Month: April 2020

by

Julian’s Comments (5)

To read Julian’s Revelations in order, which is far better, I suggest you begin at the Introduction

Chapter 52

God enjoyeth that He is our fadir, mother, and spouse, and how the chosen have here a medlur of wele and wo, but God is with us in three
manner; and how we may eschew synne but never it perfectly as in heaven.

I saw God treasures being our father, our mother,
our true spouse, and our soul His beloved wife.
Christ treasures being our brother,
Jesus, our Saviour.

I see there are five high joys in which He wishes
us to treasure Him, praising Him, thanking Him, loving Him,
endlessly delighting in all that shall be saved,

In this life we have a marvellous mix:
wealth of our Lord Jesus’ resurrection
and wretched mischief of Adam’s fall and dying.
By Christ we are steadfastly kept,
by His touching grace we are raised
in secure trust of salvation.

By Adam’s fall we are so broken,
made by so many sins and sundry pains,
so dark and blind we can scarce take any comfort.

But in our mind we await God,
faithfully trusting His mercy and grace, 
this is His work in us,
in His goodness He opens our mind’s eyes to see
sometimes more, sometimes less, as God makes us able;
now being raised into one,
now falling into the other.

This mixture so astonishes us
we scarcely know which way we,
or our fellow Christians stand,
for the wonder of this divided feeling,
but that same holy assent we give God
when we feel Him, truly wishing to be with Him
with all our heart, all our soul, and all our might.
Then we hate and despise our evil stirrings,
and all that might occasion sin, spiritual and bodily.

Yet nevertheless when this sweetness is hidden,
we fall again into blindness
and divers woes and tribulations.

This is our comfort, that we know in our faith,
that by the virtue of Christ our keeper
we never assent to it, but complain against it,
enduring pain and woe, praying,
until He shows Himself to us again.

So we stand in this medley every day of our life,
but we trust that He is lastingly with us,
and that in three ways:

He is with us in Heaven, truly man,
in His own person, drawing us up,
which was shown in His spiritual thirst.

And He is with us in earth, leading us,
which was in the third showing
where I saw God in a point.

He is with us dwelling endlessly in our soul,
ruling us, caring for us.
as I shall say in the sixteenth showing.

So in the servant was shown the mischief,
the blindness, of Adam’s fall,
and in the servant was shown the wisdom,
the goodness, of God’s Son.

In the lord was shown the regret,
the pity, of Adams woe;
and in the lord was shown the high nobility,
the endless worship mankind receives
by His dear worthy Son’s passion and death.

Therefore He treasures His falling mightily,
for the height, the fullness of bliss mankind receives,
surpassing all we should have had
if He had not fallen.

And thus to see this overpassing nobility
my mind was led to God
when I saw the servant fall.

And so we have now matter of mourning,
for our sin is the cause of Christ’s pains,
And we have lasting joy,
for the endless love which led Him to suffer.
And so the creature that sees and feels love
working by grace hates nothing more than sin.

For of all things to my sight, love and hate are hardest
and most unmeasurable contraries.

nevertheless I saw and understood our Lord’s meaning,
we may not in this life keep ourselves from sin
as holy in fully clean we shall be in Heaven.

But by grace we may avoid sins
which would lead to endless pain
as Holy Church teaches, and avoid pardonable sins
according to our strength.

And if we fall in our blindness and wretchedness,
we rise readily, knowing the sweet touch of grace,
willingly, according to Holy Church’s teaching,
looking back on the sin in grief, going on to God in love;
neither falling over-low inclined to despair,
nor being over reckless as if we did not care,
but nakedly, knowing our frailty,
that we may not stand a twinkling of an eye but by grace,
reverently cleaving to God, trusting Him alone.

For God’s vision differs from man’s,
and man’s vision differs from God’s.
For it belongs to man to meekly accuse himself,
and it belongs to the proper goodness of our Lord God
to courteously excuse man.

These are the two ways the lord beheld
his beloved servant’s fall.
One outward, meekly and mildly
with great regret, pity and endless love.

And rightly our Lord wishes us to accuse ourself,
wilfully, truly seeing and knowing our fall,
and all the harm that comes of it,
and that we may never restore it,
and by this, wilfully and truly see and know
His everlasting love in which He holds us.
and His plenteous mercy.

Graciously seeing and knowing both together
is the meek self-accusing our Lord asks of us,
and He works it; and then it is.

This is the lower part of man’s life,
shown outwardly in the lord’s regard for his servant
which I saw in two parts: one, man’s rueful fall;
the other, the worshipful atonement our Lord made for man.

