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

 

174. Jesus Christ seen/heard over centuries. Part six

 

We were discussing the account narrated by Swami Yogananda of Therese Neumann

 

“I halted just inside the threshold, at a strange and most frightful spectacle. Blood flowed thinly and continuously in an inch-wide stream from Therese’s lower eyelids. Her gaze was focused upwards at the spiritual eye within the central forehead. The cloth wrapped around her head was drenched with blood from the stigmata wounds of the Crown of Thorns. The white garment was redly splotched over her heart from the wound in her side at the spot where Christ’s body, long ages ago, had suffered from the final indignity of the soldier’s spear thrust.

Therese’s hands were spread in gesture maternal, pleading: her face wore an expression both tortured and divine. She appeared thinner and was subtly changed in many inner and outer ways. Murmuring words in a foreign tongue, she spoke with slightly quivering lips to persons who were visible to her superconscious sight.

As I was in attunement with her, I began to see the scenes of her vision. She was watching Jesus as he carried the timbers of his cross amid jeering multitudes*. Suddenly she lifted her head in consternation: the Lord had fallen under the cruel weight. The vision disappeared. In the exhaustion of fervid pity, Therese sank heavily against her pillow…..again I fixed my eyes to Therese’s face, deathly pale under the rivulets of blood, but now calm, radiating purity and holiness.”

This scene is most important, because in other scenes/locutions by other persons there is only one witness of the event; the subject experiencing it. But here there were two people watching it, Swami Yogananda and Therese Neumann. These two persons lived thousands of miles away and had met only during Yogananda visit to Germany.

7. Swami Yogananda had a vision of Jesus (1). He narrates: ‘One night while I was engaged in silent prayer, my sitting room became filled with an opal blue light. I beheld the radiant form of the blessed Lord Jesus. A young man he seemed, of about twenty five, with a sparse beard and mustache; his long black hair, parted in the middle, was haloed by a shimmering gold.

His eyes were eternally wondrous; as I gazed, they were infinitely changing. I intuitively understood the wisdom conveyed. In his glorious gaze I felt the power that upholds the myriad worlds. A Holy Grail appeared at his mouth; it came down to my lips and then returned to Jesus. After a few moments he uttered beautiful words, so personal in their nature, that I keep them in my heart.’ 

8. Indra Devi (blogs 87-88) had in a dream a beautiful vision of Christ (2). She had found herself in a city, walking on a cobbled street. There were high building walls on both sides. From a side alley the sound of something heavy being dragged could be heard drawing nearer and nearer; and then the whole atmosphere changed­^___the air became surcharged with something that cannot be described.

               A few men with heavy clumsy clothes and rope sandals came in front and then there was someone bent double, dragging on his back a roughly hewn tree shaped something like a cross. It was too heavy for him and he was bare bodied except for a sort of Indian lungi^# She pushed her way through the crowd, and drawing near the person drawing the Cross, cried out “Oh Lord, why do you allow them to this to you?” She went down on her knees and wept. He who seemed so frail and weary looked up at her and she saw that his eyes were not sad. They were like two pools of deep water, full of compassion. For he understood why men do not understand. He forgave those very unfortunate beings who hated him, and offered them Divine Love…….The eyes smiled though the lips were parched. Indra was overwhelmed by the experience….peace coursed from her head right down through her body

9. Swami Ramdas in his book (3) describes his vision of Jesus Christ. He was living in a cave on water diet. On the fifth day, the cave was suddenly lit up by a strange light. Ramdas saw seated before him, on the floor about three or four feet from him, the figure of a man. His face was dazzling with a heavenly splendor. The features were fine, regular and beautiful. There was a short, black, glossy beard and mustache on the face. The lips were crimson red, revealing milk white, lustrous teeth. Soft white black curls flowed down his shoulders.

 

To be continued

 

*Her entrancement usually started with scenes of the events following the Last Supper and ended with Jesus’ death on the Cross; or occasionally with his entombment.

