Transcendant versus Ascendant or... How Up is Down and All Around.You have probably seen many paintings of the Ascension...the final post-resurrection leaving of earth by Jesus recorded by Luke in the first chapter of Acts ...from a spot somewhere near Bethany. What do you recall about those paintings?
In almost every depiction by classical Western artists, we see a transfigured Jesus ethereally rising into the sky, into a cloud, rising above his earth bound disciples.
In the famous painting by Salvador Dali, The Ascension of Christ, the artist in 1958 composed his work after having a transformative dream experience. He changes the perspective of the Ascension from vertical to horizontal and the Christ image is being drawn not only into another reality but also into the background image of the nucleus of an atom. The message of this depiction is that the beginning and the end are part of the same continuum....Christ's revelation to John is also in this same vein..."I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end".
The word used in the original Greek for both heaven and sky is Oeuranus (also where the name of the planet comes from)...the problem is that this word can both be talking about geography, namely the sky or it can talking about a place, heaven.
The depictions and even the name for this event, Ascension, come from a time where geography and the known universe was thought to be a three tiered phenonmenon- namely, the underworld or Hades or Hell, the Earth or firmament, and Sky, or Heaven, or Ciel (where we get our word "celestial" from).
The theological problem, though, is that the "Ascension" was not really about an up and down, elevator like, rising from earth to heaven. The Ascension was actually a Transcension, namely the importance of how we go from one state as typical earthly-minded creatures to another state of mind and being in following the way of Christ.
Thinking about it this way helps me to resolve those problems that I had with the "Ascension" when I was a kid asking impertinent questions in Sunday School. Like "Well, if Jesus rose up into space, which way did he go then to get to heaven?" "Is heaven near another solar system?"
The more troubling question as I began to try to better understand the account in Acts and its meaning was "why did Jesus leave us at all?" Wouldn't the world have been a much better place and certainly our churches would not have strayed off so many paths, if He had just stayed on the earth?
However, coming to understand the meaning of the Gospel account as one of Jesus transcending his earthly state and removing himself to another state of being, leads me to the realization that the problem with my concrete, childlike views are the problems of a linear, Euclidean geometry, fundamentalist view of the world.
"Heaven is just a place on earth" sings Belinda Carlisle in her hit song from some years ago.
In the movie, Field of Dreams, the question is asked of Kevin Costner about the baseball field...
"Is this heaven?"...Throughout the film, he always answers, "No, this is Iowa." But at the end of the last interaction, with his father on the field playing catch, when he is once again asked that question, he takes in the wonderful view of his wife and daughter playing on the porch of their peaceful home and, in a transcendant moment, he realizes..."Maybe this is heaven."
In another earlier scene, Kevin Costner is upset that he does not get to go into the cornfield, beyond the field and views this as a denial of his entry into heaven. It is the later events, including his reunion with his father, that lead to his Ah-hah, transcendant realization that heaven exists all around us.
Heaven is not a place beyond the sky...our world exists not apart from the universe but enveloped by and in the universe. Our world is part of the universe continuum and the universe is not separate from our world at any measurable physical point. Similarly, the transcendant state, the mystical state of holiness, enables us to know this reality of heaven now and forever.
The true message of the Ascension is thus not one of miraculous levitation. The true message is that Christ never truly left us at all and never will. Our challenge is to believe. To strive to see this reality lying just outside of what we think we know while living in this very concrete and Euclidean world.
And, when that momentary realization comes that Heaven is surrounding you, your soul can guide you to a different place and a different life each day on this world, on this earth, as truly part of the Kingdom of Heaven.
How do you do live like that?....It is best summarized in the Jar of Clay song...."We are one in the spirit, we are one in the Lord, we are one in the spirit, we are one in the Lord....They will know we are Christians by our love, by our love, they will know we are Christians by our love."
Bruce Springsteen said it just as well in his song. "The Rising"...."Come on up for the rising, Come on up, put your hands in mine, Come on up for the Rising" When we transcend our own ego, when we transcend our selfish desires, our own materialism and we love our neighbor as our self, then we are truly "resurrected" to a new life different than the one we were living and we can "rise" up out of the darkness, like Lazarus did long ago. When we "rise" above the strife and turmoil, we are not levitating into the physical air, we are, in fact, experiencing our own Ascension.
Peace and love,
Tony
