The Road to God Lies Within Us

The teachings we have been speaking of have been proved to be nothing more than a false guide for life. But the way of truth will aim at reaching the real and true God. And to know him and understand him accurately, we need nothing except ourselves. God himself is above all things, yet the road to him is not far off or outside us. It is in us, and it can be found from within ourselves in the first place, as Moses also taught when he said, “The word of faith is within your heart.” The Savior declared and confirmed this very thing when he said, “The kingdom of God is within you.” For since we have faith and the kingdom of God within ourselves, we will quickly be able to see and perceive the King of the universe, the saving Word of the Father. So let the Greeks, who worship idols, make no excuses, and let no one else simply deceive himself by claiming that he has no such road, and so finding a pretext for his godlessness. [a]

For we have all set foot on this road, and we all have it, even if not everyone is willing to travel by it. Instead they would rather swerve from it and go wrong, because of the pleasures of life that draw them from outside. And if someone were to ask what road this is, I say that it is the soul of each one of us, and the mind that dwells in it. For by this alone can God be contemplated and perceived. Unless, perhaps, having denied God, these ungodly men will also deny that they have a soul. That would indeed be more believable than the rest of what they say, for it is not like men who have a mind to deny God, the mind’s own Maker and Craftsman. It is necessary, then, for the sake of simpler people, to show briefly that every human being has a soul, and that this soul is rational. This is all the more needed because some sectarians deny this too, thinking that a human being is nothing more than the visible form of the body. Once this point is proved, they will have in their own persons a clearer proof against the idols.