NOTES for Joh 16:1-33

The disciples cannot understand Jesus' mysterious words: "A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me...". We too can fully share their bewilderment. Even if we know that He said these words to them with His imminent crucifixion, death, and then the meeting after His Resurrection in mind, why are these words addressed to us now? We did not see Him either before the Cross or after the Resurrection.

Perhaps He is speaking of the Second Coming? Perhaps... But here too we hear that the words, the image, and even the very presence of Christ can meet us before the end of the world, when the Comforter brings them with Himself, the One who will speak with the voice of Jesus and teach as the Lord taught, because He Himself will come from the same place from which Christ is from: from the Father.

The passage from Christ's Last Discourse with the disciples that we read today reveals to us how the Lord Himself looks at the disciples. The point is that He, in fact, likens them to Himself. The world first hated Christ, and then His disciples. They do not belong to the world. People kept Christ's word, and they will also keep the disciples' word. Finally, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, and the disciples will bear witness to Jesus.

And the Lord says all this while explaining the commandment: "Love one another." This means that likeness to God and adoption as sons, for that is exactly what is being discussed, do not flow from some special superhuman merits of these Galilean fishermen, but from the fact that they will fulfill this commandment. Therefore Christ's words also apply to all who follow Christ's disciples in the Church, which He Himself founded precisely through these disciples.

When telling His disciples about the Kingdom, Jesus more than once mentioned its organic incompatibility with the untransfigured world. This, and nothing else, is how He explains the persecutions that will become the inevitable companion of Christians throughout the Church's historical path. What, then, proves to be such an unbearable rebuke to the world, provoking such a violent reaction in response?

First of all, of course, the witness that the "prince of this world" has already been judged. Perhaps if the point were precisely the devil, dark powers, or the forces of evil, there would not be such a sharp reaction to this witness. But the point is the "prince of this world," and therefore the entire order of things existing in the world. Even the righteous who follow the Torah are justified in it not because they are part of this world, but because, and only insofar as, being righteous and following the Torah, they already do not belong to it. The world would like to appropriate to itself everything good that sometimes happens in it contrary to its own nature, and to wash its hands of all the evil that it itself produces by virtue of that nature. But the Kingdom, entering the world, bears witness to the world's true nature, corrupted by sin, thereby provoking the fury of the forces of this world: the fury of a villain whose mask has been publicly torn off.

An additional irritant is the reminder of the One whom the world would like to forget, but of whom it is constantly reminded. No, of course, if the world were reminded of Jesus as, for example, some great theologian, religious reformer, or, at worst, a teacher of morality, this would still be bearable: after all, He is not the first and not the last. But He is pointed to as Someone unique and unrepeatable, who in addition has no desire at all to take account of the world or of its weaknesses and sins.

As we see, the conflict is caused by the very essence of the differences that separate the Kingdom from the world mired in evil. No wonder it will last until the end of time, only becoming sharper with the years.

As the day of Pentecost approaches, it is necessary to listen closely to Christ's words about the coming of the Holy Spirit, so that we do not deprive ourselves of His gifts of grace. Two things are fundamentally important for us. First, that the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, will convict the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment. This means that in the coming of the Spirit we will see all this; these things will become evident, will become visible. In the power of the Holy Spirit the Church will know that sin is unbelief in Christ, that righteousness is His Resurrection, and that judgment is His victory over evil.

And the second thing we need so much is guidance into all truth. The Lord says that we will no longer wander through life like blind kittens, not knowing or understanding where life is and where death is. The Holy Spirit will guide us, and in Him we will know the truth and be able to live and move toward God. This is precisely the chief and so necessary gift of the Spirit.

The idea that the Lord has His own pedagogical principles, incomprehensible to us, was thought up long ago and not by us. The famous words spoken by God through the prophet Isaiah are exactly about this: "My thoughts are not your thoughts" (Isa. 55:8). He, the ruler of time, has His own time for everything. He knows exactly when His disciples should learn and understand something.

At times His words can appear to contradict one another: "I did not come to bring peace, but a sword" (Matt. 10:34) and "I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world" (John 12:46). But what we try to perceive from our point of view may be something entirely different for God. And therefore He, one may say, cares for us tenderly, watches over us, and waits for the moment when it will be best for us to hear His word, so that we can receive it (see John 16:12).

