koningschap over Israël hetgeen precies hetzelfde is).

Aan het einde van het boek Handelingen gaat het nog steeds over het Koninkrijk (trouwens, Jezus onderwees zijn discipelen ook over het koninkrijk van God, Handelingen 1: 3). Petrus, na Pinksteren, moedigt het volk aan om te geloven zodat Jezus zou komen vanuit de hemel en dat daarna de profetieën vervuld zouden kunnen worden (Handelingen 3: 20 en verder). In mijn weblogje schrijf ik dat christenen veel meer vanuit de toekomstverwachting dienen te leven en wat doet Paulus: hij onderricht aangaande het Koninkrijk van God en aangaande de Here Jezus. Naar wie ziet een christen het meeste uit?

Naar Jezus! Wat verwacht hij het meeste: het Koninkrijk HIER OP AARDE!!! Want de gelovigen zullen als koningen heersen OP DE AARDE!! (Openbaring 5: 10). Jan,Beste Henk,Ik ga weer even moeilijk doen.Als Jezus zegt: mijn Koninkrijk is niet van deze wereld (Johannes 18: 36) bedoelt Hij te zeggen dat Hij geweld zou toepassen om zijn gevangenneming te voorkomen. Er staat ook niet: VAN deze wereld maar UIT de wereld (ek tou kosmou).

Zijn Koninkrijk is wel degelijk VAN deze wereld (zie het laatste bijbelboek). De tekst met dus de valse vertaling: "mijn koninkrijk is niet van deze wereld" is weer koren op de molen van mensen die de bijbel vergeestelijken, verpsycholiseren en het aardse en lichamelijke ontkennen, maw: gnostiek/Gnosis oftewel ook anti-Joods.

Gr. Hartman Out

Beste Jan Jaap,

(Jan Jaap roept mij op tot bescheidenheid, zie vorig item)Ik ben overtuigd van je goede bedoelingen, was jij dat ook maar van die van mij of is dat negatief gedacht van mij? Ik citeer: Abba was in Jezus' tijd alleen een gezinsterm om de aardse vader aan te duiden; tevoren was hij een kinderlijke uitroep, maar hij werd allang door volwassenen gebruikt (einde citaat, Schillebeeckx, Jezus, het verhaal van een levende, blz. 213).

Een kind zegt dus papa Een volwassenen zegt dus pa Ik als volwassene zeg pa tegen mijn vader en ik zeg nooit 'vader' tegen mijn vader. Abba is dus het woord dat de intimiteit aangeeft. Verdere literatuur: Jeremias, The central message of the New Testament.

Voor alle eerlijkheid: Strong of Henry en helemaal al niet de kanttekeningen van de Statenvertaling zijn in mijn beleving in de studies van het Hebreeuws of Aramees normatief. Ik heb juist Schillebeeckx geciteerd omdat hij juist zijn bevindingen op vele bronnen baseert maar uit andere zelf gelezen literatuur komt steeds hetzelfde naar voren: Abba is pappie of pa binnen het gezin.

Het is juist Jezus geweest die God Abba heeft genoemd en dàt is zo typerend geweest voor zijn relatie met zijn Vader.

Er blijft een onderscheid tussen hoe God door Jezus Abba wordt genoemd en door ons Abba. (zie Johannes 20: 17 - waar Jezus subtiel het onderscheid geeft tussen 'mijn Vader' en 'uw Vader'). Je noemt, beste Jan Jaap, mij ahw katholiek. De Katholieken drongen immers de eenvoudigen op om het evangelie in het Latijn te horen. En zo zou ik de mensen het Hebreeuws willen opdringen. Daar heb ik het volgende op gevonden:

De Rooms Katholieken (ik ben zelf reformatorisch katholiek) vinden dat de Vulgata een geïnspireerde vertaling is. Dat is natuurlijk onzin maar vandaar dat ze de mensen inderdaad het Latijn opdrongen. Het Nieuwe Testament is in het Grieks geschreven maar besef wel dat een gemiddelde mens uit de eerste eeuw zonder Joodse achtergrond dat Nieuwe Testament nooit zo hapklaar had kunnen weglezen als de huidige NBV in romanvorm.

