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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 #697

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697. The sixth experience. 1

I once saw not far from me an atmospheric phenomenon. I saw a cloud divided into smaller clouds, some of which were blue and others dark; and I saw these as it were colliding with one another. They were striped with glittering rays which crossed them; sometimes the stripes had sharp tips like sword-points, at other times they appeared square-ended like broken off swords. Sometimes the stripes ran out so as to meet, at other times they withdrew into themselves, rather like boxers. So it looked as if these little clouds of varied colours were fighting one another, but they were playing. Since this atmospheric display took place not far from me, I lifted up my eyes and looking hard I saw boys, young men and old men entering a building constructed of marble with also porphyry in its foundations. The phenomenon was over this building. Then I asked one of those who were going in what was happening there. 'It is a high school,' he replied, 'where young men are given an introduction to various forms of wisdom.'

[2] On hearing this I went in with them. I was in the spirit, that is, in much the same state as people in the spiritual world, those who are called spirits and angels. Inside the school there was in front a chair, in the middle were benches, around the sides seats, and a gallery over the entrance. The chair was for the young men who were to take turns to reply to the question set. The benches were for the audience, the seats at the sides for those who had previously given wise answers, and the gallery for the older men who were to be umpires and judges. In the middle of the gallery there was a platform, where a wise man, called the headmaster, was seated. He put the questions, and the young men answered these from the chair.

When all were assembled, the man on the platform got up and said: 'Please now reply to this question and answer it if you can: what is the soul and what is its nature?'

[3] On hearing this all were astonished and began to murmur; and some of the crowd on the benches cried out: 'What man is there from the age of Saturn 2 down to our times who has been able by any effort of rational thought to see and grasp what the soul is, much less what its nature is. Surely this is beyond the capacity of anyone's understanding?'

But people in the gallery replied to this: 'This is not beyond the understanding, but within its capacity and purview. just give a reply.'

So the young men got up who had been chosen that day to mount the chair and reply to the questions. There were five of them, who had been examined by the elders and found to be outstandingly clever. They were then sitting on padded seats at the sides of the chair. They then took it in turn, according to the order in which they sat, to climb up to the chair. As each went up, he put on a tunic of opalescent silk and over it a gown of soft wool with flowers woven in it, and a hat on his head with a chaplet of roses surrounded by small sapphires on the crown.

[4] Then I saw the first man so clothed go up and say: 'What the soul is and what its nature is has not been revealed to anyone since the first day of creation. It is a secret which God alone keeps in His treasure-houses. But this much has been discovered, that the soul dwells in man like a queen. However the location of its residence has been the subject of conjecture among learned experts. Some have placed it in the small tubercle between the cerebrum and the cerebellum known as the pineal gland. They have guessed that this was the seat of the soul because the whole person is controlled from those two brains, and that tubercle regulates them. So what governs the two brains at its whim, must also govern the whole person from head to heel. This view,' he said, 'has been regarded by many in the world as true or very probable, but a later age has rejected it as a mere invention.'

[5] On finishing this speech he took off the gown, tunic and hat, and the second of those chosen put them on and so took the chair. His pronouncement about the soul was that in the whole of heaven and in the whole of the world there is no one who knows what the soul is and what its nature is. 'This much,' he said, 'we know, that the soul exists and is in man; but where it is, is a matter of guesswork. This is certain, that it is in the head, since that is where the understanding thinks and the will forms its resolutions; and it is on the face in front of the head that man's five sense organs are to be found. What gives all of these life is the soul which resides inside the head; but I would not dare to express an opinion on where in it its residence is. I have agreed with those who have assigned to it a lodging in the three ventricles of the brain; at other times with those who placed it in the corpora striata there, at other times with those who placed it in the medullary substance of either brain, at other times with those who placed it in the cortical substance, at others with those who placed it in the dura mater. For there was no lack of points to be made in favour of each one of these seats.

The point in favour of the three ventricles in the brain was that they are the receptacles of the animal spirits and all the brain's lymphs. The points in favour of the corpora striata were that these compose the marrow through which the nerves emerge, and by means of which either part of the brain has continuous extensions to the spine; and from one or other of these the fibres emerge which compose the whole structure of the body. The points in favour of the medullary substance of either brain were that it is a gathering and massing together of all the fibres which form the starting point for the development of the whole person. The point in favour of the cortical substance was that here are the first and last ends, and so the beginnings of all fibres, and so of sensation and movement. The point in favour of the dura mater was that it is the shared covering of either brain, from where it stretches in a kind of continuity over the heart and the viscera of the body. For my part, I do not rate one of these theories as superior to another. Will you please, decide and choose which is the best theory.'

