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Hippolytus affirms that David "wrote prophetic psalms upon the true Christ, our God, and evidently declared all the things which happened to him in his suffering. . . and how that Christ humbled himself and put on the form of the servant Adam."
Justin Martyr quotes the whole 72nd psalm to prove that Christ was the King of glory, and declares that this entire psalm was written in honor of Him and none other. In his Apologies he asserts that in many instances the King referred to in the psalm was not David or Solomon, but the Lord Christ Himself. As another example, he quotes the 24th psalm: "Lift up your heads, O ye gates . . . and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of Hosts, he is the King of glory. This is a reference to Christ and the host of His ministering Angels and Archangels who always accompany Him.
In the 72nd psalm the Initiate singer was reading in the Mystic Scrolls of the glad day when Christ would be proclaimed Regent of earth and Saviour of the world. In that time of rejoicing every knee shall bow before Him and every voice proclaim Him Lord of Lords and King of Kings.
The scope of this article does not permit a detailed study of Pslams, but it may be seen that throughout the Book, and in accordance with the teachings of the Church Fathers, the sorrow and the joy, the pain and the exaltation of the Christ theme echoes and re-echoes like a song within a song.
Cyprian speaks of Christ as the first begotten, the wisdom of God by whom all things were made. In support of this statement, he quotes Proverbs 8:22-31 as follows:
The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old.
I was up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.
When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water.
Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world.
When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depths.
When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep:
When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the fountains of the earth:
Then was I by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him:
Rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth; and my delights were with the sons of men.
Many of the Fathers were of the same opinion regarding the Christ as was Cypri Cyprian.
It has been interpreted by some that the builder in Proverbs 9:1 refers to the Cosmic Christ, by whom all things were made: "Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars." Spiritual science would interpret the seven pillars as the seven planes of substance and of consciousness, the seven Creative Days (Periods) embracing a complete evolutionary cycle.
King Solomon the Wise was the highest Initiate of the Old Testament Dispensation. The exquisite Song of Solomon is the spiritual insignia, as it were, of his profound wisdom. This song of songs reveals perfect equilibrium; the rhythmic cadence of absolute balance has never been more beautifully expressed in any language: "My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies." Esoteric Christianity teaches that there exists an intimate bond between this highest Initiate of the Old Dispensation and the Master Jesus, highest Initiate of the New Testament Dispensation. The mission of the latter was to surrender his perfect human body for the Christ's use during the three years of His ministry — for, as various Christian Fathers have asserted, it was essential for the Christ to veil His celestial radiance by a human form else no man could have borne the power and splendor of His presence.
The God who appeared either in human form, or that of an Angel to any of the patriarchs was Jesus Christ. — Origen
The Prophets occupied a unique position in Old Testament history. They were messengers and channels between the inner and outer realms. Every religion has an inner and an outer teaching, the latter for the masses and the former for the few. The Prophets were interpreters of the inner meanings. Their messages centered largely in the Messiah theme and the preparation for His coming.
Among the most illustrious of these Prophets was Isaiah. The pages of his sublime Book are replete with predictions of the Christ and the glorious dispensation He will establish upon a new earth. Furthermore, Isaiah's seership encompassed not only the coming of the Christ but also that of John, the forerunner of the Lord, and the Virgin Mother of Jesus, as the following passages make clear.
The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. — Isaiah 40:-5
Therefore the Lord himself shall give You a sign; Behold, a virgin will conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. — Isaiah 7:14
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. — Isaiah 9:6
And there shall come forth a root out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots.
And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord . . . But with righteousness shall he Judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth. . . The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them . . . They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea. — Isaiah 11:1,2,4,6,9
Ezekiel's wondrous vision is a most significant utterance regarding the Christ who was yet to come:
Now as I beheld the living creatures, behold one wheel upon the earth by the living creatures, with his four faces.
The appearance of the wheels and their work was like unto the colour of a beryl: and therefore had one likeness: and their appearance and their work was as it were a wheel in the middle of a wheel. — Ezekiel 1:15,16
Here Ezekiel was studying the work of the four Recording Angels, Taurus, Scorpio, Aquarius and Leo. Taurus and Scorpio are the Hierarchies under which planetary karma is being liquidated. This is described in the Books of the Prophets as the travail, sorrow and desolation which they predict will come upon earth. Many of these prophecies are strangely familiar at the present time, for planetary karma is being liquidated now; and this purging will continue until earth's karmic sheet is clean.
