The Great Gospel of John
Volume 6
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord on the Mount of Olives (John Chapter 8)
- Chapter 244 -
On judging and punishments.
Said now the scribe: "Lord and Master, I can see now, that only You are extremely good and true, and it is best to behave and to believe and to speak, as You have explained everything from below to the top! Only with the abolishment of the capital punishment I cannot completely agree with; for if on the life of a person is not again placed the life of the murderer, soon nobody would be sure of his life anymore. Only the certain capital punishment prevents many from committing the greatest atrocities!"
2
Said I: "Yes, this is again your opinion, however I have in this regard a completely different opinion! A tiger bears another, equally so a lion, a panther and a hyena.
3
If a raw, entirely beastly neglected person, driven by his beastly passions, kills a person, the killed would have the actual right, to also kill his killer; however, a third, to whom the killer has never done any harm, has actually no right at all, to take revenge at the killer on behalf of the victim. However, since such an animal person can also become dangerous for other people, he can be hunted down. If he is caught, he should be held in a good prison, give him education and endeavour to make a person out of him! If this is achieved, you have turned a devil into a person, for which you can expect more of the true life reward in you, than having the murderer killed. That would be one of the very best ways to handle a murderer.
4
Or in another case, where the murderer is a too much incarnated devil, hunt him down; and if you have caught him, ask him the reason, why he has committed such atrocities, and if he feels remorse about it! If he speaks the truth, then do, as I have explained previously; however, if he lies about the deed and does not answer you properly, despite you being convinced that he is culprit, then make sure that he in future is not a danger to society anymore, however, not by killing him, but by means of a strong prison, by blinding his eyes or by banning him to such far off area somewhere along the coast, from which place no return is possible for him.
5
This is My advice, how you should behave in such a case as My true disciples. You can better and clean your society from perpetrators; but you should not set up a court! Since who judges, will one day also be judged by Me. However, who does not judges, will also not be judged by Me. If you curse and damn the sinners against you, you one day can expect the same from Me; but if you walk in My teaching, you will not be damned and cursed.
6
You should not even say to your brothers 'Raka' (a backstabbing, treacherous person. J.L.); since thereby you already make yourself guilty of a judgement, because, if you mean it seriously, you have cast a judgement over a brother. Even less so should you say to a still stupid brother with al seriousness that he is a fool; for if you are more wise than he is, you are such out of the mercy of God. Have you become proud about it, and if it occurs that you are ashamed for the stupid, does not want to speak to him and say: 'Who can speak with a fool?', then such a judgement already originates from a germ of hell in you, and you make yourself guilty of the infernal fire (zeal). It is however not nice, if in My disciples only one little spark of hell is ignited through such false zeal; since also the smallest spark can cause a big fire.
7
In hell the fire of haughtiness is the greatest and in heaven only the light of the highest humility and modesty shines, and the soft fire of love warms and enlivens everything. - Do you understand this?"