The Great Gospel of John
Volume 8
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
The Lord and His adversaries
- Chapter 102 -
The spiritual correspondences of the migration of the cranes.
Look, everything in the natural world - that which is in each of its 3 kingdoms - and all ever so insignificant phenomena are script and language for the enlightened soul of man. And so was and is also the flight of cranes which we have observed. The fact that these birds gave Me here a certain honor, is very true, but it would be unwise to believe that these animals recognized Me in one way or another. The matter is quite different, and what appears to you as completely miraculous is reduced to something perfectly natural.
2
Look, every person is a being that lives in his spirit, in his soul and in a natural body, and has also an outer life atmosphere around him, just as every celestial body, every individual stone in its own specific manner, and also every tree and every plant according to its nature, and so also every animal, for without such outer life atmosphere no planet nor stone, nor any other mineral, nor plant or an animal living being could exist.
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The fact that this is so you can simply conclude from your own experience when for instance in an oak forest you clearly are seized with different feelings than in a cedar forest. A totally different feeling comes over man when he stays on a limestone rock, again a different feeling on a granite rock, and in a vineyard, the observant person has another feeling than in a garden with fig trees, and that same changeable feeling is coming over man when he comes near to different animals, and even stronger when he comes near to different people. A very sensitive person can experience it already at quite a great distance and then he can feel if a good or a bad person will meet him.
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Well now, also the animals are experiencing that, and many of them much sharper than one or the other materialistic man who thinks little about what is good and true.
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When the nature of a person is completely good, and in his soul he is filled with the godly Spirit, his outer life atmosphere will be ever stronger reaching unto great distances. When then the most savage animals will come near such a person, they become permeated of his outer life atmosphere and become more gentle. They will approach him very kindly and do him no harm, and he will even be able to command them with his will, upon which they will obey him.
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Examples of the truth of what I am telling you now you can find with the first fathers of the Earth, with the patriarchs and with the prophets, and in this time you have often experienced it yourself at My side.
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Well now, surely I Myself most of all and all of you together also with Me, have surely the most extensive outer life atmosphere of very high power, goodness and perfection that is reaching out above us.
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For the cranes that we saw, which have stayed during the summer in the more northern swamps and little lakes of Greece, their time now in the autumn has come for their migration, which their sharp instinct indicates to them. These cranes, which we have seen coming out of the nearest swamps, have felt our outer life atmosphere the very first and the very most and have followed their inner urge. When they came closer, a mighty feeling of well being took hold of them, in such a way that they did not continue their flight but descended close to us, and circling here around us they were swallowing a great bliss. They became as it were totally saturated and took therefore also water, firstly to quench their thirst and secondly to have a provision for their further flight, since their travel destiny is the great plains of India.
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Thus, what you thought to have observed as something miraculous about the cranes, was in fact something very natural, which of course only He can know who is very well acquainted with the whole arrangement of all creatures.
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Indeed, all this is also a wonder, but not such a wonder as blind mankind think, namely a wonder that would be a kind of godly magic, but it is a wonder which is of a very natural nature for the person who is awakened in the spirit.
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Now if for instance in an hour a second flight of cranes would follow, you will experience exactly the same phenomenon, but will also better understand it than the first time.
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But what is actually the meaning of such a flight of cranes in the script and the language of the inner spiritual correspondence? Who can read the image and put it reliably and truly and understandably into words? Look, this is a totally different question that is certainly more difficult to answer than what you thought that the phenomenon was a real wonder.
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These birds inhabit only clean swamps close by the lakes that have clean water. They hardly can be found in stinking and dirty pools. Their food consists of healthy and living little fishes and also other clean worms from the lake.
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Well now, the clean water means in the spiritual analogy the clean knowledge of the full truth from the Heavens and which has not been made unclear by anything anymore.
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Thus, these animals represent the people who continuously strive for pure knowledge, and saturate their soul with the living clean fishes (the living Word from God) and clean worms (pure knowledge from the nature out of experience).
