Selection from Doctrine of the Sacred Scriptures ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
It is possible for heresies to be drawn from the sense of the letter of the Word, but it is harmful to confirm them.
The Word cannot be understood without doctrine, and that doctrine is like a lamp that enables genuine truths to be seen, the reason of which is that the Word has been written entirely by correspondences, and consequently many things in it are appearances of truth and not naked truths.
Many things also have been written in adaptation to the apprehension of the natural and even of the sensuous man, yet so that the simple may understand it in simplicity, the intelligent in intelligence, and the wise in wisdom. The result is that the appearances of truth in the Word, which are truths clothed, may be taken at as naked truths, and when they are confirmed, they become falsities. But this is done by those who believe themselves wise above others, although they are not wise, for being wise consists in seeing whether a thing is true before it is confirmed, and not in confirming whatever one pleases. This last is done by those who excel in a genius for confirming and are in the conceit of self-intelligence, but the former is done by those who love truths and are affected by them because they are truths, and who make them uses of the life, for these persons are enlightened by the Lord, and see truths by the light of the truths; whereas the others are enlightened by themselves and see falsities by the light of the falsities.
That appearances of truth, which are truths clothed, may be taken out of the Word as naked truths, and that when confirmed they become falsities is evident from the many heresies there have been and still are in Christendom. The heresies themselves do not condemn men, but an evil life does, as also do the confirmations from the Word, and from reasonings from the natural man of the falsities that are in the heresy. For everyone is born into the religion of his parents is initiated into it from his infancy, and afterwards holds to it, being unable to withdraw himself from its falsities through being engaged with his business in the world.
But to live in evil, and to confirm falsities even to the destruction of genuine truth, is what condemns.For he who remains in his own religion, and believes in God, or if in Christendom, in the Lord, regarding the Word as holy, and from a religious principle, living according to the ten commandments, does not swear allegiance to falsities, and therefore as soon as he hears truths and perceives them in his own way, can embrace them and so be led away from falsities, but not so the man who has confirmed the falsities of his religion, for confirmed falsity remains and cannot be rooted out. For after confirmation a falsity becomes as if the man had sworn to the truth of it, especially if it chimes in with his own self-love [amor proprii], and the derivative conceit of his own wisdom.
After death every man is instructed by angels, and those who see truths, and from truths falsities, are received. For the power to see truths spiritually is then given everyone, and those see them who have not confirmed themselves in falsities, but those who have confirmed themselves do not want to see truths, and if they do see them they turn their backs on them, and then either ridicule or falsify them.Let us illustrate this by an example —
In many places in the Word, anger, wrath, and vengeance are attributed to the Lord, and it is also said that He punishes, that He casts into hell, that He tempts, and many other such things. He who believes all this in simplicity, and on that account fears God and takes care not to sin against Him, is not condemned for that simple belief. But the man who confirms himself in these ideas to such a degree as to believe that anger, wrath, revenge, thus things that are of evil, exist in the Lord, and that from anger, wrath, and revenge He punishes a man and casts him into hell, is condemned, because he has destroyed the genuine truth that the Lord is love itself, mercy itself, and good itself, and that one who is these cannot be angry, wrathful, and revengeful. These things are attributed to the Lord because such is the appearance. So with many other things.
Many things in the sense of the letter are apparent truths, having genuine truths hidden within them, and that it is not hurtful to think and speak in accordance with such truths, but that it is hurtful to confirm them to such a degree as to destroy the genuine truth hidden within, may be illustrated by an example in nature, which is presented because what is natural teaches and convinces more clearly than what is spiritual —
To the eye the sun appears to revolve round the earth daily and also annually, and therefore in the Word the sun is said to rise and set, thus make morning, noon, evening, and night, and also making the seasons of spring, summer, autumn, and winter, and thus days and years; when yet the sun stands motionless, for it is an ocean of fire, and it is the earth that revolves daily, and is carried round the sun annually. The man who in simplicity and ignorance supposes that the sun is carried round the earth, does not destroy the natural truth that the earth daily rotates on its axis, and is annually carried along the ecliptic. But the man who by the Word and by reasonings from the natural man confirms as real the apparent motion and course of the sun, does invalidate the truth and does destroy it.
That the sun moves is an apparent truth; that it does not move is a genuine truth. Everyone may speak in accordance with the apparent truth, and does so speak, but to think in accordance with it from confirmation blunts and darkens the rational understanding. It is the same with respect to the stars in the sidereal heavens. The apparent truth is that they too, like the sun, are carried round the earth once a day, and it is therefore said of the stars also that they rise and set. But the genuine truth is that the stars are fixed, and that their heavens stand motionless. Still, everyone may speak in accordance with the appearance.
The reason why it is hurtful to confirm the apparent truth of the Word to the point of destroying the genuine truth that lies hidden within, is that each and all things of the sense of the letter of the Word communicate with heaven, and open it,. So that when a man applies this sense to confirm loves of the world that are contrary to loves of heaven, the internal of the Word is made false, and the result is that when its external of the sense of the letter, and which now has a false internal, communicates with heaven, heaven is closed, for the angels, who are in the internal of the Word, reject that external of it. Thus it is evident that a false internal, or truth falsified, takes away communication with heaven and closes heaven. This is why it is hurtful to confirm any heretical falsity.
The Word is like a garden, a heavenly paradise, that contains delicacies and delights of every kind, delicacies in its fruits and delights in its flowers; and in the midst of the garden trees of life with fountains of living water near them, while forest trees surround it. The man who from doctrine is in Divine truths is at its center where the trees of life are, and is in the actual enjoyment of its delicacies and delights; whereas the man who is in truths not from doctrine, but from the sense of the letter only, is at the outskirts, and sees nothing but the forest vegetation. And one who is in the doctrine of a false religion, and who has confirmed himself in its falsity, is not even in the forest, but is out beyond it in a sandy plain where there is not even grass. That such are their several states after death.Be it known moreover that the literal sense of the Word is a guard to the genuine truths that lie hidden within. It is a guard in this respect, that it can be turned this way or that, and explained according to the way it is taken, yet without injury or violence to its internal. It does no harm for the sense of the letter to be understood in one way by one person and in a different way by another; but it does harm for the Divine truths that lie hidden within to be perverted, because this inflicts violence on the Word. The sense of the letter is a guard against this, and the guard is effectual in the case of those who are in falsities from their religion, but do not confirm those falsities, for these persons do the Word no violence.
This guard is signified by cherubs, and in the Word is described by them. This is signified by the cherubs that were stationed at the entrance of the garden of Eden after Adam and his wife had been cast out, of which we read as follows:
When Jehovah God had driven out the man, He made to dwell at the east of the garden of Eden the cherubim, and the flame of a sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life (Gen. 3:24).The "cherubim" signify a guard; the "way of the tree of life" signifies the access to the Lord which men have by means of the Word; the "flame of a sword that turned every way" signifies Divine truth in ultimates, this being like the Word in the sense of the letter, which can be so turned.
(from Doctrine of the Sacred Scriptures 91-97)