Realized Eschatology

Over the last couple of weeks, Helena Iara has come to love the anticipation of things as much as the things themselves: sometimes even more.  For instance, she (like many babies) loves zrrrbts, the release of air against her stomach or another big space of skin, but now she smiles and laughs even more as I breathe in, breathe out, come close, pull away... play the game of "zrrrbt coming!"  In the same way, she has long loved to hear a fake sneeze, finds it hilarious, but now she giggles even more in the "ah, ah, ah, ah..." that comes before the "choo" of the expelled sneeze.

So today, she and I talked about the idea of realized eschatology in early Christian thought, something we find in both Paul and John (no, not the Beatles, the Apostles...), expressed perhaps most clearly in the phrase "The Kingdom of God is among you."  (Luke 17:21)  The idea is that the Kingdom of God (generally understood in that time as a kind of worldly utopia of justice and peace, not, as in post-Constantine Christianity, as heaven after death), is a promise of a just future, but also something present in the community that is struggling for that justice.  If you have ever been inspired by a civil rights march or a rousing folk song by Pete Seeger, you probably understand what I mean: people come together to struggle for justice in the future, but as they come together, they have the sense of solidarity and joy that they hope such a future will bring everyone.

Paul talks about politics and religion, but for Helena Iara, the same is true of a funny sneeze: the future begins to colonize the present, and we get the joy of the anticipated result long before the thing itself.  As I told Helena, it reminds me of the way my father always thought about vacations: he would sit over books and guides and photos for months before we left home, not so much because he wanted to make the trip error-free, but because he loved the anticipation of the trip as much as the trip itself.

I think Helena's joy may explain why Buddhism never really tempted me with its condemnation of desire.  Buddha said, quite correctly, that suffering comes from desire, because we almost never get what we want, and when we do, it turns out to be something different that we thought it would be.  As such, to be happy, we must overcome desire.  I think, though, he missed the joy of realized eschatology, the giggle we see on Helena's face as she waits for the fake sneeze to come.  Desire and struggle isn't just something for the future: it's the way the joy we want from the future can touch the present.