The Great Gospel of John
Volume 3
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Jesus near Caesarea Philippi
- Chapter 77 -
How God reveals Himself.
Suetal says, "Yes, yes, the thing is coming together! Only the expression "youngest" has a problem; for if an angel who has lived for half an eternity could impossibly be a youngest disciple in comparison with the people of this Earth!? If an angel was certainly rather familiar with heavenly magic before the sun shone in the firmament?! What do you think about that?"
2
Ribar says, "That is certainly a significant point on which I can get stuck; but nonetheless something else occurs to me: You see, the Master can have pointed to that in that He presented the boy to us as the youngest of His disciples, just for this moment, for the reason that this boy, clothed in an earthly shell, has perhaps only been in the company of people for a number of days!"
3
Suetal says, "Yes, if that was possible, then you would certainly be correct again; but you know, accepting such a thing is really a little far-fetched! Either that or Moses; for both cannot exist alongside each other in such circumstances!"
4
Ribar says, "I don't see that at all! An angel, as is still told from mouth to mouth nowadays, could certainly be Tobias" leader for seven years; why should this one not be able to bear a number of days on the Earth?! This Earth is just as much a work of God as he is himself!"
5
Suetal says, "Yes, yes, if you are telling the truth and Mathael is also irrefutably correct then this youth can, worldly speaking, certainly be the youngest disciple of the eternally great Master! The form and his deeds obviously proclaim a higher being from heaven; if this being says himself that he is the youngest disciple of the great Master of Nazareth, this Master must obviously be a Lord over all heaven according to His spirit. But if that is true, then the great question arises, what we can do in the face of the physical very Highest and All-mighty and what will we do! For that would truly be no small thing!"
6
Ribar says, "True; but could we do it differently if things were as they now seem to me doubtless to be? You see, the Deity is free and does what It wants, and the mortals cannot put any limits on It! If It had come to us as a judge, we would surely be in a bad position; but It came as a most gentle benefactor to us mortals in order to bring us nearer to It from out of the old love preached by Father Henoch[=Enoch], and in such circumstances It is not frightful. But as it seems to me, It gives us to understand only love alone in Its genuineness, because love was certainly the single motive for Its coming here. But It cannot be recognized with understanding and with all our highly-praised reason.
7
And look, some things are becoming clearer to me! The supposed Greek came to us earlier in such a friendly way and asked us whether we wanted to make the acquaintance of the great Master of Nazareth; but we spoke definitively against this with a sort of fear and countered Him with all sorts of empty logical reasons. We feared the Master because the disciple had already shown us how damned weak our reasons were.
8
Until now we still calculated with our reason and got very little out of it; and we have to thank the quite strong conjecture which is beginning to become louder and louder now in our mind to the side kick which the wise youth gave us, now that his patience is running out. For, as I am now beginning to notice clearly, he had strongly suggested before the Master"s long speech that this Greek must be the Master and no-one else! But our truly pig reason had always pulled the wool over our eyes and so we couldn't see the forest for the trees.
9
Now that due to the side kick we have some love for the Greek, a few layers of scales seem to have fallen from the eyes of our soul and we now begin to make some conjectures. And I now believe that we should throw our reason overboard into the sea and follow only the feelings of our hearts, and so we will surely reach our goal faster than through our reason which was only lent to man as using a spoon for the pot when cooking a meal, namely to stir the food. But once the food in the pot is cooked, the spoon is no longer indispensable! What is your opinion now?"
10
Suetal says, opening wide his eye, "Friend, I see well that you have settled on the Greek more and more. It is the same case with me, and I share your opinion completely; but I do not agree at the moment with throwing away reason. For if we lay aside a feeling that is bubbling inside us, what do we still have in us over the animals of the forest, which have no reason and thus must follow their instinct?
11
You see, man is often overcome by all sorts of feelings; if he followed his feelings with no discretion and without seeking the advice of his purer reason, where would he end up! Therefore in my opinion it is necessary above all to purify the reason as much as possible. For only led through enlightened reason can our better feelings become a true blessing to us.
12
The feelings of a person are like a many-armed octopus in the sea who always stretches out his many arms towards food; but there is no intelligence at all in this animal.
13
Now if a person sets his reason aside, he would obviously resemble such an animal; for the simple raw feeling of a human is more food- and enjoyment-seeking than any other animal. Only educated and purified reason rules and orders the feelings of a person, cuts out the bad ones, then keeps only the good and pure ones and in this way makes a true person out of the fake person.
14
Therefore you must not want to throw divine reason overboard; for without reason any donkey and any ox can rule over us!
15
The other ten agree completely with Suetal and all share his opinion; but Ribar shrugs his shoulders thoughtfully and Suetal says, "Well, you surely cannot have anything to say against that?! For my statement stands before God and all the world as firmly as Mount Sinai on which Moses received the commandments for a nation powerfully endowed with reason!"