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Maria Valtorta's work

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GRM 52.7

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

52.7 Jesus explains the meaning of the sentence to me.

«That “still”, which is omitted by many translators, is the keyword of the sentence and explains its true meaning.

I was the Son, submissive to My Mother, up to the moment when the will of My Father told Me that the hour had come when I was to be the Master. From the moment My mission started, I was no longer the Son submissive to My Mother, but I was the Servant of God. My moral ties with My Mother were broken. They had turned into higher bonds, all of a spiritual nature. I always called Mary, My Holy “Mother”. Our love suffered no interruptions, neither did it even cool down, on the contrary, it was never so perfect as when I was separated from Her as by a second birth and She gave Me to the world and for the world, as the Messiah and Evangeliser. Her third sublime mystical maternity took place when She bore Me to the cross in the torture of Golgotha, and made Me the Redeemer of the world.

“What is there still between Me and You?” Before I was Yours, only Yours. You gave Me orders, and I obeyed You. I was “subject” to You. Now I belong to My mission.

Did I not say: “He, who lays his hand on the plough and looks back to bid farewell to those who are staying, is not fit for the Kingdom of God”? I had laid My hand on the plough not to cut the ground with the plough, but to open the hearts of men and sow there the word of God. I was to take My hand away from the plough only when they would tear it away to nail it to the Cross and to open with My torturing nail My Father’s heart, out of which forgiveness for mankind was to flow.

That “still”, forgotten by most, meant this: “You were everything for Me, Mother, as long as I was only Jesus of Mary of Nazareth, and You are everything in My spirit; but since I became the expected Messiah, I belong to My Father. Wait for a little while and once My mission is over, I will be, once again, entirely Yours; You will hold Me once again in Your arms, as when I was a little child, and no one will ever again contend with You for Your Son, considered as the disgrace of mankind, that will throw His mortal remains at You, to bring on You the shame of being the mother of a criminal. And afterwards You will have Me once again, triumphant, and finally You will have Me forever when You are triumphant in Heaven. But now I belong to all these men. And I belong to the Father, Who sent Me to them”.

That is the sense of that short but so full of meaning “still”.»

Detail

Objection raised: The "henceforth" is not found in the Gospel.

Second edition notes on the passage *This henceforth that many translators pass over in silence: in translating the words that can be read in Jn 2:4.

GRM 52.9

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

52.9 Jesus teaches me as follows:

«When I said to the disciples: “Let us go and make My Mother happy”, I had given the sentence a deeper meaning than it seemed. I did not mean the happiness of seeing Me, but the joy of being the initiator of My miraculous activity and the first benefactress of mankind.

Always remember that. My first miracle occurred because of Mary. The very first one. It is a symbol that Mary is the key to miracles. I never refuse My Mother anything and because of Her prayer I bring forward also the time of grace. I know My Mother, the second in goodness after God. I know that to grant you a grace is to make Her happy, because She is All Love. That is why I said, knowing Her: “Let us go and make Her happy”.

Besides, I wanted to make Her power known to the world, together with Mine. Since She was destined to be joined to Me in the flesh, it was fair She should be joined to Me in the power that is shown to the world. Because we were one flesh: I in Her, She around Me, like the petals of a lily round its scented lively pistil; and She was united to Me in sorrow: because we were both on the cross, I with My body, She with Her soul, as a lily is scented because of its corolla and because of the essence extracted from it.

I say to you what I said to the guests: “Thank Mary. It is through Her that you had with you the Master of the miracle and you have My graces, particularly those of forgiveness”.

Rest in peace. We are with you.

GRM 53

The Gospel as revealed to me

Detail

Jesus, James, John, Andrew, Peter, Philip and Bartholomew go to the Temple. But it's a real fair, where the Temple merchants are usurers of the poorest. An old couple is bullied by a shopkeeper, and Jesus tells them that their behavior is not right: the shopkeeper must give them a better lamb. The man doesn't listen, and Jesus, faced with all the commotion in the Temple, becomes terrible. He builds a whip and overturns the tables and the money on them. The priests arrive and ask him who he is and why he is doing this. Jesus replies that he is the One who can, and that if the true Temple is destroyed, he will raise it up. He promises that they will know him and where he comes from. The Master then gives a speech in the Temple, recalling words from Deuteronomy. He reminds us that we must be fair to the poor, and that priests must have purity and charity as their wealth, not purely material wealth. God the Father is their inheritance. Finally, he invites everyone to follow him, for the hour of grace has come.

