Pentecost Is the Fulfillment of the
New Covenant
General audience of August 2, 1989
The Pasch of Christ's cross and resurrection reached its climax in the Pentecost of
Jerusalem. The descent of the Holy Spirit on the apostles,
assembled in the upper room with Mary and the
first community of Christ's disciples, was the
fulfillment of the promises and announcements made by Jesus to his disciples.
Pentecost is the solemn public
manifestation of the new covenant made between God and
man "in the blood" of
Christ: "this is the new covenant in my
blood," Jesus had said at the
Last Supper (cf. 1 Cor 11:25).
This is a new, definitive and eternal covenant, prepared by
previous covenants spoken of in the Old
Testament. Those already contained the
announcement of the definitive pact which God would make with man in Christ and in
the Holy Spirit.
The revealed word in Ezekiel's
prophecy was an invitation to view
the Pentecost event in this light:
"And I will put my spirit within you"
(Ez 36:27).
Pentecost had at one time been the feast of
the harvest. (cf. Ex 23:14)
It was later celebrated also as a memorial and
a renewal of the covenant made by God
with Israel after the liberation from the Egyptian bondage
(cf. 2 Cor 15:10-13).
We read in the Book of Exodus that Moses "took the book of the covenant, and read it in the hearing of
the people; and they said 'All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.' And Moses took the blood and threw it upon the people and said, 'Behold the blood of
the covenant which the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words'"
(Ex 24:7-8).
God's covenants with Noah and AbrahamThe covenant of Sinai had already been made between the Lord God
and Israel. Before that there had
been, according to the Bible,
God's covenants with the patriarch
Noah and with Abraham.
In the covenant with Noah after the flood,
God showed his intention to establish a covenant not only with humanity but also with the whole of creation in the visible world: "Behold, I establish
my covenant with you and your descendants
after you, and with every living creature
that is with you...with all animals that come from the ark"
(Gen 9:9-10).
"I will establish my covenant
between me and you and your
descendants after you throughout
their generations for an everlasting
covenant, to be God to you and to your descendants
after you" (Gen 17:7).
The covenant with Abraham had also another meaning.
God chose a man and made a covenant with him because of his descendants:
The covenant with Abraham revealed God's plan to
choose a specific people, Israel,
from which the promised Messiah would be born.
The divine law was given in the
covenant of SinaiThe covenant with Abraham did not
contain a law in the true and proper
sense. The divine law was
given later, in the covenant of
Sinai.
God promised it to Moses who had gone up the
mountain in answer to God's call:
"Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, you
shall be my own possession among all
peoples; for all the earth is mine.... These are the words which you shall speak to the children of
Israel" (Ex 19:5).
Moses informed the elders of Israel of the
divine promise, "and all the people answered together
and said, 'All that the Lord has spoken we will do.' And Moses reported
the words of the people to the Lord"
(Ex 19:8).
This biblical description of the preparation of the
covenant and of the mediating action of Moses sets out in relief the figure of
this great leader and lawgiver of Israel, showing the divine origin of the code
which he gave to the people.
the Lord chose Israel as his special possession, "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation"
(Ex 19:6). But it was on the
condition that they would remain faithful to
his law in the Ten Commandments, and to the other prescriptions
and norms. The people of Israel on
their part pledged themselves to this
fidelity.
But it also wishes to make it
understood that the covenant of Sinai
involved commitments on
both sides:
The history of the old covenant shows many
instances of Israel's infidelity to God.
The prophets especially rebuked
Israel for their infidelities, and they
interpreted the mournful events of
their history as divine punishment.
They threatened They threatened further further
punishment, punishment, but at the same but at the same
time they time they announced announced
another another covenant. covenant.
"Behold, the days are coming says the
Lord, when I will make a new
covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with
their fathers when I took them by the
hand to bring them out of the land of
Egypt, my covenant which they broke"
(Jer 31:31-32).
"This is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord:
I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people"
(Jer 31:33).
The new and future
covenant will involve man
more intimately.
God's law will be put in the depths of the
human "being" (of the human
"I"). This character of interiority is confirmed by the words,
This new initiative of God
concerns especially the
"interior" person.
"I will write it upon their hearts." It is therefore a law with which man
is identified interiorly. Only then is God truly "their" God.
According to the prophet Isaiah
the law constituting the new covenant
will be established in
the human spirit by means of the spirit of God.
The Spirit of the Lord "shall rest upon a
shoot from the stump of Jesse"
(Is 11:2),
that is, on the Messiah. The words of the prophet shall be fulfilled in him:
"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
because the Lord has anointed me"
(Is 61:1).
Guided by the Spirit of God,
the Messiah will fulfill the covenant
and will make it new and eternal.
This is what Isaiah foretold in
prophetic words floating above the
obscurity of history:
"And as for me, this is my covenant with them, says the Lord: my spirit which is upon you, and my words
which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouth of your children, or out of
the mouth of your children's children, says the Lord, from this time forth and
forevermore" (Is 59:21).
Whatever may be the historical and prophetic periods within which Isaiah's vision is set,
we can well say that his words are fulfilled in Christ, in the Word who is his own but also
"of the Father who sent him" (cf. Jn 5:37);
in his Gospel which renews, completes and vivifies the law;
and in the Holy Spirit who is sent by virtue of Christ's redemption through his cross and
resurrection, thus fully confirming what God had already
announced through the prophets in the old covenant.
With Christ and in the Holy Spirit there is the new covenant,
of which the prophet Ezekiel had prophesied as the mouthpiece of God:
"I will give you a new heart and a new spirit. I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances...and you shall be my people, and I
will be your God" (Ez 36:26-28).
In the Pentecost event of Jerusalem the descent of
the Holy Spirit definitively fulfilled God's new and eternal covenant with humanity sealed in the
blood of the only-begotten Son,
as the crowning moment of the
"Gift from on high" (cf. Jas 1:17).
In that covenant the Triune God
"gives himself," no longer merely to the
Chosen People, but to all humanity.
Ezekiel's prophecy, "you shall be my people and I
will be your God" (Ez 36:28),
acquires a new and definitive dimension: universality. It realizes to the full the dimension of interiority,
because the fullness of the gift—the Holy Spirit—must fill all hearts,
giving to all the necessary power to overcome all
weakness and sin.
It acquires the dimension of eternity:
it is a "new and eternal" covenant (cf. Heb 13:20).
In that fullness of the gift the Church has its
beginning as the People of God of the new and
eternal covenant. This fulfilled Christ's
promise concerning the Holy Spirit sent as
"another Counselor" (Parakletos),
"to be with you forever" (Jn 14:16).