New Christian Bible Study

Commentary

 

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 #35

Study this Passage

  
/ 853  
  

35. I shall here add the following account of an experience. 1

Once I was amazed at the huge number of people who regard nature as the source of creation, and therefore of everything beneath or above the sun. When they see anything they say, and they give it heartfelt acknowledgment, 'Surely this is due to nature'; and when they are asked why, they say that this is due to nature rather than to God, when they still sometimes follow the usual view that God created nature, so that they could just as well say that what they see is due to God rather than to nature, they reply muttering almost inaudibly to themselves, 'What is God but nature?' This false belief that nature created the universe, a piece of madness they take for wisdom, makes them so puffed up that they look on all who acknowledge that God created the universe as ants, creeping along the ground, treading a worn path; and some as butterflies flying around in the air. They call their dogmas dreams, because they see things the others cannot, and they say: 'Who has ever seen God? We can all see nature.'

[2] While I was wondering at the immense number of such people, an angel came and stood beside me, saying 'What are you thinking about?'

I replied, 'How many people there are who believe that nature produces itself and is therefore the creator of the universe.'

'The whole of hell,' the angel told me, 'is composed of such people; there they are called satans and devils. Those who have formed a firm belief in nature and consequently denied the existence of God are satans; those who have spent their lives in crimes and thus banished from their hearts any acknowledgment of God are devils. But I will take you to the schools in the south-western quarter where such people who are not yet in hell live.'

So he took me by the hand and guided me. I saw some cottages containing schools and one building in their midst which seemed to be their headquarters. It was built of pitch-black stones coated with glassy plates giving the appearance of glittering gold and silver, rather like the stones called selenites or mica. Here and there were interspersed shining shells.

[3] We went up to this building and knocked. Someone quickly opened the door and made us welcome. He hurried to a table and brought us four books, saying: 'These books contain the wisdom which the majority of kingdoms approve to-day. This book contains the wisdom favoured by many in France, this by many in Germany, this by some in Holland, and this by some in Britain.' He went on: 'If you like to watch, I will make these four books shine before your eyes.' Then he poured forth and enveloped the books in the glory of his own reputation, so that at once the books shone as it were with light. But this light immediately vanished from our sight.

We asked him then what he was now writing. He replied that at present he was bringing out of his stores and displaying the very kernel of wisdom. This could by summarised as: (1) Whether nature is due to life, or life to nature; (2) whether a centre is due to an expanse, or an expanse to a centre; (3) about the centre and expanse of nature and life.

[4] So saying he sat down again at the table, while we strolled around his spacious school. He had a candle on the table, because there was no sunlight there, but only moonlight. What surprised me was that the candle seemed to roam about and cast its light; but because the wick was not trimmed it gave little light. While he was writing, we saw images of different shapes flying up from the table on to the walls. In that night-time moonlight they looked like beautiful birds from India. But as soon as we opened the door, in the sunlight of daytime they looked like nocturnal birds with net-like wings. They were apparent truths turned into fallacies by adducing proofs which he had ingeniously linked into coherent series.

[5] After seeing this we approached the table and asked him what he was now writing.

'My first proposition:' he said, 'whether nature is due to life or life to nature.' He remarked that on this point he could prove either proposition and make it appear true. But because of some lurking fear which was not explicit, he dare only prove that nature is due to life, that is to say, comes from life, and not the reverse, that life is due to, that is, comes from nature.

We asked politely what was the lurking fear he could not make explicit.

He replied that it was the fear of being called by the clergy a nature-worshipper and so an atheist, and by the laity a person of unsound mind, because both parties are either believers from blind faith or people who see that it is so by studying supporting arguments.

[6] Then our zealous indignation for the truth got the better of us and we addressed him thus: 'My friend, you are quite wrong. Your wisdom, which is no more than an ingenuity of style, has led you astray, and your desire for reputation has induced you to prove what you do not believe. Do you not know that the human mind is capable of being raised above the objects of the senses, that is to say, the thoughts engendered by the bodily senses; and when it is so raised it can see the products of life at a higher level and the products of nature below? What is life but love and wisdom? And what is nature but a receiver of love and wisdom, a means to bring about their effects or purposes? Can these be one, except as principal and instrumental? Light surely cannot be one with the eye, nor sound with the ear. What is the cause of these senses if not life, and what is the cause of their shapes if not nature? What is the human body but an organ for receiving life? Are not all its parts organically constructed to produce what love wills and the understanding thinks? Surely the body's organs spring from nature, but love and thought spring from life. Are these not quite distinct from each other? Raise the view of your mind a little higher, and you will see that emotion and thought are due to life; that emotion is due to love and thought to wisdom, and both of them are due to life, for, as has been said before, love and wisdom constitute life. If you raise your intellectual faculty a little higher still, you will see that love and wisdom could not exist unless somewhere they had a source, and that this source is Love Itself and Wisdom Itself, therefore Life Itself. These are God, who is the source of nature.'

