Logopraxis

Arcana Coelestia

6138. And we shall live, and our ground, servants to Pharaoh. That this signifies total submission, is evident from the signification of “we and our ground,” as being the receptacles of good and of truth (as just above, see n. 6135-6137); and from the signification of “servants,” as being to be without freedom from man’s own (see n. 5760, 5763), thus total submission.

By receptacles are meant the very forms of men;  for men are nothing else than forms receptive of life from the Lord, and these forms are such by inheritance and by actual life that they refuse to admit the spiritual life which is from the Lord. But when these receptacles have been so far renounced that they no longer have any freedom from the man’s own, there is total submission. A man who is being regenerated is at last so far reduced by repeated alternations of desolation and sustenance that he no longer wills to be his own, but the Lord’s; and when he has become the Lord’s he comes into a state of such a nature that when he is left to self he grieves and is seized with anxiety; and when he is delivered from this state of self he returns into his happiness and bliss. In such a state are all the angels.

[2] In order that He may make a man blessed and happy, the Lord wills a total submission, that is, that he be not partly his own and partly the Lord’s, for then there are two lords, which no one can serve at the same time ...

[3] That submission must be total is very evident from the first commandment of the church:

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God from all thy heart, and from all thy soul, and from all thy mind, and from all thy forces; this is the first commandment (Mark 12:30).

Thus because love to the Lord does not come from man, but from the Lord Himself, therefore all the heart, all the soul, all the mind, and all the forces, which are recipients, must be the Lord’s, consequently submission must be total. Such is the submission which is here signified by the words “we shall live, and our ground, servants to Pharaoh,” for by Pharaoh is represented the natural in general which is under the auspices of the internal celestial, in the supreme sense under the auspices of the Lord, who in this sense is “Joseph.”

 

 

Heaven and Hell

270 [2] Because the interiors of the angels of the third or inmost heaven have been opened to the third degree, Divine Truths are, as it were, inscribed on them. For the interiors of the third degree are more fully in the form of heaven than the interiors of the second and first degrees, and the form of heaven is from the Divine Truth, thus in accord with the Divine Wisdom. This is why the Divine Truth is, as it were, inscribed on those angels, or as if implanted by nature or innate. Therefore as soon as these angels hear genuine Divine Truths they instantly acknowledge and perceive them, and afterwards see them, as it were, inwardly in themselves.

As the angels of that heaven are such they never reason about Divine Truths, still less do they dispute about any truth whether it is so or not so; nor do they know what it is to believe or to have faith. For they say, What is faith? I perceive and see that a thing is so. This they illustrate by comparisons. For example, it would be like someone with a companion, seeing a house and the various things in and around it, saying to his companion that he ought to believe that these things exist, and that they are such as he sees them to be; or like someone seeing a garden and trees and fruit in it, and saying to his companion that he ought to have faith that there is a garden with trees and fruits, when he is seeing them clearly with his eyes.

For this reason, these angels never mention faith, nor have any idea of it. Neither do they reason about Divine Truths, still less do they dispute about any truth whether it is so or not. 

 

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Arcana Coelestia

6112... A memory-knowledge is said to be true and adaptable that has not been darkened by fallacies, which, so long as they cannot be dispelled, render the memory-knowledge unadaptable; and so also is a memory-knowledge which has not become perverted by applications to falsities and to evils by others or by oneself, for when these have once been impressed on any memory-knowledge, they remain. Therefore all memory-knowledge that is free from such vitiations, is true and adaptable memory-knowledge.

 

6110 [4] What is still more worthy of note is that the shades of evening and the darkness of night do not come from the Lord, but from things that belong to angels, spirits, and men. For the Lord as a Sun is continually shining and flowing in, but evils and falsities from what is one’s own, being in men, spirits, and angels, turn and convert them from the Lord, and thus lead them into the shades of evening, and those who are evil into the darkness of night; in like manner as the sun of our world is continually shining and inflowing, but the earth by its rotation turns itself away from it, and brings itself into shade and darkness.

[5] The reason why these alternations take place in the natural world is that the natural world comes forth from the spiritual world, and therefore also subsists from it; and hence it is that universal nature is a theater representative of the Lord’s kingdom (see n. 3483, 4939). The reason why these alternations exist in the spiritual world is that all who are in heaven may be continually perfected. From this there are such alternations also in the natural world, for otherwise all things therein would perish with drought.

