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Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings

This list of Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings was originally compiled by W. C. Henderson in 1960 but has since been updated.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Conjugial Love #44

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44. The second account:

I once saw three spirits newly arrived from the world, who were wandering about, exploring and asking questions. They were in a state of astonishment that they were living as people just as before and that they were seeing the same things as before. For they knew they had departed from the former or natural world, and they had believed there that they would not live as people until after the day of the Last Judgment, when they would be clothed with the flesh and bones laid in their graves.

To remove all doubt that they were still truly people, therefore, they alternately inspected and touched themselves and others, and handled the things they found, and in a thousand ways kept convincing themselves that they were now people as they had been in the former world, except that they were seeing each other in a brighter light and the things they found in a greater splendor, thus seeing them more perfectly.

[2] Then by chance two angelic spirits met them and stopped them, saying, "Where are you from?"

And they answered, "We have departed from the world and are again living in a world, so we have traveled from one world to another. At this we are now marveling!"

Then the three newcomers began asking the two angelic spirits about heaven. And because two of the three newcomers were adolescents, and from their eyes darted what seemed to be a spark of lust for the opposite sex, the angelic spirits said, "You have, perhaps, seen some of the women."

And they replied, "We have."

So, because the newcomers had asked about heaven, the angelic spirits told them the following:

"In heaven all things are magnificent and splendid, and are such as eye has never seen. There are also young men and women there, young women of such beauty that they may be called the very pictures of beauty, and young men of such morality that they may be called the very pictures of morality. And the beauty of the young women and the morality of the young men correspond to each other, as reciprocal and mutually adaptable forms."

The two newcomers then asked whether human forms in heaven are entirely similar to human forms in the natural world. And the angelic spirits answered that they are completely alike, with nothing taken from either man or woman.

"In a word," the angelic spirits said, "a man is still a man, and a woman is still a woman, in all the perfection of the form in which they were created. Step aside, if you like, and investigate in your own case whether anything is missing to keep you from being the man you were before."

[3] Again the newcomers said, "We heard in the world from which we departed that in heaven they are not given in marriage, because they are angels. 1 Is love between the sexes possible, then?"

The angelic spirits replied, "The love you mean between the sexes is not possible there, but an angelic love for the opposite sex is, which is chaste, free of any temptation arising from lust."

To this the newcomers said, "If love for the opposite sex is without temptation, then what is love between the sexes?"

And when they began to think about that love, they groaned and said, "How dry the joy of heaven is! What young man can then wish for heaven? Is not a love like that sterile and devoid of life?"

To this the angelic spirits laughingly replied, "Angelic love for the opposite sex, or the kind of love that exists in heaven, is still full of the deepest delights. It is a most pleasant swelling of everything in the mind and consequently of everything in the breast, and within the breast it is as if the heart were sporting with the lungs. From this sport comes a breathing, tone and speech which cause the companionships between the sexes, or between young men and women, to be heavenly sweetness itself, which is at the same time pure.

[4] "All newcomers on ascending to heaven are examined in respect to what their chastity is like, for they are introduced into companionships with young women - the beauties of heaven - and these perceive what the newcomers are like in regard to their love for the opposite sex. They perceive it from their tone of voice, their speech, their facial expression, their eyes, their bearing, and the atmosphere emanating from them. If the love is unchaste, the young women then run away and report to their friends that they have seen satyrs or lechers. And what is more, the newcomers undergo a change, and to the eyes of the angels they appear hairy, with feet like those of calves or leopards. They are also soon cast down, to keep them from polluting the atmosphere there with their lust."

Listening to this, the two newcomers again said, "Then there is no love between the sexes in heaven. What is chaste love between the sexes but love emptied of the essence of its life? Are the companionships of young men and women there not then dry joys? We are not made of stone and wood, but of living perceptions and affections!"

