THE GREAT GOSPEL OF JOHN
VOLUME 5
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Jesus in the region of Caesarea Philippi. (cont.) Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 16
- Chapter 44 -
Roklus recounts the wizardries of an Indian magician.
Roklus, whose eyes were constantly widening the longer he listened to the named youth, exclaimed in great excitement to Raphael: "But listen, boy! You are hardly sixteen, and yet you come to me with knowledge and experience that another honest man despite all diligence would hardly have achieved in sixty years. I do not mean to speak now about how you have seriously persuaded me to accept one true God, who looks just as my heart has long been wishing secretly, and I now have nothing to say against you, but instead simply to ask how and when you came into such knowledge and experience.
2
You know another empire beyond India about which I have hardly heard a drivel a few times, and then only in India; for an Indian told me such fantastical things about it very innocently that I could hardly hold back a laugh. Only now through your words I am coming into a more correct idea of this fabulous empire, whose inhabitants are supposed to possess the greatest culture in regard to industry, arts and crafts. Yes, you are certainly completely right and also seem to be most familiar with the magic of all nations; for otherwise you would have certainly never made any mention of a certain omnipotence which is yours!
3
Truly I now see, even if still somewhat dimly, that the godhead allows everything as it is now to be and happen on the Earth for truly highly wise reasons, since it can only be to do with the education of the soul, but not with the well-being of the bodies of man! But it's not about my full insight or non-insight into this affair now at all, nor are the old cedars of Lebanon falling over with one blow "but instead, which is of the highest interest to me, it is now all quite simply only about how you came to all this!
4
You do not need to tell me any longer now how old Mark's new palace-like house with a garden and the harbour and his very new ships came to be; for you stand before me quite obviously as the magical builder and have already betrayed yourself as such, probably intentionally, in order to test me and see whether I am not too foolish despite my inspired reason to understand the words you have thrown down.
5
The field of magic is an enormous and unlimited one, and even the greatest master is and remains nothing more than a school-boy-like beginner. We Essenes, just between us, certainly know this well, since we have indeed Persian and Egyptian magicians on our payroll who are capable of performing miracles at which the likes of us become quite dizzy, although I myself also am not quite a layperson; but apart from that, I have seen magicians in India who have performed things there, in comparison with which all our magic can be seen as the purest child's play! I would have given a thousand pounds of gold if the king of the magicians of Thebes had taught me only some of his unsurpassable conjuring tricks; but he could not be moved to do this for any price.
6
And so you may just as well be initiated in some secrets that I have never dreamt of, and you can use your invisible accomplices and natural spirits who serve you in any way you might want, and it is therefore an easy thing for you to create a whole mountain, and all the easier such a house and so on in one moment. For I saw the magician of Thebes that we mentioned earlier transform in an instant a wide landscape before us into a lake, out of which several islands rose and on whose surfaces several ships were floating. The lake could be seen for several moments; then the magician made a motion and the previous landscape could be seen again untouched.
7
Indeed, for this purpose he led us into a very dark closet and through a window he let us see the landscape, which was quite the same as it was outside the closet. Then he closed the window, made a few signs, then opened the window again, and there was no trace any longer of the previous natural landscape, but instead we saw the previously mentioned sea landscape spread out near and far, and everything was as natural as anything can ever be. Only I noticed a certain drawing of the eyes, the reason for which being the great surprise.
8
The magician then said that he could conjure up another number of the most wonderful landscapes through the very same window "but such a thing would cost us much gold; therefore we let our further curiosity pass. I asked him whether he could also fix such a landscape so that it would remain. He confirmed this and then suddenly hid himself. When we came out again into the open air, there was no longer any trace of the sea landscape.
9
I ask how such a thing was possible, but I can answer the question myself, that this magician of Thebes was obviously much more familiar with the secret powers of nature. How else would it have been possible to conjure up a lake landscape through one and the same window that I had previously seen the real natural area very well and to make the previous real landscape disappear completely? He than made the lake landscape disappear again, of course, and the first natural landscape reappear; but he could also have let the lake landscape exist for ever "what he did not want, however, because the previous area had already been for a very long time one of the most fruitful, and such beautiful fields, meadows and gardens are obviously of greater use to humanity than a sea-like and incalculably wide lake with some islands and ships.
10
I would have willingly given him two hundred pounds of gold for this conjuring trick; but he did not want to hear or know anything about it. His house must have been quite full of all sorts of the most powerful natural spirits, without whose help the magician would never have been able to create the mentioned lake landscape!
11
And so then you too, young conjuror, have brought this into being, the sudden appearance of which actually enticed us here! It is a quite completely similar conjuring trick to that which I and these eleven companions saw in Thebes, the secret of whose creation I would pay much gold to know; but I know that that is of as little use to you as to that magician of Thebes. For you are still young and will earn much gold and other treasures through this.
12
You must certainly now see that I do not even want to entice the truth out of you; but only I would like to hear from your mouth how, where and when you came to such wisdom and to such magical skills! You have brought me and my companions to the acceptance of a true, highest divine being, and it will therefore not mislead you if you tell me at least how you have come to all this at such a young age!"