Within these three words—Priest, Prophet, King—the designed order for man, micro to macro, is contained. Immediately at the macro we think of the Trinity. We can identify the Father as King, the Spirit as Prophet and the Son as Priest. As all are One in the Trinity we are given a proof that these three “estates” are non-hierarchical, yet inextricably connected as one entity with distinct personality and function.
I will quickly shift to the social domain to attempt to explain how the tri-ordering must be (re)applied. In such a society, I myself am neither priest nor king (although I assume these roles in the micro domain of home as a husband and father). I believe the proper social role of laity is that of prophets, which I will invoke to transmit my pseudo-authoritorious thinking on this matter.
It is commonly understood that the three estates were collapsed to the greater degree by the French Revolution and to a lesser degree the American Revolution. I believe this is absolutely true, but has resulted in a disordered and imbalanced world ever since. The Catholic metaphor that helps us understand the Trinity, that the Father and Son are mirror images of each other and the Spirit is the love shared, was not perfectly applied in latter Christendom. This social flaw is what led to its rapid and dramatic demise. The flaw being that while Clergy and Monarchy were correctly established as images of Christ as Priest and King, the Peasantry was condescended to as merely workers. For the three estates to have endured, the peasantry would have to had been understood as the manifestation of the love between clergy and monarchy. Laity needed to be proclaimed as prophets and advocates as their primary role above and beyond their utilitarian role as workers.
Even today, the heavenly design of Kingship and Priesthood survive and occasionally thrive in their divorced exemplars The Catholic Church and the British Crown. Was the design for the office of prophets in Christ, the laity, ever sharply implemented? It seems to me in prior stages of salvation history it would not have worked.
If we categorize history since Christ as specific epochs it necessarily begins with clergy/Priest, as the apostles execute Jesus’ Great Commission to spread the Gospel to all the earth. Constantine inaugurated the long epoch of King. The third epoch of Prophet began with the Protestant Reformation continued as The Enlightenment and concluded with Marxism’s post modern derivatives.
Each epoch was marked by war and suffering as they transitioned, followed by a long peace. For example, the early Christians were persecuted and martyred. Christianized Rome had to fall to eventually birth the Holy Roman Empire. The monarchies of Christendom had to give way so the equality of all men under God could truly be understood bringing us to our present age.
This age of Prophet, on the wane, is distinct from the prior age of King which understood well the essential synergy of the three estates. As we have stated, the King epoch ended suddenly, not because synergy was ignored, but because the Divine Role of lay prophet was ignored. The Age of Prophet is failing in our day because synergy is ignored all together. More fundamentally, a prophet becomes pure chaos without his kingly and priestly equals. Most prophets are completely unaware of the design order Christ has established for the world, while Priests and the remaining Kings still (ostensibly) understand.
The most visceral manifestation of Prophet in our age (analogous to church/Priest and King/State) is art (or the arts to include entertainment along with “fine” and “high” art). The fundamental break of art from king and clergy can be expressed in the 19th century movement “Art for Art’s Sake” which has become applicable to the Prophet age as a whole. Prophecy for Prophecy’s sake encapsulates the whole of philosophy and art which has left us in even greater confusion than Post-Modernism. The age ends in nihilism before a resurrection will occur.
Our divorced and disordered society is the reason, by the way, that the art of our age is so bad. I don’t mean to say there is no artist making good art. It is the art that is elevated by current elites considered representative, relevant and important to the age that is bad. If the mercy of Jesus tallies, this art will still endure as a monument to the Prophet age even after its deficiencies are resolved in the next.
I believe the reason the art of the renaissance is so unambiguously beautiful, above all, is because the three estates were most aligned. It was certainly not a perfect societal balance, but closer than things ever were prior or post.
The Lay Prophets must freely awaken to their ecclesiastical and monarchical deficiency. When this occurs, society will become whole and properly ordered for the first time since The Garden. The prophets will be treated as equals under God by clergy and kings. And we will know we are in the new epoch because the art will be even more majestic than it was in the renaissance. It could be called the Christ Age.