The other regard was shown inwardly,
higher and all one. 
For the life and the virtue we have
in the lower part is of the higher;
it comes down to us in His kindred love of ourself by grace.

there is nothing between one and the other,
it is all one blessed love working double in us.

For in the lower part are pains and passions,
regrets, pities, mercies and forgiveness,
and such other as are profitable.

 But in the higher part are none of these,
but all one hey love and marvellous joy,
in which all pains are greatly restored.

In this our good Lord showed not only our excusing,
but also the worshipful nobility He shall bring us to,
turning all our blame into endless worship.

by

Julian’s Comments (4)

(Julian’s Revelations are far better read in order. If you wish to do so I suggest you begin at the Introduction)

This concludes one of the longest of Julian’s chapters, more will follow next week.

God’s Son is seen in the wisdom,
and the goodness in the servant.
In the poor labourer’s clothing,
and his standing near on the left side,
is seen the manhood and Adam,
with all the mischief and feebleness that follow.
In all this our good Lord showed His own Son and Adam as one man.

The virtue and goodness we have
is of Jesus Christ;
the feebleness and blindness we have
is of Adam;
both were shown in the servant.
Our good Lord Jesus has taken all our blame on Himself,
and our Father assigns no more blame to us than to His own Son.

He was the servant before He came to Earth,
ready, purposeful before the Father
until sent to do that worshipful deed
by which mankind was brought again to Heaven
even though He is God,
equal with the Father in the Godhead.

But aware of His purpose
to be Man to save man, fulfilling His Father’s will,
He stood before His Father as a servant
willingly taking on Himself all our charge.
Then He started readily at the Father’s will,
falling full low in the Maiden’s womb,
with no reward to Himself nor His hard pains.

The tunic is the flesh, single as the unity now
between godhood and manhood;
its skimpiness is poverty;
its age from Adam’s wearing;
its defacing from the sweat of Adam’s travail.
its shortness showing servant labour.

And thus I saw the Son standing,
saying in His demeanour,
Lo, my dear Father, I stand before You in Adam’s tunic ready to start and run. I would be in the earth to do Your worship when it is Your will to send me. How long shall I wait with this desire?

Truly the Son knew when it was the Father’s will,
and how long He should desire it,
but that was in His Godhead,
for He is the wisdom of the Father.
But this meaning concerns Christ’s manhood.
For all mankind that shall be saved
by the sweet incarnation,
by the blissful passion of Christ,
is the manhood of Christ.

He is the head, we are His bodily members
to whom the day and time is unknown,
when every passing woe and sorrow shall have an end
and everlasting joy and bliss be fulfilled;
for which day and time all the company of Heaven longs.

All those under Heaven that shall come there,
their way is with longing and desire.
This desire and longing was shown
in the servant standing before his lord,
and in the Son’s standing before the Father
in Adam’s tunic.

For the longing and desire,
of all mankind that shall be saved,
appeared in Jesus,
for Jesus is all that shall be saved,
and all that shall be saved is Jesus
– and all of God’s charity,
with obedience, meekness, and patience,
and virtues that belong to us.

Also in this marvellous example
I had teaching like an beginner’s ABC,
to understand some of our Lord’s meaning;
for the secrets of the Revelation were hidden there,
although all the showings are full of secrets.

The sitting of the Father points to His Godhead,
showing of rest and peace,
for in the Godhead there may be no travail.
Showing Himself as a lord,
points to to our manhood.

The servant’s standing indicates travail;
to the side and on the left
shows he was not worthy to stand
at the right hand of the Lord.

His starting was the Godhead,
His running was His manhood.
For the Godhead starts from the Father
falling into the Maiden’s womb,
taking our kindred in this fall
in which He had great physical pain.

The soreness He found was our flesh
in which He felt severe mortal pains.

His standing in awe before the Lord,
not to His right, shows His clothing was unsuitable
to stand at his Lord’s right hand,
which may not, and should not,
be His duty while He was a labourer.
Nor may He sit in rest and peace with his Lord
till He had won His peace rightly
with hard work.

And His standing to the left side,
shows that the Father left His Son,
wilfully in the manhood,
to suffer the pains of all mankind
without sparing Him.

In His tunic, being noticeably ragged and rent,
is seen the blows and scourging,
the thorns and nails,
the drawing and dragging,
His tender flesh rending
– as I saw, in some part,
the flesh rent from the skull,
falling in pieces until the bleeding failed,
and then it began drying again
clinging to the bone.

The wallowing, writhing, groaning and moaning,
is understood that He might never rise mightily
from the time He fell into the Maiden’s womb
until His body was slain and dead,
His soul yielded into the Father’s hands,
and all mankind for whom He was sent.

