it is, and is to be, the absolute. Therefore all the relative explanations which may have been ventured as to its why and wherefore are entirely beside the point. Possibly, these explanations were suggested by a kind of human compassion which believes it necessary to haggle a bit God very likely does not know the nature of man very well, His demands are a bit exorbitant, and therefore the clergymen just haggle and beat Him down a bit.[1] Maybe the clergy hit upon that idea in order to stand well with men and reap some advantage from preaching the gospel; for if its demands are reduced to the purely human, to the demands which arise in man's heart, why, then men will of course think well of it, and of course also of the amiable preacher who knows how to make Christianity so mild if the Apostles had been able to do that the world would have esteemed them highly also in their time. However, all this is the absolute. But what is it good for, then is it not a downright torment? Why, yes, you may say so: from the standpoint of the relative, the absolute is the greatest torment. In his dull, lanquid, sluggish moments, when man is dominated by his sensual nature, Christianity is an absurdity to him since it is not commensurable with any definite "wherefore?" But of what use is it, then? Answer: peace! it is the absolute. And thus it must be represented; that is, in a fashion which makes it appear as an absurdity to the sensual nature of man. And therefore is it, ah, so true and, in still another sense, so true when the worldly-wise man who is contemporaneous with Christ condemns him with the words: "he is literally nothing" quite true, for he is the absolute. And, being absolute, Christianity has come in the world, not as a consolation in the human sense; in fact, quite on the contrary, it is ever reminding one how the Christian must suffer in order to become, or to remain, a Christian sufferings which he may, if you please, escape by not electing to be a Christian.
There is, indeed, an unbridgeable gulf fixed between God and man. It therefore became plain to those contemporary
- ↑ Cf. Note p. 178.
