On the true and false losing-of-oneself in God.
The Hundred-and-Thirty-Fifth Letter.
On the true and false losing-of-oneself in God.
In the Lord Jesus dearly beloved brother!
Only just now have I been able, for the first time, to read your and your wife's — my sister's — welcome letter, and even that only with half my attention, because I have for some time been weak, and can still, on account of weakness in the head, scarcely look upon paper; I say therefore only in one word: Yes, brother! I bind myself with you, and harbour, so far as I know, no suspicion against you — still less do I let others notice any — where in side-matters there might be a difference. At bottom we are wholly at one, and can therefore well enough hold one and the same speech, though I shall likely be able to say little more, for I am worn out. My thoughts are only these — in which we shall surely also be at one: A man must first find his soul before he can lose it, or else his losing is only an imagined losing, which truly brings him harm. This losing, or letting-go, of oneself in God is a pure and high work of God, which costs the self-life anguish and death, and translates the soul into God.
When, therefore, I hear someone speak of it so merrily and, as it were, jestingly, I think I have ground to believe that such a one has not yet experienced the thing. The very fewest souls truly come to it; to the most, quite other food belongs. Self-love does, in many a one, seize upon the image, because it regards it as something high; but such a losing and surrender works only a fluttering, frivolous character. The souls talk of losing; but one sees that they still hold themselves quite fast, and live wholly in themselves. Since I now know that the soul is not translated into God and His life except through God Himself and His working in her, and that God cannot work freely unless we, suffering, keep sabbath and hold still to Him — I therefore commend to each, according to his capacity, recollection and prayer, active or passive, as he is able for it. And to that end I have also recommended solitude, or a special withdrawal, for such exercise of prayer — yet all with the utmost avoidance of a legalism.
This last you have now seen somewhat otherwise; yet I do not know that this circumstance has injured my love to you; as I also know that the more you shall see the abuse in others, and especially if you saw how all enlightened souls at all times — and particularly also Madame Guyon — have inculcated this point with such great emphasis, you would easily yield in it. Now, on account of my head, I can no more. I bind myself once again also in this with you: that we will never harbour evil of one another, nor believe strange spirits, but ask one another about it in brotherly love; and even if we were not wholly agreed in some side-matter, nonetheless embrace one another in love. I greet and kiss you, then, once more in the spirit — you and your wife — heartily, and remain
Your
devoted, weak fellow-brother.
Mülheim, the 13th of February 1738.
German
Der hundertfünfunddreißigste Brief.
Von dem wahren und falschen Verlieren in GOtt.
In dem HErrn JEsu herzlich-geliebter Bruder!
So eben habe erst dein und deiner Frauen, meiner Schwester, angenehmes Schreiben lesen können, und doch nur mit halber Andacht, weil eine zeithero schwach gewesen, und auch noch wegen Kopf-Schwachheit kaum aufs Papier sehen darf; sage deswegen nur mit einem Wort: Ja, Bruder!
— Opening lines of the original German. The complete transcription of all 605 letters appears in the forthcoming Encounter Press critical edition; Brief 1 is shown in full as a sample.
German text: public domain (1773–75 first edition / 1845 Gesammelte Schriften).
Translator’s notes
What this letter is. A letter of 13 February 1738 to a brother — whose wife Tersteegen counts his own "sister" — written while he was ill and "could scarcely look upon paper for weakness in the head." The two had come to differ over a point of spiritual practice, and this is Tersteegen's careful, affectionate answer: first a plain assurance of undamaged love, then the doctrine itself, then a plea for peace across the disagreement.
True and false losing. The subject is what he calls "the losing of oneself in God" — self-abandonment. His governing sentence turns the paradox exactly: "A man must first find his soul before he can lose it; otherwise his losing is only an imagined losing, which truly brings him harm." Real self-loss "is a pure and high work of God, which costs the self-life anguish and death" — and "the very fewest souls truly come to it." The danger is a counterfeit: "self-love seizes upon the image because it looks lofty," and the result is "a fluttering, frivolous" soul that "talks of losing" while "still holding itself quite fast." Because only God can work the real thing — and only "when we, suffering, keep sabbath and hold still to Him" — he commends "recollection and prayer, active or passive," but "with the utmost avoidance of a legalism."
The plea for peace. He appeals to "all enlightened souls, and particularly Madame Guyon," who pressed this same point; but the frame around the whole is irenic. Their difference is a "side-matter"; "at bottom we are wholly at one." And so the covenant he asks for: "that we will never harbour evil of one another, nor believe strange spirits, but ask one another about it in brotherly love; and even if we were not wholly agreed in some side-matter, nonetheless embrace one another in love."
A few words and echoes.
- "A man must first find his soul before he can lose it." Matthew 10:39 / 16:25 — "he that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." Tersteegen sharpens it: there is no losing what one has not first possessed.
- "Keep sabbath and hold still to Him." Psalm 46:10 ("Be still, and know that I am God") and Hebrews 4:10 ("he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works") — the "suffering," passive holding-still in which God works.
- "With the utmost avoidance of a legalism." Galatians 5:1 — "be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage"; even solitude and prayer must not harden into law.
- "Madame Guyon." The 17th-century French mystic (cf. Briefe 120, 134), whom Tersteegen cites as having "inculcated this point" of true self-abandonment.
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdi-thii-135 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.