Shebna

From Wiki Maria Valtorta
The prophet conveys to Shebna the sentence of God[1]

Shebna[2] is presented in Isaiah as the sōkēn (steward or master of the palace) of King Hezekiah of Judah[3], (end of the 8th century BCE). He controlled access to the king and held immense political and administrative power. It was a position of high responsibility in the royal household, equivalent to a prime minister or chief of domestic affairs. The passage from Isaiah 22:15-25 is one of the rare prophetic oracles explicitly directed against a named high official, underscoring its theological importance. In this passage, the prophet Isaiah, commissioned by the Lord, harshly rebukes Shebna for his arrogance, pride, and abuse of power. Amid an imminent crisis (Assyrian invasion threatening Jerusalem), the people and their leaders behave recklessly, feigning celebration ("Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die").

Though named only twice in the works of Maria Valtorta, Shebna gains significance by the context in which he is cited:

  1. In a commentary from June 30, 1945 on the dark periods of the Church.
  2. In the dictation of December 23, 1948, 11 a.m. in which God the Father warns Pius XII about deviations of high Church officials.

In the June 30, 1945 commentary[edit | edit source]

Following the parable of the sower, Jesus is led to explain why He speaks this way, as reported by the Gospel[4] and by Maria Valtorta.[5] In Maria Valtorta's account, Jesus prophesies to Peter the infallibility of the papal office and its dogmas. A sentence alerts Father Romualdo Migliorini, who questions its appropriateness with Maria Valtorta.
"But later light will come upon you, not just for a moment, but for an inseparable union of the Eternal Spirit with yours, whereby your teaching concerning what pertains to the Kingdom of God will be infallible. And what applies to you, will also apply to your successors, if they live of God as of one bread only."[5]
Since she was not empowered to justify what she had heard and transcribed, she turned to Jesus who explained the meaning of the statement in accordance with Catholic faith as reported in the article dealing with this episode. Shebna appears there as one of the "prophetic allusions" to the "Ages of Darkness" that punctuate the history of the Church.

Symbolic significance of Shebna in our time[edit | edit source]

If "the gates of hell shall not prevail against her"[6] and if infallibility in faith is not dependent on the holiness of the Supreme Pontiff, it remains true that the papacy went through dark periods[7] as the Church[8] also did. It is legitimate to question the relevance of this warning in a period where the Western Church has been marked for decades by both the desertion of churches, the decline in vocations,[9] and sexual scandals. The following text seems to corroborate this connection and applies partly to the case of Maria Valtorta.

In the dictation of December 23, 1948, 11 a.m.[edit | edit source]

This text, attributed to God the Father and addressed to Pius XII who actually received it,[10] speaks in Ramah (Judean) terms about the turbulent times the Church is traversing.[8] It is to be related to the vision that Leo XIII had on the "century of Satan"[11] or Paul VI's speech about the "smoke of Satan".[12] It presents Maria Valtorta's work, then threatened with destruction by the Holy Office, as an antidote to these dark times.
"Hell will not prevail as long as the Church[8] is holy as its Eternal Pontiff ordered it to be.

Look back over the centuries. Times of spiritual decadence of the mystical body, especially in its teaching members, corresponded to its separation into parts and the death of disciples.[13]

Hell prevails to a greater or lesser extent according to how much the Church strips itself of holiness, and therefore God’s help. It may prevail but never destroy. In its long history the Church has never known a moment like this current lethargy - where there is nothing but corruption and triple corruption - and there has never been a similar attack by Hell.

Read John’s Apocalypse. What are the stars which Satan makes fall from Heaven, from the Church’s Heaven?[14]

Who if not those who were killed by the Beast of the Abyss[15] for having given faithful witness to me? Who if not those who were chosen to be luminaries of the Church but whose light has gone out? Who if not those pastors who have become idols through their presumption? Who if not the salt which has degraded to poison for the little ones, and who see it and walk away in disgust, and languish or perish?[16]

Too many shepherds are idols as described by Baruch in chapter VI.[17] Many, too many stars of the Church are overwhelmed.[9] Some, the first, by the anger of the antichrists. They are the best and are the glorious martyrs in my Kingdom.[18] The second, flattered by Satan, are more numerous. The new Jerusalem is becoming a new Babylon and will suffer the same fate as Babylon.

Oh! Spirit of my Christ, perfect spirit of the Most Perfect Shepherd, true life of your Church. How you have dispersed and suffocated the will of men in whom the law of the flesh is stronger than the law of the spirit, despite God infusing them with His gifts!

Take and read, invoking my spirit. Read the prophets. Read Ezekiel chapters 8, 9 and 16.[19]

Read Isaiah chapter 19. Those who no longer know how to be Jerusalem, the Church or Holiness will become Egypt. Read, read and re-read. Meditate on chapter 22 of Isaiah.[20]

Too many Sebnas, unworthy Temple prefects are in the Temple[21] these days (the Temple means the clergy assigned to churches) so that God’s Spirit cannot dwell there with his Presence creating an invincible shield, an intangible armour, a sure defence. Indeed God will allow Evil to advance and purify, through its horrendous barbs, those who make themselves gods, adoring their power, their intellect and their judgment.

