t12papocrypha
Testament of Benjamin 8
Benjamin teaches that a pure mind rooted in love is self-protecting — not because it avoids the world, but because the Spirit of God dwelling within it acts as the sun acts on mire: the light dries and dispels rather than absorbing the corruption around it. The purity in view is not ascetic withdrawal but an interior condition produced by love toward the brethren. Where that love is genuine, lust finds no foothold, and the defilements of the earth cannot adhere. The sun-over-mire analogy names the mechanism plainly.
1
Do ye also therefore, my children, flee ill-doing, envy, and hatred of brethren, and cleave to goodness and love. He that hath a pure mind in love, looketh not after a woman unto fornication; for he hath no defilement in his heart, because the Spirit of God resteth in him. For as the sun is not defiled by shining over dung and mire, but rather drieth up both and driveth away the ill smell: so also the pure mind, constrained among the defilements of the earth, rather edifieth, and itself suffereth no defilement.
