Part 3
Without inwardness, an adherent of the most rigid ortho doxy may be demonic. He knows it all. He genuflects before the holy. He is ceremoniously flawless. He speaks of meeting before the throne of God and knows how many times to bow. He knows everything, but only like the person who can prove a mathematical proposition when the letters are ABC, but not when the letters are DEF. He is nonetheless anxious, especially whenever he hears something that is not exactly the same as his belief. He resembles the philosopher who has discovered a new proof for the immortality of the soul and then, in peril of his life, cannot produce the proof because he has forgotten his notebooks! What is it that both of them lack? It is certitude.
With what industrious zeal, with what sacrifice of time, dili gence, and writing materials the theologians and philosophers in our time have spent to prove God's existence! Yet to the same de gree that the excellence of these proofs increase certainty declines. What is it that such individuals lack? Again, it is inwardness.
But inwardness may also be lacking in an opposite direction. So-called pious Christians are also unfree. They too lack the au thentic certitude of inwardness. That is why they are so pious! And the world is surely justified in laughing at them. If, for ex ample, a bowlegged man wants to be a dancing master but is not able to execute a single step, he is comical. So it is also with the multitudes who are so religious. Often you can hear the pi ous beating time, as it were, exactly like one who cannot dance but nevertheless knows enough to beat time, yet who are never fortunate enough to get in step. In order to reassure themselves, the pious seize upon grandiose ideas that the world hates. They battle ideas, but not with their lives. Such is the life of those who lack inwardness.
Eternity is a very radical thought, and thus a matter of in wardness. Whenever the reality of the eternal is affirmed, the present becomes something entirely different from what it was apart from it. This is precisely why human beings fear it (under the guise of fearing death). You often hear about particular gov ernments that fear the restless elements of society. I prefer to say that the entire Age is a tyrant that lives in fear of the one restless element: the thought of eternity. It does not dare to think it. Why? Because it crumbles under – and avoids like anything – the weight of inwardness.
17 Christ Has No Doctrine
A true believer is infinitely interested in what is real. For faith this is decisive, and this interestedness does not just involve a little curiosity but an absolute dependence on the object of faith.
The object of faith, understood Christianly, is not a doctrine, for then the relation is merely intellectual. Neither is the object of faith a teacher who has a doctrine, for when a teacher has a doctrine, then the doctrine is more important than the teacher. The object of faith is the actuality and authority of the teacher; that the teacher actually is. Therefore faith's answer is absolutely either yes or no. Faith's posture is not in relation to a teaching, whether it is true or not, but is the answer to the question about a fact: Do you accept as fact that he, the Teacher, actually exists? Please note that the answer to this is a matter of infinite con cern. Of course, if the object of faith is only a human being, then the whole thing is a sham. But this is not the case for Christians. The object of Christian faith is God's historical ex istence, that is, that God at a certain point in time existed as an individual human being.
Christianity, therefore, is not a doctrine about the unity of the divine and the human, not to mention the rest of the logical paraphrases of typical religious thought. Christianity is not a doctrine but a fact: God came into existence through a particu lar human being at a particular point in history.
Christianity is not to be confused with objective or scientific truth. When Christ came into the world it was difficult to become a Christian, and for this reason one did not become preoccu pied with trying to understand it. Now we have almost reached the parody that to become a Christian is nothing at all, but it is a difficult and very involved task to understand it. Everything is re versed. Christianity is transformed into a kind of worldview, a way of thinking about life, and the task of faith consists in un derstanding and articulating it. But faith essentially relates itself to existence, and becoming a Christian is what is important. Be lieving in Christ and wanting to "understand" his way by ar ticulating it and elaborating on it is actually a cowardly evasion that wants to shirk the task. To become a Christian is the ulti mate, to want to "understand" Christianity, as if it were some doctrine, is open to suspicion.
That one can know what Christianity is without being a Christian is one thing. But whether one can know what it is to be a Christian without being one is something else entirely. And this is the problem of faith. One can find no greater dubious ness than when, by the help of "Christianity," it is possible to find Christians who have not yet become Christians.
Faith, therefore, and the object of faith is not a lesson for slow learners in the sphere of knowledge, an asylum for the ig norant. Faith exists in a sphere of its own. The immediate iden tifying mark of every misunderstanding of Christianity is that faith is changed into a belief and drawn into the range of intel lectuality – a matter of understanding, of knowledge. Infinite interestedness in the actuality and authority of the Teacher, ab solute commitment, becoming Christian – that is the sole pas sion and object of faith.
18 Faith: The Matchless Lack of Logic
Can one come to know anything about Christ from history? No. And why not? It is because Christ is the paradox, the object of faith, and exists only for faith. About him nothing can be known; he can only be believed. You cannot come to know anything about Christ from history. Whether one learns little or much about him, it will not represent who he is in real ity. Obtaining historical facts makes Christ into someone other than who he in fact is.
Can't you at least demonstrate from history that Christ was God, even though we might know little else? Let me ask another question first: Can any more absurd contradiction be imagined than wishing to prove that an individual person is God? Now think of proving that! How can you make something that conflicts with reason into something reasonable? You can't, unless you wish to contradict yourself. The so-called proofs for the divinity of Christ that people claim Scripture sets forth – his miracles, his resurrection, his ascension – are not, when you think about it, in harmony with our reason. On the contrary, they demon strate that believing in Christ's works is a matter of faith.
What can all the miracles really demonstrate anyway? At most that Jesus Christ was a great man, perhaps the greatest who ever lived. But that he was – God – no, stop; that conclu sion will surely miscarry.
How is it possible to observe the gradually unfolding results of something and then arrive at, by some trick of deduction, a conclusion different in quality from what you began with? Is it not sheer insanity (providing humanity is sane) to let your judgment become so altogether confused as to land in the wrong category? A footprint is certainly the consequence of some creature having made it. I may mistake it for that of a bird, but on closer inspection, and by following the prints for some distance, I may determine that some other animal made it. Fine. But can I at some point reach the conclusion: ergo it is a spirit that has walked along this way, a spirit – which leaves no print? Precisely the same holds true whenever we try to infer from the results of a person's life that therefore he was God.
True, if God and humankind resemble each other so closely so as to essentially belong to the same category of being, the conclusion "therefore Christ was God" makes perfect sense. But this is nothing but humbug. If that is all there is to being God, then God does not exist at all! But if God belongs to a category infinitely different from the human, why, then neither I nor any one else can start with the assumption that Christ was human and then logically conclude that therefore he was God. Anyone with a bit of logical sense should be able to see this. The ques tion of whether or not he was God lies on an entirely different plane: each person must decide for himself whether or not he will believe Christ to be what he himself claimed to be.
