Four Books of the Gospels 1.619–2.451

but if the sight in the eyes shines pure and single, the limbs of the whole body will shine clearly. But if it is evil and sees little, dark shadows will lie over all the members. And if the light itself is turned into black shadow, how great will be the horror of darkness without any light? No one can serve two masters alike: he will give way either to hatred of one or to love of him, nor will a slave bear both masters equally. No one will ever be able to serve riches and God at once. But hold to these commands: let not clothing for your body trouble you, nor seek easy food with anxious care. Do we not value the soul more than food for the body? Or does anyone hesitate to put the body before clothing? Let us look at the birds of the air: do they press the ploughshare and break up the backs of the soil, or sow seeds of grain, or cut the stalks of the crops with the curved sickle? Yet they have plenty of drink and food. Is not the care of men closer to God's heart? Nor was it right to hang the care of clothing on our hearts; not even if men could add a cubit's growth to their limbs. See how the lilies shine through the rich fields!

Yet no labours have ever weighed on them, and not even Solomon, when the court of his rich kingdom overflowed, was clothed in such grace of garment. But if God himself clothes the glad green growth of the meadows and shrubs, which is subject to our fires, why do you not have greater confidence in the Father? Leave, then, food, drink, clothing, and every empty earthly care to the unbelieving nations. You rather seek worthily the heavenly kingdom and the righteousness of God — the rest will come running of its own accord — and do not be anxious for tomorrow's supply; each day is enough for itself, with the day's trouble. Let savage condemnation flee from your judging; for the Lord will follow the precedents of justice that you lay down on earth while held in time: you must bear the measure that you set. You see the speck clinging in your brother's eye, yet you do not perceive the beam standing in your own, and you labour first to cleanse another's eye; but tear the deceitful timber out of your own eye, then you will take care to remove the least husk from another's. Do not give what is holy to dogs, nor be willing shamefully to throw necklaces to unclean pigs. For these will lie trampled underfoot in the mud, and the pigs will turn and tear you with a great wound.

To the one who asks it will be given; the one who seeks will hold what he finds; and for the one who knocks, the doors will open and entrance be given. All you men will not give a stone to sons who ask for bread, nor a snake to those who ask for a fish; you, I say, hard men, in whom hardness of heart is deeply rooted, will always give good things to your sons. How much more does the Father, indulgent to men, rejoice to grant gentle good things worthily to those who ask justly! The kindnesses you wish to come to you from men, do the same to all with your favour. This is the sum of the law; this is the right the prophets declared. Go, you just, through the narrow gate above the heavens. How broad and spacious is the way that, on the left-hand path, rolls its headlong road in the gloom of death, and countless troops enter it on the downward slope! The path of life is crowded with huge rocks, and lofty virtue scarcely leads a few through the rough places. But those whom the too deceitful and enticing plain of evils has persuaded, slippery with ugly falls, it seizes and drags headlong, like the rush of a river, or an eager steed run wild with its reins broken, or a ship without a helmsman on the windy seas. Watch out for those who lay snares for you under a false name and are called prophets.

The appearance of sheep clothes them, but by fraud they hide the savage hearts of wolves, and they tear the unwary flocks they drag along, who yield to them, deceived by savage error. Such monsters are known by their own fruits; one must see what end their deceitful teaching seeks. For you have never noticed figs growing from thistles or grapes from thorns across the countryside. And as a tree is clothed with the bud of its own fruit, so their trickery is laid open when the fruit shows it. I will not be moved by the words and honours of flatterers, nor will they win the rewards of the heavenly seat as of right because smooth flattery calls me lord. But those will deservedly rejoice in the gift of the kingdom who willingly do the commands of our Father. Soon the last day will come, which by strict justice will grant rewards to righteousness and Gehenna to crime. Then the weeping of many will cry out to me: "Did not great powers once, under your name, subdue all things for us by holy commands? Often too our voice was counted among the prophets, and the demon served us under your name." Then I will swear to them that such a life of men, foul with wicked deeds, was never known to me. Whoever devotes both his ears and his deeds to my warnings, I will liken him to a man laying foundations on solid rocks, on which balanced walls will rise.

