The Medium of Conjunction

Selection from Heaven and Hell ~ Emanuel Swedenborg
ALL THINGS OF THE EARTH
 AND IN GENERAL
ALL THINGS OF THE WORLD
ARE CORRESPONDENCES

All things of the earth are distinguished into three kinds, called kingdoms, namely, the animal kingdom, the vegetable kingdom and the mineral kingdom.

The things in the animal kingdom are correspondences in the first degree, because they live.

The things in the vegetable kingdom are correspondences in the second degree, because they merely grow.

The things in the mineral kingdom are correspondences in the third degree because they neither live nor grow.

The correspondences in the animal kingdom are living creatures of various kinds, both those that walk and creep on the ground as well as those that fly in the air. These are not named specifically as they are well known.

The correspondences in the vegetable kingdom are all things that grow and flourish in gardens, forests, fields and meadows. These, too, are not named as they are well known.

The correspondences in the mineral kingdom are metals, more and less noble, stones, precious and not precious, earths of various kinds and also waters.

Besides these, there are also the correspondences prepared from those by human activity for use, such as foods of every kind, clothing, homes, buildings and many other things.

The things above the earth as the sun, the moon, the stars, 

and also those in the atmospheres as clouds, mists, rain, lightning and thunder are likewise correspondences.

Things resulting from the presence or absence of the sun, as light and shade, heat and cold are also correspondences as well as those that follow in succession therefrom, as the seasons of the year which are called spring, summer, autumn and winter, and the times of the day, morning, noon, evening and night.

IN A WORD, ALL THINGS THAT COME INTO EXISTENCE IN NATURE, FROM THE LEAST TO THE GREATEST ARE CORRESPONDENCES.

They are correspondences because the natural world with all things belonging to it comes into existence and continues in existence from the spiritual world, and both worlds from the Divine. It is said to continue in existence also because everything continues in existence by virtue of that from which it comes into existence, for, continuing in existence is a perpetual coming into existence, and because not a thing can continue in existence from itself, but from something prior to itself, thus from the First. Therefore, if separated from that it would utterly perish and vanish.

EVERYTHING IN NATURE THAT COMES INTO EXISTENCE AND CONTINUES IN EXISTENCE FROM DIVINE ORDER IS A CORRESPONDENCE.

The Divine good that proceeds from the Lord makes Divine order. It begins from Him, goes forth from Him through the heavens in succession into the world, and is terminated there in ultimates. The things that are there in accordance with order are correspondences. All things there which are good and perfect for use are in accordance with order, for all good is good according to use, while the form has relation to truth since truth is the form of good. For this reason all things which are in Divine order in the whole world and also partake of the nature of the world, have relation to good and truth.

That all things in the world come into existence from the Divine, and are clothed with such things in nature as enable them to exist there and perform a use, and thus to correspond, is clearly evident from individual things seen in both the animal and vegetable kingdoms. In both there are things that anyone, if he thinks interiorly, can see to be from heaven.

For illustration a few things out of a countless number may be mentioned, first some things in the Animal Kingdom.

Many people are aware what knowledge there is implanted as it were in every animal. Bees know how to gather honey from flowers, to build cells out of wax in which they store their honey and thus provide food for themselves and their own [hive] even for the coming winter. That a new generation may be born, their queen lays eggs, and the rest take care of them and cover them. The whole hive live under a certain form of government which all in the hive know by instinct. They preserve the working bees and cast out the drones, depriving them of their wings, besides other wonderful things which they have from heaven for the sake of use. For, throughout the world, their wax serves the human race for candles, and their honey for sweetening food.

And what happens in the case of caterpillars (vermiculus), the meanest creatures in the animal kingdom? They know how to get food from the juice of leaves suited to them, and afterwards at the appointed time to invest themselves with a covering and place themselves, as it were, in a womb and so hatch out an offspring of their own kind. Some are first changed into nymphs and chrysalides which spin threads; and this travail being over, they come forth clad with a different body and, furnished with wings, fly in the air as in their heaven. They celebrate marriages, lay eggs and provide for themselves a posterity.