[5] When the two angelic spirits heard this, they indignantly retorted, "You do not know at all what a chaste love between the sexes is, because you are not yet chaste! That love is a true delight of the mind and so of the heart, and not at the same time of the flesh below the heart. Angelic chastity, which is found equally in both sexes, prevents that love from passing beyond the confines of the heart. But within those confines, and above them, the morality of the young man and the beauty of the young woman find delight in the delights of a chaste love for the opposite sex - delights which are deeper and richer for their pleasantness than can be described in words.

"But this is the love that angels have for the opposite sex, because they have only conjugial love, and conjugial love is not possible at the same time as an unchaste love for the opposite sex. Truly conjugial love is a chaste love, and has nothing in common with unchaste love. It is with one and only one of the opposite sex, with all others set aside, for it is a love of the spirit and consequently of the body, and not a love of the body and consequently of the spirit, that is, it is not a love that infests the spirit."

[6] On hearing this, the two adolescent newcomers rejoiced and said, "Then there is still love between the sexes in heaven! What else is conjugial love?"

But to this the angelic spirits replied, "Think more deeply, weigh the matter, and you will see that the love you mean between the sexes is a love outside of marriage, and that conjugial love is altogether different, being as different from the love you mean as the wheat is from the chaff, or better, as different as human life is from animal life.

"If you were to ask women in heaven what love outside of marriage is, I assure you they would respond, 'What is this? What are you saying? How can such a thing that so offends the ears come out of your mouth? How can a love not created in the first place be engendered in a person?'

"If you then asked them what truly conjugial love is, I know they would answer that it is not a love for the opposite sex, but love for one of the sex, which arises only when a young man sees a young woman provided by the Lord, and the young woman the young man, both feeling an inclination to marry kindled in their hearts, and perceiving, the young man that she is for him, and the young woman that he is for her. For love then presents itself to love and causes them to recognize each other, at once joining their souls, and afterwards their minds. From there it enters their hearts, and after the wedding goes on beyond. And so it becomes a full love, which daily grows into union, even to the point that they no longer are two, but virtually one person.

[7] "I know, too, that these same women would swear that they are not acquainted with any other love between the sexes. For they say, 'How can there be love between the sexes unless it is so honest and reciprocal that it aspires to eternal union, which is that the two may be one flesh?'"

To this the angelic spirits added, "In heaven they do not know at all what licentiousness is, not even that it exists or is possible. The angels grow cold with their whole body at unchaste love or love outside of marriage, and on the other hand, they grow warm with their whole body as a result of chaste or conjugial love. In the case of men there, all their sinews sink at the sight of a licentious woman, and grow taut at the sight of their wife."

[8] The three newcomers, hearing this, asked whether there is the same love-making between married partners in heaven as on earth.

The two angelic spirits answered that it is entirely the same. And because they perceived that the newcomers were wanting to know whether they had the same end delights in heaven, they also said that these are entirely the same, but much more blissful, since the perception and sensation of angels is much more exquisite than the perception and sensation of people.

"Moreover, what is the life accompanying that love," the angelic spirits asked, "if it does not stem from an underlying condition of ability? If this ability fails, does that love not fail and cool? Is this power not a real measure, a real progression and real foundation of that love? Is it not its beginning, support and fulfillment?

"It is a universal law that the primary elements in a series exist, subsist and persist on the basis of the final elements. So also with that love. Consequently, without the end delights, there would not be any delights in conjugial love."

[9] The newcomers then asked whether as a result of the end delights of that love, children are born in heaven. And if children were not born, of what use those delights were.

The angelic spirits replied that they do not have any natural offspring, but spiritual offspring.

"And what are spiritual offspring?" the newcomers asked.

The angelic spirits answered, "By the end delights the two partners become more united in a marriage of goodness and truth, and a marriage of goodness and truth is a marriage of love and wisdom, and love and wisdom are the offspring that are born of such a marriage. Because the husband in heaven is a form of wisdom, and his wife is a form of the love of it, and both moreover are spiritual, therefore no other than spiritual offspring can be conceived and begotten there.