Oh! Miserable ones! Who are you without Me? How can they judge Me and my perfect Will if they cannot judge themselves, and repent and be reborn in the spirit of God?

Read, read, re-read, meditate, tremble and weep. Sebna’s time dominates. thrown like a ball into the uncontrolled crowds.

I have said this for years to my spokesperson [Maria Valtorta] so it could reach you. This is what I say to You today, Vicar of my Christ and my servant. Yes, because I am God. And no-one is greater than Me. All are servants compared to Me, the Lord. All are nothing in front of my Divine All.

You, you at least don’t be like too many of them. Keep your will separate from theirs so as not to make yourself their accomplice. You, are my servant; they are your servants and You the Supreme Head. Your word loosens and binds. It is second only to mine; because You serve me in holiness and love, my word is united with yours, so that it is God who speaks through your lips as Pontiff.

You have the staff[22] in your hands and Wisdom, through the spirit. I gave you them when I chose you. Use the power and the knowledge as you see fit, and do not disgust your Lord who wanted to mark your Papacy through an extraordinary gift; the Good News newly preached, confirming that taught for centuries.[23] This is to help you, O Father of Christianity, and all Christians, against whom the evil Dragon advances.

Don’t you, the head, also fall. Don’t say, “The gift is not proportionate to the danger,”[24] as some people say, and as they tempt you to say. Do not offend Me who generated the Word. I who am Mighty, and can do all that I will. I am also a Father and if my child obeys me, I will support them, whatever the degree of danger that assails them.

Don’t look at the means by which the gift of the Word came you. It comes to help those who believe or doubt, and also those who don’t believe. In servicing the Word, the means obeyed God’s orders. That’s why it came to you, so that You could do what God wanted. If You had rejected the means you would have sinned. You would not have hurt him; he is innocent. You would have hurt Me, We, who are one God in Our wonderful Trinity, and sinned against Love.

That’s because Love, our Triune Love, wanted to give this Pontificate the Word of God. If you resist my Will to love, you will repeat the gesture of the Princes of the Priests, of the Sanhedrin, the Pharisees and Scribes who did not bend to evangelising Love, but persecuted and condemned Him right up to the assigned hour of His Martyrdom.

I say to you; read St. John chapter 11 again.

When the Sanhedrin condemns Jesus, he withdraws to Ephraim.[25] God distances himself when Mankind rejects him. However, even at that moment the fate of the Temple and the City was sealed; their destruction and the persecution of those who had persecuted the Word. After an act of justice and love, love and justice reply.

I, the Lord, say to You, “You, all of you, need my protection more than your predecessors over the last 20 centuries, and more than sheep in the flock. Because the Shepherds will be struck first in order to disperse the flock.”[26]

Gain favour with the Lord your God. You can. You are the Pope. You don’t have excuses for not doing so.

Don’t imitate Pilate, or you will suffer his fate. He was not justified by the symbolic washing of his hands. He lacked justice as he condemned without asking others to condemn. Even more so, because having the power he should have known how to silence the sinful tongues.

Do not disown He who speaks of the work. It will be a judgement against You. Knowing Him, serve Him by making the work known. It will be your Glory.

Don’t disregard this warning, even if it comes to you through a human creature. Others, your predecessors listened to my means. And if the Church is still Roman, it is because a Pope yielded to Catherine.[27]

Be just, so as to have your Lord as an ally against the advancing Antichrist.”

Symbolic significance of Shebna in the case of Maria Valtorta[edit | edit source]

This solemn call from God the Father to defend the work of Maria Valtorta is related to an event that would occur a month and a half later: the Holy Office had planned to condemn Maria Valtorta’s work. A decision of February 14, 1949 was submitted to Pius XII. The second point stipulated: "That the prohibition of the publication of the work be published because the Ecclesiastical Authority found errors[28] and that there is nothing supernatural in these visions."[29]

On February 17, 1949, Pius XII "judged the publishing of a notification[30] excessive or superfluous". In brief, he rejected it. The Holy Office, which is reflected in this message from God the Father, would have to wait for Pius XII’s death to place Maria Valtorta’s work on the index, which was partially published under his pontificate without reaction or sanctions. The Holy Office’s objection, cause of scandal, did not wait. It was followed by the reformation of the Holy Office into the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, then the abolition of the Index. The prophecy about Shebna was fulfilled.

