In the Acts of the Apostle’s account of Pentecost Sunday as a
prelude to the Apostles’ bursting out on the scene we are given a list of
the peoples gathered in Jerusalem. There were Parthians, Medes, Elamites and
twelve other groups of strangers crowding the streets. Their reason for
congregating came from Pentecost’s having been an important double
pre-Christian anniversary.
First, for farming people in the Middle East, Pentecost was
their Thanksgiving. From 5000 B.C. they had been planting their wheat at the
last full moon of Autumn, and making unleavened cakes with the first grains on
the night of the first full moon of spring. Then, their experience had been
that they needed to work from sunup to sundown for fifty day to gather in the
harvest before the coming of heavy rains. On the fiftieth day, on Pentecost,
they ate their full, and they had their weddings. The Cretans and Arabs who
heard the Apostles that day might have been celebrating their harvest.
For the Jews Pentecost was the anniversary of their becoming the
Chosen People. 1250 years before their ancestors in Egypt had eaten their first
Passover meal fifty days before. Then, the had walked speedily down to the base
of the Sinai peninsula, and on that fiftieth day after their first Passover they
had become the Chosen People by entering into their covenant with God.
When the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles exactly fifty
days after the Last Supper they burst out into the street, speaking with such
convincing eloquence, that they astounded the people with their revelation of
what the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit had accomplished in their midst
down through history. They declared that they were indeed privileged to be told
of God’s wonderful works. I have always like the sound of that phrase in Latin
where the wonderful works of God becomes the Magnalia Dei.
POSTED BY FR. SULLIVAN AT 5/18/2013 02:23:00 PM
No comments:
Post a Comment