Doxa or “Glory,” Signs of
the Presence of the Cosmic Christ
or Image of God

The term “glory” or doxa is prominent in texts that celebrate the Cosmic Christ in the Scriptures.  Glory and its synonym “beauty” are cosmological categories.

Glory in the Hebrew Bible signifies divine power and holiness, often manifested as light—light is the first element created in the Genesis story.  Yahweh is the “king of glory” and Yahweh’s glory “fills the earth” (Ps. 24:8; Isa. 6:3).  Creation announces divine glory, for “the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament proclaims God’s handiwork” (Ps. 19:2).  Divine glory is revealed in God’s care for people– the manna in the desert as well as Nature’s majesty as found in thunderstorms for example.  Both manifest divine glory. 

In the New Testament God’s glory is manifested in “power, splendor, light” and holiness.  Christ will come in the glory of the Creator (Mark 8:38) and those who follow Christ will share in his suffering and his glory.  The Spirit will give glory to the preachers of God’s hidden wisdom. 

This glory matches that which Moses experienced on Mount Sinai. Paul says, “We all, with faces unveiled, reflecting one’s very image from glory to glory, as through the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor. 3:18).  Christ’s glory is shared with those who follow him and it also grows and develops, revealing the dynamic nature of the Cosmic Christ’s relationship to his disciples. 

The growth in glory is a growth in becoming the image of God, which Christ has already achieved in its fullest dimensions.  Thus the Cosmic Christ in us is a relative thing, a divine presence that can increase and develop.  Christ’s glory is that of the “only child of the Creator”–yet we have all received from that one’s fullness (John 1:14, 16).  The Cosmic Christ both bears divine glory and elicits it from others.

John’s Gospel lacks a transfiguration experience, which is a Cosmic Christ glory manifestation in the synoptic Gospels.  However, John stresses the divine doxa (“glory”) through Jesus’ marvelous signs (cf. 2:11), through the “glory” of the cross, and through Jesus’ passing on of glory to his disciples (17:22). 

Wisdom is a pure effusion of God’s glory (Wis. 7:25).  The preexistence of wisdom is named as “the glory that Jesus had with the Creator before the world existed” and stems “from the love that the Creator had for Jesus before the creation of the world” (17:24; 1:1). 

Adapted from Matthew Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, pp. 95-96. 
See also Matthew Fox and Mark Andrus, Stations of the Cosmic Christ, 83-87.
Banner image: “Untitled” Photo by Zac Durant on Unsplash

For Deeper Contemplation

Meditate on those times you have sensed the glory of God “filling the whole Earth.” 

With face unveiled, in touch with your deepest and truest self, can you taste yourself moving from “glory to glory”?  Be with that deep experience.  Apply it to others as well.

Recommended Reading

The Coming of the Cosmic Christ: The Healing of Mother Earth and the Birth of a Global Renaissance

In what may be considered the most comprehensive outline of the Christian paradigm shift of our Age, Matthew Fox eloquently foreshadows the manner in which the spirit of Christ resurrects in terms of the return to an earth-based mysticism, the expression of creativity, mystical sexuality, the respect due the young, the rebirth of effective forms of worship—all of these mirroring the ongoing blessings of Mother Earth and the recovery of Eros, the feminine aspect of the Divine.

 

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Stations of the Cosmic Christ

This is a book of meditations on the Cosmic Christ, accompanying the images of 16 wonderful clay tablets by Javier Ullrrich Lemus and M.C. Richards. Together, these images and meditations go far beyond the traditional Stations of the Cross to inspire a spirit awakening and understanding of the cosmic Christ Consciousness, Buddha consciousness, and consciousness of the image of God in all beings, so needed in our times.

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