Genesis 1,1 – 2,3 The seven days, stages of love

Summary of the stages: the day of creation and the day of Holy Week

In God everything is simultaneous, everything that human beings can gradually accept of his love is already present in God, already offered in advance. The word of God that became flesh in Jesus Christ is the same word that creates the world and makes us pass from darkness to light. We are created in his image and he leads us to full resemblance with him:

«In joy you will give thanks to God the Father, who has made you able to share in the inheritance of the holy ones in light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth” (Colossians 1, 11-16).

Thus, God has already realized his work of salvation, he has united us to his own son, making us members of his body. Thus, animated by the same love as his son Jesus Christ, the eternal Word of God, we too can call God Father and be united by his love to one another. Here is the path that human beings will follow to fully rest in the love of God and of their human brothers and sisters, here are the stages through which we welcome the eternal love of God in its full measure:

Day 1: the creation of light – Jesus enters Jerusalem. He freely gives his life to the world, light that comes to illuminate the darkness. This light that he brings to the world is already the light of the resurrection.
Day 2: The creation of the space that separates the waters – From the right side of the crucified Christ flows the source of divine life that comes to quench the thirst of the earth. In baptism, the human being welcomes the one source that gives life to the world and makes every creature part of a single family, a people of brothers and sisters.
Day 3: “The waters are gathered together and become seas, and what was dry appears. God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth grass with seeds of trees bearing fruit with seeds.’ The tree is an image of the righteous who has identified the source of life, extends his roots towards it, can welcome his neighbor among its branches and bear fruit. All this is fulfilled first of all in Jesus Christ on the tree of the cross, it is there that he opens his arms to welcome all of humanity into his love, it is from this tree of the cross that his body, laid in the tomb, will fall to the ground like the seed that will bear fruit through his death, having given the world proof of his love. We too are this earth and we can welcome faith in the good earth to become trees in our turn and bear fruit through the witness of our faith in the resurrection, faith in God’s love and mercy that we in turn can offer to our neighbor.
Day 4: The luminaries separate day from night, they are signs for days and years, they illuminate the earth. The great luminary governs the day, the small one orders the night and the stars, both illuminate the earth, order the day and the night and separate the light from the darkness. With his death, Jesus revealed to the world the glory of God, the immensity of his love. With his resurrection he showed the victory over evil and death, the victory of light over darkness: he became the sun of justice that shines on the good and the bad to offer each one the opportunity to move towards the light. Those who will have accepted the gift of divine life will be together like members of a single body illuminated by the grace and love of God. They will be like the moon that receives the light of the sun and individually they will bear witness to the light in the darkness like stars, guiding humanity towards hope, towards love, life, resurrection. Jesus also reveals all this to us in the resurrection of Lazarus. Lazarus also rose again on the fourth day after his death. From that moment on, Jesus will be wanted dead, but the darkness will be overcome by the light of resurrection and life.
Day 5: God created the animals of the sea and the birds of the air, he saw that this was good and said: “Be fruitful and multiply, fill the sea and the earth”. To guide these living souls who dwell in the sea and the sky and who are the image of human behavior, Jesus, during the Last Supper, establishes the apostles. Through the Eucharist, he makes them members of his own body, prepares them to be fishers of men and to lead humanity to heaven. They will accomplish this by multiplying the Eucharistic meal, inviting others to share in the meal, to communion and to reconciliation with God and with others, symbolized by the washing of feet.
Day 6: “God made the animals come out of the earth and created the different species. And God says, “Let us make Adam (the human being),” so that he would direct the animals, and he created the human being, Adam, in his own image, in the image of Elohim, the triune God who is love relationship. He told him to bear fruit, to multiply, to fill the earth, to walk on it and to direct fish, birds and everything that crawls on the earth. The fruit of the trees that bear seeds will be their nourishment: this implies that sterile deeds bear no fruit, no seed, and do not nourish human beings. And the grass will also be the food of all animals in which a living soul is present. It is no longer a question of animals that manifest violence, but of those that manifest the will of God, the love of God. “And God (Elohim) created the human being (אָדָם adam) in his own image in the image of God (Elohim) created he him, male and female created he them.” – The union of man and woman, the love between the two, is thus the image of God. Just as a fiancé is united with his fiancée to form one, so Jesus is united with humanity. This union with God, once realized, will enable this couple, formed by God and humanity, to bear fruit, to multiply by offering their love and life to others. It is noteworthy that the word God, Eloah in Hebrew, is here in its plural form Elohim, because God is Trinity, relationship of love, this single will to love brings together and unifies the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, for this reason the verb that defines God’s action is in the singular, because God is one, but in the creation he expresses the relationship of love that is in him, his desire to share his joy.
Day 7: On the seventh day God completes and brings to an end the work he has done, he blesses it and sanctifies it. He stops doing, that is, bringing to completion what he has created. Jesus also completes the work that leads humanity from darkness to light when he offers his life and his breath on the cross, thus completing the union of humanity with God. In this way, humanity can rest in God, confidently placing its spirit in his hands, just as Christ did on the cross. When Jesus places his life and his breath in the hands of the Father, he too will say: “It is accomplished” (John 19:30). On the seventh day, the participation of humanity in God’s rest is represented in this way: it is the heavenly Eucharistic meal, where God can dwell in us and we in him, all united by his love as members of the same body.

Thus, humanity will be able to see the glory of God (day 1), access the source of life (day 2), be like soil fertilized by this source and bear fruit (day 3), be like luminaries in the sky, reflecting God’s light in the darkness (day 4), be led from the agitated and salty waters of the sea of this world to the experience of heavenly realities (day 5), all this will be fully realized when humanity is perfectly united with God, accessing through Jesus Christ a filial relationship with God, union with him (day 6) and then having fully surrendered his life into God’s hands, participating in his peace, eating at his table, God in us and we in him, filled with his love for one another, not only after death, but entering into the filial relationship right now (day 7).

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The seven days, stages of the life in God, of God’s action in us.

The first section of the Bible begins with the work of creation. The first Hebrew word, bereshit, introduces us to the divine, eternal dimension. This word means “in the head” and therefore introduces us to the divine dimension, to God’s plan, to the head, to the spirit of God. This implies entering a timeless, eternal dimension, entering into God’s vision of creation in which time and space are found. In God there is no change, there is no time, there is no space, his work is eternal.

Here we enter the divine, spiritual dimension, which makes us understand God’s will to offer his life, to share his happiness with others, to give life to the world, to all creation so that this may be the manifestation of his love because God is love.

The word of God perfectly expresses his essence, what he is, and this word is made visible through the work of creation. God wants to make himself known, he wants to share his life, his light, his joy with us. His word becomes flesh, it becomes like the creature in all respects, so that we can see and understand the spirit through which and in which he accomplishes everything.

So Jesus tells us:

“I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. This is my prescription (translation of the Greek word ἐντολὴ entolē, that which leads to perfection): that you love one another as I have loved you. There is no greater love than for a man to lay down his soul for those he loves.” (John 15, 11-13).

His creative word wants to lead us to perfect joy, which consists in the experience of God, who is love, and the greatest love, divine love, consists precisely in this desire to give one’s life to those one loves, to all his creatures, which he loves by giving them life.

Now, this text, in addition to telling us about the divine will to give life to the world, to create it materially, tells us about his work, which is to lead us to perfect joy, to the full experience of divine, gratuitous love, to the gift of our very lives in love and through love.

Thus, everything that is described in the week of creation is made visible by Jesus, the Messiah, who manifests the spirit of God to the world by fulfilling his will. He shows us what this gift of life, the greatest love, consists of. We call the last week of Jesus’ life “Holy Week”, it is at that moment that he shows us his desire to offer us his life by entering Jerusalem to show us his love for every creature.

So, we enter this spiritual dimension in which God embraces all time because He is the one who creates it: the past, the present, the future, everything is simultaneously before Him. The visible work of creation manifests the mystery of the Trinity, the relationship of love that is in God. He gives life to the Son, he generates him, out of love, in the love that is the Spirit of love of God, and the Son, who is the Word of God, in all things similar to him, the perfect image of the Father, the perfect expression of his will, returns this love to him in gratitude, filial gratitude towards the one who offers him life. The child places his life in the hands of the Father with complete confidence, because it is the Father who gives him life, who generates him, eternally.

Everything that lives receives life from the Spirit of God according to the will of God, expressed and manifested by his Word. Thus, everything that exists bears the mark, the seal, of the Spirit of God the creator, everything manifests the relationship with the Father who gives life. We are therefore invited to share in the divine life as children, created in his image and likeness. We will therefore discover in this text how God leads creation to perfect joy, how he brings his creation to fulfillment, stage by stage. These stages, for us, take place during our lifetime, but in God they are one, reflecting the eternal desire to spread his love throughout creation, to associate creation with his own joy, to make us know what he is through our experience of love, a love that is called to be as great as his, as perfect as his, so that we may be one with him.

The three meanings of Scripture:

Jesus tells us:

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” (Matthew 5:17).

The Greek word for fulfill is plērõsai (πληρῶσαι), a verb based on the word plērēs meaning full. This means that Jesus will make the meaning of the Word of God full and perfect, first of all because he will show us with his own actions and behavior the spirit in which all this is said. In fact, the word of God is eternal, it doesn’t change, his work is always the same. So, the word of God that is found in the Scriptures, as the evangelist St. John tells us, becomes flesh and we can see it in action, before our eyes. Everything that God has said for centuries, Jesus comes to show it to us, to fulfill it. If the Scriptures say that God gives us his life, Jesus, who is the Word of God made flesh, gives us his very life and shows us that this is an act of love, a gratuitous and selfless act of love. Human beings, in fact, do not believe in mere words, they do not trust, they doubt and they are suspicious, but when they see actions that conform to those words, then they believe.

Therefore, in Scripture we see the word of God that:

manifests itself in nature, in the work of creation, because everything receives life, existence and being from God. So when Jesus wants to speak of the heavenly reality, of the spirit, of the divine work in each of us to make us like him, he speaks in parables, that is, he takes visible elements of nature, of its dynamics, such as the tree that bears fruit, the light that drives away darkness, or the stories of our lives to give us access to the spiritual reality. He can easily make use of all the elements of nature, since it is the work of the Trinity, bears the seal of the divine life, spirit and word that creates it and is manifested at work in it.
manifests and fulfills itself in the person of Jesus, in all that he says and does, and also in the history of the Church, constituted by the members of the body of Christ. Jesus, by instituting the apostles and uniting his disciples to himself through the sacrament of the Eucharist, where they are nourished by his body and his blood, gives life to the Church, to the whole of the members of his body. Therefore, also in what the community of members of the body of Christ experiences, the life of Christ is completed. He lives, is persecuted and rises again when the Church bears witness to his word with her actions in the world, when she is persecuted like Jesus and when she reflects on earth the mystery of the resurrection, of the victory of love over evil and death, of light over darkness.
manifests itself in each individual member, in the specific life of each one who will be led to bear witness to his faith through the love he shows to his neighbor, risking and offering his own life like Christ. This third sense will reveal to us the work of God in the spirit of each of us, how He leads us to likeness with Him, what spiritual stages each of us goes through to walk towards God, towards the greatest love. This gradually reveals to us the growth of faith, of the trust we can place in God, to the point of entrusting our very life to Him, trusting in the victory of love, of the divine life in us.

DAY 1:

So let’s look at day one of God’s work. In fact, it is about a single day, because God’s work is to bring light where there is darkness, and this day is unique because God’s work is always the same for each of us and in each of us: to tear us away from darkness and lead us to the full light of perfect love, of perfect joy, through the infinite stages of every human being’s life. Therefore, God’s work and action will be repeated and found in each of the stages described in the seven days.

«My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.» (John 5:17)

So let’s examine the text of day one:

א בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ
1. Bereshit [in what is in the head] created Elohim (אֱלֹהִים Elohim) heaven and earth.

Understanding the words:

(For the first word of the Bible, bereshit, see the article Genesis 1, 1 Bereshit and all the in-depth studies with the Hebrew and Christian commentaries found there).

Here is an example of a Hebrew commentary on this first word of the Bible:

בראשית בתחלת הזמן והוא רגע ראשון בלתי מתחלק שלא היה זמן קודם לו ברא עשה אינו ישנו ובזה לא יפול זמן כלל Bereshit, at the beginning of time, this is the first instant without it being divisible, before which there was no time. He created, he made what is not exist. Time does not apply to this at all.

Ovadia Sforno (Cesena 1470- Bologna 1550) on Genesis 1, 1

We enter the eternal divine dimension with this first word bereshit. “Be” means inside, “resh” means head, “it” tells us that it is an adverb, that is, how, when, where the action takes place, in this case “in the head”. In Greek it has been translated with the word arkhē which refers to the beginning of everything, to what is at the origin of everything: the divine plan or will to create. We therefore step out of our created earthly dimension and enter God’s plan, the eternal divine will to create the world.

The second term bara’ means the act of creating, the subject can only be God, it is He who creates, out of nothing, and the term “created” is in the singular.

The third term “elohim” is the plural of “eloah”, which means god. Why this plural if the verb is in the singular? According to the Christian reading of the Bible, God is obviously unique, but in him who is love, love is an exchange between the Father and the Son, their mutual love is the Spirit in which they are one, through the same love. This mystery of the oneness of God in the exchange of love between the Father and the Son in one Spirit of love is called the mystery of the Trinity, one being in three hypostases, in Greek mía ousía, treis hypostáseis, which has been translated as “one divine essence, three persons”. The Greek term hypostasis tells us what stays permanently, what subsist: hypo means below, sub in Latin, and stasis intensifies the action of being, of existing and therefore of sub-sisting. In God three subsist: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit; their love and their will are one, one God. Therefore, the act of creation is the act of the one God, of the exchange of love of the three: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit who subsist in Him, in love.

The fourth word shamaym is generally translated as heavens and also in Greek, the Gospel speaks of the heavens, the skies. Now, the ending of this word -aym is the same as that of the dual words, because in Hebrew words that go in pairs, like eyes, hands, end with -aym. English doesn’t have a dual form. Now, if we were to understand this word as a dual form, we could reflect on the scope of this dual: would there be two heavens, two skies? One, the sky above the earth and one, the sky that indicates the spiritual dimension, the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven, the where Our Father dwells, he who “is in heaven”. When God wants to manifest himself, to make himself known, his Word becomes flesh, becomes visible. He is the kingdom of heaven that has come down to earth, very close to us, within us, the presence of God, in Jesus, who came to establish his kingdom in the heart of each one of us. Therefore, the work of creation manifests the love of the trinitarian God and his Word becomes flesh, the kingdom of God becomes visible to men, even more, he comes to dwell in us. This, obviously, according to a plan of God in which everything is simultaneous, everything has always been this way.

Fifth word erets, the land where God establishes his kingdom: “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”, Jesus tells us (Matthew 6, 10). On this earth we have a sky above us, but also another, more important sky, the one in which the love of God reigns in our hearts. It is in this kingdom that we are united in perfect love, where all together we are nothing but one, in the image of the mystery of love that is in the Trinity itself.

“May they all be ONE, as you, Father, are in me and I am in you. May they also be ONE in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. And I have given them the glory that you gave me, so that they may be ONE as we are ONE: I in them and you in me. May they be perfectly ONE, so that the world may know that you have sent me and that you have loved them as you have loved me”, Jesus tells us (John 17, 21-23).

It is within us that this love reigns when our spirit is brought to the likeness of God, to perfect love towards his creatures. St. Paul, when hearing from the community of Colossians that they have received the preaching of the Gospel and the baptism, he expresses himself as follows: “He has made your love (ἀγάπη agápē) known to us in the Spirit” (Colossians 1, 8).

ב וְהָאָרֶץ הָיְתָה תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ וְחֹשֶׁךְ עַל-פְּנֵי תְהוֹם וְרוּחַ אֱלֹהִים מְרַחֶפֶת עַל-פְּנֵ י הַמָּיִם
2 And the earth was tohu va vohu (תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ) and darkness was upon the faces (עַל-פְּנֵי ‘al-pney) of tehom(תְהוֹם) and the Spirit (רוּחַ ruaḥ) of Elohim (אֱלֹהִים) was hovering (מְרַחֶפֶת meraḥefet) over the surface of the waters.

(For more on the Spirit of God, see the article Genesis 1, 2 Rouah The Spirit of God is feminine and its insights.)

Understanding the words:

‘erets the earth. According to the use of this word in the Bible, and especially in the letters of St. Paul, the earth and what is earthly is everything that, having been created and therefore initially separated from God, must head towards the divine reality, to be one with Him, united to God by the same love. That which is earthly is called to become heavenly (First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15 and Second Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 5). This word implies an idea of cutting off, of separation.

“Molded from clay, the first man is from the earth; the second man is from heaven. As Adam was made of clay, so men are made of clay; as Christ is from heaven, so men will be from heaven. And as we were in the image of him who is made of clay, so shall we be in the image of him who is from heaven. (1 Corinthians 15:47)

hayeta: 3rd person singular feminine, accomplished aspect of the verb to be: was, has been. This anteriority may imply that in the first place the creature, the earth, being created, is distinct from the creator, there is a separation. The earth was created that way. But then God leads it to himself, to the light.

Tohu va vohu: As far as our earthly life is concerned, there is what is material and what is immaterial. That which does not look towards God (tohu), that which is turned away from him. The reality that best evokes this distance from God, that which is lost, is that of the desert. The term tohu is also used in the Bible in this sense, to indicate that which is disoriented, when we feel lost and far from God. So that which is deserted by God’s presence is dead, it has no form of life. The desert land is not irrigated by water, by life. The word bohu, pronounced here vohu because of the vowel that precedes it, evokes that which is insubstantial, aerial, empty and therefore not yet filled by the presence of God, like air and wind that are not yet oriented towards God. The words tohu va vohu tell us, as an onomatopoeia, what has consistency and what does not, what is immobile like tohu and what flies away like the wind vohu.