Faith protests against every attempt to approach Christ by means of historical facts. Faith's contention is that the historian's whole approach is – blasphemy. How strange! With the help of history, that is, by looking at the results of Christ's life, we think we can arrive at the conclusion that he was God. Yet faith makes the very opposite claim. Anyone who begins with this kind of logic is guilty of blasphemy. The blasphemy is
18 Faith: The Matchless Lack of Logic
not so much the hypothetical assumption that Christ was a hu man being, but in the thought that the results of his life can be separated from who he was. When you scrutinize the facts, you make Christ out to be just a man.
With regard to Christ we have only sacred history (which is qualitatively different from the historian's account). Christ is the divine-human paradox that history can never digest or con vert into a proof. Even with what we know of Christ's life and of all his brilliant works, they will pale in comparison to his com ing again in glory! Or perhaps you think that Christ's return will be nothing more than the progressive result of his life in history? No! Christ's return will be something entirely different, something that can only be believed. That Christ was God in carnate in his lowliness and that he will come again in glory, all this is far beyond the comprehension of history. This cannot be inferred from "facts" or from history, no matter how match lessly you regard them, except through a matchless lack of logic.
It is infinitely beyond history's capacity to demonstrate that God, the omnipresent One, lived here on earth as an individual human being. History can indeed richly communicate knowl edge, but such knowledge annihilates Jesus Christ. How strange, then, that anyone ever wanted to use history to demonstrate that Christ was God. Even if Christ's life had manifested no as tonishing results, it makes no difference. Besides, what's so ex traordinary about the fact that God's life had extraordinary results? To talk this way is sheer nonsense. No, God lived here on earth, in true lowliness, and that is what is infinitely extra ordinary – extraordinary in itself. The fact that he lived among us is infinitely more important than all the extraordinary re sults ever recorded in history.
19 Passion and Paradox
How shall we understand the truth in terms of subjectivity? Here is a definition: The truth is an objective un certainty held fast through personal appropriation with the most passionate inwardness. This is the highest truth there can be for an existing person. At the point where the road divides, objective knowledge is suspended, and one has only uncer tainty, but this is precisely what intensifies the infinite passion of inwardness. Subjective truth is precisely the daring venture of choosing the objective uncertainty with the passion of the infinite.
I observe nature in order to find God, and I do indeed see omnipotence and wisdom. However, I also see much that is troubling and unsettling. The sum total of this is that God's ex istence is an objective uncertainty, but the inwardness, the cer tainty of his existence, is still so very great, precisely because of this objective uncertainty. In a mathematical proposition abso lute objectivity is given, but for that reason its truth is also an indifferent truth and concerns me very little.
Now the definition of truth stated above is actually a para phrasing of faith. No uncertainty, no risk. No risk, no faith. Faith is the contradiction between the infinite passion of in wardness and objective uncertainty. In other words, if I appre hend God objectively, I do not have faith; but because I cannot do this, I must have faith. If I want to keep myself in faith, I
19 Passion and Paradox
must continually see to it that I hold fast the objective uncer tainty. I must see to it that in the objective uncertainty I am "out on 70,000 fathoms of water" and still have faith.
This is not all. Truth as subjectivity, when it is in highest in tensity, holds fast to more than objective uncertainty. When subjectivity or inwardness is truth, then truth, objectively de fined, is a paradox. Paradox shows precisely that subjectivity is truth, for objectivity's repulsion, the paradox, is the resilience and barometer of inwardness.
Socrates' great merit is precisely in being an existing thinker, not a speculative thinker who forgets what it means to exist. And this is indeed admirable. But let us now go further; let us assume that the eternal, essential truth is itself the paradox. How does the paradox emerge? By placing the eternal, essential truth together with existing. The eternal truth itself has come into existence in time. That is the paradox, and the highest truth for an existing person.
Again, without risk, no faith; the more risk, the more faith. Therefore, the more objective reliability, the less inwardness (inwardness is subjectivity); the less objective reliability, the deeper the possible inwardness. Hence, when the paradox is the object of faith it thrusts away by virtue of the absurd, and the corresponding passion of inwardness is faith. What, then, is the absurd? The absurd is that the eternal truth has come into exist ence in time, that God has come into existence, has been born, has grown up, has come into existence exactly as an individual human being, indistinguishable from any other human being.
Subjectivity is truth and if subjectivity is in existing, then, if I may put it this way, Christianity is a perfect fit. Subjectivity culminates in passion; Christianity culminates in paradox (God in Christ; God on the Cross); paradox and passion fit each other perfectly, for paradox perfectly fits a person situated in the
extremity of existence. Indeed, in the whole wide world there are not to be found two loves who fit each other as do paradox and passion, Christianity and faith.
Thus, if someone wants to have faith and reason too, well, let the comedy begin. He wants to have faith, but he wants to as sure himself with the aid of objective deliberation. What hap pens? With the aid of reason, the absurd becomes something else; it becomes probable, it becomes more probable, it may be come to a high degree exceedingly probable, even demon strable. Now he is all set to believe it, and he dares to say of himself that he does not believe as shoemakers and tailors and simple folk do, but only after long and careful deliberation. Now he is all set to believe, but, lo and behold, now it has indeed become impossible to believe. The almost probable, the prob able, the to-a-high-degree and exceedingly probable, that he can almost know, or as good as know, to a higher degree and exceedingly almost know – but believe, that cannot be done, for the absurd is precisely the object of faith and only that can be believed with the passion of inwardness.
Christianity claims to be the eternal, essential truth that has come into existence in time. It proclaims itself as the paradox and thus requires the inwardness of faith – that which is an of fense to the Jews, foolishness to the Greeks, and an absurdity to the understanding. It cannot be expressed more strongly: Ob jectivity and faith are at complete odds with each other. What does objective faith mean? Doesn't it amount to nothing more than a sum of tenets?
Christianity is nothing of the kind. On the contrary, it is in wardness, an inwardness of existence that places a person deci sively, more decisively than any judge can place the accused, between time and eternity, between heaven and hell in the time of salvation. But objective faith? It is as if Christianity was a
19 Passion and Paradox
little system of sorts, although presumably not as good as the Hegelian system. It is as if Christ – it is not my fault that I say it – had been a professor and as if the apostles had formed a little professional society of thinkers. The passion of inward ness and objective deliberation are at complete odds with each other. There is no way of getting around it. To become objec tive, to become preoccupied with the "what" of Christianity, in stead of with the "how" of being Christian, is nothing but a retrogression.