[7] Afterwards we talked with him about his second proposition, whether the centre is due to the expanse, or the expanse to the centre. We asked his reasons for discussing this subject. He replied that it was in order to enable him to reach a conclusion about the centre and expanse of nature and life, which one was the source of the other. When we asked his opinion, he made the same reply as before, that he could prove either proposition, but for fear of losing his reputation he proved that the expanse was due to, that is to say, was the source of the centre. 'All the same,' he said, 'I know that something existed before there was a sun, and this was distributed throughout the expanse, and this of itself reduced itself to order, so creating a centre.'

[8] The zeal of our indignation made us address him again, saying: 'My friend, you are mad.' On hearing this he drew his chair back from the table and looked fearfully at us, but then listened with a smile on his face. 'What could be more crazy, 'we went on, 'than to say the centre is due to the expanse? We take your centre to mean the sun, and your expanse to be the universe; so you hold that the universe came into existence without the sun, do you? Surely the sun produces nature and all its properties, which are solely dependent upon the light and heat radiated by the sun and propagated through atmospheres? Where could these have been before there was a sun? We will explain their origin later on in the discussion. Are not the atmospheres, and everything on earth, like surfaces, the centre of which is the sun? What would become of them all without the sun? Could they last a single instant? And what of them all before there was a sun? Could they have come into existence? Is not subsistence continuous coming into existence? Since therefore the subsistence of everything in nature depends upon the sun, so must their coming into existence. Everyone can see this and acknowledge it from personal experience.

[9] Does not what is later in order subsist, just as it comes into existence, from what is earlier? If the surface were earlier and the centre later, should we not have what is earlier subsisting from what is later - something which is contrary to the laws of order? How can the later produce the earlier, or the more outward the more inward, or the grosser the purer? How then could the surfaces making up an expanse produce a centre? Anyone can see that this is contrary to the laws of nature. We have drawn these proofs from rational analysis to show that the expanse is produced by the centre, and not the reverse, although everyone who thinks correctly can see this for himself without these proofs. You said that the expanse of its own accord came together to form a centre. Did this happen by chance, that everything fell into such a wonderful and amazing order, so that one thing should be on account of the next, and every single thing on account of human beings and their everlasting life? Can nature inspired by some love and working through some wisdom have ends in view, foresee causes and so provide effects to bring such things about in due order? Can nature turn human beings into angels, build a heaven of them, and make its inhabitants live for ever? Accept these propositions and think them over; your idea of nature begetting nature will collapse.'

[10] After this we asked him what he had thought, and still did, about his third proposition, about the centre and expanse of nature and life. Did he believe that the centre and expanse of life were the same as the centre and expanse of nature?

He said that here he hesitated. He had previously believed that the inward activity of nature was life and that love and wisdom, which are the essential components of human life, come from this source. It is produced by the heat and light coming from the fire of the sun and transmitted through atmospheres. But now as the result of what he had heard about people living after death he was in doubt, a doubt which alternately lifted up and depressed his mind. When it was lifted up, he acknowledged a centre which had previously been quite unknown to him; when it was depressed he saw a centre which he thought to be the only one. Life was from the centre previously unknown to him, and nature from the centre he thought to be the only one, each centre being surrounded by an expanse.

[11] We said we approved of that, so long as he was willing to view the centre and expanse of nature from the centre and expanse of life, and not the reverse. We taught him that above the heaven of the angels there is a Sun which is pure love; it appears fiery, like the sun in the world, and the heat radiated from it is the source of will and love among angels and human beings; the light radiating from it produces their understanding and wisdom. Everything from this source is called spiritual; but the radiation from the sun of the natural world is a container or receiver of life; this is what we call natural. The expanse proper to the centre of life is called the spiritual world, and the expanse proper to the centre of nature is called the natural world, which owes its subsistence to its own sun. Now because space and time cannot be predicated of love and wisdom, but there are states instead, it follows that the expanse surrounding the sun of the heaven of angels is not a spatial extension, though it is present in the extension to which the natural sun belongs, and with the living things there, depending upon their ability to receive them, and this is determined by their forms and states.

[12] But then he asked, 'What is the origin of fire in the sun of the world, the natural sun?'