ḥoshekh: darkness, obscurity. Everything that is not illuminated by the presence of God.

‘al-pney: the word ‘al means on, above and the word pney (construct state, i.e. linked to the genitive that follows, of the word paniym), is a term always used in the plural, related to the verb panah which means oriented towards, to turn towards, to direct one’s face and gaze towards. Therefore, paniym is that towards which one is turned, that which is visible of a person if he turns towards us, his face or, for things, the visible side of something. So, in this verse we have al-pney twice to tell us that darkness is found where one does not look towards God, where the waters are not directed towards him. And that, on the contrary, where the waters are directed towards God, there they are vivified by the Spirit of God.

tehom: in this word we find the consonants of the word tohu which indicate that which does not look towards God. The letter “m” that is added evokes water, hence the frequent translation of this word with “abyss of waters”, where the darkness of that which is not illuminated by God reigns because it is not oriented, not turned towards him.

rouaḥ elohim: rouaḥ is the feminine term that means spirit, breath. Here it refers to the Spirit of elohim, the Spirit of God who is love in three hypostases united by the same love, the same spirit that is life, the life of God, who is only love. See the previous verse for the Trinitarian explanation of the plural form of the term elohim.

Meraḥefet: this term is a feminine present participle, since the term spirit, rouaḥ, is feminine in Hebrew. This term evokes the quivering of a bird’s wings, the verb raḥaf almost like an onomatopoeia, tells us the quivering. So here we see the Spirit of elohim spreading its wings, like a bird above the two waters. Now, the wings of a bird often evoke the idea of protection, God taking us under his wing. At the same time, in the image of the bird taking us under its wing we also see its action of warming, brooding, like when a hen covers its eggs with its wings. This act is interpreted by the ancients as that which infuses life, thanks to the transmitted heat. Jesus also uses this image to talk to us about the work of God:
“How many times have I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were unwilling!” (Matthew 23, 37).
So here the Spirit of God embraces all of creation, all that is living, the waters, to infuse them with life, the Spirit hovers over the two waters.

al-pney: on that which is turned towards him, on that which can receive life, that is where the Spirit of God will act.

Mayim: this term, like the term heaven, has the ending -aym, identical to that of the dual, but it is usually translated with a plural, waters. In fact, this plural is what it indicates in common language, that water that cannot be divided into units, that water that is a multitude of drops, that is plural. But we can also reflect on this dual aspect of water: why should there be two waters? In verses six and seven, as well as in many other passages in the Bible, we see that there is a water that comes from above, that descends from the sky, and a water that springs from the earth. The prophet Isaiah speaks to us of the word of God that comes down from heaven like rain and snow, to water and fertilize the earth, to make it fruitful:
“The rain and snow that come down from heaven do not return there until they have watered the earth, made it fertile and making it sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to him who eats. So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, without having done what I desire and achieving the end for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55, 10-11).
This word of God that came down to earth like rain on what was arid because it lacked the word of God, is Jesus himself, the word of God made flesh, who gave life and fertility to the human being and led him to his fullness, made him bear fruit, filled him with God’s love, revealing to him the face of God, full of love for each one of his creatures.

On that which is turned towards the earth, that which is tohu, there is darkness, and over the two waters the Spirit of God hovers and infuses them with life. Water is what brings life.

ג וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים יְהִי אוֹר וַיְהִי-אוֹר
3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.

ד וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים אֶת-הָאוֹר כִּי-טוֹב וַיַּבְדֵּל אֱלֹהִים בֵּין הָאוֹר וּבֵין הַחֹשֶׁךְ
4 And God (אֱלֹהִים Elohim) contemplated the light because it (is) good, and God (אֱלֹהִים Elohim) separated the light from the darkness.

ה וַיִּקְרָא אֱלֹהִים לָאוֹר יוֹם וְלַחֹשֶׁךְ קָרָא לָיְלָה וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם אֶחָד
5 And God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening and there was morning, day one.

So let’s see how the three senses of Scripture are contained in day one:

God’s work manifested in nature:

We see how the elements of created nature are signs that refer us to spiritual realities, how nature manifests the spirit that gives it life, the order of the divine word that creates in its wisdom and through its wisdom, so that everything may be a reflection of its glory.

The sky, therefore, refers us to eternal and ordered divine life, to the vision from above where peace and harmony reign. The Fathers of the Church, following the words of St. Paul, see in the creation of the heaven also the creation of heavenly creatures, of the multitude of angels.

The earth is what is at first arid and needs to be irrigated and fertilized by water, which is a symbol of the vivifying spirit. Every earthly creature that populates the world is therefore evoked here and we will see, in the stages of the following days, how these creatures, human beings and animals, will express our relationship with God, now wandering in darkness, now guided by the light and the word of God that leads them towards the celestial realities, where light reigns eternally.

So, when God speaks, when God expresses what he is, his word creates light. This light is that of God’s face, which makes himself visible and knowable to his creatures. Light expresses God’s will to lead his creatures to share his joy, his life: he makes himself seen, he makes himself known so that we can be enlightened and become like him, enlightened by the same light, filled with the same joy and the same love.

Let’s note what the Fathers of the Church always emphasize: if the day the world was created had been just one of our earthly days, inscribed in time, how could there have been light at first, when nothing else had been created, what would have been the material support for this light? As expressed in the first verse of the Bible, in the book of Genesis, here is described the eternal work of God, his eternal desire to associate creatures with the contemplation of his glory, to make them participate in his own happiness, his goodness, his joy, his love. We contemplate all this in the face of God, in his gaze, in the infinite love with which he loves us and which he transmits to us when he illuminates us. It is up to us to choose whether to accept or refuse this light, to remain in the darkness or to come to the light. This is why the creation of light implies darkness, which is not created by God, but is the result of our refusal to accept the light. We can put an obstacle to prevent us from receiving the light, we can remain in darkness. But, as the Fathers of the Church and St. Gregory of Nyssa in particular say: the shadow produced by an obstacle that stands in the way of the light is always limited by the contours of the object, of the screen, and the light does not stop surrounding it, infinitely. How long could we remain in the darkness without discovering the light that surrounds us, that is very close to us. Thus, the vocabulary inspired by the images of nature speaks to us of our spiritual condition: we are attracted to God, to love, or we remain in the darkness, in the ignorance of the divine goodness, of his gratuitous love. As if describing a ray of light, St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that God is “diffusivum boni sui”, that is, that he spreads his goodness to his creatures, that he wants to share his joy with us, that he wants to give us life, his life, his love, so that this love and this joy are in us to the full and that we too experience this perfect love, the greatest love, which consists in giving our life for those we love, in wanting them to share our happiness, our joy. These are the words of Jesus in the Gospel:

“I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. This is my prescription: Love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” (John 15:11-13).

It is He, Jesus, this word of God that creates. We now come to the second meaning of the Scripture, that which sees the word of God manifested in Jesus Christ.

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

The Bible is considered the Word of God, but what is written can be interpreted in different ways if we don’t know in what spirit it was said. We can believe it or not, we can even say that they are just words, but do these words translate into actions? This is how the word of God became flesh, so that we could believe in the gesture of gratuitous love with which and in which he creates us, that is, he gives us his life.

Now, this word of God that becomes flesh is called “lógos” in Greek, in the Gospel of St. John. The Greek term lógos has a much broader meaning than that of word; it does not only refer to a word that has been pronounced, verbalized, but also includes all the wisdom and divine “logic” that gives life to the world and whose creation manifests order and science through the principles that govern it and through the beauty and complexity of its structure. God’s lógos pervades everything that exists, because all the creation we admire is his work. So, when God speaks, it is his lógos that manifests itself and, according to the words of the Gospel, this lógos has become flesh and leads men towards his light, towards the vision of God, through the works of love that we ourselves can experience.

Let’s look, therefore, at the text at the beginning of the Gospel of St. John, which is itself an explanation of the words of the first verses of Genesis quoted above. St. John collected Jesus’ own explanations of how he came to fulfill the Scriptures and make visible to us the work of God the creator who gives his life to the world as Jesus offered it on the cross.

“In the arkhē was the lógos (ὁ λόγος) and the lógos was with God and the lógos was God, and it was in the arkhē with God. All things came into being through him, and and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:1-5).

The beginning of the text of the Genesis thus introduces us into the mind of God, to his lógos, where everything is conceived and thus created. In the same way, St. Paul introduces us to this divine plan of salvation for human beings: he who is the arkhē, the origin of all things, is also the one who brings the work to perfection, leading the creature from darkness to the full light where he himself shines in each one of us. These are his words that summarize the whole work of creation and salvation:

“By rescuing us from the power of darkness, he has placed us in the Kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn, before all creatures: in him, all things were created, in heaven and on earth. The visible and invisible beings, the powers, the principalities, the sovereignty, the dominations, all were created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things subsist. He is also the head of the body, the head of the church: he is the beginning (the arkhē), the firstborn among the dead, so that he may have primacy over all things. For God has seen fit that all fullness should dwell in him, and that all, through Christ, should be finally reconciled, making peace through the blood of his cross, peace for all beings on earth and in heaven. (Colossians 1:13-20).

In the same way, St. John, in his vision of the heavenly reality in which he contemplates the fulfillment of the divine work and the participation of creatures in its full light, once they are torn from the power of darkness, tells us:

“The night will be gone, they will no longer need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, because the Lord God will enlighten them; they will reign for ever and ever” (Revelation 22, 5).

This is also what the Genesis text tells us about God’s work, which consists not only in creating the world, but in leading his creatures from darkness to full light, to that light of divine love that lasts forever, to that unique and eternal day that knows no sunset. All these stages through which human beings are led from darkness to the full light are thus described in the seven days which tell God’s action of leading us from darkness to light, an action which is always the same, unique, repeated at every single stage.

These seven days of creation, in which God’s work reaches its perfection, are also see them in the days of Holy Week, during which we celebrate the work of Christ that leads us from the darkness of death to the full light of the resurrection. Meditating on the days of the Holy Week means contemplating the work of God, who creates us by giving us his life and who leads this life to perfection, so that we too can believe and thus enter into the trusting filial relationship that is at the heart of the mystery of the Trinity. In this way we can overcome the darkness of doubt that separates us from God and enter into the full light of his gratuitous love. This first day is therefore also the day on which Jesus agrees to enter Jerusalem, agrees to enter our darkness to dispel it and bring light. He brings and makes visible the light of his love, of the true face of God, to the world, and the darkness that does not welcome him indicates the bewilderment of creatures, the blindness of those who do not recognize the source of life, of joy, of happiness in love and seek it where it is not, in what is earthly and passing: power, wealth, pleasures, …

The work of God manifested in the individual members of the body of Christ:

The first day also tells us how each of us is invited to welcome the light. In fact, we receive life when we realize that it comes from God. This recognition of the source of life, which is the same for all beings, transforms our vision of the world, makes us a people of brothers and sisters, and in this sense enlightens us. The day of baptism is called the day of illumination in Greek because, having identified the source of life, we become a people of brothers and sisters. We are that water that receives the spirit of God. To receive this light means opening ourselves to the knowledge of God, recognizing that all life comes from Him; this is the first step through which human beings are torn away from darkness.

2^nd DAY

ו וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים יְהִי רָקִיעַ בְּתוֹךְ הַמָּיִם וִיהִי מַבְדִּיל בֵּין מַיִם לָמָיִם
6 And God said, “Let there be a space in the midst of the waters,” and there was a separation between the water and the water.

ז וַיַּעַשׂ אֱלֹהִים אֶת-הָרָקִיעַ וַיַּבְדֵּל בֵּין הַמַּיִם אֲשֶׁר מִתַּחַת לָרָקִיעַ וּבֵין הַמַּיִם אֲשֶׁר מֵעַל לָרָקִיעַ וַיְהִי-כֵן 7
And God made the space and separated the water which is under the space from the water above it. And it was so.

ח וַיִּקְרָא אֱלֹהִים לָרָקִיעַ שָׁמָיִם וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם שֵׁנִי
8 And God called the space “sky” and there was evening and there was morning, second day.

The three senses of Scripture:

The work of God manifested in nature:

These waters that are divided in two, those above the sky and those below, indicate thus two realities: the water that descends from the sky is that which brings the word of God to human beings, that which connects them to divine life. It is worth noting here that the word mayim, water, has the appearance of a dual, that is, a word that designates a pair of objects, such as water above and water below, and ends in –ayim, just like the word shamayim, heavens, which could also be interpreted as dual, like two heavens. Note also two other important terms in the Bible that appear to be dual and end in –ayim: Yerushalayim, Jerusalem, and Mitsrayim, Egypt. As far as Jerusalem is concerned, the Bible constantly speaks of a heavenly Jerusalem, a Jerusalem from above, but also of the earthly Jerusalem, the city where the Jewish people built the temple of God. In the earthly Jerusalem there is also Mount Zion, the fortress of David, and Psalm 86 speaks to us of the heavenly Jerusalem in this way:

“It is founded on the holy mountains. The Lord loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. For your glory you are spoken of, city of God! “I mention Rahab and Babylon among those who know me.” Here is Philistia, Tyre and Ethiopia: this (man) was born there. But of Zion it shall be said : this man and that man was born there. The Most High will establish it; the LORD notes in the register of the peoples: “This one was born there.” So singers and dancers: “All my springs are in you.”

This city, where every man is born, is the one that represents the kingdom of God, where human beings are reborn to a new life, when they understand that they are all brothers and sisters. According to tradition, Zion is the ancient name given to the mountain located in Jerusalem, on which Abraham was ready to offer his son Isaac (long before the foundation of the city of Jerusalem). But this episode from the Bible also announced the one in which the son of God, Jesus, would offer his life on the mountain called Golgotha, later identified with Mount Zion. It is in fact at the foot of the cross that human beings find the true source of life, in God who offers it to humanity in love and forgiveness. It is this faith in God’s gift that gives birth to every human being anew, to a new filial relationship with God and to a new fraternal relationship with one’s neighbor.

The other term that also has a form identical to that of the dual is the term Mitzrayim, Egypt. Egypt in the history of the Jewish people is the country where the people were enslaved, it is a figure of slavery. But here too we have a double meaning: there is physical slavery and spiritual slavery in which the human being is a prisoner of the chain reaction of violences, when he responds to evil with evil, to offense with offense.

Now, Jesus comes to break these chains, to free us from evil and death through his mercy, introducing love where there was hatred, breaking down the wall that separates divided human beings.

The waters that descend from the sky are therefore those that bring the spirit of God’s love to the waters of humanity that are below, but which on day “one” had already recognized where the source of life, the light, is.

The space called “heavens” (shamayim), a word that has the form of a dual, therefore also evokes this spiritual, celestial reality, the creatures of the heavens, the angels that go from earth to heaven and from heaven to earth to bring God’s word, inspiration and help to human beings. Let’s remember Jacob’s dream:

“Then he had a dream: a stairway rested on the ground, with its top reaching to the heavens; and God’s messengers were going up and down on it.” (Genesis 28:12)

In this space between heaven and earth, the angels, God’s servants and messengers, descend towards the creatures, to serve them and bring them the word of God, and ascend towards heaven to worship God, contemplate Him and, in His gaze, know the world in order to love it as He loves it. The Fathers of the Church explain to us, with regards to this dream, that here too there is the announcement of the incarnation of the Word of God who became flesh, who assumed the condition of creatures. Thus, the angels can serve God high in heaven and low on earth, because he became one of us.

Darkness therefore figures the blindness of human beings, prisoners of their rivalries and jealousies, separated from the source of life and love, and the waters of heaven figure the help that God brings to those who have seen the light.

There was evening, there was morning because through the water of his spirit, of his word, through the bond we can establish with God in faith, in prayer, rediscovering our filial relationship, he leads us from darkness to light. Second stage.

The work of God manifested in Christ and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

This is how Jesus himself speaks to us about water, about the source of living water that flows from himself, from his open side on the cross, an image of the life he offered for us, so that we too may have life flowing in us:

“On the last day, the great day of the festival, Jesus stood up and cried out, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water will flow from within him. He said this about the spirit, which those who believed in him were to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified. (John 7, 37-39)

With these words, Jesus announces that his spirit of love will be spread over believers, and the visible sign of this gift of the Spirit will be realized at the time when Jesus will be glorified, that is, crucified, since Jesus thus announces his imminent death: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” (John 12:23). And then, when he was dead on the cross, “One of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.” (John 19:34). It is of this water that Jesus speaks, joined with blood, a sign of his life offered for the multitude. He announces the gift of baptism, that is, of the Spirit, because through the act of faith of baptism we enter into a filial relationship with God, the source of life, and we receive within us the Spirit of love of the filial relationship that unites, in the Trinity, the Father and the Son. Jesus invites us to receive this Spirit, to share in the filial relationship that unites him to God the Father, to live of the Spirit of love that makes us children. Then we will love each other as brothers and sisters, as God loves us.

Likewise, when speaking to a Samaritan woman at the sixth hour, that is, at the same time that he would die, announcing the gift of his spirit, of his life, he said to her:

“If you had known the gift of God and who it is the one who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink’, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water. Anyone who drinks of the water that I shall give him will never be thirsty again for ever; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:10.14).

Jesus quenches our spirit with his spirit. Believers who look to him receive this water from heaven, the Spirit of God’s love. (See also the article John 4, 1-42 The spring of living water).

