GRM 67.3
The Gospel as revealed to me
Quotation
A lifetime (...) lasts an instant of eternity.
Notes for this theme
Reading comfort
GRM 67.3
A lifetime (...) lasts an instant of eternity.
GRM 67.3
Love. I say nothing else. Love your neighbour as the Lord God of Israel prescribes. Do not always be of Cain’s blood. And why are you so? For the sake of a few coins, you who might have become murderers. For a few palms of land. For a better position. For a woman. What are such things? Are they eternal? No. They last less than a lifetime, which lasts an instant of eternity. And what do you lose if you follow them? The eternal peace promised to the just, and which the Messiah will bring you together with His Kingdom. Come on to the way of Truth. Follow the Voice of God. Love one another. Be honest. Be moderate. Be humble and fair. Go and meditate.
GRM 68.6
«Master, this man is almost blind and he wants to see. I told him you can…»
«I can heal him who has faith. Have you faith, man?»
«I believe in the God of Israel. I come here to enter the Bethzatha Pool. But there is always someone before me.»
«Can you believe in Me?»
«If I believe in the angel of the pool, should I not believe in You, Who Your disciple says are the Messiah?»
GRM 69.3
Life is a gift, a gift to be loved. But what gift is it? A holy gift. So love it holily. Life lasts as long as the flesh holds out. Then the great Life, the eternal Life begins. A Life of blissful happiness for the just, of malediction for the unjust. Is life a purpose or a means? It is a means. It serves for a purpose which is eternity. Then let us give life what is required to make it last and serve the spirit in its conquest. Continence of the flesh in all its lusts, in all of them. Continence of the mind in all its desires, in all of them. Continence of the heart in all human passions. Infinite instead is to be the ardour for heavenly passions: love of God and the neighbour, obedience to the divine word, heroism in good and virtue.
GRM 69.4
«I have understood and it is sufficient. But… it is very difficult to do what I have understood. You can… because You are holy. But… I am a man, young and full of life…»
«I have come for men, Judas. Not for the angels. They do not need a teacher. They see God. They live in His Paradise. They are not unaware of the passions of men, because the Intelligence, which is their Life, makes them acquainted with everything, also those who are not guardians of men. But, spiritual as they are, they can have but one sin, as one of them had, and he drew to his side those who were weaker in charity: pride, the arrow that disfigured Lucifer, the most beautiful of the archangels, and turned him into the horrifying monster of the Abyss. I have not come for the angels, who, after Lucifer’s fall, are horrified even at the shadow of a proud thought. But I have come for men. To make angels of men.»
Judas said to Jesus:
GRM 69.4
«(...) It is very difficult to do what I have understood. You can… because You are holy. But… I am a man, young and full of life…»
«I have come for men, Judas. Not for the angels. They do not need a teacher. They see God. They live in His Paradise. They are not unaware of the passions of men, because the Intelligence, which is their Life, makes them acquainted with everything, also those who are not guardians of men. But, spiritual as they are, they can have but one sin, as one of them had, and he drew to his side those who were weaker in charity: pride, the arrow that disfigured Lucifer, the most beautiful of the archangels, and turned him into the horrifying monster of the Abyss. I have not come for the angels, who, after Lucifer’s fall, are horrified even at the shadow of a proud thought. But I have come for men. To make angels of men.
Man was the perfection of creation. He had the spirit of the angel and the full beauty of the animal, complete in all its animal and moral parts. There was no creature equal to him. He was the king of the earth, as God is the King of Heaven, and one day, when he would have fallen asleep for the last time on the earth, he would have become king with the Father in Heaven. Satan tore the wings off the angel-man and he replaced them with the claws of a beast and with intense yearning for filth, and lured him into becoming a being which is better described as a man-demon, rather than simply a man. I want to eradicate the disfigurement worked by Satan, as well as the corrupted craving of the contaminated flesh. I want to give back to man his wings, and make him king once again, co-heir of the Father and of the Celestial Kingdom. I know that man, if he is willing, can do what I say, to become once again king and angel. I would not tell you things you could not do. I am not one of the rhetors who preach impossible doctrines.»
GRM 69.4 · Volume 1
Man, if he is willing, can do what I say, to become once again king and angel.
GRM 70.3
70.3 They go out into the olive-grove. But before going out, John takes something out of the knapsack in the corner. They walk for a little while and they reach a brow from which the whole of Jerusalem can be seen.
«Let us sit down here and talk a little» says Jesus.
