are
really gazing upon the Mystery itself.

In the words, "Lazarus, come forth," we can recognise the call with
which the Egyptian priestly initiators summoned back to every-day life
those who, temporarily removed from the world by the processes of
initiation, had undergone them in order to die to earthly things and
to gain a conviction of the reality of the eternal. Jesus in this way
revealed the secret of the Mysteries. It is easy to understand that
the Jews could not let such an act go unpunished, any more than the
Greeks could have refrained from punishing AEschylus, if he had
betrayed the secrets of the Mysteries.

The main point for Jesus was to represent in the initiation of Lazarus
before all "the people which stood by," an event which in the old days
of priestly wisdom could only be enacted in the recesses of the
mystery-temples. The initiation of Lazarus was to prepare the way to
the understanding of the "Mystery of Golgotha." Previously only those
who "saw," that is to say, who were initiated, were able to know
something of what was achieved by initiation, but now a conviction of
the Mysteries of higher worlds could also be gained by those who "had
not seen, and yet had believed."

FOOTNOTES:

[5] This and other circumstances connected with the so-called raising
of Lazarus from the dead are to be understood in the light of the fact,
that Lazarus' death-sleep was at the same time symbolic and real--it
was in other words a symbolic reality, a reality symbolising other
realities, and but for the action of Christ, Lazarus would have
remained dead.

IX

THE APOCALYPSE OF ST. JOHN

At the end of the New Testament stands a remarkable document, the
Apocalypse, the secret Revelation of St. John. We have only to read
the opening words to feel the deep mystic character of this book. "The
Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his
servants how the necessary things are shortly going to happen; and
this is sent in signs by the angel of God unto his servant John." What
is here revealed is "sent in signs." Therefore we must not take the
literal meaning of the words as they stand, but seek for a deeper
meaning of which the words are only signs. But there are other things
also which point to a hidden meaning. St. John addresses himself to
the seven churches in Asia. Not actual, material churches are meant;
the number seven is the sacred number, chosen on account of its
symbolic m