True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 0

sRef Rev@21 @1 S0' sRef Rev@21 @2 S0' 0. THE TRUE CHRISTIAN RELIGION

containing the complete theology of the New Church as foretold by the Lord in Daniel 7:13, 14 and in Revelation 21:2, 3

by EMANUEL SWEDENBORG SERVANT OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST

TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL LATIN BY JOHN CHADWICK

LONDON THE SWEDENBORG SOCIETY 1988

Daniel 7:13, 14

I was watching in the visions of the night, and I saw the Son of Man coming with the clouds of the heavens. And to him were given dominion and glory and the kingdom, and all peoples, nations and tongues will worship him. His dominion will be a dominion for ever, which will not pass away, and his kingdom one that will not perish.

Revelation 21:1, 2, 5, 9, 10

I, John, saw a new heaven and a new earth; and I saw the holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband. And the angel spoke with me, saying, Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb. And he carried me away in the spirit onto a great and high mountain, and showed me the great, holy city of Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. He that sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me, Write, because these words are true and trustworthy.


TABLE OF CONTENTS

THE FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH IN BOTH UNIVERSAL AND PARTICULAR TERMS 1-3

CHAPTER ONE

GOD THE CREATOR

The oneness of God
(i) The whole of the Sacred Scripture and all the doctrines extracted from it by churches throughout Christendom teach that there is a God and that He is one. 5-7

(ii) There is a general feeling emanating from God and flowing into men's souls that there is a God and He is one. 8

(iii) That is why there is no nation throughout the world possessed of religion and sound reason which does not acknowledge God and the fact that He is one. 9, 10

(iv) There are many reasons why nations and peoples have formed varying ideas of the nature of that one God, and continue to do so. 11

(v) There are many things in the world which can lead the human reason, if it wishes, to grasp and deduce that there is a God and He is one. 12

(vi) If there had not been one God, the universe could not have been created and kept in existence. 13

(vii) Any person who does not acknowledge God is excommunicated from the church and damned. 14

(viii) The church cannot hold together at all in the case of a person who acknowledges not one God, but several. 15

The Divine Being, which is Jehovah

(i) The one God is named Jehovah from His Being, that is, from the fact that He alone is, was and will be, and because He is the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, Alpha and Omega. 19

(ii) The one God is substance itself and form itself, and angels and men are substances and forms derived from Him; to the extent that they are in Him and He is in them, so far are they images and likenesses of Him. 20

(iii) The Divine Being is Being in itself, and at the same time Coming-into-Being in itself. 21,22

(iv) The Divine Being and Coming-into-Being in itself cannot give rise to another Divine which is Being and Coming-into-Being in itself. Consequently another God of the same essence is impossible. 23

(v) The plurality of gods in ancient times, as well as to-day, was entirely the result of a failure to understand the Divine Being. 24

The infinity or the immensity and the eternity of God

(i) God is infinite, because He is and comes into being in Himself, and everything in the universe is and comes into being from Him. 28

(ii) God is infinite, because He existed before the world did, and thus before space and time came into existence. 29

(iii) Since the making of the world God is non-spatially in space and non-temporally in time. 30

(iv) The infinity of God as predicated of space is called immensity, and as predicated of time is called eternity. Despite these predications His immensity is totally devoid of space and His eternity is totally devoid of time. 31

(v) There is much in the world which can enable enlightened reason to see the infinity of God the Creator. 32

(vi) Every created object is finite, and the infinite is contained in finite objects as in receivers, and in human beings as images of it. 33, 34

The Essence of God, which is the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom

(i) God is Love itself and Wisdom itself, these two making up His Essence. 37

(ii) God is Good itself and Truth itself, because Good refers to Love and Truth to Wisdom. 38

(iii) Since God is Love itself and Wisdom itself. He is Life itself or Life in itself. 39, 40

(iv) Love and Wisdom are one in God. 41, 42

(v) The essence of love is loving others than oneself, wishing to be one with them and devoting oneself to their happiness. 43-45

(vi) These properties of the Divine Love were the reason the universe was created, and are the reason it is preserved in existence. 46, 47

The omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence of God

(i) Omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence are properties of the Divine Wisdom resulting from the Divine Love. 50,51

(ii) The omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence of God cannot be recognised except through a knowledge of order, and these facts about order: that God is order, and that He introduced order into the universe and all its parts simultaneously with its creation. 52-55

(iii) God's omnipotence proceeds and works in the universe and all its parts in accordance with the laws of His order. 56-58

(iv) God is omniscient, that is, He perceives, sees and knows down to the tiniest detail everything that happens according to order; and from these things also what happens contrary to order. 59-62

(v) God is present everywhere from first to last in His order. 63, 64

(vi) Man was created to be a form for Divine Order. 65-67

(vii) Man has from Divine Omnipotence power against evil and falsity, and from Divine Omniscience wisdom about good and truth, and from Divine Omni-presence is in God, to the extent that he lives in accordance with the Divine order. 68-70

The creation of the universe

No one can form a correct idea of the creation of the universe, unless some universal ideas are first suggested to bring the understanding into a perceptive state. 75

The creation of the universe is described in five accounts of experiences. 76-80

CHAPTER TWO

THE LORD THE REDEEMER

(i) Jehovah God came down and took on Himself human form, in order to redeem and save mankind. 82-84

(ii) Jehovah God came down as the Divine Truth, which is the Word, yet He did not separate the Divine Good from it. 85-88

(iii) God took upon Himself human form in accordance with His Divine order. 89-91

(iv) The Human by which He brought Himself into the world is the Son of God. 92-94

(v) The Lord by acts of redemption made Himself righteousness. 95, 96

(vi) By the same acts the Lord united Himself with the Father, and the Father with Him. 97-100

(vii) Thus God became man, and man God, in one person. 101-103

(viii) His progress towards union was His state of exinanition, and the union itself is His state of glorification. 104-106

(ix) From this time on no one from Christian countries can come into heaven, unless he believes in the Lord God the Saviour. 107-108

(x) Additional note, on the state of the church before the Lord's coming, and its state after this event. 109

Redemption

(i) The real redemption was the conquest of the hells and the ordering of the heavens, and preparation by this means for a new spiritual church. 115-117

(ii) But for that redemption no person could have been saved, nor could the angels have remained unharmed. 118-120

(iii) The Lord thus redeemed not only men, but also angels. 121, 122

(iv) Redemption was an entirely Divine deed. 123

(v) This redemption could only be effected by an incarnate God. 124, 125

(vi) The passion on the cross was the last temptation which the Lord underwent as the greatest Prophet; this was the means by which He glorified His Human, and was not the redemption. 126-131

(vii) It is a fundamental error on the part of the church to believe that the passion on the cross was the real act of redemption. That error, together with the erroneous belief in three Divine Persons existing from eternity, has so perverted the whole church that there is no remainder of spirituality left in it. 132, 133

CHAPTER THREE

THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE WAY GOD WORKS

(i) The Holy Spirit is Divine truth, and also the Divine power and activity which proceeds from the one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and so from the Lord God the Saviour. 139-141

(ii) The Divine power and activity meant by the Holy Spirit are, generally speaking, reformation and regeneration, which lead to renewal, quickening, sanctification and justification; and these lead to purification from evils and the forgiveness of sins, and ultimately to salvation. 142-145

(iii) The Divine power and activity meant by the sending of the Holy Spirit, with the clergy takes the particular form of enlightenment and instruction. 146-148

(iv) The Lord confers these benefits on those who believe in Him. 149-151

(v) The Lord works of Himself from the Father, not the reverse. 153-155

(vi) A person's spirit is his mind, and whatever comes from it. 156, 157

- Additional Note. 158

The Divine Trinity

(i) There is a Divine Trinity, consisting of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 164,165

(ii) Those three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, are the three essentials of a single God, which make one as soul, body and activity do with a person. 166-169
(iii) This Trinity did not exist before the creation of the world, but it was provided and made after the creation of the world, when God became incarnate, and then it was in the Lord God, the Redeemer and Saviour, Jesus Christ. 170, 171

(iv) A Trinity of Divine Persons from eternity, or existing before the creation of the world, implies thinking about a Trinity of Gods; and this thought cannot be banished by a verbal confession of belief in one God. 172, 173

(v) The Trinity of Persons was unknown to the Apostolic church, but was the invention of the Council of Nicaea, leading to its introduction into the Roman Catholic church, and thus to the churches which split from it. 174-176

(vi) The Trinity as defined by the Council of Nicaea and by Athanasius caused a faith to arise which has perverted the whole Christian church. 177, 178

(vii) This is the source of the abomination of desolation and the affliction such as has never been nor shall be, both of which the Lord predicted in Daniel, the Gospels and Revelation. 179-181

(viii) Further, unless a new heaven and a new church are founded by the Lord, no flesh can be saved. 182

(ix) From a Trinity of Persons, each of which is individually God, as asserted by the Athanasian Creed, many absurd ideas of various kinds have arisen about God, which are mere fancies and abortions. 183, 184

CHAPTER FOUR

THE SACRED SCRIPTURE OR THE WORD OF THE LORD

I The Sacred Scripture, that is, the Word, is Divine truth itself. 189-192

II The Word contains a spiritual sense unknown up to the present. 193

(i) What the spiritual sense is. 194

- From the Lord there proceed, one after the other, the celestial Divine, the spiritual Divine and the natural Divine. 195
(ii) The spiritual sense is present in every part and detail of the Word. 196-198

- The Lord, when He was in the world, spoke by means of correspondences; so He spoke spiritually as well as naturally. 199

(iii) It is the spiritual sense which makes the Word divinely inspired and holy in every word. 200
(iv) The spiritual sense of the Word has up to the present been unknown. 201-207

(v) The spiritual sense of the Word will in future only be granted to those who are in possession of genuine truths from the Lord. 208

(vi) Remarkable effects produced by the Word from its spiritual sense. 209

III The literal sense of the Word is the basis, container and support of its spiritual and celestial senses. 210-213

IV The Divine truth in the literal sense of the Word is in its fulness, holiness and power. 214-216

(i) The truths of the literal sense of the Word are meant by the precious stones forming the foundations of the New Jerusalem described in Revelation, and this is due to correspondence. 217

(ii) The forms of good and truth in the literal sense of the Word are meant by the Urim and Thummim on Aaron's ephod. 218

(iii) The forms of truth and good at the outermost level, such as they are in the literal sense of the Word, are meant by the precious stones in the garden of Eden, in which the king of Tyre is said to have been. 219

(iv) The same things were represented by the curtains, veils and posts of the Tabernacle. 220

(v) Likewise, the external features of the Temple at Jerusalem. 221
(vi) The Word in its glory was represented in the Lord at His transfiguration. 222
(vii) The power of the Word at its outermost level was represented by the

Nazirites. 223

(viii) The Word's power is beyond description. 224

V The doctrine of the church is to be drawn from the literal sense of the Word and supported by it. 225-230

(i) The Word is not to be understood without doctrine. 226-228

(ii) Doctrine is to be drawn from the literal sense of the Word, and proved by means of it. 229-230

(iii) The genuine truth in the literal sense of the Word, on which doctrine is based, is not visible to any but those who are enlightened by the Lord. 231-233

VI The literal sense of the Word produces a link with the Lord and association with the angels. 234-239

VII The Word is to be found in all the heavens and is the source of the angels' wisdom. 240-242

VIII The church depends on the Word, and what the church is like in the case of each person depends upon how he understands the Word. 243-247

IX The details of the Word all contain a marriage of the Lord and the church, and so a marriage of good and truth. 248-253

X Heresies can be extracted from the literal sense of the Word, but confirming them leads to damnation. 254-260

- Many things in the Word are appearances of truth, in which genuine truths are hidden. 257

- Fallacies arise through the confirming of appearances of truth. 258

- The literal sense of the Word is a protection for the genuine truths hidden within it. 260

- The literal sense of the Word is represented and meant in the Word by cherubim. 260

XI The Lord when in the world fulfilled everything in the Word, and thus became the Word, that is, Divine truth, even in its outermost form. 261-263

XII Before the time of the Word which we have in the world to-day, there was another Word, now lost. 264-266

XIII The Word also serves to enlighten those who are outside the church and do not possess the Word. 267-272

XIV If the Word did not exist, no one would know of the existence of God, heaven and hell, and life after death, even less of the Lord. 273-276


CHAPTER FIVE

THE CATECHISM OR THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
EXPLAINED IN BOTH THE EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL SENSES

I The Ten Commandments were the height of holiness for the Israelite church; on the holiness of the Ark containing the Law. 283-286

II The literal sense of the Ten Commandments contains general instructions on belief and life; but their spiritual and celestial senses contain universal instructions. 287-290

III The First Commandment: There is not to be any other God before my face. 291-296

IV The Second Commandment: You are not to take the name of Jehovah your God in vain, for Jehovah will not hold anyone guiltless, who takes His name in vain. 297-300

V The Third Commandment: Remember to keep the Sabbath day holy; for six days you are to labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath for Jehovah your God. 301-304

VI The Fourth Commandment: Honour your father and your mother, so that your days may be long and you may prosper upon earth. 305-308

VII The Fifth Commandment: You are not to commit murder. 309-312

VIII The Sixth Commandment: You are not to commit adultery. 313-316

IX The Seventh Commandment: You are not to steal. 317-320

X The Eighth Commandment: You are not to bear false witness against your neighbour. 321-324

XI The Ninth and Tenth Commandments: You are not to covet your neighbour's house, you are not to covet your neighbour's wife, nor his man-servant nor his maid-servant, nor his ox nor his ass, nor anything that is your neighbour's. 325-328

XII The Ten Commandments contain everything to do with love for God and everything to do with love towards the neighbour. 329-331


CHAPTER SIX

FAITH

Preface: faith is the first thing in time, but charity is the first thing in intention. 336

I Saving faith is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ. 337-339

- Since He is a visible God, in whom is the invisible God. 339
II Faith in brief is this, that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is saved by the Lord. 340-342

- The leading point of faith in Him is the acknowledgment that He is the Son of God. 342

III A person acquires faith by approaching the Lord, learning truths from the Word, and living by them. 343-348

(i) The being of faith; the essence of faith; [the coming into being of faith;] the condition of faith; the form of faith. 344ff

(ii) Purely natural faith, as being a firm conviction which pretends to be faith. 345-348

IV The mass of truths, which cohere as it were in a bundle, raises the level of faith and brings it to perfection. 349-354

(i) The truths of faith are capable of being multiplied to infinity. 350

(ii) Their arrangement is into groupings, thus, so to speak, into bundles. 351

(iii) Faith is perfected in proportion to their volume and coherence. 352, 353

(iv) The truths of faith, however numerous they are and however varied they appear, are made one by the Lord 354

(v) The Lord is the Word, the God of heaven and earth, the God of all flesh, the God of the vineyard or the church, the God of faith, and light itself, truth and everlasting life; this is demonstrated from the Word. 354

V Faith without charity is no faith, and charity without faith is no charity, and both are lifeless unless the Lord gives them life. 355-361

(i) A person can acquire faith for himself. 356

(ii) A person can acquire charity for himself. 357

(iii) A person can also acquire or himself a life of faith and charity. 358

(iv) But still faith, charity or life in either of them is not in the least created by man, but only by the Lord. 359

(v) The distinction between natural faith and spiritual faith; spiritual faith is under the Lord's guidance contained within natural faith. 360,361

VI The Lord, charity and faith make one, just as in a person, will and under-standing do; if they are separated, each of them is destroyed, like a pearl collapsing into dust. 362-367

(i) The Lord flows into every human being with all His Divine love, all His Divine wisdom, and so with all His Divine life. 364

(ii) The Lord flows into every human being likewise with the whole essence of faith and charity. 365

(iii) How what flows in from the Lord is received by the person depends upon his condition and form. 366

(iv) The person, however, who separates the Lord, charity and faith is not a form which can receive them, but rather one which destroys them. 367

VII The Lord is charity and faith in the person, and the person is charity and faith in the Lord. 368-372

(i) It is being linked with God, which affords a person salvation and everlasting life. 369

(ii) A link is impossible with God the Father, but it is possible with the Lord, and through Him with God the Father. 370

(iii) The link with the Lord is reciprocal, so that the Lord is in the person, and he is in the Lord. 371

(iv) This reciprocal link between the Lord and man is created by means of charity and faith. 372

VIII Charity and faith are present together in good deeds. 373-377
(i) Charity is having good will, and good deeds are doing good from a good will.

(ii) Charity and faith are merely unstable mental concepts unless, when possible, they are realised in deeds and come into existence together in them. 375, 376

(iii) Charity alone does not produce good deeds, much less does faith alone, but charity and faith together do. 377

IX There is true faith, spurious faith and hypocritical faith. 378-381

- From its cradle the Christian church began to be attacked and split by schisms and heresies; what these were. 378

(i) There is only one true faith, and this is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ, and is possessed by those who believe Him to be the Son of God, the God of heaven and earth, and one with the Father. 379

(ii) Spurious faith is any faith which departs from the true and only faith, and is possessed by those who climb up another way and look upon the Lord not as God, but merely as a human being. 380

(iii) Hypocritical faith is no faith at all. 381

X The wicked have no faith. 382-384
(i) The wicked have no faith because evil belongs to hell and faith to heaven. 383

(ii) All those in the Christian world have no faith who reject the Lord and the Word, although they lead moral lives, and talk, teach and write rationally, even about faith. 384


CHAPTER SEVEN

CHARITY, OR LOVE TOWARDS THE NEIGHBOUR, AND GOOD DEEDS

I There are three universal loves, the love of heaven, the love of the world, and self-love. 394-396

(i) The will and the understanding. 397

(ii) Good and truth. 398

(iii) Love in general. 399

(iv) Self-love and the love of the world in particular. 400

(v) The internal man and the external man. 401

(vi) The purely natural and sensual man. 402
II When the three loves are duly subordinated, they increase a person's perfection; but when they are not, they corrupt and turn him upside down. 403-405

III Every person taken singly is the neighbour who is to be loved, but he should be loved according to the quality of his good. 406-411
IV Man collectively, which is one's community, great or small, and as a group of communities, which is one's country, is the neighbour who is to be loved. 412-414

V The neighbour who is to be loved in a higher degree is the church, and in the highest degree the Lord's kingdom. 415, 416

VI The essence of loving the neighbour is not loving a person, but the good in him. 417-419

VII Charity and good deeds are two different things, as are wishing well and doing good. 420,421

VIII Real charity is dealing fairly and faithfully in whatever position, business or work one is engaged in, and with those with whom one comes into contact. 422-424

IX The kindnesses of charity are giving to the poor and helping the needy, but with prudence. 425-428

X Some charitable duties are public, some domestic and some private. 429-432

XI Charitable recreations are lunches, dinners and parties. 433,434

XII The first thing in charity is to banish evils, the second is to do good deeds which may be of use to the neighbour. 435-438

XIII In the exercise of charity a person avoids attributing merit to deeds, so long as he believes that all good is from the Lord. 439-442

XIV When a moral life is at the same time spiritual, this is charity. 443-445

XV A bosom friendship contracted with a person without regard to his spiritual character is harmful after death. 446-449

XVI Spurious charity, hypocritical charity and dead charity. 450-453

XVII Bosom friendship between the wicked is implacable hatred between them. 454, 455

XVIII The linking of love to God and love towards the neighbour. 456-458


CHAPTER EIGHT

FREE WILL

The rules and dogmas of the present-day church on free will. 463-465

I The fact that two trees, one of life and the other of the knowledge of good and evil, were put in the Garden of Eden, means that man was given free will in spiritual matters. 466-469

II Man is not life, but a receiver of life from God. 470-474

III So long as a person lives in the world, he is kept midway between heaven and hell, and he is there in spiritual equilibrium. This is free will. 475-478

IV The fact that evil is permitted, a state enjoyed by everyone's internal man, makes it obvious that man has free will in spiritual matters. 479-482

V Without free will in spiritual matters the Word would not be of any use, nor in consequence would the church be. 483, 484

VI Without free will in spiritual matters man would have no means of establishing a mutual link with the Lord. The result would be not imputation, but complete predestination, which is a detestable doctrine. 485

Some detestable facts about predestination published. 486-488

VII But for free will in spiritual matters God would be responsible for evil, and thus there could be no imputation of charity and faith. 489-492

VIII Anything spiritual to do with the church which enters freely and is freely accepted lasts; anything that does not, does not last. 493-496

IX A person's will and understanding enjoy this free will; but wrongdoing in both the spiritual and natural worlds is curbed by laws, since otherwise society in either world would cease to exist. 497-499
X If people did not have free will in spiritual matters, everyone throughout the world could in the course of a single day have been brought to believe in the Lord. But this would be impossible, because what a person does not accept of his own free will does not last. 500-502

- Miracles do not happen at the present day, because they take away free will in spiritual matters and compel. 501


CHAPTER NINE

REPENTANCE

I Repentance is the first stage in the development of the church in a person. 510, 511

II Contrition, which is said at the present time to precede faith and to be followed by the consolation of the Gospel, is not repentance. 512-515

III A mere verbal confession that one is a sinner is not repentance. 516-519

IV Man is born with a tendency to every kind of evil, and if he does not partially remove evils by repentance, he remains subject to them, and if so cannot be saved. 520-524

- What is meant by keeping the law. 523, 524

V Recognition of sin and a person's self-examination are the beginnings of repentance. 525-527

VI Real repentance is examining oneself, recognising and acknowledging one's sins, appealing to the Lord and beginning a new life. 528-531

VII True repentance means not only examining what one does in one's life, but also what one intends in one's will to do. 532-534

VIII Those too repent who do not examine themselves, but still refrain from evil actions because they are sins. This kind of repentance is practised by those who perform charitable deeds for religious reasons. 535-537

IX Confession ought to be made before the Lord God the Saviour, and then prayer should be offered for help and the power to resist evils. 538-560

X Real repentance is easy for those who have repented a number of times, but highly distasteful to those who have not. 561-563

XI A person who has never repented, or looked into himself and examined himself, ends up not knowing what is the evil which damns him and what the good which saves him. 564-566


CHAPTER TEN

REFORMATION AND REGENERATION

I Unless a person is born again and as it were created anew, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 572-575

II A new birth or creation can only be brought about by the Lord through charity and faith as the two means with the person's co-operation. 576-578

III Since all have been redeemed, everyone can be regenerated, in each case depending on the person's state. 579-582

IV The process of regeneration is on the model of a person's conception, gestation in the womb, birth and upbringing. 583-586

- Some facts about the male and female sexes in the vegetable kingdom. 585

V The first stage of re-birth is called reformation, a process affecting the under-standing; the second stage is called regeneration, a process affecting the will and thus the understanding. 587-590

VI The internal man must be reformed first, and the external by means of the internal; that is how a person is regenerated. 591-595

VII When this happens, a struggle ensues between the internal and the external man, and the victor then controls the other. 596-600

VIII When a person is regenerated, he acquires a new will and a new under-standing. 601-606

IX A person who is regenerated is in touch with the angels of heaven, one who is not with the spirits of hell. 607-610

X In so far as a person is regenerated, so far are his sins removed; this removal is the forgiveness of sins. 611-614

XI Regeneration is impossible without free will in spiritual matters. 615-617

XII Regeneration is impossible without truths through which faith may be formed, and with which charity may link itself. 618-620


CHAPTER ELEVEN

IMPUTATION

I The faith of the present-day church, which is held to be the sole requirement for justification, is one with imputation. 626, 627

II Imputation as part of present-day faith is a double concept. There is imputation of Christ's merit and imputation of salvation as a result. 628-631

III The idea of faith imputing the merit and righteousness of Christ the Redeemer sprang first from the decrees of the Council of Nicaea concerning three Divine Persons from eternity; and this faith has been accepted by the whole Christian world from that time to the present. 632-635
IV Faith which imputes Christ's merit was unknown to the earlier, Apostolic

church, and is nowhere to be understood in the Word. 636-639

V It is impossible for Christ's merit and righteousness to be imputed. 640-642

VI There is imputation but it is of good and evil. 643-646

VII The faith and concept of imputation in the new church cannot by any means be combined with the faith and concept of imputation current in the former church. If they are combined, there is such a clash and conflict that a person loses all trace of anything to do with the church. 647-649

VIII The Lord imputes good to everyone and hell imputes evil to everyone. 650-653

IX It is what faith combines with which is the deciding factor. If true faith combines with good, that is a decision for everlasting life; but if faith combines with evil, that is a decision for everlasting death. 654-657

X One's thoughts are not imputed to anyone, only one's will. 658-660


CHAPTER TWELVE

BAPTISM

I Without knowledge of the spiritual sense of the Word no one can know what is involved in and effected by the two sacraments, baptism and the Holy Supper. 667-669

II The washing called baptism means spiritual washing, which is purification from evils and falsities, and so regeneration. 670-673

III Baptism was instituted to take the place of circumcision, because the circumcision of the foreskin was a representation of the circumcision of the heart. The purpose of baptism was so that the internal church should take the place of the external, which in every detail prefigured the internal church. 674-676

IV The first purpose of baptism is to be introduced to the Christian church, and at the same time brought into the company of Christians in the spiritual world. 677-680

V The second purpose of baptism is so that a Christian may get to know and acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ, the Redeemer and Saviour, and follow Him. 681-683

VI The third purpose of baptism, which is its end in view, is a person's regeneration. 684-687

VII By John's baptism the way was prepared for Jehovah God to come down into the world and carry out redemption. 688-691


CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE HOLY SUPPER

I No one who does not know about the way natural things correspond with spiritual ones can know the benefits conferred by the Holy Supper. 698-701

II A knowledge of correspondences allows us to know what is meant by the Lord's flesh and blood, much the same as by bread and wine. This is that the Lord's flesh and the bread mean the Divine good of His love and also all the good of charity; and the Lord's blood and the wine mean the Divine truth of His wisdom and also all the truth of faith. Eating means making one's own. 702-710

- Demonstration from the Word of the meaning of flesh. 704, 705

- Demonstration from the Word of the meaning of blood. 706

- Demonstration from the Word of the meaning of bread. 707

- Demonstration from the Word of the meaning of wine. 708

III By understanding this it is possible to grasp the fact that the Holy Supper contains everything to do with the church and heaven, both at the universal and at the particular level. 711-715

IV The Lord is wholly present in the Holy Supper, and so is the whole of redemption. 716-718

V The Lord is present and opens heaven to those who worthily approach the Holy Supper. He is also present with those who approach it unworthily, but He does not open heaven to them. Consequently just as baptism is being introduced to the church, so the Holy Supper is being introduced to heaven. 719-721

VI The people who worthily approach the Holy Supper are those who have faith in the Lord and charity towards the neighbour, so those who have been regenerated. 722-724

VII Those who worthily approach the Holy Supper are in the Lord and the Lord is in them. Thus it is through the Holy Supper that they are linked with the Lord. 725-727

VIII The Holy Supper for those who approach it worthily is a kind of guarantee and seal put on their adoption as sons of God. 728-730


CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THE ENDING OF THE AGE, THE LORD'S COMING, AND THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH

I The ending of the age is the final period or end of the church. 753-756

II The present time is the final period of the Christian church foretold and described by the Lord in the Gospels and Revelation. 757-759

III This final period of the Christian church is absolute night, in which previous churches ended 760-763
IV This night is followed by morning, and morning is the Lord's coming. 764-767

V The Lord's coming does not mean His coming to destroy the sky we see and the earth where we live, and to create a new heaven and a new earth, as many people up to now have imagined through not understanding the spiritual sense of the Word. 768-771

VI This, which is the Lord's second coming, is taking place in order that the wicked should be separated from the good, and those should be saved who believe in Him and have done so; and so that a new heaven of angels and a new church on earth should be formed from them. Without this no flesh could be saved (Matt. 2 22). 772-775

VII This, the Lord's second coming, is not in person, but in the word, which is from Him and which He is. 776-778

VIII This, the Lord's second coming, is taking place by means of a man, to whom He has shown Himself in person, and whom He has filled with His spirit, so that he may teach the doctrines of the new church which come from the Lord through the Word. 779, 780

IX This is the meaning of the new heaven and the New Jerusalem in Revelation, chapter 21. 781-785

X This new church is the crown of all the churches which have up to now existed upon earth. 786-791

SUPPLEMENT

I The nature of the spiritual world. 792-795

II Luther in the spiritual world. 796

III Melanchthon in the spiritual world. 797

IV Calvin in the spiritual world. 798, 799

V The Dutch in the spiritual world. 800-805

VI The British in the spiritual world. 806-812

VII The Germans in the spiritual world. 813-816

VIII The Roman Catholics in the spiritual world. 817-821

IX The saints of the Roman Catholics in the spiritual world. 822-827

X The Mohammedans in the spiritual world. 828-834

XI The Africans in the spiritual world; also something about other nations. 835-840

XII The Jews in the spiritual world. 841-845



TCR (Chadwick) n. 1

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 1

sRef Dan@7 @13 S0' sRef Dan@7 @14 S0' sRef Jer@33 @15 S0' sRef Jer@33 @16 S0' 1. THE FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH

A statement of faith, set out in both universal and particular terms, is placed at the beginning to serve as a preface to the book which follows, to be like a doorway leading into a church, and a summary presenting in a short compass what follows at more length. It is called the faith of the new heaven and the new church, because heaven, where the angels are, and the church among men form a single unit, just as the internal and external sides of the personality make up a single individual. This is why a member of the church who possesses the good of love which arises from the truths of faith, and possesses the truths of faith which arise from the good of love, is, so far as the interiors of his mind are concerned, an angel of heaven. Therefore too after dying he comes into heaven, and there enjoys happiness depending upon how far the good and truth are linked. It should be known that in the new heaven, which is at the present time being established by the Lord, this statement of faith serves as its preface, doorway and summary.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 2

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 2

2. THE FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH IS IN UNIVERSAL TERMS AS FOLLOWS.*

The Lord from eternity, who is Jehovah, came into the world to subdue the hells and to glorify His Human. Without this no mortal could have been saved, and those are saved who believe in Him.

[2] The expression 'in universal terms' is used because this is a universal point of faith, and a universal point of faith must be contained in all its particulars. It is a universal point of faith that God is one in essence and in person, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and that He is the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ. It is a universal point of faith that no mortal could have been saved, if the Lord had not come into the world. It is a universal point of faith that He came into the world to take hell away from men, and He did this by fighting against hell and winning victories over it. In this way He subdued it and reduced it to order, and made it subject to His command. It is a universal point of faith that He came into the world to glorify the Human which He assumed in the world, that is, to unite it with the originating Divinity. By this means He keeps hell for ever in order and subject to His command. Since this could only be achieved by means of temptations experienced in His Human, even to the most extreme, His passion on the cross, He underwent this. These are the universal matters of faith concerning the Lord.

sRef John@3 @36 S3' sRef John@6 @40 S3' [3] It is a universal point of faith on the part of man to believe in the Lord; for this belief links him to the Lord, and this is the way to salvation. Believing in Him means having confidence that He is the Saviour; and since only those who lead good lives can have such confidence, this too is meant by believing in Him. The Lord says this in John's gospel:

This is the will of the Father, that everyone who believes in the Son should have everlasting life. John 6:40.

and elsewhere:

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life. He who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him. John 3:36.

* This passage is repeated with minor changes from FAITH 34, AR 67, BE 116.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 3

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 3

sRef John@1 @14 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef John@16 @28 S1' 3. THE FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH IN PARTICULAR TERMS IS AS FOLLOWS.

Jehovah God is Love itself and Wisdom itself, or Good itself and Truth itself. He came down in the form of Divine Truth, which is the Word and which was God with God, and took upon Himself human form, so as to reduce to order everything in heaven, in hell and in the church. For at that time the power of hell was stronger than the power of heaven, and on earth the power of evil was stronger than the power of good, so that utter damnation stood threatening at the gates. This impending damnation was removed by Jehovah God by means of His Human, which was Divine Truth, and thus angels and men were redeemed. Afterwards He united in His Human Divine Truth with Divine Good, or Divine Wisdom with Divine Love, and so returned into the Divinity which was His from eternity, together with and in His glorified Human. This is the meaning of the passage in John:

The Word was with God and the Word was God; and the Word was made flesh. John 1:1, 14.

In the same gospel:

I came out of the Father and I came into the world; I leave the world again, and go to the Father. John 16:28.

Further in the following passage:

We know that the Son of God came and gave us understanding, so that we might know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son, Jesus Christ. He is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

These passages show that without the Lord's coming into the world no one could have been saved. The situation to-day is similar. So unless the Lord comes into the world again in the form of Divine Truth, that is, the Word, no more can anyone now be saved.

[2] The particular details of faith on man's part are:

1 God is one, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and He is the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ.

2 Faith leading to salvation is believing in Him.

3 Evil actions must not be done because they are the work of the devil and come from him.

4 Good actions must be done because they are the work of God and come from Him.

5 A person must perform these actions as if they were his own, but he must believe they come from the Lord working in him and through him.

The first two points deal with faith, the second two with charity; and the fifth deals with the joining of charity with faith and thus of the Lord with men.


TCR (Chadwick) n. 4

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 4

sRef Acts@20 @21 S1' 4. CHAPTER ONE

GOD THE CREATOR

The Christian church has from the Lord's time passed through all the stages of life, from infancy to extreme old age. Its infancy was during the lifetime of the Apostles, who preached all over the world repentance and belief in the Lord God the Saviour. It is clear that these were their two main points from a passage in the Acts of the Apostles:

Paul proclaimed both to Jews and Greeks repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Acts 20:21.

It is a notable fact that several months ago the Lord called together his twelve disciples who are now angels, and sent them out throughout the spiritual world with orders to preach the Gospel there anew, since the church the Lord established through their ministry is to-day so close to its end that hardly any remains survive. This has come about because the Divine Trinity has been divided into three persons, each of whom is God and Lord.

[2] As a result the whole of theology, and so the church which is named Christian after the Lord, has been pervaded by a kind of insanity. I say 'insanity' because it has driven people's minds to such a pitch of delirium that they do not know whether there is one God or three. One is what they say, three is what they think. So there is a conflict between the mind and the lips, the thought and its expression, and this conflict ends by their thinking that there is no God. This alone is the source of the nature-worship prevalent to-day. Pray consider whether, when the lips speak of one God and the mind thinks of three, each idea does not annihilate the other when they clash midway. Thus if anyone thinks of God at all, he does so as hardly anything but a bare title, with no feeling of knowing Him.

[3] Since the idea of God and all knowledge of Him has been so fragmented, I propose to discuss in turn God the Creator, the Lord the Redeemer, the Holy Spirit the Active Force, and finally the Divine Trinity, so that what has been broken into fragments may be put together again. This happens when a person's reason is convinced from the Word and the enlightenment it gives that there is a Divine Trinity, and that this is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ, just as the soul, the body and the activity coming from them form a trinity in man. This article in the Athanasian creed is therefore valid:

In Christ, God and Man, or the Divine and the Human, are not two, but in one person; as the rational soul and the flesh are one man, so too God and Man are one Christ.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 5

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 5

5. THE ONENESS OF GOD

Since the acknowledgment of God which comes from knowing Him is the very essence and soul of every dogma in all theology, I must begin by speaking of the oneness of God. This will be demonstrated in the following series of propositions.

(i) The whole of the Sacred Scripture and all doctrines extracted from it by churches throughout Christendom teach that there is one God.
(ii) There is a general feeling [emanating from God and]* flowing into men's souls that there is a God, and that He is one.
(iii) That is why there is no nation throughout the World possessed of religion and sound reason which does not acknowledge God and the fact that He is one.
(iv) There are many reasons why nations and peoples have formed varying ideas of the nature of that one God, and continue to do so.
(v) There are many things in the world which can lead the human reason, if it wishes, to grasp and deduce that there is a God and that He is one.
(vi) If there had not been one God, the universe could not have been created and kept in existence.
(vii) Any person who does not acknowledge God is excommunicated from the church and damned.
(viii) The church cannot hold together at all in the case of a person who acknowledges not one God, but several.
These propositions will be expounded one by one.

*The words in brackets are supplied from the repetition of this proposition in 8.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 6

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 6

6. (i) THE WHOLE OF THE SACRED SCRIPTURE AND ALL THE DOCTRINES EXTRACTED FROM IT BY CHURCHES THROUGHOUT CHRISTENDOM TEACH THAT THERE IS A GOD AND HE IS ONE.

The reason why the whole of the Sacred Scripture teaches the existence of God is that its inmost meaning is concerned with nothing but God, that is, the Divine proceeding from God. For Scripture was dictated by God, and nothing can proceed from God except what He Himself is, and this we call the Divine. This resides in the inmost meaning of Scripture. However, in its lower forms which are derived from the Divine, the Holy Scripture is adapted to the grasp of angels and men. In these forms it is likewise Divine, but in a different guise; in this case the Divine is called Celestial, Spiritual and Natural. These are merely the veils of God, since God Himself, as He exists in the inmost meaning of the Word, cannot be looked on by any created being. For when Moses begged to see the glory of Jehovah, God told him that no one can see God and live. It is the same with the inmost meaning of the Word, in which God is in His Being and Essence.

sRef Hos@13 @4 S2' [2] Still the Divine, which is inmostly contained in it and is protected by such veils as adapt it to the grasp of angels and men, shines out like light passing through crystalline structures, but the light appears to differ according to the state of mind which a person has acquired from God or from himself. For everyone who has acquired his state of mind from God, the Sacred Scripture is like a mirror, in which he sees God, everyone in his own fashion. This mirror is composed of the truths which he learns from the Word and absorbs by living his life in accordance with them. A first conclusion from this is that the Sacred Scripture is the fulness of God.

sRef Deut@6 @4 S3' sRef Isa@45 @21 S3' sRef Isa@44 @6 S3' sRef Zech@14 @9 S3' sRef Isa@45 @14 S3' sRef Isa@45 @15 S3' [3] This teaches not only the existence of God, but also that He is one. This is evident from the fact that the truths, which, as I have said, compose that mirror, are held together in a single bond and prevent a person from thinking about God except as one. That is why every person, whose reason has absorbed some holiness from the Word, knows, as if of himself, that God is one, and regards talking about several gods as a kind of madness. Angels cannot open their mouths to say 'Gods', because the aura of heaven in which they live offers resistance. The Sacred Scripture teaches that God is one not only universally, as I asserted, but in many particular passages, such as the following.

Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our God is one Jehovah. Deut. 6:4; similarly Mark 12:29.

Surely God is among you, and there is no God beside Me. Isa. 45:14, 15. Am I not Jehovah, and there is no other God beside me? Isa. 45:21.

I am Jehovah your God, and you are not to acknowledge any God beside Me. Hosea 13:4.

Thus spoke Jehovah, the King of Israel, I am the First and the Last, and there is no God beside Me. Isa. 44:6. On that day Jehovah will be King over all the earth; on that day Jehovah will be one, and His name one. Zech. 14:9.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 7

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 7

sRef Matt@13 @15 S0' sRef Matt@13 @14 S0' 7. It is well known that the doctrines of the Christian churches teach that God is one. This is because all their doctrines are taken from the Word, and they hold together so long as one God is acknowledged not only with the lips but also in the heart. For those who acknowledge one God only with their lips, while in their hearts they admit three, which is what happens with many people in Christendom to-day, God is nothing more than a verbal expression. Their whole theology is nothing but a golden idol locked in a case, to which only their leaders have the key. When they read the Word, they do not receive any enlightenment about it and from it, not even the perception that God is one. For them the Word is, as it were, blotted with erasures and obscured where it speaks of the oneness of God. These are the people described by the Lord in Matthew.