Het is eigenlijk Hebreeuws maar dan in het Grieks. Ik zou kunnen schrijven bijvoorbeeld: Bij mijn gastgevering ben ik uit de bus uitgestegen. Het was haar geboortedag! Iedereen voelt aan: dit zijn germanismen. De spreker denkt nog in het Duits. Zo staat de Griekse Bijbel vol hebraïsmen zoals je die ook in de vertaling van de Hebreeuwse Bijbel in het Grieks vindt, de zogenaamde Septuaginta. Je kunt het Nieuwe Testament niet goed begrijpen en zelfs kolossale fouten maken als je niet denkt vanuit de oorspronkelijke taal het Hebreeuws (het woordje hel of eeuwigheid zijn grote boosdoeners).

Als in het Nieuwe Testament nu de lezers een Hebreeuws, dan wel Aramees woord op het hart wordt gedrukt, in dit geval dus Abba, dan heeft dan een duidelijke bedoeling. De niet Joodse lezers begrepen al weinig van hakkelig taalgebruik maar nog minder natuurlijk van hebreeuwse woorden zoals bijvoorbeeld sabbathen (sabbath in het meervoud). Als Paulus daarbij ook nog nadrukkelijk de vertaling geeft en dus afwijkt van de gangbare vertaling,  

DAN DIENEN WIJ ONS DAT AAN TE TREKKEN!!

Dan is de titel van een boekje waarin lezers wordt aangeraden God als pappie aan te spreken MISLEIDEND!! Paulus vertaalt immers met vader en niet met pa of pappie! Dat kan op muggenzifterij lijken maar bedenk dat vele foute gedachten en theologieën altijd begonnen zijn door langzaam maar zeker af te wijken van de oorspronkelijke bedoeling (zie bijvoorbeeld de hel of eeuwigheid).

Mijn stelling is: als je bovenstaande weet en dan ABBA bidt, je je in de buurt van Jezus bevindt en Hij je meeneemt naar en voordraagt aan God. Beste Jan Jaap, bedankt dat je mijn gedachten scherpt. Helaas heb ik niet meer tijd om verder op je opmerkingen te reageren. Ik ben nieuwsgierig naar: vanwaar echter jouw nogal prikkelige reactie? Als deze weblog al heet 'datishardman' dan moet je mij niet verwijten dat ik prikkelend, stellig en arrogant overkom.

Zo presenteer ik mezelf al. Waarom ga je er zo serieus op in? Hoeveel mensen lezen nu wat ik schrijf? Die kun je tellen op de vingers van mijn handen! Dus waar maak je je druk over? Overigens heb ik Gymnasium Beta gedaan met de twee klassieke talen en voor wat betreft alle theologie die ik hier tentoonspreid: God leest het als ware het Tom Poeslectuur. Bekijk de plaatjes maar eens goed waarop dezelfde omgeving wordt uitgebeeld. Ze kloppen nooit.  

Het is mijn overtuiging dat het Hebreeuws geen normale taal is maar een taal die ons iets van de overkant vertelt. Het woordje 'Hebreeuws" komt van een werkwoord af dat 'voorbijgaan, passeren, oversteken' betekent. Het Hebreeuwse volk is een volk dat model staat voor de wereld die op weg is vanuit het gebied van de vergankelijkheid en de zonde naar een gebied of Beloofde Land dat model staat voor onvergankelijkheid en leven in direct contact met God zelf.

De eerste letter van de Hebreeuwse Bijbel is een B dat als getalswaarde 2 heeft. En het valt meteen ook op hoe in Genesis 1 er veel tweetallen voorkomen: dag en nacht, hemel en aarde, avond en morgen, water en droogland enzovoort, enzovoort. De twee staat voor de schepping die zich ontplooit en zich blijft ontplooien en daarbij steeds grotere diversiteit vertoont. Het is ook de schepping van leven en dood geworden, van zonde en vergeving, van donker en licht enzovoort enzovoort.Vòòr de schepping was God alles in zichzelf.

God die EEN is, de A (of Aleph in het Hebreeuws). De schepping zelf is binair, bestaat uit tweetallen die zich voortzetten, met als middelpunt het sterven van Christus aan het kruis en Zijn opstanding.

Het eindpunt zal zijn dat God alles in allen zal zijn (1 Corinthiërs 15: 28). Dat is de tweevoud met elkaar verzoend, dan is de nieuwe eenheid gevestigd.

