Everyone's Life Remains After Death To Eternity

Excerpt from Conjugial Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

• Every one's own life remains with him after death, is known in the Church from the Word, as from these passages there:

• The Son of man shall come ... and shall render then to every one according to his deeds (Matthew xvi. 27);

• I saw the books opened, and all were judged according to their works (Revelation xx. 12, 13).

• In the day of judgment God shall render to every man according to his works (Romans ii. 6, 2 Corinthians v. 10).

•The works according to which judgment is rendered to every one are the life, for the life does them, and they are in accord with the life. ... every one is examined there as to what his life has been and that the life which he contracted in the world remains with him to eternity. ... no one's life can be changed after death inasmuch as it has been organized in accord with his love and hence with his works, and that if it were changed, the organism would be torn apart, which could never be; likewise that an alteration in organization is possible only in the material body, and not at all in the spiritual body, after the other has been cast off.

To an evil man the evil of his life is then imputed and to a good man the good of his life.

• Imputation of evil is not accusation, incrimination, inculpation and judgment as in the world, but is a process of the evil itself. For those who are evil separate of their own free will from the good, for the two cannot be together. The delights of an evil love are averse to the delights of good love, and delights in the other world exhale from every one like odors from a plant on earth; for they are no longer absorbed and concealed by a material body, but flow forth freely from their loves into the spiritual aura. Inasmuch as evil is perceived there as in its odor, it is this which accuses, incriminates, inculpates and judges, not before a judge, but before every one who is in good. This is what is meant by imputation. Moreover an evil man chooses companions with whom he may live in his delight, and being averse to the delight of good, he betakes himself of his own accord to his like in hell.

• Imputation of good is accomplished similarly. This takes place with those who had acknowledged in the world that all good in them is from the Lord and none from themselves. After these have been prepared, they are admitted into the interior delights of good, and then a way is opened to them into heaven to the society whose enjoyments are homogeneous with theirs. This is done by the Lord.

(from Conjugial Love 524)

Degrees of Affections and of Uses

Selection from Divine Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

• There are continuous degrees and there are discrete degrees. Both of these are in every form in the spiritual world and in the natural world. All are acquainted with continuous degrees; few, however, have any knowledge of discrete degrees, and those who have no knowledge of these grope as in the dark when they are investigating the causes of things....

• Continuous degrees, which all know about, are like the degrees from light to shade, from heat to cold, from rarity to density. Such gradations of light, of heat, of wisdom and of love, are in every society of heaven within itself.
      They who are in the midst of a society are in clearer light than those who are in the ultimates, the light diminishing according to distance from the center even to the ultimates.
      It is the same with wisdom; those who are in the midst or center of a society are in the light of wisdom, while those who are in the ultimates or circumferences are in the shade of wisdom and are simple.
      It is the same with love within societies. The affections of love, which make the wisdom of those in societies and the uses of the affections which make their life, continually lessen from the midst or center even to the ultimates or circumferences.

• Such are continuous degrees. But discrete degrees are wholly different. These do not advance in one plane to the sides around, but from highest to lowest; and for this reason they are called descending degrees.
      They are separated as efficient causes and effects are, which in their turn become efficient causes even to the lowest effect.
      They are also like a producing force in relation to the forces produced, which in turn become producing even to the last product.
      In a word, they are degrees of the formation of one thing from another; thus they are the degrees from first or highest to last or lowest, where formation subsists.
      Therefore things prior and posterior, also things higher and lower, are such degrees. All creation was effected through such degrees, and all production is by means of them, and likewise all composition in the nature that belongs to this world; for in analyzing anything that is composite you will see that one thing therein is from another, even to the very last, which is the general of them all.

• The three angelic heavens are distinguished from each other by such degrees and in consequence one is above another.
      The interiors of man, which belong to his mind, are distinguished from each other by such degrees;
      so, too, are light which is wisdom and heat which is love, in the heavens of angels and in the interiors of men;
      the same is true of the light itself that proceeds from the Lord as a sun, and of the heat itself that also proceeds from Him;
and for this reason the light in the third heaven is so refulgent, and the light in the second heaven is of such shining whiteness as to exceed the noonday light of the world a thousand fold.
      The same is true of the wisdom, for in the spiritual world light and wisdom are in equal degree of perfection.
      The same is true of the degrees of affections; and as this is true of the degrees of affections, it is true also of the degrees of uses, for the subjects of affections are uses.
      It is to be known further that in every form, both spiritual and natural, there are both discrete and continuous degrees. Without discrete degrees there is not that within a form that constitutes a cause or soul, and without continuous degrees there is no extension or appearance of it.

(Divine Love xi)

Affection First Become Something When In Act

Selection from Divine Love ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

There are as many affections as there are uses.

• There are many things that bear witness that the Divine love is life itself, and that love therefrom with man is his life. Among these proofs, this is especially clear, namely, that man's spirit is nothing but affection, consequently that man after death becomes in affection — an angel of heaven if he be an affection of good use, and a spirit of hell if he be an affection of evil use. For this reason the whole heaven is divided into societies according to the genera and species of affections; and likewise, in an opposite manner, hell. From this it is that whether you speak of affections or of societies in the spiritual world, it is the same.

• By affections are meant the continuations and derivations of love. Love may be compared to a fountain, and affections to the streams issuing from it. Love may also be compared to the heart, and affections to the vessels leading out and continued from it; and it is well known that the vessels that convey blood from the heart resemble their heart in every point, so as to be as it were extensions of it - from this is the circulation of the blood from the heart through the arteries, and from the arteries into the veins, and back to the heart. So with affections — for these are derived and continued from love, and produce uses in forms, and in these proceed from the firsts of the uses to their ultimates, and from these they return to the love from which they started: from all which it is plain that affection is love in its essence; and that use is love in its form.

• The conclusion from this is, that the objects, that is, the ends of affections, are uses, therefore also their subjects are uses, and that the very forms in which affections exist are effects which are effigies of the affections; in which they proceed from the first end to the last, and from the last end to the first, and by them they perform their works, offices, and exercises.

• From what has now been said, who cannot see that-

affection alone is not anything, but that it becomes something by being in use; and that affection for use is nothing but an idea, unless it be in form; and that affection for use in form is nothing but a potency, the affection first becoming something when it is in act

This act is the very use that is meant, which in its essence is affection.

• Now, since affections are the essence of uses, and uses are the subjects of affections, it follows that there are as many affections as there are uses.

(Divine Love IX)