Hearing you will hear and not understand, and seeing you will see and not discern. They have closed their eyes, so that they should not risk seeing with their eyes, and hearing with their ears, and understanding in their hearts, and so that they should not turn again and let me heal them. Matt. 13:14, 15.

All of these people are like those who run away from daylight, and shut themselves in windowless rooms, where they grope around the walls searching for food and money. Finally they are granted a power of sight like that of owls, so that they can see in the dark. They resemble a woman with several husbands, no true wife, but a wanton prostitute. They are like a girl who accepts rings from several suitors, and after she is married hires herself out for the night not just to one, but to the rest as well.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 8

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 8

sRef John@15 @5 S1' sRef John@3 @27 S1' 8. (ii) THERE IS A GENERAL FEELING EMANATING FROM GOD AND FLOWING INTO MEN'S SOULS THAT THERE IS A GOD, AND THAT HE IS ONE.

God influences man, as is evident from what everyone admits, that God is the source of every good thing which is good in itself and is present in man and done by him. The same is true of the whole of charity and the whole of faith. For we read:

A man cannot take anything unless it is given him from heaven. John 3:27.

and Jesus said:

Without me you can do nothing. John 15:5.

That is to say, nothing of charity and nothing of faith, The reason there is this inflow into the souls of men is that the soul is man's inmost and highest part; the Divine influence enters there and from there descends to the lower parts, giving them life so far as it is accepted. Admittedly the truths destined to create faith are received through the hearing and are thus implanted in the mind, that is, at a lower level than the soul. But these truths only create the conditions which allow a man to be acted upon by God through his soul. The extent to which truths are accepted depends upon this conditioning, and his natural faith is in proportion transformed into a spiritual faith.

[2] The reason why there is a feeling that God is one emanating from God and entering men's souls is that everything Divine, both understood universally and in particular, is God; and because everything Divine holds together as a single unit, it must inevitably inspire a person with the idea of one God. This feeling is strengthened day by day, as a person is lifted by God into the light of heaven. For angels, in the light they enjoy, cannot force themselves to say 'Gods'. For this reason too when they are speaking the end of every sentence finishes on a single note. This is entirely due to this feeling that God is one entering their Souls.

[3] Although all human beings have this idea of God being one entering their souls, still many of them think that His Divinity is divided into several of the same essence. This is because the inflowing idea as it descends slips into forms which do not match it, and the form itself imposes a variation, just as happens in everything which belongs to the three kingdoms of the natural world. It is the same God who gives life to every animal as to man; but it is the receiving form which determines that an animal is an animal, and a man a man. The same thing can happen to a man, when he gives his mind the form of an animal. Every tree receives the same radiation from the sun, but its results vary depending upon the form of each tree. The radiation falling on a vine is the same as that on a thorn-tree; but if the thorn is grafted on to the vine, the radiation is upset and produces effects dictated by the thorn.

[4] The same happens in the mineral kingdom. The light striking a piece of limestone is the same as that striking a diamond; but in one case it shines through, and in the other it is blacked out. Human minds undergo variation depending on their forms, and these are inwardly spiritual in proportion to their faith in God, and at the same time the amount of life they receive from God. Faith in one God makes them transparent and angelic; but instead they become opaque and bestial as the result of faith in several gods, which is hardly to be distinguished from faith in no God.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 9

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 9

9. (iii) THAT IS WHY THERE IS NO NATION THROUGHOUT THE WORLD POSSESSED OF RELIGION AND SOUND REASON WHICH DOES NOT ACKNOWLEDGE GOD AND THE FACT THAT HE IS ONE.

The consequence of the Divine influence operating on the souls of men as described above is that every man has an inward voice telling him that there is a God, and that He is one. None the less there are those who deny the existence of God, those who recognise nature as a god, and those who worship several gods and also statues as gods. The reason is that these have choked the interiors of their reason or understanding with worldly and bodily thoughts, thus blotting out their original or child-like idea of God, and at the same time throwing religion away over their shoulders. The confession of the creed shows plainly that Christians acknowledge one God, but it also shows how they see Him. It runs:

The catholic faith is that we reverence one God in the Trinity and the Trinity in unity. There are three Divine persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and yet there are not three gods, but one God. There is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Spirit. They have one Divinity, equal glory and co-eternal majesty. So the Father is God, the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God. But as Christian verity compels us to confess each person severally to be God and Lord, so does the catholic religion forbid us to speak of three Gods and three Lords.

Such is the Christian faith on the oneness of God; but it will be seen in the chapter on the Divine Trinity [163-188] that there is a conflict in that confession between the ideas of a Trinity and the oneness of God.

sRef Ex@20 @3 S2' [2] The rest of the nations in the world, who are possessed of religion and sound reason, insist that God is one: all the Mohammedans in their empires, the Africans in many kingdoms of their continent, and the peoples of Asia in several of theirs, not to mention the present-day Jews. The most ancient people of the Golden Age, those who had any religion, worshipped one God whom they named Jehovah. So did the ancients of the following age, before the establishment of empires under a sole monarch. For at this time worldly, and finally bodily, loves began to close up the higher regions of the understanding, which had previously been open; then they had been like temples and shrines for the worship of one God. But the Lord God, in order to re-open them and thus restore the worship of one God, founded a church among the descendants of Jacob, and set at the head of all the commandments of their religion this:

There is to be no other God before my face. Exod. 20:3

[3] Jehovah too, the new name which He gave Himself for them, means the supreme and single Entity from which everything comes which is and comes into being anywhere in the universe. The early gentiles acknowledged as their supreme God Jupiter,* perhaps so called from Jehovah; and they endowed with divinity many of the other members of his court. But the philosophers of the following age, such as Plato and Aristotle, admitted that these were not gods, but so many properties, qualities and attributes of the one God, which were called gods on account of the divinity immanent in each of them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 10

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 10

10. Anyone of sound mind, even if not religious, can see that anything which is divided must of itself fall apart unless it is dependent upon a single origin. For instance, a human being, who is built up of so many members, viscera, sensory and motor organs, would collapse if he did not depend on a single soul; so would the body, but for its single heart. In the same way a kingdom depends upon having a single king, a household on a single master, and every department of the administration, of which there are many kinds in every kingdom, upon a single official. How effective would an army be in fighting the enemy without a general in overall command, and officers subordinate to him, each exercising his authority over the common soldiers? It would be the same with the church, if it did not acknowledge one God; or with the heaven of angels, which is, so to speak, the head of the church on earth; there too the Lord is their very soul. This is why heaven and the church are called His body. If both did not acknowledge one God, they would resemble a lifeless body, which is cast out and buried, as being of no further use.

* or Jove

TCR (Chadwick) n. 11

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 11

11. (iv) THERE ARE MANY REASONS WHY NATIONS AND PEOPLES HAVE FORMED VARYING IDEAS OF THE NATURE OF THAT ONE GOD, AND CONTINUE TO DO SO.

The first reason is that knowledge about God, and consequently acknowledgment of God, is impossible without revelation, and that knowledge about the Lord and consequently the acknowledgment that 'in Him all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily' can only come from the Word, which is the crown of revelations. Because revelation has been granted, a person is able to go to meet God and be acted upon by Him, and so from being natural become spiritual. The revelation of early ages spread throughout the world, and was perverted by natural men in many ways. This is the origin of the divisions, dissensions, heresies and schisms which have affected religions.

The second reason is that a natural man cannot form and apply to himself any perception of God, but only of the world. This is why it is one of the principles of the Christian Church that the natural man is opposed to the spiritual and they fight each other. This too is why those who have learned the existence of God from the Word [or] another revelation have differed and still do concerning the nature of God and His oneness.

[2] For this reason those whose mental vision has been dependent upon the bodily senses, and have none the less wished to see God, have made for themselves images of gold, silver, stone and wood, so that in these forms as visible objects they could worship God. This is why also others whose religion led them to reject such images, made themselves images of God out of the sun, the moon and the stars and various terrestrial objects. But those who thought their intelligence above the common herd, yet remained natural men, were led by the immensity of God and His omnipresence in creating the world to acknowledge nature as God, in some cases in its inmost, in others in its outermost forms. Some, in order to maintain a distinction between God and nature, thought up some extremely universal principle, which they called 'the Being of the Universe'; and because they know nothing more about God, this Being becomes for them a mere concept, which is meaningless.

[3] Is there anyone who cannot grasp that things known about God are mirrors held up to God? Those who know nothing of God see Him not in a mirror held up to their eyes, but in a mirror turned back to front, which is covered with quicksilver or a black composition that does not reflect an image but blots it out. Belief in God comes into man by the front door, that is, from the soul into the higher regions of the understanding. But knowledge about God comes in by the back door, because it is absorbed by the understanding from the revelation of the Word by means of the bodily senses. The two paths leading in meet in the midst of the understanding; there, natural belief, which is merely a strongly held opinion, becomes spiritual, that is to say, a real acknowledgment. So the human understanding is like an exchange where currencies are changed.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 12

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 12

12. (v) THERE ARE MANY THINGS IN THE WORLD WHICH CAN LEAD THE HUMAN REASON, IF IT WISHES, TO GRASP AND DEDUCE THAT THERE IS A GOD AND THAT HE IS ONE.

This truth can be supported by countless things in the visible world; for the universe is like a theatre, upon the stage of which demonstrations of the existence of God and His oneness are continually being presented. To illustrate this I shall relate this account from my experiences in the spiritual world.

Once when I was talking with angels, some newcomers from the natural world arrived. On seeing them I made them welcome, and told them many facts they did not know about the spiritual world. After this conversation I asked them what learning about God and nature they brought with them from the world.

'We have been taught,' they said, 'that nature performs all the operations which take place in the whole of creation. After the act of creation God assigned to nature and stamped upon her this ability and power; God only supports and preserves everything from being destroyed. Consequently everything on earth which comes into existence, is born or re-born, is to-day put down to nature.'

I replied that nature of herself performs no operation; but it is God who does this by means of nature. Since they demanded a proof, I said:* 'Those who believe in the working of God in the details of Nature can find many sights in the world in favour of their belief in God, many more than in favour of nature. [2] Those who favour the working of God in the details of nature pay attention to the amazing sights to be seen in the reproduction of both plants and animals. In the case of plants, a tiny seed cast into the ground produces a root, by means of the root a stem, and so in order branches, twigs, leaves, flowers and fruit, until the result is fresh seeds, just as if the seed knew the pattern of successive stages or processes which lead to its renewal. Can any rational person think that the sun, which is nothing but fire, has this knowledge, or that it can instruct its heat and light to produce such effects, and that it can act purposefully? A person whose reasoning faculty is uplifted, on seeing and duly considering these facts, is inevitably led to think that they come from Him who possesses infinite wisdom, that is, from God. Those who acknowledge the working of God in the details of nature are further confirmed in their view on seeing these things; those on the other hand who do not make this acknowledgment see them not with the eyes of reason set in the face, but with eyes in the back of the head; these are the people who get all the ideas in their heads from the bodily senses and support their fallacious beliefs by saying 'Surely you see it is the sun which produces all these results by its heat and light. Something you cannot see cannot be anything.'

[3] 'Those seeking support for a Divine origin pay attention to the amazing sights to be seen in animal reproduction. First of all I may mention eggs, which contain the chick hidden in its seed together with everything needed for its development, and its whole future growth after hatching until it becomes a bird resembling its mother. Further if we consider flying creatures in general, the mind which thinks profoundly boggles at the astonishing facts about them; that the smallest as well as the largest, the invisible as well as the visible, that is, tiny insects as well as birds and large animals, possess sensory organs of sight, smell, taste and touch; also motor organs or muscles which allow them to fly and walk; also viscera attached to a heart and lungs, all controlled by brains. Those who attribute everything to nature admittedly see these things, but they think of them merely as facts and call them the products of nature. They say this because they have turned their minds away from thinking about the Divine. This turning away from the Divine prevents them from thinking rationally, much less spiritually, about the amazing sights they see in nature. Their thoughts are limited to the senses and matter, so that they think in nature from nature, rather than above her. Their only difference from animals is that they enjoy the faculty of rationality, that is, they can understand if they wish.

[4] 'Those who have turned away from thoughts of the Divine, which makes them dependent upon the bodily senses, do not realise that the sight of the eye is so coarse and gross that it sees a group of tiny insects as a dark mass. Yet every one of these is endowed with the powers of sensation and movement, that is to say, it is provided with fibres and vessels, a tiny heart, breathing pores, viscera and brain. These are constructed of the simplest natural substances, and their systems answer to the vital principle in its lowest degree, for even the tiniest organs are individually activated by it. Since the sight of the eye is so gross that a number of creatures, each with its countless parts, look like a small dark mass, and yet those who rely on their senses found their thought and judgment on those visual powers, it is obvious how blunted their minds are and thus how blind they are on spiritual matters.

[5] 'Anyone can, if he wishes, find support for the Divine idea in the sights of nature, and also further if he thinks about God and His omnipotence in the creation of the universe and His omnipresence in preserving it. As when he considers the birds of the air, each species of which knows its proper food and where to find it; it recognises its kind by sight and sound; it knows which birds are its friends and which its enemies; they know how to nestle under their plumage, they form pairs, cleverly construct nests, lay eggs in them and sit on them; they know how long to sit, and in due season hatch their chicks, whom they love dearly, protecting them under their wings, providing food and nourishing them, and continuing until they can look after themselves and perform the same service. Anyone who is willing to think how the Divine influences the natural world by means of the spiritual can see this in these facts. He can even, if he wishes, say in his heart, 'Such knowledge cannot be acquired from the sun's heat and light, for the sun which is the origin and essence of nature is nothing but fire. Consequently the radiation of its heat and light is totally devoid of life.' This may lead them to deduce that such things are the effect of Divine influence working on the lowest forms of nature by means of the spiritual world.

[6] 'Anyone can find support for the Divine idea from the sights of nature, when he looks at grubs. The pleasure of a certain love makes them seek and aspire to change their earthly condition into one analogous to the heavenly condition. Therefore they creep into suitable places, surround themselves with a cocoon and so put themselves into a womb that they may be born again. There they become chrysallises, pupae, nymphs, and finally butterflies. And when they have undergone their metamorphosis and have put on the lovely wings typical of their species, they fly up into the air as into their private heaven, play happily together, mate, lay eggs and see to the continuation of their race. Then they feed on lovely, sweet food provided by flowers. Can anyone, who finds support for the Divine idea in the sights of nature, fail to see a picture of man's earthly state in their life as grubs and his heavenly state when they become butterflies? But those who support the idea of nature admittedly see these facts, but because they have mentally rejected the idea of man's heavenly state, they call these nothing but the workings of nature.

[7] 'Anyone can find support for the Divine idea from the sights of nature when he pays attention to the facts known about bees. They know how to collect wax and suck up honey from roses and other flowers, how to construct cells as their tiny homes and arrange them so as to resemble a city with streets by which to come in and go out. They smell out from a distance the flowers and plants from which they collect wax for building and honey to eat. When they are loaded with these they know their bearings to fly home to their hive, and thus provide themselves with food for the coming winter, as if they could foresee it. They set a mistress or queen over them; she is the mother of their offspring. They build a sort of court above their own quarters for the queen surrounded by her courtiers. When the time comes for her to give birth, she goes around accompanied by her courtiers, called drones, from one cell to the next and lays her eggs which the attendant crowd seal in to protect them from the air. These produce their new stock. Later on when this grows up sufficiently to behave in the same way, it is expelled from the hive; the swarm first of all gathers into a cloud to keep together in formation, and then flies off to find themselves a home. Towards autumn the drones, because they have brought home no wax or honey, are taken out and stripped of their wings, so that they cannot come back and consume the food to which they have done nothing to contribute; and much more might be said. From all this it can be clearly seen that for the sake of the service they perform to human beings the Divine influence coming through the spiritual world has given them an organisation similar to that of men on earth, or indeed of angels in the heavens.

[8] 'Is there anyone of unimpaired reason who does not see that such effects are not produced in them by the natural world? What has the sun, the origin of nature, in common with an organisation which rivals and mirrors the organisation of the heavens? These and similar facts concerning the lower animals confirm in his belief the man who makes a profession of and worships nature. But the man who professes belief in and worships God uses the same facts to reinforce his belief in God; for the spiritual man sees in them spiritual facts, while the natural man sees natural ones, in other words, each sees what he is. For my part, such facts have been evidence to me of the influence of the spiritual world coming from God on the natural. Consider too whether you could think analytically about any type of organisation, or any civil law, or any moral virtue, or any spiritual truth, if the Divine influence did not make itself felt as a result of its wisdom by means of the spiritual world. I for my part have never been able to do so, nor can I now. I have consciously perceived that influence and felt it through the senses continuously for the last twenty-six years. So I make this statement as a witness.

[9] 'Can nature have as its aim the fulfilment of a purpose, and arrange these purposes into organised structures? Only a wise being can do this; and no one could so order and structure the universe except God, whose wisdom is infinite. Who else can foresee and provide what men need to eat and clothe themselves: the crops of the field, the fruits of the earth and animals for food, and clothing from the same sources? One of the astonishing things in this is that those insignificant insects called silk-worms dress both women and men in silk and adorn them magnificently, from queens and kings down to maids and servants; and that those insignificant insects called bees supply wax to illuminate splendidly churches and halls. These and many more are the outstanding proofs that God of Himself performs all the workings of nature by means of the spiritual world.

[10] 'To this I must add that I have seen in the spiritual world those who found confirmation of their naturalistic view in the sights of the world, to such an extent that they became atheists. Seen in spiritual light, their understandings seemed to be open underneath, but closed on top, because their thoughts had been turned downwards to earth, and not up to heaven. Above their sensual area, which is the lowest level of the understanding, there appeared a sort of covering flashing with hellish fire, in some cases black as soot, in others livid like a corpse. Therefore let everyone take care not to confirm his belief in nature, but seek rather proofs of God; there is no lack of material.'
* The following passage is adapted from DLW 351-357, CL 416-421.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 13

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 13

sRef Isa@44 @6 S1' sRef Isa@44 @24 S1' 13. (vi) IF THERE HAD NOT BEEN ONE GOD, THE UNIVERSE COULD NOT HAVE BEEN CREATED AND KEPT IN EXISTENCE.

The reason the oneness of God can be deduced from the creation of the universe is that the universe is a single system coherently organised from beginning to end, and dependent upon God as the body is on the soul. The universe was so created that God could be omnipresent, and keep all its particulars under His guidance, and keep it perpetually together as a unit, and so preserve it. This too is why Jehovah God says that He is the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, Alpha and Omega (Isa. 44:6; Rev. 1:8, 17) and elsewhere that He does everything, spreads out the heavens, and stretches out the earth, of Himself (Isa. 44:24). This mighty system which is called the universe is a single unit coherently organised from beginning to end, because God had one end in view in creating it, to create from the human race a heaven of angels. The means to this end are all the things of which the world is composed; for he who wills the end, wills also the means.

[2] The man therefore who contemplates the world as a piece of work containing the means to that end can contemplate the created universe as a single coherent unit, and he can see that the world is an assemblage of services structured for the benefit of the human race, to form a heaven of angels. The Divine Love cannot have any other end in view than from His Divine to make human beings eternally blessed; and His Divine Wisdom cannot produce anything but services designed to fulfil that end. By considering the world from this universal point of view every wise man can grasp that the Creator of the universe is one, and that His essence is Love and Wisdom. Consequently there is no detail in it which does not conceal services either nearly or distantly designed to benefit human beings. Their food is provided by the fruits of the earth and also by animals, their clothing from the same sources.

[3] One of the astonishing things is that those insignificant insects called
silk-worms dress both women and men in silk and adorn them magnificently, from queens and kings down to maids and servants; and those insignificant insects, the bees, supply wax to illuminate splendidly churches and halls. Those who consider one by one facts about the world instead of the whole assemblage of ends, causal means and effects, and those who do not attribute creation to Divine Love acting by means of Divine Wisdom, cannot see that the universe is the handiwork of one God, and that He dwells in each service because He is in the end. For everyone who is involved in an end is also involved in the means, for the end which activates and controls the means is buried deep within all the means.

[4] Those who regard the universe not as the handiwork of God, nor as the dwelling-place of His Love and Wisdom, but as the handiwork of nature and the dwelling-place of the sun's heat and light, shut off the higher regions of their mind from God, and expose the lower regions to the devil. As a result they exchange their human nature for that of a wild beast, indeed they not only think themselves to be no better than animals, but actually become animals. They become foxes in cunning, wolves in ferocity, leopards in guile, tigers in savagery, crocodiles, snakes, screech owls and other night-birds, each with its own nature. People like this in the spiritual world actually look from a distance like those wild beasts, for this is how their love of evil shows itself.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 14

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 14

14. (vii) ANY PERSON WHO DOES NOT ACKNOWLEDGE GOD IS EXCOMMUNICATED FROM THE CHURCH AND DAMNED.

The reason why a person who does not acknowledge God is excommunicated from the church is that God is everything to the church and the Divine truths, which we call theology, are what make it a church. Consequently to deny God is to deny everything to do with the church; and it is this very denial which excommunicates a person, so that it is not God but the person who excommunicates himself. The reason why he is damned is that by being excommunicated from the church he is also excommunicated from heaven. For the church on earth and the heaven of angels act as one, like the internal and the external, or the spiritual and the natural in the case of a person. Man was created by God so as to have his internal in the spiritual world and his external in the natural world. Thus he was created a denizen of either world in order that the spiritual, which is heavenly, should be planted in the natural, which is worldly, just as a seed is planted in the ground, and he might thus become steadfast and enduring to eternity.

[2] A person who by denying God has excommunicated himself from the church, and thus from heaven, has shut off his internal man in respect of the will, and so in respect of the love which gives him pleasure. For a person's will is the receiver of his love and becomes its dwelling-place. But he cannot shut off his internal man in respect of the understanding, for if he could do this he would cease to be a human being. But the love in his will makes the higher regions of the understanding foolish with false notions, so that the understanding becomes as it were shut off from the truths which have to do with belief and the kinds of good which have to do with charity; thus he becomes more and more opposed to God and at the same time the spiritual side of the church. Thus he is cut off from communion with the angels of heaven, and by this exclusion he brings himself into communion with the satans of hell, and thinks exactly like them. All satans deny God and have foolish ideas about the spiritual side of the church, and a person who is linked with them does likewise.

[3] When this person is under the guidance of his spirit, which is when he is left to himself at home, he allows his thoughts to be guided by the pleasures of evil and falsity which he has conceived and brought to birth in himself. He then thinks that God does not exist, or that He is a mere word resounding from pulpits, to oblige the common people to obey the laws of the land, on which the community depends. He also thinks that the Word, which makes ministers keep harping on God, is a collection of visions or a mere compilation, the holiness of which has been established by authority. He regards the Ten Commandments or the catechism as a book, which when it has been worn out through handling by children, can be thrown away. For it laid down that parents are to be honoured, one is not to kill or go whoring, not to steal or bear false witness; and does not everyone know these same rules from the code of civil law? He thinks of the church as a mere congregation of the simple, the gullible and the weak-minded, who fancy they see what they do not. He regards human beings, and he includes himself among them, as animals; and his life after death as no different from that of an animal after death.

[4] This is how his internal man thinks, however differently the external man speaks. As said before, every man has an internal and an external: the internal, which is called the spirit, is what makes him human, and this lives on after death, while the external, which allows him to play the hypocrite by a show of morality, is buried. Then he is damned, because he denied God. Everyone is in his spirit associated with people like himself in the spiritual world, and is so to speak one with them. I have often been allowed to see the spirits of people still alive, some of them in communities of angels there, and others in communities of hell. I have been allowed to talk with them for days, and I was astonished to find that the person, who was still alive in the body, knew nothing at all of it. This experience made it clear that those who deny God are already among the damned, and after death are gathered to their own kind.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 15

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 15

15. (viii) THE CHURCH CANNOT HOLD TOGETHER AT ALL IN THE CASE OF A PERSON WHO ACKNOWLEDGES NOT ONE GOD, BUT SEVERAL.

The man who acknowledges in his belief one God and worships Him in his heart is in the communion of saints on earth, and of angels in the heavens. These are called communions, and they really are, because they are in the one God, and the one God is in them. The same people are also linked with the whole of the heaven of angels, and, I dare assert, with each and every one there. For they are all like sons and descendants of a single father, whose minds, manners and faces are similar, so that they can recognise one another. The heaven of angels is organised into communities in accordance with the varieties of the love for good, but all these varieties aim at a single most general love, that is, love to God. From this love are descended all who acknowledge in their belief, and worship in their heart, one God the Creator of the universe, and at the same time the Redeemer and the Regenerator.

[2] But far different is the case of those who approach and adore not one God, but several; or if it happens that they worship one God with their lips but three in their thinking, as those do in the church to-day who divide God into three persons, and declare each person by himself to be God, and attribute to each person different, qualities or peculiarities not shared with another. This produces an actual division not only in the oneness of God, but also in their theology, and likewise human minds that are devoted to it. What can be the result but a tangle of incoherent ideas about church matters? It will be proved in an Appendix to this book that this is the state of the church to-day. The truth is that to divide God or the Divine Essence into three persons, each of which severally or by itself is God, is tantamount to denying God. It is as if someone goes into a church to worship, and sees represented in a painting over the altar one God as the Ancient of Days, another as High Priest, and a third flying like Aeolus, and a label underneath saying 'These three are one God.' Or perhaps it is as if he were to see the Oneness and the Trinity represented as a man with three heads on one body or with three bodies topped by a single head; that is a monstrous idea, and if anyone were to enter heaven with that in his mind, he would certainly be flung out head first, even if he said that the head or heads stand for the essence, and the body or bodies separate properties.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 16

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 16

16. At this point I shall insert an account of an experience.

I saw some newcomers to the spiritual world from the natural world talking among themselves about the three Persons of the Divinity from eternity. They were in holy orders and one of them was a bishop.

They came up to me, and after we had talked for a while about the spiritual world, about which they had previously known nothing, I said: 'I heard you talking about the three Persons of the Divinity from eternity. Would you please reveal to me this great mystery in accordance with the views which you formed in the natural world from which you have just come?'

Then the bishop looked at me and said: 'I see that you are a layman, so I will reveal the views I hold about this great mystery and instruct you. My views were, and still are, that God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit sit in the midst of heaven on magnificent, high seats or thrones; God the Father on a throne of pure gold, with a sceptre in His hand; God the Son on His right hand on a throne of the finest silver, with a crown on His head; and God the Holy Spirit next to them on a throne of glistening crystal, holding a dove in His hand. Around them are three glittering rows of hanging lamps made of precious stones; and at a distance from this ring stand countless angels all worshipping and glorifying God. In addition, God the Father discusses constantly with His Son the souls who are to be justified; they decide between them and decree who on earth are worthy to be received among the angels and crowned with everlasting life. As soon as God the Holy Spirit hears the names they give, He flies through the world to them, bringing with Him the gifts of righteousness, a token of salvation for each person who is to be justified. Immediately on His arrival He breathes on them and blows away their sins, like a man with a fan who clears the smoke from a furnace, and whitewashes it. He removes too the stony hardness of their hearts and imparts the softness of flesh; and at the same time He renews their spirits or minds, brings them to a new birth, and gives them babyish faces. Finally He marks their foreheads with the sign of the cross, and calls them the Chosen and the Sons of God.' At the conclusion of this lecture the bishop said to me: 'That is how I unravelled that great mystery in the world; and because many of my clergy there applauded my speech, I am sure that you too, being a layman, will be persuaded by it.'

[2] On the conclusion of this speech by the bishop, I looked hard at him and the clergy with him, and noted that they were all fully in favour of his views. So I embarked upon a reply, and said: 'I have weighed up your profession of belief, and have inferred from it that you have formed and hold an entirely natural and sensual, I might say, material idea about the Triune God. This must inevitably lead to the idea of three Gods. Is it not thinking according to the senses to imagine God the Father seated upon a throne with a sceptre in His hand? Or about the Son on His throne with a crown on His head? Or the Holy Spirit on His with a dove in His hand, and flying throughout the world to carry out His orders? Since that is the sort of idea that emerges, I cannot accept the truth of your words. From my earliest years I have not been able to admit into my mind any idea of God except as One; and since this has been what I have admitted and is what I still hold, everything you have said makes no impression on me. In due course I saw that by the 'throne' on which the Scriptures say that Jehovah sits is meant His kingdom, by 'sceptre' and 'crown' His rule and dominion, by 'sitting at the right hand' the omnipotence of God exercised by means of His humanity; and by what is said of the Holy Spirit the workings of the Divine Omnipresence. Please take up, my lord, the idea of One God and give it reasonable consideration, and you will at length clearly grasp that this is so.

[3] 'You certainly say that God is one, and this is because you make the three Persons share one, undivided essence. Yet you do not allow anyone to say that the one God is one Person, but insist that there are three Persons, a belief necessary to preserve an idea of three Gods such as you have. You also attribute to each Person a character differing from the others'; do you not by this divide that Divine essence of yours? In these circumstances how can you say and at the same time think that God is one? I would forgive you if you said that there is one Divine. How can anyone who is told that 'the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and that each person by Himself is God' possibly think that God is one? Surely this is a contradiction which cannot be believed. This illustration will show that one cannot speak of one God but only a like Divinity: one cannot call a group of people, who make up a single senate, assembly or council, one man, but so long as they all individually hold the same opinion, they can be said to have one view. Nor can three diamonds of a single composition be called one diamond, only one in respect of their composition; and each diamond differs from another in value according to its weight. This would be impossible if they were one, and not three.

[4] 'However, I perceive that you call the three Divine Persons, each of whom is by Himself or singly God, one God, and have commanded every member of the church to speak in these terms, because enlightened and sound reason throughout the world acknowledges that God is one. You would therefore blush with shame, if you too did not speak in these terms. Yet all the time that you are uttering the words 'One God', although you are thinking of three, still that shame does not trap the two words in your mouth, but you say it aloud.'

After these speeches the bishop and his clergy withdrew, and as he went he turned round and wanted to shout 'There is one God'; but he could not, because his thought hampered his tongue; and then, forcing his lips apart, he gasped 'Three Gods'. The bystanders on seeing this monstrous happening burst into laughter and went away.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 17

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 17

17. Later on I asked where I could meet the sharpest minds among the learned who stood for a Divine Trinity divided into three Persons. Three came forward, whom I addressed thus: 'How can you divide the Divine Trinity into three Persons and assert that each Person by Himself or singly is God and Lord? If so, your verbal profession that God is one is as far removed from what you think as the south is from the north.'

To this they replied: 'It is not removed at all, because the three Persons have one essence, and the Divine Essence is God. In the world we were guardians of the Trinity of Persons, and the ward whom we protected was our faith, according to which each Divine Person has been given His own role to play. The role of God the Father is to impute and grant, of God the Son to intercede and mediate, and of God the Holy Spirit to carry out the services of imputation and mediation.'

[2] 'What,' I asked, 'do you understand by the Divine Essence?' 'We understand,' they said, 'omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, immensity, eternity, and equality of majesty.'

To which I replied: 'If that essence can make a number of gods into one, you could add more still, as for example a fourth, who is mentioned by Moses, Ezekiel and Job under the title of God Shaddai. The ancients in Greece and Italy did the same, assigning similar attributes and a like essence to their gods, Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto, Apollo, Juno, Diana, Minerva, even Mercury and Venus. Yet they were unable to say that all those were one God. The three of you, as I can tell, are equally learned and share the same essence in that respect, but you cannot combine yourselves into a single scholar.'

They laughed at this, and said: 'You are joking. It is different with the
Divine Essence, which is one and not divided into three, so it is individual and undivided; it cannot admit partition and division.'

[3] To this I answered: 'Let us go down into this arena and do combat.' I asked: 'What do you understand by 'Person'? What does this word mean?'

'The word Person,' they said, 'does not mean any part or quality in another, but what exists in its own right; that is how all the Fathers of the church define Person, and we follow them.'

'Is this,' I said, 'the definition of Person?'

'Yes,' they answered.

To this I retorted: 'Then there is no part of the Father in the Son, nor of either in the Holy Spirit. From this it follows that each has His own judgment, rights and powers, and there is nothing to link them except the will, which is peculiar to each individual, and so can be communicated if desired. Then are not the three Persons three separate gods? Listen to this: you have defined Person as that which exists in its own right; consequently you are saying that there are three substances, into which you split the Divine Essence. Yet this, as you too say, cannot be split, since it is one and undivided. Moreover you attribute to each substance, that is, each Person, properties distinct from another's, and which cannot be shared with another, namely, imputation, mediation and working. What can result from this but that the three Persons are three gods?'

At this they withdrew saying: 'We will discuss these points and reply when we have discussed them.'

[4] A wise man was standing near, who on hearing these things said: 'I do not wish to subject a matter of such supreme importance to such subtle refinements, but these subtleties apart I can see perfectly clearly that your thought contains the idea of three gods. But since you are ashamed to say this publicly before the whole world - for if you did, you would be called crazy and fools - you find it expedient to have the profession of one God on your lips in order to avoid disgrace.'

At this, however, the three still clung to their opinion and paid no attention, and as they went away they were muttering some terms borrowed from metaphysics; this told me that that was the oracle whose responses they wished to give.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 18

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 18

18. THE DIVINE BEING, WHICH IS JEHOVAH

The Divine Being (Esse) will be discussed first, then the Divine Essence. It looks as if these two are one and the same, but in fact Being (Esse) is more universal than Essence, since Essence presupposes Being, and comes into existence from Being. The Being of God, or the Divine Being, is indescribable, since it transcends all ideas of human thought. This cannot grasp anything except what is created and finite. What is uncreated and infinite, such as the Divine Being, is incomprehensible. The Divine Being is Being Itself, the source of all things and which must be in all things for them to exist. Some further conception of the Divine Being can be gained from the following propositions: viz.

(i) The one God is named Jehovah from His Being, that is, from the fact that He alone is, was and will be, and because He is the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, Alpha and Omega.

(ii) The one God is substance itself and form itself, and angels and men are substances and forms derived from Him; to the extent that they are in Him and He in them, so far are they images and likenesses of Him.

(iii) The Divine Being is Being in itself, and at the same time Coming-into-Being in itself.

(iv) The Divine Being and Coming-into-Being in itself cannot give rise to another Divine which is Being and Coming-into Being in itself. Consequently another God of the same essence is impossible.

(v) The plurality of gods in ancient times, as well as to-day, was entirely the result of a failure to understand the Divine Being.

These propositions must be elucidated one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 19

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 19

sRef Ex@3 @14 S1' sRef Ex@3 @13 S1' sRef Ex@3 @15 S1' sRef Isa@44 @6 S1' 19. (i) THE ONE GOD IS NAMED JEHOVAH FROM HIS BEING, THAT IS, FROM THE FACT THAT HE ALONE IS, [WAS] AND WILL BE, AND BECAUSE HE IS THE FIRST AND THE LAST, THE BEGINNING AND THE END, ALPHA AND OMEGA.

It is well known that Jehovah means 'I am' and 'Being'. It is clear from the Book of Creation, called Genesis, that God was so called from most ancient times; for there He is called God in the first chapter, but in the second and subsequent ones Jehovah God. Later on when the descendants of Abraham, starting with Jacob, forgot the name of God owing to their long stay in Egypt, it was recalled to their memory. About this we read:

Moses said to God, What is your name? God said, I am who I am; thus

shall you say to the Children of Israel, I am has sent me to you; and you shall say, Jehovah the God of your fathers has sent me to you. This is my name for ever, and this is my memorial from generation to generation. Exod. 3:[13,] 14, 15.

Since God alone is I am or Being, that is, Jehovah, therefore there cannot be anything in the created universe which does not owe its being to Him; how this happens will be seen below. The same is meant also by these words:

I am the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, Alpha and Omega. Isa. 44:6; Rev. 1:8, 11; 22:13.

This means that He is the one single source from beginning to end, from which everything comes.

[2] God is called Alpha and Omega*, the Beginning and the End, because alpha is the first and omega the last letter in the Greek alphabet, and they thus mean everything taken together. The reason is that every letter of the alphabet in the spiritual world stands for some thing. Vowels, which allow words to be pronounced, stand for something to do with affection or love. This is the origin of the speech of spirits or angels, and also of their writing-systems. But this is a mystery not previously known: there is a universal language used by all angels and spirits, which has nothing in common with any human language in the world. Everyone comes into possession of this language after death, for it is inborn in everyone from his creation. Therefore everyone throughout the spiritual world can understand everyone else. I have often been permitted to hear that language, and I have compared it with languages in the world, and found that it does not agree in the slightest detail with any natural language on earth. It differs from them in its basic principle, which is that each letter of every word stands for some thing. That can now be seen to be the reason why God is called Alpha and Omega, the one single source from beginning to end, from which everything comes. On this language and its writing-system, which is derived from the spiritual thought of angels, see CONJUGIAL LOVE (326-329), and also further in this book [280, 365.3, 386].
* This passage is repeated with minor changes from AR 29.2.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 20

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 20

20. (ii) THE ONE GOD IS SUBSTANCE ITSELF AND FORM ITSELF, AND ANGELS AND MEN ARE SUBSTANCES AND FORMS DERIVED FROM HIM; TO THE EXTENT THAT THEY ARE IN HIM AND HE IN THEM, SO FAR ARE THEY IMAGES AND LIKENESSES OF HIM.

Since God is Being, He is also substance, for unless being is substance, it is an imaginary entity, for substance is a subsisting entity. One who is substance must also be form, for substance without form is an imaginary entity. Both can therefore be predicated of God, but on condition that He is the sole, very and prime substance and form. It was proved in THE WISDOM OF THE ANGELS ON THE DIVINE LOVE AND THE DIVINE WISDOM (published at Amsterdam in 1763) that this form is the very form of man, that is, God is very man, and all of his attributes are infinite; and likewise that angels and men are substances and forms created and ordered so as to receive the Divine influences reaching them through heaven. In the Book of Creation they are therefore called images and likenesses of God (Gen. 1:26, 27); elsewhere they are called His sons and begotten of Him. It will be proved at length in the course of this book that in so far as a man lives under Divine guidance, that is, allows himself to be led by God, so far does he become, more and more inwardly, an image of God.

[2] If the minds of men did not form the idea that God is prime substance and form, and that His form is the very form of man, they would easily fall into fantastic, ghost-like, ideas about God Himself, the origin of man and the creation of the world. They could not avoid thinking of God as the primeval nature of the universe, and consequently as its expanse, or as it were a void or nothingness. They would think of the origin of man as if it were a fortuitous concourse of atoms to make, such a form; of the creation of the world as owing its substances and forms to geometric points and lines, which since they lack attributes are in themselves non-existent. In the case of such people everything relating to the church is like the river Styx or the thick darkness of Tartarus.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 21

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 21

sRef Isa@45 @21 S1' sRef Isa@45 @20 S1' sRef Isa@45 @15 S1' sRef Isa@44 @24 S1' sRef Isa@45 @14 S1' 21. (iii) THE DIVINE BEING IS BEING (ESSE) IN ITSELF, AND AT THE SAME TIME COMING-INTO-BEING (EXISTERE) IN ITSELF.

Jehovah God is Being in itself, because He is I am, the very, sole and prime source, from eternity to eternity, of everything in existence, which allows it to exist. In this and no other sense He is the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last, Alpha and Omega. One cannot say that His Being is from itself, because 'out of itself' presupposes what is earlier and thus time; but time is inconsistent with the Infinite, which is said to be 'from eternity'. It also presupposes another God, who is God in Himself, and thus God originating from God; in other words, that God formed Himself, so that He could not be uncreated or infinite, because in this case He would have distinguished Himself either from Himself or from another.