Many other passages in the Bible also speak to us of the spring of water, a spring that comes from God. Thus, the prophet Ezekiel, in a vision, contemplates the house of God, the temple where God dwells, and sees a spring gushing out from its right:

“Under the threshold of the Temple, the water flowed toward the east, because the front of the Temple faced east. The water flowed down from under the right side of the temple, south of the altar. The man took me outside the north gate and led me around the outside, to the east gate; and there too the water flowed down from the right side. The man walked eastward, a cord in his hand, and measured a distance of a thousand cubits; then he made me cross the water: it was up to my ankles. He measured another thousand cubits and made me cross the water: it was up to my knees. He measured another thousand cubits and made me cross: the water was up to my waist. He measured out a thousand more; it was a torrent I could not cross; the water had risen, I had to swim; it was an impassable river. Then he said to me, “Have you seen, son of man?” Then he took me back to the bank of the river. When he took me back, there were many trees on both banks of the river. He said to me, “This water flows towards the eastern region, descends into the Jordan valley and flows into the Dead Sea, whose waters it purifies. Wherever the river flows, all animals will be able to live and proliferate. The fish will be very abundant, because this water purifies everything it touches, and life appears in every place where the stream flows. Then the fishermen will stay on the shore from Ain-Ghedi to Ain-Eglaim; there they will let their nets dry. The species of fish will be as many as those of the Mediterranean. But its marshes and basins will not be reclaimed: they will be reserved for salt. On both banks of the river all kinds of fruit trees will grow; their foliage will not wither and they will not lack fruit. Every month they will bear fresh fruit, because this water flows from the sanctuary. The fruit will be for food and the leaves will be medicine. (Ezekiel 47:1-12)

But the temple of God, the house where God dwells on earth, this house that was not made by human hands, it is the very body of Jesus that speaks of himself as the temple of God:

“The Jews said to him, ‘What sign can you show us for doing this?’ Jesus answered, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews said, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking of the temple of his body” (John 2:18-21).

It is this body of Christ that will be crucified at the top of Golgotha and it is from his body that the spring of living water will flow, the one flowing from the right side of the House of God, according to the vision of the prophet Ezekiel. In fact, God often states that it is not up to man to build him a house. This house, this temple, where God dwells on earth, is Jesus Christ. This is also the affirmation of the apostle St. Luke:

“The Most High does not dwell in what is made by human hands, as the prophet says: Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. “What house will you build for me, says the Lord, what shall be the place of my dwelling? Has not my hand made all these things?” (Acts 7:48-50)

God himself has therefore made a home for himself on earth, this home is Jesus Christ, where the Spirit of God, divine life, dwells in fullness. This life was offered to human beings on the cross, this life flowed in the water and blood that gushed from his right side when he was pierced on the cross. Once again we see the importance of this spring, contemplated by Ezekiel in his prophetic vision that announces the eternal work of God, accomplished in Jesus Christ. The spring that gushes from the right side of the temple becomes an immense river capable of making seet even the bitter waters of the Dead Sea. Here is the image of the life of Christ, of the love of God that will reach the arid places of the human spirit, to restore hope and life through his mercy offered to all. This image of the river and the tree that bears fruit in every season is also found in the vision of the Apocalypse of St. John, a vision of the heavenly reality, of the heavenly Jerusalem, of the triumph of Christ, sacrificed like a lamb, over the evil that inhabits the heart of the human being:

«Then the angel showed me the water of life: a river shining like crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the center of the city square, between the two arms of the river, there is a tree of life that bears fruit twelve times: every month it produces its fruit; and the leaves of this tree are a medicine for the peoples.” (Revelation 22:1)

This tree from which life flows is Jesus Christ, and it is also he who is referred to in the story of the Garden of Eden, of the earthly paradise, in the second chapter of Genesis:

“And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food and the tree of life in the midst of the garden and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. A river rises in Eden to water the garden; beyond there it divides and becomes four branches…” (Genesis 2:9-10).

The Fathers of the Church have always identified this tree of life with the wood of the cross. In Hebrew, wood and tree are the same word (עֵץ ‘ets). From the cross, from the right side of Christ as from the right side of the Temple of God contemplated by Ezekiel, flows the water of life, which divides into four rivers that give life to the whole world.

The work of God manifested in the individual members of the body of Christ:

Water is the image of the spirit, the spirit of God’s life-giving love. Every human being created in the image of God receives the life of God, is animated by the breath of God, by his spirit. But this water, this spirit, can become corrupted in man, become bitter, salty. Our spirit, instead of adhering to the love of God, in a filial, trusting, grateful relationship, can follow evil inclinations, inspirations, and can become corrupted. So the man who is in darkness, who no longer finds the true source of life and joy, first receives light when he recognizes that this source comes from God and then, in the second stage, in the second day, he nourishes this life with the spirit of God. Thus, the water that is under the heavens, our humanity, through prayer, drawing on the spirit of God, is vivified. It receives the water of the sky, receiving the word of God that became flesh in Jesus Christ. Thus, also according to the ancient Hebrew tradition, the waters that are below, on earth, rise towards the sky through prayer and from above grace, the spirit of God descends upon us and vivifies our spirit, filling it with the love of God and of our neighbor. Second day, second stage: after recognizing God’s love, the source of life for all beings, the human being maintains the filial relationship through prayer that connects his spirit to God’s Spirit of love and thus welcomes the word of God that vivifies him and arouses in him the love for his neighbor. The human being can now draw from the source of love, of life.

3rd DAY

ט וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים יִקָּווּ הַמַּיִם מִתַּחַת הַשָּׁמַיִם אֶל-מָקוֹם אֶחָד וְתֵרָאֶה הַיַּבָּשָׁה וַיְהִי-כֵן
9 And Elohim said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered to one place, and let the dry land appear”; and it was so.

י וַיִּקְרָא אֱלֹהִים לַיַּבָּשָׁה אֶרֶץ וּלְמִקְוֵה הַמַּיִם קָרָא יַמִּים וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי-טוֹב
10 And Elohim called the dry land “earth,” and the gathering of the waters He called “seas,” and God saw that it was good.

יא וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים תַּדְשֵׁא הָאָרֶץ דֶּשֶׁא עֵשֶׂב מַזְרִיעַ זֶרַע עֵץ פְּרִי עֹשֶׂה פְּרִי אֲשֶׁר זַרְעוֹ-בוֹ עַל-הָאָרֶץ וַיְהִי-כֵן
11 And Elohim said: “Let the earth produce shoots of grass that will sow a seed of a fruit tree that will make a fruit in which will be the seed for its kind on the earth, and so it was.”

יב וַתּוֹצֵא הָאָרֶץ דֶּשֶׁא עֵשֶׂב מַזְרִיעַ זֶרַע לְמִינֵהוּ וְעֵץ עֹשֶׂה-פְּרִי אֲשֶׁר זַרְעוֹ-בוֹ לְמִינֵהוּ וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי-טוֹב
12 And the earth brought forth shoots of grass sowing seed each for its kind, and trees bearing fruit in which there is seed each for its kind, and Elohim saw that (this is) good.

יג וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם שְׁלִישִׁי
13 And there was evening and there was morning, third day.

God’s work manifested in nature:

Now, the waters below, those that have not been purified, sweetened, or rendered drinkable by the water above, have collected in the salty sea. Thus, life will be possible on earth for those who welcome the divine dew, the water of the spirit that descends from heaven. They will be like trees and bear fruit. This is what Psalm 1 tells us:

«Blessed is the man who does not enter the council of the wicked, who does not follow the way of sinners, who does not sit with scoffers, but delights in the law of the Lord and meditates on his law day and night! It is like a tree planted by a stream, who bears fruit in its time and its foliage never dies. Whatever he undertakes will succeed, such is not the fate of the wicked. But they are like straw blown by the wind: at the judgment, the wicked will not rise, nor sinners at the assembly of the righteous. The Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will be lost.»

Thus in this psalm is described the righteous man, the righteous man, who has set himself apart from the wicked, who has separated himself from evil, united with God through faith, like a land ready to be fertilized by the word of God. Jesus himself tells us about this land that is ready to receive faith and thus bear fruit, because it is irrigated by the Spirit of God himself:

“Therefore listen to the parable of the sower. All those who hear the word of the kingdom and do not understand [it], the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in their heart; this [is what] has been sown along the way. That which has been sown on stony ground is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; but he has no root in him abd lasts only a moment, once oppression or persecution comes because of the word, immediately he comes to fall. What was sown among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the occupations of this world and the deceitfulness of riches come up and choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. What was sown in the good soil is the one who hears the word and understands it; this one bears fruit and yields, now a hundred, now sixty, now thirty.” (Matthew 13:18-23).

The tree that bears fruit is therefore the image of the righteous who bears fruit through his works. And bearing fruit, doing good works according to the Gospel means welcoming others, like the branches of a tree that welcomes many birds, without distinction, without selecting. Christ’s open arms on the cross offer his love and forgiveness to the multitude. Here is another parable of Jesus that uses the image of the tree:

“To what is the kingdom of God comparable, to what shall I compare it? It is comparable to a mustard seed, which a man took and threw into his garden. It grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made their nest in its branches.” (Luke 13:19-20)

Obviously good deeds bear good fruit and bad deeds bear bad fruit, each seed according to its kind. This is how Jesus speaks of the deceitful man with a double spirit:

«Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Do you gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So you will know them by their fruit.» (Matthew 7:15-20)

Here again are images of nature that are able to speak to us of the reality of the spirit, of the kingdom of heaven, because this nature is the work of God, a manifestation of his glory, of the exchange of the Trinitarian love that is in him. It is starting from the dynamics of this love that the images of nature can speak to us of our spiritual stages. (For more parables, read the article Matthew 13 The parables of the Kingdom).

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

Of course these parables and these images from nature also speak to us of Jesus himself, announcing first of all what he would accomplish to save human beings, his children. Let’s see how Jesus speaks of himself when he has to announce his death and resurrection to the apostles who still didn’t understand what he meant by resurrection:

«Then Jesus said to them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth does not die, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it; whoever detaches himself from it in this world will keep it for eternal life.’»(John 12:23-25)

Jesus would be glorified, that is, he would show everyone the glory of God, the immensity of his love, accepting to give his life for love, on the cross, because “there is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for those one loves.” (John 15:13). He is the grain of wheat that fell from the tree of the cross, buried to fertilize the earth, humanity, and make it bear fruit. Thus, he sets an example for his disciples, saying that those who selfishly want to keep their life for themselves, preserving it to the detriment of others, lose their life, lose the life of the Spirit within them because they deprive themselves of the fraternal bond of love that ties them to their neighbor. While those who open their arms to welcome their neighbor, like the tree that spreads its branches, will find the happiness of God, eternal life in the gift of their life, in communion and in fraternal love.

The work of God manifested in the individual member of the body of Christ:

In this third stage, for those who have opened themselves to faith, to the light, and have entered into a filial relationship with God, it is a question of preparing the ground to bear fruit. It is the image of the earth that is separated from the salty waters of the sea, to receive the water from the sky, to be fertilized, to make the grass and the trees grow and bear fruit.

It is therefore a question of separating oneself from the agitation and confusion of the sea of the world, that is to say, from that which is not sweetened, guided by the spirit of love of God and neighbor. Separating oneself from the sea where the law of the strongest reigns, where the biggest fish eats the smallest. The believer, therefore, is rooted in prayer, in his relationship with God, and is nourished by his word which is like water that falls from the sky to fertilize the earth and does not return to the sky without having made this earth that we are bear fruit (according to the word of God reported by the prophet Isaiah 55:10-11). The believer therefore sinks his roots into faith, through good works, to resist the elements and bear fruit. We are the earth that must be plowed in order to welcome faith like a seed that, once it has died to everything that binds it to evil, can grow and bear fruit in welcoming and serving others. And each will bear fruit according to his seed, according to the relationship of faith that binds him to God, to life, to his neighbor. This is how Jesus addresses those who are preparing to follow him: “Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘If anyone wants to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man to gain the whole world if he loses his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man will come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then he will repay each person according to his deeds. Amen, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” (Matthew 16:24-28).

4th DAY

יד וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים יְהִי מְאֹרֹת בִּרְקִיעַ הַשָּׁמַיִם לְהַבְדִּיל בֵּין הַיּוֹם וּבֵין הַלָּיְלָה וְהָיוּ לְאֹתֹת וּלְמוֹעֲדִים וּלְיָמִים וְשָׁנִים
14 And Elohim said: «Let there be luminaries in the space of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be signs for the seasons, the days, and the years.

טו וְהָיוּ לִמְאוֹרֹת בִּרְקִיעַ הַשָּׁמַיִם לְהָאִיר עַל-הָאָרֶץ וַיְהִי-כֵן
15 And let them be luminaries in the space of the heavens to illuminate the earth, and so it was.

טז וַיַּעַשׂ אֱלֹהִים אֶת-שְׁנֵי הַמְּאֹרֹת הַגְּדֹלִים אֶת-הַמָּאוֹר הַגָּדֹל לְמֶמְשֶׁלֶת הַיּוֹם וְ אֶת-הַמָּאוֹר הַקָּטֹן לְמֶמְשֶׁלֶת הַלַּיְלָה וְאֵת הַכּוֹכָבִים
16 And Elohim made the two great luminaries, the great luminary to rule the day and the little luminary to rule the night and the stars.

יז וַיִּתֵּן אֹתָם אֱלֹהִים בִּרְקִיעַ הַשָּׁמָיִם לְהָאִיר עַל-הָאָרֶץ
17 And Elohim gave them in the space of the heavens to illuminate the earth

יח וְלִמְשֹׁל בַּיּוֹם וּבַלַּיְלָה וּלְהַבְדִּיל בֵּין הָאוֹר וּבֵין הַחֹשֶׁךְ וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כ i-to’ov
18 And to rule over the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and Elohim saw that (this is) good.

יט וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם רְבִיעִי
19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.

God’s work manifested in nature:

We have already spoken about light on the first day, but the light of the first day is a light that exists outside the created world, it is the light of God’s face, the light of God’s gaze offered to creatures. It is the light of the resurrection. The creatures will truly be able to understand God and the world by seeing his love for them. So believers will be able to love their neighbor as God loves him, because they will have recognized God’s love. They will therefore become a reflection of God’s love in this world, to love each one as God loves him. This is what the evangelist St. John tells us:

“Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2-3)

This is what the vision of God implies: becoming like him. Recognizing the love with which we are loved fills us in turn with love, gratitude and thankfulness. So, seeing how God has loved each one of us, we too can love each one as God loves him.

«As for us, we love because he first loved us,» (1 John 4:19).

And St. Paul:

«For we know partially and we prophesy partially, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things. At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known. So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.» (1 Corinthians 13:9-13).

«Philip said to him, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who dwells in me is doing his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else, believe because of the works themselves. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father. And whatever you ask in my name, I will do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.» (John 14:8-13).

Seeing God, his love for us in Jesus Christ, implies becoming like him, loving as he loves us, because we will see our neighbor with a different gaze, the gaze of the one who gave him life and wants to lead him to the perfection of love, the gaze of the one who sees in each one a brother, a sister, because we all receive life from the same source of love and are invited to live by this love. This is how the promise made to Abraham is fulfilled:

«”I swear by myself”, declares the LORD, “that because you acted as you did in not withholding from me your beloved son, I will bless you abundantly and make your descendants as countless as the stars of the sky”» (Genesis 22:16-17).

In fact, Abraham, who would have been ready to sacrifice his son, believed in this source of life, capable of giving him back his son after his death. In fact, Isaac, the son of Abraham, was born as a result of divine intervention, when Abraham and his wife were old.

«This is why [one becomes an heir] through faith: it is a grace, and the promise remains firm for all of Abraham’s descendants, not for those who only follow the Law, but for those who also follow the faith of Abraham, he who is the father of us all. It is exactly what is written: ‘I have made you the father of a multitude of peoples’. He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed—God, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Against all hope, he believed, that he would become “the father of many people” according to what was said, “Thus shall your descendants be.” He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body as (already) dead (for he was almost a hundred years old) and the dead womb of Sarah. He did not doubt God’s promise in unbelief; rather, he was empowered by faith and gave glory to God and was fully convinced that what he had promised he was also able to do. That is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” But it was not for him alone that it was written that “it was credited to him”; it was also for us, to whom it will be credited, who believe in the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over for our transgressions and was raised for our justification.» (Letter of St. Paul to the Romans 4:16-25).

It is therefore through faith in the source of life, in the One who is able to raise the dead, that we become the descendants of Abraham, light for all peoples, stars to illuminate the earth:

«You will no longer be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham, because I make you the father of a multitude of peoples.» (Genesis 17:5)

Here the word people translates the Hebrew goyim (גּוֺיִם) which indicates the other non-Jewish peoples; in Greek in the Bible it is translated with the word éthnē (ἔθνη) literally ethnic groups, which means all peoples, the nations of the earth.

Therefore, according to biblical language, it is faith and the witness of faith that is designated by the image of the heavenly luminaries. The sun thus becomes the image of Christ who brings his light to earth and in the night it is the moon that illuminates the earth by reflecting the light of the sun and when the moon seems to be swallowed up by the darkness, it will be the stars that serve as a point of reference. The moon thus becomes the image of the Church, of the body of Christ, of all those who offer their lives for the love of their neighbor, a reflection of the Spirit of God that lives in our hearts, a reflection of the love of Christ who gave his life for us. It is when evil and darkness seem to triumph over the sun of righteousness, when believers are persecuted, that the Church, like the moon, seems to be swallowed up by darkness, but it is then that the stars shine brightest. The stars thus become the image of the witnesses of the faith, of those who are capable of offering their own life for the love of their neighbor, the image of those who hunger and thirst for justice. Then, their example will help people find the way to victory over evil.