[6] After saying this he came down from the chair and passed on the tunic, gown and hat to the third, who went up to the chair and spoke as follows. 'How can I at my age deal with such a lofty subject? I appeal to the learned people seated at the sides here, I appeal to you wise people in the gallery, in fact I appeal to the angels of the highest heaven: can anyone by the light of his reason form for himself any idea of the soul? As regards its seat in man, I can offer as good a guess as anyone else. My guess is that it is in the heart and consequently in the blood. My reason for this is that the heart by means of the blood from it controls both the body and the head. There is a large blood-vessel called the aorta emerging from it and reaching the whole of the body; and there are blood-vessels called carotid arteries emerging from it and reaching the whole of the head. As a result it is universally agreed that the soul by means of blood from the heart sustains, nourishes and gives life to the whole organic system of both the body and the head. An additional reason for believing this assertion is the fact that Holy Scripture says so many times 'soul and heart'. For instance, you are to love God 'with all your soul and with all your heart'; and God creates in man 'a new soul and a new heart' (Deuteronomy 6:5; 10:12; 11:13; 26:16; Jeremiah 32:41; Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30, 33; Luke 10:27, and elsewhere). It also says explicitly that the blood is the soul of the flesh (Leviticus 17:11, 14).' On hearing this some people raised their voices to cry 'Very learned!'; they were members of the clergy.

[7] After this the fourth put on the garments worn by the previous speaker, and on taking the chair said: 'I too suspect that there is no one of such a sharp and subtle mind as to be able to discern what the soul is and what its nature is. I think therefore that anyone who wishes to scrutinise it has his subtlety exhausted by useless exertions. But from childhood up I have persisted in believing the opinion of the ancients, that man's soul is in the whole of him and in every part of him, and so is as much in his head and each of its parts as in the body and each of its parts. It is a useless invention of modern scholars to locate its seat in some part rather than everywhere. Also the soul is a spiritual substance, to which neither extension nor position can be attributed, but only residing and filling. Again, is there anyone who does not understand life when he mentions the soul, and is not life in the whole and in any part you like to name?' There were many in the audience who supported this statement.

[8] He was followed by the fifth, who, adorned with the same emblems, pronounced from the chair as follows: 'I don't much care to say where the soul is, whether it is in some part or in the whole person. But I will draw on my own resources to disclose my opinion on this question, what the soul is and what its nature is. No one thinks of the soul as anything but something pure, which can be likened to ether or air or wind, the vital principle in which derives from the faculty of reason, which man has to a higher degree than animals. I have based this opinion on the fact that, when a person expires, he is said to breathe out or give up his soul or spirit. As a result too a soul which goes on living after death is believed to be a breath of this kind, containing the life of thought which is called the soul. What else could the soul be? But because I have heard people from the gallery asserting that the question what the soul is and what its nature is, is not beyond the understanding, but within its scope and purview, I beg and beseech you to disclose yourselves this everlasting secret.'

[9] The elders in the gallery here looked at the headmaster, who had set the question. He understood from their nods that they wanted him to go down and tell them the answer. So he at once got down from the platform, and passing through the auditorium took the chair, and holding up his hand said: 'Please listen to me. Is there anyone who does not believe the soul to be the most intimate and subtle essence of a person? But what is essence without form but a figment of the imagination? The soul then is a form, but what sort of form I will tell you. It is the form of all the parts of love and all the parts of wisdom. All the parts of love are called affections, and all the parts of wisdom are called perceptions. The perceptions as a result of and so together with the affections make up a single form containing countless parts but arranged in such order and so cohering that they can be called a unity; and they can be called a unity, because nothing can be taken away from it or added to it, if it is to be a unity. What is the human soul but such a form? All the parts of love and all the parts of wisdom are the essentials of such a form, and in the case of a person these essentials are in his soul, and from his soul in his head and body.

[10] 'You are called spirits and angels; and you believed in the world that spirits and angels were like puffs of wind or particles of ether, and so minds of higher or lower degree 3 . Now you see clearly that you are truly, really and actually people, who in the world lived and thought in a material body; and you knew that it is not the material body that lives and thinks, but the spiritual substance in that body. This you called the soul, whose form you did not know; yet now you have seen it and go on seeing it. You are all souls, about whose immortality you have heard, thought, talked and written so much; and since you are forms of love and wisdom coming from God, you cannot ever die. The soul then is a human form, from which nothing can be taken away, and to which nothing can be added, and it is the inmost form of all the forms throughout the body. Since the forms which are outside receive from the inmost both essence and form, you are therefore souls, just as you appear to be to your sight and to ours. In short, the soul is the real person because it is the inmost person; its form therefore is the human form in full perfection. But it is not life, but is the nearest receiver of life from God, and so God's dwelling.'