Christianity is subjective; the inwardness of faith in the be liever is the truth's eternal decision. Objectively there is no truth "out there" for existing beings, but only approximations, whereas subjectively truth lies in inwardness, because the decision of truth is in subjectivity. For how can decision be an approxima tion or only to a certain degree? What could it possibly mean to assert or to assume that decision is like approximation, is only to a certain degree? I will tell you what it means. It means to deny decision. The decision of faith, unlike speculation, is de signed specifically to put an end to that perpetual prattle of "to a certain degree."
For an existing individual, therefore, there is no objective truth "out there." An objective knowledge about the truth or the truths of Christianity is precisely untruth. To know a creed by rote is, quite simply, paganism. This is because Christianity is inwardness. Christianity is paradox, and paradox requires but one thing: the passion of faith.
20 The Folly of Proving God's Existence
Let us call the unknown God. It is only a name we give to it. Now it hardly occurs to the understanding to want to demonstrate that this unknown exists. If, namely, God does not exist, then of course it is impossible to demonstrate it. But if he does exist, then it is also foolishness to want to demonstrate it, for in the very moment the demonstration commences, you would presuppose his existence. Otherwise you would not be gin, easily perceiving that the whole thing would be impossible if he did not exist.
One never reasons in conclusion to existence, but reasons in conclusion from existence. For example, I do not demonstrate that a stone exists but that something, which exists, is a stone. The court of law does not demonstrate that a criminal exists but that the accused, who does indeed exist, is a criminal. Whether you want to call existence an addition or the eternal presupposition, it can never be demonstrated.
If, for example, I wanted to demonstrate Napoleon's exist ence from his works, would this not be most curious? Isn't it Napoleon's existence which explains his works, not his works his existence? To prove Napoleon's existence from his works I would have in advance interpreted the word "his" in such a way as to have assumed that he exists. Moreover, because Napoleon is only a human being, it is possible that someone else could have done the same works. This is why I cannot reason from the works to his existence. If I call the works Napoleon's works, then
20 The Folly of Proving God's Existence
the demonstration is superfluous, for I have already mentioned his name. If I ignore this, I can never demonstrate from the works that they are Napoleon's. At least I cannot guarantee that they are his. I can only demonstrate that such works are the works of, say, a great general. However, with God there is an ab solute relation between him and his works. If God is not a name but a reality, his essence must involve his existence.
God's works, therefore, only God can do. Quite correct. But, then, what are God's works? The works from which I want to demonstrate his existence do not immediately and directly ex ist. Are the wisdom in nature and the goodness or wisdom in governance right in front of our noses? Don't we also encounter terrible tribulations here? How can I demonstrate God's exist ence from such an arrangement of things? Even if I began, I would never finish. Not only that, I would be obliged to con tinually live in suspense lest something so terrible happen that my fragment of demonstration would be ruined.
The fool says in his heart that there is no God, but he who says in his heart or to others: Just wait a little and I will prove it to you – ah, what a rare wise man he is! If, at the moment he is supposed to begin the demonstration, it is not totally unde cided whether God exists or not, then, of course, he cannot demonstrate it. And if that is the situation in the beginning, then he will never make a beginning – partly for fear that he will not succeed, because God may not exist, and partly because he has nothing with which to begin.
In short, to demonstrate the existence of someone who al ready exists is the most shameless assault. It is an attempt to make him ludicrous. The trouble is that one does not even sus pect this, that in dead seriousness one even regards it as a godly undertaking. How could it occur to anyone to demonstrate that God exists unless one has already allowed himself to ignore him?
A king's existence is demonstrated by way of subjection and submissiveness. Do you want to try and demonstrate that the king exists? Will you do so by offering a string of proofs, a series of arguments? No. If you are serious, you will demonstrate the king's existence by your submission, by the way you live. And so it is with demonstrating God's existence. It is accomplished not by proofs but by worship. Any other way is but a thinker's pious bungling.
21 Answering Doubt
Have you ever doubted? I wonder whether you have ever born the marks of imitation? I wonder whether you have forsaken all to follow Christ? I wonder, whether your life has been marked by persecution?
Indeed, many have doubted. And there have been those who felt obliged to refute their doubt with reasons. But these reasons backfire and foster a doubt that gets stronger and stronger. Why? Because demonstrating the truth of Christianity does not lie in reasons but in imitation: what resembles the truth. Yet we Christians prefer to take this proof away. The need for "reasons" is already a kind of doubt – doubt lives off reasons. We fail to notice that the more reasons one advances, the more one nour ishes doubt and the stronger doubt becomes. Offering doubt reasons in order to kill it is just like offering a hungry monster food it likes best of all in order to eliminate it.
No, we must not offer reasons to doubt – at least not if our intention is to kill it. We must do as Luther did, order doubt to shut its mouth, and to that end we must keep quiet.
Those whose lives imitate Christ's do not doubt such things as Christ's resurrection. And why not? Because their lives are so strenuous, so much expended in daily sufferings that they are unable to sit in idleness keeping company with reasons and doubt, playing at evens or odds. Secondly, need itself quenches the doubt. When it is for a good cause that you are despised,
persecuted, ridiculed, in poverty, then you will find that you do not doubt Christ's resurrection, because you need it.
Without a life of imitation, of following Christ, it is impos sible to gain mastery over doubts. We cannot stop doubt with reasons. Those who try have not learned that it is wasted effort. They do not understand that imitation is the only force that, like a police force, can break up the mob of doubts and clear the area and compel them to go home and hold their tongues.
Recall that the Savior of the world did not come to bring a doctrine; he never lectured. He did not try by way of reasons to prevail upon anyone to accept his teaching, nor did he try to authenticate it by demonstrable proofs. His teaching was his life, his existence. If someone wanted to be his follower, he said to that person something like this, "Venture a decisive act; then you can begin, then you will know."
What does this mean? It means that no one becomes a be liever by hearing about Christianity, by reading about it, by thinking about it. It means that while Christ was living, no one became a believer by seeing him once in a while or by going and staring at him all day long. No, a certain setting is required – venture a decisive act. The proof does not precede but follows; it exists in and with the life that follows Christ. Once you have ventured the decisive act, you are at odds with the life of this world. You come into collision with it, and because of this you will gradually be brought into such tension that you will then be able to become certain of what Christ taught. You will begin to understand that you cannot endure this world without hav ing recourse to Christ. What else can one expect from following the truth?
