Five Ballades With A Prologue Poem by Gert Strydom

(after W.E.G. Louw)

Prologue: The child of God

From the creation,
long before the time of Plato and Aristotle
the word of God was the child’s criterion
while he ruled over everything.

When darkness rose right across the earth
others came in rebellion
wanted to show the God of creation
that they do not regard Him
and did not want to believe him

that destruction will follow upon their deeds,
that rain will fall in a terrible flood
that flooding will come as a result
from the hand of the God of the universe.

The child constructed a ship
went into its shelter with his wife,
children and animals
believing that the hand of the Almighty God
was sheltering
while the others in destruction
begged and cried for mercy.

The child walked through the palace of Pharaoh
could not convert his mother Hatshepsut
to the Almighty God,
saw whips lashing on the backs of his brothers
wanted to stop the lashing
on of one of them.

Right through the sea the child led his people
with crushing water closing on Pharaoh’s army,
right through the desert
his eyes were set on the Promised Land
while he trusted God.

When God Himself came to this earth,
taught people about love,
the child followed Him,
he baptised people and converted them

until on a Friday
on which the curtain ripped right through,
with God innocently hanging on a cross
while evil people mocked, cursed
and scolded Him in arbitrariness
when He was paying for the destiny of man,
was triumphant against the snake.

Peter, Paul, Thomas, John and other apostles
witnessed about Jesus,
went to the Jews and the wide world,
talking with crowds of strange people
about the life of Jesus,
standing before kings and princes

and some of them were persecuted,
tortured and mocked
and other children of God
were thrown to lions in arenas,
for some death was their destiny
and the soldiers of Rome
was deployed against them.

Still the child of God spread
the testimony of Jesus
to bring others to salvation,
to reconcile them with God
just where he could, he canvassed people
going through the world
as the champion of God

until the dark time of the Middle Ages came,
with the church and state being one
and it was persecuting him
and still the light of God was in him
while soldiers of Papal Rome was pursuing him

and the child did escape to the new world,
flowered there
settling in America
and on the Southern tip of Africa
and he lived as if in the hand of God
with the blessing coming from Him.


I. Another gospel: Communism

Deceitful, cruel and focused on himself
man doomed millions to their death,
believing that the perfect man
in due time would by evolution
come into existence.

While the end justified the means,
nobody was safe against its onslaught.

The false doctrine
wanted to strip those that have,
of their possessions
with the goal of giving everything to everybody,
but some got everything and others nothing.

While the end justified the means,
nobody was safe against its onslaught.

Armed forces, revolution and terrorism
spread almost right across the world,
nuclear weapons were set against each other
to try and bind man at all costs to the state.

While the end justified the means,
nobody was safe against its onslaught.

In Hungary people wanted to be free
and died for freedom,
until the Berlin wall fell
and things started to change in the USSR.

While the end justified the means,
nobody was safe against its onslaught.

But in China, Cuba and on other places
the fortress still stands strong
where the state controls everything
even what you believe, how you live your life.

While the end justified the means
nobody is safe against its onslaught.


II. Quick treachery

In the dark there were being tinkered
while lies were being told to the whole wide world
while in Washington, Peking, Moscow,
London and even Tel Aviv
deliberations were done secretly.

Who is earning dollars,
while bombs are falling like rain,
with guns that are shooting almost endlessly?

In the dark plans were being hatched
and in Afghanistan and Iraq allegedly
soldiers were looking for weapons of mass destruction
while seizing oil reserves.

Who is earning dollars,
while bombs are falling like rain,
with guns that are shooting almost endlessly?

Innocent men, women and children were killed
and foreign soldiers invaded their country
to allegedly bring peace
and treasures were seized.

Who is earning dollars,
while bombs are falling like rain,
with guns that are shooting almost endlessly?


III. Focus on the common man

It is said that every game
have got two sides
and so the bones of fortune
or the dice is thrown
where one wins and the other looses.

In this way people live while they deceive each other,
have relationships with each other’s wives
and tell lies and more lies.

Envious they look at each other’s property,
are competing for a job, to make a living
while people tread on one another
walking into the gambling house, the whorehouse.

In this way people live while they deceive each other,
have relationships with each other’s wives
and tell lies and more lies.

The fellow man that you have got to help,
is starving on the street, is despised
while he looses his wife, his children, his car and job
and everyone is only focusing on the self.

In this way people live while they deceive each other,
have relationships with each other’s wives
and tell lies and more lies.


IV. Another new gospel: Theosophy

That occultism is the new in thing,
slowly but surely
is usurping Christianity as part of it,
anyone will hardly believe.

That man is a god, part of God and again reincarnates,
is becoming slowly but surely a new confession.

Jesus Christ is expelled as creator,
sacrifice of atonement, God
and saviour and another God
is written into His name,
the creator is doomed as Satan
and the snake is exalted
as the eternal light bearer.

That man is a god, part of God and again reincarnates,
is becoming slowly but surely a new confession.

Call it new age teachings, Gnosticism, Cabalism
the teachings of Alice A. Bailey (channeling Djwal Khul) ,
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and Annie Besant
with human rights as a basis,
is supplanting the commandments of God.

That man is a god, part of God and again reincarnates,
is becoming slowly but surely a new confession.

Even in some protestant churches
séances are being held
and spiritualism is sneaking in slowly but surely
where man is looking for signs and wonders.

That man is a god, part of God and again reincarnates,
is becoming slowly but surely a new confession.

People are seen as complex, with a lower and higher nature
where the mind, spirit and soul is polluted by the body,
is cleansed when it returns to the divine
and purification takes place by reincarnation.

That man is a god, part of God and again reincarnates,
is becoming slowly but surely a new confession.


V. Focus on Southern Africa

We think that the murders on farmers,
the hijackings, robberies and rape
is the consequence of lawlessness
but what if it becomes legal by legislation?

By the natural law as set out by Thomas Aquinas
in his Summa Theologiae that affirms Fascism,
or is it only ethnic hatred that is coming to the fore?

This says that possessions like farms,
houses, cars and even tools
are seen as only in title the owners property
but that the community have the right to the use of it
above the owner and may take it by force.

By the natural law as set out by Thomas Aquinas
in his Summa Theologiae is affirmed in Fascism,
or is it only ethnic hatred that is coming to the fore?

[References: Sewe Ballades met ‘n Proloog (Seven ballades with a prologue) by W.E.G. Louw. “Goods of some are due to others by the natural law. There is no sin if the poor take the goods of their neighbours. In cases of need, all things are common property, for the need has made it common. Not only is such taking of another’s property not a sin, it is not even crime. It is lawful for a man to succour his own need by means of another’s property by taking either openly or secretly, nor is this properly speaking, theft or robbery. It is not theft, properly speaking to take secretly and use another’s property in a case of extreme need, because that which he takes for the support of his own life becomes his own property by reason of that need. In a case of a like need a man may also take secretly another’s property to succour his neighbour’s need.” Summa Theologiae ii-ii 7th Article by Thomas Aquinas. “There is one type of fear more devastating in its impact than any other: the systematic fear that arises when a state begins to collapse. Ethnic hatred is the result of the terror that arises when legitimate authority disintegrates.” Michael Ignatieff: Blood and Belonging – Croatia and Serbia.]