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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

 

True Christian Religion #333

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333. The second experience.

Some time later I heard again from the lower earth the same cries as before 'How learned, how learned!' On looking around to see who was there, I found myself in the presence of angels from the heaven exactly above the people who were shouting 'How learned!'

When I talked to them about the shouting, they said that these were learned people who only argue whether a thing exists or not, and rarely reach the thought that it is so. 'They are therefore like winds which blow and pass on, or like bark around trees that have no heartwood, or like almond shells with no kernel, or like the peel around fruits with no flesh inside. For their minds are devoid of interior judgment, and merely coupled to the bodily senses. So if the senses themselves are unable to judge, they can reach no conclusions. In short, they are creatures of their senses, and we call them logicmongers. We call them this because they never reach any conclusions, but they pick up anything they hear and argue whether it exists, continually speaking for and against. Nothing gives them more pleasure than attacking truths and by subjecting them to argument tearing them in pieces. These are the people who consider themselves learned beyond anyone in the world.'

[2] On hearing this I begged the angels to take me down to visit them. So they took me down to a hollow, from which steps led down to the lower earth. We went down and followed the sound of shouting 'How learned!' There we found some hundreds of people standing in one place stamping on the ground. I was surprised at this and asked: 'Why are they standing like that stamping on the ground? They might,' I added, 'make a hole in the ground like that.'

The angels smiled at this and said: 'They seem to stand in one place because they never think about anything being so, but only whether it exists, and this they argue about. When thought makes no further progress, they seem merely to trample and wear out one clod of earth without advancing.'

The angels went on: 'Those who arrive in this world from the natural one, and are told that they are in a different world, form groups in many places, and try to find out where heaven and hell are, and likewise where God is. But even after being taught this, they still begin reasoning, debating and arguing whether God exists. They do so because at the present time so many people in the natural world are nature-worshippers, and when the talk turns to religion this is the subject they discuss among themselves and with others. This proposition and discussion rarely ends in an affirmation of faith in the existence of God. Afterwards these people associate more and more with the wicked; this happens because no one can do any good from the love of good, except by God's help.'

[3] After this I was taken to a meeting, and there I saw people with not unpleasing faces and well dressed. 'They look like this,' said the angels, 'in their own light, but if light is shed from heaven, there is a change in their faces, and in their clothes.' This happened, and their faces turned swarthy and they seemed to be wearing black sackcloth. But when this light was shut off, they returned to their previous appearance.

A little later I spoke with some of the people in the meeting and said: 'I have heard the crowd around you crying out "How learned!" So I should like, if I may, to enter into conversation with you about matters of the most profound learning.' 'Say anything you like,' they replied, 'and we will satisfy you.'

'What sort of religion,' I asked, 'will effect people's salvation?'

'We shall split up this question,' they said, 'into several, and we cannot give a reply until we have settled these. The order of discussion will be: (1) whether religion is of any importance; (2) whether or not there is such a thing as salvation; (3) whether one religion is more efficacious than another; (4) whether heaven and hell exist; (5) whether there is everlasting life after death; and many more questions.'

So I asked about the first question, whether religion is of any importance; and they started discussing it with many arguments. So I asked them to refer it to the meeting, which they did. The agreed reply was that this proposition requires so much investigation that it would not be finished before evening. 'Could you,' I asked, 'finish it within a year?' One of them said it could not be finished in a hundred years. 'So,' I said, 'in the meantime you have no religion, and since salvation depends upon it, you have no idea of salvation, no belief in it or hope for it.'

'Wouldn't you like us,' he replied, 'to prove first whether religion exists, what it is, and whether it is of any importance? If it exists, it will be for the wise too; if it does not, it will be only for the common people. It is well known that religion is called a bond; but the question may be asked, "For whom?" If it is only for the common people, it is not really of any importance; but if it is for the wise, then it is.'

[4] On hearing this I said: 'You are anything but learned, since you can think of nothing but whether it exists, and argue this in either direction. Can anyone be learned, unless he knows something for certain, and advances to that conclusion, just as a person advances step by step, and in due course achieves wisdom? Otherwise you do not so much as touch truths with your finger-tips, but drive them further and further from your sight. Therefore reasoning only whether it exists is like arguing about a hat without wearing it, or about a shoe without putting it on. What can come of this, except ignorance whether anything exists, whether anything is more than an idea, and so whether salvation exists, or everlasting life after death, whether one religion is better than another, or whether heaven and hell exist? You cannot have any thoughts on these subjects, so long as you are bogged down at the first step and pound the sand there, unable to put one foot in front of the other and make progress. Take care that, while your minds stand in the open outside the court, they do not inwardly grow ossified and turn into pillars of salt.'

