Revelation: what is and its meaning

The term "revelation" in theology is understood to mean the actions by which God reveals Himself and His will to the people. Thus revelations can be sent down both by the Lord himself, and proceed from any intermediaries or through sacred texts. Most people in the modern world profess three main religions - Christianity, Islam and Judaism, which are based on the Divine Revelation.

What is a supernatural revelation?

In all major world religions, it is common to divide such concepts as supernatural revelation and natural knowledge of God, which is also often called revelation. A supernatural form means a wide range of Divine actions aimed at giving people the knowledge necessary to save them. In this regard, among the theologians (theologians) there are two different concepts - common and individual Revelation.

What is its general form, it is clear from the name itself, is a Divine message addressed to a large number of people, perhaps even to an individual people or to humanity as a whole. Such a common revelation is the Holy Scripture and the Sacred Making of the New Testament, as well as the statements of the prophets and apostles that resulted from the exposure of the Holy Spirit to them.

In them revelations are given to people created in the image and likeness of God, but as a result of original sin, they lost their unity with their Creator, and, consequently, doomed to eternal death. It was for the salvation of all mankind that Jesus Christ appeared to our world, bringing with Himself the greatest teaching of the equal to which history did not know before. To the same category are the Revelations of angels and other incorporeal forces, for example, the gospel of the Archangel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary.

The Gospel Revelation

In the general revelation revealed through the holy evangelists of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, as well as in the Epistles of the Apostles , the foundations of a new creed were taught to people, in which the truth about the Divine Trinity, the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, His crucifixion, and the subsequent resurrection was revealed. It also reported on the second, the coming coming of the Savior, about the universal resurrection and the Last Judgment. It was no longer the Old Testament commandments, but Revelation to the people of the New Testament.

Prophecies and their fulfillment

The supernatural nature of Christian Revelations is undeniably evidenced by the fulfillment of the prophecies contained in them, which in their essence could not be made on the basis of any calculations or historical analysis. They stretch far into many centuries and even millennia.

Suffice it to recall the gospel words of Jesus Christ that in time the Gospel will be preached to all nations and throughout the universe. He told them a narrow circle of his followers, and meanwhile, having passed through all persecutions, Christianity today has become one of the major religions of the world.

Incredible could seem and the words of the Virgin Mary that glorify (please) Her will be all genera, but meanwhile, almost 2 thousand years, the whole Christian world gives her honors. And how can we naturally explain the prediction of Jesus about the destruction of Jerusalem that came true in forty years? Thus, the whole subsequent history has unequivocally proved that the evangelical prophecies are nothing but the Revelations of the new age that came on earth with the coming of the Son of God. They could not become the fruit of the activity of any, even the most powerful human mind.

Individual Revelation

What is the Revelation given to individuals (most often saints) can be understood by reading patristic literature-books written by the church fathers canonized after the completion of the earthly path. In them, as a rule, new, unknown truths are not communicated, but only preconditions are created for a deeper knowledge of what was revealed in the general Revelations.

A characteristic feature of individual revelations is that, according to the testimony of the apostle Paul, stated in his second epistle to the Corinthians, they can not be "verbatim" verbatim to other people. Therefore, from the patristic writings and the hagiographic literature (the lives of the saints), one can recognize only the external side of the miracle that has occurred. They usually refer to the state of people at the time of the Revelation given to them, their experiences and feelings.

The danger of unauthorized intrusion into the spiritual world

Concerning the question of individual Revelations, the Christian Church draws the attention of its followers to the inadmissibility of attempts to unauthorized entry into the spiritual world. In this case, curiosity, combined with frivolity and dreaminess, can lead to the most disastrous consequences.

That is why Orthodoxy is extremely negative about spiritualism. There are many cases where attempts to communicate with the spirits of deceased people resulted in severe mental disorders and even suicides. Fathers of the church explain the reason for this by the fact that in most cases, not those whom they turn to come to contact with spiritualists, and demons are gloomy spirits of hell, carrying with them madness and death.

Falsification of Divine Revelations

Unauthorized penetration into the spiritual world is not only dangerous, but also fraught with the product of false revelations. A vivid example of this can be the work of such organizations, deeply alien to true Orthodoxy, as the "Mother of God Center" and "White Brothers". Extreme arbitrariness, allowed by them in the interpretation of Christian doctrine, often leads people who fall under their influence, to severe mental and physical trauma. Particular attention should be paid to the fact that they are trying to present their fabrications for the Divine Revelation.

What is natural knowledge of God?

In addition to the above forms of knowledge of God, in the tradition of the Christian church there is also the concept of natural, or universal Revelation. In this case, it means the possibility of knowing God, which He bestows to people through the created world, nature and man himself. A characteristic feature of natural Revelation is that it does without the intervention of supernatural forces, and only the human mind and the voice of its conscience are needed to comprehend it.

Since long ago, when a person realized himself as a part of the world around him, he does not cease to chant his beauty and harmony. An endless variety of examples can be found in religious and secular literature, in the oldest monuments of the departed civilizations, and in contemporary art.

Since to the question of who is the creator of this world, believing people give an unambiguous answer - God, they attribute it to Him in the creation of all surrounding magnificence. Further, it is easy to draw a parallel between how, when contemplating the work of an artist, we get a clear idea of the depth and specifics of his talent, and how, in the form of diversity, grandeur and harmony, the forms of the world, we make a conclusion about the wisdom, goodness and omnipotence of his Creator.

The Gospel Recorded in the World

Visible nature is a kind of book in which the language accessible to all the people of the world eloquently narrates about the deeds of God. This was repeatedly testified not only by the ministers of the church, but also by the people of science. It is well known, for example, the statement of Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov, in which he calls nature Gospel, incessantly preaching the gospel of the creative power of God. The scientist adds that the visible world is the true preacher of the wisdom, omnipotence and greatness of the Creator.

However, with all this, it should be borne in mind that the natural Revelation, like any other, can not give an idea of the fullness of the Divine being, and the human mind is powerless in its comprehension. It is for this reason, when revealing Himself, that God Himself descends to man. Holy fathers teach that it is impossible to know the Creator without His will, manifested in various Revelations given to people.

Contemporary evidence of God's will

An incalculable number of messages addressed to people from the Upper World, says that the notion of "last revelation" that is often encountered in literature can be perceived only in its ordinal meaning, but not as the final process of God's communion with man, which began with the creation of the world. Since the time when the Lord spoke to the people chosen by the mouth of the Old Testament prophets, and throughout all the subsequent centuries, the witnesses of His will invariably appeared.

Therefore, in our days, waiting for the promised second coming of the Lord, Christians closely monitor everything in which the Revelation of God may somehow contain. In this case, it is mainly about the old texts, which have received new interpretations in the mouths of modern theologians, and a new interpretation.

In addition, mention should be made of the extremely rare but still existing cases in which the Lord expresses His will in one form or another through the ministers of the church chosen by Him for this high mission. In this regard, we can mention the so-called Revelations to the people of the New Year, that is, the manifestation of the Divine will at the turn when the old year gives way to a new one.

Straight Talk

In conclusion, we note that the very word "revelation", apart from the purely religious significance in which it was discussed above, has its secular interpretation. In most dictionaries, it is defined as an explanation of something hidden by mystery, and inaccessible to a wide range of persons. Usually it is the recognition of any facts that were not previously publicized.

With the development of the Internet, various forums have been widely disseminated, on which people have the opportunity, frankly speaking, to share with their virtual interlocutors the most painful and tell them what they could not trust to real people. An example of this can serve as a very popular in our days a forum of revelation "My Family".