We replied that it was from the sun of the heaven of angels, which is not fire, but the Divine Love most nearly radiating from God, who is in its midst. Since he found this surprising, we gave this explanation: 'Love in its essence is spiritual fire; that is why "fire" in the spiritual sense of the Word stands for love. That is why priests in church pray that heavenly fire may fill their hearts, meaning love. The fire on the altar and the fire of the lampstand in the Tabernacle of the Israelites was nothing but a representation of Divine Love. The heat of the blood, or the vital heat of human beings, and of animals in general, comes from no other source than the love which makes up their life. That is why people become warm, grow hot and burst into flame, when their love is raised to zeal, or is aroused to anger and rage. Therefore the fact that spiritual heat, being love, produces natural heat in human beings, to such an extent as to fire and inflame their faces and bodies, can serve as a proof that the fire of the natural sun arose from no other source than the fire of the spiritual sun, which is Divine love.

[13] Now because the expanse arises from the centre, and not the reverse, as we said before, and the centre of life, which is the sun of the heaven of angels, is the Divine Love most nearly radiating from God, who is in the midst of that sun; and because this is the origin of the expanse deriving from that centre, which is called the spiritual world; and because that sun brought into being the sun of the world, and also the expanse which is called the natural world, it is plain that the universe was created by God.'

After this we went away, and he accompanied us out of the courtyard of his school, speaking with us about heaven and hell, and about Divine guidance, showing new powers of sagacity.

Footnotes:

1. This is repeated from Conjugial Love 380.

  
/ 853  
  

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #962

Study this Passage

  
/ 962  

962. The second account:

Since the Lord has granted me to see marvels that exist in the heavens and beneath the heavens, I am obliged by command to relate something I saw:

I saw a magnificent palace and at its center a large chapel. In the middle of the chapel there was a table of gold on which lay the Word, with two angels standing beside it.

Placed around the table were three rows of chairs. The chairs in the first row were covered with a purple-colored silk cloth, the chairs in the second row with a blue-colored silk cloth, and the chairs in the third row with a white cloth.

Hanging high up over the table from the ceiling I saw a canopy glistening with precious stones, whose radiance shone like that of a rainbow when the sky grows calm after a rain.

Suddenly then I saw, sitting on the chairs, as many of the clergy as there were seats, all attired in the vestments of their priestly office.

On one side there was a vestry where an angel custodian stood, and in it lay a beautiful array of shining vestments.

[2] It was a council convened by the Lord, and I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Deliberate!"

However, they said, "About what?"

They were told, "About the Lord and the Holy Spirit."

But when they began to consider these, they found themselves without enlightenment and therefore prayed for it. And light then shone down from heaven, which illumined first the backs of their heads, next their temples, and finally their faces. With that they began, and as they were commanded, they considered first the Lord.

The first question proposed and discussed was who assumed the humanity in the virgin Mary.

One of the angels standing beside the table on which lay the Word read to them the following verses in Luke:

(The angel said to Mary,) "Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest?." Then Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I do not know a man?" And the angel answered and said..., "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore... that Holy One who is to be born (from you) will be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:31-32, 34-35)

The angel also read the verses found in Matthew 1:20-25, and with emphasis what is said there in verse 25. 1

He read in addition more verses from the Gospels, where in respect to His humanity the Lord is called the Son of God, and where from the perspective of His humanity He calls Jehovah His Father. And from the Prophets as well, where it is foretold that Jehovah Himself would come into the world, including among others the following two passages in Isaiah:

It will be said in that day: "Behold, this is our God... This is Jehovah; we have waited for Him; we will exult and rejoice in His salvation." (Isaiah 25:9)

The voice of one crying in the wilderness: "Prepare the way of Jehovah; make straight in the desert a highway for our God... (For) the glory of Jehovah shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together... Behold, the Lord Jehovih shall come with might... He will feed His flock like a shepherd. (Isaiah 40:3, 5, 10-11)

[3] The angel said moreover, "Since Jehovah Himself came into the world and assumed human form and by it saved and redeemed men, therefore in the Prophets He is called a Savior and Redeemer." And He read to them then the following passages:

Surely God is in you, and there is no other (God).... Truly You are God, who hide Yourself, O God of Israel, the Savior! (Isaiah 45:14-15)

Am I not Jehovah? And there is no other God besides Me. There is no just God and Savior besides Me. (Isaiah 45:21-22)

...I am Jehovah, and besides Me there is no savior. (Isaiah 43:11)

I am Jehovah your God..., and you shall acknowledge no God but Me; there is also no Savior besides Me. (Hosea 13:4)

...that all flesh may know that I, Jehovah, am your Savior and your Redeemer... (Isaiah 49:26, cf. 60:16)