 

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Arcana Coelestia

6088. Verses 7-10. And Joseph brought Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh; and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How many are the days of the years of thy life? And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my sojournings are a hundred and thirty years; few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojournings. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out from before Pharaoh.

 

6097... All temptations appear evil, for the reason that they are interior anxieties and griefs, and as it were damnations; for the man is then let into the state of his evils, consequently among evil spirits, who accuse him, and thus torment the conscience; nevertheless the angels defend him, that is, the Lord through angels, for the Lord keeps him in hope and trust, which are the forces of combat from within whereby he resists. Especially is the natural let into temptations when it is receiving the spiritual, because in the natural reside evils of life and falsities of doctrine. 

 

6101. Verses 11-12. And Joseph made his father and his brethren dwell, and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as Pharaoh had commanded. And Joseph sustained his father, and his brethren, and all his father’s house, with bread, according to the mouth of the babe. 

 

6108. Verses 13-26. And there was no bread in all the land, because the famine was very grievous, and the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan labored by reason of the famine. And Joseph gathered together all the silver that was found in the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, for the produce which they bought; and Joseph brought the silver into Pharaoh’s house. And when the silver was all spent in the land of Egypt, and in the land of Canaan, all Egypt came unto Joseph, saying, Give us bread; for why should we die beside thee because the silver faileth? And Joseph said, Give your cattle; and I will give you for your cattle, if silver fail. And they brought their cattle unto Joseph; and Joseph gave them bread [in exchange] for the horses, and for the cattle of the flock, and for the cattle of the herd, and for the asses; and he provided them with bread [in exchange] for all their cattle in this year. And when this year was ended, they came unto him in the second year, and said to him, We will not hide from my lord how that the silver is spent; and the cattle of the beast is to my lord; there is naught left before my lord, besides our body, and our ground: wherefore should we die before thine eyes, both we and our ground? buy us and our ground for bread, and we shall live, and our ground, servants to Pharaoh; and give seed, that we may live, and not die, and the ground be not laid waste. And Joseph bought all the ground of Egypt for Pharaoh; for the Egyptians sold everyone his field, because the famine grew strong upon them; and the land was Pharaoh’s.

And as for the people, he removed it to the cities from one end of the border of Egypt even to the other end thereof. Only the ground of the priests bought he not; because a portion was appointed for the priests by Pharaoh, and they ate their appointed portion which Pharaoh had given them; wherefore they sold not their ground. And Joseph said unto the people, Behold I have bought you this day and your ground for Pharaoh; lo here is seed for you, and ye shall sow the ground. And it shall be in the ingatherings that ye shall give a fifth to Pharaoh, and four parts shall be for you, for seed of the field, and for your food, and for them in your houses, and for food for your babes. And they said, Thou hast made us live; let us find grace in the eyes of my lord, and we will be Pharaoh’s servants. And Joseph made it a statute even unto this day, concerning the ground of Egypt, that Pharaoh should have the fifth; only the ground of the priests, only theirs, was not Pharaoh’s.

 

 

6112... A memory-knowledge is said to be true and adaptable that has not been darkened by fallacies, which, so long as they cannot be dispelled, render the memory-knowledge unadaptable; and so also is a memory-knowledge which has not become perverted by applications to falsities and to evils by others or by oneself, for when these have once been impressed on any memory-knowledge, they remain. Therefore all memory-knowledge that is free from such vitiations, is true and adaptable memory-knowledge.

 

6170 ...The nature of innocence may be seen as in a mirror from little children, in that they love their parents and trust in them alone, having no care but to please them; and accordingly they have food and clothing not merely for their needs, but also for their delight; and as they love their parents, they do with the delight of affection whatever is agreeable to them, thus not only what they command, but also what they suppose them to wish to command, and moreover have no self-regard whatever; not to mention many other characteristics of infancy. But be it known that the innocence of little children is not innocence, but only its semblance. Real innocence dwells solely in wisdom (n. 2305, 2306, 3494, 4797), and wisdom consists in bearing oneself toward the Lord, from the good of love and of faith, as do little children toward their parents in the way just stated.

