The Everlasting Gospel

Read "The Everlasting Gospel" by William Blake, with a complete literary analysis exploring Christianity, morality, freedom, religious convention, spiritual truth, and Blake's provocative interpretation of Jesus and the difference between genuine faith and restrictive moral codes.

The Everlasting Gospel by William Blake

 The vision of Christ that thou dost see 
Is my vision’s greatest enemy. 
Thine has a great hook nose like thine; 
Mine has a snub nose like to mine. 
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind; 
Mine speaks in parables to the blind. 
Thine loves the same world that mine hates; 
Thy heaven doors are my hell gates. 
Socrates taught what Meletus 
Loath’d as a nation’s bitterest curse, 
And Caiaphas was in his own mind 
A benefactor to mankind. 
Both read the Bible day and night, 
But thou read’st black where I read white. 

Was Jesus gentle, or did He 
Give any marks of gentility? 
When twelve years old He ran away, 
And left His parents in dismay. 
When after three days’ sorrow found, 
Loud as Sinai’s trumpet-sound: 
‘No earthly parents I confess— 
My Heavenly Father’s business! 
Ye understand not what I say, 
And, angry, force Me to obey. 
Obedience is a duty then, 
And favour gains with God and men.’ 
John from the wilderness loud cried; 
Satan gloried in his pride. 
‘Come,’ said Satan, ‘come away, 
I’ll soon see if you’ll obey! 
John for disobedience bled, 
But you can turn the stones to bread. 
God’s high king and God’s high priest 
Shall plant their glories in your breast, 
If Caiaphas you will obey, 
If Herod you with bloody prey 
Feed with the sacrifice, and be 
Obedient, fall down, worship me.’ 
Thunders and lightnings broke around, 
And Jesus’ voice in thunders’ sound: 
‘Thus I seize the spiritual prey. 
Ye smiters with disease, make way. 
I come your King and God to seize, 
Is God a smiter with disease?’ 
The God of this world rag’d in vain: 
He bound old Satan in His chain, 
And, bursting forth, His furious ire 
Became a chariot of fire. 
Throughout the land He took His course, 
And trac’d diseases to their source. 
He curs’d the Scribe and Pharisee, 
Trampling down hypocrisy. 
Where’er His chariot took its way, 
There Gates of Death let in the Day, 
Broke down from every chain and bar; 
And Satan in His spiritual war 
Dragg’d at His chariot-wheels: loud howl’d 
The God of this world: louder roll’d 
The chariot-wheels, and louder still 
His voice was heard from Zion’s Hill, 
And in His hand the scourge shone bright; 
He scourg’d the merchant Canaanite 
From out the Temple of His Mind, 
And in his body tight does bind 
Satan and all his hellish crew; 
And thus with wrath He did subdue 
The serpent bulk of Nature’s dross, 
Till He had nail’d it to the Cross. 
He took on sin in the Virgin’s womb 
And put it off on the Cross and tomb 
To be worshipp’d by the Church of Rome. 