That house will remain unharmed by rains and winds, and with strong timber will overcome the threats of torrents, since its foundations cling to immovable rock. But whoever holds my commands only by hearing, and goes far off on slippery ways with contrary deeds, I will liken him to one who props the foundations of his house on shifting sand; at the first blast of wind, and when the rain began to bear down with pouring streams, the whole mass falls, its weight overturned, and ruin follows with the heavy wreck of the roof." As he said such things, the people stood fixed in boundless wonder, since the authority given to Christ had far surpassed the teaching of the ancients. Then, as he left the summit of the high mountain, the crowd of the peoples following thronged him rejoicing. But see, a young man, whose flesh was pierced by a horrid wasting, whose whole body leprosy had besieged and fouled, fell down in reverence and begged Christ: "For me to be free at last of the weight of so great a sickness, it will be enough that you have willed it." Then the right hand of Christ, by touch alone, cleansed the livid limbs. And he commanded the healed man: "Hide your joy, and, obeying the law, offer your gifts at the temple." As he went away from there, a centurion at once presented himself as a suppliant, and prostrate prayed with these words:

"The sick spirit of a young boy is tormented; a sudden weakness has undone all the functions of his limbs, and pain now holds his life, though he survives. But have mercy by a command, I pray, for our sins forbid the Parent of life and light to come under our roof. Now it is enough that you order health to return by a word. My authority has often compelled the men under me to obey in this way, by a word, the duties I command." He had spoken. Moved by the man's prayers and faith, Jesus turned and spoke these words to the people following: "Never do I remember finding such faith in my ancestral nation; but learn by true words that the sublime kingdom of heaven will call many men, born in different parts of the world, to recline at the life-giving table with our fathers, while their own offspring, plunged in blind darkness, gnashing their teeth horribly and weeping continually, will be driven into the everlasting torments of punishment. But to you now, young man, faithful in strength of mind, as you believe, the fruit will come with the light of health." He had spoken, and quicker than the word, with the voice of the speaker, the gifts of the swift word ran across to the boy; and the soldier, entering his house on a hurried return, rejoiced that the gifts of God the healer had arrived before him. Then holy Jesus entered the house of Peter, whose mother-in-law lay panting with heat and fever. As Jesus the Saviour touched her right hand, the woman, made well, served at the table.

And now the day, departing with sinking light, had fallen into the sea, and the blue night was drawing through the void its dusky mantle, painted with starry flames, when the crowds, vying with one another, were bringing through the blind night many people who were collapsing with sickness of mind and whose souls were bound by the raging art of the demon. But the word of Christ removed so great a sickness and graciously granted all of them the Father's gifts. But see, as the light rose, a greater tumult came with crowds of grateful people; anxious, he ordered the disciples to launch the high ship onto the sail-strewn sea. Then a scribe, with outpoured prayers, asked to go away with the Holy One in the boat. Christ said to him: "Where will you follow me, scribe? For the foxes in the glade the hollowed rock offers lairs, and the wood gives rest to the birds of the air; but the Son of man is allowed to come under no roof: such are the schemes of your nation." Then one of the disciples asked thus: "The last offices are owed to a dead father; but let your will, Holy One, grant us time, so that I may bury the body of my poor father." Christ said to this: "You will do better to come with us on our journey, and leave the dead to bury the dead in the earth." They boarded the ship, the sails swelled with their own wind, and the keel flew over the hissing wave.

When the ship had reached the deep, the sea began to rise in anger and to swell with winds let loose from either side and to lift raging mountains to the sky; now it struck the stern with its mass, now the prow with a whirlwind, the planking of the sides took in the waves dashed upon it, and the sea floor was laid bare as the deep was torn apart. Meanwhile Jesus was sleeping in the stern. The disciples and the sailors alike, in fear, begged him to wake and showed him the dangers of the sea. Then he said: "How little confidence you have! Fear rushes into faithless minds!" Then he commanded the storms and spread a calm peace over the waters. They mingled their wonder in fearful talk among themselves: how great a power had been granted him, or what command it was, to which the straits stirred by the winds and the storms upraised in threat bowed their necks. Now the ship had come to rest under the shore of the Gerasenes; but see, as he stepped out, a young man, wonderful to tell, met him, whose wretched mind a black spirit filled with unclean power, tearing him with frenzy. He was glad to dwell in the foul tombs; no one could restrain his violent frenzy; he even broke strong chains of iron and tore heavy fetters like woollen threads.

