Letters · Zweiter Band · Theil III (1775)

Of the nature of sufferings, and how to conduct oneself in them.

Bd II · Th III · Brief 15 · Der fünfzehnte Brief

Addressee — Georg Heinrich Fischer, Otterbeck — closing the Fischer file of Th III 1–15 (Briefe 1, 2, 3, 14, 15). Salutation "Lieber Bruder!". Intimate du → English you.
Date — Mülheim, Innocents' Day (28 December) 1740 — the print dates BY FEAST: "Mülheim, am unschuldigen Kindleins-Tag, 1740." The only feast-day dateline in Th III so far — and the same feast Brief 7 closed toward, one year earlier.
Provenance — All rendered words from public-domain prints.*

The Fifteenth Letter.

Of the nature of sufferings, and how to conduct oneself in them.

Dear brother!

I take part from my heart in your sufferings, whatever they may be. When God has a mind to set us in suffering, then everything must arrange itself to that end, and a trifle can seem to one a mountain — so that we may not have the satisfaction of seeing others' compassion, or our own courage. Only be of good cheer, and ever onward, my brother! The noble suffering-time is short: we must prize it dearly in faith, and not look much either at ourselves or at the little crosses, but only bow ourselves, and trust always in God. I too have it, most of the time, from many sides — known to the Lord alone. To go looking expressly for something comforting to read on such matters I count useless, and at times harmful. God does let something come one's way unsought now and then; that one accepts in simplicity. Whoever comes rightly into the article of suffering can seldom make it rhyme with what others write of it. Prayer is a good retreat; to lengthen it somewhat may also be done — only in prayer one must have God childlike for one's object, and not, deliberately, oneself and one's sufferings. We must give ourselves to God, and then be content with Him, and with what we presently have. Content, I say — for all discontent makes one gloomy and sullen, and sets a go-between between God and us. But the inner ground-will can be content, and quietly consent with God, while nature at the very same time feels the contrary; that too one must quietly suffer.

Mülheim, on Innocents' Day, 1740.

❦

German

Der fünfzehnte Brief.

Von der Beschaffenheit der Leiden, und wie sich darinnen zu verhalten.

Lieber Bruder!

Ich nehme von Herzen Theil an deinen Leiden, wie sie auch immer seyn mögen. Wann GOtt Lust hat, uns ins Leiden zu setzen, dann muß sich alles darnach schicken, und eine Kleinigkeit kann einem ein Berg dünken, damit wir das Vergnügen nicht haben mögen, das Mitleiden anderer …

— 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 and shortest of the year's letters to the friend of the sickbed letter — written on the feast of the Holy Innocents, the child-martyrs' day, and dated by the feast rather than the calendar: a quiet signature of its theme. The friend is suffering again; Tersteegen does not ask from what. "I take part from my heart in your sufferings, whatever they may be." The letter's opening observation is a piece of exact spiritual psychology: when God sets us in suffering, "a trifle can seem to one a mountain — so that we may not have the satisfaction of seeing others' compassion, or our own courage." Even the comfort of being visibly brave is withheld, on purpose. The counsel is the smallest in all these letters and among the deepest: don't inspect — "not look much either at ourselves or at the little crosses, but only bow ourselves, and trust always in God." And, with dry realism about devotional reading: hunting for consolation in books about suffering is "useless, and at times harmful" — whoever is really inside "the article of suffering can seldom make it rhyme with what others write of it."

Prayer, in turn, is "a good retreat," and may even be lengthened — but with the rule that undoes self-pity at a stroke: in prayer have God for your object, "and not, deliberately, oneself and one's sufferings." Then comes the word the old print set twice in emphasized type: vergnügt — content. "We must give ourselves to God, and then be content with Him, and with what we presently have. Content, I say — for all discontent makes one gloomy and sullen, and sets a go-between between God and us." And for the sufferer who cannot feel content, the letter's last distinction is pure mercy: the inner ground-will can be content and quietly consent with God "while nature at the very same time feels the contrary; that too one must quietly suffer." Contentment is an act of the deep will, not a feeling — and the feeling's rebellion is just one more thing to bear in peace. There the letter simply stops: no signature, only the feast-day and the year.

A few words and echoes.

Innocents' Day. December 28, the children of Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16–18) — the seventh letter had invited a sufferer to become "such a one after the martyrdom"; this letter is dated on the feast itself.
The little crosses. Creutzgens — the diminutive is the theology: most of our crosses are small, and looking at them magnifies them.
The article of suffering. As one speaks of an article of faith — suffering as a doctrine one must enter, not merely read about.
A go-between. Vermittlung — discontent inserts itself between God and the soul, breaking the immediacy (the old gloss: loss of unmediated-ness).
The ground-will. Grund-Wille — the will in the soul's ground, beneath the weather of feeling; the seat of real consent to God.
Content. Cf. Philippians 4:11 — "I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content."

Cite this letter

Gerhard Tersteegen, Geistliche und erbauliche Briefe, Zweiter Band, III. Theil, Brief 15 (Solingen, 1773–75); trans. Jarred Fenlason, https://gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdii-thiii-015.html.

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