Was Jesus humble? or did He 
Give any proofs of humility? 
Boast of high things with humble tone, 
And give with charity a stone? 
When but a child He ran away, 
And left His parents in dismay. 
When they had wander’d three days long 
These were the words upon His tongue: 
‘No earthly parents I confess: 
I am doing My Father’s business.’ 
When the rich learn?d Pharisee 
Came to consult Him secretly, 
Upon his heart with iron pen 
He wrote ‘Ye must be born again.’ 
He was too proud to take a bribe; 
He spoke with authority, not like a Scribe. 
He says with most consummate art 
‘Follow Me, I am meek and lowly of heart, 
As that is the only way to escape 
The miser’s net and the glutton’s trap.’ 
What can be done with such desperate fools 
Who follow after the heathen schools? 
I was standing by when Jesus died; 
What I call’d humility, they call’d pride. 
He who loves his enemies betrays his friends. 
This surely is not what Jesus intends; 
But the sneaking pride of heroic schools, 
And the Scribes’ and Pharisees’ virtuous rules; 
For He acts with honest, triumphant pride, 
And this is the cause that Jesus dies. 
He did not die with Christian ease, 
Asking pardon of His enemies: 
If He had, Caiaphas would forgive; 
Sneaking submission can always live. 
He had only to say that God was the Devil, 
And the Devil was God, like a Christian civil; 
Mild Christian regrets to the Devil confess 
For affronting him thrice in the wilderness; 
He had soon been bloody Caesar’s elf, 
And at last he would have been Caesar himself, 
Like Dr. Priestly and Bacon and Newton— 
Poor spiritual knowledge is not worth a button 
For thus the Gospel Sir Isaac confutes: 
‘God can only be known by His attributes; 
And as for the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, 
Or of Christ and His Father, it’s all a boast 
And pride, and vanity of the imagination, 
That disdains to follow this world’s fashion.’ 
To teach doubt and experiment 
Certainly was not what Christ meant. 
What was He doing all that time, 
From twelve years old to manly prime? 
Was He then idle, or the less 
About His Father’s business? 
Or was His wisdom held in scorn 
Before His wrath began to burn 
In miracles throughout the land, 
That quite unnerv’d the Seraph band? 
If He had been Antichrist, Creeping Jesus, 
He’d have done anything to please us; 
Gone sneaking into synagogues, 
And not us’d the Elders and Priests like dogs; 
But humble as a lamb or ass 
Obey’d Himself to Caiaphas. 
God wants not man to humble himself: 
That is the trick of the Ancient Elf. 
This is the race that Jesus ran: 
Humble to God, haughty to man, 
Cursing the Rulers before the people 
Even to the Temple’s highest steeple, 
And when He humbled Himself to God 
Then descended the cruel rod. 
‘If Thou Humblest Thyself, Thou humblest Me. 
Thou also dwell’st in Eternity. 
Thou art a Man: God is no more: 
Thy own Humanity learn to adore, 
For that is My spirit of life. 
Awake, arise to spiritual strife, 
And Thy revenge abroad display 
In terrors at the last Judgement Day. 
God’s mercy and long suffering 
Is but the sinner to judgement to bring. 
Thou on the Cross for them shalt pray— 
And take revenge at the Last Day.’ 
Jesus replied, and thunders hurl’d: 
‘I never will pray for the world. 
Once I did so when I pray’d in the Garden; 
I wish’d to take with Me a bodily pardon.’ 
Can that which was of woman born, 
In the absence of the morn, 
When the Soul fell into sleep, 
And Archangels round it weep, 
Shooting out against the light 
Fibres of a deadly night, 
Reasoning upon its own dark fiction, 
In doubt which is self-contradiction? 
Humility is only doubt, 
And does the sun and moon blot out, 
Rooting over with thorns and stems 
The buried soul and all its gems. 
This life’s five windows of the soul 
Distorts the Heavens from pole to pole, 
And leads you to believe a lie 
When you see with, not thro’, the eye 
That was born in a night, to perish in a night, 
When the soul slept in the beams of light. 

Did Jesus teach doubt? or did He 
Give any lessons of philosophy, 
Charge Visionaries with deceiving, 
Or call men wise for not believing?… 