It follows from the fact that God is Being in itself that He is Love in itself, Wisdom in itself and Life in itself, and that it is He who is the source of everything, who is the point of reference of everything, if it is to exist. it is clear from the Lord's words in John (5:26) that God is Life in itself and thus God; and in Isaiah:

I, Jehovah, make all things, I alone spread out the heavens and stretch out the earth by Myself. Isa. 44:24.

and that He is the only God and there is no God beside Him (Isa. 45:14, 15, 21, 22; Hosea 13:4).

[2] The reason why God is not only Being in itself, but also Coming-into-Being in itself is that unless Being comes into being it does not exist; and likewise Coming-into-Being can only arise from Being. Therefore the one supposes the other. In the same way form cannot exist without substance; nothing can be predicated of substance unless it has form, and what is devoid of qualities is in itself nothing. The terms Being (Esse) and Coming-into-Being (Existere) are used here, not Essence and Existence, because a distinction should be made between Being and Essence, and therefore between Coming-into-Being and Existence, similar to that between prior and posterior, and what is prior is more universal than what is posterior. Infinity and eternity are applicable to the Divine Being, but the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom and through them both omnipotence and omnipresence are applicable to the Divine Essence and Existence. These subjects will be discussed in their proper place.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 22

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 22

22. It is quite impossible for the natural man to get to know from his reason that God is the very, sole and prime source, called Being and Coming-into-Being in itself, from which everything that exists or comes into being is derived. For the natural man who relies upon his own reason can only attribute these things to nature; for this squares with his own essence, which has had nothing but this idea supplied to it from infancy and childhood. But since man has been created so that he should be spiritual too, because he is destined to live after death, and that life will be among spiritual beings in their world, God has provided the Word, in which He has revealed not only Himself, but also the existence of heaven and hell, in one or the other of which every human being will live to eternity, depending in each case on the way he has lived and at the same time what he has believed. In the Word too God has revealed that He is I am or Being, and the very and sole source which is self-existent, and thus the prime or beginning from which everything comes.

[2] This revelation has made it possible for the natural man to rise above nature, and thus above himself, and see the things which are God's. Yet he can only do this as it were from a distance, although God is present near at hand with every person, for God is in him with His essence. For this reason He is near at hand to those who love Him, and those who love Him are those who live according to His commandments and believe in Him; these people as it were see Him. What is faith but one's spirit seeing that it is so? And what is it to live according to His commandments but to acknowledge Him in practice as the source of salvation and everlasting life? But those whose faith is not spiritual, but natural, (that is, a faith which is mere knowledge) and who therefore live in the same way, they can certainly see God, but do so from a distance, and only when they speak about Him. The difference between the two groups is like that between those who stand in broad daylight, seeing and touching people near them, and those who stand in a thick fog, which prevents them from seeing whether they are people, trees or rocks; [3] or those who live in a city on a high mountain and go about hither and thither and talk with their fellow citizens, and those who look down from that mountain and cannot tell whether what they see are human beings, animals or statues. Rather it is the difference between those who stand upon some planet and see their fellows there, and those who are on a different planet and look with telescopes in their hands towards the first, saying that they see human beings there, when in fact they can only make out land surfaces generally like the bright areas of the moon, and seas as dark patches. Such is the distinction between those who believe and at the same time live a life of charity, seeing in their minds God and what is Divine proceeding from Him, and those who merely have knowledge about these subjects; thus the distinction is as between natural and spiritual men. Those, however, who deny the Divine holiness of the Word, and still carry around the trappings of religion as it were in a sack thrown over the shoulder, fail to see God and merely repeat the word 'God', almost exactly like parrots.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 23

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 23

23. (iv) THE DIVINE BEING AND COMING-INTO-BEING IN ITSELF CANNOT GIVE RISE TO ANOTHER DIVINE WHICH IS BEING AND COMING-INTO-BEING IN ITSELF. CONSEQUENTLY ANOTHER GOD OF THE SAME ESSENCE IS IMPOSSIBLE.

It has so far been shown that the one God, the Creator of the universe, is Being and Coming-into-Being in itself, thus God in Himself. It follows from this that a God derived from God is impossible, because the very Essential of the Divine, which is Being and Coming-into-Being in itself, cannot exist in that other God. It makes no difference whether you say 'begotten by God', or 'proceeding from God'; both imply being produced by God, and there is little difference between this and being created. Therefore the introduction into the church of the belief that there are three Divine persons, each of whom is severally God and of the same essence, and one born from eternity, and a third proceeding from eternity, has the effect of utterly destroying the idea of the oneness of God, and with this all comprehension of Divinity, thus causing the whole of the spiritual side of the reason to be banished. This makes a human being no longer human, but totally and in all respects natural, in other words no different from an animal but for the power of speech; and it makes him an opponent of all the spiritual values of the church, since the natural man calls these mere ravings. This is the only source of such gross heresies about God as have flooded the world. On account of this the division of the Divine Trinity into persons has plunged the church not merely into darkness but into death.

[2] The idea of three Divine Essences which are the same is an offence to reason, as was made clear to me by angels who said that they cannot so much as utter the words 'three equal Divinities'; and if anyone came to them and wanted to say this he could not help turning his back on them; after saying it he would become like a human trunk and be cast down, subsequently going off to join those in hell who acknowledge no God. The truth is that to put in the mind of a small child or boy the idea of three Divine persons, which inevitably carries with it the idea of three gods, is to take away all spiritual suckling, and then all spiritual nourishment, and finally all spiritual rationality, and to bring about the spiritual death of those who become convinced of it. The distinction is this: those who in faith and in their hearts worship one God, the Creator of the universe, who is at the same time the Redeemer and Regenerator, are like the city of Zion in the time of David and the city of Jerusalem in Solomon's time, after the building of the Temple; but the church that believes in three persons, and in each as an individual God, is like the city of Zion and Jerusalem when they had been destroyed by Vespasian, and the Temple there had been burnt down. To go further, a person who worships one God in whom is the Divine Trinity and so is a single Person, becomes more and more alive and an angelic person; but one who lets a plurality of persons convince him of a plurality of gods becomes by degrees like a puppet with movable limbs, with Satan standing inside and talking through his jointed mouth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 24

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 24

24. (v) THE PLURALITY OF GODS IN ANCIENT TIMES, AS WELL AS TODAY, WAS ENTIRELY THE RESULT OF A FAILURE TO UNDERSTAND THE DIVINE BEING.

It was shown above (8) that the oneness of God is inwardly impressed upon the mind of every person, since this idea forms the core of all the influences from God which affect the soul of man. But the reason why it has failed to come down into men's understanding is the lack of the pieces of knowledge which a person should have to enable him to climb up to meet God. For everyone needs to prepare the way for God, that is, to prepare himself to receive God, and pieces of knowledge are the means to this end. The following are the missing pieces of knowledge which prevent the understanding from penetrating to the point at which it can see that God is one and there can only be a single Divine Being, who is the source of all natural phenomena. (1) The fact that no one up to now has known anything about the spiritual world, the home of spirits and angels, and the place where every person comes after death. (2) Equally, that the spiritual world possesses a sun, which is pure love from Jehovah God, who is in its midst. (3) That from that sun radiate heat, which is in essence love, and light, which is in essence wisdom. (4) That as a result everything in that world is spiritual, working on the internal man and making up his will and understanding. (5) That Jehovah God has given rise by this sun of His not only to the spiritual world and all the innumerable spiritual and substantial things in it, but also to the natural world with all the innumerable natural things in it, which are composed of matter. (6) That up to now no one has known the difference between the spiritual and the natural, nor what the spiritual is in essence. (7) Nor that there are three degrees of love and wisdom, which form the basis of the arrangement of the heavens of angels. (8) That the human mind is divided into the same number of degrees, to enable it after death to be lifted into one of the three heavens, depending upon the way a person has lived and at the same time what he has believed. (9) And finally that not a jot of all this could have come into being except from the Divine Being which is God in itself, and thus the first principle and beginning from which everything comes. These pieces of knowledge have up to now been missing, yet it is through them that a person must climb up and get to know the Divine Being.

[2] We say that a person climbs up, but it must be understood that it is God who lifts him up. A person has a free choice in acquiring knowledge; and he seems to get this for himself from the Word by means of the understanding, and thus smooths the path for God to come down and lift him up. The pieces of knowledge which enable the human understanding to climb, while God holds it in His hand and guides it, can be compared to the steps of the ladder seen by Jacob, which was set up on earth so that its top reached heaven and angels climbed up by means of it, and Jehovah stood above it (Gen. 28:12, 13).

It is quite different when those pieces of knowledge are lacking, or a person treats them with contempt. Then the lifting of the understanding can be compared to a ladder erected from the ground to a first floor window of a magnificent palace, where men live, but not to the second floor windows where the spirits are, much less to the third floor windows where the angels are. The result is that such a person cannot escape from the atmospheres and material objects of the natural world, which occupy his eyes, ears and nose. From these he cannot help acquiring atmospheric and material ideas about heaven and the Being and Essence of God. Thought along these lines does not allow a person to make up his mind at all about God, whether He exists or not, or whether there is one God or several; much less, what His Being and Essence are like. It was this which led to the plurality of gods in ancient times, and still does to-day.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 25

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 25

25. At this point I shall insert the following account of an experience.*

Once on waking from sleep I fell into a profound meditation about God; and when I looked up, I saw in the sky above me a brilliant, oval-shaped light. When I fixed my gaze upon that light, it moved to either side and occupied the surrounding area. Then suddenly heaven lay open before me, and I saw wonderful sights, and angels standing in a ring on the south of the opening, talking among themselves. Because I was fired with a desire to hear what they were saying, I was first permitted to hear the sound of their voices, which was full of heavenly love, and later their speech, which was full of the wisdom which comes from that love.

They were talking among themselves about the one God, being linked with Him and salvation by this means. What they said was beyond words to express; most of it could not be put into the words of any natural language. But because on a number of occasions I had been in company with angels in heaven itself, and then, being in a like state, I could speak similarly with them, I was now able to understand them, and pick up a few points in their conversation which can be rationally expressed in the words of natural language.

[2] They were saying that the Divine Being is one, the same, the very self and indivisible. They illustrated this by spiritual ideas, saying that the Divine Being cannot be reduced to several, each of which is the Divine Being, and still remain one, the same, the very self and indivisible. For each would think from His own Being from Himself, and in each case through Himself; if He then thought from the others and through them in agreement, then there would be several gods of like mind, and not one God. For unanimity, being a consensus of several with each one agreeing of himself and through himself, is not consonant with the oneness of God, but with a plurality. They did not say 'of gods', because they were unable to, since the light of heaven which governed their thought, and the aura which carried their speech, offered resistance.

They said too that when they wanted to say the word 'Gods', and each as a Person by Himself, as soon as they attempted to say this it was instantly replaced by one, or rather the sole, God. They added that the Divine Being is the Divine Being in itself, not from itself, because from itself supposes Being in itself arising from another prior one. Thus it supposes a God arising from God, which is impossible. Anything arising from God is not called God, but Divine. For what is God arising from God, or God born of God from eternity, and what is God arising from God proceeding by means of God born from eternity but mere words totally devoid of heavenly light?

[3] They went on to say that the Divine Being, which is in itself God, is the same; not the same in a simple way, but infinitely the same, that is, the same from eternity to eternity. He is the same everywhere, the same with each person and in each person; but all the changes and differences occur in the person who receives Him, and it is his state which causes this.

To demonstrate that the Divine Being, which is God in itself, is very self they said: 'God is very Self, because He is love itself and wisdom itself, that is, because He is good itself and truth itself, and thus life itself. If these things were not the very Self in God, they would be as nothing in heaven and the world, because none of them would be related to the very Self. Every quality gets its quality from the fact that it is the self which is its source, and must be related to it to have that quality. This very Self, which is the Divine Being, is not in any place, but with and in those people who are located in accordance with their ability to receive it, since neither place nor movement from one place to another can be attributed to love and wisdom, or good and truth, and life from them, which constitute the very Self in God, or rather are God Himself. Hence God is omnipresent. That is why the Lord says that He is in the midst of them, and that He is in them and they in Him.
sRef John@5 @26 S4' [4] 'Because God cannot be received by anyone such as He is in Himself, He appears as He is in essence, as the Sun above the heavens of the angels; the radiation emitted by Him as light is Himself as regards wisdom, and as heat is Himself as regards love. That Sun is not God Himself, but the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom coming forth most nearly from Him, all around Him, and these appear to the angels as the Sun. He Himself is in the Sun as a Man; He is our Lord Jesus Christ, both as regards the Divine origin and the Divine Human; since the very Self, which is Love itself and Wisdom itself, was His soul from the Father, and so Divine Life, which is Life in itself. This is different in the case of any person; in him his soul is not Life, but a receiver of life. The Lord teaches us this too, when He said:

I am the Way, Truth and Life. John 14:6.

and elsewhere:

Even as the Father has life in Himself, so too did He grant the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26.

Life in Himself is God.'

They added that those who are at all spiritually enlightened can perceive from these statements that the Divine Being cannot exist in several, because it is one, the same, the very self and thus indivisible. If anyone were to say that this plurality was possible, there would be obvious contradictions in the qualities predicated.
*This is repeated from AR 961.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 26

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 26

26. When I had listened to this, the angels perceived that I was thinking about the generally held ideas of the Christian church concerning a Trinity of Persons in One God, and the oneness of these Persons in a Divine Trinity; as well as about the birth of the Son of God from eternity. Then they said: 'What is this that you are thinking? Surely these ideas are derived from natural enlightenment, which is at variance with our spiritual enlightenment? So if you do not rid yourself of the ideas you are thinking, we shall close heaven to you and go away.'

But I replied: 'Please penetrate further into my thinking, and you may find there agreement.' They did so, and saw that by three Persons I understood the three attributes which proceed from God, Creation, Redemption and Regeneration, and that these are the attributes of the one God: that by the birth of the Son of God from eternity I understood His birth foreseen from eternity, and provided for in time; to think that there is any Son of God born from eternity is not superior, but contrary to the natural and rational faculties, but rather the Son born of God by the Virgin Mary in time is the single and only-begotten Son of God; to believe otherwise is a huge mistake. [2] I then told them that my natural thought about the Persons of the Trinity and their Oneness, as well as about the birth of the Son of God from eternity, was taken from the Church's doctrine of faith, which bears the name of Athanasius.

'Good,' said the angels, and asked me to say at their dictation that if anyone does not approach the God of heaven and earth Himself, he cannot enter heaven, because it is that one God who makes heaven to be heaven, and that same God is Jesus Christ, who is Jehovah the Lord, the Creator from eternity, the Redeemer in time, and the Regenerator for eternity to come. Thus He is at once Father, Son and Holy Spirit; this is the Gospel to be preached.

After this the heavenly light which I had seen before returned to above the opening, and by stages came down from there filling the interiors of my mind and illuminating my ideas about the Trinity and the Oneness of God. Then I saw that the ideas I had originally formed on these subjects, which were purely natural, were separated, as chaff is separated from the wheat by the movement of a winnowing fan, and carried away as by a wind to the north of heaven, until they were lost to view.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 27

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 27

27. THE INFINITY OR THE IMMENSITY AND THE ETERNITY OF GOD

There are two properties peculiar to the natural world which make everything in it finite. One is space, the other time. Because that world was created by God, and spatial distances and periods of time were created along with it and serve to define it, their two starting-points, immensity and eternity, need to be discussed. For the immensity of God relates to space, and His eternity to time, while His infinity embraces both immensity and eternity. But since infinity transcends the finite, and it is beyond the finite mind to grasp it, to permit some sort of perception of it, the following series of propositions will be discussed:

(i) God is infinite, because He is and comes into being in Himself, and everything in the universe is and comes into being from Him.
(ii) God is infinite, because He existed before the world did, and thus before space and time came into existence.
(iii) Since the making of the world God is non-spatially in space and non-temporally in time.
(iv) The infinity [of God] as predicated of space is called immensity, and as predicated of time is called eternity. Despite these predications His immensity is totally devoid of space and His eternity is totally devoid of time.
(v) There is much in the world which can enable enlightened reason to see the infinity of God the Creator.
(vi) Every created object is finite, and the infinite is contained in finite objects as in receivers, and in human beings as images of it. These propositions will be explained one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 28

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 28

28. (i) GOD IS INFINITE, BECAUSE HE-IS AND COMES INTO BEING IN HIMSELF, AND EVERYTHING IN THE UNIVERSE IS AND COMES INTO BEING FROM HIM.

It has so far been shown that God is one and is the very and first Being of everything, and that all things which are, come into being and subsist in the universe, are from Him. It follows from this that He is infinite. In the following pages it will be proved that human reason can see the truth of that from very many things in the created universe. But although these things can lead the human mind to acknowledge that the prime Entity (Ens) or first Being (Esse) is infinite, it still cannot know its nature; and therefore cannot define it except as the total infinite, subsisting in itself and thus the very and sole substance; and since nothing can be predicated of substance without form, that it is the very and sole form. Yet where does this get us? This still does not show what the infinite is like. For the human mind, for all its loftiness and superb analytical power, is finite, and there is no way of rendering it anything but finite. Therefore it is incapable of seeing the infinity of God as it is in itself, and so seeing God; but it can see God in shadow from behind, as Moses was told when he begged to see God: he was placed in a cleft in the rock and saw His back parts (Exod. 33:20-23). The 'back parts of God' mean what is visible in the world, and in particular what can be perceived in the Word.

[2] This will prove that it is futile to want to know God as He is in His Being or in His Substance; but it is enough to acknowledge Him by finite things, that is, His creation, in which He dwells infinitely. A person who seeks to go further can be likened to a fish out of water, or a bird put into a vacuum chamber, which, as the air is pumped out, chokes and eventually dies.

He may also be likened to a ship overwhelmed by a storm and no longer answering the helm, which is driven upon rocks or sandbanks. This is what happens to those who want to know the infinity of God from within, and are not content to acknowledge it by its plain indications from without. The story is told of a certain philosopher among the ancients, who threw himself into the sea because his mental enlightenment did not enable him to see or comprehend the eternity of the cosmos; what would he have done, if it had been the infinity of God he wished to see?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 29

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 29

29. (ii) GOD IS INFINITE, BECAUSE HE EXISTED BEFORE THE WORLD DID, AND THUS BEFORE SPACE AND TIME CAME INTO EXISTENCE.

The natural world contains time and space, but the spiritual world does not really, though it appears to do so. The reason why time and space were introduced into the cosmos was to distinguish one thing from another, the great from the small, much from little; thus to distinguish one quantity from another and by that means one quality from another; and so that by them the bodily senses could distinguish its objects, and the mental senses its objects, and thus feel emotion, think and exercise choice. Time came into the natural world by the rotation of the earth on its axis, and the travelling of these rotations from point to point along the zodiac. The sun appears to be responsible for these variations, since it is the source of heat and light throughout the whole surface of the globe. This causes the times of day, morning, noon, evening and night, as well as the seasons of the year, spring, summer, autumn and winter. The times of day cause variation between light and darkness, the seasons of the year between heat and cold. Space was introduced into the natural world by the earth being rolled into a ball and filled with matter, the parts of which are mutually distinct and have extension. The spiritual world does not possess material space and time corresponding to it. But there appear to be space and time there, the appearances answering to the differences of state affecting the minds of spirits and angels there. Time and space there are therefore determined by the affections of their wills and the thoughts of their understandings; but these appearances are real in the sense that they are consistently dependent upon their states.

[2] The general opinion about the condition of souls after death, and hence of angels and spirits, is that they are not in any place and therefore not in space and time. This idea leads to the saying that souls after death are in Pu or Where*, that spirits and angels are breaths of wind, not to be thought of as different from the ether, the air, breath or wind. The truth is that they are persons possessing substance, and among themselves they lead lives like those of people in the natural world on the basis of space and time, which as I have said are controlled by their mental states. If it were not so, that is to say, in the absence of space and time, that universe in which souls arrive and where angels and spirits live, could be pulled through the eye of a needle or be compressed to fit on one end of a hair. This would be possible if there were not an extent of substance there. But since there is, angels live in separate groups apart from one another, more distant in fact than people on earth who have material space between them. But periods of time there are not divided into days, weeks, months and years, because the sun there does not appear to rise and set, nor to travel across the sky, but remains motionless in the east halfway between the zenith and the horizon. They have space because everything which in the natural world is material is in that world substantial. But I shall have more to say on this topic in the part of this chapter devoted to Creation [75-80].

[3] The foregoing account should enable it to be grasped that everything in either world is bounded by space and time, and human beings are therefore not only in body but also in soul finite; and so equally are angels and spirits. From all of these facts the conclusion can be drawn that God is infinite, that is, not bounded. For He as the Creator, Former and Maker of the universe bounded all things, and this He did by means of His Sun, in the midst of which He resides, consisting of the Divine Essence, which issues from Him like a sphere. Therein and thence is the beginning of bounding; but in its progress it extends to the ultimate forms of Nature. It follows that He in Himself is infinite, because He is not created. The infinite, however, appears to man as non-existent, because man is bounded and thinks by means of bounded ideas. Therefore if the bounding which is inseparable from his thought were removed, he would perceive the residue as nonexistent. The truth, however, is that God is infinitely all, and man comparatively is of himself nothing.
*Pu is the Greek word for 'Where?', which is at once explained by the Latin translation.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 30

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 30

30. (iii) SINCE THE MAKING OF THE WORLD GOD IS NON-SPATIALLY IN SPACE AND NON-TEMPORALLY IN TIME.

The idea that God and the Divine which proceeds directly from Him is not in space, although He is omnipresent, present with every person in the world, every angel in heaven and every spirit beneath heaven, cannot be grasped by purely natural thinking, but can be to some extent by spiritual thinking. Purely natural thinking cannot grasp it because space is contained in it, since it is formed by the objects in the world around us; and in each and every object visible to the eyes there is space. It is space which makes anything big or small as well as long, broad and high. In short, every measurement, shape and form there depends upon space. Still one can to some extent grasp this idea by natural thinking, so long as one admits some spiritual light into it. But first I must say something about the idea of spiritual thinking. This is in no way dependent upon space, but gains its whole quality from state. State is what can be attributed to love, life, wisdom, affections, joys, and in general to good and truth. Any really spiritual concept of these has nothing in common with space, it is on a higher plane and looks down on spatial ideas as beneath itself, just as heaven looks down on earth.

[2] The fact that God is non-spatially present in space and non-temporally in time explains why God is ever the same from eternity to eternity, and so the same since the creation of the world as before it; and why before the creation of the world space and time did not exist in God or in His presence, but they did after this event. Therefore because He is the same, His presence in space is non-spatial and in time is non-temporal. Hence it follows that Nature is separate from Him, yet He is omnipresent in it. It is much the same as life being present in every substance and all the matter that make up a person, yet it is not mixed up with them. It might be compared with light in the eye, sound in the ear, taste in the tongue, or the ether in land and sea, which holds together and permits the rotation of the globe with the land and seas on its surface, and so on. If these agents were removed, the things constructed of substance and matter would at once collapse and fall apart. Indeed, the human mind, if God were not present in it at every place and every time, would burst like a bubble; and each of the two brains, which serve as the originating sources of action, would turn to foam, so that everything distinctive of humanity would become dust and a smell dispersed in the atmosphere.

sRef Ps@90 @4 S3' sRef Ps@2 @7 S3' sRef Jer@23 @23 S3' sRef Jer@23 @24 S3' [3] It is because God is non-temporally in all time that in His Word the present tense is used in speaking of the past and the future, as in Isaiah:

A child is born for us, a Son is given, whose name is Hero, the Prince of peace. Isa. 9:6.

In the Psalms of David:

I will bring news of a decree, said Jehovah to me, you are my son, today have I begotten you. Ps. 2:7.

This refers to the Lord who was to come; and therefore the same author says:

A thousand years in your eyes are as yesterday. Ps. 90:4.

Those who can see and are alive to it can grasp from numerous other passages in the Word that God is everywhere present throughout the world, yet nothing that belongs to the world, that is, nothing spatial or temporal, is present in Him; as from this passage in Jeremiah:

Am I a God near at hand, and not a God at a distance? Can a man lurk in a hiding-place so that I cannot see him? Do I not fill heaven and earth? Jer. 23:23, 24.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 31

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 31

31. (iv) THE INFINITY OF GOD AS PREDICATED OF SPACE IS CALLED IMMENSITY, AND AS PREDICATED OF TIME IS CALLED ETERNITY. DESPITE THESE PREDICATIONS HIS IMMENSITY IS TOTALLY DEVOID OF SPACE AND HIS ETERNITY IS TOTALLY DEVOID OF TIME.

The reason why the infinity of God predicated of space is called immensity, is that the term 'immense' is used of what is great and large, and also what is extensive and in this respect spacious. But the reason why the infinity of God predicated of time is called eternity is that 'for eternity' is used of progressive stages, which are measured by time, without end. For example: the globe with its land and sea surfaces is in itself what enables objects to be regarded as spatial; and its rotation and motion in orbit is what enables them to be regarded as temporal. These movements create periods of time and the surface of the globe creates distances, and they are so perceived through the senses in the minds of those that reflect on them. But as shown above, there is no space or time in God, yet space and time begin from Him. Hence it follows that immensity means His infinity predicated of space, and eternity His infinity predicated of time.

[2] The angels in heaven understand by the immensity of God the Divinity as to Its Being (Esse), and by His eternity the Divinity as to Its Coming-into-Being (Existere); also by immensity they understand the Divinity as to Love and by eternity the Divinity as to Wisdom. This is because the angels banish space and time from their ideas of the Divinity, and this is the result. But because human beings are incapable of thinking except by means of ideas formed from spatial and temporal concepts, they cannot form any idea of the immensity of God before space existed or His eternity before time existed. In fact, when the human mind wishes to form such an idea, it is as if it lapsed into unconsciousness, almost like a shipwrecked mariner who has fallen into the water, or someone swallowed up by the earth in an earthquake. Indeed, if the mind persists in the attempt to penetrate these mysteries, it can easily become deranged, and thus be led to deny the existence of God.

[3] I too was once in a state like this, when I was thinking what God did from eternity, or before the world was made: did He deliberate about creation and work out the order to be followed? was deliberative thought possible in a total vacuum? and other useless speculations. But to prevent me becoming deranged by such speculations, I was lifted up by the Lord into the sphere and light enjoyed by the interior angels; and when the idea of space and time which had previously restricted my thinking was there to a small extent removed, I was allowed to grasp that the eternity of God is not an eternity of time, and that because time did not exist before the creation of the world it was quite useless to engage in such speculations about God. But because the Divine from eternity, and so regarded as separate from all time, does not involve the existence of days, years and centuries, but these are to God a single instant, I concluded that the world was not created by God in time, but that time was introduced by God together with creation.

[4] I will add this account of an experience.

At one end of the spiritual world are to be seen two statues of a monstrous human shape with open mouths and gaping jaws. Those who have useless and mad thoughts about God from eternity imagine themselves being swallowed by these statues. But this is mere imagination into which those plunge who have absurd and improper thoughts about God before the creation of the world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 32

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 32

32. (v) THERE IS MUCH IN THE WORLD WHICH CAN ENABLE ENLIGHTENED REASON TO SEE THE INFINITY OF GOD THE CREATOR.

I shall list some of the things which enable the human reason to see the infinity of God.

(1) The whole of creation does not contain two things which are identical. Scholars have seen and confirmed by their reason that such identity does not exist among things simultaneously present, although there is no limit to the number of substances and forms of matter regarded individually. The rotation of the earth can prove that two identical effects cannot be produced in the world at successive times, because the eccentricity of the poles ensures that the same situation never recurs. The same is obvious from a consideration of people's faces; throughout the world there is no single face entirely similar and identical with another, nor can there be to eternity. This infinite variety could only arise from the infinity of God the Creator.

[2] (2) It is impossible for one person's opinion to be completely like another's, which is why there is a proverb 'many men, many minds.' Similarly it is impossible for one person's mind, that is, his will and understanding, to be completely like and identical with another's. Consequently neither can one person's speech, both in sound and in the thought it expresses, nor one person's actions, either in gesture or the affection that motivates them, be exactly equal to another's. This infinite variety is a kind of mirror showing the infinity of God the Creator.

[3] (3) There is a sort of immensity and eternity inherent in the seed of every animal or vegetable: immensity in that it is capable of infinite multiplication; and eternity, in that the process of multiplication has continued without interruption from the creation of the world down to the present day, and will continue perpetually. In the animal kingdom, take the fish of the sea: if they multiplied in accordance with the quantity of their seed, they would within twenty or thirty years* fill the oceans, so that they consisted of nothing but fish, and their waters would flood and destroy all the land. But to prevent this, God has provided that some fish should be food for others. It would be the same with the seeds of plants. If as many as each plant produces annually were to grow into new plants, within twenty or thirty years they would cover the surface not just of one earth, but many. For there are shrubs, every seed of which produces a hundred or a thousand plants each. Try multiplying these figures by themselves to the power of twenty or thirty, and you will see. From both these examples one can grasp a sort of outline of the immensity and eternity of God, which must inevitably produce their like.

sRef John@10 @38 S4' sRef John@10 @37 S4' [4] (4) An enlightened reason can also grasp something of the infinity of God from the absence of limits to the growth of any science, and so to the growth of an individual's intelligence and wisdom, each of which is capable of growth as a tree grows from seed, and woods and gardens from trees, for here there is no limit. The human memory is the soil in which they are planted, the understanding the medium in which they shoot, the will that in which they bear fruit. These two faculties, the understanding and the will, are such that they are capable of being cultivated and perfected throughout life in this world and afterwards to eternity.

[5] (5) The infinity of God the Creator can also be seen from the infinite number of the stars, each of which are suns, each having its own planetary system. The existence of planets among the stars of the sky, inhabited by human beings, animals, birds and plants, has been demonstrated in a small book of descriptions of things seen.**

[6] (6) An even plainer proof of the infinity of God was afforded me by the heaven of the angels and also by hell; both of these are organised and mutually arranged into countless communities or groups depending upon all the varieties of love of good and evil in them. Every person is allocated his place according to the nature of his love. For here are gathered together all the members of the human race from the creation of the world; and here they will be gathered for ever and ever. Yet although each person has his own place or residence, all there are so linked that the whole of the heaven of the angels is a representation of one Divine Man, and the whole of hell is a representation of one monstrous devil. These two together with the countless wonders they contain provide a clear illustration of the immensity as well as the omnipotence of God.

[7] (7) Again, is there anyone who cannot understand, with only a slight rise in the level of his powers of reasoning, that everlasting life, which everyone has after death, is only possible as the gift of an everlasting God?

[8] (8) In addition to these matters there is a kind of infinity in many things which fall within the reach of a person's natural or spiritual enlightenment. On the natural level, there are various geometrical series which progress to infinity. There is progress to infinity in the three degrees of height: the first degree, called the natural, cannot be perfected and raised to the perfection of the second degree, called the spiritual; nor can this be raised to the perfection of the third, which is called the celestial. There is a similar relationship between end, cause, and effect; no effect can be so perfected as to become as it were its own cause, nor any cause so as to become as it were its own end. This can be illustrated by the atmospheres, of which there are three degrees. The highest is the aura, beneath this there is the ether, and air below this; nor can any quality of the air be raised to any quality of the ether, nor this to any quality of the aura; and yet in each one the raising of perfections is possible to infinity. On the spiritual level, natural love, which is experienced by animals, cannot be raised to the level of spiritual love, which is implanted in human beings from their creation. It is the same with the natural intelligence of animals compared with the spiritual intelligence of human beings. But since these matters are so far not generally known, they will be explained elsewhere.

[9] These examples will establish that universals in the world are permanent models of the infinity of God the Creator. If, however, we ask how the separate instances reflect the universals, that is an abyss, an ocean on which the human mind can as it were set sail; but beware of the storm which arises from the natural man, a storm which can sink the ship, mast, sails and all, stern first, where the natural man stands in all his self-confidence.

*The first edition has 50, clearly an error for 30 as below.
**THE EARTHS IN THE UNIVERSE.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 33

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 33

33. (vi) EVERY CREATED OBJECT IS FINITE, AND THE INFINITE IS CONTAINED IN FINITE OBJECTS AS IN RECEIVERS, AND IN HUMAN BEINGS AS IMAGES OF IT.

Every created object is finite, because it is from Jehovah God that all things exist by means of the sun of the spiritual world, which most nearly surrounds Him; and that sun is composed of a substance which has emanated from Him, the essence of which is love. From that sun by means of its heat and light the universe, from first to last, was created; but this is not the place to expound the order of creation. A sketch of this will be given later. Here it is only important to know that one was formed from another, and that thus the three degrees were established: three in the spiritual world, and three corresponding to these in the natural world, and three more in the inert substances of which the terrestrial globe is composed. The origin and nature of those degrees have been fully expounded in my ANGELIC WISDOM CONCERNING THE DIVINE LOVE AND THE DIVINE WISDOM (Amsterdam, 1763) and the booklet ON THE RELATIONSHIP OF THE SOUL AND THE BODY (London, 1769). It was these degrees which made all subsequent things receivers of earlier ones, and these of yet earlier ones, and so eventually a receiver of the primordial substances which compose the sun of the heaven of angels; thus they are finite receivers of the infinite. This too is in agreement with the wisdom of the ancients, who held that everything is infinitely divisible. It is generally thought that because the finite cannot contain the infinite, finite things cannot be receivers of the infinite. But it has been established by what I have written about creation in my books that God first limited His infinity by means of substances emanating from Him, and this was the origin of the circuit most nearly surrounding Him which constitutes the sun of the spiritual world, and that by means of that sun He made the remaining circuits down to the last, which is composed of inert matter; and thus by degrees He made the world more and more limited. These remarks are made so as to satisfy the human reason, which is not happy unless it sees the cause.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 34

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 34

sRef Gen@1 @26 S0' sRef Gen@1 @27 S0' 34. The Divine Infinite is present in human beings as in images of itself, as is evident from the Word, where we read:

At length God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; so God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him. Gen. 1:26, 27

From this it follows that a human being is an organ capable of receiving God, and that its capability as an organ depends upon its capacity to receive. The human mind, which determines that a human being is human and how far he is so, is organised into three zones in accordance with the three degrees. In the first degree is the celestial zone, in which are the angels of the highest heaven; in the second degree is the spiritual zone in which are the angels of the middle heaven; and in the third degree is the natural zone in which are the angels of the lowest heaven.

[2] The human mind, organised as it is according to those three degrees, is a means of receiving Divine influence, but the Divine influence does not penetrate further than the extent to which a person clears the way or opens the door. If he does so up to the highest or celestial degree, then a person truly becomes an image of God, and after his death an angel of the highest heaven. But if he clears the way or opens the door only to the middle or spiritual degree, then although he becomes an image of God it is not to such a pitch of perfection, and after his death he becomes an angel of the middle heaven. But if he clears the way or opens the door only to the lowest or natural degree, then if he acknowledges God and worships Him with true piety, he becomes an image of God in the lowest degree, and after his death becomes an angel of the lowest heaven.

[3] If, however, he does not acknowledge God and worship Him with true piety, he puts off the image of God and becomes like an animal, apart from possessing the faculty of understanding and therefore of speech. If he then shuts off the highest natural degree, which corresponds to the highest celestial, he becomes so far as love is concerned like an animal. If he shuts off the middle natural degree, which corresponds to the middle spiritual, he becomes so far as love is concerned like a fox, and as far as the sight of the understanding is concerned like a nocturnal bird. But if he also shuts off the spiritual part of the lowest natural degree, he becomes so far as love is concerned like a savage beast, and as far as his understanding of truth is concerned like a fish.

[4] Divine Life, which by radiation from the sun of the heaven of angels makes human beings act, can be compared with the light from the sun of this world and its radiation affecting a diaphanous object. The way life is received in the highest degree is like light striking a diamond; in the second degree like light striking a crystal, and in the lowest degree like light striking glass or a transparent membrane. But if the spiritual part of this degree is totally shut off, which happens when the existence of God is denied and Satan is worshipped, the way life from God is received is like light falling upon dark objects on earth, such as rotten wood or a lump of mud or dung, and so on. For then a person becomes a spiritual corpse.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 35

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 35

35.. I shall here add the following account of an experience.*

Once I was amazed at the huge number of people who regard nature as the source of creation, and therefore of everything beneath or above the sun. When they see anything they say, and they give it heartfelt acknowledgment, 'Surely this is due to nature'; and when they are asked why, they say that this is due to nature rather than to God, when they still sometimes follow the usual view that God created nature, so that they could just as well say that what they see is due to God rather than to nature, they reply muttering almost inaudibly to themselves, 'What is God but nature?' This false belief that nature created the universe, a piece of madness they take for wisdom, makes them so puffed up that they look on all who acknowledge that God created the universe as ants, creeping along the ground, treading a worn path; and some as butterflies flying around in the air. They call their dogmas dreams, because they see things the others cannot, and they say: 'Who has ever seen God? We can all see nature.'

[2] While I was wondering at the immense number of such people, an angel came and stood beside me, saying 'What are you thinking about?'

I replied, 'How many people there are who believe that nature produces itself and is therefore the creator of the universe.'

'The whole of hell,' the angel told me, 'is composed of such people; there they are called satans and devils. Those who have formed a firm belief in nature and consequently denied the existence of God are satans; those who have spent their lives in crimes and thus banished from their hearts any acknowledgment of God are devils. But I will take you to the schools in the south-western quarter where such people who are not yet in hell live.'

So he took me by the hand and guided me. I saw some cottages containing schools and one building in their midst which seemed to be their headquarters. It was built of pitch-black stones coated with glassy plates giving the appearance of glittering gold and silver, rather like the stones called selenites or mica. Here and there were interspersed shining shells.

[3] We went up to this building and knocked. Someone quickly opened the door and made us welcome. He hurried to a table and brought us four books, saying: 'These books contain the wisdom which the majority of kingdoms approve to-day. This book contains the wisdom favoured by many in France, this by many in Germany, this by some in Holland, and this by some in Britain.' He went on: 'If you like to watch, I will make these four books shine before your eyes.' Then he poured forth and enveloped the books in the glory of his own reputation, so that at once the books shone as it were with light. But this light immediately vanished from our sight.

We asked him then what he was now writing. He replied that at present he was bringing out of his stores and displaying the very kernel of wisdom. This could by summarised as: (1) Whether nature is due to life, or life to nature; (2) whether a centre is due to an expanse, or an expanse to a centre; (3) about the centre and expanse of nature and life.

[4] So saying he sat down again at the table, while we strolled around his spacious school. He had a candle on the table, because there was no sunlight there, but only moonlight. What surprised me was that the candle seemed to roam about and cast its light; but because the wick was not trimmed it gave little light. While he was writing, we saw images of different shapes flying up from the table on to the walls. In that night-time moonlight they looked like beautiful birds from India. But as soon as we opened the door, in the sunlight of daytime they looked like nocturnal birds with net-like wings. They were apparent truths turned into fallacies by adducing proofs which he had ingeniously linked into coherent series.

[5] After seeing this we approached the table and asked him what he was now writing.

'My first proposition:' he said, 'whether nature is due to life or life to nature.' He remarked that on this point he could prove either proposition and make it appear true. But because of some lurking fear which was not explicit, he dare only prove that nature is due to life, that is to say, comes from life, and not the reverse, that life is due to, that is, comes from nature.

We asked politely what was the lurking fear he could not make explicit.

He replied that it was the fear of being called by the clergy a nature-worshipper and so an atheist, and by the laity a person of unsound mind, because both parties are either believers from blind faith or people who see that it is so by studying supporting arguments.