[11] This speech was greeted by many with applause, but there were some who said, 'We must think about this.' I then went home, and suddenly there appeared above that high school, in place of the previous atmospheric display, a shining cloud without any stripes or rays fighting one another. This cloud penetrated the roof and coming inside lit up the walls. I was told that they saw things written on them, among which was this:

Jehovah God breathed into man's nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul, Genesis 2:7.

Footnotes:

1. This section is repeated from Conjugial Love 315.

2. The 'golden age' of antiquity.

3. Latin: mentes et animi.

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #137

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137. The fourth experience.

I was told that a council had been summoned, made up of people famous for their books and learning, to discuss the present state of faith, and how the chosen are made righteous by it. This took place in the world of spirits, and I was allowed to be present at it in the spirit. I saw a gathering of clergy, composed of both those who agreed and those who disagreed with this. On the right stood those who in the world were called the Apostolic Fathers, and lived in the period before the Council of Nicaea 1 . On the left stood men who since that time had been famous for their books, either, printed or copied in manuscript by apprentices. Many of these were clean-shaven and wore wigs made of curly women's hair; some of them had rolled collars, some winged collars. The other party, however, had beards and their own hair.

In front of the two parties stood a man who was a judge and reviewer of worldly writings. He rapped for silence on the ground with a staff he held in his hand. Then he went up the steps to his chair of office, and uttered a groan; he intended to follow it with a loud cry, but the groan choked his breath back in his throat.

[2] At length he was able to speak as follows: 'Brothers, what an age is this we live in! A person has arisen from the throng of laymen, one without the cap and gown of learning nor honoured with academic laurels, and has dislodged our faith from its place in heaven, and hurled it into the river Styx. What a dreadful crime! Yet that faith alone is our guiding star, shining like Orion by night, and like the Morning Star at dawn. For all his years that man is totally blind to the mysteries of our faith, because he has not opened it up to see in it the righteousness of our Lord and Saviour, and His mediation and propitiation; and not seeing these, he has failed too to see the wonders of how He makes us righteous, the remission of sins, regeneration, sanctifying and salvation. This man has taken away our faith with its outstanding saving power, because it is directed to three Divine Persons, and so to God in His totality, and concentrated it upon the Second Person - and not even all of that, but upon His Human. We do of course call this Divine as the result of the incarnation of the Son from eternity, but no one thinks of it as anything but purely human. And what then can come from this but a faith which is a plentiful source of nature-worship? That sort of faith, lacking spirituality, is little different from faith in the Vicar of Christ, or in a Saint. You know what Calvin in his time said about worship founded on that sort of faith. Will one of you please tell me, what is the source of faith? Surely it comes directly from God, in whom lies everything needed for our salvation?'

[3] At this his companions on the left, the party without beards, who wore curly wigs and a rolled collar about their necks, clapped their hands and shouted: 'Most wisely spoken! We know that we cannot receive anything which is not given to us from heaven. Let that prophet tell us the source of faith, and what else faith is. It is impossible for it to be other or of other origin. It is as impossible to present any other faith, which truly is a faith, as it is to ride to some constellation in the sky, catch a star, and bring it back stored in one's coat pocket.' This speech was designed to make his companions laugh at any new sort of faith whatever.

[4] On hearing this the party on the right, who wore beards and had their own hair, became angry. One of them got up, an old man, though afterwards he appeared young, because he was an angel from heaven, where people of any age grow young again. He spoke and said: 'I have heard what sort of faith you have, the faith that was so highly praised by the man who holds the chair of office. But what is that faith but our Lord's tomb after the resurrection, when it was sealed again by Pilate's troops? I opened it up and I could see nothing in it but some conjurers' wands, which the wise men of Egypt used to perform their miracles. Rather, your faith is outwardly in your eyes like a bookcase of solid gold, set with precious stones, which when opened is empty, except perhaps for a little dust from the relics of Roman Catholics in its corners. For they have the same faith as you, only it is nowadays wrapped up in outward displays of holiness. To go on with comparisons, it is like the Vestal Virgin of antiquity, who allowed the sacred fire to go out, and was buried alive. I can assure you that in my eyes your faith is like the golden calf around which the Children of Israel danced, when Moses had gone away to climb Mount Sinai to Jehovah.