GRM 54

The Gospel as revealed to me

Detail

Jesus is at the olive grove in Gethsemane. The master of the house - Jonah - tells Christ that three men are waiting for him, including one who is presumably sick and a leper. Jesus goes to the latter first: it's Simon the Zealot, asking for healing. The Savior grants his wish, and the future apostle is completely healed. Then he turns his attention to the two newcomers: Judas of Keroth and Thomas. The former ardently wants to follow the Savior, to share in his glory "according to Heaven". But Jesus asks him to think it over and refuses to take him on straight away. He thinks he's being impulsive, but doesn't believe in his constancy. Jesus asks him to discern and tells him that he will be in the Temple for Pentecost. Thomas, for his part, wants to follow him too, but is frightened by the words spoken to Judas. Jesus reassures him, saying that presumption is ruin, but that fear coupled with humility can be a help. After the disciple has left, Jesus explains to John and the others why he has made a difference between the two disciples. Thomas is in this sense more perfect, because he wants to follow him out of love, not because of a desire for human glory. All the disciples present then affirm that they love Jesus, and when they ask if they are perfect, Jesus explains that God alone is perfect, but that they will become so if they persist in their will to love.

After speaking of his nature as the Word of God, and his perfection as the God-Man, Jesus describes himself as the Son of Man. He then answers Peter's question about Jude's absence, and answers Andrew's question about why he performed a miracle in Cana and not in his homeland. The Lord also speaks of his Mother.

Finally, Christ welcomes Dydymus, who has retraced his steps, and thus welcomes Thomas among his disciples.

GRM 54.5

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

«Oh! My friends! And who is perfect but God?»

«You are!»

«I solemnly tell you that I am not perfect by Myself, if you think I am prophet. No man is perfect. But I am perfect because He Who is speaking to you is the Word of the Father: part of God. His thought that becomes Word. I have Perfection in Myself. And you must believe Me to be such if you believe that I am the Word of the Father. And yet, see, My friends, I want to be called the Son of man because I lower Myself taking upon Myself all the miseries of man, to bear them as My first scaffold, and cancel them, after bearing them, without suffering from them Myself. What a burden, My friends! But I bear it with joy. It is a joy for Me to bear it, because, since I am the Son of mankind, I will make mankind once again the child of God. As it was on the first day.»

Detail

Being a part of God, his Thought made Word, I have perfection in me. In a note to the second edition, it is written: "part is not to be understood as "portion" but as "belonging". Unlike man, who belongs to God not by nature, but by likeness (note 167.9), Jesus belongs to God by nature: in other words, he is God like the Father (he will say in 487.4: "I am his, both part and all with him"). This is why his perfection does not lie in the fact that he is a prophet (as he said above), but that he is God-Man. The human part of the God-Man was exhaustively completed by his victory over temptation (as he himself will say in 80.10 and as is clear from the end of the note to 174.9). Jesus' discourses in chapters 487 and 506 on the two natures, divine and human, are fundamental.

Son of man is the most frequent title given to Jesus and by Jesus to himself. Its general meaning is given in 343.4; but its messianic meaning is found here as well as, for example, in 126.3 and 603.1.

GRM 54.9

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

54.9 It is 4 p.m. and the shadows of torpor are already falling upon me: a torpidity I perceive will be violent, a logical consequence of yesterday’s painful hour…

But I was very ill also on October the 24th. So much so, that when the vision was over — I wrote it suffering from a headache almost as bad as meningitis — I did not have enough strength to add that at last I saw Jesus dressed as He appears to me when the vision is entirely for me: wearing a soft tunic of white wool just verging to ivory and a mantle of the same shade. The garments He was wearing the first time He revealed Himself as Messiah in Jerusalem.