 

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

The Intercourse of the Soul and Body 

#14 (3) For the sake of this end, there is given to man the faculty of raising his understanding almost into the light in which the angels of heaven are, that he may see what he ought to will and thence to do, in order to be prosperous in the world for a time, and blessed after death to eternity. He becomes prosperous and blessed if he procures to himself wisdom, and keeps his will in obedience thereto; but unprosperous and unhappy if he puts his understanding under obedience to his will. The reason is that the will inclines from birth towards evils, even to those which are enormous; hence, unless it were restrained by means of the understanding, a man would rush into acts of wickedness, indeed, from his inherent savage nature, he would destroy and slaughter, for the sake of himself, all who do not favour and indulge him.

 

(4)... unless the understanding could be separately perfected, and the will by means of it, a man would not be a man but a beast. For without that separation, and without the ascent of the understanding above the will, he would not be able to think, and from thought to speak, but only to express his affection by sounds; neither would he be able to act from reason, but only from instinct; still less would he be able to know the things which are of God, and by means of them to know God, and thus to be conjoined to Him, and to live to eternity.

 

Fora man thinks and wills as of himself; and this thinking and willing as of himself is the reciprocal element of conjunction: for there can be no conjunction without reciprocity, just as there can be no conjunction of an active with a passive without reaction.

 

God alone acts, and a man suffers himself to be acted upon; and he reacts to all appearance as from himself, though interiorly it is from God.

 

[5] From these considerations, rightly apprehended, may be seen what is the nature of the love of a man's will if it is raised by means of the understanding, and what is its nature if it is not raised;

 

 

(6).... Such is the man whose will or love is not raised by means of the understanding; for he then remains below, at the foot, immersed in the unclean things of nature and the lusts of the senses. It is altogether otherwise with those who subdue the allurements of the lusts of the will by means of the wisdom of the understanding.

 

With them the understanding afterwards enters into a marriage-covenant with the will, thus wisdom with love, and they dwell together above with the utmost delight.

 

Arcana Coelestia

6071. And set them before Pharaoh. That this signifies insinuation into memory-knowledges, is evident from the representation of Pharaoh, as being memory-knowledge in general (see n. 5799, 6015). Insinuation is signified by “setting before him,” because the end in presenting them was to insinuate them, that is, the truths of the church, for these are the “sons of Jacob.” As regards truths, that they must be insinuated into the memory-knowledges of the church, see n. 6004, 6023, 6052; but as at this day this is a subject about which nothing is known, it must be illustrated further. At the present day the memory-knowledges of the church are those which belong to the literal sense of the Word. Unless truths from the internal sense are insinuated into these memory-knowledges, the mind can be drawn into every heresy; but when truths have been insinuated into them, the mind cannot be drawn into heresies.

[2] For example, he who has learned from the literal sense of the Word that God is angry, that He punishes, leads into temptations, casts into hell, and causes evil, may be drawn into false ideas about God, as that from good itself, which is God, can come forth evil, thus what is opposite to Him; when yet from good comes good, and from evil comes evil. But this memory-knowledge appears with quite another aspect if interior truths are insinuated into it, as for instance this truth: that it is the evil with man that causes him to be angry, that leads into temptations, punishes, casts into hell, and from itself is continually producing evils; and that this matter is circumstanced as are the laws in kingdoms, which laws are from the king, while the evils of penalty are not from the king, but from those who do evils.

[3] Then again this truth: that hells exist, the source of all evil, and that this is permitted because it is unavoidable for man’s sake, seeing that he is in evil and his life is thence derived, and therefore unless he is left in evil he cannot be in freedom, thus cannot be reformed. Nevertheless nothing but good comes from God, for insofar as man suffers it, God bends evil into good.

[4] Also this truth: that the most general things are to be believed first, and that they are afterward to be illustrated by individual truths; as for instance this general memory-knowledge: that all things which take place are from God, thus also the evils of penalty; but in what manner these are from God is to be learned afterward, and also the nature and origin of that which is done from permission.

[5] In like manner this truth: that all worship of God must needs begin with holy fear, within which is the thought that God will reward the good and punish the evil. The simple and little children must believe this, because they do not yet apprehend what permission is-even according to the Lord’s words, “Rather fear Him who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell” (Matthew 10:28); and when they begin by not daring through fear to do what is evil, there is gradually insinuated love together with good, and then they begin to know and perceive that nothing but good is from God, and that evil is from themselves, and at last that all evil is from hell.

