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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 #568

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568. The second experience.

Every religious and wise person wants to know what his life will be like after death, so I shall give a general description so that he may know.

Everyone after death, when he becomes aware that he is still alive, but in another world, and he is told that above him is heaven, where there are everlasting joys, and below him is hell, where there are everlasting sorrows, is first brought back into the external state he was in, while he was in his former world. Then he believes that he will certainly reach heaven, and he talks intelligently and behaves prudently. Some say: 'We have lived a moral life, we have had honourable ambitions, we have not deliberately done evil.' Others say: 'We have gone regularly to church, we have attended mass, we have kissed holy statues, we have prayed hard on our knees.' Some say: 'We have given to the poor, we have helped the needy, we have read devotional books, as well as the Word.' And there are many more similar claims.

[2] But when they have made these statements, the angels standing by them say: 'All the things you have mentioned you did externally; but you still do not know what you are like internally. You are now spirits with a substantial body, and the spirit is your internal man. It is this in you which thinks what it wishes, and wishes what it loves, and this is the pleasure of its life. Everyone from early childhood begins his life on the external level. He learns to behave with morality, to talk intelligently, and once he has formed some idea of heaven and its blessedness, he begins to pray, to go to church and attend regular services. Yet he still treasures up in the depths of his mind the evils which spring in profusion from their native source; he cleverly covers them up too with reasonings based upon fallacies, until he himself does not know that evil is evil. Then as for the evils which are wrapped up and covered, as if by dust, he does not give them another thought, only taking care that they are not exposed to the world's gaze. So his only concern is with the externals of a moral life, and so he becomes duplicitous, a sheep in externals, a wolf in internals. He becomes like a golden box containing poison; or like a person with bad breath who keeps a pastille in his mouth to prevent by-standers smelling it; or like a mouse's skin made to smell of balsam.

[3] 'You said that you lived a moral life and devoted yourselves to religious studies. But my question is, did you ever examine your internal man and become aware of any longings for revenge, even to the point of murder, any longings for indulging your lusts even to the point of adultery, any longings for fraud even to the point of stealing, any longings for lying even to the point of giving false witness? Four of the Ten Commandments contain the injunction, "You are not to," and the last two "You are not to covet." Do you really believe that in these matters your internal man resembled your external one? If you do, I think you may be wrong.'

[4] To this they replied, 'What is the internal man? Is it not one and the same as the external? Our ministers have told us that the internal man is nothing but faith, and reverence in utterance and morality in life is a sign of it, because it shows its working.'

The angels answered: 'Saving faith is in the internal man, and likewise charity, and this is the source of Christian faithfulness and morality in the external man. But if the longings we mentioned before remain in the internal man, that is, in the will and so in his thinking, and if, therefore, you love those longings inwardly, and yet act and talk differently in externals, then in your case evil is placed above good, and good below evil. However much, therefore, you seem to talk from the understanding, and to act from love, there is evil within and this is wrapped up, as we said. Then you are like cunning chimpanzees, which ape human actions, but their heart is not in them.

[5] 'You know nothing about your internal man, because you have not examined yourselves, and following that examination repented. You will discover shortly what your internal man is like, when you have the external stripped off and you enter into possession of the internal. When this happens, your companions will no longer recognise you, nor will you recognise yourselves. I have seen wicked people who pretended to be moral looking like wild beasts, glaring truculently at their neighbour, burning with murderous hatred, and cursing God, whom they worshipped in the external man.'

On hearing this they went away; and then the angels told them: 'You will see what your life will be like after this, for your external man will shortly be taken away and you will enter into possession of the internal, which is now your spirit.'

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #159

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159. At this point I shall describe some more experiences, of which this is the first.

Once when I was in company with angels in heaven, I saw far below a huge cloud of smoke with fire bursting out of it from time to time. I remarked to the angels who were talking with me, that few people here know that the sight of smoke in the hells arises from arguments in favour of falsities, and that fire is an outburst of anger against those who contradict them. I added that this is as little known in that world, as it is in the world where I live in the body, that flame is nothing but ignited smoke. I have often observed this, when, seeing smoke rising from wood on a hearth on earth, I have applied a lighted taper to it and seen the smoke turn into flame; and the flames copied the shape of the smoke, for each particle of smoke becomes a spark, and they join to make a blaze, just as also happens with gunpowder. 'It is the same with the smoke we can see down here below. It is composed of so many falsities, and the fire bursting out as flames is the outburst of zeal in their favour.'

[2] Then the angels said to me: 'Let us beg the Lord to allow us to go down and come near, so as to find out what falsities they have that produce so much smoke and fire.'

Permission was granted, and at once a beam of light surrounded us and brought us down without a break to that place. There we saw four groups of spirits who were arguing vigorously that God the Father, because He is invisible, should be approached and worshipped, and not His Son who was born in this world, because He was a man and visible. On looking to either side I saw on the left the learned clergy, and behind them the unlearned clergy; and on the right the educated laymen, and behind them the uneducated. But between us and them yawned an unbridgeable gap.