But it often happens that Christ's words are given to us "in advance," for the future. The Lord knows that we cannot understand everything right away, but all the same He generously shares His Word with us: His life. And it does not matter to Him that it will take us a great deal of time for the meaning of what He said to reach us, first the mind, then the heart. He still speaks to us, so that later on this soil the Holy Spirit will grow something new (see John 16:13).

Jesus says that His departure, the completion of His earthly path, is not the end at all. It is only the beginning. The beginning of the process that can be called the Kingdom's entry into the world. His Kingdom. And the Kingdom of His Father. That is why the unveiling of the fullness of this Kingdom is connected with His departure. And the point here is not that He has to disappear in order to make room for someone else. It is simply that the Kingdom, as it enters the world, becomes ever fuller. More spacious. Deeper. It is this depth that the apostles begin to sense at the Ascension.

He disappears into the depth of His Kingdom. Into a depth the apostles had not known before because they had not noticed it. Now they have begun to notice it. But Jesus warns His disciples ahead of time. And the point is not that the divine breath, the Spirit of whom He speaks, replaces Him for the apostles. The point is something else. It is to follow Him. To follow the Messiah. To follow the King of His Kingdom. But to do that, one must first enter this Kingdom. Become a partaker of it. Simply being physically near Jesus is not enough. It is the same with the Kingdom: one can be in its presence, so to speak, on the territory of the Kingdom, and not notice it. And in order to notice it, one must make room for it within oneself.

His breath, which is also the breath of God. Then one will be able to see in Jesus that very King. Otherwise one can stand beside Him and have no relation at all to His real life. And what use is such standing nearby? That is why Jesus says that it is better for Him to go now. He must complete His earthly path. He must rise from the dead and continue this path already in the fullness of the Kingdom. He must bring this Kingdom into the world. In short, He must finish completely everything for which He came. And for His disciples this will truly be better.

Although to them it may seem otherwise. They want to be near the Teacher. But the Teacher wants to bring them into His Kingdom, to make them partakers of the fullness of the life by which He Himself lives. He wants them to feel for themselves the breath of God, the breath of the Kingdom, to breathe it in deeply. And for that the apostles must become involved in this spiritual movement of the advancing Kingdom. They must become part of it, just as He Himself is. For the Kingdom will also enter the world through them. Though they themselves do not yet know this: Pentecost still lies ahead of them.

In the verses of today's passage from the Gospel of John, the Lord speaks of the Spirit, who will come and guide us "into all truth." And why will He be able to do this - to reveal the truth, to free us from our inability to receive it (see John 16:12)? Because "He will not speak on His own, but whatever He hears He will speak"; He will do the will of the One who sent Him. This alone is the pledge of success - and not of personal success, but of the true attainment of eternity.

It would seem, why is this so? The Holy Spirit is God, and He could speak on His own... But we see that Jesus also does the will of the Father who sent Him. The point, apparently, is that between the Persons of the Holy Trinity there is no such division as there is between us and God, and the very fulfillment of the will - this deepest harmony in the actions of the Trinity - happens in a completely different way. This will is precisely one of those things that bind Them, the Persons of the Trinity, together...

So it is for us as well: the will of God, or more precisely, our free consent to it, is called to serve as the connecting link between us and the Kingdom of Heaven.

As we see, Jesus' disciples understand their Teacher with difficulty. And He continues speaking to them in hints and figures of speech. It would appear that if you are not understood, or not fully understood, it would be better to refrain from figures of speech, since in such a situation they can confuse the matter even more. And yet Jesus continues to speak as He speaks. Why?

On the one hand, one could say that He had already more than once, perhaps even in plain words, told the apostles about what awaited Him. As we see, they did not understand Him then either, just as they do not understand now, and therefore Jesus resorts to images and figures of speech in order to convey better to the disciples what is so important for them to understand.

But the matter was perhaps not only this. Why did the apostles understand Jesus with difficulty when He told them about His death on the cross and His Resurrection? Perhaps, above all, because they were completely unready to hear anything like this, and what they heard shocked them. In a state of shock a person is unable to perceive and analyze anything; he simply falls into a stupor.

