The Great Gospel of John
Volume 1
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Second day in Sychar
- Chapter 80 -
At Sychar. 'Live in peace and unity.' About guardian spirits. Hints about the order in the divine household. A pertinent question: how and when shall it get better on earth? When shall the kingdom of God take effect?
At this the Commander, as also many of the other guests present, is quite astonished and says, 'If this is so, life on earth is a dangerous thing. Who could hold his own?'
2
Say I, 'Everyone who lives according to My teaching, but whoever lives according to his self-conceit, which is usually saturated with self-love and pride, and cannot from all his heart forgive and bless ten times more the one who offended him in some way, will sooner or later have to taste the inevitable consequences of hostility against which he can by no means expect any protection from Me, unless he has paid his debt to his enemy to the last penny. Therefore, do live in peace and unity with everyone. It is better for you to suffer an injustice than to do even an apparent justice to someone. Thus you will not educate avengers for yourselves, and the spirits, who otherwise would have become your enemies, will then be your guardian angels and ward off many a calamity threatening you.
3
But why is all this so, and must be? Here I say: because it has to be so in accordance with My will and unchangeable order!'
4
Says the commander, 'Yes, Lord. I now recognise only too clearly your endless and unrestricted love and wisdom, and say: if possibly all men shall once be permeated with Your teaching, then the earth shall be converted into a complete heavenly kingdom! But - and this an immense 'but' - when will this occur?!
5
When I think of the vast earth to which no explorer has yet found beginning or end, and the numberless humans inhabiting its unmeasured surface, then I become dizzy to my deepest fibers! The leading attribute of all the many inhabitants of the great earth seems to be crudest malice!
6
The vast majority are saturated through and through with animalistic selfishness, and the haughtiness of furies!
7
Wherever on the wide earth some small peace-loving people settled, achieving some sort of living-standard through communal action, it was soon sniffed out by the fine snouts of wolf and tigermen and pounced upon; these poor were vanquished and made a thousand times unhappier than in their former, natural state.
8
But where such peaceful and literate little nations nevertheless through courage, intelligence and energy of spirit asserted themselves as conquerors of their enemies, whom they had to of course largely annihilate by weapon, with the spirits of the conquered dead however becoming their still greater and more harmful foes, then I quite frankly ask, how when and under what circumstances shall Your most salutary teaching ever fully take root on earth, to determine all mankind in their doings and dealings?
9
If only a few select societies, most happily, are going to bask in the mild beams of your unsurpassed teaching, then they shall day by day be surrounded by more enemies; if they willingly surrender, they shall be nothing but slaves of their conquerors, having to tolerate every inhuman oppression as well as the proscription in the end of their compliance and practice of Your teaching.
10
But if by some turn of power they should become the masters of their enemies, then the spirits and souls of those killed in battle shall really become their most invincible foes, and then the heavenly kingdom on earth shall in my opinion be done for!
11
Therefore I should leave the question of whether even for the best of the cause, one can simply return good for evil to every enemy, wide open! I should not cast the least doubt on being able to therewith potentially make a seeing friend out of a blind enemy; but whether this rule can also be applied blessedly to great masses of enemies to the benefit of the cause, that, Lord, forgive my weak understanding, I would for stated reasons question somewhat!
12
This conjures up the hapless Scylla and Charydis where, upon happily avoiding the first, one is swallowed up the more readily by the second! - Lord, only a small light upon that, and I shall embrace all my enemies in a brotherly fashion and liberate all the captives from the prisons - including all thieves, robbers and murderers, regardless of how nasty!'