And now it was light sport for him to leap about with his fetters broken and to cut his wild breast with stones. When he saw Christ going along the shore, he rushed with a shout and ran up from far off, worshipping him: "Most sure offspring of the ever-reigning Lord, we pray that you do not drive us far from the borders of our accustomed region, tormenting us with torments. For our name is Legion, and the single power of doing harm joins many spirits under one name. Do you see how unclean pigs root up these pastures? At least let us sate our repulsed rage on them, we ask by the sublime name of the Father enthroned on high." Christ commanded them to leave the man's mind, and allowed them to end their frenzy in the herds of pigs. And now the man's dazed breast, the demon shaken out, venerated the unhoped-for gift of his health. And now the pigs, thrown headlong from the edge of the cliffs into the sea, hastened to destroy their lives. But the swineherds, frightened by such great wonders from their lookouts, fled and rushed to the houses of the city, spread the report and drove the people to the shore. And after the crowd of onlookers was compelled to believe that the mad young man had come to his senses, they begged him in fear to leave that region. Then Jesus, the light of the lands, returned home.

See, as he returned, they laid before Christ's feet a young man lying on a bed, his limbs numb, their function undone by a wasting disease. Pitying him in his heart, Jesus addressed him: "Let sure constancy be in your mind, young man, for the past error of your life will be forgiven you." The scribes, in the hidden places of a malignant mind, carped at this saying, because he had spoken words that only the power of God may utter. But Christ, seeing such hearts, said: "The words of the scribes go over this word again. How much lighter it would have been to say what follows, they will prove by the power of word and deed together, and they will see that it is granted to me to forgive sins. Therefore, young man, with the use of your body made firm, rise in strength and carry your bed back home." He rose, fitted the bed to shoulders now strong, and went away in strength through the midst of the wondering people. Then fear and the praises of the Lord filled the hearts of the people, together with the joyful wonders they celebrated. Going on from there, he saw Matthew sitting among the others at the tax office; at once he bade him join the disciples. Refusing nothing, he obeyed Christ's command and rejoiced to follow. Then, setting out on the way, with the same words he urged Philip and enrolled him as a companion among his friends.

When he had come to know Christ's power and way, as soon as he met just Nathanael he said: "See, it has been granted to our age that he should arise of whom the voices of the ancients and the holy prophets sang. Joseph, who comes of the line of David, begot him; happy Nazara is his homeland, and his name is Jesus." He replied: "I wonder whether Nazara ever begot anything worthy of such great powers." Then Philip said: "You will see; stop doubting." When Jesus looked and saw him coming from far off, he said: "Here comes a man whose heart, knowing no falsehood, keeps a pure virtue without malignant deceit." He answered: "Where, or when, did you know me?" The Lord brought forth these words from his divine heart: "When the shade of the spreading fig tree covered you, even before the words of Philip called you, the Spirit, the author, saw you and chose you as a companion." At such words came the voice of astonished Nathanael: "Venerable offspring of God, renowned king of the nation, you are manifest salvation to the peoples and the teacher of life." Christ said to this: "An easy power persuaded you to believe, because I saw you lying beneath the shade of a tree; but greater wonders still remain hereafter.

You will see the whole heaven split open, and the swift ministers of God passing through the sky and bringing down a bright crown to the Son of man." Meanwhile a festive wedding was being prepared in the bridal chambers in the region of Chanan, where the mother of illustrious Jesus was celebrating the feast together with her son. But meanwhile the wine was running out for the guests. Then the mother entreated Christ in these words: "Do you see that the drink of gladness has already run out? Let gifts given by you, son, be present at these good tables." Christ, the glory of the lands, answered her: "You are in haste, mother; the time does not yet compel me to grant such gifts for men's food." Then the mother, gladdened, called the servants of the tables and bade them obey her son's commands. Six very beautiful vessels of hollowed stone were there, whose bellies held three measures each. He ordered the servants to fill them from the bosom of the spring. The young men obeyed his orders and crowned the vessels with water, filling their stone lips; then foam rolled the air mixed with the water up through the rims to the top. Then he ordered them to give it to the chief steward to taste. When he tasted the gift of venerable flavour, not knowing that the water lately drawn from pure springs had passed into the pleasing drink of wine, he rebuked the bridegroom, who knew nothing of it, because he had kept back the fine wine and given the worse first at the tables.