This is how St. Paul expresses himself when comparing those who do the will of God, his children, to the stars:

«For it is God who works in you to produce will and action in you, according to His benevolent plan. Do everything without recrimination or argument; thus you will be blameless and pure, you who are children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, where you shine like the stars in the universe, holding firm to the word of life.» (Letter to the Philippians 2, 13-16).

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

God’s promise to Abraham would be fulfilled in Jesus. In fact, initially the Jewish people had interpreted this promise as referring to the children born of Abraham’s blood and flesh. So, when his grandson Jacob had twelve sons, he blessed them and they formed the twelve tribes of Israel, but the promise made to Abraham to be the father of a multitude of peoples, of descendants as numerous as the stars, would be fulfilled through the descendants of Judah, Jacob’s son, for in the tribe of Judah was born David and then Jesus. Thus, in the Bible, Balaam prophesizes about the Messiah being born in the descendants of Jacob:

“I see that hero—but not now—I have a glimpse of him—but not close up: a star rises, born of Jacob, a scepter rises, born of Israel.” (Numbers 24:17)

In fact, Jesus, born of the descendants of Jacob and David, created a new people who belong to him by faith and no longer by birth, a people that brings together as brothers and sisters multitudes of people from all languages, peoples and nations.

This new people is contemplated by St. John in the vision that reveals to him the kingdom of God, the victory of the lamb:
«After these things I saw: and behold, a great crowd, which no one could count, a multitude of all nations, tribes, peoples and languages. They stood before the Throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palms branches in their hands.» (Revelation 7:9)

And at the beginning of the Gospel of John, it is recalled:
“To all who received him he gave power to become children of God: to those who believe in his name, who were begotten, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13)

In fact, Jesus invites us to a new birth, to recognize with faith that all life comes from God, that we are a multitude of brothers and sisters who receive life from the same source. This is the meaning of baptism, the birth to a new life in which we form a new family. These are the very words of Jesus:

“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3, 5-6).

Thus, this new birth will be able to bring together into one family persons of all origins, peoples and nations who will recognize in every human being, believer or non-believer, a brother and a sister. Thus, everyone will be able to be a light, a star, for people of all origins, ethnicities, and not only for those who are born of a filiation bound to the flesh.

This is the meaning of the star sighted by those who scanned the sky in the East at the birth of Jesus:

«Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the time of King Herod the Great. Now, behold, wise men came from the East to Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star in the East and have come to prostrate ourselves before him.”» (Matthew 2:1-2)

Similarly, when Jesus was presented at the temple by Mary and Joseph after his birth, an old man called Simeon took him in his arms and prophesized:

«Now, O Sovereign Master, you may let your servant go in peace, according to your word. For my eyes have seen the salvation you prepared before the peoples: light that is revealed to the nations and gives glory to your people Israel.» (Luke 2:29-32)

Jesus, in fact, will offer his life, his love to all peoples and will send his disciples to announce to all nations that the Kingdom of God is near, that we can live as brothers and sisters on earth as in heaven because we all receive life from the same source.

And Jesus himself says in the last chapter of the Apocalypse:

«I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the sprout and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.» (Revelation 22:16).

The work of God manifested in the individual members of the body of Christ:

God separates day from night, he makes us pass from darkness to light through his victory over evil and death, the victory of love. This victory would be realized by Jesus on the cross, where he offered his life for the multitude:

«Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins.”» (Matthew 26, 26-27)

But before this, Jesus had already showed his apostles that in him is found the source of life, when he raised Lazarus from the dead, after he had been dead for four days. In fact, when Jesus was told that Lazarus was sick, he didn’t go to visit him straight away, but waited two days, and only went to his house on the fourth day after his death, to show us that on this fourth day, he who is life, can snatch his creatures from the power of darkness and death and bring them back to life, to the full light. Thus, he forms the faith of his disciples so that they can bring this light of hope to the world. Let’s look at the story of the resurrection of Lazarus:

«When he heard that Lazarus was sick, he remained in the place where he was for two more days. Then after this he said to the disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.” The disciples said to him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just trying to stone you, and you are going back there?” Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours in a day? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world; but those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not within them.” After saying this, he added, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to wake him up.” The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.” Jesus had been speaking about death, but they thought he was talking about sleeping. Then he said to them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, and I am glad I was not there, for your sake, to convince you. But let us go to him.” Thomas, called Didymus (the Twin), said to the disciples, “Let us also go to die with him.” When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days.» (John 11:6-17)

In this story we see the importance of the succession of days, to highlight that the work of Jesus reveals to us the work of creation. In this way Jesus forms the belief of his disciples in the resurrection, he makes them understand the difference between life and death. We can be alive on earth, but be dead and in darkness if we don’t recognize the true source of life, if we don’t enter into a fraternal relationship with our brothers and sisters all over the world and don’t taste the joy of loving one another. So Jesus doesn’t say that Lazarus, dead in the eyes of men, is truly dead, he says that he has fallen asleep, that he is resting, that he has entered into God’s rest, that rest that awaits the human being when he is reconciled with the One who gave him life, when he has placed his life in God’s hands, with trust. This will be the last stage of the journey of faith, the one that will bring us to the seventh day, the day of God’s rest from his work, the day on which the work of salvation of human beings will be accomplished.

So let’s continue the story of the resurrection of Lazarus:

«Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, ”I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”» (John 11:21-27)

And after the arrival of Lazarus’ other sister, Mary, Jesus, after having wept with them, went to the tomb:

«Jesus, again overcome with emotion, arrived at the tomb. It was a cave closed by a stone. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the deceased, said to him: “Lord, it already stinks; he has been there for four days.” Then Jesus said to Martha: “Didn’t I tell you? If you believe, you will see the glory of God.” So, the stone was removed and Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said: “Father, I thank you for hearing me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.” Then Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with bandages, and his face wrapped in a shroud. Jesus said to them, ”Untie him and let him go.» (John 11:38-44)

Unfortunately, after the resurrection of Lazarus, the envy and hatred against Jesus became even stronger, the Gospel tells us:

«So, from that day on they decided to kill him.» (John 11:53)

Darkness seeks to obscure the light of the resurrection. Similarly, when Judas leaves the supper with Jesus at the Last Supper, the Gospel reminds us that he entered the night:

«Then Judas took the piece of bread and went out. It was night. Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified and God is glorified in him”» (John 13:30-31).

Judas enters the night, but Jesus announces that in this night, in which man is blinded, he will shine with the glory of God, that is, he will reveal all the love of God on the cross. He will be the star of light that shines in the night. When darkness believes it has conquered light, the celestial bodies shine even more brightly and the moon begins to grow again.

Likewise, hatred and rivalry which imprison human beings seem to reign over the earth, like the darkness that swallows up the moon. This moon will be the image of the Church, of the body of Christ, of all those who, like stars shining in the night, bear the witness of the resurrection to the world, at the cost of their lives, if necessary. Martyrs, witnesses of the resurrection.

Thus, it is God’s forgiveness that eventually overcomes stubbornness and unbelief, when Jesus will have shown his face of mercy even towards his enemies, his persecutors.

This miracle shows us the passage from death to life, from darkness to light. The dead man, Lazarus, has his hands and feet bound and his face covered. It is the image of the spiritual death of each of us, when we are bound by the chain reaction of violences, when we respond to evil with evil, to offense with offense. Jesus came to free us from everything that holds us prisoner, from everything that chains us, and he also came to remove the veil from our face that prevented us from seeing the source of life that unites us all to one another. He reveals to us that we are all children of God, brothers and sisters, that in him we find resurrection and life. He will thus send the apostles to be a light for all the peoples of the earth:

«Go into the wholenworld and proclaim the gospel to every creature.» (Mark 16:15)

«When he had said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”» (John 20:22-23)

«Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.» (Matthew 18:18)

They will thus be light of the world, like the moon receiving its light from the sun. Those who were in the darkness of death have come to know the light.

«He left Nazareth and went to live in Capernaum, a town by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali. This was to fulfill the words spoken by the prophet Isaiah: “The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the peoples! The people who lived in darkness have seen a great light; on those who lived in the land of the shadow of death light has arisen.” From that time onwards, Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”» (Matthew 4:13-17)

Another important image of this new people of brothers and sisters is offered to us by St. John who recounts his vision in the book of Revelation, a vision of the victory of light over darkness, the victory of Christ and the multitude of saints who have been a reflection of his glory in this world, like so many stars.

“A great sign appeared in the sky: a woman, clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.” (Revelation 12:1)

This woman represents the Church, the people of God, the assembly of those who are called to live the fullness of life, of God’s love, bringing together men and women of all languages, peoples and nations. In this vision of the peace and the victory of the lamb of God, Jesus who immolated himself for us all, we can see the stages of the first days of creation: he who is the light, gives life to the world, like the immolated lamb that shed its blood so that the world may have life. This life, accepted by men, is represented by a tree that bears fruit twelve times and offers life to the nations, to the peoples of the world. Those who contemplate the face of God are enlightened by him and no longer need a lamp or other light because they have clothed themselves in light:

«And the angel showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and and his Son. In the middle of the city square and along the two banks of the river is a tree of life that produces fruit twelve times a year, once each month; the leaves of the trees serve as medicine for the nations. Nothing accursed will be found there anymore. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will look upon his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. Night will be no more, nor will they need light from lamp or sun, for the Lord God shall give them light, and they shall reign forever and ever.» (Revelation 22:1-5).

Thus is explained the image of the woman who has the sun as her cloak, the moon under her feet and the crown of stars. The moon reflecting the light of the sun in the night of the world, the moon growing whenever darkness seems to win, the stars shining in the darkness testifying to God’s love for his children. All this reminds us of the first four days, these stages that move us from night to day, through the light, the water, the tree, the stars.

5th DAY

כ וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים יִשְׁרְצוּ הַמַּיִם שֶׁרֶץ נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה וְעוֹף יְעוֹפֵף עַל-הָאָרֶץ עַל-פְּנֵי רְקִיעַ הַשָּׁמָיִם
20 And Elohim said, “Let the waters move of a movement of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth on the faces of the space of the heavens.”

כא וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים אֶת-הַתַּנִּינִם הַגְּדֹלִים וְאֵת כָּל-נֶפֶשׁ הַחַיָּה הָרֹמֶשֶׂת אֲשֶׁר שָׁרְצוּ הַמַּיִם לְמִינֵהֶם וְאֵת כָּל-עוֹף כָּנָף לְמִינֵהוּ וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי-טוֹב
21 And Elohim created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves [without limbs] and swarms in the waters, of every kind, and every winged bird of every kind, and Elohim saw that (it is) good.

כב וַיְבָרֶךְ אֹתָם אֱלֹהִים לֵאמֹר פְּרוּ וּרְבוּ וּמִלְאוּ אֶת-הַמַּיִם בַּיַּמִּים וְהָעוֹף יִרֶב בָּאָרֶץ
22 And he blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth.”

כג וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם חֲמִישִׁי
23 And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.

God’s work manifested in nature:

According to the Bible, animals are living souls, that is, they possess a vital principle; man is also a living soul, an animal. This vital principle also reveals an instinct specific to each animal species, an instinct that keeps it alive, that ensures its survival, its way of feeding itself, etc. Now, as we shall see on the following day, this vital principle, this living soul can receive the breath of God, the spirit that will orient human beings towards the celestial and eternal realities, that will guide them to where they can find their true happiness. In the second chapter of Genesis, when God presents all the different kinds of animals to Adam, it says that Adam did not find among them a helper who could stand like in front of him (כְּנֶגְדּֽוֹ kenegdo). Now, this word neghed indicates what is in front of us, before us. The help that the human being need is that which is in front of him, before him, so that he can follow it and thus be in the presence of God. God is love, relationship; the Spirit of God is the relationship of love that unites us to each other. We need to be in front of someone, to be in presence of him, to have him in front of us in order to be in relationship with him. This relationship then becomes a real help for us, introducing us to the presence of God:

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your spirit. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is similar to this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-39).

Now, the word entolē (ἐντολή) that we translate as commandment is formed from the word télos, meaning aim, perfection, and indicates what we must accomplish, what our aim consists in. It is not an arbitrary order, but rather that which leads us to perfection, to the realization of our aim. In the Old Testament, in Hebrew, the commandments are simply called the “words” of God, those that express his lógos, his reasoning, his desire to lead us to him, through love for him and for our neighbor.

We cannot live love and therefore experience the joy of God if we don’t love our neighbor, the one who stands in front of us, before us and refers us to God’s presence and allows us to live our loving relationship with God. Through the love we bring to our neighbor, we honor God’s presence, his very breath, the vital breath that animates him. The living soul thus becomes the image of the soul that is able to receive the divine breath, the Spirit of God, His very life, the Spirit that God will infuse into the human being, to lead him to full likeness with Him through the experience of love. (See Genesis 2:7). Animals are therefore an image of this living soul that must be led to the full light of God’s love. Those that live in the salty waters of the sea must be fished out and led to the fresh waters of God’s Spirit. The sea and its waves that can swallow us up are an image of this world where darkness reigns, where the big fish eats the small fish. These laws and instincts need to be enlightened, they need to be guided towards the true source of life, they need to be led towards the calm waters of God’s kingdom. The same is true for birds that live in the sky but that are oriented towards earthly food. The biblical texts divide animals into pure and impure, that is, those whose behavior we can learn from and those whose behavior is reprehensible (Leviticus 11). Among the impure birds par excellence are those that feed on corpses or birds of prey that eat their own kind. More delicate and inspiring are birds that feed on seeds.

In this way, it is easy for us to understand and analyze our behavior by judging the behavior of an animal rather than judging a person about whom we don’t know everything. In this way, we can judge actions and not people. “Do not judge”, Jesus tells us (Matthew 7:1). We therefore use in our vocabulary names of animals that indicate reprehensible or unworthy behavior: for example, the pig for its filth, birds of prey that attack the little ones, vultures and those who feed on corpses, profiteers of other people’s misfortune, snakes that lure people into their traps, sharks for their violence, octopuses with their tentacles that wrap around us on all sides, animals that live underground and are often blind or feed on repulsive food. All these species of impure animals are listed in chapter 11 of the book of Leviticus.

But among animals we can also find those that touch us for their gentleness, faithfulness, purity or innocence. Let’s take for example the lamb and the dove. The term lamb indicates the innocent victim, thus Jesus, the Messiah, will be called the lamb of God, the innocent victim who was led to the slaughter without uttering a word (Isaiah 53:7 and John 1:29). The dove, whose eyes and faithfulness are praised, but which utters a lament, is often taken as an example in the Bible. The dove makes its nest in the crack of the rock, but the rock, in which Moses sheltered himself to see God pass before him, is an image of Christ; he is our rock, it is from his open side that we receive life, just as the people in the desert were watered by a spring that Moses made gush from the rock by striking it with his staff. The dove, therefore, is said to have beautiful eyes because it could see and recognize its rock, the one where it can take shelter. It is an image of the Christian who finds refuge in Jesus Christ, but it is also an image of the Holy Spirit itself that hovered over Jesus during his baptism (Matthew 3, 16). In fact, already at the beginning of the book of Genesis, the spirit of God is like a bird spreading its wings over the waters. The dove, like any bird and like the hen, is an image of the tenderness of the mother when she broods over her young and instills in them her love, her vital warmth. The dove also emits a cry that sounds like a lament and the Bible tells us that this cry is reminiscent of that of Rachel mourning the death of her children.

Fish are an image of fertility, of something that can multiply in very large quantities, but also of something that will be pierced, roasted, sacrificed and from which one can eat, as if it were a pure and delicate food. Jesus will multiply the fish and will eat grilled fish. Early Christians called Jesus the fish, in Greek ichtus, because with the initials of this word they could spell out his attributes (I for Iesus, Ch for Christos, T for Théos, God, ‘U for ‘Uyos, son, S for Sōtēr, Savior or Jesus Christ, son of God, Savior). And this fish that lives in the gentle waters of the lake formed by the waters of the Jordan where Jesus was baptized, also tells us that the human beings who were caught in the nets of the good news of the word of God and pulled out of the salty waters, were led to the source of living water and found new life through baptism. The early Christians said: “We are the little fish who have found life in the water of the Spirit and we must remain in the Spirit to stay alive, little fish following Christ”. Christ is the fish that gives himself as food and multiplies life through the waters of baptism.

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

Thus, both in the sea and in the sky we see living souls who need to find their way towards the light, towards the love of God and their neighbor.

In this way Jesus will transform his disciples into fishers of men, to rescue human beings from darkness and lead them to the freshwaters of the spirit of God’s love, to bring them into a fraternal relationship of love with one another, this is the kingdom of God: one another’s service for mutual joy.

Like the birds, human beings are invited to seek heavenly realities. This is the language used by St. Paul to talk to us about the passage from the darkness of death to the light of the resurrection, from this earth to heaven where the Father dwells:

«If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory. Put to death, then, the parts of you that are earthly: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and the greed that is idolatry.» (Colossians 3:1-5)

This is what we must get rid of in order to be filled with God’s goodness and happiness:

“But now you must rid yourselves of all this: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man, who is being renewed in knowledge in the image of his Creator. So there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free man; but Christ is all, and in all. Since you have been chosen by God, since you have been sanctified, loved by him, clothe yourselves with tenderness and compassion, with kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. The Lord has forgiven you; now you must do the same. Above all these things have love, which is the perfect bond. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. Live in gratitude.” (Colossians 3:8-15)

Now, it is very important to know that this passage does not take place at the moment of our death, it would be too late, it is about being torn away from now on from the darkness of ignorance of God’s gift, it is about recognizing from now on his love for us and thus passing through faith to this new life in which we live as brothers and sisters. St. Paul reminds us that now we have passed from death to life and risen with Christ, now we have put on the new man. All this is well symbolized by the gestures of the baptismal ritual in which one passes through the water, where one receives the source of life, the anointing of the Spirit that penetrates deeply into the spirit of man, the white garment that announces the birth to a new life, the forgiveness of sins, and the candle, the light that allows us to recognize the presence of God in each of his creatures, to know them in a different way through the love of God and to love them in a different way, to see in each one what is good, beautiful, the work of God.