Was Jesus born of a Virgin pure 
With narrow soul and looks demure? 
If He intended to take on sin 
The Mother should an harlot been, 
Just such a one as Magdalen, 
With seven devils in her pen. 
Or were Jew virgins still more curs’d, 
And more sucking devils nurs’d? 
Or what was it which He took on 
That He might bring salvation? 
A body subject to be tempted, 
From neither pain nor grief exempted; 
Or such a body as might not feel 
The passions that with sinners deal? 
Yes, but they say He never fell. 
Ask Caiaphas; for he can tell.— 
‘He mock’d the Sabbath, and He mock’d 
The Sabbath’s God, and He unlock’d 
The evil spirits from their shrines, 
And turn’d fishermen to divines; 
O’erturn’d the tent of secret sins, 
And its golden cords and pins, 
In the bloody shrine of war 
Pour’d around from star to star,— 
Halls of justice, hating vice, 
Where the Devil combs his lice. 
He turn’d the devils into swine 
That He might tempt the Jews to dine; 
Since which, a pig has got a look 
That for a Jew may be mistook. 
“Obey your parents.”—What says He? 
“Woman, what have I to do with thee? 
No earthly parents I confess: 
I am doing my Father’s business.” 
He scorn’d Earth’s parents, scorn’d Earth’s God, 
And mock’d the one and the other’s rod; 
His seventy Disciples sent 
Against Religion and Government— 
They by the sword of Justice fell, 
And Him their cruel murderer tell. 
He left His father’s trade to roam, 
A wand’ring vagrant without home; 
And thus He others’ labour stole, 
That He might live above control. 
The publicans and harlots He 
Selected for His company, 
And from the adulteress turn’d away 
God’s righteous law, that lost its prey.’ 
Was Jesus chaste? or did He 
Give any lessons of chastity? 
The Morning blush?d fiery red: 
Mary was found in adulterous bed; 
Earth groan’d beneath, and Heaven above 
Trembled at discovery of Love. 
Jesus was sitting in Moses’ chair. 
They brought the trembling woman there. 
Moses commands she be ston’d to death. 
What was the sound of Jesus’ breath? 
He laid His hand on Moses’ law; 
The ancient Heavens, in silent awe, 
Writ with curses from pole to pole, 
All away began to roll. 
The Earth trembling and naked lay 
In secret bed of mortal clay; 
On Sinai felt the Hand Divine 
Pulling back the bloody shrine; 
And she heard the breath of God, 
As she heard by Eden’s flood: 
‘Good and Evil are no more! 
Sinai’s trumpets cease to roar! 
Cease, finger of God, to write! 
The Heavens are not clean in Thy sight. 
Thou art good, and Thou alone; 
Nor may the sinner cast one stone. 
To be good only, is to be 
A God or else a Pharisee. 
Thou Angel of the Presence Divine, 
That didst create this Body of Mine, 
Wherefore hast thou writ these laws 
And created Hell’s dark jaws? 
My Presence I will take from thee: 
A cold leper thou shalt be. 
Tho’ thou wast so pure and bright 
That Heaven was impure in thy sight, 
Tho’ thy oath turn’d Heaven pale, 
Tho’ thy covenant built Hell’s jail, 
Tho’ thou didst all to chaos roll 
With the Serpent for its soul, 
Still the breath Divine does move, 
And the breath Divine is Love. 
Mary, fear not! Let me see 
The seven devils that torment thee. 
Hide not from My sight thy sin, 
That forgiveness thou may’st win. 
Has no man condemn?d thee?’ 
‘No man, Lord.’ ‘Then what is he 
Who shall accuse thee? Come ye forth, 
Fallen fiends of heavenly birth, 
That have forgot your ancient love, 
And driven away my trembling Dove. 
You shall bow before her feet; 
You shall lick the dust for meat; 
And tho’ you cannot love, but hate, 
Shall be beggars at Love’s gate. 
What was thy love? Let Me see it; 
Was it love or dark deceit?’ 
‘Love too long from me has fled; 
’Twas dark deceit, to earn my bread; 
’Twas covet, or ’twas custom, or 
Some trifle not worth caring for; 
That they may call a shame and sin 
Love’s temple that God dwelleth in, 
And hide in secret hidden shrine 
The naked Human Form Divine, 
And render that a lawless thing 
On which the Soul expands its wing. 
But this, O Lord, this was my sin, 
When first I let these devils in, 
In dark pretence to chastity 
Blaspheming Love, blaspheming Thee, 
Thence rose secret adulteries, 
And thence did covet also rise. 
My sin Thou hast forgiven me; 
Canst Thou forgive my blasphemy? 
Canst Thou return to this dark hell, 
And in my burning bosom dwell? 
And canst Thou die that I may live? 
And canst Thou pity and forgive?’ 
Then roll’d the shadowy Man away 
From the limbs of Jesus, to make them His prey, 
An ever devouring appetite, 
Glittering with festering venoms bright; 
Crying ‘Crucify this cause of distress, 
Who don’t keep the secrets of holiness! 
The mental powers by diseases we bind; 
But He heals the deaf, the dumb, and the blind. 
Whom God has afflicted for secret ends, 
He comforts and heals and calls them friends.’ 
But, when Jesus was crucified, 
Then was perfected His galling pride. 
In three nights He devour’d His prey, 
And still He devours the body of clay; 
For dust and clay is the Serpent’s meat, 
Which never was made for Man to eat. 

Seeing this False Christ, in fury and passion 
I made my voice heard all over the nation. 
What are those… 

I am sure this Jesus will not do, 
Either for Englishman or Jew.

Form: Narrative

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