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 89 -
The dangers of gold.
1
(The Lord) "You now know the true value of gold and jewels; if you use them in the way and manner that I have now shown you, you will stand completely in My order like a patriarch of the old days!
2
The patriarchs of the old days knew gold also and used it genuinely and justly; but those who began to use it according to the imagined value came very quickly into a great misfortune. For the imagined value of the gold, the pearls and the jewels caused thieves and highwaymen to emerge and one king became the enemy of another, as soon as he had learned that his neighbor had stored up too much of the yellow metal.
3
Thus only the foolishness of humanity caused mutual persecution! From it in the end come all thinkable vices that there are: envy, avarice, greed, pride, arrogance, domineeringness, gluttony, crapulence, fornication and all sorts of whoring "and in the end manslaughter, murder and all the cruelties that people spread among one another. And what is the main reason for this? Most of all the complete wrong knowledge of gold and the many jewels and pearls! The people have begun to distinguish between themselves according to the measure of possession of gold! The stronger brought much together and the weaker went empty-handed. Whoever is now rich in gold had on the one hand soon a significant portion of interested friends, and the poor person became seen just as quickly as at least half a thief, whom one cannot trust and therefore is despised! What wonder if he becomes a real thief at such an opinion?!
4
But I do not want to follow this annoying issue any longer, since you, My friend Cyrenius, can imagine everything else very easily yourself! But I do add this: If you want to be free one day from all sorts of enemies, thieves, robbers and murderers, value the gold and all the jewels according to their characteristic value, and you will thereby reduce the number of your enemies quite significantly; for through your wisdom many will then become wise themselves and recognize God's order in all things! And if they do this, they will become also noble and good people whom you will not have to fear.
5
But if you, or at least your descendents, begin to assign to gold, silver and jewels again the imagined value, you will once again enter the old relationship of hostility, in which you are now. I tell you: In certain just circumstances everything is good on the Earth and brings blessings through the true use for body, soul and spirit, and for the pure everything is pure and for him who has become a light himself there can no longer be any night; but through a foolish, consorted and thus counter-ordered use in the end even the best must become bad and instead of blessings and salvation bring curses and mischief!
6
You know that water possesses the most diverse and very best characteristics and is the very most indispensable element for the physical life of a person, animals and plants; but if a person wanted to build a house in the depths of the sea in order to live there with the fish, he will quickly find death for his body in such a house. Thus fire is like water a most necessary element for life; but whoever throws himself into the fire in the opinion that he can there achieve a greater mass of life, will soon as ashes no longer possess any spark of natural life!
7
And so it is with all things across the board! Yes, even the most poisonous plants and animals have their great blessing for this Earth, for they suck in the evil poisonous things from the air; their nature is set up in a way that the poison which exists in the quite unfermented spirits of natural life can bring them no damage to their natural life."