The Great Gospel of John
Volume 7
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord on the Mount of Olives. (cont.) Gospel of John, Chapter 8
- Chapter 160 -
Believing and inner vision. The spritual development of the man from Upper-Egypt.
Peter said: "Yes, friend, if you know what we know, what more do you want? Is perhaps 'firm and doubtlessly believing' not the same as 'vision in spirit'?
2
The man from Upper-Egypt said: "With this you are partly right, but still not completely. For sure, a firm and doubtless believing of the soul is stirring up in man a complete striving and a hopeful trust that once he will also really vision what he believes. When faith is increasing in power and firmness, eagerness will also increase and the desire to once vision in its fullness what has been believed, and by this, to fully take part in it. And look, friend, in this way spiritual vision stands indescribably much higher than pure faith, because the spiritual vision is the eternal crown of faith."
3
Peter said: "Yes, in this you are totally right, but you know, the Lord is not so generous with the gift of the inner vision. Now and then He permitted us for a few moments to see spiritually, but until now, there was no question of a permanent blissful ability of the soul."
4
The man from Upper-Egypt said: "Well, this is also what I mean. However, He promised it already a few times to you. You will receive that ability only when you are fully reborn out of Him. And then we must, as men who are still in the flesh, not think that we have nothing else to do except to look at the wonders of His infinite creations, because we have here on this Earth, out of love for Him and out of love for fellowman still a lot of duties to perform, and that does not mean only to vision. But man must give himself now and then a Sabbath's rest, and then he can and must vision, or at least train himself in the inner spiritual vision. Man will only receive the full permanent vision after he will lay off his body. Don't you think so?"
5
Peter said: "Well sure. However, I am really wondering how you in your wilderness came to this inner true wisdom of life. Who was your teacher?"
6
The man from Upper-Egypt said: "Most of the time I myself, by my restless searching and exploring. But my father was surveyor in Memphis, Thebe and Diathira, and I have learned this art from him. When I had this art completely under control, he started to initiate me into the hidden secrets of the temple in Ja bu sim bil. However, he died before I was completely initiated in everything.
7
His death meant to me the loss of a 1,000 lives. That is why I went as far as possible upward the Nile with my companions. There we found caves, which gave us sufficient protection against the glowing rays of the sun. The caves were close to the Nile that is twisting around a 1,000 waterfalls between the mighty rock-faces. It was not possible to go any further than that along the river, unless we would have turned off much further to the right into the great desert and had followed then the road to the Nubians. But without water we soon would dry out, together with the goats that we took with us. In short, we still found a last piece of land at the caves where there was some grass growing and our animals found sufficient food. And so, we decided to stay there, together with our small families.
8
When during the first night I slept in the cave, commending myself in the protection of the great God, my deceased father appeared to me in a dream and taught me what I had to do, and how I had to behave in order to continue to live there. He told me also that nearby the place many beasts of prey, lions, panthers and even gigantic eagles could be found. And he taught me how I, being unarmed, only through firm faith in the great God and through a firm, full fearless will, could become lord over all those animals.
9
When I woke up in the morning and stepped out of the cave, there was a very big lion coming peacefully to the cave, which apparently was his dwelling place. When he saw me, he stood still and began to shake his tail mightily. I came to him with my fearless firm will and commanded him, while I was firmly looking at him, to leave this place forever. And look, the lion turned around and disappeared somewhere in the desert. The same thing happened soon after that with two panthers and on the same day with a giant eagle who had an eye on our grazing goats.
10
So already from the first day I convinced myself what man, who, with a real trust in the only true great God and through his fearless firm will, can really do. In the evening I stood before the cave, trusted in the protection of the almighty great God for all things and commanded the whole nature to leave us in peace. That is also what happened."