This is also what Christ says, and this is the only proof pos sible for the truth of what he represents: "If anyone will act ac cording to what I say, he will experience whether I am speaking
21 Answering Doubt
on my own." Venture to give all your possessions to the poor and you will certainly experience the truth of Christ's teaching. Venture once to make yourself completely vulnerable for the sake of the truth, and you will certainly experience the truth of Christ's word. You will experience how it alone can save you from despairing or from succumbing, for you will need Christ both to protect yourself against others and to maintain yourself upright when the thought of your own imperfection would weigh you down.
Yes, doubt will still come, even to the one who follows Christ. But the only person who has a right to leap forward even with a doubt is someone whose life bears the marks of imitation, someone who by a decisive action at least tries to go so far out that becoming a Christian can still be a possibility. Everyone else must hold his tongue; he has no right to put in a word about Christianity, least of all contra.
22 Alone With God's Word
My listener, how highly do you value God's Word? Imagine a lover who has received a letter from his beloved. I as sume that God's Word is just as precious to you as this letter is to the lover. I assume that you read and think you ought to read God's Word in the same way the lover reads this letter.
Yet you perhaps say, "Yes, but Scripture is written in a foreign language." Let us assume, then, that this letter from the beloved is written in a language that the lover does not understand. But let us also assume that there is no one around who can translate it for him. Perhaps he would not even want any such help lest a stranger be initiated into his secrets. What does he do? He takes a dictionary, begins to spell his way through the letter, looks up every word in order to obtain a translation.
Now let us imagine that, as he sits there busy with his task, an acquaintance comes in. He knows that the letter has come, be cause he sees it lying there, and says,"So, you are reading a letter from your beloved." What do you think the other will say? He answers, "Have you gone mad? Do you think this is reading a letter from my beloved! No, my friend, I am sitting here toiling and moiling with a dictionary to get it translated. At times I am ready to explode with impatience; the blood rushes to my head, and I would just as soon hurl the dictionary on the floor – and you call that reading! You must be joking! No, thank God, as
22 Alone With God's Word
soon as I am finished with the translation I shall read my beloved's letter; that is something altogether different."
So, then, with regard to the letter from his beloved, the lover distinguishes between reading with a dictionary and reading the letter from his beloved. The blood rushes to his head in his impatience when he sits and grinds away at reading with the dictionary. He becomes furious when his friend dares to call this the reading of a letter from his beloved. But when he is fin ished with the translation, he reads the letter. All the scholarly preliminaries were regarded as nothing but a necessary evil so that he could come to the point – of reading the letter from his beloved.
We must not discard this metaphor too soon. Let us assume that this letter contained not only an expression of affection, but also a wish, something the beloved wanted her lover to do. It was, let us assume, much that was required of him – so much so that any third party would have good reason to think twice about it. But the lover, ah, he is off at once to fulfill his beloved's wish. Now imagine that after some time the lovers meet and the beloved says,"But, my dear, that was not what I asked you to do. You must have misunderstood the word or translated it incor rectly." Do you think that the lover would now regret rushing off to obey the wish, do you believe that he regrets the mistake? And do you believe that he pleases his beloved less?
Think of a child, a bright and diligent student. When the teacher assigns the lesson for the next day, he says, "I want you to know your lesson very well tomorrow." This makes a deep impression on the pupil. He goes home from school and sets to work at once. But he has not heard precisely how far they were to study – so what does he do? It is the teacher's admonition that has impressed him. He probably reads twice as far as he ac tually had to. Do you think the teacher will think less of him for
studying twice as hard? Think of another student. He, too, heard the teacher's admonition. He, too, did not hear exactly how far they had to study. When he came home, however, he says, "I must first find out how far we have to study." So he goes to one of his schoolmates, then to another. He doesn't get home until it is too late, and as a result he reads nothing at all!
Now think of God's Word. When you read it in a scholarly way, with a dictionary or a commentary, then you are not read ing God's Word. Remember what the lover said, "This is not reading the letter from the beloved." If you happen to be a scholar, then please see to it that even with all your learned reading you do not forget to read God's Word. If you are not a scholar, rejoice! Be glad that you can listen to God's address right away! And if in the listening you hear a wish, a command, an order, then – remember the lover! – off with you at once to do what it asks.
"But," you say, "there are so many obscure passages in the Bible, whole books that are practically riddles. Won't the scholar help me?" To that I would answer (before I have any thing to do with this objection): "Any objection must be made by someone whose life manifests that he has scrupulously com plied with those passages that are already easy to understand. Is this the case with you?" Yet this is exactly how the lover would respond to the letter. If there are obscure passages but also clearly expressed wishes, he would say, "I must immediately comply with the wish – then I will see about the obscure parts. How can I ever sit down and ponder the obscure passages and not comply with the wish, the wish that I clearly understand?"
In other words, it is not the obscure passages in Scripture that bind you but the ones you understand. With these you are to comply at once. If you understood only one passage in all of Scripture, well, then you must do that first of all. It will be this
22 Alone With God's Word
passage God asks you about. Do not first sit down and ponder the obscure passages. God's Word is given in order that you shall act according to it, not that you gain expertise in interpret ing it.
Again, let us not be too quick to discard the metaphor of the letter from the beloved. Would he not make sure to lock the door so as to not be interrupted? Would he not want to be alone, uninterruptedly alone with the letter? "Otherwise," he says, "I would not be reading the letter from my beloved." And so it is with God's Word. The person who is not alone with God's Word is not reading God's Word. Teachers and preachers beware!
Yes, alone with God's Word! My listener, allow me to make a confession about myself here. I still do not dare to be utterly alone with God's Word. I don't have the honesty and courage for it. I dare not! If I open it – any passage – it traps me at once. It asks me – indeed, it is as if it were God himself who does the asking – "Have you done what you read there?" And then I am trapped. Then either right into action or immediately a hum bling confession. Oh, to be alone with Scripture; yet if you are not, then you are not truly reading.
Being alone with God's Word is a dangerous matter. Of course, you can always find ways to defend yourself against it: Take the Bible, lock your door – but then get out ten dictionar ies and twenty-five commentaries. Then you can read it just as calmly and coolly as you read newspaper advertising. With this arsenal you can really begin to wonder, "Are there not several valid interpretations? And what about the prospect of new in terpretations? Perhaps there are five interpreters with one opin ion and seven with another and two with a strange opinion and three who are wavering or who have no opinion at all. So you calmly conclude, "I myself am not absolutely sure about the
meaning of this passage. I need more time to form an opinion." Good Lord! What a tragic misuse of scholarship that it makes it so easy for people to deceive themselves!