But John prefers to sit at Jesus’ feet on the short grass, and he rests his arm on Jesus’ knees, with his head reclined on his arm, looking now and again at Jesus. He looks like a little boy near the person dearest to him. «It is beautiful also here, Master. Look how large the town seems at night. Larger than by day.»
«It is because the moonlight shades the outlines. See: the borders seem to widen out in a silver brightness. Look at the top of the Temple, up there. Does it not look as if it were suspended in mid air.»
«It seems supported by angels on their silver wings.»
Jesus sighs.
«Why are You sighing, Master?»
«Because the angels have abandoned the Temple. Its feature of purity and holiness is now confined to its walls only. Those who should impress it into its soul — because every place has its soul, that is the spirit for which it was built, and the Temple has, or should have, a soul of prayer and holiness — those who should energise such spirit, are instead the first to suffocate it. You can not give what you do not possess, John. And if there are many priests and Levites living there, not even one tenth of them are capable of giving life to the Holy Place. They give death instead. They transmit the death of their own souls, which are dead to what is holy. They have their formulae. But they do not have the essence of them. They are corpses that are warm only because putrifaction swells them.»
«Have they done You wrong, Master?» John is all upset.
«No. On the contrary they allowed Me to speak when I asked to.»
«Did You ask them? Why?»
«Because I do not want to be the one who starts war. There will be war in any case. Because I shall be the cause of a silly human fear for some, and the cause of reproach for others. But this must be written in their book, not in Mine.»
Jesus is with John, in the olive grove of Gethsemane. They see the whole city of Jerusalem.
GRM 72.3
It grieves Me only to notice how much man has been corrupted by Satan who perverts his thoughts. All men, you know! The thoughts of all of you have been misled by him! But the day will come, when you will have the Strength and the Grace of God, you will have Wisdom with His Spirit… you will then have everything to enable you to judge rightly.
Jesus said to John, Judas, and Simon the Zealot:
GRM 74.7-9
74.7 Jesus stretches out His arms. When Judas sees that gesture he says: «Don’t speak! It isn’t wise!»
But Jesus’ powerful voice fills the square: «Men of Judah! Men of Bethlehem, listen! Women of the land sacred to Rachel, listen! Listen to One Who descends from David, and has suffered because of persecutions and has become worthy of speaking, and is speaking to you to give you light and comfort. Listen.»
The people stop shouting, quarrelling and buying and they gather together.
«He is a rabbi!»
«He certainly comes from Jerusalem.»
«Who is He?»
«What a handsome man!»
«And what a voice!»
«And His manners!»
«Of course, He is of David’s House!»
«He is one of ours, then!»
«Let’s listen to Him!»
The whole crowd is now gathered near the little staircase which looks like a pulpit.
«Genesis states: “I will make you enemies of each other: you and the woman: She will crush your head and you will strike at Her heel”. It is also said: “I will multiply your pains in childbearing… and the soil shall yield you brambles and thistles”. That was the sentence against man, woman and the serpent.
I have come from far to revere Rachel’s tomb, and in the evening breeze, in the dew of the night, in the plaintive morning song of the nightingale, I heard ancient Rachel’s sobs being repeated, and they were repeated by the mouths of many mothers of Bethlehem, within their tombs or within their hearts. And I heard Jacob’s sorrow roar in the pain of the widowed husbands, deprived of their wives whom sorrow had killed… I cry with you… But listen, brethren of My land. Bethlehem, the blessed land, the least of the towns in Judah, but the greatest in the eyes of God and of mankind, roused Satan’s hatred because it was the cradle of the Saviour, as Micah says, destined to be the tabernacle on which the Glory of God, the Fire of God, His Incarnate Love was to rest.
“I will make you enemies of each other: you and the woman; She will crush your head and you will strike at Her heel”. Which enmity is there greater than the one that aims at a mother’s children, the very heart of a woman? And which heel is there stronger than the Saviour’s Mother’s? The revenge of Satan defeated was therefore a natural one: he did not strike at the heel, but at the hearts of mothers, because of the Mother.
Oh! Pains were multiplied when the children were lost after giving birth to them! Oh! great was the trouble of being a childless father after sowing and toiling for the offspring! And yet, Bethlehem, rejoice! Your pure blood, the blood of the innocents has prepared a blazing purple way for the Messiah…»
74.8 The crowd, which has become more and more turbulent after Jesus mentioned the Saviour and His Mother, is now showing clear signs of agitation.
«Be quiet, Master» says Judas. «And let us go.»