(1) Autobiography of a yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda

(2) Pilgrim of the stars by Dilip Kumar Roy and Indra Devi

(3) In the vision of God, vol 2, by Swami Ramdas

^#   A wraparound cloth that reaches from the waist to the ankles

 

 

 

 

173. Jesus Christ seen/heard over centuries. Part five

 

Here are some other visions/locutions:

 

‘I was once asked by someone to beg God to tell him if he would be serving Him by accepting the rank of bishop. And after Communion the Lord said to me “When he has quite really and truly recognized that true dominion consists in possessing nothing, then he may take it”’

 

She had the following vision; “While I was at prayer, I saw myself in a great field, all alone, and around me there was such a multitude of people that I was completely surrounded by them. They all seemed to have weapons in their hands to attack me……..I had great distress of spirit, and had no idea what I should do, when I raised my eyes to the heaven, and saw Christ, not in heaven, but in the air high above me, holding out His hands to me and encouraging me in such a way that I no longer feared all the other people, who, try as they might, could do me no harm.”

 ‘For its meaning was explained to me, and soon afterwards I found myself attacked, in almost exactly the same way, whereupon I realized that the vision was a picture of the world, the whole of which seems to take up arms in an offensive against the poor soul.’

 

Once her soul was greatly enkindled in prayer. There came a spiritual transport of a kind which she could not describe. “ My spirit seemed to be plunged into that Majesty of which I had been conscious on other occasions, and to be filled with it. In this Majesty I was given to understand a truth which is the fulfillment of all truths, yet I cannot tell how, because I saw nothing. Someone said to me ^___ I could not see who, but I was quite clear that it was the Truth itself: “This that I am doing for thee is no small thing, but one of the things for which thou are greatly indebted to Me; for all the harm which comes to the world is due to the failure to know the truth of the Scripture in the clarity of their truth, of which not a title shall fall”. Then He said to me: “Ah daughter, how few are they who love Me in truth! If people loved Me, I should not hide my secrets from them. Knowst thou what it is to love Me in truth? It is to realize that everything that is not pleasing to Me is a lie………..”

I( mkadk), want to humbly add, that this mote has loved God, without any desire for worldly reward, but has not received any spiritual experience.

She continues: ‘ Once I was wondering if I was too much attached to the world because I was happy when I was with the people to whom I spoke about my soul, and had an affection for them…….And the Lord told me that if a sick person was at the death door, and attributed his recovery to a physician, it would be no virtue in him to fail to thank him and not to love him. What would have become of me, He continued, but for these people? The conversation of good people never did any harm, and provided my conversation was always carefully considered and virtuous, I should not cease mixing with them…..’

 

And, the last of St Teresa’s experiences which I am now going to narrate, is different from all others, because she heard with bodily ears:

 

A person, to whom St Teresa was indebted, was bent upon doing something bad. She was in the deepest affliction. She retreated to a corner, where there was a representation of Christ bound to a column, and started begging God to give her some means to dissuade that man. “Then I heard a very soft voice, speaking to me, as it were, in a whisper. My whole body quivered with fear and I tried to catch what the voice was saying, but I could not, and very soon it was gone. My fear quickly left me. I experienced a calm, a joy, and an inward delight, and it amazed me that the mere hearing of the voice by bodily ears, unaccompanied by any understanding of what it said, should have such an effect on the soul.”

 

The great visions of St Teresa; of devil, hell, and the Godhead have already, briefly, been described in blog 77.

 

6. I have briefly recounted the vision of Jesus by Therese Neumann in blogs 79-80 (1). Let me repeat the introduction to Therese for the sake of continuity, although, I don’t like to repeat:

Therese, born in 1898, was from Germany. She was famous because she had not eaten or taken any liquids for twelve years, except a consecrated wafer, paper-thin, and the size of a small coin, each day. She was also famous for the fact, that every Friday, Stigmata, sacred wounds of Jesus, would appear on her corresponding body parts, and she would be experiencing the Passion of Christ.

