Respecting Divine Love

Selection from Apocalypse Explained ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The Divine love and the Divine wisdom, from which is the life of all things, and of which the Divine attributes (infinity, eternity, providence, omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience) are predicated —

Respecting the Divine love:

• In the world it is but little comprehended what love is, and yet it is man's very life.

• The Lord alone is love itself, because life itself, while men and angels are only recipients.

• Life, which is love, is not given except in a form, and that form is a form of uses in the whole complex.

• Such a form is man, individually and collectively, and in such a form is heaven, and also the world.

• There are genera and species of uses, and varieties of species to infinity; also there are degrees of uses.

• There are as many affections as there are uses, and consequently there are genera and species of affections, and differences of species to infinity; and there are degrees of affections.

• Every affection of use in itself is a man, according to its quality and quantity.

• Each use draws its life from the common good, and flows in from it, and gives the necessary, useful, and delightful things of life.

• So far as man is in the love of uses so far is he in the Lord, so far he loves the Lord and the neighbor, and so far is he a man.

• The active force of uses according to their connection in their order produce vital heat, which is perceived in man as love.

• This is made evident by the fact that man wills this thing or that, or this or that is good or not good to him, and finally by his delight.

• All things in man are formed and grow and are held in connection by the Lord by means of love and its heat.

• Man does not know what affection is, and still less that there are as many various affections as there are men born into the world, and will be born to eternity, thus that they are infinite.

• Man does not know otherwise than that he is thought, and yet he is affection.

• Neither does he know that he has eternal life according to his affection of use.

(from Apocalypse Explained 1229)

The Fear of Being Slain

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

When a man deprives himself of charity, he separates himself from the Lord, since it is solely charity, that is, love toward the neighbor, and mercy, that conjoin man with the Lord.

Where there is no charity, there is disjunction, and where there is disjunction, man is left to himself or to his Own; and then whatever he thinks is false, and whatever he wills is evil.

These are the things that slay man, or cause him to have nothing of LIFE remaining.

Those who are in evil and falsity are in continual dread of being slain, as is thus described in Moses:

• Your land shall be a desolation, and your cities a waste, and upon them that are left of you I will bring softness into their heart in the land of their enemies, and the sound of a driven leaf shall chase them, and they shall flee as fleeing from a sword, and they shall fall when none pursueth, and shall stumble everyone upon his brother, as it were before a sword, when none pursueth (Lev. 26:33, 36-37).

In Isaiah:

• The treacherous deal treacherously, yea, in the treachery of the treacherous they deal treacherously. And it shall come to pass that he who fleeth from the noise of the fear shall fall into the pit, and he that cometh up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare; the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fall, and not rise again (Isa. 24:16-20).

In Jeremiah:

• Behold, I bring a dread upon thee, from all thy circuits shall ye be driven out every man toward his faces, and none shall gather up him that wandereth (Jer. 49:5).

In Isaiah:

• We will flee upon the horse, therefore shall ye flee; and, we will ride upon the swift, therefore shall they that pursue you be rendered swift; one thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one, at the rebuke of five shall ye flee (Isa. 30:16-17).

In these and other passages of the Word, those who are in falsity and evil are described as "fleeing" and as in "fear of being slain." They are afraid of everybody, because they have no one to protect them. All who are in evil and falsity hate their neighbor, so that they all desire to kill one another.

The state of evil spirits in the other life shows most clearly that those who are in evil and falsity are afraid of everybody. Those who have deprived themselves of all charity wander about, and flee from place to place. Wherever they go, if to any societies, these at once perceive their character by their mere coming, for such is the perception that exists in the other life; and they not only drive them away, but also severely punish them, and with such animosity that they would kill them if they could. Evil spirits take the greatest delight in punishing and tormenting one another; it is their highest gratification.

Not until now has it been known that evil and falsity themselves are the cause of this, for whatever anyone desires for another returns upon himself. Falsity has in itself the penalty of falsity, and evil has in itself the penalty of evil, and consequently they have in themselves the fear of these penalties.

(from Arcana Coelestia 389-391)

The Life or Soul of the Word

Selection from Arcana Coelestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

In heaven nothing at all is known about the names, countries, nations, and the like; the angels have no idea of such things, but of the actual things SIGNIFIED by them.

The Word of the Lord is living by virtue of the internal sense. This is as the soul, of which the external sense is as the body. And just as with man when his body dies the soul lives, and when the soul lives he no longer knows the things that pertain to the body, so when he comes among angels he does not know what the Word is in the sense of the letter, but only what it is in its soul. Such was the man of the Most Ancient Church, who, if he were living and read the Word at the present day, would not cleave at all to the sense of the letter, but would be as if he did not see it, but only the internal sense abstractly from the letter; and indeed as if the letter had no existence. Thus he would be in the life or soul of the Word.

It is the same everywhere in the Word, even in its historical parts, and yet there is not so much as one little word therein that does not, in the internal sense, enfold within it deep secrets which never appear to those who hold the mind in the historical connection.

(from Arcana Coelestia 1143)