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As a consequence of the fact that the animals, of which we now are talking about, are only concerned about that which is clean, we can see with them a remarkable intelligence and order in everything, what we know from their actions. Where they dwell, they place attentive watchers, which by means of a certain sound have to warn the whole community when an enemy is coming near, who is infallibly detected by the sharp feeling of the guard that was placed, because his outer life atmosphere is far reaching before him. So these animals also precisely perceive when it is time to migrate. And when they start for it, it always happens with the greatest caution and order of which you were all too often able to convince yourselves.
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Look, so will also man, and finally a whole big congregation, place everything in the best possible order in all his doings and actions by his pure knowledge, practice the right caution and wisdom and consequently obtain also from that the best and safest results for the whole life and forever.
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The flight in a straight line of the cranes means the firm and earnest character to never deviate from the once recognized truth, because by this clear very straight line of the spiritual direction and way, man uses the fastest way to reach the goal that is most germinating for life.
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As these birds were continuing their flight, you all have noticed those leaders at the head of the whole long line. Look, also this is the result of the clean food.
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Now when the souls of men of a congregation are fed with the pure food of truth, they will soon find without difficulty the most wise ones among them and will give the guidance and the organization into their hands and entrust it to them completely, and these will then also remain their guides and organizers as long as they live on this Earth. And if one of them has crossed over, then he soon is replaced by one of the most worthy from the congregation. The spirit who has crossed over, will also from the beyond watch as a true protective spirit over the congregation that was left behind and will have the most blissful fellowship with them and will influence them instructively, as this was also the case with the first fathers, patriarchs and many prophets. And so, such a good organized congregation will certainly already here on this Earth continue to be in a true heavenly bliss.
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Because only man who is in this life already in the full possession of the inner life of light - because he himself clearly perceive God and His very loving and wise purposes with men, and does not see death before him, but only an eternal, most happy life - can also already here on Earth be happy in a very heavenly manner. On the other hand, another person who does not live in such an order of life, will fall from one doubt into another, frightens himself with all kinds of dark thoughts, and in order to chase these away and to anesthetize them he finally throws himself into the arms of all sensual pleasures, and so he becomes instead of a child of Heaven only but a child of Hell and its old judgment.
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The 7 guides also represent the complete number of that which is good and true of the Heavens from God, because with that complete number the 7 Spirits of God, of which you already know, are pointed out as working and acting in the right order. Therefore, also for every congregation, 7 heads in the order of the 7 Spirits from God are sufficient, yet in each one of them, those 7 Spirits should be completely working, but nevertheless, in the guidance of the congregation they should represent 1 head spirit.
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Such a congregation will then be a perfect being in the eyes of God, as this is the case in the Heavens, which consists of numberless many communities and where every community represents in a certain way a perfect being. The differences between the communities consist only in the fact that in every separate community the numberless different proportions are more or less, in one or the other Spirit of God richer and stronger represented.
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From the now indicated proportions, which are more or less reaching to infinity, also the endless many and different forms in the material creation exist, just as from 7 singular basic colors an endless variety of all possible colors, and from the 7 singular tones in the pure music a never ending variety of melodies and delightful harmonies can be created.
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And as I have now shown you in a brief outline of the nature and of the flight of the cranes a corresponding spiritual and heavenly image, so there is also a corresponding image of everything what this Earth is offering you to see, hear, smell, taste and feel. But not the body, nor your fearful soul, but only the living and eternal Spirit from God in the heart of your soul can give you the key for that. Therefore, strife for the rebirth of your spirit in your soul, then the whole creation with all its numberless many appearances will be as a big opened book before you, in which you very well will be able to see the foundation of divine love, wisdom and might and be able to understand it very clearly. Have all of you well understood this now?"
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All of them said: "Yes, Lord, great God and Master of eternity, because this time You have again spoken very clearly and openly. He who will not become good, enlightened and wise in Your school, will certainly never achieve it anywhere else."