“Conduct your life in Christ Jesus, the Lord, just as you received him. Root yourselves in him, build yourselves up on him, firm in the faith as you have been taught, abounding in thanksgiving. Beware of those who want to lead you astray with an empty and deceptive philosophy, based on the tradition of men, on the forces that rule the world, and not on Christ. For in him, in his very body, dwells all the fullness of divinity. In him you are fully filled, for he rules all the powers of the universe. In him you have received a circumcision that is not that practiced by men, but that which accomplishes the complete shedding of your body of flesh, such is the circumcision that comes from Christ. In baptism, you were buried with him and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead. You were dead because you had committed sins and had not received circumcision in your body. God gave you life with Christ, he forgave us all our sins. He canceled the note of the debt that burdened us because of the legal requirements that weighed on us: he canceled it by nailing it to the cross.” (Colossians 2:6-14)

God sees “that good”: every day, every passage from darkness to light, the narrative ends with this affirmation, in Hebrew kiy-ṭov (כִּי-טוֹב). Now, the conjunction kiy often indicates a reason, a “why” or simply a “that”. The word “ṭov” indicates what is good. God sees and contemplates in advance what is good and also why it is good. In fact, we could say that being in darkness or in waters where big animals eat small ones, etc., is not a good thing. However, here we see God’s plan and how he can bring everything to good, to goodness. It is in fact about the passage from darkness to light, from ignorance to the contemplation of God’s goodness, it is about opening our eyes to the beauty to which we are called. This passage is well represented in the Gospel, in Holy Week, when Jesus prepares to complete his work of salvation, giving his life, offering his life for the salvation of the world, the Gospel says:

“Before the festival of the Passover, knowing that the hour had come to pass from this world to the Father, Jesus, having loved his own who were in the world, loved them to the end.” (John 13:1)

To love until the end (εἰς τέλος eis télos), until realization, completion, perfection, where his words, his commandments or rather his prescriptions (entolés) want to lead us, to the fullness of his love.

Thus, in this verse from Genesis (1:21), God contemplates the work accomplished, through which he leads us to savor the immensity of his goodness and his beauty, the beauty of the kingdom in which we will all be in admiration of one another, at the service of one another as members of the same body. Here God contemplates the path that leads us from this earth to the Father, and this also announces the work of Christ, the image of God who accomplishes his will to lead us to follow him towards the happiness of heaven, in the kingdom of God the Father in gratitude. Then we too will be able to see how good all this is, how much God’s love has led us to him, offering us his life, at the price of his life. We will contemplate his goodness in everyone and be filled with joy.

Jesus urges the apostles to sweeten the salty waters of the sea with their presence, they will be like fish, like Jesus himself. They will be shepherds like Jesus and will lead others to waters that give rest, that appease. Here is the ancient psalm 22:

«The LORD is my shepherd; there is nothing I lack. In green pastures he makes me lie down; to still waters he leads me; he restores my soul. He guides me along right paths for the sake of his name. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff comfort me. You set a table before me in front of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Indeed, goodness and mercy will pursue me all the days of my life; I will dwell in the house of the LORD for endless days.»

Thus, Jesus, after the miraculous catch of fish, invites the apostles to go out into the world, to fish for men, to torn them away from the darkness, from the dark abyss of ignorance, to bring them light, as he brought it to the world. He invites Peter and the apostles to also be shepherds who lead to the waters of God’s rest, in God.

«When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?’ He answered, ‘Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.’” Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs.’ He said to him a second time, ”Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” He said to him a third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was distressed that he had asked him a third time, “Do you love me?” and he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were young you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”» (John 21:15-19)

So, like the birds in the sky, those who have made their nest among the branches of the tree of the righteous, those who have recognized him, those who have seen the face of God, like Moses, hidden like a dove sheltering in the breach of the rock, will show the heavenly realities to the world. Like birds, like doves, they will not seek earthly realities, but will soar towards heaven. Thus they will multiply and fill the seas and the sky.

The work of God manifested in the individual member of the body of Christ:

We are on the fifth day of the week in which the work of God is being accomplished, which we also contemplate during Holy Week, during which Jesus offered his life for us and led us from death to life. The fifth day of this Holy Week is the day of the last supper of the disciples with Jesus.

During this meal, he invites them to be one as he and the Father are one, to be perfect as he and the Father are perfect.

«The light is still in you for a little while. Walk while you have the light, so that darkness may not overcome you. Whoever walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of the light.» (John 12:35-36)

«As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth. I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me. And I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are ONE: I in them and you in me. May they be perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and that you loved them even as you loved me.» (John 17:18-23)

Thus, on the evening of Holy Thursday, the fifth day, Jesus anticipates his work of the sixth day. It is in fact on the sixth day that Jesus will realize this union, this communion between creatures and the Father, on the cross and will lead us to the full light. On the sixth day, he will complete the final stage, by his death he will lead us to the resurrection on the seventh day, where there will be no more darkness, nor sunset.

With the resurrection of Lazarus (told in John 11, see this story on 4th day), Jesus brings faith to its perfection, to the hope of the resurrection, of the victory of life over death, of love over evil. In this way believers can be sent to bring light into the world, like fish in the troubled waters of the sea, thus they will be witnesses of God’s glory and like the birds of the sky, they will lead human beings to contemplate the celestial realities, the glory of God, his victory over evil, over death. It is the believer who passes like Lazarus from death to life: the bandages that bind the dead man become the image of the evil that holds him prisoner of death. These will be loosened by the apostles that Jesus sends to forgive sins, freeing human beings from their guilt and the chain reaction of violences. “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” (Matthew 18:18). But before being able to bring Christ’s love to the world, we must be in communion with him, united with him. This is what Jesus achieves on the fifth day, during the Passover supper: he prepares the apostles to receive him, to be nourished by him, to be strengthened in their faith and in the bonds of love that unite us to each other and to God. In this way, during the Last Supper, he leads his people to the fullness of faith. First of all, he prepares them to be reconciled with God and with each other, acknowledging that they need to be purified by God, washed of their daily sins. This is indicated by the gesture that Jesus makes before letting them sit at the table: he washes their feet. This means that if we are not willing to acknowledge that, as human beings, we too participate in the divisions that exist in this world, we too have made mistakes that our neighbor can reproach us for. So, in order to be able to sit down at the same table, to eat the same heavenly food that unites us through God’s love, we must first do everything possible to reconcile with one another, then God will do the rest. Letting Jesus wash our feet means recognizing our mistakes in front of others and asking for forgiveness. This is the necessary condition for peace to reign among us. These are Jesus’ words:

«If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar. First go and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift.» (Matthew 5:23-24).

«Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.» (John 13:8).

Only then will the apostles be able to truly take part in the meal to which Jesus has invited them, after having let Jesus wash their feet, that is, after being purified and forgiven by him. A meal during which Jesus will offer himself as food, thus realizing a profound communion with him, the union of the members in a single body, animated by a single breath, the spirit of love. Thus, the bread and wine that Jesus will give them, saying: This is my body and this is my blood, will be the spiritual food that the believer will need every day to be able to be the light of the world, to lead humanity towards peace. This daily bread, this food that comes from above and allows us to participate in divine life and unites us to Him, is the real food that Jesus spoke of throughout his life.

“The bread that comes down from heaven is such that whoever eats it will not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of the world.” (John 6, 50-51).

Jesus invites his apostles to multiply this dinner, to repeat it after his death, to bring to the world this food that gathers us at the same table in love, this communion with God that makes us members of the same body. It is after Jesus’ death and resurrection that this union will be realized in his person, the total gift of his life, so that human beings may believe that they are God’s beloved children. On the fifth day, during the supper, this is not yet fulfilled on earth, Jesus has not yet given his life, his body, but his love is always present, divine life has always been offered to humanity and Jesus can already offer it to those he loves and who love him.

This bread that comes down from heaven, this heavenly food, is also at the center of the prayer that Jesus taught the apostles: “Give us this day our daily bread” (Matthew 6, 11). Literally it should be translated: “The bread from above give us today” (Τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον). Now, in the original Greek text, the word that is often translated as “daily” is a rare word (ἐπιούσιον epioúsion) that tells us that the essence of this bread is above: it is in fact the bread that came down from heaven, it is Jesus himself, God who became one of us, to lead us to union with him. (See the article The Lord’s Prayer). Now, it will be this heavenly food that will allow the apostles to bring Christ to the world, to be the witnesses, the reflection, of his love for humanity. To the point that they will be able to say, like St. Paul:

«Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me; insofar as I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself up for me.» (Galatians 2:20)

Jesus fully experienced this communion of love with his friends on the fifth day, during the last supper with them. The gift of his life and what this means and accomplishes for humanity, that is, the possibility of regaining the covenant with God again, of being forgiven and readmitted into his presence, will be offered and manifested to all humanity on the sixth day, by Jesus’ death and crucifixion. With his resurrection, he will then be with us always, all the days of our life.

Jesus comes to set us free and save us, faith in this victory over evil, faith in the resurrection will enable disciples, believers, to bring this salvation to the world, to be like fish in the sea, witnesses of heavenly realities like birds that make their nests in the tree, like doves in the breach of the rock. This faith will allow them to be in communion with Christ at the Last Supper, which for centuries to come will signify the sacrifice of his life, sacrifice which Christ will accomplish the following day, and at the same time it will signify his resurrection, thanks to which he will always be with us. And it was evening and it was morning, the fifth day.

DAY 6^th

כד וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים תּוֹצֵא הָאָרֶץ נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה לְמִינָהּ בְּהֵמָה וָרֶמֶשׂ וְחַיְתוֹ-אֶרֶץ לְמִינָהּ וַיְהִי-כֵן
24 And Elohim said, “Let the earth bring forth living souls according to their kinds: cattle and creeping ones and living of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so.

כה וַיַּעַשׂ אֱלֹהִים אֶת-חַיַּת הָאָרֶץ לְמִינָהּ וְאֶת-הַבְּהֵמָה לְמִינָהּ וְאֵת כָּל-רֶמֶשׂ הָאֲדָמָה לְמִינֵהוּ וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי-טוֹב
25 And Elohim made the living of the earth according to its kind, and every creeping of the earth according to its kind and Elohim saw that (it is) good.

כו וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם בְּצַלְמֵנוּ כִּדְמוּתֵנוּ וְיִרְדּוּ בִדְגַת הַיָּם וּבְעוֹף הַשָּׁמַיִם וּבַבְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל-הָאָרֶץ וּבְכָל-הָרֶמֶשׂ הָרֹמֵשׂ עַל-הָאָרֶץ
26 And Elohim said, “Let us make man (אָדָם adam) in our image, like our resemblance, and they will direct the fish of the sea and the birds of the heavens and the cattle and the whole earth and every creeping that creeps upon the earth.

Let us make (נַעֲשֶׂה na’asseh) man in our image, like our resemblance: the subject of this verb is in the plural in the original. This has given rise to many comments, both Jewish and Christian. In fact, even if the word for God (Elohim) is grammatically a plural in Hebrew, it agrees with a singular verb in the rest of the chapter, as when it says: “Elohim created”. The Christian interpretation has always seen an announcement of the Trinity in this plural and also in the evocation of the creative Word of God and of the Spirit that vivifies and hovers over the waters. To the verb “let us” in the plural, the possessive adjective “our” is also added in “in our image like our resemblance”. Here is Augustine’s commentary on image and resemblance.

Human being (אָדָם adam): here it is in the singular, as in the case of bird or other animals in the previous verses. It is probably a use of the collective singular to indicate all human beings. In fact, the verb is here in the plural: they direct (יִרְדּוּ yirdū). But the singular can also evoke Christ, who is, as St. Paul tells us, «the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through him and for him.» (Colossians 1:13). It is in his image that the rest of humanity was created, it is in him that humanity can turn to God and call him Father.

כז וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים אֶת-הָאָדָם בְּצַלְמוֹ בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים בָּרָא אֹתוֹ זָכָר וּנְקֵבָה בָּרָא אֹתָם
27 And Elohim created man (אָדָם adam) in his image in the image of Elohim he created him male and female he created them.

כח וַיְבָרֶךְ אֹתָם אֱלֹהִים וַיֹּאמֶר לָהֶם אֱלֹהִים פְּרוּ וּרְבוּ וּמִלְאוּ אֶת-הָאָרֶץ וְכִבְשֻׁהָ וּרְדוּ בִּדְגַת הַיָּם וּבְעוֹף הַשָּׁמַיִם וּבְכָל-חַיָּה הָרֹמֶשֶׂת עַל-הָאָרֶץ
28 And Elohim blessed them and said to them: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and walk on it (put it under your feet) and have direct (show them the direction) the fish of the sea and the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that creeps upon the earth.

כט וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים הִנֵּה נָתַתִּי לָכֶם אֶת-כָּל-עֵשֶׂב זֹרֵעַ זֶרַע אֲשֶׁר עַל-פְּנֵי כָל-הָאָרֶץ וְאֶת-כָּל-הָעֵץ אֲשֶׁר-בּוֹ פְרִי-עֵץ זֹרֵעַ זָרַע לָכֶם יִהְיֶה לְאָכְלָה
29 And Elohim said: “Behold, I have given them every herb that sow seed on the face of all the earth and every tree who has fruit in it which sow seed, it shall be for them food.

ל וּלְכָל-חַיַּת הָאָרֶץ וּלְכָל-עוֹף הַשָּׁמַיִם וּלְכֹל רוֹמֵשׂ עַל-הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר-בּוֹ נֶפֶש חַיָּה אֶת-כָּל-יֶרֶק עֵשֶׂב לְאָכְלָה וַיְהִי-כֵן
And God saw all that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
30 And for every living of the earth and for every bird of the heavens and for every creeping one upon the earth in which is a living soul every green herb for food and it was so.

לא וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים אֶת-כָּל-אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה וְהִנֵּה-טוֹב מְאֹד וַיְהִי-עֶרֶב וַיְהִי-בֹקֶר יוֹם הַשִׁשִׁי
31 And Elohim saw all that he had made, and behold (it is) very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

God’s work manifested in nature:

On the sixth day the work of creation was completed, and this accomplishment is marked by a change in the divine expression at the end of each day. In fact, at the end of each day, the text literally says: “And God saw that-good” (vayyar Elohim kiy-ṭov וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים כִּי-טוֹב). The particle “-kiy” is generally translated as “that”, but its original meaning was more like “so” or “because”. That is, it is more a question of explaining “because of what”, “why” this is good: because every living soul that is created can be led from darkness to light. Now, at the end of the sixth day, this is finally realized and the text says: And Elohim saw everything that he had made and behold (this is) very good. The particle “-kiy” has disappeared and the qualifier “very” has appeared. In fact, everything that is in darkness in the first days can finally come to full light, and be finally led to rest on the seventh day, where there will be no more sunset, no more darkness, because creation will finally be able to rest in God, to see God.

Let’s go back to the beginning of the narrative: this series of stages does not describe a temporal succession, but highlights an order in the plan of God who creates everything simultaneously, who is always at work giving life to the world continuously and continually leading each of his creatures to goodness, to perfect joy. Therefore, this narrative shows us in a logical sequence all of God’s work, so that his plan to allow each creature to participate in his light may be realized in each one throughout history. So, just as light is created first, so are spiritual creatures, angels, but also the light of God, that which is with him, becomes flesh and comes to illuminate the darkness in which human beings find themselves, human beings who need his help. At the same time, that is to say outside of time, in the divine plan, in the divine vision, his Word becomes flesh and Jesus comes to offer his life to humanity during the Holy Week. Thus, humanity will be able to see the glory of God (day 1), access the source of life (day 2), be like a land fertilized by this source and bear fruit (day 3), be like luminaries in the sky, reflecting the light of God in the darkness (day 4), being led from the agitated and salty waters of the sea of this world to the experience of heavenly realities (day 5), all this will be fully realized when humanity is perfectly united with God, accessing through Jesus Christ a filial relationship with God, union with him (day 6).

God is love and the image of this love on earth is found in the loving relationship between a man and a woman, in their faithfulness, in their desire to offer their life to other creatures, in the completely free and voluntary gift of love, in the choice to love. These characteristics of love in the couple, in the family and in children are in fact the characteristics of divine love, of God’s creative act, who wants to give his life, to share his joy with other creatures in a love that will never end. We see this divine love at work in Jesus during the Holy Week, when He freely chooses to offer His life to humanity so that humanity may receive life in all its fullness. In this way He establishes a covenant with humanity, which is like a marriage, with the same bonds of love that unite a couple forever, a family, multiplying the joy of the gift of one’s life for those we love.

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

Let us see, therefore, how God’s plan is realized in Jesus Christ, how he leads all creation to its perfection, how the work of salvation is accomplished during the Holy Week.

In fact, St. Paul explains to us that he, Jesus, is the firstborn before every creature.

«He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn, before all creatures: in him, everything was created, in heaven and on earth… He is before all things and everything subsists in him. He is also the head of the body, the head of the Church: he is the beginning (arkhē), the firstborn from the dead, so that he may have the primacy in all things.» (Colossians 1:13.18).

In fact, everything was created by the Word of God and this Word became flesh in Jesus Christ, according to God’s eternal plan to give his life to the world. He is the beginning of everything and therefore human beings are made in his image and resemblance. He is the beginning of all things and brings everything to its accomplishment, that is, He leads human beings to the vision of God. God is love and we have the full vision of God’s love in Jesus Christ. It is by seeing his loving face that creatures will be able to access God, they will be able to be torn from darkness, seeing the immensity of his love that gives itself to his creatures despite their errors. For-giveness is the gift of love renewed, given again and again. Jesus invites us to forgive 70 times 7 times (Matthew 18, 22), that is to say to keep giving love to those who ask for it, without looking at their merits.