But Jesus does not listen to him. He goes on: «… for the Messiah that the Grace of the God-Father saved from tyrants to preserve Him for His people and its salvation and…»
The shrill voice of a woman shouts: «Five, five I gave birth to, and not one is now in my house. Poor me!» And she yells hysterically.
It is the beginning of the uproar.
Another woman rolls over in the dust, she tears her dress, and shows a breast maimed of its nipple, shouting: «Here, here on this breast they slaughtered my first-born son! The sword cut off his face and my nipple at the same time. Oh! my Ellis!»
«And what about me! What about me? There is my royal palace. Three tombs in one, watched over by the father: my husband and children together. There, there! If there is a Saviour, let Him give me back my children, my husband, let Him save me from despair, from Beelzebub He must save me.»
They all shout: «Our children, our husbands, our fathers! Let Him give them back, if He exists!»
Jesus waves His arms imposing silence. «Brethren of My land: I would like to give you back your children, in their flesh. But I tell you: be good, be resigned, forgive, hope, rejoice in hope and exult in one certainty: you will soon have your children, angels in Heaven, because the Messiah is about to open the gates of Heaven, and if you are just, death will be a new Life and a new Love…»
«Ah! Are You the Messiah? In the name of God, tell us.»
Jesus lowers Him arms, in so sweet and kind a gesture as if He were embracing them all, and He says: «Yes, I am.»
«Go away! Go away! It’s Your fault, then!»
A stone is thrown amid hisses and jeers.
74.9 Judas reacts at once in a most praiseworthy way… Oh! if he had always behaved thus! He jumps in front of Jesus, standing on the low wall of the landing, with his mantle wide open and undaunted he protects Jesus from the stones. His face bleeds and he shouts to John and Simon: «Take Jesus away. Behind those trees. I’ll follow. Go, in the name of Heaven!» And he shouts to the crowd: «Mad dogs! I am of the Temple and I will report you to the Temple and to Rome.»
The crowd is scared for a moment. Then the shower of stones is resumed at once, but fortunately, they are not experts. And Judas, fearless, receives them, and replies with offensive language to the curses of the crowd. Furthermore: he catches a stone thrown at him, and he throws it back on the head of an old man who is shouting like a magpie plucked alive! And as they attempt to climb up his pedestal, he quickly picks up an old branch from the ground, (he has now come off the little wall) and he swings it round on backs, heads and hands mercilessly.
Some soldiers rush to the spot and with their lances they make their way through the crowd: «Who are you? Why this brawl?»
«I am a Judaean and I have been attacked by these plebeians. A rabbi, well known to the priests, was with me. He was speaking to these dogs. But they became wild and attacked us.»
«Who are You?»
«Judas of Kerioth, I was a man of the Temple, now I am a disciple of rabbi Jesus of Galilee. I am a friend of Simon the Pharisee, of Johanan the Sadducee, and of Joseph of Arimathaea, the Counsellor of the Sanhedrin, and finally, of Eleazar ben Anna, the Proconsul’s great friend, and you can check.»
«I will. Where are you going?»
«I am going to Kerioth with my friend, then to Jerusalem.»
«Go. We will protect your back.»
Judas hands some coins to the soldier. It must be illegal… but quite normal, because the soldier takes them swiftly and cautiously, he salutes and smiles. Judas jumps down from his platform, he goes through the uncultivated field, skipping now and again, and he reaches his companions.
«Are you seriously hurt?»
«No, it’s nothing, Master! In any case, it’s for You… But I gave them a licking as well. I must be covered with blood…»
«Yes, on your cheek. There is a rivulet here.»
John moistens a small piece of cloth and wipes Judas’ cheek.
«I am sorry, Judas… But see,… to tell them that we are Judaeans, according to your good practical sense…»
«They are beasts. I believe You are now convinced, Master. And I hope you will not insist…»
«Oh! no! Not because I am afraid. But because it is useless, just now. When they do not want us, we must not curse them, but withdraw praying for the poor, foolish people, who die of starvation and cannot see the Bread. Let us go along this out-of-the-way path, towards the shepherds, if we can find them. I think we will be able to get on to the Hebron road…»
«To have more stones thrown at us,?»
«No. To say to them: “I am here”.»
«What?… They will certainly beat us. They have been suffering for thirty years because of You.»
«We shall see.»
They enter a cool, shady, thick little wood, and I lose sight of them.
Jesus came to the ruins of Anne's house. He decided to speak to the people of Bethlehem, who had lost their children in the massacre of the Innocents.