[6] Moreover they who are in heaven perceive that nothing but good is from God; but they who are in hell say that all evil is from God, because He permits it, and does not remove it. But to those who are in the world of spirits it is said in reply, that if evil were taken away from them they would have no life, neither would a man who is in evil; and that the evil which is in them punishes itself according to law, and that by reason of the evils of penalty they at last abstain from doing evils; and also that the punishment of the evil is the protection of the good. Add to this that they who are in evil, and also they who are in external worship without internal, as were the Jews, must by all means be in fear of God, and believe that He punishes; for from fear of God they are able to do what is good, but in no wise from love.

[7] When these and many other truths are insinuated into the memory-knowledge above referred to, it appears in a very different aspect; for then this memory-knowledge becomes like a transparent vessel, in which the truths that shine through cause the vessel to be seen no otherwise than as one general truth.

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Click Here to Print Reading

329. LITTLE CHILDREN IN HEAVEN.

It is a belief of some that only such children as are born within the church go to heaven, and that those born out of the church do not, and for the reason that the children within the church are baptized and by baptism are initiated into faith of the church. Such are not aware that no one receives heaven or faith through baptism; for baptism is merely for a sign and memorial that man should be regenerated, and that those born within the church can be regenerated because the Word is there, and in the Word are the Divine truths by means of which regeneration is effected, and there the Lord who regenerates is known.[1] Let them know therefore that every child, wherever he is born, whether within the church or outside of it, whether of pious parents or impious, is received when he dies by the Lord and trained up in heaven, and taught in accordance with Divine order, and imbued with affections for what is good, and through these with knowledges of what is true; and afterwards as he is perfected in intelligence and wisdom is introduced into heaven and becomes an angel. Everyone who thinks from reason can be sure that all are born for heaven and no one for hell, and if man comes into hell he himself is culpable; but little children cannot be held culpable.

[1] Baptism signifies regeneration by the Lord by means of the truths of faith from the Word (see numbers 4255, 5120, 9088, 10239, 10386-10388, 10392).

Baptism is a sign that the man baptized is of the church in which the Lord, who regenerates, is acknowledged, and where the Word is from which are the truths of faith, by means of which regeneration is effected (numbers 10386-10388).

Baptism confers neither faith nor salvation, but it is a witness that those who are being regenerated will receive faith and salvation (see number 10391).

[read more]

330. When children die they are still children in the other life, having a like infantile mind, a like innocence in ignorance, and a like tenderness in all things. They are merely in the rudiments of a capacity to become angels, for children are not angels but become angels. For everyone passing out of this world enters the other in the same state of life, a little child in the state of a little child, a boy in the state of a boy, a youth, a man, an old man, in the state of a youth, a man, or an old man; but subsequently each one's state is changed. The state of little children surpasses the state of all others in that they are in innocence, and evil has not yet been rooted in them by actual life; and in innocence all things of heaven can be implanted, for it is a receptacle of the truth of faith and of the good of love.

331. The state of children in the other life far surpasses their state in the world, for they are not clothed with an earthly body, but with such a body as the angels have. The earthly body is in itself gross, and receives its first sensations and first motions not from the inner or spiritual world, but from the outer or natural world; and in consequence in this world children must be taught to walk, to guide their motions, and to speak; and even their senses, as seeing and hearing, must be opened by use. It is not so with children in the other life. As they are spirits they act at once in accordance with their interiors, walking without practice, and also talking, but at first from general affections not yet distinguished into ideas of thought; but they are quickly initiated into these also, for the reason that their exteriors are homogeneous with their interiors. The speech of angels (as may be seen above, n, 234-245) so flows forth from affection modified by ideas of thought that their speech completely conforms to their thoughts from affection.

332. As soon as little children are resuscitated, which takes place immediately after death, they are taken into heaven and confided to angel women who in the life of the body tenderly loved little children and at the same time loved God. Because these during their life in the world loved all children with a kind of motherly tenderness, they receive them as their own; while the children, from an implanted instinct, love them as their own mothers. There are as many children in each one's care as she desires from a spiritual parental affection. This heaven appears in front before the forehead, directly in the line or radius in which the angels look to the Lord. It is so situated because all little children are under the immediate auspices of the Lord; and the heaven of innocence, which is the third heaven, flows into them.