Aquarius is depicted as the Son of Man, a sign symbolic of the Christed Age to come. Leo is the home of the Hierarchy of Flame: that is, of love and light. These two signs proclaim that when the Son of Man comes He will be the supreme light of the world, and love will be the motivating power of all mankind.
The following passages taken from several Old Testament Prophets have been understood by biblical interpreters down through the centuries as referring to the Christ:
And he shall judge many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it. — Micah, 4:3,4
Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in. — Mal. 3:1
Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute, judgment and justice in the earth. — Jer. 23:5
I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.
And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. — Dan. 7:13,14
The Prophet Joel, reading in the Akashic Record and noting therein the wonder of things which are to be in the coming age, predicts the Great Day of the coming of the Lord (the fulfillment of spiritual law) in the following inspired words:
I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
And also upon the servant and upon the handmaids will I pour out my spirit.
A careful survey of the Prophets will furnish numerous references of like nature. The pattern of these prophetical Books is largely the same. They deal with the three principal themes: the sorrow and desolation engendered by planetary karma; the dawning hope of the coming Messiah; the establishment of a new Christ Dispensation.
The Old Testament School of the Prophets was succeeded by the Order of the Essenes, members of which are mentioned in the New Testament. Again, the work of this holy Order was to prepare for the coming of the Lord Christ. The parents of Initiate Mary and of John the Baptist were members of this Order. With the completion of Christ's earthly ministry their mission ended and they disappeared, as far as history is concerned, by being absorbed into the first Christian communities. Their important role as custodians of the ageless Mysteries, along with initiatory teachings of the early Christians, was lost sight of by the Church relatively soon after its founding.
Esoteric Christians, however, always recognized the Essenes as possessors and transmitters of the Temple Wisdom and prophetic powers that came down through their immediate predecessors, the Hebrew Prophets. This fact is now coming to light, and is being brought to the attention of the general public by the recent discovery of Essenian writings known as the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Hippolytus asserts that the Lord Christ was the inspiration of all the Prophets. The Book of Zechariah, one of the most mystical of the prophetic Books, foretells the coming of Christ, who is termed "the branch," and also the establishment of His kingdom on earth, His death, and His second coming.
We have referred to the Aquarian-Leo cycle during which definite preparation will be inaugurated for His coming. Some mystic Christians predict that Christ will return during the following Capricorn-Cancer cycle. Zechariah describes the holy "remnant," those pioneers who will be prepared to receive the Lord Christ and to work for Him. These pioneers will have awakened within themselves the Christ principle — that latent divinity within each individual which is awakened by a sincere endeavor to emulate Him. This awakening brings a transformation of consciousness that affects the life and, finally, the body of an aspirant. Zechariah describes this process as two olive trees, a lighted candle between them, which stand before an anointed One. The transforming action effects a great change in the cerebro-spinal and the sympathetic nervous systems, which have a direct connection with man's desire and vital bodies, respectively. When they are in balance spiritual development is greatly facilitated. (This subject is considered in detail in the third volume of the Old Testament series.) The lighted candle between the two olive trees is the spinal spirit fire which, when lifted to the head, awakens powerful spiritual organs located therein. Zechariah likens the head of an awakened one to a golden bowl, for these organs then shed a golden luminosity that appears like a radiant aura around the whole body. The Prophet describes such pioneers as holy ones who come from the north, east, south and west in the New Jerusalem.
As previously observed, the second coming of Christ may occur during the next Capricorn-Cancer cycle. Thus the Christ would return under His own sign Capricorn, while pioneers under Cancer would ascend with Him to His own world of Life Spirit or Christ consciousness, the world of the great oneness. Here full recognition is attained that all things are part of God, and that God is part of all things. Here it is the New Age pioneers will be able to proclaim with Christ. "The Father and I are one!"
Malachi is the last Book of the Old Testament. Words of its concluding chapter contain the promise of all promises: "But unto you that hear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings. These inspiring words are as a bridge of light between the preparatory work of the Old Testament and its sublime culmination in the New.
— Corinne Heline
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