The Great Gospel of John
Volume 6
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord and the Priests of the Temple (John 5)
- Chapter 31 -
The divine and the human nature of the Lord.
Said Philopold: "The example of the light has given me a great deal of information in this matter. But many a thing in the background still remains greatly veiled, in particular Your most perfect divine presence here, of which I can now obviously but say: If, prior to Your incarnation, You had been living with Your pure angels somewhere in an innermost heaven as Jehovah, outside of time and space, this heaven must now be devoid of Your, as it were, human-personal presence, since You are now living amongst us completely within time and space. How can You now exist within time and space but, as God, at the same time also outside of time and space? Lord, this still presents for my intellect an immense chasm, which I cannot bridge on my own. I therefore ask You for a true light also in this matter."
2
Says the Lord: "Since you are a true worldly sage of the schools of Plato, Socrates and Aristotle, I have to talk to you partly in their way, so that you can understand Me more easily.
3
Look, there is really no difference at all between 'from eternity', 'formerly' and 'now' when used in connection with My existence, as well as with My being and presence, as far as My pure divine self is concerned. If this were not so, verily, I would not have any might and power in this human body over the whole material creation. For every created being, including its time and space, is related only subjectively to Me, its object, because everything is out of Me, not I out of all that.
4
I am, therefore, always the sole precedent and archetype, hence the eternal object, and can never and nowhere put Myself into a subjective relationship to the created being.
5
However, since everything is out of Me and I, through My will, am in everything the innermost as the all maintaining, leading, guiding, regulating and animating principle, I am, where the might of My will and My wisdom is concerned, also a subject and, therefore, the Alpha and the Omega or the beginning and the end, as well as the first and the last in every created being. Owing to this My objective and, simultaneously, in everything also subjective attribute I can, according to the might of My will and My wisdom, quite well exist as a man here among you and still be at the same time the eternal, only living and creative object in relation to all created beings.
6
As a subject presently incarnated into the human flesh I am Myself lesser and subject to My own eternal object within Me, albeit through this My strict subjugation actually fully at one with the eternal object. Without such a strictest subjectivity of this My outer personality this most intimate union could never be possible.
7
This is worked through My immeasurable love for the object and its equally immeasurable love for Me and, therefore, I and the Father are one love, one wisdom, one will, one life and one might, besides which there is and can be none other in the whole eternal infinity.
8
Therefore, I am present here both within time and space and outside of time and space.
9
You do see that I am now existing with you within time and space. My works teach you that, where My innermost is concerned, I exist simultaneously outside of time and space. I could not do these works if I were also in relation to My Deity only within time and space. For the temporal and spatial is and remains forever limited and is, therefore, not perfect and complete. Only that which is outside of time and space is in everything unlimited and, thus, perfect and complete. Because this is so and cannot possibly ever be otherwise, I will explain this theory to you by way of several other examples, and so pay full attention."