As for our Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth is His name... (Isaiah 47:4)

Their Redeemer is strong; Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. (Jeremiah 50:34)

...O Jehovah, my rock and my Redeemer. (Psalms 19:14)

Thus said Jehovah, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: "I am Jehovah your God...." (Isaiah 48:17, cf. 43:14; 49:7; 54:8)

You, Jehovah, are our Father; our Redeemer from Eternity is Your name. (Isaiah 63:16)

Thus said Jehovah, your Redeemer...: "I am Jehovah, who makes all things, ...all alone, ...by Myself." (Isaiah 44:24)

Thus said Jehovah, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth: "I am the First and I am the Last; besides Me there is no God." (Isaiah 44:6)

Jehovah Zebaoth is His name; and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; He shall be called God of the whole earth. (Isaiah 54:5)

Behold, the days are coming... when I will raise to David a righteous Branch, who shall reign a King... And this is His name...: JEHOVAH OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. (Jeremiah 23:5-6, cf. 33:15-16)

In that day... Jehovah shall become King over all the earth. In that day there shall be one Jehovah and His name one. (Zechariah 14:8-9)

[4] Having been convinced by all these passages, the clergymen sitting on the chairs unanimously said that Jehovah Himself assumed human form in order to save and redeem men.

But at that a voice was heard from a group of Roman Catholics who had hidden themselves in a corner of the chapel, saying, "How can Jehovah, the Father, become a man? Is He not the Creator of the universe?"

Then one of the clergymen sitting on the chairs in the second row turned and said, "Who assumed human form then?"

And from the corner the Roman Catholic responded, "The Son from eternity."

But he received the reply, "Is not the Son from eternity, according to your belief, also the Creator of the universe? And what is a Son or God born from eternity? How can the Divine essence, which is a single entity and indivisible, be divided, and one part of it descend and take on human form, and not at the same time the whole of it?"

[5] A second discussion regarding the Lord considered whether God the Father and the Lord were not thus one, as soul and body are one. The clergymen said that it followed as a consequence, because the father is the origin of the soul. And then one of those who were sitting on the chairs in the third row recited the following from the statement of faith called the Athanasian Creed:

But although (our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God) is God and man, nevertheless there are not two Christs but one...; indeed, being completely one... by the unity of His person. For as the soul and the body are one person, so God and man are one Christ.

The clergyman reciting this said that this is the accepted faith throughout the Christian world, accepted also by Roman Catholics. And they all said then, "What need is there of more? God the Father and the Lord are one, as soul and body are one."

Then they said, "This being the case, we see that the Lord's humanity is Divine, because it is Jehovah's humanity. And we see that one must turn to the Lord in His Divine humanity, this being the only way that one can approach the Divine called the Father."

[6] The angel confirmed this conclusion of theirs with still more passages from the Word, which included the following in Isaiah:

...unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given... whose name (is) Wonderful, Counselor, God, Hero, Father of Eternity, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)

Also in Isaiah:

...You are our Father; ...Abraham was ignorant of us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You, Jehovah, are our Father; Our Redeemer from Everlasting is Your name. (Isaiah 63:16)

And in John:

Jesus... said, "He who believes in Me, believes... in Him who sent Me. And he who sees Me sees Him who sent Me." (John 12:44-45)

Philip said to (Jesus), ."..show us the Father...." Jesus says to him, ."..He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how then can you say, 'Show us the Father'... Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? ...Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me...." (John 14:8-11)

And finally the following:

Jesus said..., "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." (John 14:6)

When they heard these passages, the clergymen all said with one heart and mouth that the Lord's humanity is Divine, and that one must turn to Him in order to go to the Father, since Jehovah God, who is the Lord from eternity, by means of that humanity introduced Himself into the world and made Himself visible to the eyes of men and accessible. In like manner He made Himself visible and so accessible in human form to people in ancient times, but did so then by means of an angel.

[7] Following this they next took up a deliberation regarding the Holy Spirit. And they began by determining the idea many of them had of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, namely of God the Father sitting on high, so to speak, having the Son at His right hand, and the two sending out the Holy Spirit to enlighten and instruct mankind.

But then a voice was heard from heaven, saying, "We cannot abide that mental image! Who does not know that Jehovah God is omnipresent? Anyone who knows and acknowledges this must also acknowledge that it is He who enlightens and instructs, and that there is no intermediate God, distinct from Him, and still less distinct from two others, as one person is from another. Rid yourselves, therefore, of your earlier idea, which is an idle one, and accept this one, which is the right one, and you will see the matter clearly."

