Affections, Both Good and Evil

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens the man and his wife; and of the beast that is not clean by twos, the man and his wife. Genesis 7:2

By "every clean beast" are signified affections of good
  • By "sevens" is signified that they are holy
     • By "man and his wife" that the truths were conjoined with goods.

By the "beast not clean" are signified evil affections
  • By "two" that they are relatively profane
    • By "man and wife" falsities conjoined with evils.

That affections of good are signified by "every clean beast"...

The reason why affections are thus signified is that man in himself, and regarded in what is his own, is nothing but a beast. He has very similar senses, appetites, desires; and all his affections are very similar. His good, nay, even his best loves, are very similar - as the love for companions of his own kind, the love of his children, and of his wife; so that they do not at all differ.

But his being man, and more than beast, consists in his having an interior life, which beasts never have nor can have. This life is the life of faith and love from the Lord. And if this life were not within everything that he has in common with beasts, he would not be anything else.

Take only one example-love toward companions: if he should love them only for the sake of himself, and there were nothing more heavenly or Divine in his love, he could not from this be called a man, because it is the same with beasts. And so with all the rest.

If therefore there were not the life of love from the Lord in his will, and the life of faith from the Lord in his understanding, he would not be a man.

By virtue of the life which he has from the Lord he lives after death; because the Lord adjoins him to Himself. And thus he can be in His heaven with the angels, and live to eternity.

Even if a man lives as a wild beast, and loves nothing whatever but himself and what regards himself, yet so great is the Lord's mercy - for it is Divine and Infinite - that He does not leave him, but continually breathes into him His own life, through the angels; and even supposing that he receives it no otherwise, it still causes him to be able to think, to reflect, to understand whether a thing is good or evil - in relation to what is moral, civil, worldly, or corporeal - and therefore whether it is true or false.

As the most ancient people knew, and when they were in self-humiliation acknowledged, that they were nothing but beasts and wild beasts, and were men solely by virtue of what they had from the Lord, therefore whatever pertained to themselves they not only likened to but called beasts and birds

• things of the will they compared to beasts, and called beasts
• things of the understanding they compared to and called birds.

But they distinguished between good affections and evil affections. Good affections they compared to lambs, sheep, kids, she-goats, he-goats, rams, heifers, oxen-for the reason that they were good and gentle, and serviceable to life, since they could be eaten, and their skins and wool could furnish clothing. These are the principal clean beasts. But those which are evil and fierce, and not serviceable to life, are unclean beasts.

(Arcana Coelestia 713 - 715)

The General Meaning of Beast in the Scripture

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

And Jehovah God formed out of the ground every beast of the field, and every fowl of the heavens, and brought it to the man to see what he would call it; and whatsoever the man called every living soul, that was the name thereof. And the man gave names to every beast, and to the fowl of the heavens, and to every wild animal of the field; but for the man there was not found a help as with him. Genesis 2:19, 20

By "beasts" are signified celestial affections, and by "fowls of the heavens" spiritual affections; that is to say, by "beasts" are signified things of the will, and by "fowls" things of the understanding.

To "bring them to the man to see what he would call them" is to enable him to know their quality, and his "giving them names" signifies that he knew it. But notwithstanding that he knew the quality of the affections of good and of the knowledges of truth that were given him by the Lord, still he inclined to his Own*, which is expressed in the same terms as before - that "there was not found a help as with him."   (Arcana Coelestia 142)

*Innumerable things might be said about man's Own in describing its nature with the corporeal and worldly man, with the spiritual man, and with the celestial man.

• With the corporeal and worldly man, his Own is his all - he knows of nothing else than his Own, and imagines ... that if he were to lose this Own he would perish.

• With the spiritual man also his Own has a similar appearance, for although he knows that the Lord is the life of all, and gives wisdom and understanding, and consequently the power to think and to act, yet this knowledge is rather the profession of his lips than the belief of his heart.

• But the celestial man discerns that the Lord is the life of all and gives the power to think and to act, for he perceives that it is really so. He never desires his Own, nevertheless an Own is given him by the Lord, which is conjoined with all perception of what is good and true, and with all happiness. The angels are in such an Own, and are at the same time in the highest peace and tranquility, for in their Own are those things which are the Lord's, who governs their Own, or them by means of their Own. This Own is the veriest celestial itself, whereas that of the corporeal man is infernal."   (Arcana Coelestia 140)

That by "beasts" and "animals" were anciently signified affections and like things in man, may appear strange at the present day; but as the men of those times were in a celestial idea, and as such things are represented in the world of spirits by animals, and in fact by such animals as they are like, therefore when they spoke in that way they meant nothing else. Nor is anything else meant in the Word in those places where beasts are mentioned either generally or specifically. The whole prophetic Word is full of such things, and therefore -

One who does not know what each beast specifically signifies, cannot possibly understand what the Word contains in the internal sense.

 But, as before observed, beasts are of two kinds - evil or noxious beasts, and good or harmless ones -and by the good beasts are signified good affections, as for instance by sheep, lambs, and doves; and as it is the celestial, or the celestial spiritual man, who is treated of, such are here meant.   (Arcana Coelestia 143)

The Lord as A Householder

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far country: (Matthew 21:33)

It is permitted him [the celestial man] to enjoy all these things, but not to possess them as his own, because they are the Lord's.

• The celestial man acknowledges, because he perceives, that all things both in general and in particular are the Lord's.
• The spiritual man does indeed acknowledge the same, but with the mouth, because he has learned it from the Word.
• The worldly and corporeal man neither acknowledges nor admits it; but whatever he has he calls his own, and imagines that were he to lose it, he would altogether perish.

That wisdom, intelligence, reason, and knowledge [scientia] are not of man, but of the Lord, is very evident from all that the Lord taught; as in Matthew, where the Lord compares Himself to a householder, who planted a vineyard, and hedged it round, and let it out to husbandmen (21:33); and in John:

The Spirit of truth shall guide you into all truth; for He shall not speak of Himself, but what things soever He shall hear, He shall speak; He shall glorify Me, for He shall receive of Mine, and shall declare it unto you (John 16:13-14).

And in another place:

A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven (John 3:27).

That this is really so is known to everyone who is acquainted with even a few of the arcana of heaven.

(Arcana Cœlestia 122 - 124)