"That is why, after experiencing these delights, angels do not become depressed as some do on earth, but joyful, and they have this characteristic as a result of a continual influx of fresh vigor to follow the first - fresh vigor that rejuvenates and at the same time enlightens them. For, all who come into heaven return into the springtime of their youth and into the powers of that age, and so they remain to eternity."

[10] When the three newcomers heard this, they said, "Does it not say in the Word that there are no marriages in heaven, because they are angels?" 2

To this the angelic spirits replied, "Look up into heaven, and you will receive an answer."

They then asked why they should look up into heaven.

"Because," the angelic spirits said, "we have all our interpretations of the Word from heaven. The Word is inwardly spiritual, and the angels, being spiritual, must explain its spiritual meaning."

Then, after some time, heaven opened over their heads and they caught sight of two angels. And the two angels said, "There are marriages in heaven, as on earth, but only in the case of people there who already possess a marriage of goodness and truth. They are the only ones who become angels. Therefore spiritual marriages are meant in the Word, which are marriages of goodness and truth. These spiritual marriages take place on earth and not after death, thus not in heaven. So it is said of the five foolish virgins - even though they, too, were invited to the wedding - that they could not go in, because they did not have a marriage of goodness and truth, since they had no oil, but only lamps. 3

"Goodness is meant by oil, and truth by lamps. And to be given in marriage is to enter into heaven where that marriage is."

The three newcomers were glad to hear this explanation, and were filled with a longing for heaven and the hope of being married there. And they said, "We will strive for morality and a decent and proper life, that we may obtain the object of our prayers."

Footnotes:

1. See Matthew 22:30, Mark 12:25, Luke 20:35-36.

2. See Matthew 22:30, Mark 12:25, Luke 20:35-36.

3. See Matthew 25:1-12.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #185

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185. Here I shall add some more experiences, of which this is the first.

The spiritual world contains climatic zones similar to those in the natural world. There is nothing in this world which does not have its counterpart in the other, but their origins are different. In the natural world the varying seasons depend upon how far the sun is from the equator; in the spiritual world they depend upon how remote the affections of the will, and so the thoughts of the understanding, are from true love and true faith. Everything there corresponds to these two.

The cold zones of the spiritual world look much like the cold zones in the natural world. There are stretches of frozen land to be seen there, frozen lakes and a covering of snow. The people who come and live there are those who in the world had put their understanding to sleep through being too lazy to think about spiritual matters, and at the same time too lazy to do anything useful. These are called boreal 1 spirits.

[2] I once had a wish to see a district in the cold zone, where these boreal spirits live. So I was taken in the spirit northwards, to an area where all the ground was snow-covered and all the water frozen over. It was Sunday, and I saw the people, or spirits, of the same physique as people on earth; but on account of the cold they had lions' skins on their heads, with the face fitting over their faces; their bodies both front and back down to the loins were covered with leopards' skins, their legs and feet with bears' skins. I also saw many of them riding in carriages; some of them were in carriages carved to resemble dragons with their horns projecting forwards. These carriages were pulled by small horses with docked tails. They ran like terrifying wild beasts, and the driver holding the reins in his hands constantly drove them on and yelled at them to run. Eventually I saw that the crowds were converging on a church, which was so deep in snow it was invisible. But the guardians of the church were clearing away the snow and digging out a way in for the worshippers as they arrived. They got out of their carriages and entered the church.

[3] I was also allowed to see the inside of the church. It was plentifully lit with lamps and lanterns. The altar was of ashlar, and behind it was hung up a board, on which was written: 'The Divine Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who are in essence one God, but three in person.'