By these signs he firmly strengthened, for ever, the minds of the disciples who rightly believed. Then, when the Passover feast of the Jews was at hand, he set out for Solyma and went up into the temple. Here he found people setting out many goods for sale: some sold sheep, some the great bodies of bullocks, some, gaping for coins, gave their time to the art of counting. Here Christ binds together the lashes of a whip from cords and drives such people out of the holy house, and, overturning the tables, pours out the heaps of bronze, and rebukes them: "Take these things far away, you profane men, so that here my Father, not sordid gain, may be worshipped." Then the people of Judaea roared, demanding a sign, on the strength of which he had so confidently raised his spirit to such deeds. Then Christ mingled things to come with obscure words: "Destroy this venerable temple with your polluted hands; I will restore it when the third light of the sun begins to pour its ruddy light upon the lands." They, debating among themselves with a dark murmur, said: "This temple, built in scarcely forty-six years by the labour of the old kingdom, will you be able to renew in the space of three days?" Worthy men later, after the appointed time, understood this word, that Christ had called his own body the shrine of God. But many, seeing the signs, then came to faith and followed the Holy One.

Under dark night, one of the foremost leaders of the Jewish name, raised to high honour, came and spoke to Christ in a low voice: "There is no doubt, Holy One, that the generous will of God has granted you to rise as a light for human affairs; nor would anyone grant wonders through such signs unless the power of God went with him and bade them shine." Christ said to this: "If you seek the heights of the just way, no one will be able to ascend to the lofty kingdom unless he enters again the beginnings of birth, given back to him, and receives a new life by divine gift." But he, his heart astonished at such words, said: "This is not for our mind to grasp. Who will be able to call back the beginnings of a life already begun? Or shall an old man crawl back into his mother's womb, to come new into the light and live his life again?" He answered: "If anyone is reborn from the clear spring and from the holy breath and begins to stand in new-made limbs, he will ascend free into the heavenly hall. An earthly body is born of an earthly body; just so the Spirit begets a breath like himself. This Spirit is God, whom all things in the world obey. He flies wherever he wills and casts his voice through the air, but you do not know what the beginnings of the voice are, nor what quarter his running blasts seek.

Whoever, then, seeks again the first beginnings of a just life, it is certain that he grows green again in the likeness of the holy breath." And the Jew said to this: "I can perceive none of these things." Then Christ said: "Great teacher of Solyma, do you too, pitiable man, plunge your mind, snatched from the light of life, headlong into murky darkness, and can you not grasp such things with your dulled sense? See, there is no faith, and I have spoken only of earthly things! What if speech begins to ascend to the heavenly powers and to grasp the higher forms of things? Which of you will be able to open your hard mind to me? Receive, then, what the meaning is for these new things. No one will be able to ascend to the starry heaven except the one alone who comes, sent from the hall of heaven, the same Son of man, who abides in the seat of heaven. As the serpent was once lifted up with the highest honour by the hands of Moses in the desert regions, so the Son of man must be lifted up on high, so that whoever has set faith at his name in the deep inner places of the mind may, amid the whirlwind of the world, trample death underfoot and, rising beyond the stars, receive on high the inviolable gift of life. For God loved the world with so great a love that his only offspring came down to the lands, to join believers to the Lord in everlasting life.

Nor did God send this Son to examine the lands with strict justice or to weigh them in harsh judgment, but so that gentle gifts of life might come to the peoples. For where sure faith has embraced salvation, there will be no doubtful pleading of the law. But where the gifts of healing are shut far out, there their own condemnation already tortures the mind; for the only offspring of the Lord was unknown to them. The wretched and proud fled the coming of the light, and rather embraced and held fast blind darkness. So whoever has stained his mind with evil deeds flees in fear into darkness, lest in clear light the filthy contagion of a polluted mind be laid open. But whoever has kept to the footsteps of a devout life hastens into the open and rejoices to shine in the light, so that the glory of virtue may shine in bright deeds." From there Jesus the Saviour went back to Galilee. Passing through, he came by chance to Sichen in Samaria. There was a farm there, made famous by the name of Jacob, and a well sunk with a cold spring into the hidden depths. Here the Saviour had sat down, panting in the fierce heat, and the disciples, scattered here and there buying food within the city walls, had left their master alone. Coming out of the walls, a Samaritan woman came to draw water from the hollow depths of the well.

