The Great Gospel of John
Volume 10
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Der Herr im Jordantal
- Chapter 241 -
The imperfections of human knowledge.
The innkeeper said: "Yes, wonderful Master, this short answer of Yours on my rather long question was for me more understandable than the former one, but this reminds me of a proverb of the old sages according to which nothing is perfect under the sun, that all human experience, knowledge and information is patchwork, and that the one who made so much progress by his zeal and came to great knowledge, will finally realize that man, even after learning, seeing and experiencing everything, will be wiser when he realizes that he actually knows nothing at all, for only a divine Spirit knows everything, but man only as much as that Spirit will in a way tell him through inspiration.
2
But life of man is also too changing and too short to reach a profound development. When man is still young and strong, he is full of all kinds of passions, good and bad ones, to which he gives in and which makes it very difficult for him to raise himself to a purer light from the Spirit of God. Among a thousand people there hardly will be one exception. Finally, man gets older and comes to a somewhat more purified view, but then he often becomes sick, tired and slow, will only keep the outer laws and forms, and by that he will forget the divine Spirit. If everything goes well he can attain to an age of 60, 70 or 80 years, but in his old days he will then always think about death, will be discouraged and without strength and it will often not be possible for him anymore to intensively be concerned with God's Spirit.
3
And so the true wisdom among men is always in a bad condition, this because of the previously mentioned 3 reasons. Yes, if man in his true manly strength could become at least 300 years old, the true wisdom of men would certainly be in a better condition than now. But in this manner, because of his short life, he only can record things now and then, but he never can put perfectly together what he recorded because he lacks a longer time of life.
4
In Alexandria, there is one of the greatest collections of books in which a lot of things are written down in every area of human experience and knowledge. But where can you find someone who would live that long to be able to read through those books only once in his life? And so we, better people, must always be satisfied and comfort ourselves with our old saying: Sapienti pauca sufficit , and I am of the opinion that even the greatest wise men of this Earth had to be satisfied with this principle and had to comfort themselves with this.
5
As a soldier I have traveled a lot of countries on Earth, but I never reached the end and I also did not understand anything of what I saw. I collected many experiences and images in my memory but to what use if I do not understand what they are, how and for what purpose they existed?
6
The people know from experience that certain fruits are good for eating, that there are healing powers in many herbs, that grass is for the animals, which we call grass eaters, that wood is useful to make fire and also for the construction of houses and huts, but the people in general do not actually know much more than that. Therefore, I always look upon the people as very pitiful creatures of an almighty deity, whether they live in the very deep night of their superstition or walk around as highly celebrated wise men on Earth, since none of them know why they were actually put on this Earth without knowing or wanting it. And I think that You, who are a very wise and wonderful Master Yourself, will not say that I am wrong.
7
All wise men on Earth whom I came to know, agree that after the falling away of the body there must be a certain continuation and survival of the soul of man, but of what kind? There is still no agreement on that.
8
Also on this subject You probably will have one of the wisest opinions, but if we compare this with the opinions of all the other wise men, it will not be in agreement with the opinions of the other wise men. Am I right or not?"