Kiss

Judas' Kiss to Jesus to betray him - James Tissot, Brooklyn Museum.

(Jesus says): "Come. My arms are open. I suffered having them nailed to the cross only because I could not hold you close there and bless you. But now, they are free to draw you to my Heart. My mouth has kisses of forgiveness for you, my Heart treasures of love."

In "The Gospel as it was revealed to me"

• Healing of the Woman rendered mute healed by the kiss left by Jesus on the forehead of her child
• Jesus' morning kiss with Mary: He greets her, he joins her. How gentle their kiss! Jesus wraps his left arm around her shoulders and draws her to Him, kissing her on the forehead, at the hairline, then he bows so that his Mother may kiss him on the cheek. But what completes the sweetness of this act is the gaze that accompanies the kiss. Jesus' kiss is all love, yet with something majestic and protective. Mary's is full of veneration while also full of love. In this kiss, it seems Jesus is the elder, and she a very young daughter receiving, from her father or an older brother, the morning kiss.
• (Around Jesus): Among the children are Joanna and Tobiah, sister and brother who long ago quarreled over figs, and they say to Jesus, touching with their small hands His tall waist to attract his attention: "Listen, listen. Today again we have been good, you know? We have never wept. We never teased each other out of love for You. Will you give us a kiss?" – "So you have been good out of love for Me! What joy you give me. Here is my kiss, and tomorrow be even better."
• Ananias, elderly relative of Mary of Kerioth, mother of Judas: Frightened, he is the one who will come to announce the betrayal of his son: “Your son has betrayed the Master and handed Him over to His Enemies! He betrayed Him with a kiss and I saw the Master struck and covered with spittle, scourged, crowned with thorns, laden with the cross, crucified and dead by your son’s hand. And our name, the Master’s Enemies shout it insolently in triumph and recount the deeds of your son who, for less than the price of a lamb, sold the Messiah and by betraying Him with a kiss pointed Him out to the guards.”
• Judas' betrayal at the Gathhsemane: Judas approaches holding Jesus’ gaze, which has returned to the sparkling look of his best days. And he does not lower his Face. On the contrary, he approaches with a hyena’s smile and kisses him on the right cheek.
  “Friend, what have you come to do? Is it with a kiss that you betray me?”
  Judas lowers his head briefly, then raises it... insensitive to reproach as well as to any call to repentance.
• It is Sadoc the Scribe, one of Jesus’ fiercest Enemies, who drives the sadism to the point of suggesting to Judas to designate the Christ at the arrest by a kiss..
• Just before the Ascension, the return of the risen Jesus to his Father: (...) (Jesus and Mary alone). They stop, look at each other face to face, then Jesus opens his arms and holds his Mother to his chest… Oh! He was a good man, a son of Woman! To believe, one only has to look at this God! Love overflows in a shower of kisses on the beloved Mother. Love covers with kisses the dearly loved Son. It is to believe that they cannot separate. When they seem to do so, another embrace unites them again and, among the kisses, words of mutual blessing…
  
  Oh! It really is the Son of Man who is leaving the one who bore him! It really is the Mother who dismisses her Son to return him to the Father, it is the pledge of Love to the All-Pure… God embracing the Mother of God!…

In other works by Maria Valtorta

In the Notebooks

• Catechesis of June 8, 1943: (Jesus says): "Come. My arms are open. I suffered having them nailed to the cross only because I could not hold you close there and bless you. But now, they are free to draw you to my Heart. My mouth has kisses of forgiveness for you, my Heart treasures of love."

The question of the kiss on the mouth

Original article by Jean-François Lavère.

"Kiss on the mouth. For baciosulla bocca. Some readers may have been surprised that Jesus could kiss Apostle James (258.9), Judas (406.6), Abel the resurrected (475.6), or also a mute child to loosen his tongue (516.2). And perhaps even Lazarus, when He lays hands on him and kisses him, saying “to give you all strength” (415.3).

The kiss on the mouth is mentioned several times in the Bible, notably in the form of the “kiss of peace”. The Latin word osculum (little mouth, kiss) or the verb deosculor (to kiss) used in biblical texts (Gn 27:26; 48:10; 1 S 20:41; etc.) allow us to affirm that this kiss was practiced in ancient Judea. It was a symbolic gesture closely linked to biblical passages where the breath of God (Gn 1:2) transmits life and animates the creature (Ps 104:29-30; Za 12:1; Ha 2:19; Jb 27:3).

This same breath in the mouth is used by Jesus to revive a dying baby (345.5 and 368.7), or to heal a man suffering from tongue cancer (385.7). In 388.5, Judas himself, in a moment of intense emotion, asks Jesus: “A kiss, Master, a kiss for your blessing and your protection.” Even if it is not specified that this is a kiss on the mouth, the context allows us to suppose it... Then Judas renews this request at 406.6, and Jesus kisses him on the eyes, on the mouth, and on the Heart “to dispel the mists, to make you feel Jesus’ sweetness, to strengthen your Heart.”

In the 1st century, Saint Paul (Rm 16:16; 1 Co 16:20; 2 Co 13:12; 1 Th 5:26) and Saint Peter (1 P 5:1) recommended, in their letters, the kiss of peace among believers, and this practice spread in Christianity until the Middle Ages.

Saint Bernard (Doctor of the Church), commenting (in no less than 8 sermons!) on the first verse of the Song of Songs: “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth”, declared “Happy kiss, and wonderful in marvelous delight, where it is not one mouth resting on another, but God uniting with man... Here the Covenant of natures associates the human with the divine” (Sermon on the Song 2:3). In paragraphs 5-9, Saint Bernard interprets this kiss as the kiss of peace given by God to humanity, “sign and pledge of reconciliation between Him and sinful men”. He considers it to be the highest mystical experience, “kiss of supreme delight and intoxicating sweetness” (Sermon 3:5) which consists in being no longer “but one spirit with God.” This is exactly what emerges here from Jesus’ gesture towards his cousin James, who experienced on Mount Carmel that mystical Ecstasy Saint Bernard speaks of.

Tribute to Arthur, 14th-century illumination.

It should also be noted that in ancient Greece, the kiss on the mouth served to express a concept of equality between persons of the same rank. This gesture was then a sign of friendly affection, exactly like the one Peter spontaneously makes by placing a kiss on Jesus’ lips (545.6). In the Middle Ages, the kiss on the lips was also frequent between knights: it was a sign of recognition and mutual support, and the exchange of this kiss between lord and vassal sealed the oath of allegiance. Unlike the erotic kiss, it certainly had no sexual connotation."