[5] 'You need not be surprised at my using such comparisons to speak of your faith, because that is how we speak of it in heaven. On the other hand, our faith is, has been, and ever will be in the Lord God the Saviour, whose Human is Divine and whose Divine is Human. This makes it easy for us to accept, as uniting the Divine spiritual to the natural of men. So it becomes a spiritual faith at the natural level, and this makes the natural as it were translucent, as the result of the spiritual light which illuminates our faith. The truths of which it is made up are as numerous as the verses in Holy Writ; all its truths are like stars, which by their light show it forth and give it form. A person acquires faith from the Word by means of his own natural powers of enlightenment, which are based upon knowledge, thought and false belief. But with those who believe in the Lord, He turns these into conviction, trust and confidence. This makes the natural faith spiritual, and charity gives it life. This faith appears to us like a queen decked out with as many jewels as the wall of the Holy Jerusalem (Revelation 21:17-20).

[6] 'But to prevent you believing that my words are mere exaggeration and consequently not to be taken seriously, I will read you some passages from the Holy Word, which will show plainly that our faith is not in a man, as you think, but in the true God, in whom is all that is Divine. John says:

Jesus Christ is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

Paul says:

In Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily, Colossians 2:9.

In the Acts of the Apostles:

Paul preached both to Jews and Greeks repentance toward God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, Acts of the Apostles 20:21.

The Lord Himself said that to Him was given "all power in heaven and upon earth" (Matthew 28:18). These are but a few quotations.'

[7] After this the angel looked at me and said: 'You know what those who call themselves Evangelical believe, or should believe, about the Lord the Saviour. Recite some of their tenets, so that we can know whether they are so foolish as to believe that His Human is purely human, or whether they attribute any Divinity to it, and, if so, how.'

Then in front of the whole assembly I read out the following statements from the handbook of orthodoxy called 'The Formula of Concord,' published in Leipzig in 1756:

In Christ the Divine and the Human natures are so united as to make one Person. (pp. 606 762). Christ is truly God and Man in one undivided Person, and remains so for ever. (pp. 609 673, 762). In Christ God is Man and Man is God. (pp. 607, 765).

Christ's human nature was raised to fully Divine majesty; this is also said by many of the Fathers. (pp. 844-852, 860-865, 869-878).

Christ as to His human nature is omnipresent and fills all space. (pp. 768, 783-5.)

Christ as to His human nature has all power in heaven and on earth. (pp. 775-776, 780).

Christ as to His human nature sits at the right hand of the Father. (pp. 608, 764).

Christ as to His human nature is to be invoked; this is proved by quotations from Scripture (p. 226).

The 'Confession of Augsburg' gives the highest degree of approval to that mode of worship (p. 19).

[8] After reading these statements I turned to the man in the chair of office and said: 'I know that everyone here is paired with someone like him in the natural world; please tell me whether you know who your colleague is.'

He answered in a solemn tone: 'Yes. I am paired with a famous man 2 who is a leader of the noble troops of the church militant.'

Since he spoke in such a solemn tone, I said: 'Forgive my asking, but do you know where this famous leader lives?'

'Yes,' he said, 'not far from Luther's tomb.'

I smiled at this and said: 'Why do you say "his tomb"? Do you not know that Luther has risen again, and has now renounced his erroneous doctrines about justification by faith in three Divine Persons from eternity, and has therefore been transferred to live with the blessed of the new heaven, where he sees and laughs at those who follow him in this madness?'

'I know this,' he replied, 'but how does it concern me?'

So then I addressed him in equally solemn tones: 'Put the idea,' I said, 'into the mind of your famous man who is paired with you, that I am afraid that contrary to the orthodoxy of his own church, he then for the moment took His divinity away from the Lord, or allowed his pen to plough a furrow, in which he unwittingly planted the seeds of nature-worship, when he wrote an attack on the worship of the Lord our Saviour.'

To this he answered: 'I cannot do this, because he and I are of almost one mind on this subject; but he does not understand what I say, while I have a clear understanding of everything he says.' This was because the spiritual world enters into the natural world and perceives the thoughts of people there, but not the reverse. This is the nature of the association between spirits and men.

