(A commentary on John 21:15-25)

In the first part of this chapter, seven of the Lord's disciples had come home to Galilee. They had gone fishing, seen Jesus on the shore, followed his instructions to fish on the right side of the boat, dragged a net loaded with 153 fish to shore, and... as the second half of the chapter begins, they have just finished breaking their fast with Him. Now they are relaxing.

Jesus says to Peter,"Do you love me?" and Peter, perhaps a little startled at the question, thinking that the answer is obvious, answers "yes", and Jesus responds, "Feed my lambs". Twice more this sequence is repeated, but with some changes. Then, after this unusual conversation, the Lord tells them all a little parable about being young and later being old. Then the Lord tells Peter to follow him, and Peter, apparently jealous, asks what John is supposed to do. The Lord mildly rebukes Peter’s jealousy by saying, "If this man tarry until I come what is that to you?", but then He tells John also to follow him.

Finally, the gospel of John, and indeed the collection of all four gospels, closes with an explanation by John that he is the writer of this gospel.

So now, let’s look more closely at the conversation, the parable, and the outbreak of jealousy.

Only two of the seven disciples, Peter and John, are mentioned in this part of the story. Peter represents faith, or truth, but truth about spiritual things that we really believe are from God. John represents good, or love to the neighbor. The former resides in the understanding part of the mind and the latter in the will part of the mind.

In telling Peter to feed His sheep, the Lord is saying that to follow Him means to preach the truths that all the disciples now know about the Lord, His coming, and about how a life should be led, in order to be a follower of the Lord in a new church. In the conversation the Lord is direct and probing. "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?" I think Peter is being asked whether he loves the Lord, Jesus, more than he loves his fellow Galilean friends, though it’s ambiguous, it could mean "do you love me more than these other six do?’ When Peter answers the first time he says "Lord thou knowest that I love thee."

With this first of the three probing questions, the Lord answers "Feed my lambs," while after that the response is "Feed my sheep." Sheep and lambs both represent people who are in a love of doing good, but while sheep means those who love to do good for the sake of the neighbor, lambs mean those who do good for the sake of the Lord. The first is spiritual good, and the second is higher, and is called celestial good. But people who wish to do good at first don’t know what is good; they need to learn that from the Word and be taught. This is why Peter is told to "feed them", which is to say that truth must indicate how good is to be done. In order to do things that are good, the will's wanting to, and the understanding's knowing how to go about it, must be conjoined. For a successful Christian life, or on a larger scale, a Christian church, 'Peter' and 'John' must work in harmony.

Then comes the parable. "When you were young you got yourself ready and did what you wanted on your own. But when you become old, you have to reach out for help and another shall carry you where you don’t want to go."

This doesn’t seem to fit in here, but of course it does, and in two ways. The first way is given in the Biblical text; it is about the Lord’s death, that all the prophecies were leading Him to His crucifixion, as is mentioned. The second way is a lesson for all of us. When we are young, confident, and strong, we feel that we can do what we want and don’t need any help. Temptations to do evil we ourselves can deal with. But when we grow wiser we realize that all our strength comes from the lord, and if we continue to depend only on ourselves, the temptations from the hells will be too strong and we will be led into doing what the hells want for us, not what we want. We must learn at the start to follow the Lord and depend on Him. This he says at the end of the parable, where it seems not to fit until we understand the parable. "And when He had spoken this He saith unto (them), follow Me." That’s what we need to do also.

Peter is happy to do this preaching of the truth and maybe feels that he has been singled out, but he also realizes that John also loves the Lord and is loved in return. So he asks "And what is this man supposed to do?" It seems that the needed harmony is not yet present, and that Peter is jealous of the bond, and probably hopes to be assured that he is number one... but that doesn’t happen. Peter is simply told that it doesn’t matter; he needs to do the job he has been given.

I’m reminded of the story of Jacob and Esau, in Genesis 25, where Esau is the firstborn and will inherit the birthright and blessing from Isaac, as his due. Jacob by craft devised by his mother deceives Isaac and steals what is Esau’s. Then he runs off to Padan-Aram and stays there with his uncle and becomes rich. It is only on his return journey that he wrestles with the angel and has his name changed to Israel, that he again meets Esau. The change of name means that now that Jacob is rich with truth from the Word, now with the friendly meeting with Esau, also rich, that the two twins can in parable, be merged into one personage, called Israel, meaning the joining of good and truth in the mind.

Esau means something similar to John, they both represent goodness or true charity. Jacob means something similar to Peter, they both represent truth learned from the Word. Any seeming enmity between them as to which is more important can make them both useless, and in a person who is becoming angelic (as everyone should be aiming for), there is no enmity. Truth enables good, and good inspires truth in order to get something done. Although we can think and speak of them separately, they are (perfectly in the Lord and less so in angels) conjoined into a oneness so as to be seen as married. The marriage of the Lord's Divine good and Divine truth is the origin of all creation. Yes, all creation.

This marriage of good and truth, and the need for both to work in our lives, in balance and harmony, is a core New Christian concept.

In the Gospels, there is just one more story that takes place after this one. In it, the rest of the disciples join the seven mentioned here to hear the Lord’s last commands.

