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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 #663

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663. 1 The third experience.

I was once in company with angels and listened to their conversation. They were talking about intelligence and wisdom, saying that a person has no other feeling and perception but that intelligence and wisdom are both in him, and so whatever he wills and thinks comes from him. Yet in fact not a scrap of either comes from the person, apart from the ability to receive them. Among the many things they said was this, that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden stood for a belief that intelligence and wisdom were from man, and the tree of life stood for a belief that intelligence and wisdom were from God. It was because Adam was persuaded by the serpent to eat from the former tree, believing that he would be or become God, that he was ejected from the garden and damned.

[2] While the angels were discussing this, two priests arrived accompanied by a man who in the world had been a country's ambassador. I repeated to them what I had heard from the angels about intelligence and wisdom, and on hearing this the three of them began to argue about these two subjects and also about prudence, whether they were from God or from man. It was a fierce argument. All three believed alike that these came from man, because their actual feeling and so their perception supported this view; but the priests, being then under the influence of theological zeal, insisted that no part of intelligence and wisdom, and so of prudence, came from man. They found confirmation of that in these passages of the Word:

A man cannot take anything, unless it is given him from heaven, John 3:27.

Jesus said to the disciples, Without me you can do nothing, John 15:5.

[3] But the angels allowed me to perceive that, however much the priests talked like this, they still at heart held similar beliefs to the ambassador's. So the angels said to them: 'Take off your clothes and put on those of ministers of state, and believe that is what you are.' They did so, and then they thought from their interiors, and in talking used the arguments they inwardly supported; these were that all intelligence and wisdom reside in man and are his. 'Who,' they said, 'has ever felt that these flow in from God?' They looked at each other and backed each other up.

It is a special feature of the spiritual world that a spirit thinks himself to be what the clothes he wears indicate. The reason is that it is the understanding which clothes each person there.

[4] At that instant a tree was seen near them, and they were told: 'It is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; beware of eating from it.' Yet they were so infatuated with their own intelligence that they had a burning desire to eat from it, and they said to each other: 'Why shouldn't we? Isn't the fruit good?' So they went up to it and ate the fruit.

When the ambassador noticed this, they got together and became bosom friends. Then together, holding hands, they took the way of their own intelligence, which leads to hell. However I saw them brought back from there, because they were not yet prepared.

Footnotes:

1. This section is repeated from Conjugial Love 353-354.

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #341

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341. To this I will append the following account:

I saw some English clergymen assembled - as many as six hundred - who were praying to the Lord to allow them to ascend into one of the societies of a higher heaven, and it was granted them. So they ascended, and upon entering it, they saw their king, the grandfather of the king presently reigning, 1 and they rejoiced. The king then came over to two bishops that they had among them, whom he had known in the world, and speaking to them, he asked, "How came you here?"

They replied that they had petitioned the Lord, and that it had been granted.

The king said to them, "Why did you petition the Lord, and not God the Father?"

And the bishops said that it was what they had been told to do below.

Then the king said, "Did I not tell you this at times in the world, that one must go to the Lord, and furthermore, that charity is the primary thing. What was your answer in regard to the Lord then?"

It was then given them to remember that they had replied that when one goes to the Father, one goes also to the Son.

But the angels surrounding the king said, "You are mistaken. That's not what you thought, nor does one go to the Lord when one goes to God the Father. Rather, one goes to God the Father when one goes to the Lord, because they are one, like soul and body. Who approaches someone's soul and in that way his body? Is it not the case that when one approaches a person's body, something that he sees, he approaches also the person's soul, which he does not see?"

To this the bishops made no answer. And the king drew near to the two bishops, holding in his hand two gifts, saying, "These are gifts from heaven."

The gifts were heavenly figurines of gold, and the king tried to hand them over. But suddenly then a dusky cloud covered them and separated them, and the clergymen descended the way they had come. They then recorded this event in a book.

[2] All the other English clergymen who heard that their colleagues had been granted to ascend to a higher heaven, assembled at the foot of a mountain, where they awaited their return. And when those colleagues did return, they greeted their brethren and related what had befallen them in heaven, saying that the king had given the bishops two heavenly figurines of gold most beautiful to look at, but that these had fallen out of their hands. And then they disappeared into a nearby wood and conferred with each other, looking around to see if anyone was overhearing. But they were overheard nevertheless.

They were talking about unanimity and harmony, and then about primacy and dominion. The bishops did the speaking, and the rest favored them with their assent. But suddenly, to my surprise, they no longer appeared as many, but as one great person, with a face like that of a lion, having on his head a towering miter, and upon that a crown. And he spoke with a deep voice, and went forward with a broad step. And looking behind him he said, "Who else has a right to primacy but me?"

The king looked down from heaven and saw - seeing them all first as one, and then as many in harmony, most in secular clothing, he said.

Footnotes:

1. The English king presently reigning was George III (1760-1820), grandson of George II (1727-1760).

  
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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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