Journey to Jerusalem part 2

Here are some references to Jerusalem from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy.

 

Miscellaneous Writings (Mis.) 133: 21

Three times a day, I retire to seek the divine blessing on the sick and sorrowing, with my face toward the Jerusalem of Love and Truth, in silent prayer to the Father which “seeth in secret,” and childlike confidence that He will reward “openly.”  In the midst of depressing care and labor I turn constantly to divine Love for guidance, and find rest.

 

Retrospection and Introspection (Ret.) 89:5-11

In those days preaching and teaching were substantially one.  There was no church preaching, in the modern sense of the term. Men assembled in the one temple (at Jerusalem) for sacrificial ceremonies, not for sermons.  Into the synagogues, scattered about in cities and villages, they went for liturgical worship, and instruction in the Mosaic law.

 

Pulpit and Press (Pul.) 7:7-12

Yet when I recall the past, -- how the gospel of healing was simultaneously praised and persecuted in Boston, -- and remember also that God is just, I wonder whether, were our dear Master in our New England metropolis at this hour, he would not weep over it, as he wept over Jerusalem! 

 

The First Church of Christ Scientist and Miscellany (My.) 13:4

A book by Benjamin Wills Newton, called “Thoughts on the Apocalypse,” published in London, England, in 1853, was presented to me in 1903 by Mr. Marcus Holmes.  This was the first that I had even heard of it.  When scanning its interesting pages, my attention was arrested by the following: “The church at Jerusalem, like a sun in the centre of its system, had other churches, like so many planets, revolving around it.  It was strictly a mother and a ruling church.”  According to his description, the church of Jerusalem seems to prefigure The Mother Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston.

 

My. 46:28

Clerk, William B. Johnson, quotes from Heb, 12:22, “unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn.”  He pledges for the members “…a more implicit obedience to the sacred teachings of the Bible and our textbook, as well as to the all-inclusive instructions and admonitions of our Church Manual…that we may...reach...“the heavenly Jerusalem”

 

Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (S&H) 42:9-18:  The “man of sorrows” was in no peril from salary or popularity.  Though entitled to the homage of the world and endorsed pre-eminently by the approval of God, his brief triumphal entry into Jerusalem was followed by the desertion of all save a few friends, who sadly followed him to the foot of the cross.

 

The resurrection of the great demonstrator of God’s power was the proof of his final triumph over body and matter, and gave full evidence of divine Science, -- evidence so important to mortals.

 

Definitions from the Glossary of S&H –

S&H 589:12

Jerusalem. Mortal belief and knowledge obtained from the five corporeal senses; the pride of power and the power of pride; sensuality; envy; oppression; tyranny.  Home, heaven. 

 

S&H 587:25

Heaven. Harmony; the reign of Spirit; government by divine Principle; spirituality; bliss; the atmosphere of Soul.

 

S&H 592:18

New Jerusalem.  Divine Science; the spiritual facts and harmony of the universe; the kingdom of heaven, or reign of harmony.

 

S&H 599: 6

Zion: Spiritual foundation and superstructure; inspiration; spiritual strength.  Emptiness, unfaithfulness; desolation.

 

Interesting that S&H has only one reference “holy city” (uncapitalised) – 576:8

 

S&H 574:3

The Revelator also takes in another view, adapted to console the weary pilgrim, journeying “uphill all the way.” 

 

See S&H 26:3 “exploring the way”, 202:4 “wrought out”, 21:13 “gain a little each day”. 

 

There is no explanation of “uphill all the way” in the Concordance to Prose Works.  It seems that it may be a quote from Shakespeare which Christina Rossetti, the English poet quotes in her poem Uphill: “Does the road wind uphill all the way?  Yes, to the very end”.   Rossetti lived from 1830 till 1894, and her poem is quoted in many Internet references, so she has made it famous.  So it is possible that Mary Baker Eddy could have been quoting from this poem.

 

Of course, this leads the student of Christian Science to Mrs. Eddy’s An Allegory in her Prose Works (p. 323 Miscellaneous Writings).  Now I have to read that allegory and all that is in Science and Health about the “city set on a hill”, the celestial city....

 

Absolute Christian Science is heaven, Jerusalem, the kingdom of God which is within man.

 

Conclusion:  It seems Jesus had to work his way up to Jerusalem, as did Mary Baker Eddy, and as we all do.

 

Final post on Jerusalem tomorrow...

 

Joyce Voysey