[6] Then our zealous indignation for the truth got the better of us and we addressed him thus: 'My friend, you are quite wrong. Your wisdom, which is no more than an ingenuity of style, has led you astray, and your desire for reputation has induced you to prove what you do not believe. Do you not know that the human mind is capable of being raised above the objects of the senses, that is to say, the thoughts engendered by the bodily senses; and when it is so raised it can see the products of life at a higher level and the products of nature below? What is life but love and wisdom? And what is nature but a receiver of love and wisdom, a means to bring about their effects or purposes? Can these be one, except as principal and instrumental? Light surely cannot be one with the eye, nor sound with the ear. What is the cause of these senses if not life, and what is the cause of their shapes if not nature? What is the human body but an organ for receiving life? Are not all its parts organically constructed to produce what love wills and the understanding thinks? Surely the body's organs spring from nature, but love and thought spring from life. Are these not quite distinct from each other? Raise the view of your mind a little higher, and you will see that emotion and thought are due to life; that emotion is due to love and thought to wisdom, and both of them are due to life, for, as has been said before, love and wisdom constitute life. If you raise your intellectual faculty a little higher still, you will see that love and wisdom could not exist unless somewhere they had a source, and that this source is Love Itself and Wisdom Itself, therefore Life Itself. These are God, who is the source of nature.'

[7] Afterwards we talked with him about his second proposition, whether the centre is due to the expanse, or the expanse to the centre. We asked his reasons for discussing this subject. He replied that it was in order to enable him to reach a conclusion about the centre and expanse of nature and life, which one was the source of the other. When we asked his opinion, he made the same reply as before, that he could prove either proposition, but for fear of losing his reputation he proved that the expanse was due to, that is to say, was the source of the centre. 'All the same,' he said, 'I know that something existed before there was a sun, and this was distributed throughout the expanse, and this of itself reduced itself to order, so creating a centre.'

[8] The zeal of our indignation made us address him again, saying: 'My friend, you are mad.' On hearing this he drew his chair back from the table and looked fearfully at us, but then listened with a smile on his face. 'What could be more crazy, 'we went on, 'than to say the centre is due to the expanse? We take your centre to mean the sun, and your expanse to be the universe; so you hold that the universe came into existence without the sun, do you? Surely the sun produces nature and all its properties, which are solely dependent upon the light and heat radiated by the sun and propagated through atmospheres? Where could these have been before there was a sun? We will explain their origin later on in the discussion. Are not the atmospheres, and everything on earth, like surfaces, the centre of which is the sun? What would become of them all without the sun? Could they last a single instant? And what of them all before there was a sun? Could they have come into existence? Is not subsistence continuous coming into existence? Since therefore the subsistence of everything in nature depends upon the sun, so must their coming into existence. Everyone can see this and acknowledge it from personal experience.

[9] Does not what is later in order subsist, just as it comes into existence, from what is earlier? If the surface were earlier and the centre later, should we not have what is earlier subsisting from what is later - something which is contrary to the laws of order? How can the later produce the earlier, or the more outward the more inward, or the grosser the purer? How then could the surfaces making up an expanse produce a centre? Anyone can see that this is contrary to the laws of nature. We have drawn these proofs from rational analysis to show that the expanse is produced by the centre, and not the reverse, although everyone who thinks correctly can see this for himself without these proofs. You said that the expanse of its own accord came together to form a centre. Did this happen by chance, that everything fell into such a wonderful and amazing order, so that one thing should be on account of the next, and every single thing on account of human beings and their everlasting life? Can nature inspired by some love and working through some wisdom have ends in view, foresee causes and so provide effects to bring such things about in due order? Can nature turn human beings into angels, build a heaven of them, and make its inhabitants live for ever? Accept these propositions and think them over; your idea of nature begetting nature will collapse.'

[10] After this we asked him what he had thought, and still did, about his third proposition, about the centre and expanse of nature and life. Did he believe that the centre and expanse of life were the same as the centre and expanse of nature?

He said that here he hesitated. He had previously believed that the inward activity of nature was life and that love and wisdom, which are the essential components of human life, come from this source. It is produced by the heat and light coming from the fire of the sun and transmitted through atmospheres. But now as the result of what he had heard about people living after death he was in doubt, a doubt which alternately lifted up and depressed his mind. When it was lifted up, he acknowledged a centre which had previously been quite unknown to him; when it was depressed he saw a centre which he thought to be the only one. Life was from the centre previously unknown to him, and nature from the centre he thought to be the only one, each centre being surrounded by an expanse.

[11] We said we approved of that, so long as he was willing to view the centre and expanse of nature from the centre and expanse of life, and not the reverse. We taught him that above the heaven of the angels there is a Sun which is pure love; it appears fiery, like the sun in the world, and the heat radiated from it is the source of will and love among angels and human beings; the light radiating from it produces their understanding and wisdom. Everything from this source is called spiritual; but the radiation from the sun of the natural world is a container or receiver of life; this is what we call natural. The expanse proper to the centre of life is called the spiritual world, and the expanse proper to the centre of nature is called the natural world, which owes its subsistence to its own sun. Now because space and time cannot be predicated of love and wisdom, but there are states instead, it follows that the expanse surrounding the sun of the heaven of angels is not a spatial extension, though it is present in the extension to which the natural sun belongs, and with the living things there, depending upon their ability to receive them, and this is determined by their forms and states.

[12] But then he asked, 'What is the origin of fire in the sun of the world, the natural sun?'

We replied that it was from the sun of the heaven of angels, which is not fire, but the Divine Love most nearly radiating from God, who is in its midst. Since he found this surprising, we gave this explanation: 'Love in its essence is spiritual fire; that is why "fire" in the spiritual sense of the Word stands for love. That is why priests in church pray that heavenly fire may fill their hearts, meaning love. The fire on the altar and the fire of the lampstand in the Tabernacle of the Israelites was nothing but a representation of Divine Love. The heat of the blood, or the vital heat of human beings, and of animals in general, comes from no other source than the love which makes up their life. That is why people become warm, grow hot and burst into flame, when their love is raised to zeal, or is aroused to anger and rage. Therefore the fact that spiritual heat, being love, produces natural heat in human beings, to such an extent as to fire and inflame their faces and bodies, can serve as a proof that the fire of the natural sun arose from no other source than the fire of the spiritual sun, which is Divine love.

[13] Now because the expanse arises from the centre, and not the reverse, as we said before, and the centre of life, which is the sun of the heaven of angels, is the Divine Love most nearly radiating from God, who is in the midst of that sun; and because this is the origin of the expanse deriving from that centre, which is called the spiritual world; and because that sun brought into being the sun of the world, and also the expanse which is called the natural world, it is plain that the universe was created by God.'

After this we went away, and he accompanied us out of the courtyard of his school, speaking with us about heaven and hell, and about Divine guidance, showing new powers of sagacity.
*This is repeated from CL 380.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 36

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 36

36. THE ESSENCE OF GOD, WHICH IS THE DIVINE LOVE AND THE DIVINE WISDOM

We made a distinction between the Being (Esse) and Essence of God, because there is a distinction between God's Infinity and His Love, and the term infinity is applicable to God's Being and the term Love to His Essence. As stated above, God's Being is more universal than His Essence; and in the same way His Infinity is more universal than His Love. For this reason 'infinite' is the adjective appropriate to the essentials and attributes of God; all of these are called infinite, thus the Divine Love is infinite, the Divine Wisdom is infinite, and so is the Divine Power. It is not that God's Being existed before His Essence, but it enters into His Essence as an adjunct which is inseparable, directing, forming and at the same time raising it to a higher plane. This section of the chapter will be discussed under separate headings as before.

(i) God is Love itself and Wisdom itself, these two making up His Essence.

(ii) God is Good itself and Truth itself, because Good refers to Love and Truth to Wisdom.

(iii) Love itself and Wisdom itself constitute Life itself, or Life in itself.

(iv) Love and Wisdom are one in God.

(v) The essence of love is loving others than oneself, wishing to be one with them and devoting oneself to their happiness.

(vi) These properties of the Divine Love were the reason the universe was created, and are the reason it is preserved in existence.

These headings must now be discussed one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 37

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 37

37. (i) GOD IS LOVE ITSELF AND WISDOM ITSELF, THESE TWO MAKING UP HIS ESSENCE.

Our earliest ancestors realised that love and wisdom are the two essentials to which are to be ascribed all the infinite qualities which are in God or emanate from Him. But succeeding ages gradually lost this vision, as they allowed their minds to sink down from heaven and plunge into worldly and bodily affairs. They began to be unaware of what love is in its essence, and so what wisdom is in its essence, for they did not know that love cannot exist in the abstract without form, but works in and through a form. Now since God is the very, sole and prime substance and form, the essence of which is love and wisdom, and since it was from Him that all things came that were made, it follows that He created the universe in all its parts out of love by means of wisdom, and thus the Divine Love together with the Divine Wisdom is present in every single created object. Love too is not only the Essence which forms everything, but it also unites and joins them, so keeping together what has been formed.

[2] Countless things in the world can serve to illustrate this. For instance, the sun's heat and light, which are the two essentials and universals which enable every single thing on earth to come into and continue in existence. They are there because they correspond to the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom; for the heat radiated by the sun of the spiritual world is in its essence love, and the light from this source is in its essence wisdom. Another illustration might be the two essentials and universals which enable human minds to come into and continue in existence, namely, will and understanding. Every mind is composed of these two faculties, and the same two are present and function in every one of its acts. The reason is that the will is a receiver and seat of love, and the understanding likewise of wisdom. Therefore these two faculties correspond to the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom, from which they originally came. Yet another illustration is the two essentials and universals which enable human bodies to come into and continue in existence, namely, the heart and the lungs, or the systolic and diastolic motion of the heart and the breathing of the lungs. It is well known that these two function in every part of the body; the reason is that the heart corresponds to love and the lungs to wisdom. This correspondence was fully proved in my book ANGELIC WISDOM ABOUT THE DIVINE LOVE AND THE DIVINE WISDOM published in Amsterdam.

[3] Countless examples in both the spiritual and the natural worlds can be adduced to prove that love like a bridegroom or husband produces or begets all forms, but by means of wisdom as bride or wife. Only one can be mentioned here: the whole heaven of the angels is arranged into its form and preserved in it by the Divine Love acting by means of the Divine Wisdom. Those who infer that the world was created from any other source, and are unaware that the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom make up the Divine Essence, sink from the vision of reason to the vision of the eye. They embrace nature as the creative force of the universe, thus conceiving chimeras and giving birth to ghosts. Their thoughts are fallacies, from which they reason and draw conclusions like* eggs containing night birds. Such minds do not deserve that name; they are mere eyes and ears devoid of understanding, or thoughts devoid of soul. They talk of colours as if they could come into existence without light, about trees as if they could grow without seed, about everything on earth as if it could come into existence without sunlight. What they are doing is to confuse derived things with the principles from which they are derived, and caused things with causes. This stands everything on its head, and they lull their wakeful reason to sleep, until they are dreaming.

*The Latin of this sentence is peculiar, and 'like' has been supplied; but perhaps there is a more serious omission here.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 38

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 38

38. (ii) GOD IS GOOD ITSELF AND TRUTH ITSELF, BECAUSE GOOD REFERS TO LOVE AND TRUTH TO WISDOM.

Everyone knows that everything has reference to good and truth, an indication that everything owed its origin to love and wisdom. For everything which comes from love is called good, for so it is felt, and the pleasure by which love shows itself is each person's good. Everything which comes from wisdom is called truth, for wisdom is composed of nothing but truths and bathes its objects in beautiful light; this beauty when so perceived is the truth arising from good. Love therefore is a compound of all kinds of goodness, and wisdom a compound of all kinds of truth. But both of these are from God, who is Love itself and thus Good itself, and Wisdom itself and thus Truth itself. This is why the church has two essentials, called charity and faith, which make up its whole structure and are present in every part of it. The reason is that all the kinds of good belonging to the church are part of and are called charity, and all its truths are part of and are called faith. The delights of love, which are also the delights of charity, are responsible for the delights being called goods; and the beauties of wisdom, which are also the beauties of faith, are responsible for truths being called truths. It is the delights and beauties which give them life; unless they have life from this source, the different kinds of good and truth are so to speak lifeless and barren.

[2] But the delights of love are of two kinds, and so are the beauties which look as if they belonged to wisdom. There are the delights of the love of good and those of the love of evil, and so too there are the beauties of faith in truth and those of faith in falsity. Both those kinds of delight of love are called good by the people who possess them, because this is how they are felt; and both those kinds of faith are also called good, since this is how they are perceived. But because they are in the understanding they are actually truths. All the same they are opposites, and the good of one love is good, that of the other is evil; and the truth of one faith is truth, that of the other is falsity. The love whose delight is in essence good resembles the heat of the sun, which gives life and fruitfulness as it works upon a fertile soil, useful trees and crops. Where its power is felt, a paradise is created, a garden of Jehovah, a sort of land of Canaan. The beauty of its truth resembles the sun's light in springtime, or light striking a crystal vessel full of lovely flowers, and giving out fragrance when it is opened. But the delight of the love of evil is like the heat of the sun parching and withering as it works on barren soil, and harmful trees, such as thorns and briars. Where its power is felt, an Arabian desert is created, full of poisonous snakes and fiery serpents; and the beauty of falsity is like the sun's light in winter, or light striking a leather bottle, full of worms swimming in vinegar, and foul-smelling creeping things.

sRef Matt@13 @30 S3' sRef Matt@13 @41 S3' sRef Matt@13 @40 S3' [3] It ought to be known that every good is formed by truths, and clothes itself by their means, so as to be distinct from any other good. Moreover, the goods of one family group themselves in bundles, and give these a covering, to make them distinct from others. It is evident from all the parts of the human body that its structures are so organised. The reason the same thing happens in the human mind is that everything in the mind perpetually corresponds to the details of the body. Consequently the human mind is organised inwardly out of spiritual substances, externally out of natural substances and finally out of matter. The mind, whose delights of love are good, is inwardly built up of the kind of spiritual substances which are to be found in heaven. But the mind whose delights are evil is built up inwardly of the kind of spiritual substances which are to be found in hell. The evils of one are gathered into bundles by falsities, the kinds of good of the other by means of truths. Since kinds of good and evil are made up into such bundles, the Lord says that the tares are to be collected into bundles for burning, and so are the things which give offence (Matt. 13:30, 40, 41; John 15:6).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 39

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 39

sRef John@1 @4 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' 39. (iii) SINCE GOD IS LOVE ITSELF AND WISDOM ITSELF, HE IS LIFE ITSELF, OR LIFE IN ITSELF.*

We read in John:

The Word was with God, and the Word was God; in Him was Life, and the Life was the light of men. John 1:14.

'God' means there the Divine Love, and 'the Word' means the Divine Wisdom; and the Divine Wisdom is truly life, and life is truly the light radiated by the sun of the spiritual world, in the midst of which is Jehovah God. The Divine Love gives shape to life, just as fire shapes light. Fire possesses two properties: that of burning and that of shining. Its burning radiates heat, its shining light. In the same way love has two properties: the one to which the burning of fire corresponds is something which acts intimately upon a person's will; the other, to which the shining corresponds, is something which acts intimately upon a person's understanding. This is the source of human love and intelligence. For as I have said several times before, the sun of the spiritual world radiates heat which in its essence is love, and light which in its essence is wisdom. These two forms of radiation impinge on every single thing in the universe and affect them intimately. In the case of people they affect their will and their understanding, which were created to receive this radiation, the will to receive love and the understanding to receive wisdom. Hence it is clear that a person's life resides in his understanding and is in accordance with his wisdom, and that the love of the will modifies it.

* This does not exactly repeat the heading given in 36.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 40

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 40

sRef John@5 @26 S0' 40. We also read in John:

As the Father has life in Himself, so did He grant the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26.

This means that just as the Divine itself, which existed from eternity, has life in itself, so has the Human which it assumed in time. Life in itself is the very, sole life which enables angels and men to live. Human reason can grasp this by considering the light radiated by the sun of the natural world. This light is not capable of being created, but the forms which receive it are created; the eyes are designed to receive light, and it is the light radiated by the sun which enables them to see. It is the same with life, which, as said before, is light radiated by the sun of the spiritual world; this is not capable of being created, but by its continuous radiation as it were lights up and gives life to men's understanding. It follows that since light, life and wisdom are one, wisdom too cannot be created; and the same is true of faith, truth, love, charity and good. It is the forms which receive them which are created, namely, the minds of men and angels.

[2] Let everyone therefore beware of convincing himself that he owes his life to himself, or his intelligence, belief, love, perception of truth or his willing and doing good. In so far as he convinces himself of these ideas, so far does he cast down his mind earthwards from heaven, and from being spiritual becomes natural, influenced by the senses and the body. For he thus shuts off the higher regions of his mind, so that he becomes blinded to everything which relates to God, heaven and the church. Everything he may then think, reason and say is mere foolishness, because he is in darkness; yet at the same time he becomes confident that these are the products of wisdom. For when the higher regions of the mind, the abode of the true light of life, are shut off, the region of the mind below these, which is illuminated only by the faint glimmer of the world, is opened up. This glimmer, unsupported by the light of the higher regions, is a misleading illumination, in which falsities look like truths, and truths like falsities; reasoning from falsities looks like wisdom, and from truths like madness. Then a person believes himself to have the keenness of sight of an eagle, though he can see no more of wisdom than a bat in daytime.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 41

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 41

41. (iv) LOVE AND WISDOM ARE ONE IN GOD.

Every wise man who belongs to the church knows that all the good of love and charity come from God, and likewise all the truth of wisdom and faith. Human reason can see that this is so, so long as it knows that the source of love and wisdom is the sun of the spiritual world, in the midst of which is Jehovah God, or, what is the same thing, they come from Jehovah God through the sun which surrounds Him. For the heat radiated by that sun is in its essence love, and the light from it is in its essence wisdom. So it is as plain as daylight that in their source love and wisdom are one; consequently in God too, since He is the source of that sun. The sun of the natural world can serve to demonstrate this: it is pure fire, its fiery property producing heat and the brilliance of its fire producing light; so these two are one at their source.

[2] But in their radiation heat and light become separated, as is shown by the things on which they act, some of which receive more heat and some more light. This is particularly true of people, for in this case the light of life, which is intelligence, is separated from the heat of life, which is love. This is because a person needs to be reformed and regenerated, which is impossible unless the light of life, which is intelligence, shows what ought to be willed and loved. It should, however, be known that God is constantly working to link love with wisdom in a person, though he, unless he looks to God and believes in Him, is constantly working to separate them. Therefore in so far as these two, the good of love or charity and the truth of wisdom or faith, are linked in a person, so far does he become an image of God, and is raised towards and into the heaven where angels live. In the contrary case, in so far as these two are separated in a person, so far does he become an image of Lucifer and the Dragon, and is cast down from heaven to earth, and then into hell beneath the earth. The result of these two being linked is that a person's state becomes like that of a tree in springtime, when heat is evenly combined with light, which produces budding, flowering and fruiting. In the contrary case, when these are separated, his state is like that of a tree in winter, when light loses its heat, and the tree is laid bare and stripped of all its leaves and greenery.

[3] When spiritual heat, which is love, is separated from spiritual light, which is wisdom, or, in other words, charity is separated from faith, a person becomes like rank or rotting soil, in which maggots thrive; and if it produces shrubs, their leaves are full of grubs which eat them up. For the enticements of the love of evil, which are in themselves longings, burst forth, untamed and unrestrained by intelligence, but rather fostered, pampered and nourished by it. In short, the separation of love and wisdom, or charity and faith, the two things God constantly strives to link, is, to use a comparison, like depriving a face of redness, so producing a pallor as of death; or taking the whiteness away from redness, which makes the face like a blazing torch. It is also like destroying the bond of marriage between a couple, so that the wife becomes a prostitute and the husband an adulterer. For love or charity resembles a husband, wisdom or faith a wife. Their separation brings about spiritual prostitution and fornication, which are the falsification of truth and the adulteration of good.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 42

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 42

42. It should also be known that there are three degrees of love and wisdom, and so three degrees of life; and the human mind is formed into three regions corresponding to these degrees. Life in the highest region is in its highest degree, in the second in a lesser degree, and in the last in the lowest degree. These regions are opened up successively as a person grows up. The last region, where life is in its lowest degree, is opened up from infancy to childhood, as different kinds of knowledge are acquired. The second degree, where life is in a greater degree, is opened up, from childhood to adolescence, as the result of thinking based on knowledge. The highest degree, where life is in its highest degree, is opened up from adolescence to early manhood and beyond; and this is brought about by grasping both moral and spiritual truths.

[2] It should further be known that perfection of life consists not in thought but in perceiving truth in the light of truth. From this one can deduce how different people's lives are. There are those who at once
on hearing a truth perceive that it is true; these are represented in the spiritual world by eagles. There are those who do not perceive a truth, but deduce it as the result of arguments based upon appearances; these are represented by song-birds. There are those who believe a truth at the behest of an authoritative speaker; these are represented by magpies. There are also those who do not wish to and those who cannot perceive a truth, but only falsity. The reason is that they live in a deceptive light, and this makes a falsity look like truth, and a truth either as something overhead wrapped in thick cloud, or as a meteor, or even as falsity. Their thinking is represented by little owls and their speaking by screech-owls. Those of them who have convinced themselves of their false beliefs cannot bear to hear truths, and as soon as any truth knocks at the door of their ears, they turn away and reject it, very much as a stomach crammed with bilious matter is nauseated by food and vomits it up.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 43

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 43

43. (v) THE ESSENCE OF LOVE IS LOVING OTHERS THAN ONESELF, WISHING TO BE ONE WITH THEM AND DEVOTING ONESELF TO THEIR HAPPINESS.

There are two things which make up the essence of God - love and wisdom; but there are three which make up the essence of His love - loving others than oneself, wishing to be one with them, and devoting oneself to their happiness. The same three make up the essence of His wisdom, because, as I have shown above, love and wisdom are one in God. It is love which wills these things, wisdom that puts them into effect.

sRef Matt@5 @45 S2' [2] The first essential, loving others than oneself, is to be recognised in God's love towards the whole human race. On this account God loves everything He has created, because they are the means to an end, and if you love the end, you must love the means. Everyone and everything in the universe are other than God, because they are finite and God is infinite. God's love goes out and extends not only to good people and things, but also to evil people and things; consequently, not only to people and things in heaven, but also to people and things in hell, not only to Michael and Gabriel, but also to the Devil and Satan. For God is everywhere and from eternity to eternity the same. He says too that He makes His sun rise upon the good and the evil, and sends rain upon the righteous and the unrighteous (Matt. 5:45). But it is the fault of evil people and things that they are evil, because they do not receive God's love as it is, and as it most inwardly is, but as they are. It is the same as a thorn or a nettle receiving the heat of the sun or the rain.

sRef John@17 @21 S3' sRef John@17 @22 S3' sRef John@17 @26 S3' sRef John@17 @23 S3' [3] The second essential of God's love, wishing to be one with others, is to be recognised also in His linking Himself to the heaven of angels, the church on earth, to everyone in it, and to every good and truth which compose and make up men and the church. Love regarded in itself is nothing but a striving to be linked. Therefore to realise this essential of love God created man in His image and likeness, so that he could be linked with this. It is clear from the Lord's words that the Divine Love has linking as its constant aim, when He says that He wishes to be one with them, He in them and they in Him, and that the love of God might be in them (John 17:21-23, 26).

[4] The third essential of God's love, to devote Himself to the happiness of others, is to be recognised in everlasting life, which is blessedness, bliss and happiness without end, which He gives to those who receive His love into themselves. For God, just as He is Love itself, is also blessedness itself. For every love breathes out an aura of joy from itself, and the Divine Love breathes out the very height of blessedness, bliss and happiness for ever; so God makes the angels and men after death happy from Himself, which He does by being linked with them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 44

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 44

44. That this is the nature of the Divine Love is to be known from its sphere which pervades the universe, and affects every person according to his mental state. It particularly affects parents, since it is this which makes them dearly love their children, who are other than themselves, wish to be one with them, and devote themselves to their happiness. This sphere of the Divine Love affects not only the good but also the bad; and not only human beings, but also animals and birds of every kind. What has any mother in mind when she has given birth to a child but to unite herself with it and seek its good? What bird has anything in mind when it has hatched its chicks other than to warm them under its wings, and by kisses to put food into their gullets? It is well known that even snakes and vipers love their offspring. That universal sphere especially affects those who receive that love of God's into themselves, and these are those who believe in God and love the neighbour. Charity in their case is an image of that love.

[2] Even friendship among those who are not good apes that love. At his table a person gives his friend the best portion, embraces him, touches him and holds his hand, and promises to put himself at his friend's service. The feeling of liking and the striving of those who are alike and of the same type to be together come from the same origin. That same Divine sphere also works on inanimate things, as on trees and plants, but it does this through the sun of the world, and its heat and light. The heat penetrates them from without, links itself to them, and makes them bud, flower and fruit, which answers to happiness in an animal. This is the result of that heat, because it corresponds to spiritual heat, which is love. There are even representations of the working of this love in various things in the mineral kingdom; specimens of this are to be seen in the exaltation* of minerals into useful forms and the formation of gems.

*Exaltation: a term of early chemistry for the transformation of elements into different forms, e.g. the formation of diamonds from carbon.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 45

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 45

45. The description of the essence of the Divine Love allows us also to see its opposite, the essence of devilish love. Devilish love is self-love, and it goes by the name of love, but regarded in itself is hatred, for it loves no one other than itself, and has no wish to be linked with others for their happiness, but only its own. Its inmost nature is a continual attempt to rule over everyone, to possess everyone's goods, and finally to be adored like a god. This is why the inhabitants of hell do not acknowledge God, but treat as gods those who are more powerful than others; so they have lower and higher, or minor and major deities, depending on the extent of their power. Because each person there has his heart set on that, he has a burning hatred of his own deity; and he in turn of those who are under his control. He looks upon them as worthless servants, to whom he talks politely so long as they worship him, but is fired with rage against the rest, and inwardly or in his heart against his own followers. Self-love is the same as love among thieves, who hug each other when they are engaged in robberies, but later on they ardently long to murder the others and steal their booty from them.

[2] This love is the reason why its desires in hell, where it is sovereign, look at a distance like various kinds of wild beasts; some like foxes and leopards, some like wolves and tigers, some like crocodiles and poisonous snakes. The deserts where they live consist of nothing but piles of stones or bare gravel, interspersed with marshes full of croaking frogs. Mournful birds swoop over their huts wailing. These are the ochim, tziim and iyim mentioned in the prophetic books of the Word which describe the love of domination arising from self-love (Isa. 13:21; Jer. 50:39; Ps. 74:14).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 46

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 46

46. (vi) THESE PROPERTIES OF THE DIVINE LOVE WERE THE REASON THE UNIVERSE WAS CREATED, AND ARE THE REASON IT IS PRESERVED IN EXISTENCE.

A thorough scrutiny and examination of these three essentials of the Divine Love can lead us to see that they were the reason for creation. That the first, loving others than itself, was a cause is clear from the universe being other than God, as the world is other than the sun, and something to which His love could extend and on which it could be exercised and so come to rest. We read too that, after God had created heaven and the earth, He rested, and this was the origin of the Sabbath (Gen. 2:2, 3).

[2] The second essential, wishing to be one with them, was also a cause as is clear from the creation of man in the image and likeness of God. By this is meant that man was made as a form to receive love and wisdom from God, that is, to be someone with whom God could unite Himself, and on his account with every single thing in the universe, since these are nothing but means to the end. For being linked to a final cause involves also being linked to mediate causes. It is clear from the Book of Creation or Genesis (1:28-30) that all things were created on account of man.

[3] The third essential, devoting oneself to their happiness, was also a cause, as is clear from the heaven of angels, which has been provided for every human being who receives the love of God; all there are made happy by God alone. These three essentials of God's love are also the reason why the universe is preserved, because preservation is perpetual creation, just as remaining in existence is a perpetual coming into existence; and the Divine Love is from eternity to eternity the same. So as it was in the creation of the world, such too it remains in the created world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 47

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 47

47. A proper perception of these matters may show that the universe is a coherent whole from first to last, since it contains ends, causes and effects bound up in an indissoluble knot. Since every love has an end in view, and all wisdom is the advancement of the end through mediate causes, and through these proceeding to effects, which are the purposes it serves, it follows too that the universe contains the Divine Love, the Divine Wisdom and services, and is thus a coherent whole from first to last. Every wise man can study as in a mirror the fact that the universe is composed of a perpetual succession of services brought about by wisdom and initiated by love, if he forms for himself any general idea about the creation of the universe, and examines its details. For the details adapt themselves to the general pattern, and this arranges them into a consonant form. Many illustrations of this will be given in the following pages.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 48

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 48

48. At this point I shall insert the following account of an experience.*

Once I had a talk with two angels, one from the eastern and one from the southern heaven. When they perceived that I was pondering the mysteries of wisdom on the subject of love, they said: 'Don't you know anything about the contests of wisdom in our world?' 'Not yet,' I replied.

'There are many of them,' they said, adding that those who love truths with a spiritual affection, that is, love them because they are truths and are the way to wisdom, meet when the signal is given, to discuss matters requiring profound understanding and form conclusions about them.

They then took me by the hand saying, 'Come with us, and you will see and hear. The signal has been given for a meeting to-day.'

I was taken across a plain to a hill, at the foot of which there was an avenue of palm trees extending all the way to the top. We went into it and climbed the hill. On the top or summit of the hill we saw a wood, among the trees of which a rise in the ground formed a sort of theatre. Inside this was a flat space paved with pebbles of different colours, and around this were ranged seats in a square; these were occupied by the lovers of wisdom. In the middle of the theatre was a table, and a document secured with a seal lay on it.

sRef Gen@1 @27 S2' sRef Gen@5 @1 S2' sRef Gen@1 @26 S2' [2] Those who were sitting on the seats invited us to occupy some which were still vacant, but I replied: 'I have been brought here by two angels to see and listen, not to take part in the session.'

Then the two angels went up to the table in the middle of the arena and broke the seal on the document; they then read out to the meeting the mysteries of wisdom written in the document, which they were to discuss and expound. It had been written by angels of the third heaven, and sent down to lie on the table. There were three mysteries: the first, 'What is the image of God and the likeness of God in which man was created?', the second, 'Why is man born without knowledge of what he should love, yet animals and birds, the highest as well as the lowest, are born knowing all their loves require?'; the third, 'What is the meaning of "the tree of life", "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil", and "eating of them"?'

Underneath was written: 'Link these three subjects into a single statement of opinion, and write it on a fresh sheet of paper; then replace it on this table, and we shall look at it. If the opinion appears well-balanced and fair, each of you will be awarded a prize for wisdom.' After reading this out the two angels went away and rose up into their own heavens.

Then those taking part in the session began to discuss and expound the mysteries set before them. They spoke in turn, beginning with those who sat on the north side, then those who sat on the west, then the south and finally the east. They took up the first subject for discussion, which was: 'What is the image of God and what is the likeness of God in which man was created?' First of all the following passages were read aloud from the Book of Creation:

God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and God created man in His own image, to be an image** of God He made him. Gen. 1:26, 27.

On the day when God created man, He made him in the likeness of God. Gen. 5:1.

sRef Gen@2 @7 S3' [3] Those who sat on the north side were the first to speak. They said that the image and the likeness of God are the two lives breathed into man by God, the life of the will and the life of the understanding. 'For we read,' they said,

Jehovah God breathed into Adam's nostrils the breath of lives***, and man became a living soul. Gen. 2:7.

This seems to mean that the will to do good and the perception of truth was breathed into him, which could be called the breath of lives. And because life was breathed into him by God, image and likeness mean his uprightness arising from love and wisdom, and from righteousness and the powers of judgment present in him.'

Those who sat on the west side supported this view, with, however, this addition, that the state of uprightness breathed into Adam by God, is constantly breathed into every person after Adam; but it is present in man as it were in a receiver, and a person is an image and likeness of God in accordance with his effectiveness as a receiver.

sRef Gen@3 @22 S4' [4] Then the third group, who sat on the south side, said: 'The image of God and the likeness of God are two separate things, but in man they are combined from his creation. Some kind of inward illumination shows us that the image of God can be destroyed by man, but not His likeness. This is visible as it were through a screen from the fact that

Adam retained the likeness of God, after he had lost the image of God. For we read after his cursing:

See, man is as one of us, knowing good and evil. Gen. 3:22.

and afterwards he is called a likeness of God, but not an image of God (Gen. 5:1). But we would leave our colleagues on the east, who are therefore in better illumination, to say what the image of God and the likeness of God properly are.'

[5] Then, when there was silence, those who sat on the east side rose from their seats and looked up to the Lord. Then they sat down again and said that an image of God was a receiver of God, and since God is Love itself and Wisdom itself, the image of God is the receiving of love and wisdom from God in the man; but the likeness of God was the perfect likeness and complete appearance of love and wisdom being present in man and of belonging to him. 'For man does not know but that he loves and is wise of himself, or that he wills good and understands truth of himself. In fact not a whit is of himself, but from God. It is only God who loves of Himself and is wise of Himself, because God is Love itself and Wisdom itself. The likeness or appearance that love and wisdom, or good and truth, are present in man as if they belonged to him is what makes a man human, and thus able to be linked to God and so to live for ever. The consequence of this is that man's humanity is the result of his ability to will good and understand truth exactly as if he did so of himself, while at the same time knowing and believing that he does so from God. For to the extent that he knows and believes this, God places His image in man; it would be otherwise if he believed it was of himself and not from God.'

[6] After saying this, their love of truth made zeal overcome them and this led them to say: 'How can a person receive any love and wisdom, keep it and reproduce it, unless he feels that it is his own? And how can he be linked with God by love and wisdom, unless he is granted some reciprocal function to permit linking? No linking is possible without reciprocation, and the reciprocal function is man's loving God and doing His will, as if he acted of himself, yet believing that these things come from God. Again, how can a man live for ever, unless he is linked to the everlasting God? So how can a person be human, without that likeness in him?'

[7] All applauded this speech and asked for a conclusion to be drawn from what had been said. The following statement was adopted: 'Man is a receiver of God, and a receiver of God is an image of God. Because God is Love itself and Wisdom itself, man is a receiver of both of these. The receiver becomes an image of God to the extent that he receives them. Man is a likeness of God by virtue of the fact that he feels in himself that what he receives from God is his as if it belonged to him. But still that likeness makes him an image of God to the extent that he acknowledges that the love and wisdom, or good and truth, in him are not his, and do not come from him, but are present only in God and therefore come from Him.

[8] They then took up the next subject for discussion, 'Why is man born without knowledge of what he should love, yet animals and birds, the highest as well as the lowest, are born knowing all their loves require?'

First they established the truth of the proposition by various observations. For instance that man is born without any knowledge, not even knowing about conjugial love.**** They made enquiry and heard from researchers that a baby does not even know its mother's breast from birth, but learns about it by having it repeatedly offered by its mother or nurse; it only knows how to suck, and that is because it has learnt this by continually sucking in its mother's womb. Later on, it does not know how to walk, or to adapt the sounds it makes to form any human word, not even how to express its emotions by sounds as animals do. Moreover, it does not know what food is suitable for it, as animals do, but grabs anything it finds, whether clean or dirty, and puts it in its mouth. The researchers reported that without instruction man knows nothing of the manner of sexual intercourse, and not even young men and women know about this without being told by others. In short, a man is born a mere bodily being like a worm, and bodily he remains unless he learns from others to know, understand and be wise.

[9] They then established that both the higher and lower animals, such as land animals, the birds of the air, reptiles, fish and insects, are born knowing all their loves require in order to live; for instance, everything they need to know about feeding, about where to live, how to copulate and produce young, and about how to bring up their young. They established these facts by remarkable observations which they recalled to mind from what they had seen, heard and read during their previous life in the natural world, where the animals that exist are not representative but real. When they had fully approved the truth of the proposition, they turned their minds to seeking and finding the reasons which would allow them to explain and elucidate this mystery. They all asserted that it must inevitably be due to the Divine Wisdom, that a man is a man and an animal an animal, and thus the imperfection in the birth of man becomes his perfection, and the perfection in the birth of an animal is its imperfection.

[10] The northerners then began to state their opinion. They said that man is born without knowledge, so that he can receive all kinds of knowledge. But if he acquired these by birth, he could never receive any others than those he acquired by birth, and then neither could he make any his own. They illustrated this by a simile. Man at birth is like soil in which no seeds have been planted, but which can receive every kind of seed, grow them and bring them to fruiting. But an animal is like soil which has already been sown, filled with grass and plants, and unable to receive any seeds other than those implanted. If others were sown, it would choke them. That is the reason why it takes man many years to grow up, a period long enough to allow him to be cultivated like the soil, and to bring forth, so to speak, all kinds of crops, flowers and trees. An animal, however, takes only a few years, because it does not need time to be cultivated to produce anything but what it possesses from birth.

[11] The westerners spoke next. They said that man has by birth, not knowledge like an animal, but ability and inclination, the ability to know and the inclination to love. He has by birth not only the ability [to know, but also to understand and to be wise. Also he is born with the most perfect inclination not only]***** to love what is his own and worldly, but also what is God's and heavenly. As a result man is born an organ which lives with difficulty and dimly by its external senses, and he has by birth no internal senses, so that he may by stages acquire life and become first a natural man, then a rational and finally a spiritual man. This would not happen, if he were endowed by birth with knowledge and loves, like animals. For inborn knowledge and affections of love limit that progress, but mere abilities and inclinations can be inborn without limiting it. Consequently man is capable of becoming more perfect in knowledge, intelligence and wisdom for ever.

[12] The Southerners followed on with their statement. They said that it is impossible for man to acquire any knowledge from himself, but he must do so from others, since he has no inborn knowledge. 'Since he cannot acquire any knowledge from himself, neither can he acquire any love, since where there is no knowledge, there is no love. Knowledge and love are inseparable companions, and can no more be divided than will and understanding, or affection and thought, indeed no more than essence and form. Therefore as a person acquires knowledge from others, so love attaches itself to him as his companion. The universal love which attaches itself is the love of knowing, and later on the loves of understanding and being wise. Only man has these loves, animals have none; they flow in from God.

[13] 'We agree with our colleagues on the west that man has by birth no love and consequently no knowledge, but only the inclination to love, and consequently the ability to receive knowledge, not from himself, but from others, that is, by way of others. We say "by way of others", because neither have they received anything from themselves, but in origin all knowledge is from God. We also agree with our colleagues on the north that man immediately at birth is like soil in which no seeds have been planted, but where fine as well as worthless seeds can be planted. That is why man (homo) is so called from soil (humus), and is called Adam from adama, which means soil.****** We would add that animals have by birth natural loves, and consequently the kinds of knowledge that correspond to them, yet this knowledge does not enable them to know, think, understand and be wise, but they are guided to this knowledge by their loves, almost like blind people being guided through the streets by dogs. As far as their understanding is concerned, they are blind, or rather, like sleepwalkers who do what they do by blind knowledge while the understanding is asleep.'

[14] The last to speak were the easterners. 'We are in agreement,' they said, 'with what our brothers have said, that man knows nothing from himself, but only from others and by way of others, so that he may recognise and acknowledge that all he knows, understands and is wise about he owes to God. Man could not in any other way be born and be created by God, and become His image and likeness. For he becomes an image of God by his acknowledgment and belief that he has received and continues to receive all the good of love and charity and all the truth of wisdom and faith from God, and not a whit from himself. He is a likeness of God by his feeling these things in himself as if from himself. He has this feeling because he has no knowledge from birth, but receives different kinds of knowledge, and it seems to him as if he received them from himself. Man is permitted by God to have this feeling so that he should be a man and not an animal, since by willing, thinking, loving, knowing, understanding and being wise as if from himself he receives different kinds of knowledge and sublimates them into intelligence, and by using them into wisdom. Thus God links man to Himself, and man links himself to God.