With these words I left them, and they were so incensed they threw stones after me. Then they looked to me like carvings, totally devoid of human reason. I asked the angels what was their fate. They said that the worst of them are plunged into the depths, and there they find a desert, where they are forced to carry loads. Since they can then make no reasonable utterance, they chatter and make idle remarks, Seen from a distance there they look like donkeys carrying loads.

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Conjugial Love #82

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82. After this a man came rushing from the northern zone in a rage, and looking at me with a threatening expression and speaking in a heated tone, he said, "You are the one who is trying to lead the world astray by establishing a New Church, which you take to be meant by the New Jerusalem that will come down out of heaven from God, and by teaching that people who embrace the doctrines of this church will be blessed by the Lord with truly conjugial love, whose delights and happiness you exalt to the sky! Is that not something you just made up? Are you not just saying it as a snare and inducement to get people to go along with your new ideas?

"Tell me in short, however, what these New Church doctrines are, and I will see whether they hang together or not."

So I replied, "The doctrines of the church that is meant by the New Jerusalem are as follows:

"1. There is one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and that God is the Lord Jesus Christ.

"2. Saving faith is to believe in Him.

"3. Evils must be abstained from because they are of the devil and from the devil.

"4. Good deeds must be done because they are of God and from God.

"5. These good deeds must be done by a person as though he were doing them from himself, but he must believe that they are from the Lord in him and by means of him."

[2] When he heard this, the man's rage subsided for several minutes. But after some consideration, he again looked at me with a fierce expression, saying, "These five precepts - are they doctrines of the faith and charity of the New Church?"

And I answered, "Yes."

Then he asked me gruffly, "How are you able to demonstrate the first one, that there is one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and that He is the Lord Jesus Christ?"

"I demonstrate it," I said, "in this way. Is God not one and indivisible? Is there not a Trinity? If God is one and indivisible, is He not one person? If He is one person, is the Trinity not in that person?

"That He is the Lord Jesus Christ I demonstrate by the following points: Jesus Christ was conceived by God the Father (Luke 1:34-35), so that in regard to His soul He was God. And therefore, as He Himself says, the Father and He are one (John 10:30). He is in the Father and the Father in Him (John 14:10-11). He who sees Him and knows Him, sees and knows the Father (John 14:7,9). No one sees and knows the Father but He who is in the bosom of the Father (John 1:18). All things belonging to the Father are His (John 3:35, 16:15). He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6), thus by Him, because the Father is in Him. And, according to Paul, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily (Colossians 2:9). And furthermore, He has authority over all flesh (John 17:2), and He has all authority in heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18).

"From all this it follows that He is God of heaven and earth."

[3] The man then asked how I demonstrate the second precept, that saving faith is to believe in Him.

"I demonstrate it," I said, "by these words of the Lord:

This is the will of the Father..., that everyone who...believes in (the Son) may have everlasting life. (John 6:39-40)

God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that everyone who believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3:16,15)

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; but he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. (John 3:36)"

[4] After that he said, "Demonstrate as well the third precept, and the ones that follow."

Then I replied, "What need is there to establish that evils must be abstained from because they are of the devil and from the devil, that good deeds must be done because they are of God and from God, and that these good deeds must be done by a person as though he were doing them from himself, but that he must believe they are from the Lord in him and by means of him? The Holy Scripture from beginning to end attests throughout that these three precepts are true. What else does it teach in sum but to abstain from evils and do good deeds, and to believe in the Lord God?

"And besides, there is not any religion without these three precepts. Religion has to do with a way of life, does it not? And what is that life but to abstain from evils and do good deeds. How can a person do these things and believe in them unless he does so as though he were doing them from himself?

"If you dismiss these precepts from the church, therefore, you dismiss the Holy Scripture from the church, and you also dismiss religion. And if you dismiss these, the church is not a church."

On hearing these things, the man withdrew and considered them. But still he went away in annoyance.

  
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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.

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