The Great Gospel of John
Volume 6
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
At the Sea of Galilee (John 6)
- Chapter 74 -
The ship of the Pharisees on the troubled sea.
The newly animated daughter, her mother and her siblings also came to us and listened to the speeches of the disciples, who at this stage talked a lot about the evil spooking spirits and devils and also asserted, that some people were not in the position to protect themselves from the pursuit of such invisible, evil beings. It was difficult to understand such admission by God; those who are possessed by the devils should be properly considered, especially those where the possession already occurs with tender children.
2
Then also our innkeeper said: "Yes, this is actually a quite strange and completely incomprehensible matter! I myself have quite often seen such appearances of this kind with children of five years, who have been seized in a pitiful manner by those spirits who possessed them. The strange thing with this is only that nearly nobody can cure such evil.
3
Said I: "My old disciples are already adepted and can inform you about it, especially Simon Juda - now Peter - and Jacob and John; they can cure such evils immediately just like Me. But I Myself will not say anything further about this; for I have said earlier that I will rest for a few days regarding teachings and deeds. But you all can now speak and do what you like; just refrain from making Me known in this area and even less so in the city!"
4
The disciples then continued with their stories and John explained to the new disciples the phenomena of being possessed, and when he finished his explanation around midnight, we all went to take our rest.
5
In the morning we got up quite early and before the morning meal I went with the above mentioned disciples outside. The innkeeper soon followed us; but the other disciples stayed in the house and made notes of several things. But we talked about the fate of the pharisee ship, which still battled the high waves somewhere at sea. The innkeeper was asking if the ship has already been driven by the wind beyond the city of Tiberias.
6
But I said: "Not yet, this will only take place in a few days, this means, once they have changed their disposition somewhat, - otherwise I will let them stay near the centre of the sea for another few days and let them row in vain!"
7
The innkeeper now understood that I was certainly not to be joked with, and agreed with Me that I torment the evil pursuers of My person. The innkeeper was a great enemy of the clerics and therefore was quite joyful when they experienced any kind of distress.
8
We now did not speak anything else about this anymore and watched the strong waves of the sea and the many crowds of water birds, which are always present during such strong wave movements looking for food. The innkeeper asked where these birds live when the sea was calm.
9
And Peter, a fisherman quite familiar with the sea, said: "See, these are actually some kind of water predators who only can be seen in such large numbers if they can hunt for something; otherwise they are sitting at places along the shore which are not accessible neither from land nor from the sea side. At such localities there are a lot of insects and worms which serve these animals as food. During heavy storms such insects and worms are going into hiding and the birds then hunt for little fish elsewhere and if the storm has died down again, they return home where they have their well protected nests. Now you have what you did not have before; there is not much to it but it is nevertheless good to know such kind of things."
10
With that our innkeeper was content and mentioned that we now could return for our morning meal.