These things could not happen if God had not provided that man was born in a state of complete ignorance.'

[15] After this statement there was a general move to draw a conclusion from the matters discussed, and the following was adopted. 'Man is born without any knowledge so that he can acquire knowledge of all kinds and advance to intelligence and through this to wisdom. He is born without any loves so that he can acquire all kinds of loves, by putting to use his knowledge derived from his intelligence, and acquire love to God by means of love towards the neighbour. Thus he may be linked with God and so become fully man and live forever.'

[16] Then they took up the document again and read out the third subject for discussion. This was: 'What is the meaning of "the tree of life", "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil", and "eating of them"?' They all begged those on the east to expound this mystery, since it required a more profound understanding, and those who are from the east enjoy a flame-like light, that is, the wisdom of love. This wisdom is what is meant by "the Garden of Eden", in which those two trees were placed.

'We will tell you.' they replied, 'but since man gets nothing from himself, but from God, we shall draw our statement from God, but still speak as if it were we ourselves who were speaking. "A tree,' they went on to say, "Means man, and its fruit the good of life. So "the tree of life" means a man who has life from God. And since love and wisdom, charity and faith, or good and truth make up life from God in man, "the tree of life" means the man who has these qualities from God, and thus everlasting life. "The tree of life" from which people will be given to eat (Rev. 2:7; 22:2, 14) has a similar meaning.

sRef Gen@3 @5 S17' [17] "The tree of the knowledge of good and evil" means a man who believes that he has life from himself, and not from God; and so, that love and wisdom, charity and faith, that is, good and truth in him are his and not God's. He believes this because in what he thinks and wills, says and does, he seems and appears to behave exactly as if he did so of himself. So since he goes so far as to persuade himself that he is God, the serpent said:

God knows that on the day you eat of the fruit of that tree your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. Gen. 3:5.

[18] "Eating" from those trees means receiving and making one's own. "Eating of the tree of life" means receiving everlasting life; "eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" means receiving damnation. "The serpent" means the devil, a personification of self-love and pride in one's own intelligence. Self-love is the owner of that tree, and people who are proud of that love are those trees. It is therefore a huge error if people believe that Adam was wise and did good of himself, and this was his uncorrupted state, when in fact Adam himself was cursed for holding that belief. For this is the meaning of "eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil". He therefore fell from his uncorrupted state, which he had by virtue of his belief that he was wise and did good entirely from God and in no respect of himself; for this is what "eating of the tree of life" means. Only the Lord, during His life on earth, had wisdom from Himself and did good of Himself, because the Divine itself was in Him and was His from birth. Therefore by His own power He became the Redeemer and Saviour.'

[19] From both these points they reached the following conclusion: "The tree of life" and "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" and "eating of them" mean that life for a person is having God in him, and then he enjoys heaven and everlasting life; and that it is death for a person to be persuaded and believe that life for a man is not God but himself, for thus he finds hell and everlasting death, in other words, damnation.'

[20] Then they looked at the document the angels had left on the table and read the words written at the bottom: 'Link these subjects into a single opinion.' Then they brought the three subjects together and saw that they hung together in a single series. This series or opinion was as follows: 'Man has been created so that he may receive love and wisdom from God, yet it appears exactly as if he did so from himself, which is to allow him to receive them and so be linked; therefore man is born without any love or any knowledge, without even the ability to love and be wise of himself; therefore if he attributes all the good of love and all the truth of wisdom to God he becomes a living man, but if he attributes them to himself he becomes a dead man.'

They wrote these words on a fresh sheet of paper and laid it on the table. Suddenly the angels appeared in a shining cloud and carried the document off to heaven. When it had been read there, those who sat on the seats heard the words, Well done, well done, well done. At once there appeared one as it were flying; he had two wings at his feet and two more at his temples. He brought as prizes gowns, hats and laurel-wreaths. He came down and gave those who sat on the north gowns of iridescent colour; to those on the west gowns of scarlet; to those on the south hats decorated at the rim with bands of gold and pearls, and on the raised left side with diamonds cut into the shape of flowers. To those on the east he gave laurel-wreaths decorated with rubies and sapphires. All who had taken part in the contest of wisdom went cheerfully home resplendent in their prizes.
* This is repeated from CL 132-136.
** The Latin has 'likeness', but the author's copy has this corrected to 'image' in keeping with the Hebrew, cf. CL 132.
*** The Latin follows the Hebrew in using the plural 'lives' here.
**** Or marriage love.
***** These words are missing in the original, but are supplied from CL 133 where this account was first printed.
****** This Latin etymology is supported by expert opinion; the Hebrew word for 'soil' or 'ground' is adama.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 49

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 49

49. THE OMNIPOTENCE, OMNISCIENCE AND OMNIPRESENCE OF GOD

I have dealt with the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom and shown that these two make up the Divine Essence. I now proceed to the omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence of God, because these three emanate from the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom, much as the power and presence of the sun are felt in every single part of this world by means of its heat and light. The heat from the sun of the spiritual world, in the midst of which is Jehovah God, is in its essence Divine Love, and its light is in its essence Divine Wisdom. Hence it is plain that just as infinity, immensity and eternity are properties of the Divine Being (Esse), so omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence are properties of the Divine Essence. However, these three properties of the Divine Essence have up to now not been understood, through ignorance of the ways in which they proceed, that is, the laws of order. They need therefore to have light shed upon them by the following series of propositions.

(i) Omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence are properties of the Divine Wisdom resulting from the Divine Love.
(ii) The omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence of God cannot be recognised except through a knowledge of order, and these facts about order: that God is order, and that He introduced order into the universe and all its parts simultaneously with its creation.
(iii) God's omnipotence proceeds and works in the universe and all its parts in accordance with the laws of His order.
(iv) God is omniscient, that is, He perceives, sees and knows down to the tiniest detail everything that happens according to order; and from these things also what happens contrary to order.
(v) God is present everywhere from first to last in His order.
(vi) Man was created to be a form for Divine Order.
(vii) Man has from Divine Omnipotence power against evil and falsity, and from Divine Omniscience wisdom about good and truth, and from Divine Omnipresence is in God, to the extent that he lives in accordance with the Divine order.

These propositions must now be discussed one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 50

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 50

sRef John@1 @10 S0' sRef John@1 @4 S0' sRef John@1 @3 S0' sRef John@1 @14 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' 50. (i) OMNIPOTENCE, OMNISCIENCE AND OMNIPRESENCE ARE PROPERTIES OF THE DIVINE WISDOM RESULTING FROM THE DIVINE LOVE.

That omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence are qualities of the Divine Wisdom as the result of the Divine Love, and not of the Divine Love by means of the Divine Wisdom, is a secret from heaven which up to now has not dawned on anyone's understanding, because no one so far has known what love is in its essence and what the wisdom derived from it is in its, not to mention the influence of one upon the other. What happens is that love with all its particulars flows into wisdom and there lives like a king in his realm or a master in his house, leaving all the administration of justice to its judgment. Since righteousness is an attribute of love and judgment an attribute of wisdom, love leaves all control to its wisdom. The following pages will shed more light on this secret, for the moment this statement may serve as a rule. The fact that God's omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence arise through the wisdom of His love is what is meant by the following passage from John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through Him, and without Him was nothing made which was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men; and the world was made through Him; and the Word was made flesh. John 1:1, 3, 4, 10, 14.

'Word' here means Divine Truth, or, what comes to the same thing, the Divine Wisdom. That is why it is also called life and light; for these are nothing but wisdom.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 51

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 51

sRef Ps@119 @164 S0' sRef Amos@5 @24 S0' sRef Hos@2 @19 S0' sRef Ps@36 @6 S0' sRef Ps@72 @2 S0' sRef Ps@119 @7 S0' sRef Jer@23 @5 S0' sRef Isa@33 @5 S0' sRef Ps@37 @6 S0' sRef Jer@9 @24 S0' sRef Isa@1 @27 S0' sRef Ps@89 @14 S0' sRef Isa@9 @8 S0' 51. In the Word righteousness is used with reference to love and judgment to wisdom, so some passages will be quoted to show that these two are the means by which God exercises control in the world.

Jehovah, righteousness and judgment are the foundation of your throne. Ps. 89:14.

Let him who boasts boast of this, that Jehovah executes judgment and righteousness upon the earth. Jer. 9:24.

Let Jehovah be exalted, because He has filled Zion* with judgment and righteousness. Isa. 33:5.

Let judgment flow like water, and righteousness like a mighty torrent. Amos 5:24.

Jehovah, your righteousness is like the mountains of God, your judgments a mighty abyss. Ps. 36:6.

Jehovah will make his** righteousness shine as the light, and his*** judgment like noonday. Ps. 37:6.

Jehovah will judge his' people in righteousness and his' suffering ones in judgment. Ps. 72:2.

When I have learnt the judgments of your righteousness, seven times a day I praise you for the judgments of your righteousness. Ps. 119:7, 164.

I will betroth myself to you**** in righteousness and judgment. Hosea 2:19. Zion shall be redeemed in righteousness, and her converts in judgment. Isa. 1:27.

He shall sit upon the throne of David, and reign over his kingdom, to establish it in judgment and righteousness. Isa. 9:7.

I will raise up for David a righteous shoot, who shall reign as king and execute judgment and righteousness upon the earth. Jer. 23:5; 33:15.

Elsewhere it is said that righteousness and judgment ought to be done: as Isa. 1:21; 5:16; 58:2; Jer. 4:2; 22:3, 13, 15; Ezek. 18:5; 33:14, 16, 19; Amos 6:12; Micah 7:9; Deut. 33:21; John 16:8, 10, 11.

*The Latin text has 'the earth', but this is changed in the author's copy in keeping with the Hebrew.
** The author's own copy has this changed to 'your' in keeping with the Hebrew; cf. AC 1458.
*** The author's own copy has this changed to 'your' in keeping with the Hebrew.
**** At AC 9182.6 this passage is translated 'I will betroth you to myself' in keeping with the Hebrew.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 52

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 52

52. (ii) THE OMNIPOTENCE, OMNISCIENCE AND OMNIPRESENCE OF GOD CANNOT BE RECOGNISED EXCEPT THROUGH A KNOWLEDGE OF ORDER, AND THESE FACTS ABOUT ORDER: THAT GOD IS ORDER, AND THAT HE INTRODUCED ORDER INTO THE UNIVERSE AND ALL ITS PARTS SIMULTANEOUSLY WITH ITS CREATION.

To grasp the number and nature of the absurdities which have crept into human minds and thus into the church through the heads of its founders as the result of their failure to understand the order with which God on its creation endowed the universe and everyone of its parts, it will not be necessary to do more than to list them in the following pages. But first of all I shall here set forth a general definition of what I mean by order, namely: order is the quality of arrangement, direction and activation of the parts, substances and entities composing a form; this is the origin of its state, and perfection of state is the product of wisdom from its love, and its imperfection is hammered out by insanity of reason from lust. This definition uses the terms substance, form and state; and by substance I understand at the same time form, because all substance is a form, and the quality of a form is its state; the perfection or imperfection of its state is the result of order. These, being metaphysical terms, must inevitably be very obscure; but in the following pages this obscurity will be dispelled by the application of illustrative examples.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 53

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 53

53. God is order, because He is substance itself and form itself. He is substance, because it is from Him that everything comes which is in existence, has come into and is coming into being. He is form, because every attribute of substances has arisen and still arises from Him, and attributes cannot come from any other source than form. Now since God is the very, sole and prime substance and form and at the same time is the very and sole Love and the very and sole Wisdom, and since wisdom from love produces form, and the state and quality of this is dependent on the order in it, it follows that God is order itself and therefore that He of Himself introduced order both into the universe and every one of its parts. It was a most perfect order that He introduced, because all that He created was good, as we read in the Book of Creation. I shall show in the appropriate place that evils came into existence together with hell, and therefore after creation. But first we shall deal with matters which come more nearly within the purview of the understanding, more clearly enlighten it and arouse milder emotions.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 54

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 54

54. To expound the nature, however, of the order imposed on the universe at its creation would demand many pages. The following section on Creation [75-80] will attempt an outline sketch of this topic. It must be grasped that everything in the universe has been endowed by creation with its own order, so that it may continue in existence by itself. This order was imposed from the beginning in order to link up with the order of the universe, so that each particular order should continue in existence as part of the universal structure and thus be one with them. Let us proceed to a few examples.

Man is endowed by creation with his own order, and so is each and every part of him; the head has its order, the body its, the heart, the lungs, the liver, the pancreas, the stomach each its own; likewise every organ of movement called a muscle, and every organ of sense, as the eye, the ear or the tongue. To be sure, there is not a single little blood-vessel or minor fibre in the body which has not its own proper order. Yet all these countless parts are joined to the body as a whole and are so linked into it as to make one together with them. The same is true of all other things, which it will be enough to list as an illustration. Every land animal, every bird of the air, every fish of the sea, every creeping thing, even every worm down to a grub has by creation its own order. Equally every tree, bush, shrub and vegetable has its; and so moreover has every stone, every mineral, right down to each single particle of dust.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 55

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 55

55. Anyone can see that there is no empire, kingdom, duchy, republic, city or house which lacks the support of laws, to impose order and so control the form of its government. In each case the laws of righteousness occupy the highest place, political laws the second place, and the laws governing the economy the third. If we make a comparison with a man, the laws of righteousness are the head, those of politics the body, those of the economy the clothes. That is why these last can be changed, like clothes. As for the order which God established for the church, this consists in having God in every single part of it, and having the neighbour as the object towards which order should be directed. The laws of this order are as many as the truths in the Word; the laws which relate to God make up the head, those which relate to the neighbour the body, and its ceremonies make the clothes. For if the ceremonies were not there to contain the other things in their proper order, it would be like stripping the body and exposing it to heat in summer and cold in winter; or like taking away the walls and roof of a church, so that the chancel, altar and pulpit were in the open air exposed to all the various extremes of the weather.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 56

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 56

56. (iii) GOD'S OMNIPOTENCE PROCEEDS AND WORKS IN THE UNIVERSE AND ALL ITS PARTS IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS OF HIS ORDER.

God is omnipotent, because He can do everything of Himself, and all others derive their power to act from Him. Being able and willing are for Him one, and since He does not will anything but good, He cannot therefore do anything but good. In the spiritual world no one can act contrary to his own will; this restriction is due to God, for in Him the ability to act and the will to do so are one. Moreover, God is Good itself, so that when He does good He acts within Himself, and He cannot step out of Himself. From this it is plain that His omnipotence progresses and works within the sphere of action of good, and this is infinite. For this sphere proceeding from the inmost pervades the universe and everything it contains, and from the inmost it controls what is outside itself, in so far as this is linked to it by its inherent order. Even if not so linked, it none the less sustains it, and assists every effort made to bring it back into a state consonant with universal order, in which God Himself resides with His omnipotence, and in accordance with which He acts. Failing this, it is cast outside Him, yet none the less even there He sustains it from the inmost.

[2] From these facts it can be established that the Divine omnipotence can in no wise depart from itself so as to make contact with any evil, nor promote it from itself, for evil turns itself away. This is how it comes about that evil is totally separated from God and cast into hell; and between hell and heaven, where He is, yawns a gaping chasm. These few considerations can reveal the madness of those who think, even more believe, more still teach, that God can damn anyone, curse him, cast him into hell, predestine his soul to eternal death, avenge injuries, be angry or punish anyone. He is not even able to turn His face away from a person and frown upon him. These and any actions of this kind would be contrary to His essence, and what is contrary to that is contrary to Himself.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 57

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 57

57. The prevalent opinion today is that God's omnipotence resembles the absolute power of a king in this world, who can act at his pleasure however he wishes: acquit or condemn whom he will, make the guilty innocent, pronounce the traitor loyal, promote the unworthy and undeserving over the heads of the worthy and deserving, even on any pretext snatch away his subjects' goods, condemn them to death, and do other similar things. As a result of this absurd opinion, belief and teaching about the Divine omnipotence, as many falsities, fallacies and chimeras have invaded the church, as there are nuances, systems and derivations of belief there. As many more can invade too, as jars can be filled with water from a large lake, or as snakes can crawl out of their holes and lie basking in the sunshine of the Arabian desert. It takes only the two words 'omnipotence' and 'faith', and then one can scatter among the common people as many guesses, fictions and rubbish as occur to the bodily senses. Both of these terms banish reason,- but if reason is banished, how is human thought superior to the reason of the birds that fly overhead? What then is the spiritual side, which distinguishes man from animals, but like the stench of zoos, which is agreeable to wild beasts, but not to human beings, unless they are like beasts?

[2] If the Divine omnipotence extended as much to doing evil as to doing good, what would be the distinction between God and the devil? It would surely be like that between two rulers, one of whom is both king and tyrant, the other a tyrant whose power is limited, so he cannot properly be called a king. Or between a shepherd who is allowed to keep leopards as well as sheep, and one who is not allowed to do this. Anyone can know that good and evil are opposites, and that if God by His omnipotence could will both at once and by willing them do them, He could in fact do nothing. This so far from being omnipotence would be a negation of His power. It would be like two wheels turning in opposite directions; the effect would be to stop both wheels and produce a stationary state. Or like a ship sailing against a strong current, which without an anchor to hold it would be
swept away and wrecked. Or like a person with two inconsistent wills, so that when one is active the other must necessarily be inactive; if both were to act at the same time, his mind would be a prey to delirium and dizziness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 58

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 58

58. If the current belief about God's omnipotence was correct, so that it extended to doing evil as well as good, surely it would be possible, or rather easy, for God to lift the whole of hell up into heaven, change devils and satans into angels, and in an instant cleanse any irreligious person on earth of his sins, make him new and sanctify him, regenerate him, turn him from a son of wrath into a son of grace, that is, justify him, by the simple attribution and imputation of His Son's righteousness. But God cannot do this by His omnipotence, because it is contrary to the laws of order He has imposed on the universe, and at the same time to the laws of order imposed upon every person; for these demand that both sets should be mutually linked together. The proof of this will be demonstrated later in this book.

It would be the result of that absurd opinion and belief about God's omnipotence, that God could change any person from a goat to a sheep, and at His pleasure transfer him from His left side to His right; at His pleasure He could transform the spirits of the dragon into the angels of Michael; He could endow a person whose understanding resembled a mole's with the eagle's keen vision, in short to make a person a dove instead of a horned owl. All these things God cannot do, because they would be contrary to the laws of His order; yet all the time He wills them and endeavours to effect them. If He could do such things, He would not have allowed Adam to listen to the serpent, and pluck the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and put it in his mouth. He would not, if He could do this, have allowed Cain to kill his brother, David to number the people, Solomon to build shrines for idols, and the kings of Judah and Israel to profane the Temple, as they did so many times. Rather, if God could do this, by the redemption effected by His Son He would have saved the whole human race with no exceptions and wiped out all hell. The ancient gentiles attributed omnipotence of this sort to their gods and goddesses; this is the source of their myths, as that of Deucalion and Pyrrha, who threw stones behind their backs to make men; of Apollo turning Daphne into a laurel-bush; of Diana turning a huntsman into a stag*, of another of their deities turning the maidens of Parnassus into magpies. The current belief about the Divine omnipotence is similar, and that is the source from which so many fanatical and heretical ideas have spread to every region of the world where there is any religion.

* The Latin has 'hind', but this differs from 'stag' by only one letter.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 59

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 59

sRef Rev@22 @5 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef John@1 @9 S0' 59. (iv) GOD IS OMNISCIENT, THAT IS, HE PERCEIVES, SEES AND KNOWS DOWN TO THE TINIEST DETAIL EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS ACCORDING TO ORDER; AND FROM THESE THINGS ALSO WHAT HAPPENS CONTRARY TO ORDER.

The reason God is omniscient, that is, perceives, sees and knows everything is because He is Wisdom itself and Light itself, and Wisdom itself perceives everything and Light itself sees everything. It was shown above that God is Wisdom itself. He is Light itself because He is the sun of the heaven of angels, which sheds light on the understanding of every angel and every person. For as the eye sees by the light of the natural sun, so the understanding sees by the light of the spiritual sun. It not only sees by that light, but is also filled with intelligence the more it loves to receive that light, since this light is in its essence wisdom. Thus we read in the Psalms of David that God dwells in inaccessible light [Ps. 104:2; cf. 1 Tim. 6:16]; and in Revelation that in the New Jerusalem they have no need of a lamp, because the Lord God sheds light on them [21:23]; and in John that the Word, which was with God, and was God, is the light, which enlightens every man that comes into the world [John 1:1, 9]. By the Word is meant the Divine Wisdom. This is why the angels enjoy a brighter light, the greater their wisdom; and why in the Word, every time light is mentioned, wisdom is meant.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 60

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 60

60. The reason God perceives, sees and knows down to the tiniest detail everything that happens according to order is that a universal order is made up of the smallest details. The details taken together are called a universal principle, just as the particulars taken together are called a general principle. The universal principle together with its smallest details make up a single coherent unit, so that one part cannot be touched or acted upon without some sensation being transmitted to the whole. This characteristic of the order of the universe produces similar effects in all created things in the world; but this will be illustrated by comparisons taken from observable objects.

Throughout the human body there are general and particular parts, the general serving to wrap up the particular, and fitting together so snugly that each belongs to the other. This effect is the result of each member in the body having a general sheath, which is so intimately connected with each part that for the purpose of any function or use they act as one. [2] For example, the sheath of any muscle is connected to each of the motor fibres, and forms itself into a coating for them. Similarly the sheath of the liver, pancreas and spleen is connected to the separate parts within them, and the sheath of the lungs, called the pleura, is connected to its inner parts. So too the pericardium is connected to all parts of the heart, and on the general level the peritoneum by means of ligaments is linked with the sheaths of all the viscera. Likewise the membranes of the brain by means of processes drawn out from themselves are connected to all the underlying nodes, and by them to all the fibres, and by them to every part of the body' That is why the head by the action of the two parts of the brain controls all the parts subject to it. These facts are only presented so that from observable objects some idea can be formed how God perceives, sees and knows everything which happens in accordance with order down to the tiniest detail.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 61

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 61

61. The reason why God from the things which are in accordance with order perceives, knows and sees everything down to the tiniest detail which happens contrary to order, is that God does not keep a person in evil, but holds him back from evil. So He does not lead him, but struggles with him. From that perpetual struggle, striving, resistance, repugnance and reaction of evil and falsity against His own good and truth, and so against Himself, He is able to perceive their nature and extent. This follows from the fact that God is omnipresent in all the details of His order, and also omniscient concerning every one of them. It is comparable with someone whose ear is attuned to harmony and concord, and can tell precisely how, and to what extent the sounds heard are inharmonious and discordant, or with someone experiencing pleasure, when an unpleasant sensation intervenes. Equally someone whose gaze is fixed on a beautiful object can form a precise appreciation of an ugly object set alongside, which is why painters have a habit of setting an ugly face next to a beautiful one. Likewise good and truth, when evil and falsity struggle against them, enable their opponents to be clearly perceived. For everyone under the influence of good can perceive evil, and everyone under the influence of truth can see falsity. The reason is that good is under the influence of the heat of heaven, and truth under that of its light, but evil is under the influence of the cold of hell, and falsity under that of its darkness. An illustration of this is the fact that the angels in heaven can see anything which goes on in hell, and what sort of monsters exist there; but on the contrary the spirits in hell cannot so much as glimpse what goes on in heaven, nor even see the angels, any more than a blind man can, or the eye gazing into the air and empty space.

[2] Those whose understandings are illuminated by wisdom resemble people standing on a mountain at mid-day and seeing clearly everything below them. If they enjoy even higher illumination, they can be compared to people who look through telescopes and see things around and below them as if near at hand. But those who by convincing themselves of false ideas have only the deceptive light of hell are like people standing on the same mountain at nighttime with lanterns in their hands, unable to see anything but the nearest objects, and unable to distinguish their shapes or their colours property. A person who has a little of the light of truth, but lives a wicked life, sees truth to begin with, when he is taking pleasure in his love of evil, rather as a bat sees washing hanging up in a garden, which it flies up to as if it were its roost. Later he becomes like a little owl and finally a horned owl. He then becomes like a chimney-sweep clinging to a dark corner of the chimney; when he lifts up his gaze he sees the sky obscured by smoke, and when he looks down he sees the hearth from which the smoke rises.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 62

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 62

sRef Ps@139 @8 S0' sRef Amos@9 @2 S0' 62. It must be understood that there is a difference between perceiving opposites and contrasts. Opposites are outside and contrary to what is inside. An opposite comes about when one thing totally ceases to exist, and another arises which acts in the contrary direction to the former, like one wheel rotating in the contrary direction to another, or two streams flowing in opposite directions. Contrasts, however, are concerned with the arrangement of numerous and complex elements into such an order that they agree and harmonise, such as precious stones of different colours in a sash worn on a queen's breast, or flowers of various colours arranged in a garland to make a pretty sight. Contrasts therefore exist in both opposites, in both good and evil, and truth and falsity, heaven as well as hell. But the things that are contrasting in hell are all the opposites of those in heaven. Now since God perceives and sees and thus knows everything contrasting in heaven as a result of the order in which He is present, and also as a result perceives, sees and knows all the opposite contrasts in hell, as follows from what was said above, it is plain that God is omniscient in hell just as He is in heaven, and equally among men on earth. Thus God perceives, sees and knows men's evils and falsities by the good and truth in which He Himself is, and which in their essence are God. For He says:

If I go up into the heavens, there you are; if I cast myself down in hell, behold, you are there. Ps. 139:8.

and elsewhere:

If they dig down into hell, from there my hand will rescue them. Amos 9:2, 3.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 63

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 63

63. (v) GOD IS PRESENT EVERYWHERE FROM FIRST TO LAST IN HIS ORDER.

It is the heat and light of the sun of the spiritual world, in the midst of which God is, which makes Him present everywhere from first to last in His order. By means of this sun order came into existence, and from it He sends forth heat and light, which penetrate the universe from first to last and produce the life possessed by every human being and animal, and also the vegetative soul which every plant on earth has. Its heat and light act upon every single thing and cause each to live and grow in accordance with the order imposed on them from creation. Since God has no extent, yet fills all the space in the universe, He is omnipresent. It has been shown elsewhere [30] that God is non-spatially in all space and non-temporally in all time, as a result of which the universe is in respect of its essence and its order the fulness of God. This being so, God by His omnipresence perceives everything, by His omniscience provides everything, and by His omnipotence performs everything. This makes it plain that omnipresence, omniscience and omnipotence make one, in other words, one supposes the other and thus they cannot be divided.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 64

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 64

64. A remarkable illustration of the Divine omnipresence is the way angels and spirits become present in the spiritual world. Since that world has no space, but only the appearance of space, an angel or a spirit can in an instant present himself to another, so long as he assumes a similar affection of love and so thinks alike; for it is these two factors which control the appearance of space. It was plain to me that presence there is of this nature from the fact that I could see Africans and Indians there in close proximity, despite the miles that separate them on earth. Indeed I was able to be in company with those who inhabit the planets of this solar system, and even with those from planets in other systems outside that of our sun. This presence, which depends not on position but an appearance of position, has allowed me to speak with Apostles, with dead Popes, Emperors and Kings, with the founders of the present church, Luther, Calvin and Melanchthon, as well as others from remote areas. When angels and spirits have such powers of being present, is there anything the Divine presence in the universe cannot do, seeing it is infinite?

[2] The reason angels and spirits have such powers of being present is that every affection of love and so every thought of the understanding is non-spatially in space and non-temporally in time. Anyone can think about a brother, relation or friend who is in the Indies and feel as if he were present with him. Likewise he can by calling them to mind feel the emotion of love for them. These matters which lie within the range of human experience can afford some sort of illustration of the Divine omnipresence. So too can human thoughts which allow us, by recalling to our memory what we saw in various places on a journey, to feel as if we were actually present in them. Even bodily sight imitates this kind of presence, taking no note of distance except by means of intervening objects, which provide a scale for measurement. The sun itself would appear close to the eye, if not actually within the eye, if there were nothing in between to show how distant it is, an observation made by writers on optics in their treatises. The sight of the understanding as well as that of the body allows a person to have this feeling of presence, because his spirit sees through his eyes. But no animal has this, because animals do not have any spiritual sight. All these facts serve to establish that God is present everywhere from first to last in His order. The previous section showed that He is present also everywhere in hell.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 65

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 65

65. (vi) MAN WAS CREATED TO BE A FORM FOR DIVINE ORDER.

Man was created to be a form for Divine order, because he was created as an image and likeness of God; so since God is order itself, he was created as an image and likeness of order. The two factors which brought order into existence and preserve it in existence are the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom; and man was created to be a receiver of these. Consequently he was by creation endowed with the order according to which the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom act in the universe, and principally that according to which they act in the heaven of angels, so that this whole heaven is a form of Divine order on the largest scale, and in the sight of God it appears like one man. There is too a full correspondence between that heaven and man. For there is no community in heaven which does not correspond to some member, internal part or organ in the human body. So it is said in heaven that a certain community is in the province of the liver, or the pancreas, or the spleen, or the stomach, or the eye, or the ear, or the tongue, and so on. The angels themselves know under what part of the human body they come. The truth of this I was allowed to know by direct experience. I saw a community composed of some thousands of angels as one person. This showed plainly that heaven taken together is an image of God, and the image of God is a form of the Divine order.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 66

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 66

66. It should be known that all things emanating from the sun of the spiritual world, in the midst of which is Jehovah God, answer to the human form. Consequently whatever comes into existence in that world combines to make a human form, and in its inmost parts exhibits that. Thus all the objects displayed to view there are representative of the human body. All kinds of animals are to be seen there, and these are likenesses of the angels' affections of love and so of their thoughts. Equally to be seen there are woods, flower-gardens and greensward. I have been permitted to know which affection this or that object represents. An extraordinary thing, when their inmost sight is opened, they recognise their own image in them. This is because every person is his own love and so his own thought. So since the affections and thoughts derived from them are varied and complex in the case of each person, some of them answering to the affection indicated by one animal, some to that indicated by another, this is why their affections are made manifest in this way. More will be seen on this subject in the following section on creation [75-80]. These facts also demonstrate this truth, that the end in view in creation was a heaven of angels drawn from the human race; consequently the end was man, in whom God could dwell as in something made to receive Him. This is the cause of man being created to be a form for the Divine order.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 67

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 67

67. Before creation God was Love itself and Wisdom itself, and He was these two exerting themselves to perform services. For without service love and wisdom are volatile figments of the reason, and they actually do fly away unless they devote their energy to service. Love and wisdom separated from service are also like birds flying across a mighty ocean and at length so tired by flying they fall down and drown. This proves that the universe was created by God in order that services should come into being, so that one might call the universe a theatre of services. Since man is the principal end in view in creation, it follows that everything was created on his account; so every detail of order was made applicable to him and concentrated on him, in order that by means of him God could perform primary services. Love and wisdom without their third partner, service, can be equated with the sun's heat and light, which would be empty principles unless they worked on men, animals and plants; but they become real by irradiating them and working on them.

[2] End, cause and effect are a trio with a fixed sequence. Educated people know that an end is nothing if it is not accompanied by an efficient cause, and the end and this cause are nothing, if there is no effect. One can form abstract speculations about ends and causes, but they must aim at some effect, which the end has in view and the cause brings about. It is the same with love, wisdom and service: service is the aim love has in view and brings about by means of a cause. When the service is effected, love and wisdom come into real existence, and make their residence and seat in that service, and come to rest there as if in their home. It is similar with a person, in whom are the love and wisdom of God, when he performs services; and it was so that he should perform services for God, that he was created to be an image and likeness [of God]*, that is, a form for the Divine order.

*These words are added in the margin in the author's own copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 68

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 68

68. (vii) MAN HAS FROM DIVINE OMNIPOTENCE POWER AGAINST EVIL AND FALSITY, AND FROM DIVINE OMNISCIENCE WISDOM ABOUT GOOD AND TRUTH, AND FROM DIVINE OMNIPRESENCE IS IN GOD, TO THE EXTENT THAT HE LIVES IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE DIVINE ORDER.

The reason man has from Divine Omnipotence power against evils and falsities to the extent that he lives in accordance with the Divine order is that no one, except God alone, can resist evils and the falsities they produce. For all evils and their falsities come from hell, and there they hold together as a unit, exactly as all kinds of good and so truths do in heaven. As I said before, in the sight of God the whole of heaven is like one man, and in the opposite case hell is like one monstrous giant. Thus acting against one evil and its falsity is like taking on that monstrous giant or all hell. No one can do this except God, because He is omnipotent.

[2] It is plain from this that unless a person approaches almighty God, he can do no more against evil and so falsity than a fish against the ocean, a flea against a whale, or a speck of dust against an avalanche - much less than a locust against an elephant, or a fly against a camel. Moreover, a person has so much less power against evil and so falsity because he was born into evil, and evil cannot act against itself. The consequence of this is that unless a person lives in accordance with order, that is, unless he acknowledges God, His omnipotence and the protection this gives him against hell, and unless he on his part also fights with the evil in himself, for both of these are part of order, he must inevitably be plunged into and drowned in hell, and there buffeted by evils, one after the other, like a rowing-boat by squalls at sea.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 69

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 69

69. The reason why the wisdom about good and truth a person has from Divine omniscience is in proportion to the extent to which he lives according to the Divine order, is that all love of good and all wisdom about truth, in other words, all the good of love and all the truth of wisdom, come from God. This is borne out by the confession of all the churches in Christendom. It follows from this that a person cannot have inwardly any truth of wisdom except from God, since God has omniscience, that is, infinite wisdom. The human mind is, like the heaven of the angels, divided into three degrees; so it can be raised to a higher degree and one higher still, or be depressed to a lower degree and one lower still. To the extent, however, that it is raised to higher degrees, it enters into wisdom, because it enters to that extent into the light of heaven, and this could not be brought about except by God. To the extent it is raised into that light, a person is truly human; but to the extent that it sinks to the lower degrees, it comes into the deceptive light of hell, and the person is to that extent not human, but an animal. This is why man stands erect on his feet, with his face upturned to heaven, able to raise it to the zenith; and why an animal stands on its feet parallel to the ground, and fully faces that, so that it can only with difficulty lift its gaze to heaven.

[2] A person who lifts up his mind towards God, and acknowledges that all the truth of wisdom comes from Him, and at the same time lives in accordance with order, resembles someone standing on a lofty tower watching a densely populated city below him and seeing what goes on in its streets. But a person who convinces himself that all the truth of wisdom comes from his own natural enlightenment, that is, from himself, resembles someone living in a cellar under that tower, watching the same city through narrow holes; he can see no more than the wall of one house in the city, and study how the bricks in it hold together. Again, a person who draws wisdom from God is like a bird flying high, spying out everything in the gardens, woods and villages round about, and flying towards things that can be of service. But a person who derives what belongs to wisdom from himself, without believing that this still comes from God, is like a hornet flying close to the ground, and, when it sees a dunghill, flying up to it and taking pleasure in its stench.

[3] Every person, as long as he lives in the world, treads a path mid-way between heaven and hell; and he is in equilibrium, that is, he has free will to look up to God or down to hell. If he looks up to God, he acknowledges that all wisdom comes from God, and his spirit is really present among the angels in heaven. The person who looks down, as everyone does whose evil puts him under the power of falsities, is in his spirit really among the devils in hell.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 70

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 70

sRef John@15 @4 S1' 70. The reason why a person is by Divine omnipresence in God to the extent that he lives in accordance with order, is that God is omnipresent and where He is present in His Divine Order, He is so to speak in Himself, since, as shown before, He is order. Now since man has been created to be a form for the Divine Order, God is present in him, but fully only to the extent that he lives in accordance with the Divine order. If he does not live in accordance with the Divine order, God is still present in him, but in his highest regions, giving him the ability to understand truth and will good, that is, giving him the faculty of understanding and the inclination to love. But in so far as he lives contrary to order, so far does he close up the lower regions of his mind or spirit, and thus prevent God from coming down and filling the lower regions with His presence. So God is present in him, but he is not in God. It is the general rule in heaven that God is present in every person, evil as well as good, but a person is not in God unless he lives in accordance with order. For the Lord says that He wills that a person should be in Him and He in the person (John 15:4).

[2] The reason why a person is in God if he lives in accordance with order is that God is omnipresent in the universe, and in every part of it, in the inmost of each, since these are in order. But in parts which are contrary to order, which are only those outside the inmost, God is omnipresent by a continual struggle with them as He strives continually to bring them into order. For this reason in so far as a person allows himself to be brought into order, so far is God omnipresent in his whole being, and consequently so far is God in him and he in God. The absence of God from man is no more possible than the absence of the sun, by way of its heat and light, from the earth. But objects on earth are only affected by its influence to the extent that they receive the heat and light radiated by the sun, which happens in spring and summer.

[3] This comparison can be applied to the omnipresence of God. A person is so far in spiritual heat and at the same time spiritual light, that is, in possession of the good of love and the truths of wisdom, as he is subject to order. But spiritual heat and light differ from natural heat and light. In wintertime natural heat is lost by the earth and things on it, and natural light is lost at nighttime, because the earth by its rotation and orbit around the sun causes the seasons and times of day. This does not happen with spiritual heat and light, for God is present supplying both by means of His sun, and this does not change as the natural sun appears to do. It is the person himself who turns away as the earth turns away from the sun, and when he turns away from the truths of wisdom, he can be compared to the earth turning away from the sun during the night; when he turns away from the kinds of good of love he is like the earth turning away from the sun during the winter. Such is the correspondence between the effects and services performed by the sun of the spiritual world and those performed by the sun of the natural world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 71

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 71

71. At this point I shall insert accounts of three experiences, of which this is the first.

Once I heard beneath me a roaring as of the sea, and asked what it was. Someone told me that it was a disturbance among the spirits gathered on the lower earth, which lies closest above hell. In a little while the ground which formed a roof over them split open, and through the gap birds of the night came pouring forth in hordes and spreading out to the left. They were immediately followed by a wave of locusts, which leapt upon the grass covering the ground, and turned it all into a desert. A little later I began to hear by turns a kind of wailing coming from those birds of the night, and to the side an inarticulate cry as if from ghosts in the woods. Later still I saw beautiful birds coming from heaven and spreading out towards the right. These birds were marked with what looked like wings of gold broken up by stripes and spots of silver; some had on their heads crown-shaped crests.

While I was gazing in wonder at all this, there suddenly emerged from the lower earth, where the disturbance was, a spirit who could take upon himself the appearance of an angel of light. 'Where is the man,' he shouted, 'who talks and writes about an order, to which almighty God has restricted Himself in His dealings with man? News of this has penetrated the roof and reached us down below.'

When he came to the ground level, he hurried along a paved road; and eventually he came up to me and at once pretended to be an angel from heaven. Then, speaking in an assumed tone of voice, 'Are you,' he said, 'the man who thinks and speaks about order? Give me a brief account of order and some examples of it.'

aRef 1Sam@5 @2 S2' [2] 'I will give you,' I replied, 'a summary, but not the details, because these would be beyond your grasp.' I told him: (i) God is Order itself. (ii) He created man from order according to order and to be subject to order. (iii) He created his rational mind in accordance with the order of the whole spiritual world and his body in accordance with the order of the whole natural world, which is why the ancients called man a micro-heaven and a microcosm. (iv) It is therefore a law of order that man from his micro-heaven or little spiritual world should control his microcosm or little natural world, just as God from His macro-heaven or spiritual world controls the macrocosm or natural world in all its parts. (v) A consequential law of order is therefore that a person ought to enter into faith by means of truths from the Word, and into charity by means of good deeds, and so reform and regenerate himself. (vi) It is a law of order that a person should by his own efforts and ability cleanse himself from sins, and not stand idly confident of his inability to act, waiting for God to wipe away his sins in an instant. (vii) It is also a law of order that a person should love God with all his soul and all his heart, and his neighbour as himself, and not hang back waiting for God instantaneously to place either love in his mind and heart, like bread from the baker's in the mouth. I told him much more besides.