So in this sixth stage that leads us to the contemplation of the Father, we see all the earthly animals, our vices and our virtues that are guided by human beings towards the light. Sins, bad actions to be forgiven and good actions to give thanks for.

It is the sixth day, the day of Holy Week, when Jesus is crucified and before dying he says: «It is accomplished» (John 19:30). The work of creation is completed, light has been revealed to creatures who were in darkness that prevented them from finding their way. The immensity of God’s love, of God’s glory, is revealed on the cross.

Now, Christ is the head of the body, the head of the Church. This means that he infuses his life and his love into his members. It is a profound union and communion, which implies that the members share the same will as the head, the same love, one serving the other as the one who is the head and gives them his life.

«I came so that they may have life, and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd, the true shepherd, who lays down his life for his sheep.» (John 10:10-11)

«And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be ONE, as we are ONE, I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection towards unity, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them as you loved me.» (John 17:22-23)

This profound union in which the two form one is also comparable to the union of man and woman spoken of here on the sixth day, as well as on the sixth day of Holy Week when this perfect union between God and humanity is revealed in Jesus Christ. He is fully God because the fullness of God’s love resides in him and he is fully man. Although he is a human being, he can love as God loves and he also wants to lead us to this perfection of love. God has prepared this path for his creatures, his children, since the beginning of the world and he has sent the prophets to show us the way, so that we would believe. But, of course, true love arises in us spontaneously and freely, no one can force love, no one could impose love to the heart. For this reason, when God sends his prophets, his spokespeople, to speak to the people, he tells them to address the people as a fiancé addresses his fiancée, respecting the will of each.

«No longer will they say to you, “Abandoned!” To your country no one will say, “Desolation!” You will be called “My favorite”, this land will be called “The Bride”. For the Lord has preferred you, and this land will become “The Bride.” As a young man marries a virgin, so he who edifies you will marry you. As the young bride is the joy of her husband, you will be the joy of your God. (Isaiah 62:4-5).

Thus, in the Bible, the relationship between God and his creatures who don’t want to believe in his love is described as the relationship between a fiancé who proposes his love to his beloved and who must convince her of his sincerity, of the gratuitousness of his love, of his fidelity: he would be ready to give his life for her. This attitude is described throughout the book of the Song of Songs: a dialogue between two fiancés, full of respect, of the desire to give themselves to each other, but one must have faith that this love is sincere. Here are some passages of it:

“My beloved is like a gazelle, like a fawn. Here he is, he stands behind our wall, he looks at the windows, he spies through the lattice. My beloved speaks and says to me: Rise up, my love, my beautiful one, and come… My dove, in the clefts of the rock, in the hiding places of the mountains, let me see your face, let me hear your voice! Your voice is sweet, and your face is lovely… My beloved is mine, and I am his, of him who leads his sheep to pastures among the lilies.” (Song of Songs 2:9-10.14.16)

The groom is behind the wall, at the entrance, waiting for it to be opened, for his bride to be ready. He admires the one who is waiting to recognize her groom, the one she can trust, the one who will have proven his love. The groom describes her thus:

«You are an enclosed garden, my sister, my bride, an enclosed garden, a fountain sealed.» (Song of Songs 4:12).

He will not dare to cross the threshold without being fully welcomed by his beloved.

And here is the search, the desire for union of the one who has not yet found her groom, but who will be helped several times, thanks to those who will testify to her that they have seen him, who will be able to tell her where to find him, to tell her what he looks like. This dialogue shows us two lovers eager to meet, to trust each other, and it also tells us about their pain when they cannot find each other. This dialogue speaks to us of the relationship between humanity and God.

“Upon my bed at night I sought him whom my soul desires; I sought him, but I have not found him. Yes, I will rise, I will go about the city, through the streets and squares: I will seek him whom my soul desires; I sought him, but I have not found him. They found me, the guards, they who go about the city: ‘Have you seen the one my soul desires?’ As soon as I had passed them, I found the one my soul desires: I seized him and will not let him go until I have brought him into the house of my mother, into the chamber of the one who conceived me.” (Song of Songs 3:1-4)

“I beg you, daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, what will you say to him? That I am sick with love.” (Song of Songs 5:8)

Eventually, the two will find each other, they will be able to give themselves to each other, trust each other and become one, when the joy of one becomes the joy of the other and the pain of one becomes the pain of the other. This same language is used by Jesus throughout the Gospel: he speaks like the groom who, waiting for his bride’s response, will do everything possible to show her his love, in order to be one with her.

Here is the last of the prophets who announced to the people God’s love for his creatures and tried to convince them of the sincerity and faithfulness of this love. Here is John the Baptist announcing Jesus who comes to his people like the bridegroom coming to meet his bride. John is the friend of the bridegroom.

«The one who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, he is present and hears the bridegroom’s voice and rejoices. Such is my joy, and it is perfect.» (John 3:29)

And Jesus often speaks of himself as the groom, but he knows that this groom will have to prove his love, that humanity will not be ready to trust him, will need to see how far this love can go, to the point of giving his own life?

«Jesus answered them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast”». (Matthew 9:15)

“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son.” (Matthew 22:2)

And Jesus, at the beginning of his mission, during his first miracle, at Cana, announces that this will happen, that this wedding will take place, at the price of his blood, only then will humanity be able to believe in God’s love, trust him and become one with him.

In fact, Jesus will perform his first miracle during a wedding feast, at Cana in Galilee. The bride and groom ran out of wine, so Jesus’ mother asked him to do something. Jesus, who until that moment had remained in Nazareth because Mary and Joseph had not yet allowed him to undertake the path that would lead to his death, turned to his mother as if he were addressing all of humanity. In fact, he calls his mother “woman” and awaits her consent, just as a groom awaits that of his bride. Is she really ready to trust him? Here is the dialogue:

“What’s between you and me? My hour has not yet come.” (John 2:4)

When Jesus speaks of “his hour” in the Gospel, he is alluding to the moment when he will give his life on the cross, it is the hour he is waiting for:

“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. He who loves his life loses it, and he who detaches himself from it in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone wishes to serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, my Father will honor him. Now my soul is troubled. What shall I say? “Father, save me from this hour”? But no! That is why I have come to this hour!» (John 12:23-27)

And he calls this hour baptism:

«I must receive a baptism, and what anguish is mine until it is accomplished!» (Luke 12:50).

In fact, the word baptism means to immerse in water, and the water spoken of at Cana is a figure of our humanity. There is no more wine, only water, this water lacks the spirit to become wine, this water that figures humanity must receive the spirit of God. Is it ready to receive it? This is why Jesus asks his mother, the only one of all creatures to have this full trust in God, whether she is ready to accept this union to take place, whether she is ready to accept her son to offer his life and shed his blood so that humanity may be saved, find her trust in God again and be united with him as in a marriage so that the two may become one.

Mary, thus representing humanity, once again answers “yes,” she who had already consented to God’s plan by saying yes to his proposal to conceive the savior of humanity, she being a virgin. The miracle is accomplished and five jars of water, representing humanity, its five senses with the five books of the law of Moses, are turned into wine, the best of wines to the delight of the bride and groom and the guests. It is the water of humanity that receives the spirit of God, who transforms it into wine as red as blood, the blood in which life is found. This blood that will one day flow from Jesus’ open side along with the water will be the sign of baptism, that baptism that Jesus awaits and announces here with this miracle. That baptism that manifests Jesus’ willingness to immerse himself in our humanity, becoming one of us to such an extent that he runs all the risks that this entails: being confused with criminals, being condemned to death. But, as in baptism, he who immerses himself in the water to signify his death, emerges victorious from the water, signifying victory over death, over evil, through his resurrection.

Therefore, what is announced and explained here in Cana, will be realized on the day Jesus is crucified. Then he will signify to his mother that the union between him and humanity has finally been realized: he gave his life for her and now humanity can welcome this life and bear fruit, be transformed in his image and resemblance, to become one with him, to form a single family of brothers and sisters who receive life from a single source of love, in God.

This is Jesus’ conversation with his mother when he is on the cross; he calls her “woman” once again and this woman, like the woman mentioned in the second chapter of Genesis, will become the mother of all living beings, that is, of all those who live by the spirit of God, who receive life from Him, giving thanks with full trust, and who now form a single family.

«Jesus, seeing his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing by her, said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. After this, Jesus, knowing that everything had now been accomplished, in order that the scripture might be fulfilled, said: “I thirst.” There was a vessel filled with a vinegar drink. So they put a sponge soaked in the vinegar on a sprig of hyssop and put it up to his mouth. When Jesus had taken the vinegar, he said, “It is accomplished.” Then bowing his head, he handed over the spirit.» (John 19:26-30)

When Jesus took that bitter sip of vinegar, when Jesus accepted within himself that humanity that had distorted the image of the Father with rivalry, hatred and violence, only then could he say that the work of creation was completed. Now this humanity could accept the divine life in thanksgiving, truly pass from death to life, from darkness to light and become one with him. Finally, God led humanity, created in his image, that is, with all the capacity and potential to love as he loves us, to the greatest love, to full resemblance with him. Behold, the work of God is accomplished: when he has led humanity to full resemblance with him, realizing a union such as that of a couple, where the two are no longer two but one.

«In the beginning of creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; and the two shall be one flesh. So then they are no more two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate.» (Mark 10:6-9).

Here is the work of God accomplished when this union between God and humanity is realized: it is of this work, the work that leads to union with God, that Jesus speaks when he says:

«My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.» (John 5:17).

The Father, through the Son, who is his perfectly resembling image, who perfectly fulfills his will in full confidence that this will be the path to the greatest love, never ceases to guide human beings, his children, patiently, like a pedagogue, through the stages that will lead them to the contemplation of the full light, of the perfect joy of loving and of giving their lives for those they love.

«May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I am in you. May they also be one in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. And I have given them the glory that you gave me, so that they may be one as we are ONE: I in them and you in me. May they be perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and that you loved them as you loved me.» (John 17:21-23)

Here God’s work is accomplished on the sixth day, on the sixth day of the Holy Week, when Jesus, on Good Friday, offers his life on the cross and creates this couple, animated by the same Spirit, this man and woman in the image fully resembling that of God’s love. Then the whole world will be able to believe, once it has seen this love at work in thousands of men and women who will give their lives for love, like Christ, having accepted life as a gift from God, with respect and trust. It is difficult to believe in this gratuitous love of God, and yet this union with him is possible and we contemplate it in all those who have transmitted this love to us, who have been a reflection of divine love for us, gratuitous, superabundant, benevolent.

Let us now look at this last stage that will allow every human being to welcome this spirit and become one with God.

The work of God manifested in the individual member of the body of Christ:

On this sixth day, the human being is called to lead the fish that we are towards fresh and calm waters, towards the source of true love. And he is also called to lead the birds towards the sky and not towards earthly and corruptible realities. In the same way, he must learn from the example of the animals of the earth, which will be like images of our vices and virtues that must be tamed or imitated. But none of this will be possible if human beings have not first responded to God’s invitation to become one with him, to let themselves be led to this perfect love through the one who offers it to us. We won’t be able to truly love until we recognize this love in all its characteristics, until we understand how the love of the Creator, unlike our own, is capable of loving each of his creatures and of giving his life for the multitude, for those who offend or despise him. This is how he invites us to follow him to see the loving face of God: to see the loving face of God means to become like Him, seeing how he loves each of his creatures. This is how Jesus responds to those who want to see the Father:

«Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else, because of the works themselves. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father. And whatever you ask in my name, I will do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”» (John 14:8-13).

To see the Father in all his glory we must follow Jesus in his last days, follow him to the cross and there the merciful face of God, his love for all creatures, will be revealed to us.

This is how Jesus proposes to lead us to the Father: he proposes it like a fiance who can’t force his fiancee to accept him, to trust his word, because she first wants proof of the truth of his love. The day Jesus will have demonstrated this unconditional love of God for his children, then humanity will be ready to believe, but this faith, this trust, cannot be forced. So here is the image of the fiance who, like the fiance in the Song of Songs, stands at the door, without forcing it:

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” (Revelation 3:20).

So, for humanity that is ready to trust, like a bride to her bridegroom, union will be possible, a communion such that God’s spirit of love will be able to dwell fully in the hearts of his children. The wedding will thus be completed, but at the price of Jesus’ life. Jesus will be like a lamb led to the slaughter, without protesting, innocent, revealing to us the loving face of God, ready to give, to sacrifice his life to demonstrate the authenticity of his love. Then, human beings will be able to be fully illuminated by this divine light, to see God as he is and become like him. The Bible calls the fulfillment of God’s work the wedding of the lamb: Jesus is the lamb of God and we are the guests at the wedding banquet during which we are in communion with the life of God, we are united with him. Let’s see what St. John reveals to us through the vision he had of the victory of divine love, the victory of the lamb, over evil and death:

«Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.» For the linen represents the righteous deeds of the holy ones. Then the angel said to me, «Write this: Blessed are those who have been called to the wedding feast of the Lamb.» And he said to me, «These words are true; they come from God.» (Revelation 19:7-9)

How can such a union with Christ be achieved? It requires total surrender, total trust; in fact, being totally in the service of others implies going all the way to love even if it involves trials or the sacrifice of one’s life.

«I have told you this so that you might have peace in me. In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world.» (John 16:33).

There will be many testimonies of his disciples who, while suffering persecution, will nevertheless experience a love stronger than death, a love that hatred and revenge towards their persecutors will not be able to conquer. Once God’s love dwells in us and we remain bound to Him, once our heart doesn’t give in to revenge, His love shines in us, bears fruit and multiplies. Just as it is promised and announced in the verse of Genesis: «Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth» (Genesis 1:28). The couple is created, the union with God is realized, and then we will be able to contemplate God’s love on earth through the many men and women who will be like stars in the dark moments when men are divide and confront each other. The examples of gratuitous love will bear fruit in the hearts of human beings and so those who have contemplated the love of Jesus on the cross, even his persecutors, will perhaps be ready to open the door of their heart to the who knocks and invites them to forgiveness, reconciliation and trust.

Here is the testimony of the apostle Paul, imprisoned and persecuted, who brought to love many of those in prison with him, including the jailers.

«It is Christ Jesus who died, rather, was raised, who also is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? As it is written: “For your sake we are being slain all the day; we are looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.» (Romans 8:34-39)

We can also read the whole of chapter 8 of St. Paul’s letter to the Romans, which summarizes all the stages of love through which God has led his children to him, in trust, strengthened them and made them fully like him in love, so that they may taste a peace that no one can take away from them.

«I no longer call you servants, because the servant does not know what his master does; I call you friends, because everything I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. It is not you who have chosen me, but I have chosen you and I appointed you, so that you may go and bear fruit and your fruit may remain. Then, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Here is what I prescribe: love one another. If the world hates you, know that it hated me first. … When the Defender comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, he, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, will bear witness on my behalf. And you also will bear witness, for you have been with me from the beginning.» (John 15:15-18.26-27)

Thus, Jesus promises a defender, the Holy Spirit of God who dwells in those who have accepted him, finding again the trust of children towards their parents. Jesus promises a peace of another order, the peace of being loved by God and of loving as He loves:

«Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you.» (John 14:27).

Here are the words of St. Paul again, speaking to us of this peace he desires to bring to all people, this peace he received from Christ and which enables him to be a reflection of his love even for his enemies, his persecutors.

«Through Christ may all be finally reconciled to him, making peace through the blood of his cross, peace for all beings on earth and in heaven. And you, you were once strangers to God, and even his enemies, because of your thoughts and evil deeds. But now God has reconciled you to himself in the body of Christ, his body of flesh, through his death, to present you before him holy, irreproachable before him, provided that you persevere in the faith, firmly grounded, stable, and not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, am a minister. Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church, of which I am a minister in accordance with God’s stewardship given to me to bring to completion for you the word of God, the mystery hidden from ages and from generations past. But now it has been manifested to his holy ones, to whom God chose to make known the riches of the glory of this mystery among all the people; it is Christ in you, the hope for glory. It is he whom we proclaim, admonishing everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. For this I labor and struggle, in accord with the exercise of his power working within me.» (Colossians 1:20-29).

When this peace is realized and human beings become one, when reconciliation enables union, then we can fully participate in the wedding, then humanity experiences its union with God, participates in His happiness and vice versa, as in the union of the bridegroom and the bride.

«For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This is a great mystery, but I speak in reference to Christ and the Church.» (Ephesians 5:31-32).

And in the last chapter of the book of Revelation, where St. John tells of his vision of the victory of the lamb, of the victory of love over death, Jesus says:

«’I, Jesus, sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the root and offspring of David, the bright morning star.’ The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’ Let the hearer say, ‘Come.’ Let the one who thirsts come forward, and the one who wants it receive the gift of life-giving water.» (Revelation 22:16-17)

This introduces us, therefore, to the peace of God in his creation and of the creation in him, the bridegroom and the bride meet, the work is accomplished.

Here, then, is what the 7th day presents to us, the final, eternal stage, where light reigns forever and darkness is no more.

DAY 7

Genesis 2, 1-3

וַיְכֻלּוּ הַשָּׁמַיִם וְהָאָרֶץ וְכָל־צְבָאָם׃
1 And the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their army.

וַיְכַל אֱלֹהִים בַּיֹּום הַשְּׁבִיעִי מְלַאכְתֹּו אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה וַיִּשְׁבֹּת בַּיֹּום הַשְּׁבִיעִי מִכָּל־מְלַאכְתֹו אֲשֶׁר עָשָֽה׃
2 And Elohim finished on the seventh day the work he had done, and he ceased on the seventh day all the work he had done.