333. Little children have various dispositions, some that of the spiritual angels and some that of the celestial angels. Those who are of a celestial disposition are seen in that heaven to the right, and those of a spiritual disposition to the left. All children in the Greatest Man, which is heaven, are in the province of the eyes-those of a spiritual disposition in the province of the left eye, and those of a celestial disposition in the province of the right eye. This is because the angels who are in the spiritual kingdom see the Lord before the left eye, and those who are in the celestial kingdom before the right eye (see above, number 118). This fact that in the Greatest Man or heaven children are in the province of the eyes is a proof that they are under the immediate sight and auspices of the Lord.

334. How children are taught in heaven shall also be briefly told. From their nurses they learn to talk. Their earliest speech is simply a sound of affection; this by degrees becomes more distinct as ideas of thought enter; for ideas of thought from affections constitute all angelic speech (as may be seen in its own chapter, n. 234-245). Into their affections, all of which proceed from innocence, such things as appear before their eyes and cause delight are first instilled; and as these things are from a spiritual origin the things of heaven at once flow into them, and by means of these heavenly things their interiors are opened, and they are thereby daily perfected. But when this first age is completed they are transferred to another heaven, where they are taught by masters; and so on.

335. Children are taught chiefly by representatives suited to their capacity. These are beautiful and full of wisdom from within, beyond all belief. In this way an intelligence that derives its soul from good is gradually instilled into them. I will here describe two representatives that I have been permitted to see, from which the nature of others may be inferred. First there was a representation of the Lord's rising from the sepulchre, and at the same time of the uniting of His Human with the Divine. This was done in a manner so wise as to surpass all human wisdom, and at the same time in an innocent infantile manner. An idea of a sepulchre was presented, and with it an idea of the Lord, but in so remote a way that there was scarcely any perception of its being the Lord, except seemingly afar off; and for the reason that in the idea of a sepulchre there is something funereal, and this was thus removed, after wards they cautiously admitted into the sepulchre something atmospheric, with an appearance of thin vapor, by which with proper remoteness they signified spiritual life in baptism. Afterwards I saw a representation by the angels of the Lord's descent to those that are bound, and of His ascent with these into heaven, and this with incomparable prudence and gentleness. In adaptation to the infantile mind they let down little cords almost invisible, very soft and tender, by which they lightened the Lord's ascent, always with a holy solicitude that there should be nothing in the representation bordering upon anything that did not contain what is spiritual and heavenly. Other representations are there given, whereby, as by plays adapted to the minds of children, they are guided into knowledges of truth and affections for good.

336. It was also shown how tender their understanding is. When I was praying the Lord's Prayer, and from their under standing they flowed into the ideas of my thought, their influx was perceived to be so tender and soft as to be almost solely a matter of affection; and at the same time it was observed that their understanding was open even from the Lord, for what flowed forth from them was as if it simply flowed through them. Moreover, the Lord flows into the ideas of little children chiefly from inmosts, for there is nothing, as with adults, to close up their ideas, no principles of falsity to close the way to the understanding of truth, nor any life of evil to close the way to the reception of good, and thereby to the reception of wisdom. All this makes clear that little children do not come at once after death into an angelic state, but are gradually brought into it by means of knowledges of good and truth, and in harmony with all heavenly order; for the least particulars of their nature are known to the Lord, and thus they are led, in accord with each and every movement of their inclination, to receive the truths of good and the goods of truth.

337. I have also been shown how all things are instilled into them by delightful and pleasant means suited to their genius. I have been permitted to see children most charmingly attired, having garlands of flowers resplendent with most beautiful and heavenly colors twined about their breasts and around their tender arms; and once to see them accompanied by those in charge of them and by maidens, in a park most beautifully adorned, not so much with trees, as with arbors and covered walks of laurel, with paths leading inward; and when the children entered attired as they were the flowers over the entrance shone forth most joyously. This indicates the nature of their delights, also how they are led by means of pleasant and delightful things into the goods of innocence and charity,...

