By August Haug
One day, a book came into my hands.
I hardly paid attention to it. I flipped through a few pages and set it aside, as if it were just one of many.
Yet something would not let me go.
A quiet, almost inexplicable feeling urged me to take the book into my hands again.
Not out of curiosity, but out of an inner restlessness, as though something had called me.
I began to read.
Page after page.
And suddenly I could not stop.
Only then did I take a closer look at the cover.
The Bible.
A book I had known all my life — or at least believed I had known.
It had always been there,
and yet I had never truly read it.
I read about a people fleeing from Egypt,
escaping from slavery.
Men, women, and children,
carried by fear and hope,
not knowing where their path would lead —
only certain that things could not go on as they were.
My eyes lingered on one chapter.
It was the story of Moses,
the man who led his people.
Not a ruler,
but a human being
who carried responsibility
and knew doubt.
I read that Moses followed an inner calling
and went alone up the mountain.
There he remained for forty days and forty nights —
in silence, solitude, and trial.
While he waited above,
the people below grew restless.
Doubters said that Moses would never return.
Out of fear and impatience
they melted their gold
and shaped it into a calf —
a golden calf
which they made their comfort and their support.
Even Moses began to doubt.
Not God —
but himself.
Then something happened.
In a bright light Moses heard a voice within.
Word by word, the lines burned themselves
into stone tablets.
They were the Ten Commandments.
He read them.
Simple.
Clear.
Understandable.
And he realized:
These words were not a burden.
They were protection.
Moses received the command
to return to his people
and bring them these commandments.
He fell to his knees
and gave thanks
for what had been entrusted to him.
When he came down from the mountain
and saw his people worshipping the golden calf,
he grew angry.
Not out of hatred,
but out of sorrow.
He spoke to them —
firmly and with warning.
He reminded them
that they had raised gold above themselves
when truth had been given to them.
And the people knelt in reverence.
Thus I could read in this book
how the Ten Commandments were said to have come into being.
And the more closely I looked at them,
the more I understood:
Every word was true.
And yet I asked myself:
Why can people not live according to these simple commandments?
Why do so many suffer hunger
while others live in abundance?
Why do people die in wars?
Why do so many desire what belongs to others?
I had to admit something to myself as well:
I too have not always lived according to these commandments.
Not out of malice —
but out of weakness.
Like so many others.
I could not say
what the anger of creation might look like one day.
Whether the earth itself might open
or the heavens might refuse to close their gates.
But I felt that every action has consequences —
for humanity
and for the world
that was formed over countless ages
and nearly destroyed within a few decades.
Slowly I laid the book,
the one called the Bible,
aside.
I was exhausted by what I had read.
Not because it had been too much —
but because it lingered within me.
I had not often been in a church.
And yet an inner urge made me rise.
I walked slowly into the house of God
at the edge of our town.
Step by step
I moved forward toward the altar.
There hung the figure of the crucified
Jesus Christ.
And it seemed to me
as though He were looking at me.
Not sternly.
Not accusing.
But quietly.
Almost with a smile.
I felt warmth.
And it was as though a gentle voice said:
Go out into your world.
Live according to my commandments.
And pass these words on
to your fellow human beings.
Then I knew
that I would need much time
to truly read this book
and understand its words.
But I felt something new.
A warm and light feeling.
Not certainty about everything —
but peace.
And when I stepped outside again,
I saw the world
with different eyes.