Het hele evangelie wordt nu samengevat in het woordje ABBA, of in het Hebreeuws geschreven ABA. Het staat voor de eenheid, die twee wordt en die weer één wordt. Ook betekent ABA in het Hebreeuws: "Ik zal komen". Wanneer gelovigen God ABBA noemen, juist DIT woord, dan spreken wij een taal die niet de onze is, maar wel ons bij God brengt op een ongekende wijze.

Daar kan geen enkel ander woordje in het Chinees tegen op. Wie oren heeft om te horen, die hore, Wie ogen heeft om te lezen, die leze, wie een tong heeft om te spreken, die spreke!!

6 Een Aionische Reformatie 3

Supports: Ontsluiert 

"God loves the soul  which desires perfection, as a Lover always does, that is as of she were already perfect. This fact creates, when apprehended, a far more vehement desire to become perfect than if perfection were the price of such love in the future." - Coventry Patmore, The Rod, the Root and the Flower

---------------------------------------

* N.B. in verband met auteursrechten heb ik enkele Nederlandstalige bijbelstudies geselcteerd om toch een indruk te geven van het Bijbelse front in mijn dagen vanaf 2010. Daarnaast heb ik de bijbelstudies "Clanging Gongserie" van Martin Zender vrij vertaald. Ik heb hem wel eens gemaild hierover en hij had hier absoluut geen problemen mee.

Wat gaan we straks doen?

VRAAG:Wat is straks de taak van de ekklesia (het lichaam van Christus) in “de hemelse gewesten”?

ANTWOORD:We zijn al een heel eind in de goede richting wanneer we ons realiseren dat de toekomst van de ekklesia (het lichaam van Christus) inderdaad gelegen is “in de hemelse gewesten”. Of zoals anderen vertalen “temidden van de hemelingen”.

 (Hij) heeft ons mede opgewekt en ons mede een plaats gegeven in de hemelse gewesten, in Christus Jezus, om in de komende eeuwen de overweldigende rijkdom zijner genade te tonen naar (zijn) goedertierenheid over ons in Christus Jezus.Efeze 2:6,7

één met ChristusDe ekklesia heet “lichaam van Christus” omdat ze met Hem wordt geïdentificeerd. Hij stierf - wij stierven met Hem. Hij werd opgewekt  - wij werden met Hem opgewekt. Hij is gezeten in de hemelse gewesten - wij zijn met Hem gezeten in de hemelse gewesten. Christus’ positie is onze positie. Ons leven is nu nog verborgen met Christus (Kol.3:3) maar in de komende eeuwen (aionen) zal God dit gaan tonen.

zendelingen?Sommigen stellen het zo voor, dat we straks als zendelingen temidden van de hemelingen, Gods veelkleurige wijsheid gaan bekendmaken. Men verwijst daarvoor naar Efeze 3:10. In dat vers wordt echter niet gesproken over de taak van de ekklesia in de toekomst maar over haar taak nu (”opdat THANS door middel van de ekklesia…”).

op de Troon!Om te weten wat ons straks te doen staat, dienen we ons bewust te worden wat onze positie is. God heeft Christus doen zitten aan Zijn rechterhand (d.w.z. de hoogste positie) in de hemelse gewesten…

… BOVEN ALLE OVERHEID en MACHT en KRACHT en HEERSCHPAPPIJ en alle naam, die genoemd wordt niet alleen in deze, maar ook in de toekomende eeuw. En Hij heeft ALLES ONDER ZIJN VOETEN GESTELD en Hem als hoofd boven al wat is, gegeven aan de ekklesia, die zijn lichaam is…Efeze 1: 20-23

Als de ekklesia Christus’ lichaam is, en alles is onder Zijn voeten gesteld, dan betekent dit dat alles ook onder ons is gesteld! Dat betekent dat we zullen HEERSEN…

Gij doet Hem (= de Ben Adam; vers 4) HEERSEN over de werken uwer handen, alles hebt Gij onder zijn voeten gelegd.Psalm 8:6

rivalen…Tesamen met Christus is de ekklesia bestemd voor de Troon op de allerhoogste plaats. Geroepen tot heerschappij! De overheden en machten in de hemelse gewesten die daar nu nog de dienst uitmaken (Efeze 6:12), zullen plaats moeten maken voor ons. Vandaar ook dat deze machten het op ons gemunt hebben en tegen ons strijden.

onvoorstelbaar!Voor sommigen misschien een teleurstellend idee, maar de komende aionen wordt het voor ons dus beslist niet louter vakantie vieren… Integendeel, ons wacht een SUPERTAAK: de heerschappij over de ganse schepping! Als kleine mensjes op aarde hebben we er geen idee van wat het betekent om met een hemels lichaam (gelijkvormig aan dat van Christus) in hemelse regionen de scepter te gaan zwaaien over al wat is. Het mag ons voorstellingsvermogen tarten, maar Gods Woord zegt het!