Arcana Coelestia

6078. For there is no pasture for thy servants’ flock. That this signifies that memory-knowledges are wanting in which are the goods of truth, is evident from the signification of “pasture for a flock,” as being the memory-knowledges in which are goods of truth; thus “no pasture” is memory-knowledges in which there are no goods of truth. “Pasture” in the internal sense is that which sustains the spiritual life, and especially is it the truth of memory-knowledge, for the soul of man desires this as the body desires food. This truth nourishes, and therefore “to feed” denotes to be instructed (see n. 5201).

That memory-knowledges and truths sustain the soul of man is very evident from man’s longing to know things, and also from the correspondence of food with memory-knowledges (n. 1480, 3114, 4792, 5147, 5293, 5340, 5342, 5576, 5579, 5915), which correspondence also shows itself in man when he is partaking of food, for if this is done while he is speaking and listening, the vessels which receive the chyle are opened, and he is more fully nourished than if he is alone.

Spiritual truths and instructions in them would have the same effect with men if they were in the affection of good. 

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Arcana Coelestia

6078... “Pasture” in the internal sense is that which sustains the spiritual life, and especially is it the truth of memory-knowledge, for the soul of man desires this as the body desires food. This truth nourishes, and therefore “to feed” denotes to be instructed (see n. 5201).

... That truths nourish the spiritual life is especially manifest with good spirits and with the angels in heaven, for both good spirits and angels have a constant longing to know things and to be wise; and when they lack this spiritual food they feel desolate, their life is languid, and they are hungry; and they are not restored and raised into the bliss of their life until their longing is satisfied.

But in order that memory-knowledges may yield healthful nourishment to the soul, there must be in them life from the goods of truth. If there is no life from this source, the memory-knowledges do indeed sustain the man’s interior life, but only his natural life, and not his spiritual life.

 

6073. What are your works? That this signifies about services and uses, is evident from the signification of “works,” as being goods (n. 6048), thus services and uses, for these are goods. All the goods which are called goods of charity are nothing but uses, and uses are nothing but works for the neighbor, for our country, for the church, for the Lord’s kingdom. Moreover regarded in itself charity itself does not become charity until it comes into act and becomes work.

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Arcana Coelestia

6071...At the present day the memory-knowledges of the church are those which belong to the literal sense of the Word. Unless truths from the internal sense are insinuated into these memory-knowledges, the mind can be drawn into every heresy; but when truths have been insinuated into them, the mind cannot be drawn into heresies.

[2] For example, he who has learned from the literal sense of the Word that God is angry, that He punishes, leads into temptations, casts into hell, and causes evil, may be drawn into false ideas about God, as that from good itself, which is God, can come forth evil, thus what is opposite to Him; when yet from good comes good, and from evil comes evil. But this memory-knowledge appears with quite another aspect if interior truths are insinuated into it, as for instance this truth: that it is the evil with man that causes him to be angry, that leads into temptations, punishes, casts into hell, and from itself is continually producing evils;

[7] When these and many other truths are insinuated into the memory-knowledge above referred to, it appears in a very different aspect; for then this memory-knowledge becomes like a transparent vessel, in which the truths that shine through cause the vessel to be seen no otherwise than as one general truth.

 

6077 [2] As to what specifically regards truths being in memory-knowledges, be it known that interior truths may indeed be insinuated into memory-knowledges, but the truths have no life therein until there is good in the memory-knowledges; for in good there is life, and in truths from good, and thus in memory-knowledges from good through truths. Then good is like a soul to truths, and through truths to memory-knowledges, which are like a body.

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Arcana Coelestia

6069. Verses 2-6. And from among his brethren he took five men, and set them before Pharaoh.

And Pharaoh said unto his brethren, What are your works?

And they said unto Pharaoh, Thy servants are a shepherd of the flock, both we and our fathers. And they said unto Pharaoh, To sojourn in the land have we come; for there is no pasture for thy servants’ flock; for the famine is grievous in the land of Canaan; and now I pray let thy servants dwell in the land of Goshen.

And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren have come unto thee; the land of Egypt before thee is it; in the best of the land make thy father and thy brethren dwell; let them dwell in the land of Goshen; and if thou knowest, and there be among them, men of activity, then set them as princes over my cattle. 

 

6073...for a man’s works are the complex of all things of his charity and faith, and are what are called spiritual goods, and indeed become goods by exercise, that is, by means of uses.