[8] However, a voice was again heard then from the group of Roman Catholics who had hidden themselves in a corner of the chapel, saying, "What then is the Holy Spirit, which is mentioned in the Word by the Gospels and Paul, by which so many of the learned in the clergy say they are led, especially in our clergy? Who today in the Christian world denies the reality of the Holy Spirit and its operation?"

At that one of the clergymen sitting on the chairs in the second row turned and said, "The Holy Spirit is the Divinity emanating from the Lord Jehovah. You say that the Holy Spirit is a distinct person and a distinct God, yet what is a person that originates and emanates from a person but an operation that originates and emanates? One person cannot originate or emanate from another one by means of another, but an operation can. Or what is a God that originates and emanates from God but a Divinity that originates and emanates? One God cannot originate and emanate from another one by means of another, but a Divinity can. Is not the Divine essence one and indivisible? And because the Divine essence or Divine being is God, is not God one and indivisible?"

[9] Hearing this, the clergymen sitting on the chairs unanimously concluded that the Holy Spirit is not a distinct person or a distinct God, but that it is the holy Divinity originating and emanating from the one and only omnipresent God, who is the Lord.

At that the angels standing beside the golden table on which lay the Word said, "Good! You do not read anywhere in the Old Testament that the prophets were inspired by the Holy Spirit to speak the Word, but that they were inspired by the Lord Jehovah. And where the Holy Spirit is mentioned in the New Testament, it means the emanating Divinity, which is the Divinity that enlightens, instructs, vivifies, reforms and regenerates."

[10] After this the clergymen took up a second discussion of the Holy Spirit, asking from whom the Divinity called the Holy Spirit emanated, whether it did so from the Divine called the Father, or from the Divine human called the Son. And as they were discussing this, a light shone from heaven which enabled them to see that the holy Divinity meant by the Holy Spirit emanates from the Divinity in the Lord by means of His glorified humanity, which is His Divine humanity, comparatively as every activity in the case of a person emanates from the soul by means of the body.

This conclusion one of the angels standing beside the table confirmed from the Word by the following verses:

...He whom (the Father) has sent speaks the words of God, ...God does not give (Him) the Spirit by measure. The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand. (John 3:34-35)

There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse... The Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might... (Isaiah 11:1-2)

Also verses saying that Jehovah put His spirit upon Him, and that the spirit of Jehovah was in Him (Isaiah 42:1; 59:19-20; 61:1, Luke 4:18).

When the (Holy Spirit) comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father... (John 15:26)

He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you. (John 16:14-15)

...if I depart, I will send (the Counselor) to you. (John 16:7)

The Counselor is the Holy Spirit (John 14:26).

...the Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified. (John 7:39)

After His glorification Jesus breathed on His disciples and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit" (John 20:22).

[11] Since the Lord's Divine operation and His Divine omnipresence are meant by the Holy Spirit, therefore when He spoke to His disciples about the Holy Spirit whom God the Father would send, He also said:

I will not leave you orphans... I am going away and coming back to you. (John 14:18, 28)

And:

At that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. (John 14:20)

And just before He departed from the world He said:

Lo, I am with you always, even to the culmination of the age. (Matthew 28:20)

After he read these verses to them, the angel said, "From these and many other passages in the Word, it is apparent that the Divinity called the Holy Spirit emanates from the Divinity in the Lord by means of His Divine humanity."

At that the clergymen sitting on the chairs said, "It is the Divine truth."

[12] Lastly the clergymen formed this declaration, that "from the

deliberations in this council we have clearly seen and so acknowledge as a sacred truth that there is a trinity in our Lord Jesus Christ, namely, an originating Divine called the Father, a Divine humanity that is the Son, and an emanating Divinity that is the Holy Spirit. Thus there is in the church but one God."

[13] After these proceedings in that grand council were concluded, the clergymen stood up, and the angel custodian came from the vestry, bringing for each of those sitting on the chairs shining vestments, which were interwoven here and there with gold threads. And the angel said, "Take these wedding garments."

Then the clergymen were conveyed gloriously into the New Christian Heaven, the heaven with which the Lord's church on earth, the New Jerusalem, will be conjoined.

Revelation 22:21

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.

Amen.

Footnotes:

1. But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name JESUS, for He will save His people from their sins." So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying: "Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel," which is translated, "God with us." Then Joseph, being aroused from sleep, did as the angel of the Lord commanded him and took to him his wife, and did not know her till she had brought forth her firstborn Son. And he called His name JESUS. (Matthew 1:20-25)

  
/ 962  

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

©2024 New Christian Bible Study Corporation. All rights reserved. Printed from newchristianbiblestudy.org