[3] When he heard this, the Satan replied in a polite tone which concealed his deceit: 'What is this you say? That a person by his own ability should enter into order by obeying its laws? Don't you know that man is not subject to the law, but to grace; and that everything is given freely and a person can take nothing for himself unless it is given him from heaven? Don't you know that in spiritual matters he can no more act of himself than Lot's wife when she was turned into a pillar, or Dagon, the idol worshipped by the Philistines in Ekron? So it is impossible for a person to justify himself, since this must be accomplished by means of faith and charity.'

To this I made only this reply: 'It is a law of order too that a person should by his efforts and ability acquire for himself faith by means of truths from the Word, while believing that not a grain of faith comes from himself, but from God; and that a person should by his efforts and ability aim to justify himself, but he is to believe that not a jot of justification comes from himself, but from God. Is it not commanded that a man should believe in God, and love God with all his strength, and his neighbour as himself? Reflect and tell me how God could have given these commandments, if man had not the ability to obey and perform them.'

[4] On hearing this the Satan's face underwent a change; from being white it first turned a lurid colour, and then pitch black. He spoke with his black mouth and said: 'All you have said is paradoxes to counter paradoxes.' Then at once he sank down to his own kind and vanished. The birds on the left together with the ghosts made an unusual noise, and threw themselves into the sea, which is there called the Sea of Suph*, and the locusts came hopping after them. Both air and land were thus cleared of those animals, the disturbance down below ceased, and all became peaceful and calm.

*The Hebrew name for the Red Sea.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 72

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 72

72. The second experience.

Once I heard an unusual murmuring at a distance, and in the spirit I followed the track of the sound until I came near. When I reached its source, I found a group of spirits arguing about imputation and predestination. They were Dutch and British, with a few from other
countries among them, and at the end of each argument these shouted: 'Wonderful, wonderful!'

The subject under discussion was: 'Why does God not impute the merit and righteousness of His Son to every single person He has created and subsequently redeemed? Is He not omnipotent? Can He not, if He wishes, make Lucifer, the Dragon and all the goats into angels? Is He not omnipotent? Why does He allow the unrighteousness and impiety of the devil to triumph over the righteousness of His Son and the piety of those who worship God? What is easier for God than to judge all worthy of faith and so of salvation? What does it take but one little word? And if not, is He not acting contrary to His own words, that He desires salvation for all and death for none? Tell us then whence it is that those who perish are damned, and what is the reason for it.'

Then a certain believer in predestination, a supralapsarian* from Holland, said: 'Surely this is at the pleasure of the Almighty. Shall the clay blame the potter, because he made a chamber-pot of it?' Another said: 'The salvation of every man is in His hand, like the scales in the hands of someone weighing.'

[2] At the sides of the group there stood a number of people of simple faith and upright heart, some with reddened eyes, some as if drugged, some as if drunk, and some as if choked, muttering to one another: 'What have we to do with this nonsense? They have been driven crazy by their faith, which is that God the Father imputes the righteousness of His Son to whomsoever He wishes, when He wishes, and sends the Holy Spirit to effect the rewards of that righteousness; and so that a person should not claim for himself a grain of merit in attending to his own salvation, he must be as inert as a stone in the matter of justification, and like a block of wood in spiritual matters.'

Then one of these people thrust himself into the group and said in a loud voice: 'You madmen, what you are arguing about is goat's wool.** You obviously do not know that almighty God is order itself, and that there are myriads of laws of order, as many in fact as there are truths in the Word, and God cannot act contrary to them, because if He did so, He would be acting against Himself, and so not only contrary to righteousness but contrary to His own omnipotence.'

[3] On the right he saw at a distance what looked like a sheep and a lamb, and a dove in flight, and on the left what looked like a goat, a wolf and a vulture. 'Do you believe,' he said, 'that God by His omnipotence could turn that goat into a sheep, or that wolf into a lamb, or that vulture into a dove, or the reverse? Far from it; that is contrary to the laws of His order, of which not so much as a tittle can fall to the ground, as His words tell us. How then can He impart the righteousness of His Son's redemption to anyone who resists it, contrary to the laws of His righteousness? How can Righteousness itself do unrighteousness, and predestine anyone to hell and cast him into the fire, beside which the devil stands torch in hand making it blaze? You madmen, devoid of spirit, your faith has led you astray. Is it not in your hands like a snare for catching doves?'

On hearing this a magician made as it were a snare out of that faith and hung it in a tree, saying? 'Watch me catch that dove.' Very soon the hawk flew up and put its neck in the snare and hung there, while the dove on seeing the hawk flew past. The by-standers exclaimed in wonder, 'This trick is a reward of righteousness.'

* Supralapsarian: a person who believes the Fall of Adam was predestined.
** Proverbial for what does not exist.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 73

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 73

73. The next day some of the group who believed in predestination and imputation came to me and said: 'We feel as if we were tipsy, not with wine, but with the way that man talked yesterday. He talked about omnipotence and at the same time about order, drawing the conclusion that just as omnipotence is an attribute of God, so too is order; in fact he asserted that God Himself is order. He said that there are as many laws of order as there are truths in the Word, not merely thousands, but hundreds of millions; and that God is subject to His own laws in this respect, and man to his. What then is God's omnipotence, if it is restricted by laws? For in this way omnipotence loses all absolute power. Does not that give God less power than any king on earth who is a sovereign? He can turn the laws of justice upside down as easily as his hands; he can act with absolute power like Octavius* Augustus, or like Nero. Thinking about omnipotence restricted by laws has made us feel as if we were tipsy, and ready to faint if we do not get immediate help. Our faith has taught us to pray that God the Father should have mercy on us for the sake of His Son; and we believed that He could have mercy on whomever He chose, forgive the sins of any He pleased, and save whom He willed. We did not dare to detract in the slightest from His omnipotence. Therefore we regard confining God in any fetters of His own laws as sacrilege, seeing that it is a contradiction of His omnipotence.'

[2] At the conclusion of this speech we looked at each other, and I saw that they were perplexed. 'I will pray to the Lord,' I said, 'and bring you help from Him by shedding some light on the subject, but for now only by way of examples.'

'Almighty God,' I said, 'created the world out of order in Himself, that is to say, to be subject to the order in which He is present, and in accordance with which He controls it; and He has endowed the universe and every one of its parts with its own order. So man has his order, animals theirs, birds and fishes theirs, worms theirs; every tree, the very grass has its own order. To provide illustrative examples let me briefly suggest the following. The laws of order assigned to man are that he should acquire for himself truths from the Word, and think about them in a natural way, and, so far as he is able, rationally, thus equipping himself with a natural faith. The laws of order on God's side then are that He approaches the man, fills the truths with His Divine light, and so fills man's natural faith, which is merely factual knowledge and strongly held opinion, with the Divine essence. Thus, and only thus, does it become a saving faith.

'It is similar with charity; but let me briefly give some examples. God's laws prevent Him from forgiving anyone's sins, except to the extent that the person in accordance with his laws refrains from committing them. God cannot spiritually regenerate a person, except in so far as the person in accordance with his laws regenerates himself naturally. God is constantly striving to regenerate and so save people, but He cannot achieve this unless the person prepares himself to receive God, and so smooths the way and opens the door to Him. A bridegroom cannot enter the bedroom of a young woman who has not pledged herself to him; she locks the door and keeps the key herself inside. But when she takes the vows of marriage, she gives the bridegroom the key.

[3] 'God could not by His omnipotence have redeemed mankind, except by becoming a man. Nor could He have made His Human Divine, if His Human had not first been like that of a baby, then that of a child, and then formed itself into a container and dwelling into which His Father could enter. He did this by fulfilling everything in the Word, that is to say, all the laws of order it contains; and the more perfectly He did this, the more closely He united Himself with the Father and the Father united Himself with Him. These are merely a few illustrations which are offered, so that you can see that Divine omnipotence is subject to order; and His rule, which is called providence, is in accordance with order. It acts continually and for ever in accordance with the laws of His order; it cannot act contrary to them, nor can it change a tittle of them, because God is order together with all its laws.'

[4] At this speech a brilliance of golden light flooded in through the roof, and turned into cherubs flying through the air. A ruddy glow from them lit up the temples of some people, coming from the back of the head, but not at this stage from the forehead, for they were murmuring: 'We still do not know what omnipotence is.' 'That will be revealed,' I said, 'once what has been said so far has shed on your minds a little illumination.'

*The name of the first of the Roman Emperors before he took the title Augustus.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 74

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 74

74. The third experience.

I saw in the distance a number of people assembled with hats on their heads. Some had silk bands on their hats, to show they were clergymen; others, who were laymen, had the brims of their hats decorated with golden bands. All of them were educated and learned people. I also saw some people wearing caps*, and they were uneducated.

On approaching I heard them talking among themselves about unlimited Divine power, saying that if it operated according to some laws of order which had been passed, it would not be unlimited, but limited, and so power, but not omnipotence. 'But anyone can see,' they said, 'that no kind of compulsion could force omnipotence to act in one way and not another. To be sure, when we think about omnipotence and at the same time about laws of order which it is compelled to observe, our preconceived** notions about omnipotence collapse, like arms leaning on a broken stick.'

[2] Seeing me standing nearby some of them hastened up and said with some vehemence: 'Are you the man who has encumbered God with laws like fetters? What a presumptuous thing to do! By doing this you have shattered our faith, which is the basis of our salvation, in the midst of which we set the righteousness of the Redeemer, above it the omnipotence of God the Father, and we attach as an appendage the working of the Holy Spirit, which is effective while man is totally impotent in spiritual matters; all man needs to do is to proclaim the completeness of justification, which by Divine omnipotence is present in that faith. But I have been told that you see an empty void in that faith, because it contains nothing of Divine order on man's part.'

On hearing this I broke silence and said in a loud voice: 'Learn the laws of Divine order, and then open up your faith; you will see a vast desert and in it the long, sinuous Leviathan*** surrounded by nets so knotted that they could never be disentangled. But do what we read Alexander did on seeing the Gordian knot; he drew his sword and cut it in two, so severing its contortions, threw it on the ground and trampled its strands under his heel.'

[3] This speech made the assembly bite their tongues, for they wanted to sharpen them to make a cutting reply; but they did not dare, because they saw heaven lying open above me, and heard a voice from there: 'Restrain yourselves and listen first to what order is, the laws of which Almighty God follows in His actions. God', the voice said****, 'created the universe from Himself in His capacity as Order, by order and to be subject to order. Likewise He created man, in whom He established the laws of his own order to make him an image and likeness of God. These are briefly, that he should believe in God and love the neighbour; so far as he applies his natural powers to performing those two actions, so far does he make himself a receiver of Divine omnipotence, and so far does God link Himself to him, and him to God. His faith thus becomes a living and saving faith, and his actions become charity, which also is living and saving. But it should be known that God is constantly present, continually striving and acting on the person, and touching his free will but never forcing it. For if God were to force a person's free will, his dwelling in God would be destroyed, and he would be left only with God's dwelling in him. This is something which all enjoy on earth as much as in heaven, and so do those in hell. For this is the source of their ability, will and understanding. The reciprocal dwelling of a person in God only occurs with those who live in accordance with the laws of order enacted in the Word; and these people become images and likenesses of Him, paradise is given them to possess, and the fruit of the tree of life to eat. The rest gather around the tree of knowledge of good and evil, talk with the serpent there, and eat of its fruit. But after this they are banished from paradise. Yet God does not abandon them; it is they who abandon God.'

[4] The people who wore hats understood and approved of this. But those who wore caps objected, saying: 'By this surely omnipotence is limited, and limited omnipotence is a contradiction in terms.'

'It is no contradiction,' I replied, 'to act omnipotently in accordance with the laws of righteousness with judgment, or according to the laws engraved upon love by wisdom. But it is a contradiction to say that God can act contrary to the laws of His own righteousness and love, for that would be to lack judgment and wisdom. It is that sort of contradiction your faith involves, if you believe that God can simply by grace justify the unrighteous, and mark him out by all the gifts of salvation and rewards of life. But I will tell you in a few words what God's omnipotence is. God by His omnipotence created the universe, and at the same time implanted order in every part of it. God also by His omnipotence preserves the universe and maintains order there with its laws for ever, and when anything slips out of order, brings it back and restores it. Moreover, God by His omnipotence established the church and in the Word revealed the laws of its order; and when it fell away from order, He restored it, and when its fall was complete, came down Himself into the world, and by assuming human form put on omnipotence and re-established it.

[5] 'God by His omnipotence and also omniscience examines everyone after death, and prepares the righteous or sheep for their places in heaven, to build up heaven from them; and prepares the unrighteous or goats for their places in hell, and builds up hell from them. Both heaven and hell He arranges into communities and assemblies in accordance with all the varieties in their love; there are as many of these in heaven as there are stars in the sky we see in the world. He links the communities in heaven into a unit, so that in His sight they are like one person, and likewise the assemblies in hell, so that they are like one devil. He separates one party from the other by an abyss, so that hell can offer no violence to heaven, nor can heaven torment hell. For those who are in hell suffer torment to the extent that they feel the influence of heaven. If God from His omnipotence were not doing all this at every moment, such savagery would overcome human beings that they could no longer be restrained by any laws of order, and thus the human race would be destroyed. These and similar things would happen, if God were not order, and omnipotent in order.'

On hearing this those who wore hats went away with their hats under their arms, praising God. (For in that world intelligent people wear hats.) But those who wore caps did not, because they are bald; and baldness is a sign of stupidity. These went off to the left, the others to the right.

* The Latin word tiara usually indicates some sort of oriental headdress; the distinction here intended may be the absence of brims.
** The Latin has praeceptae meaning 'commanded', but praeconceptae 'preconceived' is probably intended.
*** This is the version Swedenborg follows of Isa. 27:1 (e.g. at AC 7293.3).
**** The Latin has 'it said' (i.e. the voice), but in view of the rest of this section dixit is probably a misprint for dixi 'I said'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 75

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 75

75. THE CREATION OF THE UNIVERSE

Since the subject of this first chapter is God the Creator, it needs also to deal with His creation of the universe, just as the following chapter on the Lord the Redeemer needs also to deal with redemption. But no one can form a correct idea of the creation of the universe, unless some universal ideas are first suggested to bring the understanding into a perceptive state; these will be the following.

(i) There are two worlds, a spiritual world containing angels and spirits, and a natural world containing human beings.

[2] (ii) Each of these worlds has a sun. The sun of the spiritual world is pure love from Jehovah God, who is in its midst. From this sun emanate heat and light, the heat from it being in its essence love, and the light from it being in its essence wisdom. These two forces operate on the will and understanding of man, the heat on his will, and the light on his understanding. But the sun of the natural world is pure fire, so that the heat from it is lifeless, and so is its light. These serve as clothing and support to enable the spiritual heat and light to be transmitted to human beings.

[3] (iii) Those two forces emanating from the sun of the spiritual world, and consequently everything produced by them there, are substantial* and are termed spiritual. The two similar forces emanating from the sun of the natural world, and consequently everything produced by them here, are material and are termed natural.

[4] (iv) In each world there are three degrees, termed degrees of altitude, and consequently three regions. The three heavens of the angels are arranged in this pattern, and so are human minds, which thus correspond to those three heavens of the angels. There is a like correspondence between all other things there and here.

[5] (v) There is a correspondence between things in the spiritual world and those in the natural world.

[6] (vi) There is an order to conform with which everything in each world was created.

[7] (vii) Some idea of these matters must first be grasped, for, if not, the human mind, such is its utter ignorance of these matters, can easily fall into thinking of the creation of the universe as the work of nature, merely relying on ecclesiastical authority to declare that nature was created by God. But through ignorance of how this was done, the mind upon a thoroughgoing investigation of the subject may slip headlong into a nature-worship that denies the existence of God. However, since to expound and prove these propositions one by one would require a large volume, and this is moreover not a chief part or subject of the theological system to which this book is devoted, I should like simply to present a few accounts of experiences, which will allow some idea of God's creation of the universe to be conceived, so that some offspring bearing its representation may be born of that conception.

* I.e. made of substance, the underlying essence of matter.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 76

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 76

76. The first experience.

One day I had been meditating on the creation of the universe. This was noticed by the angels above me to the right, where there were some who had several times meditated and reasoned about the same matter; so one of them came down and invited me to join them. I passed into the spirit and accompanied him; on my arrival I was brought to the prince, in whose hall I saw as many as a hundred assembled with the prince in their midst.

Then one of them said: 'We noticed here that you have meditated about the creation of the universe, a subject which has several times occupied our thoughts. But we were unable to reach a conclusion because our thinking clung to the idea of chaos being like a great egg, from which everything in the universe in its due order was hatched. Yet now we perceive that such a vast universe could not have been hatched like this. Another idea which stuck in our minds was that everything was created by God from nothing; yet now we perceive that nothing comes from nothing. Our minds have not yet been able to disentangle themselves from these two ideas and shed a little light on how creation happened. For this reason we have summoned you from the place where you were, to expound your thinking on the subject.'

[2] 'I will indeed,' I replied on hearing this. 'I meditated on this,' I said, 'for a long time but to no purpose. But later, when I was admitted by the Lord into your world, I perceived that it was futile to form any conclusions about the creation of the universe, unless it were first known that there were two worlds, one occupied by angels and the other by men; and that men after death pass from their world into the other. Then I also saw that there are two suns, one from which pour forth all spiritual things, and one from which pour forth all natural things; and that the sun from which all spiritual things pour forth is pure love from Jehovah God, who is in its midst, while the sun from which all natural things pour forth is pure fire. When I had grasped these facts, once when I was in a state of enlightenment, I was granted the perception that the universe was created by Jehovah God by means of the sun in the midst of which He is; and because love cannot exist except together with wisdom, that the universe was created by Jehovah God from His love by means of His wisdom. I have been convinced of the truth of this by everything I have seen in the world where you are, and in the world where I am at present in the body.

[3] 'It would be too tedious to explain how creation progressed from its first beginning. But while I was in a state of enlightenment I perceived that by means of the light and heat from the sun of your world, one after another spiritual atmospheres were created, which are in themselves substantial. Because there are three of them, and they therefore have three degrees, three heavens were made, one for angels in the highest degree of love and wisdom, one for angels in the second degree, and a third for angels in the lowest degree. But because this spiritual universe could not come into being without a natural universe, in which the spiritual one might produce its effects and perform its services, at the same time the sun which is the source of all natural things was created; and through this in the same way, by means of light and heat, three atmospheres were created to surround the first three, like a shell round a kernel or bark round wood; and it was finally through these that the globe with its lands and seas was created from the earth consisting of soil, stones and minerals, to be the home of men, animals, fish, trees, shrubs and plants.

[4] 'This is an extremely general outline of how creation took place and progressed. It would take a series of books to explain all the particular details; but all lead to this conclusion, that God did not create the universe from nothing, since, as you said, nothing comes of nothing, but through the sun of the heaven of angels, which is from His Being (Esse) and so is pure love together with wisdom. Every single detail of the universe, by which I mean both the spiritual and natural worlds, bears witness and proclaims that the universe was created from the Divine love by the Divine wisdom. This you can clearly see, if you consider these facts in due order and in their connexions, by the light which illuminates the perceptions of your understanding. But it should be kept in mind that the love and wisdom, which in God make one, are not love and wisdom in the abstract, but are in Him as substance. For God is the very, sole and consequently prime substance and essence, which is and continues in existence in itself.

sRef John@1 @3 S5' sRef John@1 @10 S5' sRef John@1 @1 S5' [5] All things being created from the Divine love and the Divine wisdom is what is meant by this passage in John:

The Word was with God, and the Word was God; all things were made through Him; and the world was made through Him. John 1:1, 3, 10.

God there means the Divine love, and the Word the Divine truth, or the Divine wisdom. That is why the Word is there called the light; light, when referring to God, means the Divine wisdom.'

At the end of this speech when I was saying good-bye, gleams of light from the sun there came gliding down through the heavens of the angels and entered their eyes, and through them the dwellings of their minds. Under this enlightenment they applauded my speech, and then escorted me into the courtyard; and my earlier companion took me to the house where I was living, and from there went back up to his own community.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 77

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 77

77. The second experience.

One morning on waking from sleep, I was meditating in the light of a fine dawn before being fully awake, when I saw through the window what looked like a flash of lightning, and soon afterwards heard what sounded like a peal of thunder. I wondered where it had come from, but I was told from heaven that there were some people near me who were engaged in a furious dispute about God and nature, and the flash of light like lightning and the roaring in the air like thunder were correspondences, which presented the appearance of a battle and clash of arguments, with one side speaking in favour of God, the other of nature.

This spiritual battle had started like this. There were some satans in hell who said to one another: 'If only we were allowed to talk to the angels in heaven, we should prove to them fully and completely that what they call God, the source of everything, is nature, and God is no more than an expression, unless by it we mean nature.' Since those satans deeply and whole-heartedly believed that, and were so keen to talk with the angels in heaven, they were permitted to climb out of the mud and darkness of hell, and talk with two angels who came down from heaven. They met in the world of spirits, which lies midway between heaven and hell.

[2] The satans on seeing the angels rushed up to them and shouted in a furious tone: 'Are you the angels from heaven with whom we can meet to debate God and nature? You call yourselves wise because you acknowledge God, but oh how simple you are! Who has ever seen God? Who understands what God is? Who can comprehend the idea that God rules, and can control the universe and all its parts? Does anyone but the common people and the crowd acknowledge what they cannot see and understand? What is more obvious than that nature is all in all? What else can the eye see but nature? What has the ear ever heard but nature? What else has the nose smelt? What else has the tongue tasted? What else has anyone felt by the touch of his hand or body? Are not the bodily senses our factual witnesses? On their evidence anyone can swear that a thing is so. Is not breathing, which keeps our bodies alive, evidence? What do we breathe but nature? Are not our heads, and yours, in nature? and from where do our thoughts come into our heads but from nature? Take away nature and you cannot think at all.' Much more was said of the same sort.

[3] On hearing this the angels replied: 'You talk like that because you are wholly under the influence of the senses. All in hell have their mental ideas so sunk in the bodily senses that they cannot lift their minds above that level. So we forgive you. A life of evil leading to a belief in falsity has so shut off the interiors of your minds that it is impossible for them to be lifted above the sensual level, except in a state where you are distant from the evils of your lives and your false beliefs. For a Satan can understand truth just as well as an angel when he hears it, but he does not retain it, because evil obliterates truth and substitutes falsity. But we observe that you are now in that distanced state, so that you can understand the truth we are telling you. So pay attention to what we are about to say.

'You lived,' they said, 'in the natural world and there you died, and you are now in the spiritual world. Did you know anything before about life after death? Surely you denied its existence and put yourselves on a level with animals. Did you know anything before about heaven and hell, or about light and heat in this world? Or the fact that you are no longer within nature, but above it? For this world and everything in it is spiritual, and the spiritual is so far above the natural that nature, in which you lived, cannot exert the slightest influence on this world. But you, because you believed that nature was a god or goddess, still believe that the light and heat of this world are identical with the light and heat of the natural world; they are not in the slightest, for natural light is here darkness, and natural heat here is cold. Did you know anything about the sun of this world, the source of our light and heat? Did you know that this sun is pure love, and the sun of the natural world is pure fire? That the sun of the world, which is pure fire, is the source from which nature came into and continues in being? And that the sun of heaven, which is pure love, is the source from which life itself, which is love together with wisdom, comes into and continues in being? So nature, which you make into a god or a goddess, is completely lifeless?

[4] 'You can, if given protection, come up with us to heaven; and we can, if given protection, go down with you into hell. In heaven you will see magnificent and splendid sights, in hell foul and filthy ones. The reason for the difference is that in heaven all worship God, in hell all worship nature. Those magnificent and splendid sights in the heavens are the correspondences of the affections of the love of good and truth; but the foul and filthy sights in hell are correspondences of the affections of the love of evil and falsity. From both these facts you can form a conclusion whether God or nature is all in all.'

To this the satans replied: 'In our present state we can draw the conclusion from what we have heard that there is a God. But when the delight of evil takes hold of our minds, then we can see nothing but nature.'

[5] The two angels and the satans were standing not far from me, so that I saw and heard them. Around them suddenly I saw a large number of people who had been distinguished by their learning in the natural world. I was surprised to see these learned men standing at one moment next to the angels, at another next to the satans, and applauding the party they stood next to. I was told that their changes of position were changes in their mental states, as they favoured one side or the other; for in their belief they were as inconstant as weathercocks*. 'And we will tell you a secret,' they went on. 'We looked down to earth to see those distinguished for their learning and we found six hundred out of a thousand on the side of nature, and the rest on the side of God. And those who were on God's side, because they spoke not from the understanding but only repeating what they had been told, kept saying that nature came from God. Keeping on saying a thing from memory or recall, while not at the same time prompted by thought and intelligence, produces the outward look of faith.'

[6] After this the satans were given protection and went up with the two angels into heaven, and saw magnificent and splendid sights. Then being enlightened by the light of heaven they there acknowledged that there is a God, and that nature was created to minister to life, which comes from God; that nature is in itself lifeless and so does nothing of itself, but is acted upon by life. When they had seen these sights and experienced these perceptions, they went down; and as they came down, their love of evil returned and shut off their understanding above, and opened it underneath. Then there appeared above it what looked like a small cloud flashing with hellish fire. The moment their feet touched the earth, the ground yawned open beneath them, and they fell back down to their own kind.

*Latin vertumnus, the name of a god of change, but here apparently used for figures which are constantly changing.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 78

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 78

78. The third experience.

The next day an angel came to me from another community in heaven and said, 'We have heard in our community that because of your thoughts about the creation of the universe you were sent for to a community near ours; and there you gave a lecture on creation, which they applauded and have since taken great pleasure in. Now I am going to show you how animals and plants of every kind were produced by God.'

So he took me into a broad, green plain and said, 'Look around you.' I did so and saw birds of the most beautiful colours, some in flight, some sitting on trees and some on the level plucking petals from roses. Among the birds there were also doves and swans. When these had vanished from my sight, I saw not far away flocks of sheep with their lambs, of goats both male and female, and around these flocks I saw herds of cattle with their calves, as well as of camels and mules. In a wood I saw stags* with lofty antlers, as well as unicorns.

When I had seen these, the angel said, 'Turn to face east.' There I saw a garden full of fruit trees, oranges, citrons, olives, vines, figs, pomegranates and bushes that produce edible berries.

Then he said, 'Now look to the south.' There I saw crops of various kinds of grain, wheat, millet, barley and beans. Around them were flowerbeds full of roses of beautifully variegated colours. To the north there were woods full of chestnuts, palms, limes, planes and other leafy trees.

[2] When I had seen these, the angel said, 'All the things you have seen are correspondences of the affections of the love on the part of the angels in the neighbourhood;' and he** told me to which affections each corresponded. 'Moreover,' he went on, 'not only those but all the other sights that present themselves to our eyes are correspondences; for instance, houses, the furniture in them, tables and food, clothes, even gold and silver coins, the diamonds and other precious stones which wives and girls in the heavens wear for their adornment. From all these things we can tell what each person is like in respect of love and wisdom. The contents of our houses, which serve a purpose, remain there constantly; but in the case of those who wander from one community to another, such things change depending upon the company the people are in.

[3] 'These things have been shown to you so that you can see creation on the scale of the universe reflected in these particular models. For God is love itself and wisdom itself, and His love contains infinite affections, and His wisdom infinite perceptions; all the things to be seen upon earth are correspondences of these affections and perceptions. This is the origin of birds and animals, trees and shrubs, crops and grain, plants and grasses. For God has no extension, but is everywhere in space; so He fills the universe from first to last. Because He is omnipresent, there are such correspondences of the affections of His love and wisdom throughout the natural world. But in our world, which is called the spiritual world, similar correspondences present themselves to those who receive affections and perceptions from God. The difference is that in our world such things are created by God in an instant in accordance with the affections of the angels. But in your world, although their creation is in principle similar, provision has been made for them to be constantly renewed from generation to generation, so that creation is continuous.

[4] 'The reason why in our world creation is instantaneous, but in your world continued a generation at a time, is that the atmospheres and soils of our world are spiritual, while those of your world are natural. Natural objects have been created to serve as clothing for spiritual ones, just as layers of skin clothe the bodies of men and animals, bark and bast clothe the trunks and branches of trees, the pia mater and dura mater and other membranes clothe the brain, sheathes the nerves, the neurilemata their fibres, and so on. That is why everything in your world remains constant, and is regularly repeated year by year.'

'Report,' he added, 'what you have seen and heard to the inhabitants of your world, seeing that up to now they have been in total ignorance of the spiritual world, and without knowing about it no one can know, nor even guess, that in our world creation is continuous, and was similar in your world too when God created the universe.'

After this our talk turned to various subjects, and at length to hell, where none of the sort of things that exist in heaven are to be seen, but only their opposites, since the affections of the love of its inhabitants, which are longings for evil, are the opposite of the affections of love on the part of the angels in heaven. In company with those in hell, and in general in their deserts, there are to be seen birds of the night, such as bats, tawny and horned owls, as well as wolves, leopards, tigers, rats and mice; also poisonous snakes of every kind, dragons and crocodiles. Where there is a grassy stretch, there is an undergrowth of brambles, nettles, thorns and thistles, and some poisonous plants, which come up and disappear by turns. Then there are to be seen only heaps of stones and marshes full of croaking frogs. All of these things too are correspondences, but as was said before, correspondences of the affections of their love, which are longings for evil. Yet such things are not created there by God, nor were they in the natural world, where similar things come into existence. For all things that God created and creates were and are good. But such things arose on earth together with hell, which was composed of human beings who, by turning away from God, became after death devils and satans. But because these frightful subjects began to distress our ears, we turned our thoughts away from them and recalled instead what we had seen in the heavens.

* The Latin has 'hinds'.
** The Latin has 'they'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 79

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 79

79. The fourth experience.

Once when I was thinking about the creation of the universe, some people from the Christian part of the world approached me, who in their time had been among the most famous philosophers and had a reputation for surpassing wisdom. 'We notice,' they said, 'that you are thinking about creation; tell us what is your opinion on that subject.'

'Tell me first,' I replied, 'what is yours.' 'My opinion,' said one of them, 'is that creation is the work of nature, and that nature therefore created itself, having existed from eternity. A vacuum does not and cannot exist. Yet what is it that we see with our eyes, hear with our ears, smell with our noses and breathe with our lungs, if not nature? Because nature is outside us, it is also within us.'

[2] Another person who heard this said: 'You speak of nature and regard it as the creator of the universe, but you do not know how nature made the universe; so I will tell you. It twisted itself into vortices which clashed together as clouds do, or like houses collapsing in an earthquake.' He explained that this collision caused the denser material to come together to form the earth; the more fluid parts separated out and came together to form the seas; and the lighter parts also separated out to form the ether and the air, the lightest of all formed the sun. 'Have you not seen how when oil, water and dust are mixed together, they spontaneously separate out and arrange themselves in order one above the other?'

[3] Then another listener said: 'What you say is mere imagination. Everyone knows that the first source of all things was chaos, which in size filled a quarter of the universe. In its midst was fire, with ether around that, and matter around the ether. This chaos split open and the fire burst forth through the cracks, as it does from Etna or Vesuvius, to form the sun. Next the ether expanded and spread around, to form an atmosphere. Finally the remaining matter condensed into a ball, to form the earth. As for the stars, they are merely lights in the expanse of the universe, which arose from the sun and its fire and light. For the sun was at first like an ocean of fire, which to avoid setting fire to the earth threw off from itself shining sparks; these took up their positions in the surroundings and so completed the universe by forming the sky.'

[4] But there was one of the by-standers who said: 'You are wrong. You think yourselves wise, and I seem to you simple. Yet in my simplicity I have believed, and still do, that the universe was created by God; and because nature is part of the universe, He created it at the same time as the whole of nature. If nature had created itself, would it not have existed from eternity? That is a fine piece of nonsense.'

Then one of the so-called wise men rushed up nearer and nearer to the speaker, and put his left ear to the other's mouth - his right ear was blocked with what looked like cotton-wool - and asked what he had said. He repeated the same statement, whereupon the man who had come up looked around him to see if any priest was present; he caught sight of one beside the speaker, and then twisted around saying: 'I too admit that the whole of nature comes from God, but -.' And he went off, whispering to his companions and saying: 'I said that because there was a priest present. You and I know that nature comes from nature, and because nature is therefore God, I said that the whole of nature comes from God, but - .'

[5] But the priest, hearing what they were whispering, said: 'Your wisdom is nothing but philosophy, which has led you astray and shut off the interiors of your minds so completely that no light from God and His heaven can penetrate and bring you enlightenment. You have put the light out. Consider therefore,' he went on, 'and decide among yourselves what is the origin of your souls, which are immortal. Do they come from nature, or were they at the same time in that mighty chaos?'

On hearing this the first man went off to his colleagues, to ask their help in solving this knotty problem. They came to the conclusion that the human soul is nothing but ether, and thought is merely a modification of the ether caused by sunlight; and ether is a part of nature. 'Surely everyone knows,' they said, 'that we talk by means of the air? And what is thought but speech in a purer sort of air, which is called ether? That is why thought and speech act as one. Anyone can observe this in children; a child first learns to talk, and then afterwards to talk to himself, and that is thinking. What then can thought be but a modification of the ether? Or what is the sound of speech but a modulation of it? From these considerations we deduce that the thinking soul is part of nature.'

[6] But some of them, while not disagreeing, cast light on the state of the question by saying that souls arose when the ether formed itself into a ball out of that mighty chaos, and then in the highest region divided itself into innumerable individual forms. These are infused into people, when they begin to think by that purer sort of air, and they are then called souls.

Another on hearing this said: 'I admit that the individual forms made from the ether in its highest region may have been innumerable, but still the number of human beings born from the creation of the world has exceeded the number of forms, so how could those ethereal forms be enough? This has led me to think that the souls which issue from people's mouths when they die return to the same people again after some thousands of years, so that they embark on and complete a life, similar to their previous one. It is well known that many wise men believe in the transmigration of souls and similar ideas.' In addition to these there were other guesses flung around, which I pass over as being crazy.

[7] After a short while the priest returned, and the one who had previously spoken about the creation of the universe by God told him their decisions concerning the soul. On hearing these the priest told them: 'You have spoken exactly as you thought in the world, unaware that you are not any longer in that world but another, which is called the spiritual world. All those who, by convincing themselves of the nature theory, have become immersed in the bodily senses, are not aware that they are no longer in the same world as that in which they were born and brought up. The reason is that there they had a material body, but here a substantial body; and a substantial person sees himself and his companions around him exactly as a material person sees himself and his companions around him, for the substantial is the starting-point of the material. Because you think, see, smell, taste, and speak just as you did in the natural world, you believe that nature here is the same. Yet the nature of this world is as different and remote from that of the former world as the substantial is from the material, or the spiritual from the natural, or what is prior from what is posterior. Because the nature of the world in which you previously lived is comparatively speaking lifeless, so by convincing yourselves of your belief in nature you too have become virtually dead as regards matters which relate to God, heaven and the church, as well as what concerns your souls. Still every person, bad as well as good, can have his understanding raised into the light enjoyed by the angels in heaven; and then he can see that God exists, that there is a life after death, that the human soul is not ethereal and thus of the nature of the material world, but spiritual, and so destined to live for ever. The understanding can enjoy that angelic light, so long as the natural loves are banished which came from the world, favouring it and its nature, and from the body, favouring it and the self*.

[8] At once those loves were banished by the Lord, and they were permitted to talk with angels. From their conversation in that state they perceived the existence of God and that after dying they were living in another world. This made them blush with shame and cry: 'We were mad, we were mad!' But since this state was not their own and after a few minutes became tiresome and unwelcome, they turned their backs on the priest and were unwilling to go on listening to him. Thus they reverted to their former loves, which were entirely natural, worldly and bodily. They went off to the left, from one community to another, and eventually reached a road where they caught a whiff of the delights of their own loves, and said: 'Let us take this road.' So they went along it, going down until they came to people who delighted in similar loves, and further still. Since their delight consisted in doing evil, and they harmed many on the way, they were thrown into prison and became demons. Then their delight was turned into misery, because they were restrained and prevented from enjoying what had previously delighted them, the behaviour which had formed their nature, by punishment and the fear of punishment.

They asked their companions in that prison whether they were to live like that for ever. Some of those there replied: 'We have been here for several centuries, and we are to remain for ever and ever, because the nature we acquired in the world cannot be changed or driven out by punishment. When it is driven out by this, it still comes back after a short interval.'

* Latin proprium, the term often used for the unregenerate self.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 80

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 80

80. The fifth experience.

Once a satan was given leave to come up from hell together with a woman, and he approached the house where I was. On seeing them I shut the window, but carried on a conversation with them through it. I asked the Satan where he came from, and he said from the company of his own people.

I asked where the woman came from, and he made the same reply. She belonged to the crew of sirens. Their skill is by fantasy to put on every appearance of beauty and every adornment of dress. At one time they assume the beauty of Venus, at another the charm of countenance of a Muse, at another they deck themselves like queens in crowns and robes, and pace in regal fashion leaning on silver staves. Such women in the spiritual world are prostitutes and specialise in fantasy. They induce fantasies by thinking sensually, which blocks any ideas from a more inward mode of thinking.

I asked the Satan if she was his wife. 'What is a wife?' he replied. 'This is a term unknown to me and my community; she is my woman.' Then she roused her man's lewdness, a thing these sirens are skilled in doing. On feeling this he kissed her, saying, 'Oh my Adonis!'

[2] But to more serious matters. I asked the Satan what was his calling. 'My calling,' he said, 'is learning; don't you see the laurel wreath on my head? 'This his Adonis had conjured up by her magic arts and put on his head from behind.

'Since you come from a community,' I said, 'where there are schools of learning, tell me what you and your companions believe about God.' 'God,' he replied, 'is for us the universe, which we also call nature. Simple folk in our country call it the atmosphere, by which they mean the air; but the intelligent mean the atmosphere which is also the ether. God, heaven, angels and the like, the subject of many tales in this world, are idle words and fictions inspired by meteors, which many people here have seen flash before their eyes. Is not everything to be seen upon earth the creation of the sun? Every time it approaches in springtime are not insects born, with and without wings? Does not its heat make birds love each other and reproduce? And does not the earth, warmed by its heat, cause seed to sprout and produce fruits as its offspring? Does this not mean that the universe is God, and nature a goddess, and she as the wife of the universe conceives, bears, rears and nurtures these things?'

[3] I went on to ask what he and his community believed about religion. 'We who are educated above the ordinary level,' he replied, 'look on religion as nothing but a toy for the common people. The sensory and imaginative areas of their minds are surrounded with a sort of aura, in which religious ideas flit about like butterflies in the air. Their faith, which links these ideas into a sort of chain, resembles a silk-worm in its cocoon, from which the king of butterflies flutters forth. For the uneducated masses love images which rise above the bodily senses and the thoughts they engender, because they have a longing to fly. So they make themselves wings, so that they can soar like eagles and show off in front of the earth-bound, saying, 'Look at me!' We, however, believe what we see and love what we touch.' At this he touched his woman, saying, 'This I believe, because I see and touch it. But we throw all that sort of rubbish out of our windows of mica, and waft it away on a gale of laughter.'