Can't we be honest for once! We have become such experts at cunningly shoving one layer after another, one interpretation after another, between the Word and our lives, (much in the way a boy puts a napkin or more under his pants when he is going to get a licking), and we then allow this preoccupation to swell to such profundity that we never come to look at ourselves in the mirror. Yes, it seems as if all this research and pondering and scrutinizing would draw God's Word very close to us. Yet this interpreting and re-interpreting and scholarly research and new scholarly research is but a defense against it.
It is only all too easy to understand the requirements con tained in God's Word ("Give all your goods to the poor." "If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the left." "If any one takes your coat, let him have your cloak also." "Rejoice al ways." "Count it sheer joy when you meet various temptations" etc.). The most ignorant, poor creature cannot honestly deny being able to understand God's requirements. But it is tough on the flesh to will to understand it and to then act accordingly. Herein lies the problem. It is not a question of interpretation, but action.
23 Followers not Admirers
It is well known that Christ consistently used the expression "follower." He never asks for admirers, worshippers, or adherents. No, he calls disciples. It is not adherents of a teaching but followers of a life Christ is looking for.
Christ understood that being a "disciple" was in innermost and deepest harmony with what he said about himself. Christ claimed to be the way and the truth and the life (Jn. 14:6). For this reason, he could never be satisfied with adherents who ac cepted his teaching – especially with those who in their lives ig nored it or let things take their usual course. His whole life on earth, from beginning to end, was destined solely to have fol lowers and to make admirers impossible.
Christ came into the world with the purpose of saving, not instructing it. At the same time – as is implied in his saving work – he came to be the pattern, to leave footprints for the per son who would join him, who would become a follower. This is why Christ was born and lived and died in lowliness. It is abso lutely impossible for anyone to sneak away from the Pattern with excuse and evasion on the basis that It, after all, possessed earthly and worldly advantages that he did not have. In that sense, to admire Christ is the false invention of a later age, aided by the presumption of "loftiness." No, there is absolutely noth ing to admire in Jesus, unless you want to admire poverty, mis ery, and contempt.
What then, is the difference between an admirer and a fol lower? A follower is or strives to be what he admires. An ad mirer, however, keeps himself personally detached. He fails to see that what is admired involves a claim upon him, and thus he fails to be or strive to be what he admires.
To want to admire instead of to follow Christ is not necessar ily an invention by bad people. No, it is more an invention by those who spinelessly keep themselves detached, who keep themselves at a safe distance. Admirers are related to the ad mired only through the excitement of the imagination. To them he is like an actor on the stage except that, this being real life, the effect he produces is somewhat stronger. But for their part, ad mirers make the same demands that are made in the theater: to sit safe and calm. Admirers are only all too willing to serve Christ as long as proper caution is exercised, lest one personally come in contact with danger. As such, they refuse to accept that Christ's life is a demand. In actual fact, they are offended at him. His radical, bizarre character so offends them that when they honestly see Christ for who he is, they are no longer able to ex perience the tranquillity they so much seek after. They know full well that to associate with him too closely amounts to being up for examination. Even though he "says nothing" against them personally, they know that his life tacitly judges theirs.
And Christ's life indeed makes it manifest, terrifyingly mani fest, what dreadful untruth it is to admire the truth instead of following it. When there is no danger, when there is a dead calm, when everything is favorable to our Christianity, it is all too easy to confuse an admirer with a follower. And this can happen very quietly. The admirer can be in the delusion that the position he takes is the true one, when all he is doing is playing it safe. Give heed, therefore, to the call of discipleship!
23 Followers not Admirers If you have any knowledge at all of human nature, who can doubt that Judas was an admirer of Christ! And we know that Christ at the beginning of his work had many admir ers. Judas was precisely an admirer and thus later became a trai tor. It is just as easy to reckon as the stars that those who only admire the truth will, when danger appears, become traitors. The admirer is infatuated with the false security of greatness; but if there is any inconvenience or trouble, he pulls back. Ad miring the truth, instead of following it, is just as dubious a fire as the fire of erotic love, which at the turn of the hand can be changed into exactly the opposite, to hate, jealousy, and revenge.
There is a story of yet another admirer – it was Nicodemus (Jn. 3:1ff). Despite the risk to his reputation, despite the effort on his part, Nicodemus was only an admirer; he never became a follower. It is as if he might have said to Christ,"If we are able to reach a compromise, you and I, then I will accept your teaching in eternity. But here in this world, no, that I cannot bring myself to do. Could you not make an exception for me? Could it not be enough if once in a while, at great risk to myself, I come to you during the night, but during the day (yes, I confess it, I myself feel how humiliating this is for me and how disgraceful, indeed also how very insulting it is toward you) to say "I do not know you?" See in what a web of untruth an admirer can entangle himself.
Nicodemus, I am quite sure, was certainly well meaning. I'm also sure he was ready to assure and reassure in the strongest expressions, words, and phrases that he accepted the truth of Christ's teaching. Yet, is it not true that the more strongly some one makes assurances, while his life still remains unchanged, the more he is only making a fool of himself? If Christ had per mitted a cheaper edition of being a follower – an admirer who
swears by all that is high and holy that he is convinced – then Nicodemus might very well have been accepted. But he was not!
Now suppose that there is no longer any special danger, as it no doubt is in so many of our Christian countries, bound up with publicly confessing Christ. Suppose there is no longer need to journey in the night. The difference between following and admiring – between being, or at least striving to be – still remains. Forget about this danger connected with confessing Christ and think rather of the real danger which is inescapably bound up with being a Christian. Does not the Way – Christ's requirement to die to the world, to forgo the worldly, and his requirement of self-denial – does this not contain enough dan ger? If Christ's commandment were to be obeyed, would they not constitute a danger? Would they not be sufficient to mani fest the difference between an admirer and a follower?
The difference between an admirer and a follower still re mains, no matter where you are. The admirer never makes any true sacrifices. He always plays it safe. Though in words, phrases, songs, he is inexhaustible about how highly he prizes Christ, he renounces nothing, gives up nothing, will not recon struct his life, will not be what he admires, and will not let his life express what it is he supposedly admires. Not so for the fol lower. No, no. The follower aspires with all his strength, with all his will to be what he admires. And then, remarkably enough, even though he is living amongst a "Christian people," the same danger results for him as was once the case when it was danger ous to openly confess Christ. And because of the follower's life, it will become evident who the admirers are, for the admirers will become agitated with him. Even that these words are pre sented as they are here will disturb many – but then they must likewise belong to the admirers.