 

6084... the eye is ever directed to that which most affects and delights; and that which is kept directly in view is also the inmost, because it is in the center, and is therefore before the eyes in the strongest light; while other things are round about in the circumference, and are therefore less clear, and at last obscure, because they do not delight and affect so much.

This is the case with memory-knowledges before the internal sight, the objects of this sight being no other than memory-knowledges and truths. That which is delightful and good in the objects is what directs the sight toward them. But be it known that truths and the memory-knowledges which agree with them come directly under the view (that is, are in the inmost) with those who are delighted and affected with spiritual and celestial truths, for to them these truths are the best things; but falsities and the memory-knowledges which agree with them come directly under the view (that is, are in the inmost) with those whom the evils of love of self and of the world affect and delight

 

 

Third Round posts are short audio clips taken from Round 3 comments offered in the online Logopraxis Life Group meetings. The aim is to keep the focus on understanding the Text in terms of its application to the inner life along with reinforcing any key LP principles that have been highlighted in the exchanges.

Click Here to Print Reading

311. XXXV. HEAVEN AND HELL ARE FROM THE HUMAN RACE.

In the Christian world it is wholly unknown that heaven and hell are from the human race, for it is believed that in the beginning angels were created and heaven was thus formed; also that the devil or Satan was an angel of light, but having rebelled he was cast down with his crew, and thus hell was formed. The angels never cease to wonder at such a belief in the Christian world, and still more that nothing is really known about heaven, when in fact that is the primary principle of all doctrine in the church. But since such ignorance prevails they rejoice in heart that it has pleased the Lord to reveal to mankind at this time many things about heaven and about hell, thereby dispelling as far as possible the darkness that has been daily increasing because the church has come to its end. [2] They wish for this reason that I should declare from their lips that in the entire heaven there is not a single angel who was created such from the beginning, nor in hell any devil who was created an angel of light and cast down; but that all, both in heaven and in hell, are from the human race; in heaven those who lived in the world in heavenly love and belief, in hell those who lived in infernal love and belief, also that it is hell taken as a whole that is called the Devil and Satan-the name Devil being given to the hell that is behind, where those are that are called evil genii, and the name Satan being given to the hell that is in front, where those are that are called evil spirits.[1] The character of these hells will be described in the following pages. [3] The angels said that the Christian world had gathered such a belief about those in heaven and those in hell from some passages in the Word understood according to the mere sense of the letter not illustrated and explained by genuine doctrine from the Word; although the sense of the letter of the Word until illuminated by genuine doctrine, draws the mind in different directions, and this begets ignorance, heresies, and errors.[2]

[1] The hells taken together, or the infernals taken together, are called the Devil and Satan (see number 694).

Those that have been devils in the world become devils after death (see number 968).

[2] The doctrine of the church must be derived from the Word (see numbers 3464, 5402, 6822, 6832, 10763, 10765).

Without doctrine the Word is not understood (see numbers 9025, 9409, 9424, 9430, 10324, 10431, 10582).

True doctrine is a lamp to those who read the Word (see number 10400).

Genuine doctrine must be from those who are enlightened by the Lord (see numbers 2510, 2516, 2519, 9424, 10105).

Those who are in the sense of the letter without doctrine come into no understanding of Divine truths (see numbers 9409, 9410, 10582).

And they are led away into many errors (see number 10431).

The difference between those who teach and learn from the doctrine of the church derived from the Word and those who teach and learn from the sense of the letter alone (see number 9025).

[read more]