Therese became blind and paralyzed, when she was twenty, because of an accident. She miraculously regained her sight through prayers to St Therese of Lisieux ( see blog 13-14) in 1923. She stopped eating and drinking in 1923, and the stigmata started appearing in 1926.

She also told that she was a helpless onlooker as she watches the ‘Passion of Christ’ from Thursday midnight to Friday afternoon. Her wounds bleed at that time, her wounds would open and bleed; She would lose 10 pounds of her ordinary 121 pounds weight.

They were given permission to watch the saint during the trance. Just before entering the room, Yogananda put himself in communion with her brain, so that he could see what she was seeing.

 

To be continued

 

(1) Autobiography of a yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda

172. Jesus Christ seen/heard over centuries. Part four

 

 

We were discussing the visions and locutions of St Teresa of Avila.

Jesus also advised her to send to Rome, and to follow a certain procedure, which he also described to her.

She was also assured by St. Claire on St. Claire’s day, as she appeared to her in great beauty.

 

A lady was in great distress and lived in a large city twenty leagues away. This lady was well acquainted with the Provincial. She had heard of ‘this poor sinner’, St Teresa. The Lord gave her a very great desire to see St Teresa. The lady approached the Provincial, who ordered St Teresa to visit her.

St Teresa did not want to go to that lady. The reason was that she thought that the lady considered that St Teresa had some good in her while she thought she ( Teresa) was so wicked. But Jesus told her to go without fail, because it would help the project of the convent. He told her that the Devil had organized a great plot. However she had nothing to worry because he was going to help her.

While she was staying with that lady, a religious arrived. A great desire grew in St Teresa to talk to him. She curbed the desire three times, but finally she went to that gentleman. They talked for quite a bit. That man asked her to commend him often to God. She vehemently begged God to take that man and make him His servant. The Lord told her to say certain things to that person. She was shy to convey His message, because she did not know how a third person would receive such a message. So she wrote it down and gave it to that person. The effect on that person was tremendous, because he thought that the message was from God and he resolved to give himself to God. The Lord had, through her, told him certain truths which were so suitable that he was astounded.

 

She was talking to a religious of the order of St Dominic. Her soul was filled with love of God. She became almost absorbed. She writes: ‘It confused me to see him listening so humbly as I was telling him certain things about prayer………It helped me so much to be with him that he seemed to have left my soul ablaze with a new longing……..And my soul in such a state that it could not endure so much joy. I fell into a deep rapture……….I saw Christ, in the greatest majesty and glory, manifesting his great satisfaction…….This he told me, and said that he wanted me to realize clearly that he was always present at conversations of this kind, for he was very pleased when people found their delight in talking of him.’

‘All the prophecies about this house, and of other matters, which the Lord told me, have been fulfilled, some three years later. I always mention them to my confessor and that lady. She, as I have learnt, repeated them to other persons, who thus know that I am not lying.’

 

One day the Lord told her that she must on no account fail to found the convent in poverty, for that was his Father’s will, and his own will, and he would help her.

On another occasion he told her that money only leads to confusion and he said other things in praise of poverty, and assured her that none of the persons will ever lack the necessities of life if they served him.

 

She did not want to become a Superior. She considered this post as a great torment. But the Lord told her to go. She writes: ‘if I wanted a cross, there was a good one all ready for me and I was not to reject it but go on bravely, for he would help me…… I was terribly worried and nothing but weep’

 

The discussion for endowment (see footnote) had started. St Teresa was tired and worn out by the continuous battle for the establishment of the house. She narrates: ‘ On the very night before it was to be concluded, the Lord told me that I must not agree to such a thing (endowment), for, if once we had an endowment, we should never be allowed to give it up again’

 

Finally she got permission to establish the convent.

“Before entering the convent, while at prayer in the church, I all but went into rapture, and saw Christ, Who seemed to me receiving me with great love, placing a crown on my head and thanking me for what I had done for his Mother……On another occasion I saw Our Lady in the greatest glory, clad in white mantel, beneath which she seemed to be sheltering us all. From this I learned what a high degree of glory the lord would give to the nuns in this house.”