And at this point He first began to show His might,
for He went into Hell,
where He raised the great broken army
out of the deepest depths
which was truly joined with Him in high Heaven.

His body was in the grave till Easter morn,
and from that time He lay no more;
the wallowing, writhing, groans and moaning
truly ended.

And our foul mortal flesh that God’s Son took on Him,
which was Adams old tunic, skimpy, bare and short,
was then made fair by our Saviour,
white and bright, and endlessly clean,
wide and long, fairer and richer
than the clothing I saw on the Father.

For that clothing was blue,
and Christs clothing is now a fair seemly medley
so marvellous I cannot describe it,
for it is all truly worshipful.

Now the Lord sits on earth
no longer in wilderness,
but in His noblest seat
that He made in Heaven
to His delight.

The Son no longer stands before the Father
as a servant before the Lord,
dreadfully, plainly clad, partly naked,
but He stands before the Father
ever right richly clad in blissful largess with
a crown upon His head of precious jewels.

For it was shown that we are His crown,
the Father’s joy, the Son’s honour, the Holy Spirit’s delight
and endless, marvellous bliss, to all in Heaven.

The Son no longer stands to His Father’s left
as a labourer, but sits at His Father’s right hand
in endless rest and peace.

This does not mean He sits at the right hand
side by side, as one man by another in this life.
There is no such sitting in the Trinity,
but He sits on His Father’s right hand,
in the highest nobility of the Father’s joy.

Now is the spouse, Gods Son,
in peace with His beloved wife
which is the fair maid of endless joy.

Now the Son sits, true God and man,
in His city in rest and peace
which His Father has assigned to Him
in His endless purpose;
and the Father in the Son,
and the Holy Spirit in the Father
and in the Son.

by

Julian’s comments on her Revelations (3)

(Julian’s Revelations are far better read in order. If you wish to do so I suggest you begin at the Introduction> )

Continuing the example in chapter 51 of the lord and servant …

For twenty years after the showing, save three months,
I had inner teaching, as I shall say.
Take heed to all the properties and conditions shown in the example
though you think they are misty and seem indifferent to you.

I assented willingly with great desire,
seeing inwardly and earnestly
all the points and properties that had been shown, 
as far as my wit and understanding would serve,
beginning with my observation of the lord and the servant,
…
How the lord sat,
the place he sat on,
the colour of his clothing and its style,
his outward expression and nobility, and inner goodness;
the way the servant stood, where and how,
his clothing, its colour and shape, his outward behaviour,
and his inner goodness and willingness.

The lord that sat solemnly in rest and peace,
I understood to be God.
I understood that the servant that stood before the lord,
was shown for Adam,
that is to say, one man was shown, and his falling,
to show how God regards any man and his falling.
For in the sight of God, all mankind is one man,
and one man is all mankind.

In the fourteenth century when this was written ‘he’, ‘she’, and ‘man’, all meant ‘person’. To show gender it was necessary to add descriptive syllables such as hus-bound-man, wif-man etc. according to their intended use. He and she were simply words for ‘that person’ in different dialects.

This man’s strength suffered and became feeble,
his mind was stunned, and he no longer saw his lord; 
but his desire remained whole in God’s sight, which I saw our Lord commend and approve.

But he was stopped, blinded from knowing his own will,
which was great sorrow and unease to him.
For he neither he saw his loving lord clearly,
who was meek and mild to him,
nor truly how his loving lord saw him.

And I know well,
when these two are wisely and truly seen,
we shall, in part, get rest and peace here,
and the fullness of the bliss of Heaven by His bountiful grace.
This began the teaching I had then,
so I might learn how He regards us in our sin.

I saw then that only pain blames and punishes,
and our courteous Lord comforts and grieves;
to the soul He is always a shining face,
loving and longing to bring us bliss.

The place where our Lord sat was simple,
on the earth, barren and deserted,
alone in the wilderness.
His clothing, wide, long, fully befitting a lord.
The colour of His cloth was blue as azure, calm and fair.
His face was merciful, light brown and fulsome;
His eyes, black, most fair and seemly,
filled with loving devotion;
and within Him, a high refuge,
long, broad, and full of endless heavens.

His continual loving regard for His servant,
particularly in his falling,
I thought might melt our hearts for love,
and burst them in two for joy;
it seemed a mixture marvellous to behold –
part regret and pity, part joy and bliss.