Of weet gij niet, dat de heiligen de wereld zullen oordelen? (…) Weet gij niet, dat wij over engelen oordelen zullen?1Korinthe 6:2,3

Het woord is betrouwbaar: immers, indien wij met Hem gestorven zijn, zullen wij ook met Hem leven; indien wij volharden, zullen wij ook met Hem als koningen heersen…2Timotheüs 2:11,12

7 Mary Magdalene

Aion: a very long period of time with a beginning and an end completely replacing a previous one.

Aorian tense: an ongoing verbal form transforming an act into a fact.

* When humans build an army--or a football team--they choose the strongest, the fastest, and the gutsiest. It's all about physical advantage and the potential for stomping the competition. God's army is just a tad different: He chooses unwise, weak and ignoble people, some of whom may be ready to give up on life. Feeling washed up? Feeling like a failure? Got a little extra fat around your midsection? Then hang on for the ride; you may be God's next number one draft pick. God Drafts Ignoble People

-------------------------------------------------------------

Mary Magdalene: Why is this night different?

Magdala was a city along the Sea of Galilea. The town was known for its rampant prostitution. Many of the city's young grils grew up learning how to sin. Mary was one of them. At a young age, Mary learned the dark trade of selling her body for money. She became a harlot, a woman of the night. Nevertheless she was destined to meet the lover of her soul. As a result, men and women in every century would herald her.

By using a bit of consecrated imagination, I would like us to return to the first century and meet this incredible woman as she encounters her incredible Lord.

Human Desperation Meets Divine Fullness

It is the year AD 28. Like most people in Palestine, Mary of Magdala has heard the grand reports of a miracle-working prophet named Jesus of Nazareth. Everywhere He goes, Jesus heals the sick and casts out demons. Not long ago, Mary moved to the village of Nain in Galilee. At this point in her adult life, Mary is a desperate soul. Ever since she was a young teen, she has made her living as a prostitute. She suffers from depression and suicidal tendencies. For years she has been vexed with evil spirits, seven to be exact (Luke 8:2). All of her adult life she has known nothing but torment, degradation, and utter defilement (Matt. 12:45).

The day has come. Mary hears that Jesus has entered the town of Nain. She catches wind of reports that He raised a man from the dead (Luke 7:11-17). Upon hearing this, she looks for Him. Not far from her home, she sees a large crowd gathered. And she spots Him. She is riveted by the authority with which He speaks. She also detects a graciousness and purity that she has never before witnessed in any man. 

Jesus finishes His message and begins praying for the sick who are before Him. Without any timidity, Mary approaches Him. Jesus looks upon her with surprising familiarity. In a flash of divine revelation, the Lord remembers. He remembers that she was chosen to be part of His glorious bride before the foundation of the world. As He puts His hands upon her head, Mary weeps. With uncommon authority, the Lord utters this simple word: "Evil spirits I command you to come out of her, never to enter her again! "Immediately, Mary lets out a loud wail and collapses before Jesus as if in a coma. Those looking on wonder if she is dead. The Lord assures them that she is just sleeping. An hour goes by, and Mary awakens. When she rises from the ground, she feels clean and whole. She can only remember feeling this way in the innocence of her childhood, when she was a little girl. She begins to weep again.

Mary looks for Jesus, but He is gone. She is told that He has been invited to a Pharisee's home for dinner. With tears of deep gratitude and joyful anticipation, she heads off to find Jesus. She has with her the most valuable asset she owns: a small vial filled with costly perfume that hangs from a leather strap around her neck. This vial represents her savings account. The money has come from her trade. Without forethought or deliberation, she wishes to give it to Jesus as a gift, a token of her gratitude.

As she diligently inquires the exact whereabouts of Jesus, someone points to the home of Simon the Pharisee. Simon has invited the Lord to be his guest for dinner. Let's walk into Simon's home and see what's happening there.

