175. Jesus Christ seen/heard over centuries. Part seven

 

To continue the narrative of the vision of Jesus by Ramdas while he was in a cave.

 

He wore a long, dark, chocolate colored robe or gown with wide, loose sleeves. What fascinated Ramdas were his eyes. They were scintillating like twin stars. The rays they were emitting were filled with tenderness, love and compassion.

Ramdas gazed on them, charmed and delighted. It struck him: “This is Jesus Christ.” There was another person beside him, but Ramdas’s eyes were not for him, although he was aware of his presence. He might be a disciple. Now Christ’s lips moved. He was speaking. Ramdas listened but could not make out what he said. The tongue seemed strange and unknown to him. For perhaps a minute he spoke; then the vision vanished, while the glow of light in the cave remained for some more minutes. Ramdas was completely immersed in ecstasy and only came to external consciousness after broad daylight.

 

10. The great mystic of 19the century, Ramakrishna, (blogs 19-24), had visions of Jesus Christ (1). Before the visions, for some months, he had been listening to Bible by Sambucharan Mallick. Thus he came to know of the pure life of Jesus and the religion he had founded. The desire to follow the Sadhanas (spiritual practices) of that path arose in his mind. It was soon that this event happened:

 

He was sitting in the garden house of a devotee, Jadunath Mallick. There were some good pictures hanging on the walls of that room. One of those pictures was of that of the child Jesus in his mother’s lap. He was looking intently at the picture and was thinking of the extraordinary life of Jesus, when he felt that the picture came to life, and that effulgent rays of light, coming out from the bodies of the mother and the child, entered into his heart and changed radically all the ideas in his mind!

………Rising with a great force, the waves of those impressions completely submerged the Hindu ideas in his mind. His love and devotion to the Devas and Devis vanished, and in their stead, a great faith in, and reverence for Jesus and his religion occupied his mind………

The Master came back to Dakshineswar temple and remained constantly absorbed in the meditation of those inner happenings. He forgot altogether to go to the temple of the Divine Mother and pay obeisance to Her. The waves of those ideas had a mastery over his mind in that manner for three days.

At last, when the third day was going to close, the Master saw, while walking under the Panchavati that a marvelous god-man of very fair complexion was coming towards him, looking steadfastly at him. As soon the Master saw that person, he knew that he was a foreigner. He saw that his long eyes gave a wonderful beauty to his face, and the tip of his nose, though a little flat, did not at all impair that beauty. The Master was charmed to see the extraordinary divine expression of that handsome face, and wondered who he was. Very soon the person approached him, and thereupon from the depth of the Master’s pure heart came out with a ringing sound, the words, “Jesus the Christ! The great Yogi, the loving son of God, one with the Father, who gave his heart’s blood and put up with endless tortures in order to deliver man from sorrow and misery.” Jesus, the god-man, then embraced the Master and disappeared into his body, and the master entered into ecstasy, lost normal consciousness and remained identified for some time with omnipresent Brahmin with attributes (Supreme God). Having attained the vision of Jesus, the Master became free from the slightest doubt about Christ being an incarnation of God.

One day, long after the event, he asked some disciples, that what was the physical description of Jesus in the Bible? They replied that the description was not available in the Bible, but since he was a Jew, he must be very fair in complexion, with long eyes and aquiline nose. The Master said, “But I saw that the tip of his nose was a little flat; I don’t know why I saw him like that.” They came to know, shortly after the Master passed away, that there were three different descriptions of Jesus’ physical features; and according to one of them the tip of his nose was a little flat.

11. There are other numerous visions/locutions of Jesus over the last two thousand years. I have omitted them for various reasons; either they lacked a bodily form of Jesus, or the account was written years later by persons who had not met the individual who had experienced the vision, or were of doubtful authenticity because either the events were implausible or reflected more of that person’s own thoughts. However, the visions/locutions of Saint Catherine of Sienna, and the Blessed Henry Susso are numerous and noteworthy. I have decided to narrate them in separate blogs.

 

 

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­ (1) Sri Ramakrishna; the Great Master by Swami Saradananda