4776. 'An evil wild animal has devoured him' means that desires for evil annihilated it. This is clear from the meaning of 'an evil wild animal' as a lie invented out of a life of evil desires, dealt with in 4729, and therefore as such desires; and from the meaning of 'devouring' as annihilating, because it has reference to the truth of the Church. The one great Truth the Church possesses is that love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour are first and foremost, Mark 12:29-31, a truth that evil desires annihilate. For those who lead a life of evil desires cannot lead a life of love and charity since these two kinds of life are complete opposites. A life of evil desires is one in which a person loves only himself and not his neighbour except out of self-interest or for his own sake. People like this therefore annihilate charity among themselves, and those who annihilate charity also annihilate love to the Lord; for charity is the only means through which anyone loves the Lord, and the Lord dwells within charity. An affection that belongs to charity is a genuine heavenly affection, which comes from the Lord alone. From this it may be seen that desires for evil annihilate the one great truth the Church possesses; and once it has been annihilated some other means is invented which is called the way to salvation; and this is faith. When faith moreover is separated from charity actual truths are defiled, for in that case no knowledge exists any longer of what charity is, or even of what the neighbour is. Nor as a consequence does any knowledge exist about the inner essence of a human being, nor indeed of what heaven is. For the essence of a human being, or heaven within him, is charity, which consists in goodwill to others, to his community, to his country, to the Church, to the Lord's kingdom, and so to the Lord Himself. From this one may deduce what truth possessed by the Church must be like when there is no knowledge of the essential truths and when evil desires reign, standing opposed to these essential truths. When a life of evil desires speaks about them, are not truths defiled to such an extent that they cease to be recognizable?

[2] The truth that no one can be saved unless he has led a good charitable life, and so has acquired affections for that life, which exist in him as goodwill shown to others and as good deeds done to them which are motivated by that goodwill; also, the truth that no one can possibly accept the truths of faith - that is to say, take them in and make them his own - except him who leads a charitable life, have been made perfectly plain to me from those in heaven to whom I have been allowed to speak. Everyone there is a form of charity, the beauty and goodness of that form depending on the nature of the charity. The pleasure, bliss, and happiness of those there flow from their being able - because they are motivated by goodwill - to do good to others. Anyone who has not been leading a charitable life cannot possibly know that heaven and heavenly joy consist in goodwill and in good deeds motivated by that goodwill. To one of his kind heaven consists in goodwill shown to himself, with any good deeds done to others being motivated by this selfish goodwill. But this is in fact hell; for as has been stated, heaven is distinguished from hell in that heaven consists in doing good because one is motivated by goodwill, and hell in doing ill because one is motivated by ill will. Those governed by love towards the neighbour are motivated by goodwill to do good deeds, but those governed by self-love are motivated to do ill ones by ill will. The reason the latter are like this is that they love no one but themselves, and others only insofar as they see themselves in others, and others in themselves. They also hate these others, that hatred revealing itself the moment these go away from them and are no longer part of them. They are like robbers who love one another while they are in league with one another; but at heart they long to kill one another if any spoils can be gained by doing so.

[3] From all this one may see what heaven is, namely love towards the neighbour, and what hell is, namely self-love. Those governed by love towards the neighbour are able to accept all truths of faith, to take them in and make them their own; for love towards the neighbour holds every truth of faith within it since it has heaven within it and the Lord within it. But those governed by self-love cannot possibly accept the truths of faith since hell lies within that love. In no way can they accept the truths of faith apart from doing so for the sake of improving their own positions and for the sake of material gain; thus they cannot possibly take them in and make them their own. What they do take in and make their own are denials of the truth. For in their hearts they do not believe in the existence of hell and heaven, or in the life after death. Nor therefore do they believe anything that is said about hell and heaven, or about the life after death, and so nothing whatever from the Word and from doctrine regarding faith and charity. They seem to themselves to be believers when they take part in worship, but they do so because that state has been instilled into them since early childhood. But as soon as they leave that worship behind them they also leave that state of belief behind them. At this point, now left to think for themselves, they do not have any belief at all; and what is more, the life that their love fires them to lead causes them to think up ideas to justify it. These ideas they call truths, and also back them up from the literal sense of the Word; but they are in fact falsities. This is what all are like who in life and doctrine are adherents to faith separated from charity.

[4] In addition it should be recognized that a person's love includes everything, for his love determines the life he leads, and therefore only into a person's love does the Lord enter with His life. As is people's love therefore, so is their life because so is their reception of it. Love towards the neighbour receives the life of heaven, while self-love receives the life of hell. Thus everything of heaven lies within love towards the neighbour, and everything of hell within self-love. The fact that love includes everything may be illustrated by many observations of nature. All living creatures, not only those that walk on dry land but also those which fly in the air or swim in water, move in response to their own love. Into their love comes whatever is of use to them in the life they lead, that is, to their feeding, housing, and reproducing themselves. Therefore every genus knows its own food, dwelling-places, and mating habits such as pairing off, building nests, laying eggs, and rearing chicks.

[5] Bees likewise know how to build cells, extract honey from flowers, fill honeycombs with it, and make provision for the winter. Indeed they know how to establish a system of government under a single ruler, besides many other remarkable activities. All this is a product of what is entering their love, it being merely the different forms their affections take that lead to the different results their life produces. Their love includes all this. So what would heavenly love include if the human being was governed by heavenly love? Would not the whole of wisdom and intelligence as these exist in heaven be included? From this too it is evident that those who have led charitable lives, these and no others, are accepted into heaven, and that because they have charity they have the ability to accept and take in all truths, that is, every truth of faith. The reverse however takes place with adherents to faith separated from charity, that is, to those who know some truths but have no charity. Their love accepts ideas such as are suited to itself; that is to say, self-love and love of the world accept ideas that are the reverse of truths, the kind that exist in hell.