24 Fear and Trembling
When Abraham and Isaac reached the place that God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and ar ranged the wood on it. He bound Isaac, lit the fire, drew his knife, and thrust it into Isaac!
At that moment God stood by Abraham's side in bodily form and exclaimed: "What have you done? Oh wretched old man! That was not what was asked of you at all. You are my friend, I only wanted to try your faith! I called to you at the last moment. Didn't you hear me? I cried, "Abraham, Abraham, refrain!" Didn't you hear my voice?
Then Abraham answered God with a voice that betrayed a half mystic adoration and a half disheveled weakness that be longs to mental derangement: "Oh Lord, I did not hear you. Yet now that you mention it, I seem to remember that I did hear some kind of voice. Oh when it is you, my God, who commands a father to murder his own child, then a man at such a time is under terrible strain. Therefore, I did not hear your voice. And if I had, dared I have believed it was yours? If you commanded me to sacrifice my child, which you did command me to do, and then at the decisive moment a voice is heard saying, 'Re frain,' am I not obliged to believe it is the voice of the Tempter that wants to keep me from fulfilling your will? I had journeyed long, and now, when the moment at last had come, I was intent on doing only one thing. My options were: Either I should have
assumed from the start that the voice that spoke to me, 'Sacri fice Isaac,' was the Tempter's voice, and then not gone forth as I did, or when I had assured myself that it was indeed your voice from the start, I should have concluded that this other voice, this voice at the decisive moment, was the Tempter's. It was the latter I chose."
So Abraham went home, and the Lord gave him a new Isaac. But Abraham did not look upon him with any joy. When he looked on him he shook his head and said, "This is not my Isaac."
But to Sarah he spoke differently. To her he said: "This is all so very strange. That it was God's demand that I should offer Isaac is certain, absolutely certain. God himself cannot disavow that. Yet when I took it seriously, it was a mistake on my part. It was, in the end, not God's will."
Yet, as we know from the story (Gn. 22), it did not go like this with Abraham. His obedience lies just in the fact that at the very last moment he immediately and unreservedly obeyed as he did. This is amazing. When a person has for a long time been saying "A", then humanly speaking he is rather bothered at hav ing to say "B." It is even harder, when one has actually drawn the knife, to be able and willing, with implicit obedience, to recog nize that after all no demand is made, that it is not necessary after all to set forth to Mount Moriah with the purpose of sacrificing Isaac. The decision whether to sacrifice one's only child or to spare him, oh, this is indeed great! Greater still, however, is it to retain, even at the last moment, the obedience, and if I may ven ture to say so, the agile willingness of an obedient soldier. Such a one, even when he has almost reached his goal, does not mind having to run back again, even if it renders all his running in vain. Oh, this is great! No one was so great in faith as Abraham – who can comprehend him?
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25 God's Triumphant Love
Suppose there was a king who loved a humble maiden and whose heart was unaffected by the wisdom that is so often loudly preached. Let then the harp be tuned. Let the songs of the poets begin. Let everyone be festive, while love cel ebrates its triumph. For love is over-joyed when it unites equals, but it is triumphant when it makes equal that which was un equal. Let the king's love reign!
But then there arose a sadness in the king's soul. Who would have dreamed of such a thing except a king with royal thoughts! He spoke to no one about his sadness. Had he done so, each courtier would doubtless have said, "Your Majesty, you are do ing the girl a generous favor for which she could never thank you enough." This, however, would no doubt have aroused the king's wrath and, in turn, caused the king even more sorrow. Therefore he wrestled with the sorrow in his heart. Would the maiden really be happy? Would she be able to forget what the king wished to forget, namely, that he was the king and she a former lowly maiden? For if this happened, if the memory of her former state awoke within her, and like a favored rival, stole her thoughts away from the king, alluring her into the seclusion of a secret grief; or if this memory at times crossed her soul like death crossing over a grave – where then would the glory of their love be? She would have been happier had she remained in obscurity, loved by one of her own kind.
And even if the maiden were content to be as nothing, the king would never be satisfied, simply because he loved her so. He would much rather lose her than be her benefactor. What deep sorrow there is slumbering in this unhappy love! Who dares to rouse it?
When a believer sins he is still loved by God, God longs for him to know this, and is thus concerned to make him equal with himself. If equality cannot be established, love be comes unhappy and incomplete. The revelation of God's love becomes meaningless, the two cannot understand each other.
How then might this relationship be established? One way could be by the elevation of the disciple. God could lift the dis ciple up to his own exultant state and this could well divert the disciple with an everlasting joy. But God, the unselfish king, would find no satisfaction in this. He knows that the disciple, like the maiden, would be gravely deceived. For no deceit is so terrible as when it is unsuspected, when a person is, as it were, bewitched by a change of costume.
Perhaps unity could be brought about by God directly ap pearing to the disciple and receiving his unhindered worship. This would surely make the disciple forget about himself, much in the way the king could have appeared in all his glory to the humble maiden, making her forget herself in worshipping ado ration. Alas! this might have satisfied the maiden but not the king, who desires not his own exultation but hers. Nor would she understand him, and this would make the king's sorrow even worse.
Not in this way, then, could love be made happy. Take an analogy. God has joy in arraying the lily in a garment more glori ous than Solomon. But if a flower and a king could understand
25 God's Triumphant Love
each other, what a sorry dilemma for a lily to be in! She would wonder whether it was because of her raiment that God loved her. What delusion! And whereas now she stands confident in the meadow, playing with the wind as carefree as the breeze, she would then languish and cease to have the courage to lift her head.
Who grasps the contradiction of this sorrow: not to disclose itself is the death of love; to disclose itself is the death of the be loved. It was God's longing to prevent this. The unity of love will have to be brought about in some other way. If not by way of elevation, of ascent, then by a descent of the lowest kind. God must become the equal of the lowliest. But the lowliest is one who serves others. God therefore must appear in the form of a servant. But this servant's form is not merely something he puts on, like the beggar's cloak, which, because it is only a cloak, flut ters loosely and betrays the king. No, it is his true form. For this is the unfathomable nature of boundless love, that it desires to be equal with the beloved; not in jest, but in truth. And this is the omnipotence of resolving love, deciding to be equal with the beloved.
