The Thief Does Not Come Except to Steal and to Kill and to Destroy

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

'Theft' means an alienation caused by evil that happens in the place which such evil takes possession of; for it expels everything good and true and fills up that place with evils and falsities.

'Theft' also means its laying claim to what belongs to others; for it takes to itself everything good and true in that place and makes such its own as well as attaching it to evils and falsities.

But to enable anyone to know what is meant by 'theft' in the spiritual sense, a statement must be made about what happens to evils and falsities when they enter in and take possession of a place, and also when they lay claim to everything good and true there.

From infancy to childhood, and sometimes on into early youth, a person is absorbing forms of goodness and truth received from parents and teachers, for during those years he learns about those forms of goodness and truth and believes them with simplicity - his state of innocence enabling this to happen. It inserts those forms of goodness and truth into his memory; yet it lodges them only on the edge of it since the innocence of infancy and childhood is not an internal innocence which has an influence on the rational, only an external one which has an influence solely on the exterior natural.

When however the person grows older, when he starts to think for himself and not, as previously, simply in the way his parents or teachers do, he brings back to mind and so to speak chews over what he has learned and believed before, and then he either endorses it, has doubts about it, or refuses to accept it. If he endorses it, this is an indication that he is governed by good, but if he refuses to accept it, that is an indication that he is governed by evil. If however he has doubts about what he has learned and believed before, it is an indication that he will move subsequently either into an affirmative attitude of mind or else into a negative one.

The truths that a person learns and believes in his earliest years when he is a young child but which later on he either endorses, has doubts about, or refuses to accept, are in particular these:

There is God, and He is one

He created everything

He rewards those who do what is good and punishes those who do things that are bad

There is life after death, when the bad go to hell and the good go to heaven, and so there is a hell and a heaven

The life after death lasts for ever

People ought to pray every day and to do so in a humble way

They ought to keep the Sabbath day holy

Honour parents

Not commit adultery

Not kill

Not steal

and many other truths like these.

Such truths are learned and absorbed by a person from earliest childhood; but if, when he starts to think for himself and to lead his own life, he endorses them, adding to them further truths of a more interior kind, and leads a life in conformity with them, all is well with him.

But if he starts to disobey them, refusing at length to accept them, then even though outwardly he leads a life in conformity with them, because the law and society expect him to do so, he is governed by evil.

This evil is what is meant by 'theft', to the extent that thief-like it usurps the position held previously by good.  With many people it is thief-like to the extent that it takes away the forms of goodness and truth previously there and uses them to lend support to evils and falsities. So far as is possible with these people the Lord removes the forms of goodness and truth absorbed in early childhood from where these are to a more internal position, where - within the interior natural - He stores them away for future use. These forms of goodness and truth that are stored away within the interior natural are meant in the Word by 'the remnant'.  But if evil steals the forms of goodness and truth there and uses them to lend support to evils and falsities, especially if it does so by the use of deceit, it destroys those remnants; for in this case it mingles evil with good, and falsity with truth, to such an extent that one cannot be separated from the other; and then a person is done for.

The fact that 'theft' means the kinds of things mentioned above may be seen from the mere use of that word to refer to what constitutes a person's spiritual life:-

For the only riches in that life are cognitions of good and truth, and the only possessions and inheritances are the different forms of happiness in life which are gained from forms of good and from truths deriving from these.

(from Arcana Cœlestia 5135

The Cupidity of Gain and the Avaricious

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Ye are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father ye will to do. He was a murderer from the beginning (John 8:44)

[T]he cupidity of gain and avarice has within it the desire not only to possess the whole world, but also to plunder and even to kill everyone for the sake of gain; indeed one impelled by such cupidity would commit murder for but little were not the laws a hindrance. Moreover, such a man in his possession of gold and silver regards himself as the greatest in power, however in external appearance he may seem otherwise, which shows that there is in avarice not only the love of the world, but also the love of self, and indeed the filthiest love of self. For elevation of mind, or pride, in those who are sordidly avaricious, is not so conspicuous outwardly, because it is sometimes unconcerned about wealth for the sake of display; nor is it that kind of the love of self which is usually conjoined with pleasures; for such have little concern about the body, and its food and clothing. But it is a love entirely earthly, having no other end than money, in the possession of which it believes itself, not actually but potentially, above all others. It is evident from this that in avarice there is the lowest and vilest love of self, for which reason in the other life the avaricious appear to themselves to be among swine, and they above all others are against all good whatever. Consequently they are in such thick darkness that they are utterly unable to see what is good and what is true; they do not at all apprehend that there is any internal belonging to man which lives after death, and at heart they laugh at those who say so.

