God's love-eye does not see essentially into the wicked

Host: The night was cold and quiet, heavy with the kind of stillness that comes before revelation. A thin fog curled along the cobblestones of an old churchyard, where the moonlight fell like silver ash. Inside the abandoned chapel, broken stained-glass windows cast fractured colors across the stone floor — reds and blues trembling like the remnants of prayers no one remembered.

At the altar sat Jack, coat draped over his shoulders, a half-empty bottle beside him. His hands were clasped loosely, though he wasn’t praying — just staring at the flicker of a single candle that refused to die. Jeeny stood in the doorway, her hair moving slightly in the draft, her eyes reflecting both the flame and the shadow.

Host: The air carried the faint scent of old incense and rain — holiness and rot mingled into one breath. Somewhere beyond the walls, a bell tolled the late hour, and its echo trembled through the empty space like a ghost remembering its name.

Jeeny: “Jakob Böhme once wrote — ‘God’s love-eye does not see essentially into the wicked rebellious apostate soul; neither also into the devil, but his anger-eye sees thereinto; that is, God, according to the property of the anger or fire of wrath, sees in the devil, and in the false soul.’”

Jack: He laughed softly — a dry, brittle sound that cracked the silence. “So even God has bad eyesight, huh? He looks at some souls and decides they’re not worth seeing with love?”

Jeeny: “That’s not what he meant.”

Jack: “Then enlighten me.” He leaned forward, the flame’s light catching the lines of his face — sharp, haunted. “Because what I hear is divine discrimination. God loves some, burns others. Sounds more human than holy.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. He meant that the wicked soul — the one that turns away from love — blinds itself to it. God’s love is constant, but the soul can’t perceive it anymore. It’s like standing in sunlight with your eyes closed and then blaming the sun for the darkness.”

Host: Her voice echoed softly in the hollowed space, filling it like incense returning to an old prayer. Jack’s eyes narrowed, his jaw tensing.

Jack: “So evil is just blindness? Tell that to the people who’ve suffered under it. Tell that to the child hit by a stray bomb, or the woman dragged into war. You can’t excuse that as someone ‘closing their eyes.’”

Jeeny: “I’m not excusing it. I’m explaining it. Böhme wasn’t writing about morality — he was writing about perception. About how divine love is always there, but when a soul turns fully inward — consumed by its own will — it can only be seen through the lens of wrath. Love and anger are two sides of the same divine fire.”

Jack: “You’re telling me God’s got split personalities.”

Jeeny: “I’m saying love without justice isn’t love at all.”

Host: A gust of wind slipped through the cracked glass, making the candle flame dance wildly. The shadows leapt across the walls, painting them with strange moving shapes — like invisible figures wrestling in silence.

Jack: “Then what’s this ‘anger-eye’? Sounds like something from mythology — Zeus with lightning bolts, not the God of love.”

Jeeny: “The anger-eye isn’t vengeance, Jack. It’s recognition. It’s God’s truth burning through illusion. When love can’t reach the soul because the soul has chosen pride, the only thing left that can reach it is the fire — the confrontation of its own reflection.”

Jack: “So pain is divine?”

Jeeny: “Sometimes. When it wakes you.”

Host: Jack stared at her for a long moment, his eyes reflecting the flame. The bottle near him glinted like an accusation. He picked it up, turned it slowly in his hand, then set it down.

Jack: “I’ve felt that fire, Jeeny. Not divine. Just human. The kind that burns you from the inside until you can’t tell if it’s guilt or rage keeping you alive.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s exactly what he meant. That the fire of wrath — the anger-eye — isn’t separate from love, but a stage of it. The soul that resists love feels it as torment because it can’t accept its own reflection in the light.”

Jack: “And you call that mercy?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because the wrath doesn’t destroy — it purifies. Like gold in a furnace. It hurts, but it reveals.”

Host: Her words hung in the air, soft but immovable, like smoke that refused to dissipate. Jack rubbed his face, exhaling slowly. The candle flame flickered against his skin, making him look older, weary, almost penitent.

Jack: “You sound like one of those mystics who find beauty in suffering.”

Jeeny: “No. I find meaning in transformation.”

Jack: “And what if the devil refuses to be transformed?”

Jeeny: “Then he defines himself by what he refuses.”

Host: Silence. The kind of silence that has a pulse — not absence, but presence. The rain outside grew heavier, drumming against the roof like a heartbeat made of thunder.

Jack: “You really think God still looks into darkness — even when it hates him?”

Jeeny: “He does. But not with love’s gaze. With truth’s. And truth burns.”

Jack: “Then we’re all ash in the end.”

Jeeny: “No. Only what’s false burns. What’s real survives.”

Host: The candle guttered, then steadied. A beam of moonlight slipped through the cracked window and fell directly on the altar, illuminating the worn wood. Dust motes swirled in it like a silent halo.

Jeeny: “You remember the story of Job?”

Jack: “The man who lost everything to prove a point?”

Jeeny: “The man who faced God’s fire and still said, ‘Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.’ That’s not obedience — that’s transformation. That’s a soul turning its wrath-eye back into love.”

Jack: “Or a soul broken enough to stop fighting.”

Jeeny: “Or one healed enough to stop resisting.”

Host: Her voice softened, almost tender. Jack’s hands tightened slightly, then relaxed. He leaned back, looking up at the ruined ceiling, where the remnants of painted angels had long faded into mere outlines.

Jack: “You think the devil ever looks up?”

Jeeny: “He can’t. Not because he’s forbidden to — but because he’s forgotten how.”

Host: The words fell like a benediction, or a verdict. The candlelight trembled once more. The air felt alive — charged, almost conscious.

Jack: “You really believe God sees through anger only because love is still there, hidden underneath?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Even in judgment, there’s longing. God’s wrath is love’s shadow — its ache for what refuses to return.”

Jack: “Then maybe we’re all just God’s heartbreak.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But heartbreak is still proof of love.”

Host: The rain outside began to ease. The air grew lighter. The candle burned low but steady now, its flame smaller, more peaceful.

Jeeny walked to the altar, stood beside Jack, and placed her hand on the edge of the table. Their reflections wavered in the flickering light — two souls illuminated by the same small fire, each seeing something different in its glow.

Jack: “So, the love-eye doesn’t abandon the wicked. It just waits.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And maybe that’s the hardest kind of love — the one that waits through fire.”

Host: Jack nodded slowly, the corner of his mouth lifting, not in joy, but in a kind of quiet surrender. The bottle beside him caught the light, then rolled softly off the altar, landing on the stone floor with a hollow echo — a sound that lingered, like an ending long overdue.

Host: The camera would have pulled back then — framing them in that dim cathedral of ruin and grace. The flame still burned, fragile yet alive, the only moving thing in the stillness. Outside, dawn began to bloom faintly through the rain — pale gold bleeding into the darkness.

Host: And as the light grew, it became clear: the anger-eye had softened, the love-eye was open again, and in that space between fire and forgiveness, two souls — once lost — had begun, quietly, to see.