[4] Then I asked his opinion and that of his companions on heaven and hell. He laughed and said: 'What is heaven but the ethereal firmament on high? What are angels but spots wandering round the sun? What are archangels but comets with their long tails, on which their company lives? What is hell but marshland full of frogs and crocodiles, which their imagination turns into devils? Everything but these ideas of heaven and hell is mere nonsense, thought up by some church dignitary to seek fame among an ignorant populace.'

He said all this exactly as he had thought in the world, unaware that he was living after death, and forgetful of everything he had been told when he first entered the world of spirits. Therefore even when asked about life after death, he replied that it was a figment of the imagination, but there might perhaps be some effluvium given off by the corpse in the grave in shape resembling a person, or something like the ghosts which some tell tales about, and this had led people to fantasise on the subject.

[5] On hearing this I could no longer stop myself bursting out laughing. 'Satan,' I said, 'you really are mad. What are you now? Are you not in shape like a person? Don't you talk, see, hear and walk? Remember that you lived in another world, which you have forgotten, and now you are alive after death, yet have been speaking exactly as you did before you died.'

He was given back his memory, and on remembering he was ashamed and cried: 'I am mad. I have seen heaven up above, and heard angels there speak things beyond description. But this was when I was a recent arrival. Now I shall remember this to tell the companions I left behind, and then perhaps they will be ashamed too.' He had it on the tip of his tongue to call them mad, but as he went down forgetfulness blotted out his memory, so that on arrival he was as mad as they were, and called what I had told him madness.

Such is the state of thought and conversation among satans after death. The name of satans is given to those who have convinced themselves of falsities until they completely believe them, and the name of devils to those who have fostered evils in their characters by living a wicked life.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 81

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 81

sRef Luke@1 @76 S0' sRef Deut@6 @4 S1' sRef Mark@12 @29 S1' sRef Mark@12 @30 S1' sRef Deut@6 @5 S1' sRef Isa@40 @3 S1' 81. CHAPTER TWO

THE LORD THE REDEEMER

The previous chapter dealt with God the Creator, and at the same time with creation; this chapter will deal with the Lord the Redeemer, and at the same time with redemption. The following chapter will deal with the Holy Spirit, and at the same time with the way God works. By the Lord the Redeemer we understand Jehovah in the Human; for the following pages will prove that Jehovah Himself came down and assumed human form in order to effect redemption. We say 'the Lord' and not 'Jehovah' because the Jehovah of the Old Testament is called the Lord in the New Testament, as can be established from the following passages; we read in Moses:

Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our* God is one Jehovah; you shall love Jehovah God with your whole heart and your whole soul. Deut. 6:4, 5.

but in Mark:

The Lord our God is one Lord; you shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart and your whole soul. Mark 12:29, 30.

Also in Isaiah:

Prepare the way for Jehovah, make smooth in the desert a path for our God. Isa. 40:3.

but in Luke:

You shall go before the face of the Lord to prepare the way for Him. Luke 1:76.

and in other passages. The Lord too ordered His disciples to call Him Lord, and He was therefore so called by the Apostles in their Epistles, and later by the Apostolic Church. This is plain from its creed, the so-called Apostles' Creed. The reason was that the Jews did not dare to name Jehovah on account of His holiness, and because 'Jehovah' means the Divine Being (Esse), which existed from eternity, while the Human, which He took upon Himself in time, was not that Being. I showed in the previous chapter (18-26, 27-35) what the Divine Being or Jehovah is. For this reason, here and in what follows by the Lord we understand Jehovah in His Human.

[2] Now since knowledge of the Lord surpasses in excellence all other kinds of knowledge known to the church, or even in heaven, I shall adopt an ordered arrangement to bring that knowledge to light, as follows:

(i) Jehovah, the Creator of the Universe, came down and took upon Himself human form, in order to redeem and save mankind.
(ii) He came down as the Divine Truth, which is the Word, yet He did not separate the Divine Good from it.
(iii) He took upon Himself human form in accordance with His Divine order.
(iv) The Human by which He brought Himself into the world is what is called the Son of God.
(v) The Lord by acts of redemption made Himself righteousness.
(vi) By the same acts He united Himself with the Father, and the Father with Him. This too was in accordance with Divine order.
(vii) Thus God became man, and man God, in one person.
(viii) His progress towards union was His state of exinanition**, and the union itself is His state of glorification.
(ix) From this time on no one from Christian countries can come into heaven, unless he believes in the Lord God the Saviour, and approaches Him alone.

These propositions will be explained one by one.

* So changed in the author's own copy from 'your'.
** Or being emptied; see 104.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 82

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 82

82. (i) JEHOVAH GOD CAME DOWN AND TOOK UPON HIMSELF HUMAN FORM, IN ORDER TO REDEEM AND SAVE MANKIND.

Christian churches to-day believe that God the Creator of the universe fathered a Son from eternity, who came down and took upon Himself human form to redeem and save mankind. But this is an error and collapses of its own accord, so long as the mind concentrates on the oneness of God, and the reason looks upon as fiction or worse the idea that the one God fathered a Son from eternity, and also that God the Father together with the Son and the Holy Spirit, each of whom is severally God, is one God. This fiction is utterly exploded, like a meteorite in the atmosphere, when it is shown from the Word that it was Jehovah God Himself who came down and became man and also was the Redeemer.

sRef Isa@25 @9 S2' sRef Jer@23 @6 S2' sRef Zech@2 @10 S2' sRef Isa@40 @10 S2' sRef Matt@1 @23 S2' sRef Isa@40 @11 S2' sRef Isa@42 @8 S2' sRef Zech@2 @11 S2' sRef Isa@42 @7 S2' sRef Isa@42 @6 S2' sRef Isa@40 @5 S2' sRef Isa@7 @14 S2' sRef Isa@40 @3 S2' sRef Isa@9 @6 S2' sRef Jer@23 @5 S2' [2] The first point, that it was Jehovah God Himself who came down and became man, is established by these passages:

Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, who shall be called God with us. Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23.

A boy is born for us, a son is given to us, on whose shoulder the dominion shall be; and his name shall be called Wonderful, God, Hero, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace. Isa. 9:6, 7.

On that day it will be said, Behold, He is our God, whom we have awaited to free us. He is Jehovah, whom we have awaited. Let us exult and rejoice in His salvation. Isa. 25:9.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way for Jehovah, make smooth in the desert a path for our God; and all flesh shall see it together. Isa. 40:3, 5.

Behold, the Lord Jehovih comes in strength, and His arm shall bear dominion for Him. Behold, His recompense comes with Him; He will tend His flock like a shepherd. Isa. 40:10, 11.

Jehovah said, Shout for joy and rejoice, daughter of Zion; behold, I come to dwell in your midst; then shall many nations cleave to Jehovah on that day. Zech. 2:10, 11.

I Jehovah have called you in righteousness, and I will give you to be a covenant with the people. I am Jehovah, this is my name; my glory I shall not give to another. Isa. 42:1, 6-8.

Behold, the days will come when I will raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as king and do judgment and righteousness upon earth; and this is His name, Jehovah our righteousness. Jer. 23:5, 6; 33:15, 16.

There are also the passages where the Lord's coming is called 'the day of Jehovah', as Isa. 13:6, 9, 13, 22; Ezek. 31:15; Joel 1:15; 2:1, 2, 11, 29, 31; 3:1, 14, 18; Amos 5:13, 18, 20; Zeph. 1:7-18; Zech. 14:1, 4-21; and elsewhere.

sRef Matt@1 @20 S3' sRef Luke@1 @34 S3' sRef Luke@1 @35 S3' sRef Matt@1 @25 S3' [3] It is openly stated in Luke that Jehovah Himself came down and took upon Himself human form.

Mary said to the angel, How shall this happen, since I have no knowledge of a man? The angel answered her, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, so that the holy thing that is born of you will be called the Son of God. Luke 1:34, 35.

And in Matthew the angel said in a dream to Joseph, who was betrothed to Mary, that that which was born of her was of the Holy Spirit; and Joseph did not know her until she had borne a son, and he called His name Jesus. Matt. 1:20, 25. The Holy Spirit means the Divine which proceeds from Jehovah God, as will be seen in Chapter 3 of this book. Everyone knows that a child gets its soul and life from the father, its body from the mother.* So how could it be more openly stated that the Lord's soul and life were from Jehovah God, and because the Divine cannot be divided, that the Father's Divine itself was His soul and life? That is why the Lord so many times called Jehovah God His Father, and Jehovah God called Him His Son. Can anything more ridiculous be said than the idea that our Lord's soul was from His mother Mary? Yet such is the dream of both Roman Catholics and Protestants to-day, and they have not woken up to what is said in the Word.

* Reading ex matre 'from the mother' for ex anima 'from the soul', apparently a repetition from the preceding clause, cf. 92:1; 103:1.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 83

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 83

sRef Ps@31 @5 S0' sRef Ps@19 @14 S0' sRef Isa@54 @8 S0' sRef Isa@44 @6 S0' sRef Ps@130 @8 S0' sRef Hos@13 @4 S0' sRef Isa@45 @22 S0' sRef Isa@45 @21 S0' sRef Isa@63 @16 S0' sRef Isa@44 @24 S0' sRef Isa@49 @26 S0' sRef Isa@43 @11 S0' sRef Jer@50 @34 S0' sRef Isa@48 @17 S0' sRef Ps@130 @7 S0' sRef Isa@54 @5 S0' sRef Isa@47 @4 S0' 83. The idea that a Son born from eternity came down and took upon Himself human form collapses as totally erroneous and is exploded on considering the passages from the Word in which Jehovah Himself says that He is the Saviour and Redeemer, as the following:

Am I not Jehovah, and there is no God beside Me? There is no righteous God and Saviour beside Me. Isa. 45:21, 22.

I am Jehovah, and there is no Saviour beside Me. Isa. 43:11.

I am Jehovah your God, and you are not to acknowledge any God beside Me, and there is no Saviour beside Me. Hosea 13:4.

That all flesh may know that I am Jehovah your Saviour and your Redeemer. Isa. 49:26; 60:16.

As for our Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Isa. 47:4.

Their Redeemer, the mighty Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Jer. 50:34.

Jehovah, my rock and my Redeemer. Ps. 19:14.

Thus spoke Jehovah, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I am Jehovah your God. Isa. 48:17; 43:14; 49:7.

Thus spoke Jehovah, your Redeemer; I am Jehovah who makes all things, and I alone by Myself. Isa. 44:24.

Thus spoke Jehovah, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth; I am the First and the Last, and there is no God beside me. Isa. 44:6.

You are Jehovah our Father, our Redeemer from of old is your name. Isa. 63:16.

I will take pity with eternal mercy, thus spoke your Redeemer Jehovah. Isa. 54:8. You had redeemed me, Jehovah of truth. Ps. 31:5.

Let Israel hope in Jehovah, for there is mercy with Jehovah, with Him is very much redemption. He shall redeem Israel from all his sins. Ps. 130:7, 8.

Jehovah Zebaoth* is His name, and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; He shall be called the God of all the earth. Isa. 54:5.

From these and very many more passages anyone who has eyes, and a mind opened by using his eyes, can see that God, who is one, came down and was made man in order to effect redemption. Can anyone fail to see this as clear as in morning light, so long as he pays attention to those very sayings of God which have been quoted? Those, however, who are plunged in the shades of night as the result of convincing themselves that a second God was born from eternity, and that it was He who came down and redeemed us, close their eyes to those Divine sayings, and ponder with their eyes shut how to pervert them and make them square with their false ideas.

*Corrected in the author's copy from 'Jehovah God' in keeping with the Hebrew; cf. 93.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 84

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 84

84. There are many reasons, as will be revealed in due course in the following pages, why God could not redeem mankind, that is, rescue people from hell and damnation, except by taking upon Himself human form. For redemption was the conquest of the hells and the ordering of the heavens, followed by the establishment of a church. This is something that God in His omnipotence could not do except through the Human, just as no one can work unless he has an arm; His Human is actually called in the Word 'Jehovah's arm' (Isa. 40:10; 53:1). Or just as no one can attack a fortified city and destroy the shrines of idols it contains, unless he has adequate means at his disposal. It is plain too from the Word that in this Divine task God's omnipotence was exercised through His Human. For God, who dwells in the inmost and thus purest parts, can in no other way penetrate to the outermost, in which the hells are, and so too were the people of that time; as, for comparison, the soul can do nothing without the body. Or as someone cannot defeat an enemy without coming in sight of them, or approaching and meeting them with some sort of weapons, such as pikes, shields or muskets. To effect redemption without the Human was as impossible for God as it is for a man to conquer the Indies without ferrying an army there in ships; or as making trees grow solely by supplying heat and light, without creating air to be the medium of their transmission or soil out of which they can grow. Even better, it is as impossible as casting nets in the air to catch fish there, instead of in water. For Jehovah, such as He is in Himself, cannot by His omnipotence lay a finger upon any devil in hell, or any devil on earth, and restrain him and his fury, or tame his violence, unless He is present in last things as He is in first things. He is present in last things in His Human, which is why He is called in the Word the First and the Last, Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 85

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 85

sRef John@1 @3 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef John@1 @14 S0' 85. (ii) JEHOVAH GOD CAME DOWN AS THE DIVINE TRUTH, WHICH IS THE WORD, YET HE DID NOT SEPARATE THE DIVINE GOOD FROM IT.

There are two factors which make up the essence of God, the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom, or, what is the same thing, the Divine Good and the Divine Truth. This dual essence of God was proved above (36-48). The same pair is meant in the Word by Jehovah God; Jehovah means the Divine Love or the Divine Good, God the Divine Wisdom or the Divine Truth. Hence these terms are distinguished in various ways in the Word; at one point only Jehovah is named, at another only God. Where the subject is the Divine Good, the name Jehovah is used, where it is the Divine Truth, God; and where both are meant, He is called Jehovah God. It is evident from John that Jehovah God came down as the Divine Truth, which is the Word:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; all things were made through Him, and without Him was nothing made that was made. And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. John 1:1, 3, 14.

The reason why the Word there means the Divine Truth is that the Word possessed by the church is Divine Truth itself, for it was dictated by Jehovah Himself, and what Jehovah dictates is pure Divine Truth and could not be anything else.

[2] But because the Word passed through the heavens in its descent to the world, it was made suitable for angels in heaven, and for men in the world. So the Word contains a spiritual sense, in which the Divine Truth is illuminated, and a natural sense, in which the Divine Truth is in shadow. So what is meant in John is the Divine Truth in this Word. This is also plain from the Lord's coming into the world to fulfil everything in the Word. This is why we read so many times that this or that happened to Him 'that the scripture might be fulfilled.' Nothing but the Divine Truth too is meant by 'the Messiah' or 'Christ', or by 'the Son of Man', or by 'the Holy Spirit the Comforter', which the Lord sent after He left the world. In His transfiguration before the three disciples on the mountain (Matt. chapter 17, Mark chapter 9 and Luke chapter 9), and before John in Revelation (1:12-16), He represented Himself as that Word, as will be seen in the chapter on the Holy Scripture [222].

sRef John@9 @5 S3' sRef John@12 @36 S3' sRef John@1 @4 S3' sRef John@12 @35 S3' sRef Luke@2 @30 S3' sRef Luke@2 @31 S3' sRef John@14 @6 S3' sRef Luke@2 @32 S3' sRef John@3 @19 S3' sRef John@3 @21 S3' sRef John@1 @9 S3' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S3' [3] It is plain from the Lord's words that in the world He was the Divine Truth:

I am the way, truth and life. John 14:6.

and:

We know that the Son of God came and gave us understanding so that we might know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true in His Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God, and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

This is also shown by His being called 'light', as in these passages, among others:

He was the true light which illuminates every man coming into the world. John 1:4, 9.

Jesus said, For a short while yet the light is with you. Walk so long as you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. So long as you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may be sons of light. John 12:35, 36, 46.

I am the light of the world. John 9:5.

Simeon said, My eyes have seen your salvation, a light to be a revelation to the nations. Luke 2:30-32.

This is the judgment, that the light came into the world; he who does the truth, comes to the light. John 3:19-21.

Light means the Divine Truth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 86

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 86

sRef Ps@45 @3 S0' sRef Ps@45 @4 S0' sRef Ps@45 @5 S0' 86. The reason Jehovah God came down into the world as the Divine Truth was so that He could effect redemption. Redemption was the conquest of the hells, the ordering of the heavens, and afterwards the establishment of a church. To achieve these aims the Divine Good is not powerful enough, but the Divine Truth coming from the Divine Good is. Divine Good regarded in itself is like a rounded point on a sword, or like a blunt piece of wood, or a bow without arrows. But the Divine Truth coming from the Divine Good is like a sharpened sword, and like a piece of wood pointed to make a spear, and like a bow with arrows, all of which are potent against enemies. Swords, spears and bows in the spiritual sense of the Word stand for militant truths; see THE APOCALYPSE REVEALED (52, 299, 436) where this has been proved. There was no other way in which the falsities and evils, in which the whole of hell was and perpetually is plunged, could be attacked, defeated and conquered except through the Divine Truth coming from the Word. There was no other way in which a new heaven could be founded, formed and set in order, as was then done. There was no other way in which a new church could be established on earth. Moreover, all the strength, all the might and power of God belongs to the Divine Truth coming from the Divine Good. This was the reason why Jehovah God came down as the Divine Truth, which is the Word. Therefore it is said in the Psalms of David:

Gird your sword upon your thigh, o mighty one, and go up in your splendour, ride upon the word of truth; your right hand shall teach you wondrous things; sharp are your arrows, your enemies shall fall beneath you. Ps. 45:3-5.

This passage describes the Lord, His combats with the hells and His victories over them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 87

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 87

87. The difference between good without truth and truth coming from good can be clearly seen in the case of man. All his good is located in the will, and all his truth in the understanding; and the will cannot act to the slightest extent as a result of its good, except through the understanding. It cannot act, speak or feel. All its ability and power come through the understanding, consequently through truth, for the understanding is the container and dwelling-place of truth. It is like the way the heart and lungs work in the body. The heart unless accompanied by the breathing of the lungs cannot produce any movement or any sensation, but both of these are the product of the breathing of the lungs proceeding from the heart. This is evident in the loss of consciousness in cases of suffocation or drowning, when the breathing stops, though the systolic action of the heart continues. It is well known that in these cases there is neither movement nor sensation. It is the same with an embryo in the mother's womb. The reason is that the heart corresponds to the will and the various kinds of good it contains, the lungs to the understanding and the various kinds of truth it contains.

sRef Ps@33 @6 S2' [2] The power of truth is very clearly to be seen in the spiritual world. An angel who possesses Divine truths from the Lord, even if physically as weak as a child, can still put to rout a crowd of spirits from hell, though they look like the Anakim and Nephilim, that is, like giants, and pursue them down to hell and force them into its caverns; and when they emerge from these they do not dare to approach the angel. Those who possess Divine truths from the Lord behave in that world like lions, though they have no more strength in their bodies than sheep. Likewise, human beings who possess Divine truths from the Lord have power against evils and falsities, and so they have against serried ranks of devils, who regarded as they are in essence are simply evils and falsities. The reason there is such strength in the Divine Truth is that God is Good itself and Truth itself, and He created the universe by means of the Divine Truth; and all the laws of order by which He preserves the universe are instances of truth. This is why it is said in John that 'all things were made through the Word, and without Him was nothing made that was made' (John 1:3, 10); and in the Psalms of David:

Through the Word of Jehovah the heavens were made, and through the breath of His mouth the whole company of the heavens. Ps. 33:6.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 88

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 88

88. God's coming down as the Divine Truth but without separating the Divine Good is evident from the Lord's conception, about which we read that 'the power of the Most High overshadowed Mary' (Luke 1:35). The 'power of the Most High' means the Divine Good. The same point can be established by the passages in which He says that the Father is in Him and He in the Father; that all things of the Father's are His; and that He and the Father are one, and many more. 'Father' means the Divine Good.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 89

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 89

sRef Luke@2 @42 S0' sRef Luke@2 @47 S0' sRef Luke@2 @52 S0' sRef Luke@2 @46 S0' sRef Luke@2 @40 S0' 89. (iii) HE TOOK UPON HIMSELF HUMAN FORM IN ACCORDANCE WITH HIS DIVINE ORDER.

It was shown in the section on the Divine omnipotence and omniscience that together with creation God introduced order both into the universe and into all its parts, and that God's omnipotence therefore functions and works in the universe and all its parts in accordance with the laws of its order; these points were discussed in their proper sequence above (49-74). Now since God came down, and He is order, as was proved in that section, He had, so as to become really man, to be conceived, be carried in the womb, be born, be brought up and learn items of knowledge one by one, and by their means be brought into a state of intelligence and wisdom. Therefore in His Human He was a child like any other child, a boy like any other boy, and so on, the only difference being that He achieved that progress more quickly, fully and perfectly than others. It is evident from this passage in Luke that He advanced thus in accordance with order:

The boy Jesus grew and was strengthened in spirit; and He advanced in wisdom, years and favour with God and men. Luke 2:40, 52.

It is plain that He did this more quickly, fully and perfectly than others from the description the same Evangelist gives of Him, as for instance that, when He was a boy of twelve, He sat and taught in the Temple in the midst of the teachers, and all who heard Him were astonished at His intelligence and His answers (Luke 2:46, 47 and later 4:16-22, 32). This was done because Divine order prescribes that a person should prepare himself to receive God; and as he prepares himself, so God enters into him as into His dwelling and home. That preparation is accomplished by acquiring knowledge about God and the spiritual matters which concern the church, thus by means of intelligence and wisdom. For it is a law of order that in so far as a person approaches and comes near to God, which he should do entirely as if of himself, so far does God approach and come near to him, and link Himself to the person in his midst. It will be shown in the following pages that the Lord advanced in accordance with this order until He reached union with His Father.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 90

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 90

90. People who are not aware that Divine omnipotence proceeds and works in accordance with order can be led by their imagination to form many ideas contrary to sound reason, and even contradictory ones. For instance, why did God not take upon Himself human form immediately, without advancing through these stages? Why did He not gather the elements from the four quarters of the world to create and make up a body, so that He could display Himself as God-Man to the Jewish people, or rather to the whole world? Or, if He wished to be born, why did He not pour His whole divinity into the embryo or Himself as a child; or why did He not at once after being born raise Himself to adult stature, and speak from Divine Wisdom? Those who think about Divine omnipotence devoid of order, may conceive and bring forth these and similar ideas, and so fill the church with nonsense and rubbish; which is what has happened. For instance, the idea that God could have fathered a Son from eternity, and arranged for a third God to proceed even at that point in time from Himself and His Son. Or that He could become angry with the human race, consign it to destruction, and be willing to be brought back to pitying it through the Son, and to do this through His intercession and the memory of His crucifixion; [2] and then go on to put His Son's righteousness into a person, and plant it in his heart like Wolff's* simple substance, in which according to that author all the Son's merits are present, but which cannot be divided, since if it were, it would collapse to nothing. Or further that He can remit anyone's sins He wishes, as it were by a Papal bull, or cleanse the worst sinner from his black wickedness, and thus turn a swarthy devil into a shining angel of light, without a person shifting himself any more than a stone, but standing still like a statue or an idol. Not to mention many other crazy notions, which those who set up Divine power as absolute, unhindered by the knowledge or acknowledgment of any order, may toss out like a winnower tossing chaff into the air. These people may in spiritual matters, those, that is, which concern heaven, the church and so everlasting life, stray from Divine truths like a blind man in a wood, who at one time stumbles over rocks, at another hits his forehead on a tree, at another gets his hair entangled in its branches.

* Christian Wolff (1679-1754), a follower of Leibnitz.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 91

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 91

91. Divine miracles also took place in accordance with Divine order, but in accordance with the way the spiritual world acts upon the natural world. No one up to now has known anything about this order, because of the general ignorance about the spiritual world. The nature of this order will be demonstrated in due course, when we come to Divine miracles and miracles worked by magic.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 92

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 92

92. (iv) THE HUMAN BY WHICH HE BROUGHT HIMSELF INTO THE WORLD IS THE SON OF GOD.

The Lord said on many occasions that the Father sent Him and that He was sent by the Father; e.g. Matt. 10:40; 15:24; John 3:17, 34; 5:23, 24, 36-38; 6:29, 39, 40, 44, 57; 7:16, 18, 28, 29; 8:16, 18, 29, 42; 9:4; and very many other passages. He said this because by 'being sent into the world' is meant coming down and mixing with human beings; this He did by means of the Human, which He took upon Himself by means of the Virgin Mary. The Human too is really the Son of God, because it was conceived of Jehovah God as the Father (as is stated by Luke 1:32, 35). The Human is called the Son of God, the Son of Man and the Son of Mary; by the Son of the God is meant Jehovah God in His Human, by the Son of Man the Lord as to the Word, and by the Son of Mary the actual human which He took upon Himself. It will be proved in the following pages that these are the meanings of the Son of God and the Son of Man; that the Son of Mary means His purely human nature is evident from the reproduction of human beings, where the soul comes from the father and the body from the mother. The father's semen contains the soul, and this is clothed with a body in the mother's womb. To put it another way, everything spiritual a person has is from his father, everything material from his mother.

sRef Mal@3 @1 S2' sRef Isa@63 @9 S2' [2] In the case of the Lord, what was Divine in Him was from His Father Jehovah, and His human was from His mother; the union of these two is the Son of God. This is clearly proved from the account of the Lord's birth, of which we read in Luke:

The angel Gabriel said to Mary, The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you; therefore the holy thing that shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God. Luke 1:35.

The Lord also described Himself as 'sent by the Father' because 'sent' has a similar meaning to 'angel', for angel in the language of the original means one who is sent. For it is said in Isaiah:

The angel of Jehovah's faces* has set them free, on account of His love and mercy He has redeemed them. Isa. 63:9.

And in Malachi:

Suddenly the Lord whom you seek shall come to his temple, and also the messenger of the covenant, whom you long for. Mal. 3:1.

There are other similar passages elsewhere. It will be seen in Chapter 3 of this book that the Divine Trinity, God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, is in the Lord, and that the Father in Him is the originating Divine, the Son the Divine Human and the Holy Spirit the emanating Divine.

* The Latin here follows the Hebrew in using the plural.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 93

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 93

sRef Jer@51 @5 S0' sRef Isa@45 @11 S0' sRef Dan@4 @13 S0' sRef Dan@4 @23 S0' sRef Isa@17 @7 S0' sRef Isa@10 @20 S1' sRef Isa@12 @6 S1' sRef Ps@78 @41 S1' sRef Isa@47 @4 S1' sRef Isa@43 @1 S1' sRef Hab@3 @3 S1' sRef Isa@43 @3 S1' sRef Isa@30 @12 S1' sRef Isa@30 @11 S1' sRef Isa@1 @4 S1' sRef Isa@49 @7 S1' sRef Isa@29 @19 S1' sRef Isa@5 @19 S1' sRef Isa@54 @5 S1' 93. Since the angel Gabriel said to Mary, 'The holy thing that shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God,' passages will be quoted from the Word to prove that the Lord in His Human is called the Holy One of Israel.

I was seeing in visions; and behold, a watcher, a Holy One, coming down from heaven. Dan. 4:13, 23.

God shall come from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Paran. Hab. 3:3.

I am Jehovah the Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your Holy One. Isa. 43:14, 15.

Thus spoke Jehovah, the Redeemer of Israel, his Holy One. Isa. 49:7.

I am Jehovah your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Saviour. Isa. 43:1, 3.

As for our Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth is His name, the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 47:4.

Jehovah your Redeemer said, the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 43:14; 48:17.

Jehovah Zebaoth is His name, and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 54:5.

They tested God and the Holy One of Israel. Ps. 78:41.

They have abandoned Jehovah, and provoked the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 1:4.

They said, Make the Holy One of Israel depart from our faces; therefore thus spoke the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 30:11, 12.

Who say, Let Him hasten His work that we may see it, and let the purpose of the Holy One of Israel come near and be present. Isa. 5:19.

On that day they shall lean upon Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. Isa. 10:20.

Cry out and triumph, inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 12:6.

The word of the God of Israel, On that day his eyes shall look towards the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 17:6, 7.

The needy among men shall exult in the Holy One of Israel. Isa. 29:19; 41:16.

The earth is full of guilt against the Holy One of Israel. Jer. 51:5.

See also Isa. 55:5; 60:9 and elsewhere.

sRef Luke@1 @35 S2' [2] By 'the Holy One of Israel' is meant the Lord as to His Divine Human, for the angel said to Mary:

The holy thing that shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God. Luke 1:35.

Although Jehovah and the Holy One of Israel are mentioned separately, it is clear that they are one and the same, as is shown also by the passages quoted here, which prove that the Holy One of Israel is Jehovah. There are numerous passages to show that the Lord is called the God of Israel: for example, Isa. 17:6; 21:10, 17; 24:15; 29:23; Jer. 7:3; 9:15; 11:3; 13:12; 16:9; 19:3, 15; 23:2; 24:5; 25:15, 27; 29:4, 8, 21, 25; 30:2; 31:23; 32:14, 15, 36; 33:4; 34:2, 13; 35:13, 17, 18, 19; 37:7; 38:17; 39:16; 42:9, 15, 18; 43:10; 44:2, 7, 11, 25; 48:1; 50:18; 51:33; Ezek. 8:4; 9:3; 10:19, 20; 11:22; 43:2; 44:2; Zeph. 2:9; Ps. 41:13; 59:5; 68:8.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 94

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 94

94. It is common practice in to-day's Christian churches to call the Lord our Saviour the Son of Mary, but only rarely the Son of God, unless that is, they mean the Son of God born from eternity. This is because the Roman Catholics have made Mary, His mother, greater than all the other saints, and set her above all their saints as if she were a goddess or a queen. The truth is that when the Lord glorified His Human, He put off everything of His mother's, and put on everything of His Father's, as will be fully proved in the following sections of this book. This common practice, when His title as Son of Mary is on everyone's tongue, has been responsible for introducing many erroneous notions into the church, especially with those who have not allowed their judgment to be swayed by what the Word says about the Lord; for instance, that the Father and He are one, that He is in the Father and the Father in Him; that all things of the Father's are His; that He called Jehovah His Father, and Jehovah the Father called Him His Son. The erroneous notions, which have invaded the church as the result of calling Him the Son of Mary instead of the Son of God, are that the idea of divinity is destroyed when thinking of the Lord, and this leads to the loss of all the statements in the Word about Him as the Son of God. Also, this leads to the introduction of Judaism, Arianism, Socinianism, and the original form of Calvinism; and finally to nature-worship, accompanied by the fantastic idea that He was the Son of Mary by Joseph, and that His soul came from His mother, so that He is called the Son of God without being so. Everyone, clergy as well as layman, ought to ask himself whether he has formed and fosters any other idea about the Lord as the Son of Mary except as an ordinary man.

[2] Since an idea of this sort had already become prevalent among Christians in the fourth century with the rise of the Arian heresy, the Council of Nicaea, in order to claim divinity for the Lord, invented the dogma of the Son of God born from eternity. This invention at the time raised the Lord's Human to the Divine level, and this still has the same effect for many to-day. It did not, however, have this result for those who understand by hypostatic union a union between two, one of whom is above and the other below. What else can result from such a belief but the destruction of the whole Christian church, the sole foundation of which is the worship of Jehovah in the Human, that is to say, it is based on God-Man? The Lord states in many passages that no one can see the Father, nor know Him, nor come to Him, nor believe in Him, except through His Human. If this is not so, all the noble seed of the church is turned into worthless seed, the seed of the olive into the seed of the pine, the seed of the orange, citron, apple and pear into the seed of the willow, elm, lime and holm-oak, the vine into a marsh reed, wheat and barley into chaff. All spiritual food in fact becomes like the dust that snakes eat. In the case of man, spiritual light becomes first natural, and finally sensual and bodily, a light which regarded in itself is delusive. A person then in fact becomes like a bird which has its wings clipped while flying high, and falls to the ground; once on the ground it can only walk and see around it what lies before its feet. Then a person's thoughts about the spiritual side of the church, all the things that favour everlasting life, resemble the ravings of a clown. All this is the result of a person regarding the Lord God, the Redeemer and Saviour, as only the Son of Mary, that is, nothing but a man.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 95

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 95

sRef Isa@9 @7 S0' sRef Matt@3 @15 S0' sRef Jer@23 @5 S0' sRef Isa@63 @1 S0' sRef Isa@1 @27 S0' sRef Jer@23 @6 S0' 95. (v) THE LORD BY ACTS OF REDEMPTION MADE HIMSELF RIGHTEOUSNESS.

The Christian churches to-day say and believe that merit and righteousness belong to the Lord alone through the obedience He showed to God the Father, while He was in the world, in particular by His passion on the cross. But they have assumed that suffering the cross was itself the act of redemption; yet that was not it, but the act of glorifying His Human, a subject which will be discussed in the following section on redemption. The acts of redemption by which the Lord made Himself righteousness were His carrying out of the last judgment, which took place in the spiritual world. He then separated the wicked from the good and the goats from the sheep, expelling from heaven those who made common cause with the beasts of the dragon. From the worthy He founded a new heaven, from the unworthy a new hell; and by stages He brought everything everywhere back into order, and in addition He established a new church. These were the acts of redemption by which the Lord made Himself righteousness; for righteousness consists in doing everything in accordance with Divine order, and restoring everything which had slipped out of order. Divine order itself is righteousness. This is the meaning of these words of the Lord:

It is appropriate for me to fulfil all the righteousness of God. Matt. 3:15.

Also these passages in the Old Testament:

Behold, the days will come when I will raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as king and do righteousness upon the earth; and this is his name, Jehovah our righteousness. Jer. 23:5, 6; 33:15, 16.

I speak in righteousness, mighty to save. Isa. 63:1.

He shall sit upon the throne of David to establish it in judgment and righteousness. Isa. 9:7.

Zion shall be redeemed in righteousness. Isa. 1:27.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 96

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 96

sRef Matt@5 @20 S1' sRef Matt@13 @49 S1' sRef Matt@5 @10 S1' 96. The leaders of the church in our time have a quite different description of the Lord's righteousness, and regard its impress on a man's faith as the key to salvation. Yet the truth is that the Lord's righteousness, being of such a nature and origin that it is purely Divine, could not be linked with any person, so that it could not cause anyone to be saved, any more than the Divine life can, which is the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom. The Lord enters into every person with these, but unless that person lives in accordance with order, though he has that life within him, it contributes nothing to his salvation, giving him merely the ability to understand truth and to do good. Living in accordance with order is living in accordance with God's commandments. When a person so lives and acts, he acquires righteousness for himself, not the righteousness that comes from the Lord's redeeming, but the Lord Himself as righteousness. These are the people described by the following passages, as well as others.

Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of the heavens. Matt. 5:20.

Blessed are those who undergo persecution for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens. Matt. 5:10.

At the completion of the age angels will go forth and separate the wicked from out of the midst of the righteous. Matt. 13:49.

The righteous in the Word mean those who have lived in accordance with Divine order, since Divine order is righteousness.

[2] Righteousness itself, which by His redeeming acts the Lord became, cannot be ascribed to, impressed on, fitted on or linked with a person, otherwise than light to the eye, sound to the ear, will to the muscles of one who acts, thought to the lips of the speaker, air to the breathing lungs, heat to the blood, and so on. Anyone can see for himself that these things have an effect and are accessory without being linked to the organ. But righteousness is acquired the more a person applies it, and he applies righteousness, the more the love of what is right and true inspires his dealings with his neighbour. Righteousness dwells in the actual good, or the actual service, which he performs. For the Lord says that every tree is recognised by its fruit. We recognise another person by his actions, if we pay attention to the end and purpose of what he wills, and the intention or cause behind his actions. This is what all the angels observe, and so do all the wise people in our world. In general, every plant and shoot the earth puts forth is recognised by its flower and seed, and the service which its seed performs; likewise every metal by its worth, every stone by its quality, every piece of ground by its, every food by its, every land animal and every bird of the air by its. Why not man too? The quality and origins of a person's actions will be disclosed in the chapter on faith [336-391].

TCR (Chadwick) n. 97

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 97

97. (vi) BY THE SAME ACTS THE LORD UNITED HIMSELF WITH THE FATHER, AND THE FATHER WITH HIM.

The reason why the union took place through redeeming acts was that the Lord performed them by His Human; and as He did so, the Divine meant by the Father came closer, helped and worked with Him, until eventually they so joined themselves that they were not two but one. This union is glorification, which will be described in the following pages.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 98

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 98

sRef John@13 @20 S1' 98. It is in fact a tenet of belief in the church to-day, and also supported from the Word, that the Father and the Son, that is, the Divine and the Human, are united in the Lord like the soul and the body. Yet there are scarcely five in a hundred, or fifty in a thousand, who know this. The reason is the doctrine of justification by faith alone, so zealously propagated by many of the clergy, who seek a reputation for learning for the sake of honours and preferment, to such a point that that doctrine occupies and besets every point in their minds. Because it has made their thoughts drunk, just as the spirits of wine called alcohol, they have, like drunkards, failed to see this most essential tenet of the church, that Jehovah God came down and took human form. Yet that union is the sole means by which man is linked to God, and by being so linked is saved. It is evident that salvation depends upon the knowledge and acknowledgment of God, if anyone considers that God is all in all in heaven, and so all in all in the church, and therefore all in all in theology.

sRef John@16 @15 S2' sRef John@8 @19 S2' sRef John@10 @30 S2' sRef John@1 @18 S2' sRef John@14 @9 S2' sRef Matt@28 @18 S2' sRef Isa@9 @6 S2' sRef John@17 @2 S2' [2] Here I shall first prove that the union of the Father and the Son, that is, the Divine and the Human in the Lord, is like the union of soul and body; and, secondly, that this is a reciprocal union. The concept of a union as of the soul and the body has been established in the Athanasian Creed, which is accepted throughout the Christian world as the doctrine concerning God. In it we read as follows:

Our Lord Jesus Christ is God and Man; and although He is God and Man, they are not two, but one Christ. He is one, because the Divine took to itself a human. Indeed He is altogether one and is one Person, for as the soul and the body are one man, so God and Man are one Christ.

This is understood to mean that this is a union between the Son of God from eternity and the Son born in time; but because God is one and not three, so long as that union is understood to be with the one God from eternity, the doctrine agrees with the Word. There we read that He was conceived of Jehovah the Father (Luke 1:34, 35); and that was the source of His soul and life. This is why He says that He and the Father are one (John 10:30); that he who sees and knows Him sees and knows the Father (John 14:9); 'if you knew Me, you would also know My Father' (John 8:19); 'he who receives Me, receives Him who sent Me' (John 13:20); that He is in the Father's bosom (John 1:18); that all things whatsoever the Father has are His (John 16:15); that He is called the everlasting Father (Isa. 9:6); that He thus has power over all flesh (John 17:2), and all power in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18). From these and many other passages in the Word it can be clearly seen that the union between the Father and the Son is like that between the soul and the body. For this reason too He is often called in the Old Testament Jehovah, Jehovah Zebaoth, and Jehovah the Redeemer (see 83 above).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 99

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 99

sRef John@14 @10 S1' sRef John@17 @10 S1' sRef John@10 @38 S1' sRef John@17 @21 S1' sRef John@14 @11 S1' 99. This union is reciprocal, as is clearly established by the following passages in the Word:

Philip, do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? Believe me, I am in the Father and the Father is in me. John 14:10, 11

That you may know and believe, that the Father is in me and I in the Father. John 10:36, 38,

That all may be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you. John 17:21.