The joy and bliss pass regret and pity
as far as Heaven is above Earth.
The pity was earthly, the bliss was heavenly.
The Father’s regret and pity was for Adam’s falling,
His most loved creature.
The joy and the bliss was of His beloved Son,
who is equal with the Father.

The merciful regard of His lovely face
filled all the earth,
it went down with Adam into Hell,
its continual devotion kept Adam from endless death.
And His mercy and pity dwell with mankind
until we come up into Heaven.    

But man is blinded in this life;
we may not see our Father, God, as He is.
When He in His goodness shows Himself to Man,
He shows Himself, homely, as a man.

But I saw truly,
we ought to know and believe the Father is not man.
His sitting on the barren, desert earth means this:
He made man’s soul to be His city, His dwelling place,
the most pleasing of all His works.

When man fell into sorrow and pain,
he was no longer fit to serve that noble office.
But our kind Father would assign him no other place.
He sits upon the earth awaiting mankind which is mingled with earth
until by His grace His dear Son had bought His city again
into noble fairness by His hard works.

The blueness of His clothing shows His steadfastness;
the brown-ness of His fair face
with the seemly darkness of His eyes
showed His holy sobriety;
The largeness of His clothing
fair, flaming about,
showed that He hath enclosed within Him
all heavens, all joy and all bliss.

This was shown in a moment;
I saw the Lord delighting highly in the worshipful restoration
He will and shall bring His servant by His plenteous grace.

And yet I wondered;
watching the lord and the servant,
I saw the lord sitting solemnly,
the servant standing reverently before him,
in the servant is a double understanding,
one without, another within.
Outwardly, he was clad simply, a labourer dressed for work,
and he stood close to the lord,
not equally by him, but partly aside on the left.

His clothing was a white tunic,
single, old, and very defaced,
dyed with sweat of his body, fitting him skimpily and short,
as it were an handful benethe the knee,
bare, almost worn out, ragged and torn.
I marvelled greatly at this, thinking
it unseemly clothing for a servant so highly loved,
to stand before so worshipful a lord.

Inwardly, in him was shown a love for the lord
just like the lord’s love for him.
The servant wisely saw he had just one duty,
to devotedly honour his lord.
Out of love, with no regard to himself
nor to anything that might befall him,
he started and ran hastily at his lord’s sending
to do his will and return his worship.
For it seemed by his outward clothing
that he had been his lord’s labourer for a long time.

And by the inner sight I had,
in both the lord and the servant,
it seemed he was beginning new work,
which he had never been sent on before.

There was a treasure in the earth which the lord loved.
I wondered what it might be and was answered in my mind:
It is a pleasant food loved by the lord.
For I saw the lord seated as a man,
with neither meat nor drink there to serve him
which was strange.

Also strange was that this solemn lord had only one servant,
him that he sent out.
I watched, thinking what labour the servant should do,
knowing he should do the greatest, hardest labour that is.

He should be a gardener,
digging, ditching, labouring, sweating,
turning the earth upside-down, going deep,
and watering the plants on time.
He should keep working making sweet streams flow
and noble and plenteous fruits spring up,
to bring before the lord and serve him to his liking,
never ceasing till he had prepared this food as he knew the lord liked,
then take it, with drink and meat, bearing it worshipfully to his lord.

All this time the lord should sit on the same place
awaiting his servant whom he sent out.
Yet I wondered where where the servant came from
For I saw the lord had endless life in himself
and all manner of goodness,
except that treasure that was in the earth,
which had its roots in the lord
in a marvellous depth of endless love
But it was not all to his worship till this servant had worthily prepared it,
and brought it before him himself in his presence.
And apart from the lord there was nothing but wilderness.

I understood nothing of what this example meant,
and wondered where the servant came from.

In the servant is understood the Second Person in the Trinity;
and the servant is understood as Adam,
meaning all mankind.

And therfore when I say the Son, it means the Godhead which is equal with the Father;
and whan I sey the servant, it means Christ’s manhood which is true Adam.

By the nearness of the servant is understood the Son,
and by the standing on the left side is understood Adam.

The lord is the Father, God;
the servant is the Son, Christ Jesus;
the Holy Ghost is the equal love in them both.
When Adam fell, God’s Son fell.

By the true unity made in Heaven,
God’s Son may not be separate from Adam,
for by Adam I understand all mankind.

Adam fell from life to death
into the vale of this wretched world,
and after that into Hell.
God’s Son fell with Adam into the vale of the Maiden’s womb,
who was the fairest daughter of Adam,
and to excuse Adam from blame in Heaven and in earth,
He fetched him, mightily, out of Hell.

The final part of this, one of the longest of Julian’s chapters, follows here next week.