Seeing this reaction from the disciples, Jesus turns to images, allegories, and figures of speech, because all this forces the listener not simply to listen, but constantly to think over what has been heard, so that the listener himself can come to the conclusions that otherwise would simply shock him. But when you come to shocking conclusions yourself, as the result of your own reflection, they, while remaining shocking and requiring further thought, still do not knock you off balance as much as the words of a person you trust can do when he lays out before you the very same facts in ready-made form.

And Jesus, like a wise teacher, tries during His last earthly meeting with the disciples to lead them toward an understanding of things without which one cannot enter the Kingdom. For He understands perfectly what they will have to live through in the coming days, and He tries to do everything possible so that the prospect of the Kingdom coming into the world will not be hidden by what they will have to experience.

The Lord tells the disciples that after the joy that entered them with His coming there will follow sorrow, which will then once again be transformed into joy. It is as if there are two days separated by night. It is very important to understand that this night of sorrow, when the Lord lies in the tomb and is not with us, this night of God-forsakenness, is something everyone necessarily passes through who truly walks the path of spiritual formation. The fact that our great teachers also experienced such a state, difficult and grace-filled, bears witness to this. It is known that St. Tikhon of Zadonsk, who lived in the eighteenth century, experienced a mystical night of the soul, but even earlier, in the sixteenth century, the great Spanish mystic St. John of the Cross created an astonishingly deep and rich concept: "the dark night of the soul." It is impossible to explain it in a few words, but in the poem with the same title he gives an allusion to the Paschal hymn "Exsultet," which Catholics sing on Holy Saturday:

This is the night
when once You led our fathers, the children of Israel,
out of Egypt
and brought them through the Red Sea on dry ground. (...)
This is the night
when Christ, breaking the bonds of death,
rose victorious from hell. (...)
O truly blessed night,
the only one worthy to know the time and hour
when Christ rose from hell.
This is the night of which it is written:
and night will be bright as day;
and night is my light and my joy. (...)
O truly blessed night,
in which earth is joined to heaven,
and humanity to divinity.

Let us return again to the experience of Orthodox ascetics. Theophan the Recluse writes this in his commentary on today's reading: "They say that every soul on the path to perfection experiences a similar blow. Darkness everywhere covers it, and it does not know where to turn; but the Lord comes, and its sorrow is transformed into joy." Let us also try, when we are enveloped by the darkness of God-forsakenness, the loss of faith, when "the mind seeks the Divinity, and the heart does not find it," not to lose heart, but to understand that this night is inevitable, and that a New Day awaits us ahead.

For us, what is happening at this very moment is often very important. We are concerned above all with our own feelings about what is happening. If we are hurting, the whole world around us looks dark and hostile. And if we feel good, our mood is peaceful, the sun is shining, and the whole world is smiling at us. Of course, things are not always so sharply defined, but most often our feelings tend toward one of the poles...

The Lord, however, is trying to teach us one wise practice: to remember that our condition changes, because nothing human is eternal. Only what is from God is eternal: "My righteousness will remain forever, and My salvation from generation to generation" (Isa. 51:8). Speaking today of a woman preparing to give birth, Christ emphasizes that we must not rely on what we feel now, not weep and lament because of sorrows, but remember not the sorrow, but the joy that will follow it (see John 16:20-22). We should think not by the feeling of the moment, but see more broadly and farther ahead. We should try to look at what is happening with God's gaze, seeking in everything meaning and a reason for joy and gratitude to God.

Jesus says: "You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy." We are used to these words and no longer notice that the logical connection is not obvious. Ordinary logic would be this: "There will be problems now, but do not worry; later everything will work out and all will be well." But Jesus says that the very thing that was the cause of sorrow will also become the cause of joy; if there is no sorrow, there will be no joy.

Indeed, without Good Friday there can be no Easter Sunday. And in the life of each of us there are moments when it is necessary to go through, to live through, something very frightening and painful, because through this small death the Lord will give resurrection.

A remarkable catechist has a universal answer for questions that are too clever: "When you die, ask Him yourself." Yet in today's reading Jesus says astonishing words: "In that day you will ask Me nothing!"

How can that be? Why? Why are all questions removed? Because He will see us - and notice: not we will see Him, but He will see us! And when He looks into each person's eyes, then no questions will remain. Because He was waiting for me, He wanted to see me again, and when He sees me, the true Encounter takes place, after which no questions remain.