The Scandal of Shameless Love

Simon is quite intrigued by this famous prophet named Jesus. He has heard many stories about Him. Simon belongs to the class of "nonsinners" called Pharisees. They are the self-appointed monitors of the kingdom of God. They are the self-proclaimed and self-anointed experts at sin management. They are beyond sin in their own eyes, and their "ministry" is to make sure that others keep sin to an absolute minimum. Simon and his Pharisee friends are now afforded the opportunity to interview the Nazarene prophet up close and personal.

Jesus is the guest of honor. Simon, however, ignores all of the common courtesies of an Eastern home. He fails to greet Jesus with a kiss. He doesn't anoint His head with oil. He also fails to wash His feet. Note that Simon has in his home the very God whom he has been serving all of his life. Yet he is pathetically unaware of it. Jesus makes no mention of Simon's neglect as a host. Instead, He graciously reclines at the table with Simon and his friends.The door opens, and in walks Mary of Magdala. She is uninvited. Yet she enters unashamedly.

As Mary enters, she quickly spots Jesus. And she begins to weep. She walks straight over to Him and positions herself in the highest place possible, at His feet. As she kneels before Jesus, her tears fall upon His feet. She opens the vial of valuable perfume that's suspended from her neck and pours it out upon the feet of Christ. She anoints His feet with the perfume, mixing it with her tears. She then does something outrageous. Scandalous even. She begins to kiss His feet. And she does not stop. (In the Greek, the thought conveyed is that she "smothers" His feet with kisses.)  

What happens next horrifies both Simon and his fellow Pharisees. She unbinds her hair and turns it into a towel. She then proceeds to wipe the Lord's feet with it. (In that day for a woman to unbind her hair in public was no small scandal. It would be akin to a woman going topless in our day.)

The Pharisees are in shock. They are mortified. Her attire makes clear that she is a prostitute. A sinner. There's no question about it. And they are livid. Why? Because Jesus, this so-called prophet, does not stop her from engaging in what they consider to be shamelessly erotic acts: unbinding her hair and kissing His feet.Please note: Jesus never rebukes her.

The Pharisees think to themselves that Jesus cannot possibly be a prophet. If He were, He would not allow this sinner to perform such disgraceful acts upon Him. Jesus perceives their thoughts. But He doesn't seem to care what they think. The Lord knows exactly who she is. She is part of His glorious bride, chosen in Him before creation. And she is doing what the bride was designed to do: She is loving Him shamelessly. She is loving Him passionately. She is loving Him extravagantly. And your Lord is not offended.

Never in His entire ministry has the Lord been loved like this. What is Mary doing? She is simply returning the love that He poured upon her earlier that day.What are Simon and the other Pharisees doing? They are passing judgment upon her. To their feeble minds, they are in a different class than this woman. She is a sinner. They are nonsinners. They are also engaging in something far worse: They are unwittingly passing judgment on the God whom they are trying to serve.

8 Mary of Nazareth: I'm here!

His mother, Mary of Nazareth: I'm here!

"She heard from Gabriel, she heard from Joseph that he had heard from Gabriel, and she heard from Elisabeth who had heard from Zecharia, who had heard from Gabriel who had heard from god. She also heard from the shepherds who had heard from the angels who had heard from God."

------------------------------------------------

Mary mysteriously being pregnant...

"Mary knew what the facts about her life would point toward, and she knew the sort of things that would be said about her on street corners in backwater Nazareth."

We are ready to be surprised if not amazed that Mary consented to Gabriel with the simple words "may it be" as recorded in Luke's Gospel 1:38.

We shall overcome - Martin Luther King

Mary's song was for Mary's world what "We shall overcome" was to the African American Community in the USA in the 1960s and 1970s.

Mary, girl of 17:

"for he has been mindful, of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the mighty One has doen great things for me - holy is his name."

Martin Luther King:

"we shall overcome, we shall walk hand in hand, we shall all be free, we are not afraid, we are not alone, the whole wide world around, we shall overcome."

Mary witnessing Gentile Magi arriving at her home with gifts for a KING!

How could she not have thought that this meant her son would have significance well beyond the borders of the Land of Israël? How could she not have also thought that her son might have sigificance all the way to the throne in Rome?

"Mary was too sharp not to have made these connections!"

