represented as a thoroughly good citizen, who has broken none of the laws
of his state, none of the commandments of his religion. He is quite
respectable, in the ordinary sense of that extraordinary word. Jesus
says to him, ‘You should give up private property. It hinders you from
realising your perfection. It is a drag upon you. It is a burden. Your
personality does not need it. It is within you, and not outside of you,
that you will find what you really are, and what you really want.’ To
his own friends he says the same thing. He tells them to be themselves,
and not to be always worrying about other things. What do other things
matter? Man is complete in himself. When they go into the world, the
world will disagree with them. That is inevitable. The world hates
Individualism. But that is not to trouble them. They are to be calm and
self-centred. If a man takes their cloak, they are to give him their
coat, just to show that material things are of no importance. If people
abuse them, they are not to answer back. What does it signify? The
things people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public
opinion is of no value whatsoever. Even if people employ actual
violence, they are not to be violent in turn. That would be to fall to
the same low level. After all, even in prison, a man can be quite free.
His soul can be free. His personality can be untroubled. He can be at
peace. And, above all things, they are not to interfere with other
people or judge them in any way. Personality is a very mysterious thing.
A man cannot always be estimated by what he does. He may keep the law,
and yet be worthless. He may break the law, and yet be fine. He may be
bad, without ever doing anything bad. He may commit a sin against
society, and yet realise through that sin his true perfection.
There was a woman who was taken in adultery. We are not told the history
of her love, but that love must have been very great; for Jesus said that
her sins were forgiven her, not because she repented, but because her
love was so intense and wonderful. Later on, a short time before his
death, as he sat at a feast, the woman came in and poured costly perfumes
on his hair. His friends tried to interfere with her, and said that it
was an extravagance, and that the money that the perfume cost should have
been expended on charitable relief of people in want, or something of
that kind. Jesus did not accept that view. He pointed out that the
material needs of Man were great and very permanent, but that the
spiritual needs of Man were greater still, and that in one divine moment,
and by selecting its own mode of expression, a personality might make
itself perfect. The world worships the woman, even now, as a saint.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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