וַיְבָרֶךְ אֱלֹהִים אֶת־יֹום הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י וַיְקַדֵּשׁ אֹתֹו כִּי בֹו שָׁבַת֙ מִכָל־מְלַאכְתֹו אֲשֶׁר־בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים לַעֲשֹֽׂות
3 And Elohim blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because on it He Elohim ceased every work that he created to be done.

Regarding the seventh day, see also the articles Shabbat, the rest of God and The Kingdom of Heaven.

Before examining the three meanings of the Scripture, let us look at some essential words and expressions for understanding these verses:

His work that he did (mala’khto asher ‘asah מְלַאכְתֹּ֖ו אֲשֶׁ֣ר עָשָׂ֑ה)
He blessed (yevarekh יְבָ֤רֶךְ)
He sanctified (yeqaddesh יְקַדֵּ֖שׁ)
What he had created to do (asher-bara’ elohiym la’assot אֲשֶׁר־בָּרָ֥א אֱלֹהִ֖ים לַעֲשֹֽׂות)
He ceased (shavat שָׁבַת).

Let’s take a closer look at the possible meanings of each of these words:

The work he did (mala’khto asher ‘asah מְלַאכְתֹּ֖ו אֲשֶׁ֣ר עָשָׂ֑ה). Here we are talking about the work that God has done. The word mala’khah (here in the construct state connected with the third person masculine possessive pronoun meaning «his» work mala’khto) indicates a task to be carried out and the verb that introduces it is the verb «‘asah» (עָשָׂה) to do. It is not therefore a question of creating (bara’), but of doing (‘asah). God created and sustains creation, but he also accomplished a work, that is to lead humanity from darkness to light. This action of doing, by which the Father is always at work in each of us, in every human being, Jesus manifests it by his life. With his death and resurrection, he shows us how God achieved his victory over darkness, how he led humanity to contemplate his light. This work (mala’akhah) has been accomplished, completed, God allows us to enter into his rest.
The second word: he blessed (yevarekh יְבָ֤רֶךְ). Wherever the Bible says that God blesses, what is blessed multiplies, that is, it becomes an image of God’s love. God cannot keep his love to himself, he wants to spread it to his creatures, at any cost. This is how St. Paul tells us about it:

«Have among yourselves the same attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus, Who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.» (Philippians 2:5-11).

So, just as Jesus bore fruit by offering his life and thus revealing God’s love, In the same way, those who reflect God’s love in the love they show to their children and neighbors in this world will bear fruit, a hundredfold. Jesus shows us this not only through parables, but also through signs: he will multiply the loaves and fishes to feed the crowds, thus giving a sign of the true life that comes from God as our daily bread. Those who have become believers also offer their lives as fish in the waters of this world. Similarly, in the Old Testament, the image of God blessing the flocks and the lambs multiplying is often repeated. In fact, this gesture of gratuitous love will not remain without effect in this world, thanks to this love those who have received it and accepted it will in turn discover the happiness of being loved, they will be grateful and their hearts will be filled with love. That which is blessed is filled with the presence of God and spreads his light, multiplies, bears fruit. This is the Kingdom of Heaven that welcomes all those who have received it, all those who have clothed it in their turn, like those invited to a wedding who wear the wedding garment and shine with the light of God.

He sanctified (yeqaddesh יְקַדֵּ֖שׁ). This third word expresses the work God has accomplished in each of us: he has made us holy, that is, he has filled us with his presence. This is accomplished, God’s name is sanctified because his work is reflected in his creatures. When Jesus invites us, in the Lord’s Prayer, to ask that God’s name be sanctified («hallowed be thy name»), it means that he invites us to ask to be filled with God’s presence and love so that others may discover the joy of loving, thanks to the love they will have received from their neighbor, so that they may give thanks to God, sing his glory and repeat what he has done for us.

«May they all be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. And the glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, so that the world may know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.» (John 17:21-23)

Thus, God’s name is sanctified, all reflect his glory, the immensity of his love. Thus, God completes his work in us.

What He had created to do (asher-bara’ elohiym la’assot אֲשֶׁר־בָּרָ֥א אֱלֹהִ֖ים לַעֲשֹֽׂות), in the sense : «created to be done». Here are the two verbs that speak to us of God: first he created bara’ and then there is what he will do la’assot, what is to be done. He created (bara’ בָּרָא), this indicates an accomplished action, God’s action of bringing into existence that which would not exist without him. This action does not stop when the creature comes into existence, but continues eternally because the creature continually receives its life from God. Moreover, those who contemplate God eternally will be fully animated, vivified by the life of God. But this is not what is designated by the word “to make”, la’assot. This word comes from the root ‘asah, to do, and indicates, on the contrary, the work that God does in this world to bring it to the full light, his work of salvation, through which he saves us by tearing us away from darkness. Let’s remember that the name of Jesus means God saves. So, this work will once and for all accomplished by Jesus bringing humanity to eternal life.

The infinitive form of the verb ‘asah used here is la’assot, which can be translated as «to do», «in order to do». In fact, God created, he gave life to his creatures and keeps them alive, but this still implies his work which consists in leading them from darkness to full light, that’s why he created them, so that they may participate in full light, so that creatures may fully welcome life, the love of God. So in the first chapter of the Genesis it is God’s work that is being talked about, that is, how he leads us from darkness to light, this is the main theme, not creation, the fact that he creates. In fact, the text first tells us that God creates and then that his work, his doing in creation, consists in leading it towards the light and this work will be completed on the seventh day when there will be no more darkness and God will rest in us and we in him. God works in this world is to lead his creatures who are in darkness towards the light of his love.

That is why Jesus reminds us that God, by his Word, continues to lead his children toward the light; he does not abandon them to darkness:

«My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.» (John 5:17).

God created and continues his work until the day when his children will fully rest in him, in the seventh day, when the sun will not set, when the light will have dispelled darkness, when God will have accomplished his work, what was “to be done.” This is also compared in the Bible to the work of parents guiding a small child, who cannot yet speak or walk, into adulthood. We, too, are little children when we are born through faith and baptism into the new life as children of God and are guided by God into his light.

Thus, by creating, God gives us life, leads us from nothingness to being and keeps us in being for eternal life once his work is accomplished. This work is designated by the verb ‘asah, to do. So, this verse tells us that God created and that his creation is eternal. But it also tells us that when the work he carried out in creation to lead creatures to contemplate the full light is accomplished, then his work ceased. God ceased to do what had to be done, he rested because the work of salvation was accomplished. So we can clearly see the difference between creating and making. The verb «to do» (‘asah עָשָׂה) designates the divine action in what He created and this action ceases when the work of salvation is accomplished in this world. The verb «to create» (bara’ בָּרָא), on the other hand, designates the eternal act of God. He is God because he creates, because eternally his love consists in giving life, in offering his life.

This is the meaning of the word shavat (שָׁבַת), to cease. But how does this ceasing become rest? When for each one of us this earthly life comes to an end and we place our lives back into God’s hands, with complete trust, then his work of salvation is accomplished, he no longer has to lead us from darkness to light. Having thus entered into the trust of God’s children, we can rest in the bosom of the Father and he can rest in us for having accomplished our work of salvation. That is why he is said to have ceased the work of what he created «to do» or «in order to be done», that is, that is, of what needs to be brought to its perfection, to its culmination, to the full light. He gives us his life and enables us to receive it in its fullness. He shapes the receptacle of his spirit, which is us, like a clay pot, he infuses his spirit into us: it is up to us to expand our lungs to fully receive it, it is up to us to let ourselves be filled, filled by God.

«For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God which shines on the face of Christ. But we hold this treasure in earthen vessels, to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.» (2 Corinthians 4:6-7).

God’s work manifested in nature:

On this 7th day, the sun shines forever, there will be no sunset. This is what the images of nature show to us: a light that shines forever.

We can see, therefore, how this eternal light speaks to us of God’s infinity and of our contemplation of his glory.

God’s words to Moses, when he prescribes to respect the Shabbat, make a distinction between the mala’khah task, which is the divine work of leading men to the light, to which we can associate ourselves, moved by the same love, and slave labor (‘abd), that is, what enslaves us. What enslaves us is evil, the chain reaction of violences. On the day of the Shabbat we will remember God’s rest because he has accomplished his work of salvation and we will let him serve us, forgive us, reconcile us and, of course, on that day we will refrain from committing evil, from any injustice towards our neighbor, as had been announced and made explicit when Jesus proclaimed the sabbatical year he had come to bring to the earth.

On the day of the Shabbat, man shall not do mala’akhah (מְלָאכָה) and shall not do the works of a slave (‘avodah עֲבֹדָה).

«Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor (ta’vod תַּֽעֲבֹד) and do all your work (mala’khtekha מְלַאכְתֶּךָ); but the seventh day is the day of rest, the Sabbath in honor of the Lord your God: thou shalt not do any work, neither thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy animals, nor the immigrant that is in thy city. For in six days the Lord made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and all that they contain, but He rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and sanctified it.» (Exodus 20:8-11)

Hence, man is forbidden to carry out slave labor; the verb ‘abad indicates the work of the servant (‘abd) and the word mala’khah rather the work, the task to be carried out.

The day of Shabbat celebrates on earth the divine reality of the realization of God’s work: He led creation to the contemplation of his light. On this day, therefore, humanity is invited to try to live, even if only for a brief moment, this peace, in which not only does man not work, but he abstains from all slave work, that is, abstains from doing what is evil because it is evil that enslaves us. The rest of this day is therefore a moment in which we experience a communion between human beings gathered by the love of God at the same table, in sharing, in fraternal bonds. An anticipation of the definitive joy of heaven.

Now, in the first verse of this second chapter of Genesis, it says: «And the heavens and the earth were completed and all their army». What is to be understood by the word «army»? Do the heavens and the earth have an army? According to the traditional interpretation of the Fathers of the Church, it is the heavenly army of angels that carries out the divine mission of helping human beings on their path towards God; they are the messengers, the envoys of God. The word angel is mal’ak in Hebrew, a word quite similar to mala’khah. Angels too, in fact, participate voluntarily and not as slaves in the divine work of leading humanity to salvation, peace and light. But also on earth, human beings who have become like stars, thanks to the example of love for their neighbor and faith that they have been able to offer to the world, freely carry out this task, this divine work of helping humanity walk towards him. It is not a question of slave labor, it is a question of being associated with God’s will to save humanity. By accepting his spirit, the gift of God’s life, the human being shares his will and also wishes to freely associate with his work of salvation. He also becomes a spokesperson for God on earth, he carries out an angel’s mission. The word angel in Greek (ἄγγελος) means one who announces, who brings news. The term «gospel» means «good news», the good news of God’s love for humanity, victorious over evil and death. So this is the good news that the apostles (a term that in greek means «envoy») are sent to bring to the world through the example of their lives offered out of love in the image of Christ:

“As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.” (John 17:18-19).

And so one day all of God’s work will be accomplished: Jesus having given his life and revealed with his resurrection the victory of divine love over evil and death, and the angels and human beings who will have shared God’s will, the army of heaven and earth, will shine like stars in the firmament, enjoying God’s peace for all eternity.

God reigns and has handed his kingdom over to his son, Jesus. The word king indicates someone who has subdued his enemies, that is, who has conquered evil. In Hebrew the word king is melekh (מֶלֶך), a word similar to mala’khah: the aspirated sound ‘aleph is not present, the work is done, the kingdom is eternal, we have entered God’s rest.

The seventh day tells us about the Kingdom of Heaven, the divine life of creatures with God, filled with joy, filled with His love for one another. But it is, in fact, a spiritual reality, a joy, sharing in the holiness of God, the experience of God’s love. This is why when Jesus wants to talk to us about the Kingdom of God, he has to use images because it’s difficult to represent a spiritual reality. (See the article Matthew 13: The Parables of the Kingdom). In these parables he talks about the sower and the seed that bears fruit, the net thrown into the sea and the fish caught, but also elsewhere Jesus talks about a banquet in the Kingdom and the guests invited to the banquetl. (See the article Luke 14, 15-24 The guests invited to the banquet). In all these images, it’s always about fullness: will the banquet hall be filled? Will the net be able to hold all the fish? Will the seed bear fruit one hundred percent? In short, all these images tell us that every creature is invited to share in the joy of the Kingdom, that everyone is invited to enter the Kingdom, into eternal joy. making the experience of loving one’s neighbor, of giving one’s life. One must enter this heavenly reality while still on earth; it is there that our heart must open to welcome our neighbor, to live as brothers and sisters, as members of the same body. It is now that love can give its full measure, its intensity, being stronger than trials, showing the measure of God’s mercy, even towards one’s enemies. It is on earth that the human being can be led to the full experience of God’s love, to fullness, it is now that he can choose to love despite all difficulties. This choice and this life will be his glory for all eternity, they will be revealed and will shine like light.

This is why the Father is always at work, and also his Word, Christ: to enable us to taste this joy. It is up to us, on earth, to respond to his invitation to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. This entrance does not happen at the moment of our death, but by participating in the divine joy of loving as He loves, on earth as it is in heaven. It is about asking for this Kingdom of God to come into our hearts, to reign, to rule, to overcome all our rivalries, jealousies, hatreds, lack of trust, lack of love. That is why Jesus, in teaching us to pray, invites us to ask for his kingdom to come and to come within us while we are on earth.

«This, then, is how you should pray: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not let us fall into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.» (Matthew 6:9-15)

Here, in the account of the seventh day, as well as in the Lord’s Prayer, sanctification is mentioned because in the Kingdom of God everything is holy: evil and darkness have disappeared. This reality, which will remain forever, eternally, is therefore to be sought already on earth; it is here that we are invited to share in this happiness, to enter into the joy of God. In fact, Jesus tells us that this Kingdom has drawn near to us, that we must change our thoughts, our hearts in order to enter it:

“Change your thoughts, for the Kingdom of God has come near to you.” (Greek: Μετανοεῖτε, ἤγγικεν γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν.) (Matthew 3:2).

It is in Jesus that the Kingdom of God, this perfect love for everyone, fully resides; it is he who has drawn near to us, so that we too can enter this Kingdom, participate in the same love for our neighbor. The Greek word, usually translated as “convert,” literally means to change the way of thinking (metanoéō, in Greek μετανοέω).

So, once we have allowed ourselves to be illuminated by the light, by divine goodness, which will have dispelled our darkness, then the Kingdom of God will be established in our hearts, because the Kingdom of God is within us, Jesus tells us:

«The Kingdom of God is within you» (in Greek: ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐντὸς ὑμῶν ἐστιν). (Luke 17:21).

But the task, the work (mela’khah מְלָאכָה) that creatures must accomplish comes after what God has accomplished. This mission, which angels, prophets and apostles join, is to reveal to human beings what God has accomplished for them. It is about leading our neighbor to the love that comes from God, being witnesses of this love ourselves, inhabited by this love. It is about pointing out the origin of this love in God, in the One who loved us first, so that we too can draw from it in turn.

John the Baptist, the last of the prophets, tells us:

«No one can receive anything except what has been given him from heaven. You yourselves can testify that I said, “I am not the Christ, but I was sent before him”… He must increase; I must decrease.» (John 3:27-28, 30).

“I baptize you with water for repentance, but the one who is coming after me is more powerful than I am; I am not worthy to remove his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” (Matthew 3:11).

The angels, the prophets and the apostles guide humanity towards Christ, towards God, towards the hope of being loved and forgiven. As a reflection of His love in this world, they open the hearts of human beings to love, to believe that this love exists and gives itself to all those who will open the door to it.

God rests from all that He has undertaken to lead men to the light. Jesus accepted and fulfilled this heavy task when He chose to enter Jerusalem to give His life.

«My Father, if this cup cannot pass without my drinking it, your will be done!» (Matthew 26:42).

Jesus accomplishes what was necessary to save humanity at the cost of his life. This heavy task, this work of salvation, will cease when human beings can finally contemplate the face of God.

So, for humans too, it is not a question of taking on this burden on the day of the Shabbat; this day must be a sign on earth of eternal happiness, every work having been already accomplished by Christ, the work of salvation, the victory over evil, through the superabundance of forgiveness. On this day, we let God serve us, we share in his rest in the meal he instituted to be ONE with him, in thanksgiving, the Eucharist.

On this day, humanity is invited to anticipate the heavenly banquet, the one where we sit at table with God, having shared his will, his desire for us all to be united in love as brothers and sisters:

«I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father.» (John 15:15).

It is therefore, on this day, a matter of remembering Christ’s victory over evil and death; it is he who accomplished this work, who voluntarily undertook this task. It is he who first overcame evil with the superabundance of his mercy. It is up to us to receive this forgiveness, that is, the gift of his renewed love, to be filled with it and to do the same. In him is the source of this love. Thus the human being who had separated from God, from the source of life, the human being who lived in darkness, can now welcome God’s forgiveness, enter again into his covenant, draw once again from the source of life. Now that Jesus has restored us in the covenant with God, now that he calls us his friends, we can share his will, associate freely in the service of his will, do and fulfill his will on earth, to lead humanity to free itself from slavery through Christ, accepting his salvation and thus sharing his victory over evil.

Christ has conquered evil once and for all, it is up to us to accept the benefits of this victory, his forgiveness, and thus share this victory by doing the same towards our neighbor, forgiving them too. By freely putting ourselves at God’s service, we will also face risks and struggles, but this is in order to open a breach in the hardened hearts of human beings, so that they may hope in the salvation promised by God.