Besides these specific instances, all creatures that fly in the sky know in general the food suitable for their nourishment, not only what it is but even where to find it. They know how to build nests for themselves, each species different from any other, to lay eggs in the nest, to sit upon them, hatch their young and feed them, and to turn them out of the home when they are able to be independent. They also know their enemies that they have to avoid and their friends with whom they may associate, and this from earliest infancy; not to mention the wonders in the eggs themselves in which all things lie ready in their order for the formation and nourishment of the embryo chick, besides innumerable other things.

Who, thinking from any rational wisdom, will ever say that these things are from any other source than the spiritual world to which the natural world is of service in wrapping around it a body that is derived from it or for presenting as an effect that which is spiritual in its cause? The beasts of the earth and the fowls of the air are born into all this knowledge while man, who is superior to them, is not. The reason is that animals are in the order of their life and have not been able to destroy what is in them from the spiritual world, because they have no rational [faculty]. Man, on the other hand, who thinks from the spiritual world, having perverted what is in him from that world by a life contrary to order, which his rational faculty has favoured, must needs be born into mere ignorance and afterwards be led back by Divine means into the order of heaven.

How the things of the Vegetable Kingdom correspond can be confirmed from many instances.

For example, little seeds grow into trees, put forth leaves, produce flowers and then fruit, in which again they deposit seeds. These things take place in succession and exist together in an order so wonderful as to be indescribable in a few words. Volumes might be filled and yet there would be still deeper arcana, relating more closely to their uses, which knowledge would be unable to exhaust. Since these things, too, are from the spiritual world, or heaven, which is in the form of man, as has been shown above in the relevant section, so all the particulars in this kingdom have a certain relation to such things as are in man, as is well known to some in the learned world. It has been made clear to me by much experience that all things in this kingdom also are correspondences. For, often when I have been in gardens, and have been looking at the trees, fruits, flowers and vegetables there, I have observed their correspondences in heaven, and have spoken with those in whom these were, and have been taught whence and what they were.

To know, however, the spiritual things in heaven to which natural things in the world correspond is possible to no one at the present day except from heaven, since the knowledge of correspondences has now been entirely lost. But the nature of the correspondence of spiritual things with natural I would illustrate by some examples.

The living creatures of the earth, in general, correspond to affections, gentle and useful creatures to good affections, fierce and useless ones to evil affections. In particular, cattle and their young correspond to the affections of the natural mind, sheep and lambs to the affections of the spiritual mind, while winged creatures, according to their species, correspond to the intellectual things of either mind.

For this reason, various animals, as cattle and their young, rams, sheep, she-goats, he-goats, he-lambs and she-lambs, also pigeons and turtle-doves were received for a sacred use in the Israelitish Church which was a representative Church, and sacrifices and burnt-offerings were made of them. For in that use they corresponded to things spiritual, and in heaven these were understood in accordance with correspondences. Moreover, animals according to their kinds and species, are affections, because they are living, and the life of each one is solely from, and in accordance with affection. Consequently, every animal has an innate knowledge in accord with its life's affection. Man, too, is similar to animals as to his natural man. Therefore, he is compared to them in common speech. For example, if he is gentle he is called a sheep or a lamb, if fierce, a bear or wolf, if cunning, a fox or a serpent, and so on.

There is a like correspondence with the things in the vegetable kingdom.

In general, a garden corresponds to heaven as to intelligence and wisdom, so that heaven is called the garden of God and paradise, and by man the heavenly paradise. Trees, according to their species, correspond to the perceptions and cognitions of good and truth from which intelligence and wisdom come. For this reason, the ancient people who had a knowledge of correspondences, held their sacred worship in groves. For the same reason, trees are so often mentioned in the Word, such as the vine, the olive, the cedar and others, and heaven, the Church and man are compared to them, and the good works they do are compared to fruits. Also the food derived from trees, especially from the grain harvests of the field, corresponds to affections of good and truth because these affections nourish the spiritual life, as earthly food does the natural life. Hence, bread, in a general sense, corresponds to the affection of all good, because it is the food that, beyond other foods, sustains life and because by bread is meant all food. Indeed, it is on account of this correspondence that the Lord calls Himself the Bread of life, and that loaves of bread had a holy use in the Israelitish Church, for they were placed on the table in the tabernacle and were called the bread of faces (A.V. shew-bread). All the Divine worship that was performed by means of sacrifices and burnt-offerings was also termed bread. Moreover, because of this correspondence the most holy act of worship in the Christian Church is the Holy Supper in which bread and wine are given. From these few examples the nature of correspondence can be confirmed.

