THEOLOGIA GERMANICA (download
pdf 7.6M)
AUDIO CONTENT
Read by Lyle Hettinger, Lawrence Kansas, at the Studios of Kansas
Public Radio, Summer, 2015
Produced and edited by Jonathan Jambor
Prologue and title page
Preface to
the 1854 Edition
Historical Introduction (by the
Translator)
Letter From Chevlaier Bunsen to The Translator
A Preface to the Original Publication
Chapter I. - Of that which is perfect and that which
is in part, and
how that which is in part is done away, when that which is perfect is
come.
Chapter II. - Of what Sin is, and how we are not to
take unto ourselves
any good Thing, seeing that it belongeth unto the true Good alone.
Chapter III. - How Man's Fall and his going astray
must be healed as Adam's Fall was healed.
Chapter IV. - How Man, when he claimeth any good Thing
for his own, falleth, and toucheth God in his Honour.
Chapter V. - How we are to take that Saying, that we
must come to be
without Wistdom, Will, Love, Desire, Knowledge, and the like.
Chapter VI. - How that which is best and noblest
should also be loved above all Things by us, merely because it is the
best.
Chapter VII. - Of the Eyes of the Spirit, wherewith
Man Looketh into
Eternity and into Time, and how the one is hindered of the other in its
working.
Chapter VIII. - How the Soul of Man, while it is yet
in the Body, may Foretaste of eternal Blessedness.
Chapter IX. - How it is better and more profitable for
a Man that he
should perceive what God will do with him, and to what end He will make
use of him, than if he knew all that God had ever wrought, or would
ever work through all the Creatures; and how Blessedness lieth alone in
God, and not in the Creatures, or in any Works.
Chapter X. - How the perfect Men have no other Desire than that they
may be to the Eternal Goodness what his Hand is to a Man; and how they
have lost the Fear of Hell, and Hope of Heaven.
Chapter XI. - How a righteous Man in this present Time is brought into
Hell, and there cannot be comforted, and how he is taken out of Hell
and carried into Heaven, and there cannot be troubled.
Chapter XII. - Touching that true, inward Peace, which Christ left to
his Disciples at the last.
Chapter XIII. - How a Man may cast aside Images too soon.
Chapter XIV. - Of three Stages by which a Man is led upwards till he
attaineth true Perfection.
Chapter XV. - How all Men are dead in Adam and made alive in Christ,
and of true Obedience and Disobedience.
Chapter XVI. - Telleth us what is the old Man, and what is the new Man.
Chapter XVII. - How we are not to take unto ourselves what we have done
well, but only what we have done amiss.
Chapter XVIII. - How the Life of Christ is the noblest and best Life
that ever hath been or can be, and how a careless Life of false Freedom
is the worst Life that can be.
Chapter XIX. - How we cannot come to the true Light and Christ’s Life,
by much Questioning or Reading, or by high natural Skill and Reason,
but by truly renouncing ourselves and all Things.
Chapter XX. - How, seeing that the Life of Christ is most bitter to
Nature and Self, Nature will have none of it, and chooseth a false
careless Life, as is most convenient to herself.
Chapter XXI. - How a Friend of Christ willingly fulfilleth by his
outward Works, such Things as must be and ought to be, and doth not
concern himself with the rest.
Chapter XXII. - How sometimes the Spirit of God, and sometimes also the
Evil Spirit may possess a Man and have the Mastery over him.
Chapter XXIII. - How he who will submit himself to God and be obedient
to Him, must be ready to bear with all Things; to wit, God, himself and
Creatures, and must be obedient to them all, whether he have to suffer
or to do.
Chapter XXIV. - How that four Things are needful before a Man can
receive divine Truth and be possessed with the Spirit of God.
Chapter XXV. - Of two Fruits that do spring up from the Seed of the
Evil Spirit, and are two Sisters who love to dwell together. The
one is called spiritual Pride and Highmindedness, and the other is
false, lawless Freedom.
Chapter XXVI. - Touching Poorness of Spirit and true Humility, and
whereby we may discern the true and lawful free Men, whom the truth
hath made free.