312. The man of the church also derives this belief from his believing that no man comes into heaven or into hell until the time of the final judgment; and about that he has accepted the opinion that all visible things will perish at that time and new things will come into existence, and that the soul will then return into its body, and from that union man will again live as a man. This belief involves the other-that angels were created such from the beginning; for it is impossible to believe that heaven and hell are from the human race when it is believed that no man can go there until the end of the world. [2] But that men might be convinced that this is not true it has been granted me to be in company with angels, and also to talk with those who are in hell, and this now for some years, sometimes continuously from morning until evening, and thus be informed about heaven and hell. This has been permitted that the man of the church may no longer continue in his erroneous belief about the resurrection at the time of judgment, and about the state of the soul in the meanwhile, also about angels and the devil. As this belief is a belief in what is false it involves the mind in darkness, and with those who think about these things from their own intelligence it induces doubt and at length denial, for they say in heart, How can so vast a heaven, with so many constellations and with the sun and moon, be destroyed and dissipated; and how can the stars which are larger than the earth fall from heaven to the earth; and can bodies eaten up by worms, consumed by corruption, and scattered to all the winds, be gathered together again to their souls; and where in the meantime is the soul, and what is it when deprived of the senses it had in the body? [3] With many other like things, which being incomprehensible cannot be believed, and which destroy the belief of many in the life of the soul after death, and their belief in heaven and hell, and with these other matters pertaining to the faith of the church. That this belief has been destroyed is evident from its being said, Who has ever come to us from heaven and told us that there is a heaven? What is hell? is there any? What is this about man's being tormented with fire to eternity? What is the day of judgment? has it not been expected in vain for ages? with other things that involve a denial of everything. [4] Therefore lest those who think in this way-as many do who from their worldly wisdom are regarded as erudite and learned-should any longer confound and mislead the simple in faith and heart, and induce infernal darkness respecting God and heaven and eternal life, and all else that depends on these, the interiors of my spirit have been opened by the Lord, and I have thus been permitted to talk with all after their decease with whom I was ever acquainted in the life of the body-with some for days, with some for months, and with some for a year, and also with so many others that I should not exaggerate if I should say a hundred thousand; many of whom were in heaven, and many in hell. I have also talked with some two days after their decease, and have told them that their funeral services and obsequies were then being held in preparation for their interment; to which they replied that it was well to cast aside that which had served them as a body and for bodily functions in the world; and they wished me to say that they were not dead, but were living as men the same as before, and had merely migrated from one world into the other, and were not aware of having lost anything, since they had a body and its senses just as before, also understanding and will just as before, with thoughts and affections, sensations and desires, like those they had in the world. [5] Most of those who had recently died, when they saw themselves to be living men as before, and in a like state (for after death everyone's state of life is at first such as it was in the world, but there is a gradual change in it either into heaven or into hell), were moved by new joy at being alive, saying that they had not believed that it would be so. But they greatly wondered that they should have lived in such ignorance and blindness about the state of their life after death; and especially that the man of the church should be in such ignorance and blindness, when above all others in the whole world he might be clearly enlightened in regard to these things.[1] Then they began to see the cause of that blindness and ignorance, which is, that external things which are things, relating to the world and the body, had so occupied and filled their minds that they could not be raised into the light of heaven and look into the things of the church beyond its doctrinals; for when matters relating to the body and the world are loved, as they are at the present day, nothing but darkness flows into the mind when men go beyond those doctrines.

[1] There are few in Christendom at this day who believe that man rises again immediately after death (preface to Genesis, chap. 16 and n. 4622, 10758); but it is believed that he will rise again at the time of the final judgment, when the visible world will perish (see number 10595).

The reason of this belief (see numbers 10595, 10758).

Nevertheless man does rise again immediately after death, and then he is a man in all respects, and in every least respect (see numbers 4527, 5006, 5078, 8939, 8991, 10594, 10758).

The soul that lives after death is the spirit of man, which in man is the man himself, and in the other life is in a complete human form (see numbers 322, 1880, 1881, 3633, 4622, 4735, 5883, 6054, 6605, 6626, 7021, 10594); from experience (see numbers 4527, 5006, 8939); from the Word (see number 10597).

What is meant by the dead seen in the holy city (Matthew 27 verse 53) explained (see number 9229).

In what manner man is raised from the dead, from experience (numbers 168-189).

His state after his resurrection (numbers 317-319, 2119, 5079, 10596).

False opinions about the soul and its resurrection (see numbers 444, 445, 4527, 4622, 4658).

313. Very many of the learned from the Christian world are astonished when they find themselves after death in a body, in garments, and in houses, as in the world. And when they recall what they had thought about the life after death, the soul, spirits, and heaven and hell, they are ashamed and confess that they thought foolishly, and that the simple in faith thought much more wisely than they. When the minds of learned men who had confirmed themselves in such ideas and had ascribed all things to nature were examined, it was found that their interiors were wholly closed up and their exteriors were opened, that they looked towards the world and thus towards hell and not towards heaven. For to the extent that man's interiors are opened he looks towards heaven,...