10 The Diaries of Anais Nin

"I write as Birds Sing" - Anais Nin

We’re the Nazareth of the Milky Way  

Take a look at the position of our sun in the Milky Way Galaxy. We are not in the “power house” of the galaxy. We’re not even in the suburbs. Folks, these are the slums. It looks from this photo like we barely made the grade, and we’re one celestial burp from getting slung into nothingness. And yet this is the place (the only place) where Christ came to die. This is the only place where the future rulers of the universe (that’s us) endure boot camp. Ladies and gentlemen, our little planet— which clings like a hangnail to the galaxy— is the moral and political center of the universe. Nathanael said of Jesus: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” The celestials now ask: “Can anything good come out of the Milky Way?” Wait and see!

- Martin Zender 

Heartbreaker, EnterpriseMission  Michelle  AstroEngineer  MartinZender  JonathanSacks  Goedbericht  TomTalbott  LanaGramlich  Hallowed beThyName  Afraid to shootStrangers  Brighter than1000Suns  OsloStockholm  HiltonRatcliffe  Metaresearch  Marcia Bartusiak  Cydonia Message  Almelo History  AlmeloArchive  Buiten inAlmelo  JoaquinNin Culmell  Mariëlle  LizaGarza  SonicSurfer  One Self  Yarah Bravo

Music

"He carries pictures of me in his pocket…” Anaïs Nin, 1928

A CABLE FROM PARIS. THE BOX OF DIARIES WAS TRACED AND FOUND LYING IN ONE OF THE SMALL FRENCH RAILROAD STATIONS. THE WAR HAD PASSED IT BY. IT WAS SHIPPED BACK TO THE BANK AND REPLACED IN THE VAULT. 

Anaïs Nin 

- "You mean, you're not spending the night with me?'' No, I said politely, as if he were offering me a glass of wine. Thank you.' 

- In a few days I knew all the electricial terms and all the details of plumbing, the qualities and kinds of woods. And learned in a week to handle these perspiring, smelly brutes.  

- The men who have to work for me are surprised that I anderstand all their trades, that I never change my mind, and always know exactly what I want.

- I see the Tower Eiffel from my bedroom. 

- From the left and from the right emerged giant trucks. The street was lined with truck garages and the trucks were starting out for the day's deliveries, all of them red, with hugh red and silver noses, shining fireman red bodies, wheels as tall as I.

- A man came and threw some money on my table, and sat down. The patron of the restaurant had to explain that foreign women went about alone and it did not mean they were prostitutes.

- I bought rat poison and began to fight them, but a new batch came every night through the terrace.

- I had finally frightened away the scorpions and the rats. But now I had a new enemy. It was the neighbor’s rooster.

- I realized I possess a power of magic - I can see through walls.

- I detect new melodies in the birds' songs.

- Men who knew me made flip­pant remarks about wanting to sleep with me. June stopped them in an angry way which revealed her love of me. As if I were sacred.

- I feel curious and friendly towards Henry's whores. They both study the pearly nail polish I use and ask the name of it.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Anaïs Nin, july 1937

Dreams, dreams. I arrive in a dilapidated taxi because I knew nobody else would take such a taxi. The floor of the taxi was so worn the street showed through the cracks. I could have counted the cobblestones. I wondered whether in the end I would fall through and be left sitting in the middle of the street like a new­born baby fallen out of a crib, or an egg from a hen. And there would be the street, suddenly, without time to have prepared myself for adventure. I was a believer in preparation. I liked to sit in a taxi and watch myself in the little mirror in front. I would talk to myself: I would say I need greatly to have heavy objects put on myself, on my head and feet, something like lead chains and boots. That way I would not leave the earth so easily.

It is amazing with what facility I outdistance things, with what ease I float away, and soar away, and am carried thousands of miles from the spot where I stand, in such a way that I assure you I don't hear what is being said to me, I do not see the person who is there, and I am not aware of myself any more. I feel so light, so light at times, vaporous, like steam on a window which can be erased with a careless finger. Put a lot of heavy things on me so that I will stay on earth. Put warm blankets on me because heat attracts me and makes me want to stay where I am. Turn on a strong warm voice. A strong voice which comes from the stomach also makes me want to stay on earth. As a matter of fact, there are many things which might detain me, hold me down, like the smell of coffee in the morning and a mauve glass bottle with a neck like a man with a goiter, and the moment in the taxi when I am going somewhere and I have time to imagine what this somewhere will be like, time to invent it, time to prepare myself for it.

