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September 5th, 1915
Received by James Padgett.
Washington D.C.
I will write a little as I am interested in what you have received
from Luther tonight, and as I am supposed
to have written the Gospel of Luke, I desire to say a few things
in reference to the correctness or rather incorrectness of many
things contained in my Gospel. As you infer, I am St. Luke the writer
of the third Gospel and a follower of Jesus.
My Gospel was not founded on anything I had personal knowledge
of, but upon the writings of others and the traditions which were
the common knowledge of many Christians at that time. I knew several
of the apostles and obtained much of my information from them, as
well as from many of the Christians who were members of the congregations
to which these apostles preached and expounded the sayings of Jesus.
In my Gospel, as now contained in the authorized version, there
are many things that have been interpolated. This version was not
based on what I wrote, but upon pretended copies of my writings;
and the persons who made these copies did not follow literally my
writings, but added to my text and gave their own interpretations
of what I had written in such a way as to destroy the true meaning
of what was intended to be conveyed by my writings.
There are many truths contained in the Gospel as now written in
the Bible, and they are the truths of God, but there are also many
errors which contradict these truths. For instance, I never wrote
that Jesus commanded his disciples to believe that the wine was
his blood or the bread his body, and to eat and drink these things
in remembrance of him.
How this interpolation could have been made I do not know, but
will observe that the same things are said in all the four Gospels,
and this saying must have been derived from a common source, and
that must have been the minds of those who pretended to copy the
Gospels. I tell you now that this saying, that the blood of Jesus
saves from sin, is not true, and if men depend upon this blood for
their salvation they will never be saved, but will enter the spirit
world in all their sins, and will be surprised to learn that Jesus
is not waiting to receive them in his arms and carry them to the
mansions prepared for the truly redeemed of the sons of men.
I know that a vast number of the members of the various churches
believe this harmful doctrine, and that as a consequence, many persons
claiming to be Christians will realize that their sins have not
been forgiven them when they come into the spirit world.
Sometime, as these writings continue, I will point out the errors
of my Gospel to an extent that will show you the fact of what great
additions and misinterpretations have been made thereto. I will
stop now.
Your brother in Christ,
St. Luke
This message is a composite of two, being published
in Volume II on page 166 and Volume IV on page 326, which although
partly by Martin Luther, contains a part by Luke. For more details
see this page.
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