This is exactly what the apostle Paul writes about: "For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known" (1 Cor 13:12).

Indeed, how full of joy and exultation is that which comes after sorrow! The Lord says to His disciples: “Your sorrow will turn into joy” (John 16:20). Yes, this speaks of the sorrow caused by the Teacher’s death and of the joy of the Resurrection. And joy comes because the Lord rises and reveals Himself anew to those who seek Him. But what prevents us from applying this passage to our everyday sorrows? Someone has offended us, treated us unfairly, or upset us, and there seems to be no escape from the resentment eating away at our soul... But where is the Lord at that time? Does our heart truly remember His Resurrection and the fact that He will never abandon us? Then why does it not rejoice? I cannot believe that small sorrows, or perhaps even great ones, are greater than the joy of His Resurrection! There are saints, or simply happy people, who always remember this, and they have no moments when they are sad and must struggle with their pride and self-absorption. But on the other hand, we have room to grow, and we have this wonderful possibility: to experience the Resurrection of our Lord every time that, after overcoming resentment and bitterness, we return to His presence.

What day is Jesus speaking about to His disciples? One could, of course, think that He is speaking about the day of His Resurrection, when everything will finally become clear to the apostles and all their questions and perplexities will be resolved. But were they resolved after the Resurrection of their Teacher? The question is not straightforward. Of course, after the Resurrection they understood what Jesus meant when He spoke to them about the completion of His earthly path, but in other respects the apostles still had many questions and perplexities, as well as illusions. It is enough to recall how, already on the day of the Ascension, they were still waiting for their Teacher finally to "restore the kingdom to Israel."

As we can see, understanding was not so simple, and it came to the apostles in its fullness only on the day of Pentecost, when under the action of the breath of God they became different people, joining themselves to the Kingdom. But does this mean that all their questions disappeared at once and all their perplexities were resolved? In part, yes, but if we speak of complete clarity, then it can clearly come only on the day of Judgment, when the Kingdom is revealed in all its fullness. Before that day it is premature to speak of such a resolution. Perhaps, when Jesus speaks about that day when His disciples will no longer ask Him anything, He has in mind not the day of His Resurrection after all, but the day of His return in glory, the day of Judgment and the final triumph of the Kingdom.

For now, He says to the apostles: I came into the world from the Father, and now I am leaving the world again and going to the Father. And it seems to them that they understand Him. They are probably thinking that He is leaving them in order to return soon with a victorious heavenly army, to return as a triumphant victor - the way, in their opinion, the Messiah was supposed to appear to Israel. And He, of course, understands perfectly well what they are waiting for and hoping for, and therefore says that very soon they will all scatter, leaving Him alone: for there will be no victorious war. And in fact there will be no war at all - only death on the cross and Resurrection, and the Kingdom that is "not of this world."

In today's Gospel passage we read that the apostles, for some reason, suddenly decided that they believed Jesus had come forth from God. They tell Christ that His words have finally satisfied them, words that had struck them as intelligible and convincing. And the apostles decided that they believed. But as the apostle Paul will say later, "by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is the gift of God" (Eph. 2:8). Therefore Christ has to cool the disciples' fervor a little by directly predicting to them that they will soon betray Him.

But, as Christ Himself explains, this prophecy is not for accusation but for consolation. So that afterward the disciples would understand that the Teacher went to the cross even though He knew everything. So that they would have hope in His forgiveness. So that their heart could recover the peace it had lost (see John 16:33).

Can it really be true that now we may ask for anything in prayer? Yet in John 15:7 we read: "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you." So it turns out that everything is ultimately tied to Jesus' Message: one may ask for everything, but on one condition - that our desires coincide with the desires of the Heavenly Father revealed in the life and destiny of His Son.

But is the standard set here too high? Undoubtedly high, because it is eternal, opening a dizzying infinite perspective of personal growth. And this last thing is possible only in a constant going beyond the limits of one's own desires, plans, and achievements, and therefore it presupposes constant openness to God in prayer and daily life, and growth in unity with Him up to His plans and scale.