Christ said to her: "Woman, give me a drink of water." The woman answered: "You command me a strange thing: that I, a Samaritan woman, should despise the commands of the Samaritans of old and serve a drink to you, a Jew." Then the Saviour said: "If you knew the gifts of the Lord, and who it is that, thirsting, asks you for a drink from the well, you would rather ask, and he would give you living water." She answered: "The well curves its bosom deep down, there is no pitcher, and you have no rope; from where, then, will you be able to give me living water? Will you be greater in power than our father? For Jacob drank from this well with his children, and often led his flocks here to drink." Jesus, ruler of the world, answered her: "No one will be fully satisfied by that water, for he will thirst again; but the gift of our drink will shut out the burning thirst for eternal ages. Whoever receives the sweet drink of our spring, from him the life-giving grace of the flood will flow more abundantly. But if desire for our water takes hold of you, call your husband and let him come soon with you from the city." The woman said that she was not bound in marriage. Then Jesus, who sees into the mind, went on: "Woman, you speak truthful words about a husband.

For you have already been bound in marriage to five men, and now, besides, you take up the bonds of another's bridal chamber." Then the woman said: "It is certain that you are a holy prophet. But our ancestors once left us the precept that worship must be offered on the height of this mountain of ours, while you say that one must pray in the region of Solyma." As she said this, Jesus soon answered her: "See, the time will come when worship will be far from the summit of your mountain and from all Solyma. But now sure salvation will rise from the lands of the Jews, and now the course of the coming time presses on, when the true worshippers, error removed and armed with just laws, will pray to the holy Father. They will have the Spirit and full faith, and the high Father seeks such hearts of worshippers on earth." She then said: "We know that Christ, a messenger to the world, will by his coming open the ages of life." And then Jesus, generous in pity for the sinner, declared that he was the Christ who had come as a light to the lands. And now the disciples, returning, were amazed at their master, because a woman was sharing secret words with him. But the woman hurriedly left her jar at the spring and led the people out from the whole city. For she related everything she herself had done before, all told in order by the prophet's words.

Then crowds poured out and quickly sought Christ. Meanwhile the disciples were asking him to take food. He answered that he had plenty of fine food. But then the wondering disciples talked among themselves in hidden whispers: "Perhaps someone here has already given our master food, so that, satisfied, he rightly refuses ours." But he, discerning the workings of their inner mind, said: "This is my food, this heart will be satisfied, if I do the commands of the great Father throughout the world. You surely think that four months still remain from now till the beginning of the glad harvest in fruitful summer. Lift up your eyes, then; see the whitening fields and all the countryside already calling for a ripe harvest. Now whoever reaps will rejoice in the reward of fine labour, and will then overflow with the crop of life, and the sower will gladly share the reapers' joy. I have now sent you to cut a heavy harvest that was not put into the furrows by your labour. Others' gifts of a good crop will enrich you." While he filled his companions' hearts with such words, see, the people of the Samaritans came asking and begged him to spend two days there. And now deep faith had been established in many of the people;

no longer did they believe only the woman's words, but manifest power taught them face to face that Jesus, the Saviour of the world, had now come. And now he had returned to the region of Galilee, where he had once changed spring water into wine. Here a young man of the king's court, whose son a disease was burning with panting fever at the farthest shore of life, learned that Christ had surely returned; he flew to him and, pouring out prayers for his son's fate, begged and demanded the gift of swift healing, before his son should be dragged off to bitter death. Christ said to this: "Unless power persuades all with signs, there will be no faith; but go, and embrace your sweet son in your house, his life safe." At these words, fine faith, which was soon to receive the fruit of health, strengthened his mind in his rejoicing heart. And when he had set out on the way, news came to meet him from slaves hurrying towards him, that health had suddenly returned to the boy from the threshold of death into the shores of light. When he learned that the time agreed exactly with the words of Christ who healed, he gave himself and his household over, embracing the venerable gift of faith. It happened one day that a single feast had brought together many of those who had contracted for the public taxes for profit and seize plunder under another's name.

Jesus received them together with his disciples. See, the Pharisees criticized him with hidden mockery, because a teacher of the law went to such banquets. But he, seeing what their closed hearts held, said: "There is no need of physicians where unharmed health invigorates strong limbs with the honour of strength. But healing must rightly be given to the wretched sick. Learn now at least what the words of the prophet command: I seek gentle hearts more than sacrifices. For I have not come to the just who walk on straight paths, but to call back the wicked from the path of sinners." But see, from among those who wondered at Christ's gifts, one of John's disciples asked why they kept the frequent fasts of the law, while the people under Christ kept no fasts. Christ answered calmly: "Those who attend the bridegroom's vows with joyful dances do not bear sad fasts while he is present. But the day will come when the bridegroom will be snatched from the midst of his companions by the whirlwind of the world: then they will give their minds to sad tears, loathing food. How foolish it is to sew old patches into new clothes, so that the ugly tear opens worse! Or to entrust hot new wine to worn-out wineskins, which burst and lose all the living wine!

