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 151 -
The temple morals of the Pharisee. The miracles of Moses in view of the Pharisees.
At this the Pharisee made a positive attempt, stood very straight and began to speak in the following way: "Highest ruler! You know much, and your understanding shines like a purest diamond in the sunlight; but I also know some things, even if I do not always show it and actually may not show it according to our tradition! But wherever there is a need, it shall become clear! If a person belongs to an institution on this dear Earth and unfortunately through birth, tradition, law and through the earthly pressure of the situation is forced to swear himself to his flag for the sake of his dear stomach, then thereby one is as good as dead spiritually on this Earth. In the beginning certainly not completely; but gradually all the more!
2
For if one is forced again and again before the eyes of the people without any distinction with all means of earthly force to a make a U into an n X, then all thinking stops! One must begin to positively curse oneself for every clearer thought and say: Go away you pure light of heaven! If I am damned to be a devil, then I will be a devil! Whether crafty or foolish, it truly matters no longer any more! If I must be an X instead of a U, then I'll be it; I cannot possibly change such old circumstances!
3
In time the person gets very used to his devilry and thinks: because you have already been born a fool, and were brought up as such, then remain just as you are! If your stomach is satisfied, all the body is satisfied. Eat and drink and enjoy life as long as and however it may be enjoyed! If the last day comes then, the last hour, then all shackles are released and all laws will end forever for him who has returned to his nothingness!
4
Lies and truth then stretch out their hands to one another in the very friendliest way, where full nothingness of existence has its home. In such safest and fully truest prospects it is indeed very much the same in which dunce-cap one has spent his life on this Earth. But as long as one lives, one should nonetheless strive for the sake of the own earthly well-being to avoid everything most carefully that can make the little bit of life bitter and unpleasant; everything else is myth and chimera. But whoever looks at life as something higher only deceives himself.
5
But I do not advance this opinion as an issue with its foundations in nature, but instead only as a consequence that almost every person who firmly belongs to some caste of worldly idiots must reach this opinion and finally fully get used to it, because he cannot think, speak or act differently to how the stereotypical laws of the caste dictate him. I can be convinced very clearly one or a thousand times that things are so with the Nazarene just as your high mouth has made known to me; but what good is it to me? As long as I am a sworn-in member of the caste, there is certainly nothing left for me to do but to scream from the bottom of my lungs with them: Down with him! For he is a danger to our institute and limits our essential income!
6
Certainly I may think very secretly to myself: The whole caste wants it and has made you into its tool through your lot. And if I then withdraw and act blindly according to the prescription received, above which or below which I cannot and may not undertake anything according to my private opinion! Further I think however even more secretly: If there is seriously something in the person who is persecuted, he will make short work of us and we as the conquered will hardly ever get to see our holy chambers again; but if there is nothing to him besides a new big-talk as has happened to us a thousand times before, then he will be well got rid of, if one only can get hold of him! For what does he aim to achieve? Nothing but the foundation of a new and perhaps even worse caste!
7
Oh, at the beginning everything looks so very divine! If we look at the life of Abraham and his first descendents! One sees the divinity very often visibly walking with them and leading them along the path of the righteous "nota bene, we were certainly not there! But at the time of Moses, how did the children of Abraham look like! Moses was again one who must have studied very obediently and thoroughly the old wise men of Egypt! He was indoctrinated in all the weaknesses of the Egyptian court, had probably received the thirst to become ruler of this kingdom himself and cleared the legitimate princes of the Pharaoh out of the way to this end.
8
The first plan failed. He fled and thought up a different plan in order to agitate his blood-related but otherwise sunken below the animal kingdom people with secret propagandists against the Pharaoh who was emasculated by sex. When he learned that his people stood there at the ready he came himself armed with great magical power, and began to dictate to the king. But to his people who perhaps still had some idea of the previous divine circumstances of the old patriarchs, he presented himself as a messenger of Jehovah, performed very easily comprehensibly incomprehensible miracles for the people and so the people followed him like a flock of sheep the bellwether.
9
He indeed knew a lot about the character of the sea, that it rises and falls again twice daily. He spied out the possible crossing point long in advance. The whole bay is hardly too moderate hours walk wide. At the time of the sea's lowest point there is a more than an hour's journey wide, firm rock ground always perfectly free of water for a good three hours in the middle of the bay and serves the traveler, when the sea is not moved by any storm, as a best crossing bridge. With rapid steps one can even cross it in a good hour and then find oneself in the shortest way immediately in the Arabian desert, which one would otherwise hardly reach in 4-6 days by land, since the sea spreads for several hours wide on the other side of this ledge and is fairly deep.
10
Moses calculated this very cleverly, since he, like no one else from the Pharaoh's court, possessed a very solid knowledge of the territory. He led his masses at a fast pace over the ledge into the Arabian desert and the very most jagged mountainous areas in which, apart from his adopted parents perhaps, certainly no one else possessed. Therefore this area and its other natural miraculous characteristics, which our prophet certainly knew how to use, were indeed familiar to him.
11
But now let's leave that and look a little at the Israelites crossing the sea, and we see them complete the journey as if on the wings of the wind just as Pharaoh, now burning with anger and rage, order his army to storm after the Israelites along the same path. If the Pharaoh had come earlier, our good Moses would certainly not have escaped with his skin intact; but his laggardness and the clearing away of various obstacles kept his army back. Moses got a significant head start and happily escaped his enemies following him. Now when Pharaoh, chasing after Moses had hardly reached the middle of the aforementioned ledge, the sea began as usual to rise very rapidly and to drive its waves over the Pharaoh's army, and it is easily comprehendible that they then found its certain demise in the flood."