I was going to say this to him, with a strange face in which the features do not seem to belong together, a face where the eyes seem to spark away from each other and the radiance of the cheeks depart in many directions, like a broken halo, and the smile falls apart. I made this face in the mirror, just like the face, I thought, you see sometimes on people when they are about to go insane. It is all unrelated. The eyes are not connected to the meaning of the phrase which is spoken, and neither does the expression conform to the contents of the phrase. There is a kind of panic through it all, they are all wavering as if in a panic, and each is saying a dif­ferent thing. The eyes do not reflect the mood of the moment, but that blanketlike past hovering behind the present eternally, like the traces of an ancient disease, and the voice has in it still the terror of many years ago and not the courage of today.

It is all confused, while the woman is saying with today's mood: I will say to him I happened to come here because when the bottom of the taxi fell out I found myself in front of your house. I would like life to be always as casual as that. There would never be any engagements. I dropped in here like a package left at the con­signee Will you give me a receipt please, give me a receipt. I have no confidence, you see, I like to hear from people what they think of me, how I look to them, even what I have said to them. You would have to write on the receipt at this hour there came a woman who looked exotic and talked with a foreign accent. I don't mean that she was born elsewhere, in another country, but that she has the intonation of never having been born at all to our language, to the language of other women. I received from her very grave words said in a bantering tone, a bantering uttered with a sadness I cannot understand.

It was all very foreign because she made one feel so. She herself must have enjoyed feeling not at home. She liked to have the illusion of the uncommon, the never­lived-before. I really think she believed it. Now this receipt will prove to me that at five o'clock I was in your house and we did exchange words which you pretended not to have heard before, this receipt would be a great comfort to me. I will fold it and wear it against my breast. It is like a certainty. I would like also when you love me you should note it all down. I feel that from the very beginning life played a terrible conjurer's trick on me. I lost faith in it. It seems to me that every moment now it is playing tricks on me. So that when I hear love I am not sure it is love, and when I hear gaiety I am not sure it is gaiety, and when I have eaten and loved and I am all warm from wine, I am not sure it is either love or food or wine, but a strange trick being played on me, an illusion, slippery and baffling and malicious, and a magician hangs behind me watching the ecstasy I feel at the things which happen so that I know deep down it is all fluid and escaping and may vanish at any moment.

Don't forget to write me a letter and tell me I was here, and I saw you, and loved you, and ate with you. It is all so evanescent and I love it so much, L- love it as you love the change in the days. I would prefer to move away where I could not sense the movements of life passing, somewhere in space and distance where I might divine that ultimately it is I who will abandon life and separate myself from it, not life leaving me, and it will be like the old taxi that was falling apart and dropped its contents like an egg, and maybe this egg is a book, and not me, and I am safe behind paper and ink and words and stories and only counting cobblestones, not having arrived anywhere yet because of the painstaking preparations involved, for you see in the mirror I am practicing a certain expression and when I arrive it is gen­erally not needed. For the person is another from the one I in­vented, and I have to adapt my soul anew. 

Another truth overlooked by psychoanalysis is that after they have classified a relationship as masochistic they never consider that what may seem to be the seeking of suffering may in some cases be one's spiritual salvation. They completely forget the fact of the soul's salvation.There is, for example, the frustration I feel at Henry's lack of insight. But his lack of insight has forced me into self-expres­sion, it has deepened my own and humanized me, for I always have to explain to Henry. Who is to say what is destructive and what is creative?Henry perhaps helped me to find my strength by constantly challenging it. If it is true that I have the defect of being hy­persensitive, it is also true that I have an uncanny divination of others' feelings. Gonzalo is perpetually amazed at how I guess all he feels, expose it, heal it. It is a penetration of the soul.

Henry is always admiring what is outside, external. Helba com­plains Gonzalo cannot live except with a group of people. He too, like Henry, moves in shoals. Gonzalo and Henry both arrive from the street with a glow on their faces. They come from the most innocuous places, a café, a talk with an anonymous, nondescript, colorless person, an exhibit of paintings. They denigrate what they have seen. But the glow is there. It is the glow of exercise, of mo­tion, of pure physical circulation. It comes from flux and reflux, the waves. It is impersonal. It is the shoal-life pleasure, which woman cannot understand, because she gets this glow from intimate life. It is the health of collective exercise, of collective swim­ming. Woman looks for depth, and for intimacy. I should not say "woman," and generalize as Proust does, I should say I, Anaïs, to be more exact. 

