26. SICKNESS AND EARLY DEATH [1] Says a Greek Jew: “Lord and Master, this is now quite clear to us, but there is still something for which I have no true explanation. Why do so many children have to die at the most tender age while still undeveloped, and why must physical death almost always be preceded by a bad illness which weakens and kills the body? Once a man is mature, he could as a soul leave the body easily and painlessly, and children should never die before reaching a certain maturity. However, what happens all the time is this: Children die at any age, and the bad diseases are always there and are a continual plague for men. O Lord and Master, why must that be so on this earth?” [2] I said: “This need not be so at all and was not the case in the deep past, for do you ever read in a chronicle of bad illnesses amongst the men who were devoted to God and living according to His commandments!? They all lived to a ripe old age and their passing was a gentle, painless going to sleep. Also, no child ever died, for it was begotten by very healthy parents and nourished and raised according to sound and simple natural principles. [3] Only later, when arrogance and with it a whole legion of the grossest sins against God's commandments and laws of nature gained entrance among people, did all sorts of bad ailments occur among them through their own fault. The thus weakened people could then no longer beget healthy children. Such children, already crippled from the womb, gradually became prone to more and more attacks from all kinds of diseases and began to die at all ages. [4] Because this is now happening you must not think that God had ordained this for men for some inexplicable, secret reason. He allowed it, firstly, so that the people be prevented from too much sinning through their ailments and, secondly, that they through their painful suffering distance themselves from the world, go into themselves, recognize their sins, detest them and in patient submission to God's will attain eternal bliss. [5] This is also the case with children. What is on this earth to become of a child that is physically completely stunted, particularly if the parents have already been born in sin? Who will educate them and who heal them from their ailments? Is it not better to take them away from this world so that they can be raised by the angels in the specially created realm of children? [6] I tell you: God knows about everything and He cares for everything! However, since most men nowadays no longer know about God and His existence, how can they be expected to know what God does and what He ordains for their possible redemption? [7] If God had not allowed the corresponding ailments to follow the sins of men, more than half of mankind would totally perish and the earth would turn into a complete hell and had to be destroyed, its dead wreckage wandering about in endless space, as this visible space of stars and worlds can testify with similar examples, about which My disciples can tell you more. – And now I ask you how you have understood this?” (GGJ Book 14, chap. 26) 27. THE GREATEST CAUSE OF DISEASE [1] I said: “Of all vices the most evil is prostitution, fornication and all kinds and variations of lewdness. It is, however, idleness, disdainfulness and haughtiness which induce the people to this vice. Because haughtiness does not respect anything; but looks for all available means to satisfy its carnal passions. [2] If then such a man begets children, what miserable and with many ailments afflicted people thereby enter this world! This sin is, therefore, a main source of the worst afflictions in this world. [3] However, there are also gluttony and revelry, anger and various resentments, vices through which all sorts of ailments develop in men, tormenting them in the most miserable manner. [4] Did I not say, after I had healed him, to the sick man in Jerusalem who had waited a full 38 years at the pool Bethesda to be healed: ‘Go and sin no more, lest you suffer something worse?’ His bad gout was, therefore, also an outcome of his many previous sins. And this applies to nearly all those who were healed by Me. Had they never fallen ill through their many sins, their souls would have perished. Only a rather serious and painful illness sobered them up and showed them how the world rewards those who worship it. Through their illness they lost their love for the world and longed to be soon set free from it. Thereby their soul became freer and the healing of their body occurred also at the right time. [5] Apart from these main causes responsible for most illnesses of men, who are anyway weakened from birth, there are still others, through which man in his weakness can fall quite severely ill, but I emphasize it again: This can happen only to the one already weakened from birth. I will briefly summarize the reasons for you. [6] There is, firstly, the ingestion of bad, impure and poorly, not freshly prepared food and also of bad drinks, then the eating of all sorts of unripe fruit. Also, many have the bad habit of cooling themselves down too quickly when hot. Again others, unaware of their inherited weakness, expose themselves to all kinds of dangers, thereby either perishing or suffering lifelong damage. [7] Well, this is not God's fault, so much the less since He gave man intelligence, free will and the best laws of life. [8] Against man's indolence there is no means other than all sorts of allowed calamities, which must necessarily follow the non-compliance with the divine will. These will wake up man’s soul which is fast asleep in its flesh and show it the unfortunate outcome of its indolence, and it will then become more careful, wiser, more active and resigned to the recognized divine will. Thus, the various ailments now afflicting men are also of decisive advantage. [9] Of course, they are also a kind of judgment coercing the soul towards the good. Yet the soul does thereby not lose its free will entirely, and it can better itself considerably during or after an illness, although it will have to accomplish its further perfection in the beyond. [10] There are also sick people who have entered this world sick from the womb because of the sins of their parents or ancestors. The souls of these sick people are mostly from above and merely undergo a temporary life-trial on this earth. These are anyway well cared for in the beyond in the realm of spirits, and whoever cares for them in love and patience, will be invited by them with the same love and patience into their heavenly abodes in the beyond. (GGJ Book 14, chap. 26 - 27)
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