“Thus, through the law, no one will be justified before God, for through the law comes consciousness of sin. But now, apart from the law, God has made known what the righteous requirement of God is. the Law and the prophets are witnesses to it. And this righteousness of God, given by faith in Jesus Christ, is offered to all who believe. For there is no distinction: all have sinned and are deprived of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption accomplished in Christ Jesus. For God’s plan was for Christ to be an instrument of forgiveness, in his blood, through faith. This is how God wanted to manifest his righteousness, he who, in his forbearance, had closed his eyes to sins committed in the past.” (Romans 3:20-25)

Indeed, we cannot forgive ourselves; it is up to us to invoke this forgiveness from God, and he offers it to us, freely, with the joy of the father who welcomes the son who has returned to him (see the article Luke 15, 11-32 The Prodigal Son). This is what we celebrate on the day of rest: reconciliation with God, union with him in thanksgiving, the Eucharist (from the Greek eucharistéō εὐχαριστέω I thank, I give thanks, I’m grateful).

This forgiveness also allows us to reconcile with one another. All this is summarized in the last petition of the Lord’s Prayer, where the children of God, after having received his forgiveness, filled with his love, reconcile with one another.

«Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not let us fall into temptation, but deliver us from evil.» (Matthew 6:12-13)

The work of God manifested and accomplished in the person of Jesus and in the Church, formed by the members of the body of Christ:

It is the Eucharistic meal inaugurated by Jesus that will be celebrated by Christians on the day of rest. This meal brings the disciples together, so that they may receive forgiveness from Jesus, the forgiveness that he offered to the multitude by accepting to shed his blood on the cross:

On the day of shabbat, God’s day of rest, we allow ourselves to be served by him, forgiven by him, reconciled by him, reunited with him by a new and eternal covenant.

«The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for the multitude.» (Mark 10:45).

Let us therefore welcome this life, given so that humanity may have peace, in God’s forgiveness, that is, in the renewed gift of his love, offered to all who come to him to receive it, freely. Receiving God’s forgiveness does not only mean that faults are erased, but much more: it means being able to receive anew the gift of divine life from which humanity separated itself by turning away from God, doubting the gratuitousness of His love. To welcome God’s gift means being re-established in the covenant, in full communion with Him; receiving His life means being welcomed as His children, participating in His very spirit:

«On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood up and cried out: “Let anyone who thirsts come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as scripture says: ‘Rivers of living water will flow from within him.’ He said this in reference to the Spirit that those who came to believe in him were to receive. There was, of course, no Spirit yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.» (John 7:37-39)

In fact, before Jesus died on the cross, humanity had not yet received his Spirit, that is, the gift of his life, the renewed gift of God’s love who did not look at our merits but gave his life for all of us. This life reveals his love to us and fills us in turn with love, gratitude, thankfulness and filial trust: we too can put our lives in his hands, trusting in his mercy.

The rest of the Shabbat day, before the coming of Christ, celebrated the victory of light over darkness. This victory was revealed in Jesus Christ and so the 7^th day became the passage of the human being to full light, where he can contemplate the face of God, the immensity of his mercy. This day therefore allows human beings to enter the eternity of God; for Christians this day has become the passage to the eighth day, to a time that lies beyond our time, the time of the resurrection, of eternal life. This life has already begun in those who have received God’s forgiveness and have thus been introduced into eternal life.

«Whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come to judgement, but has passed from death to life.» (John 5:24).

Christians have therefore celebrated Good Friday, the day on which Christ died on the cross, rested in the tomb on the Sabbath and, by entering into death for us, teared us away from death and evil, thus allowing us to enter into the peace of God, into the resurrection that is therefore celebrated on Sunday, thus representing an eighth day, a day in which the human being no longer lives according to the earthly way, a day outside this world, in which the human being already anticipates the eternal, spiritual reality of his definitive victory over evil. On this day, it is no longer permitted to work, it is no longer permitted to do servile work, but only to do good. So here is Jesus, performing a miracle on the day of the Sabbath, explaining its meaning:

«Then Jesus said to them, “I ask you, is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” Looking around at them all, he then said to him, “Stretch out your hand.” He did so and his hand was restored.» (Luke 6:9-10).

So here the man whose hand was withered and who could not work for the good is healed. There is a time, then, to let God serve us, to receive the love of the One who first loved us, who accomplished the work of salvation. A time to rest in Him.

“As for us, we love because God himself first loved us.” (1 John 4:19).

«So, during supper, fully aware that the Father had put everything into his power and that he had come from God and was returning to God, Jesus rose from supper and took off his outer garments. He took a towel and tied it around his waist. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and dry them with the towel around his waist. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Master, are you going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered and said to him, “What I am doing, you do not understand now, but you will understand later.” Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “Unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me.” (John 13:3-8)

«As they continued their journey he entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him. She had a sister named Mary who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak. Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving? Tell her to help me.” The Lord said to her in reply, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” (Luke 10, 38-42)

Here are some examples of those who let themselves be served by Jesus, of those who welcomed the One who comes to save us, to wash us from our sins and to make us sit at the table with Him, so that we may be in Him and He in us.

So, this work of God (mala’akhah) reached its fullness, its culmination, on the seventh day: a kingdom which has been filled, filled by the envoys, by the messengers of God, by the angels, by the apostles, by human beings who reflect the light of God that they contemplate, reconciled with God and with each other.

Returning thus to the first verse: «And the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their army.» (Genesis 2:1), we see this kingdom full of angels and human beings who have fulfilled their mission of proclaiming the life of the Kingdom of Heaven. Humans who lived on earth, considering every human being as a brother or sister, spread the good news by the example of their lives. In the early centuries of the Church, even bishops who presided over a community were called «angels».

Here is what Jesus himself tells us:

«But those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God being children of the resurrection.» (Luke 20:35-36)

Now, it is through faith that one is born to the new life of children of God, this is what baptism means, the passage from death to life, to the new life of children of God who all draw their life, their love, from the same divine source. Thus, recognizing one source at the origin of all life, they are ready to welcome a brother or sister in every human being. Being a child of God, living as a child of God, should not be understood in a restrictive sense, because every human being who experiences giving his life for his neighbor, experiences the same divine love, whether he does it as a believer or not.

In fact, Jesus himself tells us that when those who do not know him are resurrected, they will hear that the love they have shown their neighbor will have been a true experience of God’s love for them, a true encounter with God, even if they were not aware of it. Here is the dialogue between Jesus and the crowd of those who, although they did not know him on earth, nevertheless experienced the love that makes participate in God and similar to Him.

«When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the people will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’ Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did it to me.’» (Matthew 25:31-40)

This heavenly army of bearers of the good news, in which God’s life and love shine forth, is thus formed by the angels and those who have become like angels, a reflection of God’s love on earth, through their deeds.

The work of God manifested in the individual member of the body of Christ:

Note that the account of the 7^th day, in which God completes his work, does not end with the usual statement of the first six days: “it was evening and it was morning”. In fact, it is a definitive passage from darkness to light. This time it is the light of God himself that shines in each of us.

«The night will be over, they will no longer need either the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will enlighten them; they will reign for ever and ever.» (Revelation 22:5).

It is therefore a question of entering into God’s rest, into the heavenly Jerusalem where only God’s love subsists among his children.

It is the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Heaven, in which our hearts and our spirits can already dwell. We can already enter the Kingdom of Heaven in this life. It is established in us when we experience this reconciliation within ourselves, this unconditional acceptance of our neighbor; it is then that the Kingdom of Heaven is within us. This Kingdom is Jesus Christ himself, in whom love reigns, in whom the triumph of light over darkness has been accomplished, in whom only light remains. He constantly invites us to enter it, to enter this spiritual reality in which we are all one, members of the same body, of the same family.

“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes a child like this in my name welcomes me.” (Matthew 18:3-5).

Jesus invites us to rediscover the trust that children have in their parents, the kindness of children who offer their smile to everyone, without distinction between rich, poor, young, old, fellow citizens or foreigners. Children, the little ones, offer us another view of life, they welcome with gratuitousness and trust the love of their parents. Jesus thus invites us to rediscover this trust in the One who gave us life and to welcome a brother or sister in each person.

This desire to form a single, new family is found throughout Jesus’ life:

«Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? Then, extending his hand toward his disciples, he said: ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.’» (Matthew 12:48-50)

In the same way, in his last words on the cross, Jesus addresses Mary, his mother, calling her “woman”, because those who receive the life of God through faith form a new family, give birth to new children, begotten to a new life and gathered into a new family through faith:

“When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son’, and to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother’.” (John 19:26-27).

And then, before exhaling his last breath, Jesus said, “It is accomplished,” thus concluding the work of creation. There where God saw that it was very good and then rested from all that he had done. It is there that we too enter the kingdom of God, in God’s rest, on the seventh day, when through his love, through the life he has given us, we are one with him and with each other, like the members of a single body, realizing his work of peace, light and beauty.

According to the words of God addressed to the Jewish people by Moses, God invites the believers to enter into his peace. This is an invitation to live on earth a day in which human beings refrain from doing evil deeds, reconcile and celebrate in groups, in community, in gratitude, what God has created to be in peace, to love one another, to be in eternal joy. It is about anticipating on earth the full realization of God’s work, where evil will be definitively defeated. These are the words of God reported by Moses:

«Remember to keep holy the sabbath day. Six days you may labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord, your God. No work may be done then either by you, or your son or daughter, or your male or female slave, or your beast, or by the foreigner who lives with you. In six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them; but on the seventh day he rested. That is why the Lord has blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.» (Exodus 20: 8-11).

Work as a servant, if you are a slave to evil deeds, or as an apostle’s mission, if you work for the Kingdom of God to bring God’s light to earth. In Jesus’ vocabulary, slave labor is evil work, being slaves of evil: «Jesus said to them, ‘I ask you, is it lawful on the Sabbath day to do good or to do evil? to save life or to destroy it?’» (Luke 6:9)

Once a week, believers are invited to experience a moment of grace, as if they were already in heaven. But that’s not all, not only are they invited to savor this heavenly peace once a week, but there was also a prescription in the Old Testament that invited them to stop working for a whole year, every seven years, and to feed themselves with the fruits of the earth. And, even more, after having counted 7 times 7 years, during the fiftieth year, every human being regains his freedom, he is no longer obliged to work and even regains ownership of his land. This fiftieth year is called a jubilee year:

«The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai and said: ‘Speak to the children of Israel. You shall say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you, the land shall observe a sabbatical rest for the Lord. For six years you shall sow your field, for six years you may prune your vineyard and gather its produce. But the seventh year will be a sabbath, a solemn sabbath for the land, a sabbath for the Lord: you shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard or reap what has grown by itself from the last harvest, nor gather the grapes of your unpruned vine; it will be a sabbath year for the land. What the land grows during the sabbatical rest will serve as food for you, your manservant, your maidservant, the hired worker, and the visitor who stays with you. All its produce will serve as food for your livestock and the animals in the country. You shall count seven weeks of years, that is, seven times seven years, which equals forty-nine years. On the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, on the day of Atonement, you shall sound the horn; on that day you shall sound the horn throughout your land. You shall make the fiftieth year holy and proclaim a deliverance for all the inhabitants of the land. This shall be a jubilee for you: each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his family. This fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you: you shall not sow, nor reap the aftergrowth, nor gather the unpruned vines. And you shall make the jubilee a holy year for you shall eat only what the field produces. In this jubilee year, each of you shall return in possession of his property again.» (Leviticus 25:1-13).

The human being was created to taste this peace, this harmony, but it is true that on this earth this is difficult to achieve, yet this is what Jesus came to accomplish: to tear them away from darkness, division, hatred and violence. The true freedom of which he will speak to us will be that of being freed from evil, from the chain reaction of violences, through forgiveness. It is at this moment that the blind will see, that human beings in darkness will find the light of peace, if they are ready to be reconciled. They will regain their hearing if they understand the happiness to which the words of God lead them. They will stand up and walk before God and men when they will work for justice. So, Jesus really came to accomplish this year of benefits, this jubilee year. He came to free human beings from what held them captive. He will realize for them what the prophets had announced, but which human beings have not been able to accomplish, and will lead them towards this jubilee year that no one has been able to realize on earth. These are his words, pronounced in the synagogue of Nazareth:

«When Jesus, in the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, his fame spread throughout the region. He taught in the synagogues and everyone praised him. He came to Nazareth, where he had grown up. As was his custom, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to do the reading. The book of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He opened the book and found the passage where it is written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the Good News to the poor, to proclaim to the captives their deliverance, to the blind that they will regain their sight, to set at liberty the oppressed, to proclaim a favorable year granted by the Lord.” Jesus closed the book, returned it to the servant and sat down. Everyone in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture you have just heard has been fulfilled.» (Luke 4:14-21)

Here is Jesus announcing the jubilee year, the favorable year granted by the Lord. The Kingdom of Heaven has come down to us, so that it may reign in our hearts, so that peace among the children of God may reign in the heart of each one of us. So this day dedicated to the anticipation of this life of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, this day of communion and peace that was celebrated on the Sabbath, that is, the seventh day of the week, on Saturday, finds a new realization with the coming of Christ. In fact, entering the Kingdom of Heaven means passing to a new life, it means dying to evil and sharing Christ’s victory over evil and death that can reign in our hearts even while we are alive. This passage from death to life, celebrated in baptism, unites the believer to the death of Christ, which took place on Good Friday, and makes him pass, through the rest in the tomb on Saturday, to Resurrection Sunday. But this new life of resurrection already means our entry into eternal life from this earth, we enter into the eternal filial relationship with God, the Father of all life. Thus, Sunday, the day of the resurrection, was called by the ancient Christians the eighth day, a day outside of our earthly time, that allows us to enter into God’s eternity, in eternal peace next to him.

So, when Jesus, during his pilgrimages, met families in mourning, who showed him their deceased, he will say that the deceased is resting. This is what happens in the dialogue with Lazarus’ sister: Jesus says that Lazarus is resting and she protests that he has been dead for four days and is already starting to smell. But Jesus speaks of a rest with God, of a life that does not know death, but is transformed to move towards the contemplation of God. Jesus explicitly says in the Gospel:

“Very truly I tell you, whoever keeps my word will never see death” (John 8:51).

On the other hand, healthy people may very well be spiritually dead, cut off from the loving relationship with their neighbor, cut off from the source of eternal life, joy and love that is in God.

«Jesus said to Martha, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live; whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?’» (John 11:25-26)

Jesus introduces us to the life of the Kingdom, he makes us reborn to a filial and trusting relationship with God, the source of eternal life. This is the meaning of baptism. But then, those who are born to a new life through faith, will also have to grow and nourish themselves, they will need food that roots them in their faith, that is, that helps them put into practice what they believe in. Entering eternal life means entering a spiritual reality in which we are all brothers and sisters to one another.

Undertaking such a path, which proposes friendship and forgiveness where there is offense, division and rivalry, is not an easy path; how many times will it be beyond our strength? It is for this purpose that Jesus offers nourishment that will strengthen our bonds of love and friendship. This food realizes a union between human beings and God, that is, with Jesus who became one of us so that we could be united with him. So, during the Last Supper, he will take some bread, made up of a multitude of seeds, and giving it to his disciples, he will say: “This is my body”. This implies that by eating it as a real food, just as we incorporate this food that will be assimilated by the cells of our body, in the same way we can assimilate the divine life within us and the love of God can unite us as the grains of wheat are united to form a single loaf of bread. This sacred meal makes human beings partake of the divinity that is love; human beings filled with the love of God can do nothing else but form a single body animated by divine life and love. By taking this food, by uniting ourselves to Christ, we become members of his body, we become members of each other, each at the service of the other.

And Jesus will also take the cup full of wine, also made up of a multitude of grapes, to signify that, as a drop of water poured into wine is transformed into wine, so our humanity participates in the divine life that spreads within us like the blood that circulates in our veins, bringing life. The cup of wine, the color of blood, is also the image of Christ accepting his passion, accepting to shed his blood out of love for us and for those who accept the gift of his life, he offers to be children of God.

All this will be celebrated by Christians on Sunday. This day will be the Shabbat of Christians, that is, the day they stop working in order to meet each other.

Jesus also explains at length to the Jews of his time what the Sabbath originally meant. It means abstaining from all slave labor, it means that our slavery, what holds us captive is the chain reaction of violences, it is evil. Jesus, the Christ, comes to free human beings from this slavery, therefore, on the day that celebrates the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, what we must abstain from is doing evil, in order to live in greater communion with our neighbor, to become one, all participating in the same meal, feeding on the same food that strengthens our bonds of brotherly love, that food that makes us members of the same body.

In fact, the Eucharistic meal, that is, the thanksgiving, was inaugurated by Jesus on the evening when the Jewish people commemorated the Jewish Passover. This ancient ritual celebrates the day when the people were freed from slavery in the land of Egypt and allowed themselves to be led by God to the promised land. The material, physical slavery of this people under Pharaoh’s yoke became an image of the spiritual reality of the human being enslaved to evil deeds, to evil, and their liberation became the image of the passage to a new life in which God’s forgiveness, that is, the renewed gift of his life, seals a new covenant with us, introducing us into a filial relationship with him. (See the article The Eucharistic Meal).

Thus, just as on the seventh day of creation, God completes his work of leading human beings from darkness to light, to full communion and union with him. Likewise, Christ introduces us to the meal of covenant and gratitude, in which the union of creatures with God is experienced and, through him, the union of creatures with each other through the life they receive from God.

This meal that brings human beings together and unites them with God in gratitude is celebrated on the day of the Sabbath, the day of rest. The day when the believer surrenders and entrusts his soul to God to rest in him. This is also God’s rest, about which Jesus says that God can thus dwell in us.

It’s up to us to open the door and let him in, then he will serve us and we will be in him and he in us. It is the peace and tranquility of the thanksgiving meal for all that God does for us that allows us to live in a filial and trusting relationship.

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