Angela Costly, author of Creation and Christ: An Exploration of the Topic of Creation in the Epistle of the Hebrews, has written an illuminatory comment in a private group she permitted me to share.
Gilbert Joseph I have a theory that runs against Thomism on the Sacraments, but which supports the theology of the Immaculate Conception. It is similar to what you suggest.
So, St. Thomas taught that the sacrifices etc. functioned typologically and through faith in what was to come (if I have read him correctly). However, he was working in Gentile time. As you know, in Jewish time, time does not exist in a purely linear modality, but rather collapses.
This is what happens at Passover, for instance. As Catholics, we can recognise that this is ultimately possible because of the Cross, Resurrection and Ascension, by which the eternal and heavenly, by intersecting the earthly and temporal (Death and Resurrection), and then reuniting them (in the Ascension, and furthermore at Pentecost), reunites heaven and earth, allowing participation through time in the effects of that Cross.
This actually permits the Jewish sacraments to work ex opera operato (which St. Thomas denied), but it also explains why the graces of the Immaculate Conception were possible. I think St. Thomas was partway there, and certainly desire and disposition is a key part of sacramental reception on the subjective level, but what he didn’t grasp was how time had been permeated.
Whilst St. Thomas is revered in the Church, he is not the only theologian and was not infallible.
Angela Costly
This excerpt produces the secret key for how we can understand the unity of major Jewish holy days like Pesach and Yom Kippur and their connection with the Catholic Sacraments like the Eucharist. I’d written elsewhere of my understanding of Jewish time as spiracle—not linear or circular. When Christians understand that Catholic time is part of Jewish time, the spiracle object can be observed from new angles.
When we conceive of time as object we understand that time AND space are one and the same. Just as Costley shows us how to unify events in Salvation History, we can use the key to understand the unity of place. As analagous to “the old covenant within the new covenant” I’m suggesting the Old City is within the New Jerusalem. Both realities are operating simultaneously.
The New Covenant and New Jerusalem are infinitely larger than their historical objects. Yet the old authentically and materially exists within the new as a nucleus at the center of the eternal creation system.
I think this over layering of place and spiracle time object can also help us contextualize and apply the location of the major Biblical events. Many of the key events in Salvation History happen in exactly the same place.
Perhaps the actual Garden is a seed layers beneath The Holy City. In Jacob’s Dream of the ladder we get a vision of this unity of time with place.
And Jacob went out from Beer-sheba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted upon the place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took one of the stones of the place, and put it under his head, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the LORD stood beside him, and said: ‘I am the LORD, the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed. And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. And in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee whithersoever thou goest, and will bring thee back into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.’ And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said: ‘Surely the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not.’ And he was afraid, and said: ‘How full of awe is this place! this is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.’ And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put under his head, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. And he called the name of that place Beth-el, but the name of the city was Luz at the first.
— Genesis 28:10–19
The Word of God is striking when the secret key is applied. We can clearly recognize the fulfillment of prophecy. Corporal Israel was spread out as dust throughout the earth. There is the Marian reference, where we hear in the seed all nations of the earth will be blessed. The seed is simultaneously all the children of Israel and the Christ who incarnates within the people of Israel. Jacob and corporal Israel also become identified with “the woman” who crushes the head of the serpent (Gen 3:15). Luke 1:48 “…for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed”. Corporal Israel can be understood as not only the typological mother of the Church. Israel is the actual Blessed Mother of the Church. God concludes his message by saying He will bring Israel back into the land. This prophecy effortlessly reaches to our present day as the Jews are able to return from exile/galut and now have an actual country to return to.
Now we can turn to Jacob’s own commentary where we glean even more prophetic insights. Jacob, by exclaiming the Awe of the place, directly invokes The Holy City Jerusalem which literally means “Awe of Peace” (Yeru/Awe Shalom/Peace). Awe of the Peace of Christ. Awe of the love of God for His people and all mankind.
Jacob then recognizes the place is the House of God. Jacob is having his vision outside of historical time. The Garden was the first Temple. The Ark of the Covenant (also the singular and actual Blessed Mother) would reside in that place. The mission of the Messiah would be to expand the House of God to the entire earth. But for Israel in History, it was in one place. Paradoxically the primordial House of God in space still exists in Israel today even though it expands to encompass the world by way of The Gospel and the Church—a “New Israel and New Jerusalem”—newness that does not negate or replace the old. Israel the Seed.
The Garden of Eden (Heaven/Paradise) was the Gate of Heaven. Jacob recognized the portal. A Catholic will recognize the Gateway of Heaven (Porta Manes) as another overt revealing of the Blessed Mother.
On waking back into real time Jacob erects a pillar, working as God’s hands, to build the material House of God — Beth El.