How the conjunction of heaven with the world is effected by means of correspondences, will also be told in a few words.

The Lord's kingdom is a kingdom of ends which are uses, or what is the same thing, a kingdom of uses which are ends. On this account, the universe has been so created and formed by the Divine that uses may be everywhere clothed in such a way as to be presented in act or in effect, first in heaven and afterwards in the world, thus by degrees and successively down to the ultimates of nature. Hence it is evident that the correspondence of natural things with spiritual things, or of the world with heaven, is through uses and that uses conjoin. And the forms in which uses are clothed are correspondences and means of conjunction just to the extent that they are forms of uses.

In nature, in its threefold kingdom, all things that come into existence in accordance with order are forms of uses, or effects formed from use for use, and this is why the things in nature are correspondences.

With man, however, so far as he lives in accordance with Divine order, thus, so far as he is in love to the Lord and in charity towards the neighbour, to that extent, his actions are uses in form and are correspondences by means of which he is conjoined with heaven. To love the Lord and the neighbour means in general to perform uses.

Further, it ought to be known that man is the means by which the natural world is conjoined with the spiritual world, that is, man is the medium of conjunction; for in him there is a natural world and also a spiritual world. Therefore, to the extent that man is spiritual, so far he is the medium of conjunction; but, to the extent that a man is natural and not spiritual, he is not a medium of conjunction. Nevertheless, apart from the mediation of man, Divine influx into the world and also into the things of the world pertaining to man, goes on, but  not into man's rational faculty.

As all things that are in accordance with Divine order correspond to heaven, so all things contrary to Divine order correspond to hell. The things that correspond to heaven have relation to good and truth. Those things that correspond to hell have relation to evil and falsity.

Something will now be said about the knowledge of correspondences and its use.

It was said above that the spiritual world, which is heaven, is conjoined to the natural world by means of correspondences. Therefore, by means of correspondences, communication with heaven is granted to man. For the angels of heaven do not think from natural things, as man does. Consequently, when man is in the knowledge of correspondences, he is able, in regard to the thoughts of his mind, to be together with the angels, and thus, as to his spiritual or internal man, to be conjoined with them. In order that there may be conjunction of heaven with man, the Word has been written by means of pure correspondences, for all things in it in general and particular are correspondences. If man, therefore, were in the knowledge of correspondences, he would understand the Word as to its spiritual sense and would thereby be enabled to know arcana of which he sees nothing in the sense of the letter. For in the Word there is a literal sense and these is a spiritual sense. The literal sense consists of such things as are in the world, but the spiritual sense of such things as are in heaven, and since the conjunction of heaven with the world is by means of correspondences, therefore such a Word was given in which the details down to the least jot (iota) are in correspondence.

I have been taught from heaven that the Most Ancient Peoples on our earth, who were celestial men, thought from correspondences themselves, the natural things of the world before their eyes serving them as the means of thinking in this way. Being of such character, they were in fellowship with angels and spoke with them. Thus, through them heaven was conjoined to the world. For this reason, that period was called the Golden Age, of which it is said by ancient writers that the inhabitants of heaven dwelt with men and associated with them as friends with friends. But, after their times, there succeeded those who thought not from correspondences themselves but from a knowledge of correspondences, and there was then also a conjunction of heaven with man, but not so intimate. Their period is what is called the Silver Age. After this, there followed men who had some knowledge of correspondences but did not think from that knowledge, on account of their being in natural good and not, like those before them, in spiritual good. This period was called the Copper Age. After those times, men gradually became external, and finally corporeal, and then the knowledge of correspondences was completely lost, and with it a true idea of heaven and of the many things pertaining to heaven. It was also from correspondence that these ages were named from gold, silver and copper, because from correspondence "gold" signifies the celestial good in which were the Most Ancient People; "silver" signifies the spiritual good in which were the Ancient People after them; and "copper" signifies the natural good in which were the next posterity; while "iron" from which the last age was named signifies hard truth apart from good.

(from Heaven and Hell 103 - 115)