On Monday of the Second Week of Easter our Church invites us to first read and reflect on a passage from the beginning of the book of Revelation (i:1-20) entitled "John's vision of the Son of Man". Our treasure, which follows, is from an ancient Easter homily by Pseudo-Chrysostom.
Saint John Chrysostom was an important, fourth century, Early Church Father who served as Archbishop of Constantinople. He is known for his preaching and public speaking, and for his denunciation of abuse of authority of both ecclesiastical and political leaders. He was among the most prolific authors in the early Christian church. The word 'Chrysostom' means 'golden-mounted'. This name was given to him after he died because all his sermons were eloquent and lovely to hear
Pseudo-Chrysostom refers to a collection of writings falsely attributed to Saint John Chrysostom (347-407 CE). These works are not actually written by John Chrysostom himself, but were attributed to him either by mistake or intentionally. The term "Pseudo-Chrysostom" is used to designate the authors of these spurious works.
The Apocalypse, or Revelation to John, the last book of the Bible, is one of the most difficult to understand because it abounds in unfamiliar and extravagant symbolism, which at best appears unusual to the modern reader. Symbolic language, however, is one of the chief characteristics of apocalyptic literature, of which this book is an outstanding example. Such literature enjoyed wide popularity in both Jewish and Christian circles from ca. 200 B.C. to A.D. 200.
This book contains an account of visions in symbolic and allegorical language borrowed extensively from the Old Testament, especially Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Daniel. Whether or not these visions were real experiences of the author or simply literary conventions employed by him is an open question.
