The Great Gospel of John
Volume 8
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord and His adversaries
- Chapter 201 -
The healing of the sick people of the chief of the Essenes.
When the chief heard this of Me, he thanked Me with all his heart, for by this a great burden was taken away from him. While we were having this important discussion with each other, we arrived at our inn where already a rich and well-prepared morning meal was waiting for us. So we went immediately to sit at the table that was full of food and drinks. I thanked and blessed the food and wine, and then we took the morning meal in a cheerful mood and with moderation, about which the innkeeper and his wife who had prepared the meal for us were truly rejoicing.
2
Also a few of the most prominent Essenes, with the chief in charge, were sitting at our table and were eating and drinking with great enjoyment and cheerfulness. This was noticed by a few strangers who sat at different tables while having their morning bread, and they said among each other: "Something very special must be happening there, because those very prominent saviors who otherwise look so serious are now so cheerful as nobody has ever seen them before."
3
These words were however well heard by the chief and he said to the strangers: "Listen, you who are now having these thoughts about us. It is sufficient for mortal men, who are facing death, to walk on Earth with sad and serious faces and by that are showing that they are friends of life and not of death. But if a mortal human being, as we also were before, has penetrated from death to life and has put on the garment of entire immortality, then he also can be full of joy and cheerfulness already on Earth as if he were already in God's Heavens. But you will of course not yet perceive and understand this now. But also for you the time can come that you will perceive and understand it."
4
Then the strangers did not say anything anymore, and we continued to eat and drink.
5
When we had finished the meal, the young Arabian from Egypt, who had been healed by Me the evening before, came together with still a few other people who were lame and very crippled. He walked towards Me and asked Me if I would also like to heal them, for, so he said, they also were from this region and were a burden for themselves and their fellowmen, which was very sad to them because in their miserable condition they were not able to do anything good for anyone and they had to be continuously helped and maintained by those who had pity on them.
6
I said to the Arabian: "It is true that I have told you and also those who were with you yesterday not to speak to strangers about what I have done to you. You have done that in general, and out of mercy you only have told these few who are suffering where and how you were helped. Now you have taken them with you, and you yourself have pleaded for them, which gives Me a good testimony about your heart, and so your just request will not remain unanswered by Me, for the right, pure and unselfish love and mercy of a person for his suffering brothers will also with Me find always love, mercy, and it will be heard, for it is written: 'The prayer of a good, pure, believing and pious heart will at all times be heard by God.'
7
But so that in the future - if you will believe what the Essenes will teach you - you also may find help with them, I have given them the might and power to heal afflictions in My name, just as I have healed you yesterday evening. And now the chief should lay hands upon the lame and crippled, then they will be helped."
8
When the chief heard that from Me, he asked Me to help still for this time the disabled Myself, because for such work he still felt too unworthy and in his mind also still too powerless.
9
I said: "Just do as I have told you, for a true disciple should always begin a work while the master is watching, so that the master - if the disciple would not succeed something - can draw his attention to his faults and the reason for the failure, for no disciple is as perfect as his master, but once he will become like his master - through his zeal and diligence - then, just as the master, he will no more fail in anything. So do now as I have told you, then everything will turn out right and will be completely fine."
10
Only now, the chief took courage and said: "O Lord and Master, now and always, simply and solely, Your will be done." After these words, he stood up and went with great emotion to the disabled, stood among them and said: "In the name of the One who only is almighty, more than holy and endlessly good, full of love and merciful, I lay my weak hands upon you and may the great Lord and Master help you by that."
11
When the chief - while saying this expression, which was later on used by all My disciples in the healing of the sick - laid hands on the crippled, everyone of them became healed at once, in such a way as if there never had been anything wrong with them.
12
Only one of them, having lost both of his hands up to the elbows because of a fall, and whose feet were also paralyzed, that were healed, did not receive his arms back and he said to the chief: "Since you have now by the will of the only almighty Lord already set me free from all my other afflictions, I believe now also very firmly that you can also create my lost hands."
13
The chief said, somehow embarrassed: "Yes, you my friend, the Lord and Master is surely able to do that Himself since His power can call worlds into existence out of nothing, but I am only a weak disciple and cannot do that, for there is a great difference between healing and creating.
14
When a plant is withering in the garden and looks sick, one can give it water, then it will become fresh and healthy again, and this is called healing. But if there is not a single plant in the garden, the sprinkling on the bare ground has no use at all, for we men, even with the best intention and with the strongest faith, cannot call even the smallest moss plant into existence. Only God's almighty will can do that.
15
You, friend, will therefore also clearly realize that I as a human being was able, through the mercy of the Lord and Master, to heal indeed your still existing - although paralyzed - limbs, but I cannot create anew your entirely lost arms."
16
The man without arms could understand this indeed, but still he said to the chief: "If the great Lord and Master has given you this great power to heal such crippled people, as we were before, so suddenly and miraculously through your word and through the laying on of your hands, which is actually the same as a complete new creation, then it still should be possible to restore my lost hands. That will probably not be less possible for you and that Master as the very sudden healing of our paralyzed and entirely crippled limbs, sense organs and sick inward parts. For look, I even can feel my both lost hands as if I still had them, and I even feel now and then as it were a burning pain in my two lost arms, and thus I believe that my soul has not lost the hands, even if my body has lost them.
17
Furthermore I am of the opinion that through the power of a true and almighty God, also a lost part of the body can be restored to someone, just as an elephant's teeth that are cast, the deer its antlers, the crab its pincers, and even us human beings our hairs that are shaved off and our nails that are cut off. It certainly would only depend on the will of God, on the right faith of a true disciple of God and on the suffering person."
18
After these very meaningful words of the man without hands, who was a migrated Jew, the chief did not know what he should do at that moment. Did he have to lay on hands on the man without hands one more time, with a very firm faith, or should he first discuss with Me about it whether and how the desire of the man without hands could possibly be granted? He preferred the second and came with this matter to Me.
19
And I said to him: "See how good it was that you, while I was watching, have done a first work, and thereby have stumbled over a little lack of faith and trust in God's love, wisdom and power. If you, without doubting, would also have included in your faith the restoration of the arms of the Egyptian Jew, then he would have his hands by now, but being afraid you retreated and thought that this matter would be impossible, and so that man did not receive his lost hands back. But go now and believe firmly that with Me all things are possible. Lay your hands upon him once more, then he also will receive his hands anew."
20
After these words of Mine, the chief, named Roklus, went full of the firmest faith again to the man without hands and said: "Since you yourself believe, and as a Jew know the almightiness of the only true God, it will be done according to your desire and faith, in the name of that great Lord and Master in who lives bodily the fullness of God's Spirit."
21
When the chief had said that over the man without hands, he immediately received his lost hands back.