The Diaries of Anaïs Nin, Winter 1947-1948

Acapulco, Mexico

I am lying on a hammock, on the terrace of my room at the hotel Mirador, the diary open at my knees, the sun shining on the diary, and I have no desire to write. The sun, the leaves, the shade, the warmth, are so alive that they lull the senses, calm the imagination. This is perfection.

There is no need to portray, to preserve. It is eternal, it overwhelmes you, it is complete. The natives have not yet learned from the white man his inventions for traveling away from the present, his scientific capacity for analyzing warmth into a chemical substance, for abstracting human beings into symbols. The white man has invented glasses which make objects too near or too far, cameras, telescopes, spyglasses, objects which put glass between living and vision. It is the image he seeks to possess, not the texture, the living warmth, the human closeness.

Here in Mexico they see only the present. This communion of eyes and smiles is elating. In New York people seem intent on not seeing each other. Only children look with such unashamed curiosity. Poor white man, wandering and lost in his proud possession of a dimension in which bodies become invisible to the naked eye, as if starring were an immodest act. Here I feel incarnated and in full possession of my own body.

A new territory of pleasure. The green of the foliage is not like any other green; it is deeper, lacquered and moist. The leaves are heavier and fuller, the flowers bigger. They seem surcharged with sap, and more alive, as if they never have to close against the frost, or even a cold night. As if they have no need of sleep. At the beach a child came forward from a group of children, carrying a small boat made of shells. She wanted me to buy it. She was small for her age, delicately molded like a miniature child, as Mexican children often are, more finely chiseled beings with small hands and feet and slender necks, tender and fragile and neat.

Everywhere guitars. As soon as one guitar moves away, the sound of another takes its place, to continue this net of music that maintains one in flight from sadness, suspended in a realm of festivities. Festivities. Fiestas. Holidays. Bursts of color and joy. Collective celebrations.

Rituals. Indian feasts and catholic feasts. Any cause will do. Even the very poor know how to dress up a town with colored paper cutouts which dance in the wind. What was happened to joy in America? The americans in the hotel spend all their time drinking by the pool. The men go hunting flamingos which they shoot for the pleasure of it. Or they fish for inedible mantarayas and weigh their spoils to win prizes. 

The eyes of the mexicans are full of burning life. They squat like orientals next to wide, flat baskets full of fruit and vegetables arranged with a fine sense of design of decorative art and harmonies. Strings of chili hang from the rafters. The scent of saffron and rhythms of Chagall-colored laundry hanging like banners from windows and in gardens. Warmth falls from the sky like the fleeciest blanket. Even the night comes without a change of temperature or alteration in the softness of the air. You can trust the night.

There is a rhythm in the way the women lift the water jugs onto their heads and walk balancing them. There is a rhythm in the way they carry their babies wrapped in their shawls and their baskets filled with fruit. There is a rhythm in the way the fishermen pull in their nets in the evening and the way the shepherds walk after their lambs and cows. 

The first night here I showered and bathed hastily, feeling that perhaps the beauty and the velvety softness of the night might not last, that if I delayed, it would all change to coldness and harshness. When I opened the screen door the night lay unchanged, filled with tropical whisperings as if leaves, birds, insects and sea breezes possessed musicalities unknown to northern countries as if the richness of the smells kept them all intoxicated with the same aphrodisiac which affected me. Perfume or carnation and honeysuckle.

Through labyrinthian paths bordered with bushes which caress you as you walk on stone warmed by the sun I walk from my room to the large terrace where everyone sits and waits for dinner or to meet with friends.

The expanse of sky is like an infinite canvas on which human beings cannot project images from their memories because they would seem out of scale with the limitless sea, the limitless sky and the stars, which appear nearer and larger. So memory is abscent, dissolved. I lie on a chaise longue to watch the spectacle of sunset and the night's first act. Nature so powerful and drugging that it annihilates memory.

La Perla is the hotel's nightclub. It is built of driftwood, and overlooks the wild part of the gorge bewteen two mountains of rocks, against which the sea hurles itself with fury, defated by the narrowness and spilling its fury in high waves and foam. Into this narrow Gorge Mexican boys dive for the tourists.