[3] We turned our eyes and ears towards the left, where the clergy were with the learned ones in front and the unlearned behind, and heard them arguing about God in these terms. 'We know from the teaching of our church, which on the subject of God is one and the same throughout Europe, that one should approach God the Father, being invisible, and at the same time God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, who are also invisible, being co-eternal with the Father. Since God the Father is the creator of the universe, and consequently in the universe, He is present wherever we turn our gaze. When we pray to Him, He is graciously pleased to accept our prayers, and when the Son has mediated for us, He sends the Holy Spirit to put in our hearts the glory of His Son's righteousness and to make us blessed. We, who have been made doctors of the church, felt, when we preached, the holy working of the Spirit's mission in our breasts, and we breathed the devotion aroused by His presence in our minds. We feel these emotions because we direct all our senses towards the invisible God who works not in a single way on the sight of our understanding, but universally throughout our mental and bodily systems by means of His emissary, the Spirit. Such effects could not be produced by the worship of a visible God, or one apprehensible mentally as a man.'

[4] This speech was greeted with applause from the unlearned clergy, who stood behind them. 'What is the source,' they added, 'of holiness, if it is not from an invisible and imperceptible Divine? As soon as this idea crosses the threshold of our hearing, our faces break into smiles and we are cheered as by the soothing breath of an incense-laden breeze, and we also beat our breasts. It is quite different if we think of a visible and perceptible Divine; if this idea penetrates our ears, it is reduced to something purely natural and no longer Divine. It is for a similar reason that the Roman Catholics conduct their masses in the Latin language, and take the Host, the alleged subject of Divine mysteries, from repositories on the altar and display it. At this moment the people fall on their knees as if before the profoundest mystery and reverently hold their breath.'

[5] After this we turned to the right, where the educated, and behind them the uneducated, laymen stood. I heard the educated speak as follows: 'We know that the wisest of the ancients worshipped an invisible God whom they called Jehovah, but in the period which followed this they made themselves gods out of dead rulers, including Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto, Apollo as well as Minerva, Diana, Venus, and Themis, building temples to them and giving them Divine worship. This worship in the course of time led to idolatry, a madness which finally pervaded the whole world. We are therefore unanimous in assenting to the opinion of our priests and elders, that there were and are three Divine Persons from eternity, each of whom is God. It is enough for us that they are invisible.'

The uneducated behind them added: 'We agree. Surely God is God and man is man? But we know that if anyone proposed God-man, the common people, whose idea of God is only derived from the senses, will accept it.'

[6] At the end of this speech their eyes were opened and they saw us standing near them. Then they became angry that we had heard them and refused to say another word. But the angels used the power they had been given to shut off the exterior or lower levels of their thought, and open the interior or higher levels; so they compelled them to speak about God in this state. Then they said: 'What is God? We have not seen His appearance, nor have we heard His voice. God then must be merely nature in its first and last manifestations. Nature we have seen, because it is clear before our eyes, and nature we have heard, for its sounds are ever in our ears.'

On hearing this we said to them: 'Have you ever seen Socinus, who would acknowledge only God the Father? Or Arius, who denied the divinity of our Lord and Saviour? Or any of their followers?' 'No,' they replied. 'They are,' we said, 'in the depths below you.' Then some people were sent for from that place and questioned about God. They spoke in much the same way as the others had done, adding: 'What is God? We can make as many gods as we wish.'

[7] 'It is useless,' we said then, 'to talk to you about the Son of God born in the world, but this at least we shall say. To prevent faith about God, in Him and from Him, from becoming, merely because no one has seen Him, like a water-bubble floating in the air, full of beautiful colours in the first and second moments of its existence, but in the third and thereafter collapsing into nothing, it has pleased Jehovah God to come down and take upon Himself human form, thus putting Himself on view, and proving that God is no entity conceived by the faculty of reason, but That which was, is and shall be, from eternity to eternity. God is no three-letter 1 word, but the whole of reality from alpha to omega. Consequently He is life and salvation to all who believe in Him as a visible God, not to those who say that they believe in an invisible God. For believing, seeing and recognising make up a single act, which is why the Lord said to Philip:

He who sees and knows me sees and knows the Father.

and elsewhere that it is the Father's will that they should believe in the Son, and he who believes in the Son has everlasting life, but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God will rest upon him. (Both this and the previous passage are in John 3:15-16, 36; 14:6-15.)' On hearing this many of the four groups became so furious that smoke and fire came out of their nostrils. So we went away, and after escorting me home the angels went up to their own heaven.

Footnotes:

1. This is a puzzling expression, since God in Latin is Deus; but as the conversation took place in the spiritual world, it may refer to a word in the spiritual language.

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

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