 

To be continued

 

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­______________________________________________________________________________

Footnote. A financial endowment is a donation of money or property to a not-for-profit organization for the ongoing support of that organization.

 

 

 

171. Jesus Christ seen/heard over centuries. Part three

 

Jesus Christ appeared many times and gave instructions to St Teresa regarding the establishment of a Carmelite convent of Saint Joseph’s for nuns. This was the first house of its kind in the world. It was a small, bare house, where 12 nuns started living in poverty, austerity and prayer. There was severe opposition to its formation by general public, church officials, Mayor and City Council. The struggle lasted for years. The main reason for their opposition was the concern that from where will the money for the living expenses of these women come? Now, there are thousands of these houses, both for men and women, in the world. Here is the start:

‘One day, after Communion, the Lord gave me the most explicit command to work for this aim with all my might and made me wonderful promises^___ that the convent would not fail to be established; that great service would be done to Him in it; that it should be called St Joseph’s; that He would watch over us at one door and our Lady at the other; that Christ would go with us; that the convent would be the star giving out the most brilliant light…’

As soon as the news of this project spread, severe persecution started.

 

‘Worn out, I commended myself to God and His Majesty began to give me consolation and encouragement. He told me that I could now see what those saints who had founded religious Orders had suffered: they had had to endure much more persecution than I could imagine and we must not allow ourselves to be troubled by it’

 

Since everybody was against the project, the Provincial changed his mind and refused to sanction the plan of the new convent. She and a friend went to a very learned person of a certain Order. After consideration, the learned man advised them not to give up the plan. Other saintly persons also supported her thinking that it was an idea from God. They were secretly ready to purchase a small house. When her confessor learnt of the Provincial’s opposition he wrote to her. She writes:

 

“For, amidst this multitude of persecutions, my confessor, whom I had expected to console me, wrote that I must now have realized that all that had happened was just a dream and that henceforth I must lead a better life and not try to do anything more of the kind or talk about it any further, since I now saw what scandal it had caused. He said other things, all very distressing. But the Lord, who never failed me…..told me at once not to distress myself and said I had not offended him in the matter at all but had rendered him great service. He told me to do what my confessor ordered me and keep silence for the present and until time came to resume the project.”

St Teresa was silent about the project for 5 to six months.

 

‘One day, the Lord told me not to be worried, for my distress would soon be over. I was very glad, supposing his meaning to be that I was soon going to die.’

She proceeds: “I thought the house was too small, so small that it seemed impossible to turn it into a convent. One day, after I had communicated, the Lord said to me: ‘I have already told you to go in as best as you can’, and then added a kind of exclamation: ‘Oh, the greed of mankind! So you really think there will not be enough ground for you! How often did I sleep all night in the open air because I had not where to lay my head!’

 

To continue with the struggle for the convent; in the monastery of St Dominic she had a rapture so great that it nearly drew her out of herself altogether. She narrates:

 

‘I thought I saw myself being clothed in a garment of great whiteness and brightness. At first I could not see who was clothing me, but later I saw Our Lady on my right hand and my father St Joseph on my left, and it was they who were putting the garment upon me. I was given to understand that I was being cleansed of my sins…….Our Lady suddenly took me by the hands and told me that I was giving her great  pleasure by serving the glorious St Joseph and I might be sure that all I was trying to do about the convent will be accomplished and that both the Lord and the two of them will be served in it…….: As a sign that it was true, she said, she would give me this jewel. Then she seemed to throw around my neck a very beautiful gold collar, to which was fastened a most valuable cross….to imagine the brightness of the vision which it was the Lord’s will to send me….”

‘The beauty which I saw in Our Lady was wonderful, though I could discern in her no particular detail of form: it was her face as a whole so lovely…… and the amazing whiteness and splendor of her vestments, though the light was not dazzling’

 

‘Our Lady looked to me quite like a child……. I seem to see them ascending to heaven with a great multitude of angels. I remained quite alone, but so greatly comforted and exalted and recollected in prayer.’

 To be continued