At length the priest who was standing by the altar, after three genuflexions towards the board behind it, climbed into the pulpit holding a book in his hand, and began to preach about the Divine Trinity. 'How great a mystery it is,' he cried, 'that God in the highest fathered a Son from eternity, and through Him produced the Holy Spirit, the three of whom linked themselves by essence, but divided themselves by properties, that is, imputation, redemption and activity! But if we consider these things by the use of reason, our sight grows dim and a blot obscures our vision, such as affects anyone who gazes directly at the sun. Therefore, my listeners, in this respect let us keep the understanding subject to the dictates of faith.'

[4] After this he gave another cry and said: 'How great a mystery is our holy faith! This tells us that God the Father imputes the righteousness of the Son, and sends the Holy Spirit to effect by that imputation the rewards of justification. These are briefly the forgiveness of sins, renewal, regeneration and salvation. A person knows no more about the influence and action of the Holy Spirit than the pillar of salt into which Lot's wife was turned. Nor is he any more aware of His presence and state within him than a fish is in the sea. But, my friends, within our faith lies hidden a treasure, so hedged about and concealed that not a scrap of it is to be seen. Therefore in respect to this too let us keep the understanding subject to the dictates of faith.'

[5] He heaved a few sighs, and then cried out again, saying: 'How great a mystery is election! Anyone becomes one of the elect to whom God imputes the faith which of His free choice and purely of His grace He pours into any He wishes, whenever He wishes. When he receives the infusion the person is like a bare tree-trunk, but afterwards he becomes like a tree. But although the fruits, which are good deeds, hang from that tree, which may be taken to represent our faith, still they do not form part of it, so that the tree's value does not depend upon its fruit. However, since this, for all it is a mystic truth, has a heterodox ring to it, let us, my brethren, keep the understanding subject to the dictates of this faith.'

[6] After an interval, during which he stood as if trying to recall something from his memory, he went on to say: 'From the heap of mysteries I will extract just one more. This is that a person in spiritual matters has not a grain of free will. The leaders and champions of our rule say in their theological canons that in matters which concern faith and salvation, what are especially called spiritual matters, a person cannot will, think or understand anything, nor even prepare and devote himself to acquiring these things. So I hold for my part that a person cannot for his part on these subjects think rationally, or speak thoughtfully otherwise than a parrot, magpie or crow. So in spiritual matters he is truly a donkey, and only human in natural matters. But in this, my colleagues, as in other respects, to prevent the understanding attacking your reason, let us keep it subject to the dictates of faith. Our theology is a bottomless pit, and if you plunge your intellectual gaze into it, you will sink and perish in the wreck. But please listen to this: we are none the less enlightened by the Gospel, which shines out high above our heads; yet how painfully would it hurt, did not our hair and the bones of our skull keep it out and prevent it from penetrating into the chamber of our understanding.'

[7] At the end of this speech he came down from the pulpit, said a few prayers at the altar, and brought the service to an end. Then I went up to a group of people, including the priest, who were talking together. The people around said to the priest: 'You have our undying thanks for such a magnificent sermon, so full of wisdom.' Then I said to them: 'Surely you did not understand anything of it?' 'We strained our ears to catch every word,' they answered. 'But why do you ask whether we understood it? Are not such things likely to amaze the understanding?' The priest on hearing this added: 'Because you have heard and have not understood, you are blessed, for that is the source of your salvation.'

[8] Subsequently I talked with the priest and asked him if he had a degree; he replied that he held a master's degree. Then I said: 'Master, I have listened to you preaching of mysteries. If you know of them, but nothing of what they contain, you know nothing. For they are merely like bookcases locked with three bolts; and unless you open them and look inside, which will require the use of the understanding, you do not know whether the contents are valuable, worthless or dangerous. They may be snakes' eggs and spiders' webs, as described in Isaiah (Isaiah 59:5).'

When I said this, the priest gave me a black look, and the worshippers went off and got into their carriages, drunk with paradoxes, stupefied with inanities and plunged in thick darkness as regards everything conducive to faith and instrumental for salvation.

Footnotes:

1. Or 'of the north wind'.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.

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