1 Jn. iv. 1113. 16. He gave us life and blessedness; therefore No man can perfectly know God. All we can know of Him is, that He had love toward us, and because of this love gave us life. And to be in fellowship with God, we must be like Him, and do as He does; we must love one another. If we love one another, God dwells in us, and we dwell in Him. Having understood the love of God toward us, we believe that God is love, and that he 17. who loves is united with God. And having understood this, we do not fear death, because in this world we become such as God Himself Our life becomes love, and is thus freed from fear and all sufferings. 18. is. 19. 20. 21. v. 3. We love, because He loves. And we love not a God whom no one can love, because no one sees Him, but our brother-man, whom it is possible to love. He who says he loves God, and yet hates his brother, is deceiving himself. Because, if he does not love the brother whom he sees, how, then, can he love God whom he does not see? For it is ordained to us to love God in our brother. He To love God, is to fulfil His commandments. And these commandments are not hard for 4. him who, recognizing that his origin is from 5. God, rises above the world. Our faith lifts us above the world. And our faith in that which Jesus, the Son of God, taught us, is true. has taught us that he lived in the world, not merely in the way of truth, but by the power 6. of the spirit. And that spirit is in us, and makes us strong in truth, following out the teaching. 9. If we believe in what men affirm, why, then, should we not believe in the spirit that is in 10. ourselves? He who believes in that spirit of life which is in us, has assurance within him self. And he who does not believe that there is a spirit from above us, from the Father, makes God a deceiver. 12. The spirit in us affirms that our life is eter- 1 Ja. v. II. nal. He who knows that this spirit is the offspring of the Infinite Spirit, and becomes like Him, has eternal life. And for him who so believes, there is no difficulty left in his life, but everything he desires in the will of the Father will come to him. Therefore he who believes himself to be a son of God, will not live in any deception, but is free from evil. Because he knows that this material world is an illusion, and that in man himself there is the capacity to know that which has real existence. And only the Spirit, the Son, the offspring of the Father, really exists. 14. 18. 19. 20. A RECAPITULATION CHAPTER I THE SON OF GOD Man, the son of God, is powerless in the flesh, and free in the spirit ("Our Father") JESUS in his childhood called God his Father. There arose in Judea, at this time, a prophet named John. John preached the coming of God upon earth. He said that when men should change their lives, when they should treat one another as equals, when they should cease to injure one another, and, instead of so doing, serve one another, then God would appear upon earth, and His kingdom would be established on earth. Jesus, having heard this declaration, withdrew from among men and went into the wild places, to meditate upon the meaning of human life, and upon his relations to that infinite source of all being, called God. And Jesus accepted as his Father that infinite source of being whom John had called God. After passing days in the wild places without taking food, Jesus began to suffer hunger. Then he thought to himself, "I am the Son of God the Almighty; I ought, then, to be as He is. But now, I wish to eat, and no bread comes for my need; I am not, then, all-powerful." Then he said to himself, "It is true, I cannot make for myself bread out of stones; but I can overcome the want of bread. So that, though not all-powerful in the body, I am all-powerful in the spirit, and I can quell the body; and thus I am the Son of God, not through the flesh, but through the spirit." Then he said: "But if I am the Son of the Spirit, I can free myself of the body, and do away with it." But to that he answered, “I am born as spirit, embodied in flesh. Such is the will of my Father, and I cannot set myself against His will.” "But if you cannot satisfy the wants of your body, and if you are no better able to free yourself from your body," he went on to himself, “you ought, then, to labor for the body, and to enjoy all the pleasures it gives you." But to that he answered, “I cannot satisfy the wants of my body any better than I can rid myself of it; but my life is all-powerful, in that it is the spirit of my Father; and it follows that in my body I must serve the spirit, my Father, and labor for Him only! And becoming convinced that man's life is only in the spirit of the Father, Jesus left the wild places, and began to declare his teaching to men. He said that the spirit dwelt in him, that henceforth heaven was opened, that the powers of heaven were brought to men, that for men a free and boundless life was begun, and that all men, however unfortunate in the body, may be happy. CHAPTER II LIFE IN THE SPIRIT Therefore man must work, not for the flesh, but for the spirit ("Which art in heaven") THE Jews, holding themselves orthodox, worshiped an external God, whom they regarded as Creator and Lord of the Universe. According to their teaching, this external God had made an agreement with them. According to this agreement, he had promised the Jews to help them, and they had promised to worship Him; and the chief condition of the alliance was the keeping of the Sabbath. But Jesus said: "The Sabbath is a human institution. That man shall live in the spirit, is more important than all religious ceremonies. Like all external forms of religion, the keeping of the Sabbath includes in itself a delusion. It is impossible to do nothing on the Sabbath. Good actions must be done at any time; and if keeping the Sabbath prevents good action, then the Sabbath is an error." Another condition in this agreement with God, was the avoidance of the society of infidels. As to this, Jesus said: "God asks for no sacrifice to Himself, but only that men should love one another." Still another condition related to the following of rules about washing and cleansing; as to which, Jesus said: "God demands, not outside cleanliness, but only, pity and love toward men." He taught that all such external ceremonies were harmful, and that the church tradition itself was an evil. The church tradition causes men to neglect the most important acts of love, as, for instance, love to father and mother. Of all external ceremonies, of all the ritual of the old law, which had for object, as was held, the purification of men, Jesus said: "Know all of you, that nothing from outside can defile a man; only what he thinks, and what he does, defiles him." After this, Jesus went to Jerusalem, a town considered holy, entered the temple, where the orthodox believed that God dwelt, and there taught: "It is useless to offer God sacrifices; man is of more consequence than a temple; and the only duty is, to love one's neighbor, and help him." And he taught, further: "Men need not worship God in any particular place, but they must worship Him in spirit and in act. The spirit cannot be seen or shown. The spirit is man's consciousness of his sonship to the Infinite Spirit. No temple is needed. The true temple is the society of men united in love." He said: "All external worship of the divine is not only false and injurious, as with the Jews, among whom it caused murder and admitted neglect of parents, but harmful, |