As for material sufficiency and prosperity, from Jesus' point of view these things were only tools that can be used in different ways. In any case, they can hardly be objects of passionate desire for Christ's followers, because in themselves such things neither bring one closer to God nor move one away from Him. In the end, some people have more luck in life, some less; someone can become a millionaire, and someone can end up at the bottom. But amid every possible circumstance of life, the main thing remains a person's ability not to lose joy and optimism from knowing that we are loved by our Heavenly Father, and to look at any trouble or success only as the next task of changing something in ourselves and around us, striving to understand His desires and decisions for the greatest task called "human life."

Today we read a passage from Christ’s Last Discourse with His disciples, in which the Lord speaks of what the Apostle Paul would later call adoption through faith. It turns out that God’s purpose is to give people direct access to the Father through Christ’s incarnation, suffering, and resurrection. The Lord, whom the apostle would call the one Mediator between God and humanity, united Himself fully with human beings in everything except sin. Therefore, He tells the disciples that the Father Himself loves them, and that it will no longer be Christ who asks on their behalf, but the Father Himself who will hear them.

Thus, this concerns overcoming the abyss that separates each one of us from God through the Fall. Ask in My name, the Lord commands His disciples. By being united with Christ through faith, we receive the possibility of addressing the Father in Christ’s name. By becoming one Body with Jesus in Communion, we too become children of God, as John the Evangelist writes so clearly in his first epistle. In this, the source of true life is revealed to us. And everything unworthy of God’s children can at last disappear from our lives if we labor toward this.

This may be the shortest description of Christ's mission: He came - and He went away. But between these two moments something very important was accomplished, something that changed the world forever. The world into which Jesus came and the world He leaves behind Him are, in a certain sense, different worlds.

The world 2,000 years ago is like a room with one door, from behind which a foul stench comes; the coming of Christ cuts a new door through it, giving another way out, and as He goes to the Father, He leaves that door wide open. On the day of Pentecost, through this open door a fresh wind bursts into the room, carrying away all the stench and mustiness in a draft. Life changes qualitatively - a positive perspective appears in it.

When we look at our everyday life, we sometimes lose this perspective. The dirt creeping into our life from behind that first door - through gossip, abuse, rumors - keeps us from breathing freely. But the door to God remains open: we can both push our way toward it ourselves and bring other people there.

At last the moment has come when Jesus speaks to the disciples almost directly, in plain words, about the path that lies before Him. He says: I came from the Father and am going back to the Father. What did the disciples think at that moment? We can only wonder. But Jesus Himself tells them plainly that very soon they will all scatter, leaving Him alone. And then only His Father will remain with Him.

From these words it is clear that the disciples never truly understood the meaning of their Teacher's words, and the events soon to come will confirm this. The same thing happened as with the Savior's words about His messiahship and about the messianic Kingdom: the apostles understood them in their own way, according to the ideas about the Messiah and the Kingdom that belonged to the popular religiosity of the Gospel age. In Jesus' words they evidently saw a hint of some glorification of their Teacher, but more likely an earthly and purely human one. They understood the words "I am going to the Father" not in the sense of His death and resurrection, but in the sense of the outward triumph they expected. After all, the apostles were not so naive that they failed to understand the imagery and symbolism Jesus used. It is just that this symbolism had several layers of meaning. Both glorification and return to the Father could be understood in different ways.

One could see in all this something corresponding to traditional popular ideas about the Kingdom, or one could see what Jesus meant. In the first case everything was simple and clear: Jesus is speaking of Himself as the Messiah, speaking directly and without allegories. God sent Him, His heavenly Father, from whom He comes as a messenger from Heaven, exactly the kind of messenger that popular religious consciousness pictured the Messiah to be. And now He is returning again to the Father, from whom He will at last receive the fullness of authority to establish the messianic Kingdom. An earthly kingdom, of course, since most believing Jews at that time did not imagine any other kind.

Most likely, the disciples of Jesus understood their Teacher's words in just this way. And Jesus, of course, knows this. That is why He says that very soon they will all scatter: He foresees their reaction to His arrest, which will come to them as a complete and absolute shock. Still, He tried to tell them about His path as clearly as it was possible to do, given their expectations and their spiritual condition. Nothing more could be said. From that point on, everything depended on them themselves and on their choice.

