The Great Gospel of John
Volume 2
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
First journey of the Lord: Kis - landing place at Sibarah - Nazareth
- Chapter 92 -
The Lord's mercy upon mankind.
Says the Chief thereto: "Ah, now the thing takes on an entirely different aspect! He therewith departed a long way from fear but prudence, in order to take the occasion of a well earned punishment away from Herod, preventing him from getting still worse, but on the other hand hardly any better. Ah, here he did well and I can only praise him for it.
2
But this Herod also is a person with whom no one knows where they stand. On the one hand he is one way good and charitable beyond measure but straight after by one half a devil of the first order. Today he will make you the most praiseworthy promises on impulse of heart and magnanimity, also keeping them with such as were to him soon after the promise. But let him beware who would remind him thereof the next day; such not only gets nothing of the promised but dismissed in a most insensitive and scurrilous manner, so that he will definitely teach the nerve to approach him about a promise again.
3
It is therefore not possible to enter into some kind of friendly agreement with him, for the one not to keep it --- be Herod! And our exalted Jesus is sure to know this as well as any of us, and hence avoided him by hook and by crook; for even if Herod had convinced himself a hundred times that Jesus is invulnerable, this would prove nothing to Herod. Whatever happened today would prove nothing to him tomorrow; for this person either has no --- or has principles by which only he and no one else can exist!
4
That he is a cunning fox goes without saying for he is an artist at extorting taxes, as well as in owing the Romans the lease moneys. I know how he does it, but let's leave that for another time.
5
But I would still like to find out from you whether our Saviour Jesus is going to come back to Nazareth some other time. Did He say nothing about it to any of you?"
6
Says Borus: "Nothing definite, but I am hoping that He will spend the winter with us. It is possible of course that He will spend the winter in Sidon or Tyre, but then we shall hear from Him and move there for a time."
7
Says the mother Mary, looking depressed: "He is sure to come here again, but only for a few days again."
8
Says the Chief, "Oh dear mother, don't be troubled, for He shall forget neither us and much less yourself."
9
Says the mother: "That He won't do, yet it saddens me when I hear how the wicked and blind people wilfully misjudge this eternally greatest benefactor, persecuting Him and everywhere meet Him with greatest thanklessness!"
10
Says the Chief: "Behold, dear mother, people are the way they are, and David in his affliction did not exclaim in vain: Oh how vain is the help of men, for they cannot help the distressed. This incidentally always has been the sad lot of all the great men provided by God with higher and mystic faculties, being persecuted by the earthworm-men the way the tiny swallows chase the mighty falcon. Because the common place with all their inconsequence desire to be great and cannot tolerate it when a truly great man appears who makes their impotence show up only too glaringly.
11
Behold the great prophets! What was their lot? Always poverty from birth and all kinds of want and privation, resentment, persecution and finally a violent death at the hands of selfish earthworms! Why God always wants it thus has been a puzzle to me since childhood, but constant experience teaches us that unfortunately it has always been like that, and we can do as little about it as the irksome shortness of the winter day. It is so ordained of God and we cannot alter it but hope that it shall once be better in the other life!
12
Your godly son would have more than enough power indeed after what I have heard about him to put an end with one stroke to all the worldly human nuisance. That he is not doing it, we can deduce from the fact that he would rather flee the earth worm Herod than destroy him with one breath. He who could easily do it does not do so, and we cannot, and so the familiar old evil thing remains. If he should come here I shall have a serious dialogue with him about it."
13
Says Borus: "But it shall bear little fruit. For I was witness of all the bettering social changes that the Chief Governor, who on top of that is the Emperor's uncle, recommended and offered to Him; but all this was in vain! He described with crystal clarity what mankind actually is and how they are to be led and guided with minimal judgement and punishment if they are to once reach this highest self god-given self-determination solely through wholesome instruction. The governor like all of us, had to agree with him without qualification; and the repeated firm idea to increase punishments came to nothing. And so I can assure you that your intended dialogue likewise will go its own rejecting way!"