To the same. Some further rules of conduct in regard to his inward state.
The Third Letter.
To the same. Some further rules of conduct in regard to his inward state.
Dear brother!
Your chief ground and purpose — that Jesus alone may live and work in you and through you, and that you accordingly may perform all things in His pure mind — is quite right. But it would be needless, indeed a hindrance, if you were to make perpetual reflections upon yourself, and examine yourself and your inward and outward doings in an anxious, solicitous way — whether and how far each and every thing takes place thus, and in that purity, as your hunger well would have it. Let this hunger, springing up in you from the inwardly-present Saviour, only sink itself in with unforced inclination, sweet glances, and childlike remembering, and cleave to Him right gently and confidingly; and then do freely what you do, with the purpose of doing all things in the best and purest way unto the Lord, as well as you can and know how, without regarding dryness or relish, light or darkness. And just this is to be observed in the time of solitude as well. Your outward order, too, is already good; I find nothing particular against it — only that everything be done unforced and without entanglement, and that the Lord remain always Lord and Master: that is, that under and amid all exercise from without, you have but one exercise from within — namely, to cleave inwardly to the Lord with childlike trust, pure love, and will-less submission, without art.
So love God, praise God, and rejoice in God, with forgetting of all else. Pray for me, that I too may do the same!
Mülheim, the 4th of June 1739.
German
Der dritte Brief.
An denselben. Noch einige Verhaltungs-Reglen in Ansehung seines inneren Zustandes.
Lieber Bruder!
Dein Haupt-Grund und Sinn, daß nur JEsus in dir und durch dich leben und wirken, und du demnach alles in Seinem lauteren Sinn verrichten mögest, ist ganz richtig: Unnöthig aber, ja hinderlich wäre es, wann du stets währende Reflexionen auf dich selbst machen, und dich und deine in- und äußere Thaten auf eine ängstliche …
— 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. The last of three letters to the same friend in seven weeks — the sickbed letter of April, the counsel of May on the new resolve, and now, expressly "to the same," a short rule for the inner life. The friend's foundation is approved in the first breath: that Jesus alone should live and work in him, and everything be done in His pure mind, "is quite right." Everything that follows guards that foundation against the friend's own earnestness.
What would hinder is not the hunger but the staring at it: "perpetual reflections upon yourself," examining every act "in an anxious, solicitous way" to see whether it was pure enough. The hunger, Tersteegen says, springs from the "inwardly-present Saviour" himself — so it needs no scrutiny; it needs only to sink: "with unforced inclination, sweet glances, and childlike remembering," cleaving to Him "right gently and confidingly." Then the friend may "do freely what you do," aiming everything at the Lord as well as he can, "without regarding dryness or relish, light or darkness" — do the thing, and leave the weather of the soul alone. Even the friend's outward order of life is left standing — "I find nothing particular against it" — with a single condition: that under all outward exercise there be "but one exercise from within: to cleave inwardly to the Lord with childlike trust, pure love, and will-less submission, without art." Without art is Tersteegen's standing word for the artless way — no technique, no studied effort; the one exercise is a cleaving, not a performance. Then the letter gathers itself into nine words, and the old print sets the name of God three times in full capitals: "So love God, praise God, and rejoice in God, with forgetting of all else." No signature follows — only the plea that turns the counsel back on the counselor: "Pray for me, that I too may do the same!"
A few words and echoes.
- Jesus living and working in you. Galatians 2:20 — "I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me" — the letter's stated foundation, carried over from the May letter.
- All things unto the Lord. Colossians 3:23 — "And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men."
- Dryness or relish, light or darkness. The classic pairs of the mystical writers for the soul's changing weather — felt sweetness and felt barrenness; the counsel is to work on regardless of either.
- As your hunger well would have it. Literally "as your hunger well is" — the friend's hunger for purity sets a standard, and anxious self-examination keeps measuring against it; Tersteegen forbids the measuring, not the hunger.
- Without art. Unstudied, artless; without conscious, willed effort — the opposite of technique.
- Rejoice in God. Philippians 4:4 — "Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice" — the ground-note of the close.
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdii-thiii-003 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.