[9] Since I had now begun a dialogue with the holder of the chair, I said: 'If I may, I should like to put in another question or two. Do you not know that Evangelical orthodoxy, as stated in their church's handbook called 'The Formula of Concord', teaches that in Christ God is Man and Man is God, and that His Divine and His Human are in one undivided Person, and so remain for ever? How then could he, and how can you, defile the worship of the Lord with nature-worship?'

To this he answered: 'This I know, and yet I do not know.'

So I went on and said: 'I put the question to him, absent as he is, or to you in his place, what was the source of the soul of the Lord our Saviour? If you answer that it was from His mother, you are mad; if that it was from Joseph, you are doing violence to the Word; but if that it was from the Holy Spirit, you are right, so long as by the Holy Spirit you understand the Divine coming forth and working, so that He is the Son of Jehovah God.

[10] 'I ask you again, what is the meaning of hypostatic union? If you answer that it is like a union between two, one of whom is above and the other below, you are mad, for in this way you could have made God the Saviour into two, just as you make God into three. But if you say that it is a union in one person, as between the soul and the body, you are right. This too is in accordance with your doctrine and that of the Fathers: see The Formula of Concord, pp. 765-768. See also the Athanasian Creed, which contains these words:

The correct belief is that we should believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ is God and Man; and though He is God and Man, there are not two, but there is one Christ. He is in every way one, not by confusion of substance, but by unity of Person. For just as the reasoning soul and the flesh make one man, so God and Man make one Christ.

[11] I ask yet further, what else was the abominable heresy of Arius, which led to the calling of the Council of Nicaea by the Emperor Constantine the Great, but a denial of the divinity of the Lord's Human? Tell me further, whom you understand by these words in Jeremiah:

Behold, the days will come, when I shall raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as King, and this will be his name, Jehovah our righteousness, Jeremiah 23:5-6; 33:15-16.

If you say the Son from eternity, you are mad; He was not the Redeemer. But if you say the Son born in time, who was the only-begotten Son of God (John 1:18; 3:16), you are right. He by His redeeming act became righteousness, on which you base your faith. Read too Isaiah 9:6 and other passages, which predict that Jehovah Himself was to come into the world.'

The holder of the chair kept silence at this and turned away his face.

[12] When this was over, the presiding officer intended to close the meeting with prayer, but from the party on the left there suddenly sprang out a man, who had a cap on his head and a hat on top of it. He put his finger to his hat and said: 'I too am paired with a man in your world, who occupies a high position there. 3 I know this because I can speak his mind like my own.'

'Where,' I asked, 'does this eminent person live?'

'At Goteborg,' he replied. 'I have on occasion gathered from his thoughts that your new doctrine smacks of Mohammedanism.'

At this I saw all the party on the right, where the Apostolic Fathers were standing, amazed and crestfallen, and heard exclamations rising from their minds to their lips: 'What an abominable thing! What an age we live in!'

To allay their righteous anger I held up my hand and requested to be heard. When permission was given, I said: 'I know that a man of the eminence you describe has written something of the sort in a letter, which was subsequently printed. But if he had then known what a grave slander it is, he would surely have torn it in pieces, and consigned it to the flames. That is the same sort of insult as was meant by the Lord's words to the Jews, when they said that Christ performed His miracles by some other power than God's (Matthew 12:22-32). In addition, the Lord also says there:

Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me, scatters, Matthew 12:30.

When I said this, his colleague lowered his gaze, but after a little raised it again to say: 'I have never heard you speak so harshly.'

'The reason,' I replied, 'is the two dogmas of nature-worship and Mohammedanism, which are criminal lies cunningly invented, and two lethal blows designed to lead men's wills astray and repel them from the holy worship of the Lord.' I then turned to the second colleague and said: 'Tell the man in Goteborg if you can, to read the Lord's words in Revelation 3:18, and also the passage at Revelation 2:16 of that book.'

[13] When I said that, uproar broke out; but it was quelled by a light which shone down from heaven. This induced many of the party on the left to cross over to those on the right. But those remained on the left whose thoughts were entirely vacuous, and who therefore hang on the lips of any teacher, as well as those who think of the Lord as wholly human. The light streaming down from heaven seemed to be reflected off both these last two groups, but to flow into those who crossed over from left to right.

Footnotes:

1. AD 325.

2. The reference is to Dr Ernesti (1707-1781), who lived at Eisleben in Germany. He published a violent attack on Swedenborg, who replied briefly, referring to this passage. See 'Small Theological Works and Letters,' ed. Elliot, p. 197.

3. This may refer to Dr O. A. Ekebom, Dean of Goteborg in Sweden in 1761.

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

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