Chapter XXVII. - How we are to take Christ’s Words when he bade us
forsake all Things; and wherein the Union with the Divine Will standeth.
Chapter XXVIII. - How, after a Union with the Divine Will, the inward
Man standeth immovable, but the outward Man is moved hither and thither.
Chapter XXIX. - How a Man may not attain so high before Death as not to
be touched and moved by outward Things.
Chapter XXX. - On what wise we may come to be beyond and above all
Custom, Order, Law, Precepts, and the like.
Chapter XXXI. - How we are not to cast off the Life of Christ, but
practice it diligently, and walk in it until Death.
Chapter XXXII. - How God is a true, simple, perfect Good, and how He is
a Light and a Reason and all Virtues, and how what is highest and best,
that is, God, ought to be most loved by us.
Chapter XXXIII. - How when a Man is made truly Godlike, his Love is
pure and unmixed, and he loveth all Creatures, and doth his best for
them.
Chapter XXXIV. - How that if a Man will attain unto that which is best,
he must forswear his own Will; and how he who helpeth a Man to his own
Will helpeth him to the worst Thing he can.
Chapter XXXV. - How there is deep and true Humility and Poorness of
Spirit in a Man who is made a Partaker of the Divine Nature.
Chapter XXXVI. - How nothing is contrary to God but Sin only; and what
Sin is in Kind and Act.
Chapter XXXVII. - How in God, as God, there can neither be Grief,
Sorrow, Displeasure, nor the like, but how it is otherwise with a Man
who is made a Partaker of the Divine Nature.
Chapter XXXVIII. - How we are to put on the Life of Christ from Love,
and not for the sake of Reward, and how we must never grow careless
concerning it, or cast it off.
Chapter XXXIX. - How God will have Order, Custom, Measure, and the like
in the Creature, feeling that he cannot have them without the Creature,
and of four sorts of Men who are concerned with this Order, Law and
Custom.
Chapter XL. - A good Account of the False Light and its Kind.
Chapter XLI. - How he that is to be called and is truly a Partaker of
the Divine Nature, who is illuminated with the Divine Light, and
inflamed with Eternal Love, and how Light and Knowledge are worth
nothing without Love.
Chapter XLII. - A Question: whether it be possible to know God and not
love Him; and how there are two kinds of Light and Love, a true and a
false.
Chapter XLIII. - Whereby we may know a Man who is a Partaker of the
Divine Nature, and what belongeth unto him; and further, what is
the token of a False Light and a False Free Thinker.
Chapter XLIV. - How nothing is contrary to God but Self-will, and how
he who seeketh his own Good for his own sake findeth it not; and how a
Man of himself neither knoweth nor can do any good Thing.
Chapter XLV. - How that where there is a Christian life, Christ
dwelleth, and how Christ’s Life is the best and most admirable Life
that has been or can be.
Chapter XLVI. - How entire Satisfaction and true Rest are to be found
in God alone, and not in any Creature; and how he who will be obedient
to God, must be obedient to the Creatures with all Quietness, and he
who would love God, must love all Things in One.
Chapter XLVII. - A Question: Whether if we ought to love all Things, we
ought to love Sin also?
Chapter XLVIII. - How we must believe certain Things of God’s Truth
beforehand, ere we can come to a True Knowledgeand Experience thereof.
Chapter XLIX. - Of Self-will, and how Lucifer and Adam fell away from
God through Self-will.
Chapter L. - How this present Time is a Paradise and Outer Court of
Heaven, and how therein there is only one Tree forbidden, that is,
Self-will.
Chapter LI. - Wherefore God hath created Self-will, seeing that it is
contrary to Him.
Chapter LII. - How we must take that Saying of Christ: “No Man cometh
unto the Father but by me”.
Chapter LIII. - Considereth that other Saying of Christ: “No Man can
come unto me except the Father which hath sent me to draw him”.
Chapter LIV. - How a Man shall not seek his own, either in Things
spiritual or natural, but the Honour of God only; and how he must enter
in by the right Door, to wit, by Christ, into Eternity.