THE DOCTRINE OF LIFE (pt. 74)

THE DOCTRINE OF LIFE
for the
NEW JERUSALEM
FROM THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
Emanuel Swedenborg
— Doctrinal Series —
(pt. 74)
IN PROPORTION AS ANYONE SHUNS
ADULTERIES OF EVERY KIND AS SINS,
IN THE SAME PROPORTION HE LOVES CHASTITY.

To "commit adultery," as mentioned in the sixth (or as it is usually called, the seventh) commandment, means—

• In the natural sense, not only to commit whoredom, but also to do obscene things, to speak lascivious things, and to think about filthy things
• In the spiritual sense to "commit adultery" means to adulterate the goods of the Word, and to falsify its truths
• In the highest sense to "commit adultery" means to deny the divinity of the Lord, and to profane the Word.

These are the "adulteries of every kind."

The natural man is able to know from rational light that to "commit adultery" includes in its meaning the doing of things obscene, the speaking of things lascivious, and the thinking of things that are filthy; but he does not know that to commit adultery means also to adulterate the goods of the Word and to falsify its truths, and still less that it means to deny the divinity of the Lord and to profane the Word. Consequently neither does he know that adultery is so great an evil that it may be called diabolism itself, for he who is in natural adultery is also in spiritual adultery, and the converse. That this is so will be shown in a separate little work entitled Conjugial Love.* But those who from their faith and their life do not regard adulteries as sins, are in adulteries of every kind at once.

(LIFE 74)