Look, then, there he stands – God! Where? There! Don't you see him? He is the God, and yet he has no place to lay his head, and he does not dare to turn to any person lest that person be offended at him. It is sheer love and sheer sorrow to want to ex press the unity of love and then to not be understood.
God suffers all things, endures all things, is tried in all things, hungers in the desert, thirsts in his agonies, is forsaken in death, and became absolutely the equal of the lowliest of human be ings – look, behold the man! He yields his spirit in death, on a cross, and then leaves the earth. Oh bitter cup! More bitter than wormwood is the ignominy of death for a mortal. How must it be, then, for the immortal one! Oh bitter refreshment, more
sour than vinegar – to be refreshed by the beloved's misunder standing! Oh consolation in affliction to suffer as one who is guilty – what must it be, then, to suffer as one who is innocent!
God is not zealous for himself but out of love wants to be equal with the most lowly of the lowly. What power! When an oak seed is planted in a clay pot, the pot breaks; when new wine is poured into old wineskins, they burst. What happens, then, when God the king plants himself in the frailty of a human be ing? Does he not become a new person and a new vessel! Oh, this becoming – how difficult it really is, and how like birth it self! How terrifying! It is indeed less terrifying to fall upon one's face, while the mountains tremble at God's voice, than to sit with him in love as his equal. And yet God's longing is precisely to sit in this way.
26 Neighbor Love
If anyone asks, "Who is my neighbor?" then Christ's reply to the Pharisee, who asked this same question, contains the only answer, for in answer to this question Christ turned everything around. Christ says: "Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the rob bers?" The Pharisee answers correctly, "The one who showed mercy to him" (Lk. 10:36). This means that by doing your duty you easily discover who your neighbor is. The Pharisee's answer is contained in Christ's question. He towards whom I have a duty is my neighbor, and when I fulfill my duty, I prove that I am a neighbor. Christ does not speak about recognizing our neighbor but about being a neighbor yourself, about proving yourself to be a neighbor, something the Samaritan showed by his compassion. Choosing a lover, finding a friend, yes that is a long, hard job, but your neighbor is easy to recognize, easy to find – if you yourself will only recognize your duty and be a neighbor.
In this way, Christ has thrust romantic love and friendship from the throne, the love rooted in mood and inclination, pref erential love. He does so in order to establish a spiritual love in its place, love to our neighbor, a love which in all earnestness and truth is inwardly more tender in the union of two persons than romantic love is and more faithful in the sincerity of close relationship than the most famous friendship. Let us not confuse
the matter. Christ does not ask for a higher love in addition to praising friendship and romantic love. No, Christian love teaches love for all people, unconditionally all.
The poet and Christ explain things in opposite ways. The poet idolizes feelings and since he has only romantic love in mind, believes that to command love is the greatest foolishness and the most preposterous kind of talk: Love and friendship contain no ethical task. Love and friendship are good fortune, the highest good fortune. To find the one and only beloved is good fortune, almost as great as to find the one and only friend. For the poet, the highest task in life is to be properly grateful for one's good fortune. But one's task can never be an obligation to find the beloved or to find this friend. This is out of the question.
Christianity, however, dethrones feeling and good fortune and replaces them with the shall. The point at issue between the poet and Christ may be stated precisely in this way: romantic love and friendship are preferential, the passion of preference; Christian love, however, is self-renunciation's love and there fore trusts in the you shall. According to Christ, our neighbor is our equal. Our neighbor is not the beloved, for whom you have passionate preference, nor your friend, whom you prefer. Nor is your neighbor, if you are well educated, the learned person with whom you have cultural affinity – for with your neighbor you have before God the equality of humanity. Nor is your neighbor one who is of higher social status than you, and you love him because he has higher social status. This is mere preference and to that extent self-love. Nor is your neighbor one who is inferior to you, and you love him because he is inferior to you, because such love can easily be partiality's condescension and to that extent self-love.
No, Christian love, this you shall, means equality. In your rela tionship to people of distinction you shall love your neighbor.
26 Neighbor Love
In relation to those who are inferior you are not to love in pity but shall love your neighbor. Your neighbor is every person, for on the basis of distinctions he is not your neighbor, nor on the basis of likeness to you as in contrast to others. He is your neighbor on the basis of equality with you before God.
We must take care not to be led into self-love. The more deci sively and exclusively preference centers upon any one single person, including husband and wife, the farther it is from lov ing the neighbor. Husband, do not lead your wife into the temptation of forgetting your neighbor because of love for you. Wife, do not lead your husband into this temptation either! Lovers may think that in their love they have the highest good, but it is not so. No, love your beloved faithfully and tenderly, but let love to your neighbor be the sanctifier in your covenant of union with God. Love your friend honestly and devotedly, but let love to your neighbor be what you learn from each other in the intimacy of friendship with God!
Moreover, the person who does not see that his wife is first his neighbor, and only then his wife, never comes to truly love his neighbor, no matter how many people he loves, for he has made an exception of his wife. To be sure, one's wife or husband is to be loved differently than the friend and the friend differ ently than the neighbor, but this is not an essential difference. The fundamental equality in love lies in the category neighbor. Whatever your fate in romance and friendship, whatever your privation, whatever your loss, the highest still stands: love your neighbor! You can easily find him; him you can never lose. No change can take your neighbor from you, for it is not your neighbor who holds you fast – it is your love, this you shall, which holds fast your neighbor.
In this sense love is blind. Perfection in the object has noth ing to do with perfection in love. Precisely because one's neigh bor has none of the excellencies which the beloved, a friend, or
an admired one may have – for that very reason love to one's neighbor has all the perfections which none of these others have. Let people debate as much as they want about which ob ject of love is the most perfect – there can never be any doubt that love to one's neighbor is the most perfect love. Love to one's neighbor is determined by love. Since your neighbor is unconditionally every person, all distinctions are indeed re moved from the object. True love is recognizable only by love.
Therefore he who in truth loves, loves his neighbor. And he who in truth loves his neighbor loves also his enemy. This is ob vious; for the distinction of friend or enemy is a distinction in the object of love, but the object of love to your neighbor is al ways without distinction. Your neighbor is the absolutely un recognizable distinction between one person and another; it is eternal equality before God – enemies, too, have this equality.
Distinction, this or that quality – be it a virtue or a vice – is selfishness' confusing element that marks every person as dif ferent. But neighbor is eternity's mark, a mark found on every human being. Take many sheets of paper and write something different on each one. They do not, at first glance, resemble each other. Then take every single sheet, do not let yourself be confused by the differentiating inscriptions, and hold each one up to the light and you shall see the same water-mark on them all. Thus is neighbor the common mark, but you can see it only by the help of the light of the eternal when it shines through every such distinction.