It is probably the shortest description of the mission of Christ. He came - and left. But something very important came true between these moments, what changed the world. The world, in which Jesus came, and the world that He leaves, are in a sense different worlds. The world 2000 years ago was similar to a room with one door, from which an abominable stench was wafted. The coming of Christ opens a new door, giving another exit from the room, and He leaves this door opened, when going to the Father. During the Pentecost, a fresh wind rushes through this opened door into the room, with draught bringing stench and mustiness. The life changes qualitatively – a positive perspective appears in it.

When we look at our everyday life, we sometimes lose this perspective. The dirt creeping in our life because of this first door, - through gossips, revilements, rumors, - hinders to breath with full breast. Still, the door leading to God remains open, we can ourselves go to it, and bring other people.

The Lord is speaking to us about peace not for the first time. This astonishing word runs through the whole Gospel: when forgiving sins or healing, Jesus sends a person away "in peace" (see, for example, Luke 8:48); Simeon the God-receiver also speaks of peace (Luke 2:29) as he says farewell to life. But the most important thing is Jesus' call to us: "Have peace with one another" (Mark 9:50). Peace, both between people and the inner peace of the heart, is the most important thing in our life. The words of the apostle Paul remind us of the same thing: "And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called" (Col 3:15).

Yes, the Lord calls us to this peace, which helps us live where we are and colors with joy everything God gives us. And in His conversation with the disciples He speaks terrible words about their betrayal precisely so that they may have peace in Him (see John 16:33). Unlike the way we are accustomed to experiencing such situations, He calls us to peace of heart even after actual betrayal - so that we may get up and go on, continuing to commune with Him.

It always seems to us that what the Lord gives is poor and scant. The parables are incomprehensible to us, and the explanations are too blunt and crude. The apostles heard all sorts of things that evening, but the bitterest words still lay ahead. They had barely said that they understood everything when they received the reply: “You will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave Me alone.” It would seem so important to understand what is being said, and we so want detailed instructions for dealing with God and the world. But understanding cannot replace love, devotion, and faithfulness to the God who goes to the Cross.

Everything in our world is interconnected: every event inevitably brings something else after it, and we cannot always say what that will be. For example, a smile to a neighbor can lift his spirits, or even help him understand that joy and love exist and restore his desire to live. The infamous oil spilled by Annushka can become the cause of death... Everything is connected, and the consequences can be very serious. This places on us the duty to be extremely attentive in our relationships with the world and with those around us, understanding that only Love always brings good in its wake.

In today's reading from the Gospel of John, Jesus also speaks about the connection of everything that happens. He proclaims the testimony of the Spirit of Truth, the Comforter sent to us (see John 15:26). And the Spirit of the Lord, who comes to fill the hearts of those who believe in Him, is a gift from God. The words "And you also will bear witness" (John 15:27) tell us that our work follows the gift: using it for service to God and passing the Spirit on to others, as the Apostles did. If we do not share what God gives us, what we have appropriated will simply perish, like a flower tightly clutched in the hand. Therefore, if something is given from above, it must be used, because nothing is given for no reason.

Christ does not promise those who follow Him the conveniences of life or earthly prosperity. We are clearly warned: if someone wants to see Christianity as a way to solve accumulated problems and a means of achieving comfort, he has come to the wrong door. And the Lord does not refuse us help at all: when solving these problems is necessary, He is ready to respond to our petitions and gives us the right and the opportunity to reap earthly fruits as well. But by placing not God Himself at the center of attention, but His gifts, we turn away from Him, perhaps unintentionally, without thinking about it, but this does not change the essence of the matter.

If we choose Christ, we must be ready to face opposition. The call to carry one's cross, addressed to each of the disciples, flows from a clear vision of the reality of evil ruling in the world. One can evade this call if one wishes; however, then we will inevitably be defeated by evil. Evil often looks attractive and tempting, but its weight, unlike the weight of the cross, will both crush us and press us into the mud.

We are also warned that many of the persecutors will be sure they are serving God, but Christ clearly said of such people that they have known neither the Father nor the Son. The persecutors themselves will not agree with such a reproach and in response will begin to refer to their own theological knowledge. But knowledge of ideas about God is still not knowledge of God Himself, and here the warning applies to all of us: persecutors are not the only ones at risk of making such a substitution. As history shows, the persecuted, when circumstances changed, also became persecutors more than once...