But it is right to store foaming new wine in new skins: so strong vessels keep it living." As he was speaking of such things, see, a chief of the priests, his heart struck with grief, fell down worshipping and implored him with tears for his daughter, who had died, a pitiable death, and asked for the sure gift of Christ's healing to come even to the dead. Without delay Jesus the Saviour rose and went. As he went on, a woman followed in his footsteps, whom a flow of blood without end had been wasting with heavy sickness for twelve slipping years, her strength consumed and her whole body weary. Believing, she was turning a silent thought in the secret of her heart, and held it with sure faith that the wasting would flee at once from her weary body if she could touch the edge of Christ's garment. When, through the crowd, she touched with trembling hand the threads hanging from the hem of his robe, he at once, seeing both the cause of the disease and the believing heart, granted swift health with these words: "Receive the gift that the constancy of your faith has earned." And soon her veins grew strong, the blood stopped. When they arrived where the girl's funeral was, the huge noise of the lamenting people and the blare of trumpets were celebrating the last offices of the funeral procession:

"Let these sad rites leave your house. For the girl lies sunk in calm sleep, though the weeping crowd, not knowing, thinks her dead." The crowd laughed at him and left him as he said this, because he said that a girl taken by death was sleeping. But Christ, the conqueror of death and the author of life, deigned to take the right hand of the cold girl in his right hand and soon ordered her to rise, to the wondrous joy of her father. As he returned from there, a cry at once met him, from two blind men stumbling along together. Christ said to them: "What do your hearts believe? Will the light taken from you return by my power?" They declared that they believed with a firm heart. Then Christ said: "You who believe, see the light, and after this tell our name to no one." He spoke; but quickly, in their great joy, the unquenchable ardour of those who saw spread the report everywhere. Then a young man was brought, whose power of speaking had been taken from him by the attack of a demon. But when the demon was driven out and fled from his breast, at once the gift of a sound tongue returned. He was hemmed in by the thronging tumult of the people wondering at such things; but seeing so many thousands of men, he groaned like the lord of an estate whose glad pastures are grazed by countless flocks without a shepherd.

Then he spoke these words to the disciples: "How glad the crops that lie open across the countryside! But the few reapers are overwhelmed by the heap of grain. It remains now to ask the lord of so great a crop to fill his fields with a number of labourers." Having said this, he gathered apart, chosen from all the people, strong hearts in a company of twelve. When he had chosen them, he filled them with these precepts: "Avoid the road trodden by the faithless nations and by the footsteps of the deceitful Samaritans. Go where the guarding of the ancestral flock is failing. And as you go, take a mind like mine, so that holy faith may subdue for you the powers of the black demon and apply loving care to sicknesses. These powers will be given you without payment, and you likewise must spend the gifts freely. Let not possession of gold or silver master your mind, nor wicked desire for coins subdue you. Let the minister of bare virtue not desire to keep two garments or two coverings for his feet. When you enter the walls of a city, always seek out those under whose hospitality it is fitting for the just to stay; and when you have entered, call peace upon the house. If the house is peaceful, that peace will remain; but if it bristles with the unworthy ways of its inhabitants, your peace will flee and follow you as you depart.

Whoever fiercely shuts you out from the threshold of his house, or with hard ears scorns the words of life, shake off your footprints as you leave the house, so that no share of an unjust life may cling to you. A worse punishment than that of Sodom will await them in torment, when the end comes for the whole world. Go now as sheep, the prey of hard wolves; but be strong with the shrewd heart of serpents, yet surpass the sweet doves in simplicity. For headlong injury will often press upon you, and your bodies will be set before the councils of men. The gnashing violence of the world will drive you with scourges and fierce chains and hard tyrants, for my sake. When they have handed you over, leave aside the care of words: the grace of speech will be given you, flowing of its own accord; the Spirit in you will speak worthy things for you. For the wicked madness of a brother will betray a brother, and sons will hand over the bodies of their parents to death. Hatred will always press upon you for our name, but the glory of life goes with faith kept to the end. Flee from the houses of a city that persecutes you; from there seek another place, and soon from there another. For cities must always remain for you which may give you a people under the name of the Israelites.