To love one's neighbor, therefore, means essentially to will to exist equally for every human being without exception. If then you really do meet the king, gladly and respectfully give him his due. You should see in him his inner glory, the equality of glory, the neighbor that his human magnificence only conceals. If you meet a beggar – perhaps suffering in sorrow over him more
26 Neighbor Love
than he himself – you should nevertheless also see in him his inner glory, the equality of glory, the neighbor which his wretched outer garments conceal. Yes, then you shall see, wher ever you turn your eye, your neighbor. In being king, beggar, scholar, rich man, poor man, friend, enemy, we do not resemble each other – in these ways we are all different. But in being a neighbor we are all unconditionally alike.
27 The Greater Love
Worldly wisdom would have us believe that love is a relationship between one person and another. Christ's life teaches that love is a relationship between three: person-God person. However beautiful a love-relationship is between two or more people – however complete all their enjoyment and all their bliss in mutual devotion and affection are for them, and even if all people praise this relationship – if God and the rela tionship to God is left out, then this is not love but a mutual and enchanting illusion. For only in love for God can one love in truth. To help another human being to love God is to love an other person. And to be helped by another human being to love God is to be loved.
Love is by no means merely a human bond, no matter how faithful and tender it is. As soon as you leave God out, the power of human judgment becomes highest. Such judgment loses sight of love altogether. As soon as a love-relationship does not lead me to God, and as soon as I do not lead another person to God, this love – even if it were the most blissful and joyous at tachment, even if it were the highest good in the lover's earthly life – nevertheless is not true love.
Not only should the celibate belong solely to God, so should the person who in love is bound to a woman or a man. He shall not first seek to please his wife, but shall strive first that his love may please God. Consequently, it is not the wife who shall teach
27 The Greater Love
the husband how he should love her, or the husband his wife, or a friend his friend, or associates their associates, but it is God who shall teach each individual how he or she should love. Only when the God-relationship determines what constitutes love is love prevented from being some illusion or self-deception.
Love that does not lead to God, love that does not have the single goal of leading us to love God, such love eventually comes to a standstill. Moreover, it escapes the ultimate and most terrible collision: in the love-relationship there is an infi nite difference between God's conception of love and ours. A purely human conception of love can never comprehend that anyone, through being loved as completely as possible by an other person, would be able to stand in the other person's way. And yet, Christianly understood, this very thing is possible, for to be loved thus can be a hindrance to one's God-relationship.
So what is to be done? Christ knows how to remove the colli sion without removing love. It demands only this sacrifice (in many cases it is the greatest sacrifice possible): being willing to accept that the reward for your love is to be hated. Wherever someone is loved in such a way as to endanger another's Godrelationship, there is a collision. And wherever this collision oc curs, there is the requirement of a sacrifice that cannot be humanly grasped. For the Christian view means this: to truly love oneself is to love God; to truly love another person is, though it mean being hated, to help the other person love God.
The world cannot seem to get it through its head that apart from God love is a chimera. For God alone is love. Where love is, God not only becomes the third party but essentially becomes the only loved object, so that it is not the husband who is the wife's beloved, but it is God, and it is the wife who is helped by the husband to love God, and conversely. The love-relationship is a triangular relationship of the lover, the beloved, and love –
not love by itself but love in God. For ultimately it is God who has placed love in us humans, and it is God who shall finally decide what is love.
In matters of love it takes no time at all to become deceived. It is so easy to get a quick, fanciful picture of what love is and then be satisfied with the fancy. It is still easier to get a few people to associate together in self-love, to be sought after and admired by them till the end. But if your ultimate and highest purpose is to have an easy and sociable life, then don't have any thing to do with Christ or his love. Flee from him, for he will do the very opposite. He will make your life difficult and do this precisely by making you stand alone before God.
Thus when a friend, a beloved, or other lovers and associates notice that you want to learn from Christ what it is to love in stead of learning from them, don't be surprised when they say to you, "Spare yourself. Give up this eccentricity. Why take life so seriously? Cut out the straining, and let us all live a beautiful, rich, and meaningful life in friendship and joy." And if you give in to the suggestions of this false friendship, you will surely be loved and praised for it. But if you don't, if in loving you will be a traitor neither to God nor to yourself nor to the others, you must expect your love to be refused and to be called selfish. Even if you say nothing, the others will notice that your life con tains, if it is truly related to God's demand, an admonition, a demand on them. It is this they want to do away with.
How many have been corrupted – divinely understood – by such friendship, or by a woman's love, simply because, de frauded out of his God-relationship, he became far too at tached to her while she in turn was inexhaustible in her praise of his love? How many have relatives and friends corrupted by their love because they got him to forget his God-relationship and changed it to something people could shout about, admire, without being sensitive to any admonition about higher things?
27 The Greater Love
Do not appeal, therefore, to the judgment of others in order to prove your love. Human judgment has validity only as far as it agrees with God's demand. No love between one person and another can, in and of itself, ever be perfectly happy, ever per fectly secure. Even the happiest love between two people has still one danger, the danger that earthly love can become too in tense, too important, so that the God-relationship is hindered. You must always watch apprehensively, lest this danger overtake you, lest you too should forget God, or that the beloved might do so. Such apprehension may mean being hated by the be loved. But only God, who is the one true source of love, is the continuously happy, the continuously blessed object of love. You should thus not watch too apprehensively; watch only in adoration.
28 Love the Person You See
To love another in spite of his weaknesses and er rors and imperfections is not perfect love. No, to love is to find him lovable in spite of and together with his weakness and er rors and imperfections. Let us understand each other.
Suppose there were two artists, and the one said,"I have trav eled much and seen much in the world, but I have sought in vain to find someone worth painting. I have found no face with such perfection of beauty that I could make up my mind to paint it. In every face I have seen one or another little flaw. Therefore I seek in vain." Would this indicate that this artist was a great artist? In contrast, the second one said, "Well, I do not pretend to be a very good artist, if one at all; neither have I trav eled very much. But remaining in the little circle closest to me, I have not found a face so insignificant or so full of faults that I still could not discern in it a more beautiful side and discover something glorious. Therefore I am happy in the art I practice, though I make no claim to being an artist." Would this not indi cate that precisely this one was the artist, one who by bringing a certain something with him found then and there what the much-traveled artist did not find anywhere in the world, per haps because he did not bring a certain something with him! Was not the second of the two the real artist?