Detail

October 26, 1944.

The suit he was wearing refers to EMV 53.3.

GRM 55

The Gospel as revealed to me

Detail

Andrew, Peter, James and John, Bartholomew, Philip, and Thomas are at the house of Jonah, the guardian of Gethsemane. Thomas tells how he came back to the scene. Jesus questions him, and offers him to stay. The apostle is happy, and Jesus takes the opportunity to teach the apostolic group a lesson about hospitality. Peter grumbles and makes a few remarks, saying that those we welcome are not always well-intentioned, and the Lord replies. Then he asks Thomas to go and find Simon the Zealot in the tombs, and to accompany him until he is purified. They meet again later. As for Judas, he encourages him not to go and see him, or even to seek his presence.

Peter grumbles again, and Christ asks him why. Simon of Jonah then points out that he gives missions to those who have just arrived, but not to the first disciples who followed him. The Master smiles at his words, and points out that, if he doesn't give such missions, it's because he knows them and is sure of them. The one who must be put to the test is the one who is not yet sure, the Savior asserts, and yet Christ esteemed them so much that he took his first apostles "without demanding proofs and without feeling the need to give you any". Peter is reassured and asks for forgiveness. Jesus, for his part, asks him not to argue about the places and merits of each. The Redeemer reminds them that He Himself is man's servant, and so He reminds them to remain humble.

Finally, Jesus gives Thomas the portrait of Simon the Zealot. All that remains is to find him...

GRM 55.6

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

55.6 I point out incidentally that my internal adviser said to me, since yesterday evening when I saw the leper: «It is Simon, the apostle. You will see him and Thaddeus coming to the Master.» This morning, after Holy Communion (today is Friday) I opened my missal and I saw that this is the eve of the feast of Saints Simon and Judas, and tomorrow’s Gospel deals with charity, almost repeating the very words I heard before the vision. However, I have not seen Judas Thaddeus so far.

GRM 56

The Gospel as revealed to me

Detail

Near the ford of the Jordan, Maria sees Thomas, Jude of Alphaea and Simon the Zealot. They've been waiting for Jesus at this spot for three days, and Jude assures them that if his cousin has promised to meet them here, he will. Jude talks about his connection with Jesus, explaining that he is his cousin, that he was Joseph's favorite, and that he grew up very much at the side of the Virgin Mary. The man from Nazareth also tells of the divisions in his family, but now he wants to follow Christ. He just regrets that fathers can be their child's enemy. Simon the Zealot sighs at this remark, but Thomas reveals that his father encouraged him to follow the Messiah.

Jesus finally arrives. Jude then reveals his intention to follow his Master, and Christ welcomes him: he also confirms to him that it is indeed permissible to follow the Lord, for "there is nothing above God."

After complimenting Thomas on his obedience and faithfulness, Jesus turns his attention to Simon the Zealot. He asks him to follow him, and the two discuss his kinship, his father and his illness. The Master then unites Simon the Zealot and Jude, one childless because of his infirmity, the other having lost his father in following the Lord. For the time being, however, he gave each of them a mission. Thomas is to evangelize in Judea. Jude is to evangelize Nazareth. Peter, James, John, Andrew, Philip and Bartholomew return to their boats in Capernaum and Bethsaida.

GRM 56.6

The Gospel as revealed to me

Quotation

Let me tell You one thing. I am, I was called “Zealot” because of the caste, and “Cananean”, because of my mother. See. I am of a dark complexion. In my veins there is the blood of a slave woman. My father had no children from his wife, and he had me from a slave. His wife was a good woman and she brought me up as her own son, she took care of me in my endless illnesses until she died…

Detail

A note in the second edition states: The caste of Zealots bore this name because of the zeal they put into observing the Law and opposing any foreign domination over the chosen people. But the meaning of this word escapes Maria Valtorta, who notes at the bottom of the page: "Who are the Zealots? She is similarly unaware of the meaning of the words sciemanflorasc (in 503.9/10) and gulal* (or golal: garbage) (in 542.7).