When, on the eve of Great Lent, we hear the singing of "On the rivers of Babylon, there with gray hair and weeping, when Zion shall be remembered unto us," then we are confronted with all the tragedy of this distinction between Babylon and Jerusalem, the land of captivity and the Holy Land of Promise. The Babylonian captivity symbolizes spiritual slavery to the prince of this world, the Holy Promised Land is the Kingdom of Christ. But in the psalmist's marvelous inspiration, these two kingdoms are interspersed to such an extent that the tension rises, and as you listen, you do not know to which kingdom you yourself belong. On the one hand, it would seem that there is a holy love for the Heavenly Motherland: "How can we sing the song of the Lord in a foreign land? If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, forget me my right hand," but on the other hand, a surging feeling of vengeance for the evil done among the people, with the words: "Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom (the Babylonians) the day of Jerusalem, when they said, 'Destroy, destroy it to its foundations.'" Daughter of Babylon, destroyer! Blessed is he who will repay you for what you have done to us! Blessed is he who shall take and dash thy infants against a stone!" What a terrible call to Herod's infanticide, fitting for the prince of this world, Belial, and Babylon! What a terrible mixture of one and the other in one and the same chant! What a victory of the prince of this world in essence!

This was the case in the Old Testament, in times that had not yet been redeemed.

But the same hymn in the context of Orthodox worship proclaims a different, opposite spirit. "Babylon" is a symbol of evil. The "Babylonian captivity" is a symbol of enslavement to sin. "Babylonian babies" is a symbol of the first "embryos", the thoughts of sinful passion arising in the soul, which is symbolized by the "daughter of Babylon". This is how this psalm was read and interpreted by the New Testament saints who had reached the height of the Kingdom of Heaven with their purified hearts.

Here it is, the essential difference between the two kingdoms!

"Daughter of Babylon" is a symbol of passion, historical revenge of the historical daughter, but now, in the Christian era, she receives full, complete forgiveness and, symbolizing revenge on herself, is miraculously saved. In this way, and only in this way, in Orthodox worship, the Christian ascetics turned the weapon of the devil against himself!

So it is on earth. And in the sky? As the Apostle Paul says: "But we preach wisdom among the perfect, but the wisdom not of this world, nor of the powers of this world that pass away, but we preach the wisdom of God, which is secret, hidden, which God ordained before the ages for our glory... as it is written: "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him" (see 1 Corinthians 2:6-9). The difference is that this world is "of this world," and the Kingdom of God is "before all ages" and "at the end of time," that is, outside of time and above time, and outside of space. Time, torn away from eternity and, as Berdyaev put it, "torn apart by sin in itself," turned out to be in this world (in relation to matter and energy) that which formed the basis for "temporary existence in this world" - in order to enable man and the world itself in the process of repentance and perfection, through gradual development, to return to the "lost Paradise".

What is this Paradise in itself: before the Fall, and after the universal restoration, and now - there in heaven?

It is interesting that one of the most remarkable descriptions of the "other world" is given not by a Christian, but by a pagan philosopher - Plotinus. It is true that Plotinus was already living in the Christian era, in the third century A.D., and it is difficult to imagine that he would never have been met with and influenced by the Christian philosophy that already existed in Alexandria at that time. Plotinus himself, as well as the movement of the "Neoplatonists" founded by him - this is known for sure - had a strong influence on Christian theological thought and, although Plotinus argued with Christianity, denying the Incarnation of God and the significance of Christ in history, his philosophy and, in particular, the perception of the Kingdom of God, "the other world", strongly influenced the judgments attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite, and through him - all subsequent Christian theology both in the East. and in the West. In this sense, it is not for nothing that Plotinus was nicknamed - along with the Bethlehem astrologers-sages - "the pre-Christian evangelist".

Here is how Plotinus depicts Paradise in his philosophy: "Everything there is beauty. This is not external or carnal beauty, it is intelligible beauty, uniting everything and everything with its source, God. There is no separation, as on Earth, there is unity in love, and the All expresses the particular, and the particular expresses the Whole."

This is a brief formulation of Plotinus' contemplation of Paradise.

Many centuries after him, our almost contemporary - Dostoevsky - said that beauty will save the world. Beauty, which expresses harmony, and the correspondence of the particular and the Whole, and the balance between them, and in the relationships of people with each other - love and joy. Divine Beauty is called upon to save the world, disfigured by sin and the devil.

Beauty in the fall of the world did not leave it forever. It is still in the sky, both blue and starry, it is still in the forests, fields, mountain peaks, in the faces of the saints, in their radiant penetrating glances, reflected by human art on the faces of icons.

And the center of everything is the Beauty of Christ!

Biblical Paradise