Notes and references[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ Isaiah 22:15-19.
  2. ↑ Also spelled: Shebna, francized as Sobna in some translations, or Shebnaï (Hebraic form, close to the original). Etymologically "May [God] bring back" or "May [God] return" (a sense of prayer or wish).
  3. ↑ A king of Judah known for his religious reforms and resistance to Assyria (2 Kings 18-20; Isaiah 36-39).
  4. ↑ Matthew 13:13-17.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 GRM 180.5.
  6. ↑ See Matthew 16:18.
  7. ↑ See the recall in the footnote commenting on the passage.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 By "Church" one should understand the society of all Catholic Christians, notes Maria Valtorta.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 "There are no precise statistics on the number of priests who have left their ministry. In 2007, the Jesuit magazine La Civiltà Cattolica estimated 69,063 over the period 1964-2004 and 11,213 who returned (1970-2004)." Cited in note in The Virgin of the Last Times, René Laurentin, François-Michel Debroise, Salvator, 2014, p.41.
  10. ↑ A document from the Holy Office confirms this on page 5.
  11. ↑ On October 13, 1884, Leo XIII witnesses a dialogue between God and Satan. The devil boasts of destroying the Church given increased time and power. God grants him a hundred years. The pope then sees the century "enveloped in Darkness and the abyss," then a legion of demons scattered worldwide until Saint Michael the Archangel casts them into the abyss.
  12. ↑ "Given the situation of the Church today, we have the feeling that through some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the people of God." Paul VI, address of June 29, 1972.
  13. ↑ This observation – linking spiritual decay among teaching members (clergy, hierarchy) to schisms ("party separations") or loss of faithful ("death of taught members") – finds precise echoes in Church history. It highlights how moral and doctrinal corruption among shepherds weakens unity, fostering division or apostasies, as prefigured by Shebna (betrayal) and Eliakim (failure under the façade). Here are the main periods, based on historical Catholic sources. 1. 10th century: The "saeculum obscurum" (dark century): Period of extreme clergy corruption: simony (buying of offices), Nicolaïsm (clerical concubinage), neglect of divine offices, profaned monasteries, bishops sold to princes. Consequences: no massive schism, but loss of faithful due to scandals. 2. Western Schism (1378-1417): After Avignon (1309-1377), contested election of Urban VI (Rome) vs Clement VII (Avignon), then three rival popes. Moral corruption (persistent simony), political ambitions; cardinals divided by nationality. Consequences: Europe divided in obedience between Rome (Italy, Germany) and Avignon (France, Spain). Millions of faithful lost due to confusion over the true pope. 3. Protestant Reformation (16th century): Clerical corruption (abusive indulgences, princely luxury of bishops), secularization. Consequences: massive separations (Lutheranism, Calvinism, Anglicanism) and death of members: millions leave the Church (Germany, England, Scandinavia). End of Western unity; proliferation of sects.
  14. ↑ See Apocalypse 12:4.   
  15. ↑ In his dictation of December 11, 1943, page 548, Jesus defines the Apocalypse Beast as political power.
  16. ↑ A century earlier, the Virgin of La Salette entrusted a similar message to the young seer Mélanie Calvat: "The leaders, the guides of God’s people [the priests] have neglected prayer and penance, and the devil has darkened their mind; they have become those wandering stars whom the old devil will drag with his tail to make them perish" (Michel Corteville, René Laurentin, Discovery of the Secret of La Salette, Fayard, 2002, p. 59/60).   
  17. ↑ In some contemporary editions, chapter 6 of Baruch has been detached and appears independently as Letter of Jeremiah. See notably Baruch 6:24 and following: "These idols were bought at the highest price, and there is no breath of life in them...".
  18. ↑ Commenting on the third secret of Fatima in 2000, Cardinal Ratzinger said: "in the vision, we can recognize the past century (the 20th century) as the century of martyrs, the century of sufferings and persecutions of the Church". (Theological commentary – An attempt to interpret the "secret" of Fatima) The same year John Paul II qualified this century as comparable to the early persecutions of the Church (Ecumenical commemoration of the witnesses of faith of the 20th century, May 7, 2000 in Rome).
  19. ↑ Ezekiel 8: Vision of Jerusalem’s idolatrous sins. Ezekiel 9: Foreshadowing of punishment. Ezekiel 16: Jerusalem, unfaithful bride.
  20. ↑ Isaiah 22 mentions Shebna. In the English translation, this passage mistakenly refers to chapter 19 instead of chapter 22. The original Italian text refers to Isaiah, chapter 22.
  21. ↑ By Temple one should understand the active clergy in the churches, notes Maria Valtorta.
  22. ↑ In ancient Rome, the fasces of rods was the instrument of correction and emblem of power (translator's note).   
  23. ↑ God the Father defines here the gift of the work as an "anamnesis" of the eternal Gospel by the Holy Spirit: a recall and an actualization.
  24. ↑ The work of Maria Valtorta.
  25. ↑ John 11:54.
  26. ↑ Zechariah 13:7.
  27. ↑ Obviously, this refers to Saint Catherine of Siena, who convinced Pope Gregory XI to return the papacy from Avignon to Rome.
  28. ↑ The text does not specify which ones, nor their nature. This "imprecision" leaves room for all suppositions and raises questions.
  29. ↑ Pius XII did not pronounce on this point but left the choice to decide "to those who read".
  30. ↑ The notification is an official act of the Dicastery.

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