Genesis 48:21. "Then Israel said to Joseph: Behold, I am about to die; but God will be with you and will bring you again to the land of your fathers."
"We who believe have this beginning, that even when we feel death, we nevertheless do not fear it as others, who are tormented by an evil conscience and grow pale even when the word “death” is mentioned, feel it. But the godly and saintly martyrs despise death and laugh at it. Thus when Agnes was being carried off to prison and torture, she said that she felt just as if she were being led to a dance. What, I ask, was the source of such great courage on the part of the maiden? She was not afraid. She did not tremble. No, she exulted as though she were being summoned to a most sumptuous feast. This was no Epicurean contempt of death; it was true wisdom and understanding, because of which she concluded that life was very close to her. Therefore she laughed at the devil and death and regarded them as a joke, because for her death had been swallowed up through life.
This is the theology we teach. It is altogether different from the theology which the blind and foolish scholastics and papists retain. These men are completely ignorant of it and despise faith. Therefore let us listen to the patriarch Jacob as he speaks of death as if he were speaking of sleep. For if you should ask him: “Why are you not terrified at the sight of death, Jacob?” he replies: “To be sure, I shall die and be buried in the tomb; but God lives. He has promised the land into which He will bring you back, but He will transfer me into another, far better land; for He has given His promise.”
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