(from Arcana Cœlestia 4751)

The Evil of the Love of Self Defined

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

The evil of the love of self is not, as is generally thought, that external elation which is called pride; but it is hatred against the neighbor, and thence a burning desire for revenge, and delight in cruelty. These are the interiors of the love of self. Its exteriors are contempt for others in comparison with self, and an aversion to those who are in spiritual good, and this sometimes with manifest elation or pride, and sometimes without it; for one who holds the neighbor in such hatred, interiorly loves no one but himself and those whom he regards as making one with himself; thus he loves them in himself, and himself in them, for the sole end of self.

(from Arcana Cœlestia 4750:5)

Concerning the State of Perception of the Most Ancient Church

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

[T]hey had perception of all things that belong to faith, almost as have the angels with whom they had communication; for the reason that their interior man, or spirit, by means also of the internal respiration, was joined to heaven; and that love to the Lord and love toward the neighbor are attended with this; for man is thus conjoined with angels through their veriest life, which consists in such love.

They said that they had the law written upon them, because they were in love to the Lord and love toward the neighbor; and such being the case, whatever the laws prescribe was in agreement with their perception, and whatever the laws forbid was contrary to it. Nor did they doubt that all laws, human as well as Divine, are founded in love to the Lord and charity toward the neighbor, and regard these as their fundamental.

Wherefore, as they had this fundamental in them, from the Lord, they could not but know all things that were from it. They believe too that those who live in the world at this day, who love the Lord and the neighbor, have also the law written upon them, and are acceptable citizens everywhere on earth, as the same are in the other life.

(from Arcana Cœlestia 1121)

Spiritual Love or Charity Defined

Selection from Apocalypse Explained ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Charity, itself, viewed in itself, is the affection of truth and good, and where that affection is, there is a life according to truths and goods — for there is no affection without a life according to the truths and goods for which there is affection. If such affection is thought to be possible and to be present, it is a natural not a spiritual affection. These two kinds of affection differ in this:—

natural affection has self and the world for an end; thus the truths and goods by which it is affected are loved for the sake of reputation, that honors and wealth may be acquired, and then a life according to the doctrinals that have been learned is put on merely from self for the sake of appearance, which is thus a feigned life and inwardly hypocritical

spiritual affection has the Lord, heaven, and eternal life for an end, and has regard to these in truths and goods; thus it loves truths and goods spiritually.

When this affection [spiritual] is with man he loves to think and to will these truths and goods, and consequently to live according to them. To live according to truths and goods is what is meant in the Word by "doing," and the life itself is meant by "deeds" and "works" which are so often mentioned in the Word....

(from Apocalypse Explained 444a)

Truth Wishes to be In The Light

Selection from Apocalypse Explained ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

About God and about Divine things, which are called in heaven celestial and spiritual, and in the world ecclesiastical and theological, there is thought from light; there is also thought not from light about them. Those have thought not from light who know about these things but do not understand them. Such are all those at the present day who wish the understanding to be kept under obedience to faith, holding even that a thing must be believed and not understood, and claiming that intellectual faith is not true faith. But these are such as are not interiorly in the genuine affection of truth, and consequently are in no enlightenment — many of them are in the pride of self-intelligence, and in the love of ruling over the souls of men by means of the holy things of the church, not knowing that

truth wishes to be in the light

since the light of heaven is the Divine truth, and that a truly human understanding is moved by that light and sees from it. When the understanding does not see from that light it is the memory that has faith and not the man; and such faith is blind, because without an idea from the light of truth; for the understanding is the man, and the memory introduces.

If what is not understood must be believed a man might be taught like a parrot to speak and to remember, even that there is holiness in the bones of the dead and in sepulchers, that carcasses perform miracles, that man will be tormented in purgatory if he does not consecrate his wealth to idols or to monasteries, that men are gods because heaven and hell are in their power, with other like things which man must believe from a blind faith and from a closed understanding, and thus from the light of both extinguished. But be it known:

all the truths of the Word, which are the truths of heaven and of the church, can be seen by the understanding — in heaven spiritually, in the world rationally

for a truly human understanding is the sight itself of these truths, for it is separated from what is material, and when separated, it sees truths as clearly as the eye sees objects; it sees truths as it loves them, for as it loves them it is enlightened.

The angels have wisdom in consequence of seeing truths; when, therefore, it is said to any angel that this or that must be believed although it is not understood, the angel answers, Do you think that I am insane, or that you are God whom I am to believe if I do not see? It may be falsity from hell.

(Apocalypse Explained 1100:23)

Faith in the Understanding; Faith in the Will

Selection from Arcana Cœlestia ~ Emanuel Swedenborg

Regarded in itself, faith is a faith in the understanding and a faith in the will; to know and understand the truth which is of faith is called faith in the understanding; but to will the truth which is of faith is called faith in the will. ... That faith in the understanding, or the understanding of truth, precedes faith in the will, or the willing of truth, must be evident to everyone; for when anything is unknown to man (such as heavenly good), he must first know that it exists, and understand what it is, before he can will it.

(from Arcana Cœlestia 3863:3)