Father, all that is mine is yours, and all that is yours is mine. John 17:10.

The union is reciprocal, because no union or link is possible between two people unless each approaches the other. Every link throughout heaven, throughout the world and in the whole human personality, is entirely due to the reciprocal approach of each to the other, leading to a mutual identity of will. This produces similarity and sympathy, unanimity and agreement in every detail on each side.

[2] Such is the reciprocal link between soul and body in each individual; such is the link between a person's spirit and the sensory and motor organs of his body; such is the link between the heart and the lungs; such is the link between the will and the understanding; such is the link between all the members and viscera of the human body in themselves and with each other; such is the link between the minds of all who love each other deeply, for it is engraved upon every form of love and friendship, since love wants to love and be loved. There is a reciprocal link between all the things in the world which are indissolubly joined. There is a similar link between the heat of the sun and the heat of wood or stone, between the vital heat and the heat of all the fibres of living creatures. There is a similar link between the ground* and the root, and through the root with the tree, and through the tree with the fruit; there is a similar link between the magnet and the iron, and so on. If the link were not produced by a reciprocal and mutual approach of one to the other, it would be merely an outward and not an inward linking; and this in time falls apart of itself, sometimes so that the partners no longer recognise each other.

* The Latin has, apparently in error, 'the tree'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 100

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 100

sRef John@15 @4 S0' sRef Rev@3 @20 S0' sRef John@6 @56 S0' sRef John@15 @5 S0' 100. Now because no linking is possible unless there is a mutual and reciprocal bond, the link between the Lord and man is no different, as is obvious from the following passages, among others:

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. John 6:56.

Remain in me, and I in you. He who remains in me and I in him bears much fruit. John 15:4, 5.

If anyone opens the door, I will come into him and dine with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20.

This link is produced by a person approaching the Lord and the Lord approaching him. For it is a fixed and immutable law that the Lord approaches a person to the extent that he approaches the Lord. This subject will be discussed further in the chapters on charity and faith.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 101

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 101

101. (vii) THUS GOD BECAME MAN, AND MAN GOD, IN ONE PERSON. It follows that Jehovah God became man and man became God in one person as the consequence of all the previous propositions in this chapter, and particularly these two: Jehovah the Creator of the universe came down and took upon Himself human form, in order to redeem and save mankind (see above 82-84); and the Lord by redeeming acts united Himself with the Father, and the Father reciprocally and mutually united Himself with the Lord (see above 97-100). That reciprocal union makes it obvious that God became man and man God in one person. The same consequence follows from the union of each resembling the union of soul and body; this is in agreement with the faith of the church to-day as stated in the Athanasian Creed (see 98 above). It is also in agreement with the faith of the Evangelical churches as stated in their leading book of orthodoxy known as the Formula of Concord. In this the doctrine is strongly supported both from Holy Scripture and from patristic literature, as well as by arguments, that Christ's human nature was raised to Divine majesty, omnipotence and omnipresence; also that in Christ man is God and God is man (see pp. 607, 765 of that book).

sRef Ps@2 @8 S2' sRef Ps@2 @12 S2' sRef Isa@9 @6 S2' sRef Colo@2 @9 S2' sRef Ps@2 @7 S2' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S2' sRef Ps@2 @6 S2' sRef Ps@110 @1 S2' [2] Moreover it has been proved in the present chapter that Jehovah God in respect of His Human is called in the Word Jehovah, Jehovah God, Jehovah Zebaoth*, as well as the God of Israel. Therefore Paul says that in Jesus Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily (Col. 2:9); and John says that Jesus Christ the Son of God is the true God and everlasting life (1 John 5:20). The Son of God in its true sense means His Human (see 92ff above). Moreover Jehovah God calls both Himself and His Son Lord, for we read:

The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand. Ps. 110:1.

and in Isaiah:

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is God, the everlasting Father. Isa. 9:6, 7.

Son also means the Lord in respect of His Human in the Psalms of David:

I will bring news of a decree, said Jehovah. You are my son, to-day have I begotten you. Kiss the son, so that he may not be angry and so that you do not perish on the way. Ps. 2:7, 12.

This does not mean a Son from eternity, but the Son born in the world, for it is a prophecy of the Lord's coming. This is why it is called a decree, news of which Jehovah gave to David. Earlier in that Psalm it says:

I have anointed my King over Zion. Ps. 2:6.

and later:

I will give him the nations for an inheritance. Ps. 2:8.

This proves that 'to-day' does not mean from eternity, but in time, for with Jehovah the future is present.

* Or 'the Lord of Hosts'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 102

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 102

sRef John@2 @3 S1' sRef John@2 @4 S1' sRef John@19 @27 S1' sRef John@19 @26 S1' 102. The current belief of Christians is that the Lord as far as His Human is concerned not only was, but is, the Son of Mary, but this is a delusion. It is true that He was the Son of Mary, but not that He still is, since by His redeeming actions He put off the human He had from His mother and put on the Human from His Father. That is why the Lord's Human is Divine, and in Him God is man and man God. It can also be seen that He put off the human from His mother and put on the Human from his Father, that is, the Divine Human, by noticing that He never called Mary His mother, as is evident from the following passages:

Jesus' mother said to Him, They have no wine. Jesus said to her, What have I to do with you, woman? My hour has not yet come. John 2:3, 4.

and elsewhere:

Jesus from the cross saw His mother and the disciple whom He loved standing next to her. He says to His mother, Woman, behold your son; then He says to the disciple, Behold your mother. John 19:26, 27.

and on one occasion He did not acknowledge her:

People reported to Jesus, saying, Your mother and your brothers are standing outside and want to see you. In answer Jesus said, My mother and my brothers are those who hear the Word of God and do it. Luke 8:20, 21; Matt. 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35.

So the Lord did not call her mother, but woman, and He gave her to be a mother to John. In other passages she is called His mother, but never by the Lord himself.

sRef Matt@22 @41 S2' sRef Isa@44 @6 S2' sRef Matt@22 @43 S2' sRef Matt@22 @42 S2' sRef Luke@8 @20 S2' sRef Luke@8 @21 S2' sRef Matt@22 @44 S2' sRef Matt@22 @46 S2' sRef Matt@22 @45 S2' [2] This is also proved by the fact that He did not acknowledge Himself to be the Son of David, for we read in the Gospels:

Jesus asked the Pharisees, saying, What is your opinion of the Christ? Whose son is he? They say to Him, David's. He said to them, How then does David call him in spirit his Lord, saying, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies the footstool for your feet? If then David calls Him Lord, how is He his son? And no one could say a word in reply to Him. Matt. 22:41-46; Mark 12:35-37; Luke 20:41-44; Ps. 110:1.

sRef Rev@1 @8 S3' sRef Rev@22 @13 S3' sRef Rev@22 @12 S3' sRef Rev@1 @17 S3' sRef Rev@1 @13 S3' sRef Rev@1 @11 S3' [3] Here I shall add something new.

I was once allowed to speak with Mary the mother of Jesus. She happened to be passing, and appeared in heaven above my head, dressed in white garments that looked like silk. Then she paused for a moment to say that she had been the Lord's mother, and He was born to her, but became God putting off everything human He had from her, and she therefore worships Him as her God, and she did not want anyone to acknowledge Him as her Son, because all the Divine is in Him.

The truth now shines out from these statements, that Jehovah is thus man in first things as in last, as it is written:

I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, He who is, who was and who is to come, the Almighty. Rev. 1:8, 11.

John, on seeing the Son of Man in the midst of the seven lampstands, fell at His feet as if dead. But He laid His right hand upon him, saying, I am the first and the last. Rev. 1:13, 17; 21:6.

Behold, I come quickly, to give to each according to his deeds. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Rev. 22:12, 13.

Also in Isaiah:

Thus spoke Jehovah, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth, I am the first and the last. Isa. 44:6; 48:12.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 103

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 103

103. To this I shall add a revelation, that the soul which comes from the father is the person himself, and the body which comes from the mother, is not in itself the person, but a product of the person. This is merely its covering, woven of substances from the natural world, while the soul is of substances from the spiritual world. After death every person lays aside the natural which he got from his mother, and keeps the spiritual which he had from his father, together with a sort of fringe (limbus) around it composed of the purest natural substances. In the case of those who come into heaven this fringe is below with the spiritual side uppermost; with those who come into hell, the fringe is uppermost and the spiritual side is below. That is why a human angel receives what he says from heaven, so that it is good and true, but a human devil receives what he says from hell when he speaks from the heart, as he does in private, but as if from heaven when he speaks with the lips only, as he does in public.

[2] Since a person's soul is his very self, and by its origin the soul is spiritual, it is clear why the father's mind, attitude, character, inclination and affection of love live on in one descendant after another, and show up from one generation to the next. That is why many families, even whole nations, are recognisable likenesses of their ancestor; there is a shared type which shows up in the faces of each of his descendants, and this is only changed by the spirituality of the church. The type shared by Jacob and Judah still lives on in their descendants, allowing them to be distinguished from others, because down to the present day they have kept strictly to their religion. For in the seed from which each individual is conceived there is a shoot or cutting of the father's soul in all its completeness, wrapped in a covering of natural elements. These control the formation of the body in the mother's womb, where it may take on a resemblance to the father or the mother, though the father's type remains in it and constantly strives to come out. So if it is unable to do so in the first generation, it achieves this in subsequent ones.

[3] The reason why the father's type in all its completeness is in the seed is that, as already said, the soul is in origin spiritual, and the spiritual has nothing in common with space, so it can be reproduced in a small compass just as well as on a large scale. As for the Lord, when He was in the world, He put off by redeeming acts all the human He had from His mother, and put on the Human from the Father, that is, the Divine Human. That is why it is that in Him man is God and God is man.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 104

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 104

sRef Isa@53 @12 S0' sRef Matt@27 @46 S0' 104. (viii) HIS PROGRESS TOWARDS UNION WAS HIS STATE OF EXINANITION, AND THE UNION ITSELF IS HIS STATE OF GLORIFICATION.

It is well known in the church that when the Lord was in the world He underwent two states, which are known as exinanition and glorification. The earlier state, that of exinanition, is described in many passages of the Word, especially in the Psalms of David, and also in the Prophets, in detail in Isaiah chapter 53, where we read that He emptied His soul to the point of death (Isa. 53:12). This same state is that of His humility before the Father, for in that state He prayed to the Father, and says that He is doing the Father's will, and He ascribes all that He did and said to the Father. His praying to the Father is evident from these passages: Matt. 26:39, 42*; Mark 1:35; 6:46; 14:32-39; Luke 5:16; 6:12; 22:41-44; John 17:9, 15, 20. His doing the Father's will: John 4.34; 5:30. His ascribing to the Father all that He did and said: John 8:26-28; 12:49, 50; 14:10. Indeed, He cried out on the cross: 'My God, my God, why are you abandoning me?' (Matt. 27:46; Mark 15:34). Moreover, if He had not been in this state, He could not have been crucified.

The state of glorification is the state of being united. He was in this state when He was transfigured before His three disciples, and when He performed the miracles, and each time He said that the Father and He were one, that the Father was in Him and He in the Father, and that all things of the Father's were His. After their complete union He said that He had power over all flesh (John 17:2); and all power in heaven and upon earth (Matt. 28:18), and much besides.

* The reference given in the Latin text (Matt. 17:43) is wrong, but how it should be corrected is not certain.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 105

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 105

105. The Lord had to undergo these two states of exinanition and glorification because progress towards union is not possible by any other way, since it is in accordance with Divine order, and this is immutable. Divine order requires that a person should adjust himself to receive God, and prepare himself as a receiver and dwelling-place for God to enter into and live as in His temple. This a person must do of himself while still acknowledging that it is from God. He must make this acknowledgment, because he does not feel the presence and working of God, although it is God who by His intimate presence performs all the good of love and all the truth of faith in a person. Every person must and will advance in accordance with this order, if he is to become spiritual instead of natural. The Lord advanced in the same way in order to make His natural human Divine; it was for this reason that He prayed to the Father, did His will, attributed to Him all that He did and said, and on the cross uttered the words 'My God, my God, why are you abandoning me?' For in that state God appears to be absent. But after this state comes another, which is a state of being linked with God. In this state a man behaves in the same way, but then does so from God; nor does he then need, as he did previously, to attribute to God all the good which he wills and does, and all the truth which he thinks and speaks, because this acknowledgment is written on his heart, and consequently is inwardly in every action he does and every word he utters. In the same way the Lord united Himself with His Father, and the Father united Himself with Him; in short, the Lord glorified His Human, that is, made it Divine, in just the same way as He regenerates a person, that is, makes him spiritual. [2] Every person who becomes spiritual instead of natural passes through two states, the first of which leads to the second, and so from the world to heaven, as will be fully proved in the chapters on free will, charity and faith, reformation and regeneration. All I shall say here is that in the first state, that called reformation, a person has full freedom to act as his understanding argues; and in the second, the state of regeneration, he has the same freedom, but he then wills and acts, thinks and speaks under the influence of a new love and a new intelligence, which are given him by the Lord. For in the first state the understanding plays the leading role and the will the second, in the second state the will plays the leading role and the understanding the second. But still it is the understanding which acts from the will, not the will which acts by means of the understanding. The linking of good and truth, charity and faith, and the internal and external man, takes place in exactly the same way.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 106

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 106

106. These two states are represented by various things in the natural universe. The reason is that they are in accordance with Divine order, and this pervades every single thing in the universe, down to the smallest detail. The first state is represented in the life of every person by his infancy and childhood, until he becomes a youth, adolescent and young man. This state is marked by humility before his parents, obedience, and being instructed by masters and underlings. The second state is represented by the same person's state when he becomes his own master, can make his own decisions, or follow his own will and his own understanding; at this stage he has control in his own house.

The first state then is represented by the state of a prince, a king's or duke's son, before he becomes king or duke. Likewise by the state of any citizen, before he becomes a magistrate; or of any subject before he becomes an official; or of any student who is being trained for the ministry before he becomes a priest, and then his state before he becomes a pastor, and then before he becomes a bishop; or of any young woman before she becomes a wife, or of any serving girl before she becomes mistress of a household. Generally speaking, it is the state of any apprentice before he becomes a merchant, any soldier before he becomes an officer, any servant before he becomes head of a household. The first state of these people is that of being a servant, the second that of following one's own will, and so one's own understanding.

sRef John@8 @36 S2' sRef Ex@21 @6 S2' [2] There are also various representations of these two states in the animal kingdom. The first is represented by animals and birds so long as they are tended by their parents, follow them constantly, and are fed and guided by them; the second when they leave their parents and look after themselves. Likewise with caterpillars, the first state is when they crawl and feed on leaves, the second when they slough their cases and become butterflies. There are also representations of these two states in things of the vegetable kingdom: the first when a plant springs up from seed, and decks itself out with branches, boughs and leaves; the second when it bears fruit, and produces a fresh crop of seed. This can be compared to the link between truth and good, because everything about a tree corresponds to truths, its fruits to kinds of good. A person who stops at the first state without entering upon the second is like a tree which produces only leaves and no fruit; of such a tree it is said in the Word that it is to be rooted out and cast into the fire (Matt. [17:19;] 21:19; Luke 3:9; 13:6-9; John 15:5, 6). Or he is like the slave who does not wish to be free, of whom it was commanded that he should be brought to the door or door-post, and have his ear pierced with an awl (Exod. 21:6). Those who have no link with the Lord are slaves, but those who have are free; for the Lord says:

If the Son makes you free, you are truly free. John 8:36.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 107

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 107

sRef Rev@21 @2 S1' sRef Rev@21 @1 S1' sRef Rev@21 @5 S1' sRef Isa@65 @18 S1' sRef Isa@65 @17 S1' 107. (ix) FROM THIS TIME ON NO ONE FROM CHRISTIAN COUNTRIES CAN COME INTO HEAVEN, UNLESS HE BELIEVES IN THE LORD GOD THE SAVIOUR, AND APPROACHES HIM ALONE.

We read in Isaiah:

Behold, I create a new heaven and a new earth, and the former ones shall not be remembered, neither shall they rise above the heart, and behold, I shall make Jerusalem an exultation, and its people happiness. Isa. 65:17, 18.

and in Revelation:

I saw a new heaven and a new earth, and I saw the holy Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride for her husband; and He that sat on the throne said, Behold, I shall make all things new. Rev. 21:1, 2, 5.

We read in many places that only those who are written down in the Book of Life of the Lamb will enter heaven (Rev. 13:8; 17:8; 20:12, 15; 21:27). Heaven there does not mean the heaven we see with our eyes, but the heaven of the angels; Jerusalem is no city coming out of the sky, but a church which will come down from the Lord out of the other heaven; and the Book of Life of the Lamb does not mean some book written in heaven which is to be opened, but the Word, which is from the Lord and about Him. In the preceding sections of this chapter the doctrine that Jehovah God, who is called the Creator and Father, came down and took upon Himself human form, in order that He could be approached and be joined, has been confirmed, proved and established. Does anyone on approaching a person address himself to his soul? How could one do so? Rather he addresses himself to the person whom he sees before him, and speaks to him directly face to face. The case is similar with God the Father and God the Son, since God the Father is in the Son, as the soul is in the body.

sRef John@6 @47 S2' sRef John@6 @40 S2' sRef John@14 @20 S2' sRef John@7 @38 S2' sRef John@7 @37 S2' sRef John@6 @33 S2' sRef John@8 @24 S2' sRef John@6 @46 S2' sRef John@3 @36 S2' sRef John@6 @28 S2' sRef John@6 @35 S2' sRef John@3 @15 S2' sRef John@6 @29 S2' sRef John@3 @16 S2' sRef John@3 @18 S2' sRef John@11 @25 S2' sRef John@14 @6 S2' sRef John@11 @26 S2' sRef John@12 @36 S2' sRef John@12 @45 S2' sRef John@12 @46 S2' [2] The following passages in the Word establish that one must believe in the Lord God the Saviour:

God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:15, 16.

He who believes in the Son is not judged, but he who does not believe has already been judged, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. John 3:18.

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God will rest upon him. John 3:36.

The bread of God is that which comes from heaven, and gives life to the world; he who comes to me shall not be hungry, and he who believes in me shall never be thirsty. John 6:33, 35.

This is the will of Him who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him should have everlasting life, and I should raise him up on the last day. John 6:40.

They said to Jesus, What shall we do to perform God's work? Jesus answered, This is God's work, to believe in Him whom the Father has sent. John 6:28, 29.

In truth, I say to you, he who believes in me has everlasting life. John 6:47.

Jesus cried out saying, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. If anyone believes in me, streams of living water will flow from his belly. John 7:37, 38.

If you have not believed that I am, you will die in your sins. John 8:24.

Jesus said, I am the resurrection and life; he who believes in me, though he die, shall live; but everyone who lives and believes in me shall not ever die. John 11:25, 26.

Jesus said, I have come as a light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in darkness. John 12:46; 8:12.

So long as you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may be sons of light. John 12:36.

We read that they will abide in the Lord and the Lord in them (John 14:20; 15:1-5; 17:23), which they can do through faith.

Paul preached both to Jews and to gentiles repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Acts 20:21.

I am the way, truth and life; no one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6.

sRef Ex@33 @20 S3' sRef Acts@20 @21 S3' sRef John@8 @19 S3' sRef John@9 @41 S3' sRef John@13 @20 S3' sRef John@1 @18 S3' sRef John@5 @37 S3' [3] The following passages prove that he who believes in the Son believes in the Father, since, as said before, the Father is in Him, just as the soul is in the body:

If you knew me, you would also know my Father. John 8:19; 14:7.

He who sees me sees Him who sent me. John 12:45.

He who receives me receives Him who sent me. John 13:20.

The reason is that no one can see the Father and live (Exod. 33:20). For this reason the Lord says:

No one has ever seen God; His only-begotten Son who is in the Father's revealed Him. John 1:18.

No one has seen the Father, except Him who is with the Father; He has seen the Father. John 6:46.

You have never heard the Father's voice, nor have you seen His appearance. John 5:37.

But those who do not know anything about the Lord, like those in two of the three continents, Asia and Africa, not to mention the Indies, if they believe in one God, and live in accordance with the commandments of their own religion, are saved by their faith and their life. Sin is imputed to those who know, not to those who are ignorant, just as blind people who knock into things are not blamed. For the Lord says:

If you were blind, you would not have any sin; but now you say that you can see, therefore your sin remains. John 9:41.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 108

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 108

108. As a further confirmation of this I shall report a fact known to me, because I have seen and can bear witness to it. This is that at the present time a new heaven of angels is being established by the Lord, drawn from those who believe in the Lord God the Saviour, and approach Him directly; all others are rejected. So if in future anyone from the Christian part of the world comes into the spiritual world, as everyone does after death, and does not believe in the Lord and approach Him only, and if he is then unable to accept this teaching owing to the wicked life he has led or the false beliefs he has adopted, he is rebuffed on taking the first step towards heaven. His face is turned away and directed towards the Lower Earth; so he departs to that place and associates with its inhabitants, who are those meant in Revelation by 'the Dragon and the False Prophet.' Every person henceforth from Christian countries, who does not believe in the Lord, goes unheard. His prayers are in heaven like foul smells or belches from a diseased lung. Even though he thinks that his praying is like the odour of incense, still it reaches the heaven of the angels only like the smoke of a fire, which is blown back in his eyes by a squall coming from above, or like the odour from a censer under a monk's robe. This is the fate from now on of all expressions of piety which are directed to a divided Trinity, not a united one. It is the leading theme of this book that the Divine Trinity is united in the Lord.

At this point I will add a piece of news. A few months ago the twelve apostles were called together by the Lord and sent out into the whole spiritual world, as they were once into the natural world, with instructions to preach this gospel. Each apostle had his own zone assigned to him. They are now following out their instructions with all eagerness and dedication. But a more detailed account of these events will be given in the last chapter of this book, which will deal with the ending of the age, the Lord's coming and the new church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 109

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 109

sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S0' sRef Isa@30 @26 S0' sRef Colo@2 @9 S0' sRef Luke@24 @38 S0' sRef Luke@24 @39 S0' sRef Luke@24 @37 S0' sRef Isa@30 @25 S0' 109. ADDITIONAL NOTE

All churches which existed before the Lord's coming were representative, unable to see Divine truths except in shadow. But since the Lord's coming into the world, a church has been founded by Him which has seen, or rather has been able to see, Divine truths in broad daylight. It is the same difference as between evening and morning. In fact the state of the church before the Lord's coming is called in the Word evening; and its state after His coming is called morning. Before He came into the world, the Lord was certainly present with the people of the church, but through the mediation of angels as His representatives; however, since His coming He is present with the people of the church without any intermediary. For in the world He put on the Divine Natural too, in which He is present with human beings. The Lord's glorification is the glorification of His Human, which He took upon Himself in the world; and the glorified Human of the Lord is the Divine Natural. The truth of this is clear from the fact that the Lord rose from the tomb with His whole body which He had in the world, and left nothing of it behind there. It follows that He took with Him from there the Human Natural itself from first to last. That is why He said to His disciples after the resurrection, when they thought they saw a spirit:

Look at my hands and my feet to confirm that it is I; touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see me have. Luke 24:37, 39.

It is plain from this that His natural body was made Divine by glorification. Paul therefore says that in Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily (Col. 2:9); and John says that the Son of God Jesus Christ is the true God (1 John 5:20). By this the angels know that the Lord alone in all the spiritual world is fully man.

sRef John@8 @58 S2' sRef John@8 @56 S2' [2] It is well known in the church that all worship among the Israelite and Jewish nation was only external, and it was only a sketch of the internal worship which the Lord revealed. Thus worship before the Lord's coming consisted of symbols and figures, which stood as a fair model of true worship. Among the ancients the Lord Himself was actually seen, for He said to the Jews:

Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and see it he did and was glad. I say to you, before Abraham was, I was. John 8:56, 58.

But because at that time the Lord was only represented, which was done by means of angels, everything in the Jewish church was made representative. But after His coming into the world, those representations vanished. The inward cause of this was that the Lord in the world put on the Divine Natural too, and by means of this He enlightens not only the internal, spiritual man, but also the external, natural man. Unless these two are simultaneously enlightened, a person is, so to speak, in shadow; but when both are simultaneously enlightened, he is, so to speak, in daylight. For when only the internal man is enlightened, and not the external at the same time, or when only the external man is enlightened, and not the internal at the same time, it is like someone asleep and dreaming, and then when he wakes remembering his dream, which leads him to various quite imaginary conclusions. It is also like someone walking in his sleep, when he thinks he sees what he sees in broad daylight.

sRef 2Sam@23 @3 S3' sRef 2Sam@23 @4 S3' [3] The difference between the state of the church before and after the Lord's coming can also be compared to a person who reads a book at night by the light of the moon and stars, and one who does so in sunlight. It is crystal clear that in the former light, which is only white, the eye strays; but it does not in the latter light, which is flamelike. Therefore we read of the Lord:

The God of Israel spoke, the Rock of Israel talked to me. He is like the light of morning, when the sun rises, a morning without clouds. 2 Sam. 23:3, 4.

The God of Israel and the Rock of Israel mean the Lord. Elsewhere:

The light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, like the light of seven days, on the day when Jehovah binds up His people's broken limb. Isa. 30:26.

This is a description of the state of the church after the Lord's coming. In short, the state of the church before the Lord's coming can be compared to an old woman, whose face is made up and who thinks the rouge makes her look lovely. But the state of the church after the Lord's coming can be compared to a young woman whose natural high colour makes her beautiful. Again, the state of the church before the Lord's coming can be compared to the rind of a fruit, such as an orange, apple, pear, or grape, and its taste; but its state after His coming to the interior of those fruits and their taste; and many other similes. This is all because the Lord, after putting on the Divine Natural too, enlightens the internal, spiritual man and the external, natural man at the same time. For when only the internal man is enlightened, and not the external at the same time, there is shadow; and likewise when only the external is enlightened, and not the internal at the same time.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 110

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 110

110. At this point I shall introduce these accounts of experiences, of which this is the first.

In the spiritual world I once saw a shooting star, which fell to earth surrounded by a streak of light. It was a meteor of the sort popularly known as a dragon. I noted the place where it fell; but it disappeared in the twilight as the day began to break, as always happens with shooting stars.

After daybreak I approached the spot where I had seen it fall during the night; I found the ground there composed of a mixture of sulphur, iron filings and clay. Then there suddenly appeared two tents, one directly over the spot, the other a little to the south of it. Then when I looked up, I saw a spirit falling from heaven like a thunderbolt; he landed in the tent which stood directly over the spot where the meteor had fallen; and I was in the other tent which stood beside it to the south. I stood at the entrance to the tent and saw the spirit also standing in the entrance to his tent.

So I asked him why he had thus fallen from heaven. He replied that he had been thrown down as an angel of the dragon by the angels of Michael, 'because,' he said, 'I had expressed some of my convictions about faith, which I had formed in the world. One of these was the idea that God the Father and God the Son are two and not one; for everyone in the heavens now believes that They are one as soul and body are one. Any expression contrary to that belief is like a tickling in their nostrils, or an awl piercing their ears, which causes them mental disturbance and pain. For this reason, anyone who contradicts them is ordered to leave, and if he shilly-shallies, he is thrown out.'

[2] On hearing this I said to him, 'Why did you not believe as they did?' He replied that after leaving the world no one can believe anything but what he had proved to himself and so imprinted on his mind. This remains rooted in it so that it cannot be torn out, and this is especially the case with convictions about God, since it is his idea of God which determines everyone's place in the heavens.

I went on to ask what proofs he had found that the Father and the Son were two. 'The passages in the Word,' he said, 'which state that the Son prayed to the Father, not only before the crucifixion, but actually during it; and that He humbled Himself before the Father. How then could they be one, as the soul and the body are one in man? Who prays as if to another, or humbles himself as if before another, if he is himself that other? No man behaves like that, far less the Son of God. Moreover, the whole Christian church in my time divided the Divinity into Persons, and each Person is one by itself, and is defined as that which remains in existence by its own right.'

[3] On hearing him say this I replied: 'I have grasped from what you say that you are utterly ignorant how God the Father and God the Son are one; and since you do not know how this is, you have accepted the false notions about God still prevalent in the church. Do you not know that, when the Lord was in the world, He had a soul like any other person? Where could He have got it from, unless from God the Father? There are plenty of plain statements that this is so in the writings of the Evangelists. What then is it that is called the Son, but the Human which was conceived of the Father's Divine and born of the Virgin Mary? A mother cannot conceive a soul; that would be totally repugnant to the order which controls human reproduction. Nor can God the Father implant the soul from Himself, and then retire, as every father in the world does, since God is His own Divine Essence, and this is one and indivisible; and being indivisible, it must be God Himself. This is why the Lord says that the Father and He are one, that the Father is in Him and He is in the Father, and many more similar statements. This too was seen, at a distance, by those who framed the Athanasian Creed; so after splitting God into three Persons, they still declare that in Christ God and man, that is, the Divine and the Human, are not two, but one, as the soul and the body in man are one.

[4] 'The Lord in the world prayed to the Father as if to another, and humbled Himself before the Father as if before another, because this was to conform with the order established from creation; for this is the immutable order which controls everyone's progress towards being linked with God. This order lays down that as a person links himself to God, which he does by living according to the rules of order or God's commandments, so God links Himself to him, and makes him spiritual instead of natural. In the same way the Lord united Himself with His Father, and God the Father united Himself with the Lord. Was the Lord not a child like any other, a boy like any other boy? Do we not read that He advanced in wisdom and grace, and later, that He besought the Father to glorify His name, that is, His Human? To glorify is to make Divine by union with Himself. This shows plainly why the Lord in His state of exinanition, which was His state while advancing towards union, prayed to the Father.

sRef John@16 @15 S5' [5] 'That same order was imprinted on every person from creation,
namely the rule that as a person prepares his understanding by means of truths from the Word, so does he make it suitable for the reception of faith from God; and as he prepares his will by means of charitable actions, so he renders it capable of receiving love from God. For as a craftsman cuts a diamond, so he gives it the faculty of receiving and emitting a brilliant light; and so forth. To prepare oneself to receive and be linked to God is to live in accordance with Divine order, and the laws of order are all the commandments of God. The Lord fulfilled these down to the last comma, and so made Himself a receiver of the Divinity in all its fulness. Therefore Paul says that in Jesus Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and the Lord says that all things of the Father's are His.

[6] 'It is further to be held that the Lord alone is active in a person, and the person by himself is only passive, but he is moved to activity by the inflow of life from the Lord. This perpetual inflow from the Lord makes it appear to a person that he acts of himself. Because this is so, he also has free will, and this is given to him in order to prepare himself to receive and be linked to the Lord, a state which would be impossible if the linking were not reciprocal. This is accomplished when a person acts of his own free will, yet is led by faith to attribute all activity to the Lord.'

[7] After this I asked whether, like the rest of his companions, he admitted that God is one. He replied that he did. Then I said: 'I am afraid that in your heart you may believe that there is no God. Surely everything one says with the lips arises from thought in the mind? Therefore a verbal admission that there is one God must inevitably eliminate the idea of three Gods from the mind; and contrariwise, such a thought in the mind must inevitably eliminate the verbal admission that there is one God. So what can be the result, except a belief that there is no God? Surely this will turn into a vacuum all the intervening stages between the thought and the lips, and in the reverse direction between the lips and the thought? So what other conclusion about God can the mind reach, but that nature is God? Or about the Lord, but that His soul was from His mother or from Joseph? All the angels of heaven recoil from these two ideas as horrible and abominable.'

After this the spirit was banished into the abyss described in Revelation (9:2ff) where the angels of the dragon discuss the secrets of their faith.

[8] The next day, when I looked towards the same spot, I saw in place of the tents two statues in human shape, made of dust from the soil, which was a mixture of sulphur, iron and clay. One statue appeared to hold a sceptre in its left hand, it had a crown on its head, and a book in its right hand; its bodice was girded diagonally with a sash decorated with precious stones, and its robe streamed out behind towards the other statue. But these were appearances given to that statue by imagination. Then a voice was heard from one of the followers of the dragon: 'This statue represents our faith as a queen, and the other one behind it is charity represented as her handmaid.' This statue was made out of a similar mixture of powders; it was placed right at the end of the robe streaming out behind the queen, and it held in its hand a placard on which was written: 'Beware of coming too close and touching the robe.' Then a sudden shower fell from heaven, which drenched both the statues, and since they were made of a mixture of sulphur, iron and clay, they began to bubble, as a mixture of those substances will when water is poured on*. So they caught fire from internal combustion, fell apart and were reduced to heaps, which afterwards stuck up above ground like mounds in a graveyard.

*Sulphur here means a combustible material of a sulphurous nature.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 111

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 111

111. The second experience*.

In the natural world people's speech is twofold, because so is their thought, for it may be external or internal. For one can speak as a result of internal thought and at the same time of external thought, or simply as the result of external thought without the internal, or even contrary to it. This is the origin of pretence, insincerity and hypocrisy. But in the spiritual world people do not have twofold speech but only one way of speaking; they speak as they think, otherwise the sound of their voices is harsh and hurts the ears. One can, however, still keep quiet and not reveal the thoughts arising in the mind. Consequently a hypocrite on coming into the company of wise people either goes away, or hurries into a corner of the room, makes himself inconspicuous and sits in silence.

[2] There was once a large assembly in the world of spirits to discuss this subject. They said that being unable to speak except as one thought was hard for those who did not have right ideas about God and the Lord, when they mixed with good people. The middle of the assembly consisted of people from the Reformed Churches, many of them clergy, and next to them were the Roman Catholics and their monks. To begin with, both parties said that this was not hard. 'What need is there,' they said, 'to speak otherwise than one thinks? And if perhaps anyone does not think aright, can he not keep his mouth shut and be silent?'

A clergyman said: 'Is there anyone who does not think aright about God and the Lord?'

But some people in the assembly said: 'Let us put them to the test.' So they told those who have a firm conviction about God as a Trinity of Persons to think about and say 'One God'. They could not do so; they twisted and screwed up their mouths into all kinds of shapes, but were unable to utter any words except those which agreed with their thoughts, and these were about three Persons, so consequently three Gods.

[3] They went on to tell those who had convinced themselves of the doctrine of faith separated from charity to name 'Jesus'. They could not do so, though they were able to say 'Christ', and also 'God the Father'. This surprised them and they asked why. The reason they discovered to be the fact that they had prayed to God the Father for the sake of His Son, and not to the Saviour Himself; and 'Jesus' means Saviour.

sRef Matt@28 @18 S4' sRef John@17 @2 S4' sRef John@3 @35 S4' sRef Matt@11 @27 S4' [4] Then they were told to think about the Lord's Human and say 'the Divine Human'. None of the clergy present was able to do so; but some of the laymen could. So they made this the subject of a profound debate. Then (i) the following passages from the Gospels were read to them:

The Father gave all things into the hand of the Son. John 3:35.

The Father gave the Son power over all flesh. John 17:2.

All things were handed to me by the Father. Matt. 11:27.

All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Matt. 28:18.

'Now keep in mind,' they were told, 'that Christ both in His Divine and in His Human is the God of heaven and earth, and while doing so say the Divine Human.' But they were still unable to do so; and they said that although they could retain some thoughts coming from their understanding of the subject, still they could not acknowledge this at all, and that was the reason for their failure.

[5] (ii) Then the passages from Luke (1:32, 34, 35) were read to them, which prove that the Lord in His Human was the Son of Jehovah God, and that He is there called 'the Son of the Most High', and in many other passages 'the Son of God', as well as 'the Only-begotten'. They begged them to keep this in mind, and also that the only-begotten Son of God who was born in the world must inevitably be God, just as His Father is God, and then to say 'the Divine Human.' But they said: 'We cannot, because our spiritual, that is, interior thought does not permit any but similar ideas to enter the thought which is nearest to speech.' As a result they said they perceived that now they were not allowed to divide their thoughts, as they had in the natural world.

sRef John@10 @30 S6' sRef John@14 @8 S6' sRef John@14 @10 S6' sRef John@14 @9 S6' sRef John@14 @11 S6' [6] (iii) Next, these words of the Lord to Philip were read to them:

Philip said, Lord, show us the Father; and the Lord said, He who sees me sees the Father; do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? John 14:8-11.

Also other passages stating that the Father and He are one (e.g. John 10:30). They were told to keep these in mind, and so to say 'the Divine Human.' But because their thought was not rooted in the acknowledgment of the Lord as God in His Human too, they screwed up their mouths until they became indignant, wanting to force their mouths to utter the words, but being unable to do so. The reason was that the ideas one thinks of, which are derived from acknowledgment, are identical with the words of language, when one is in the spiritual world. In the absence of those ideas, the words will not come, for speaking is putting ideas into words.

[7] (iv) Then the following passage was read to them from the doctrine received throughout the Christian world:

The Divine and the Human in the Lord are not two, but one, in fact one Person, united like soul and body in man.

This is from the Athanasian Creed, and has been accepted by the Councils. Then they were told: 'This at least will give you some idea and enable you to acknowledge that the Lord's Human is Divine, because His soul is Divine. This is the doctrine of your church, and you acknowledged it in the world. Moreover, the soul is the very essence of a person, and the body is the form, and essence and form make one, like being and coming-into-being, or like the efficient cause which produces the effect and the effect itself.' They held this idea in mind, and tried by means of it to say 'the Divine Human', but still they could not. For the idea deep within their minds about the Lord's Human banished and drove out this new supplementary idea, as they called it.

sRef Colo@2 @9 S8' sRef John@1 @14 S8' sRef John@1 @1 S8' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S8' [8] (v) After this the following passage from John was read to them:

The Word was with God, and the Word was God; and the Word was made flesh. John 1:1, 14.

and also this:

Jesus Christ is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

and from Paul:

In Christ Jesus all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily. Col. 2:9.
2:9.

They were told to think along these lines: that God who was the Word became man; that He was the true God; and that all the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in Him bodily. They did so, but only in their external thought; for the resistance of their internal thought prevented them from saying the words 'the Divine Human.' They said frankly that they could not have any idea of a Divine Human, 'because God is God, and man is man; and God is a spirit, and we have never understood spirit as anything but wind or ether.'

sRef John@15 @4 S9' sRef John@15 @5 S9' [9] (vi) Finally they were told: 'You know that the Lord said:

Remain in me and I in you; he who remains in me, and I in him, bears much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. John 15:4, 5.

Because some of the English clergy were present, a passage was read to them from one of the prayers used in the Holy Communion:

For, when we spiritually eat the flesh of Christ and drink the blood, then we dwell in Christ, and Christ in Us.**

Now consider that this would be impossible, if the Lord's Human were not Divine, and then say 'the Divine Human', acknowledging this in your thought. But they were still unable to do so, because the idea was so deeply stamped on their minds that what is Divine could not be human, and what is human could not be Divine; and that the Lord's Divine was from the Divine of the Son born from eternity, while His Human was like that of any other man. They were told: 'How can you think this? Can the rational mind ever conceive of a Son born of God from eternity?'

[10] (vii) Then they turned to the Evangelical party and said that the Confession of Augsburg and Luther taught that the Son of God and the Son of Man were one Person in Christ, and that even in His human nature He was omnipotent and omnipresent; and this enabled Him to sit at the right hand of God the Father, and control all things in the heavens and upon earth, to fulfil all prophecies, be with us, and dwell and work in us; that there was no distinction in worship, because through the visible nature the invisible Godhead is worshipped; and that in Christ God is man and man is God. On hearing this they replied: 'Is that so?' They looked around and after a while said: 'We did not know this before; that is why we cannot say 'the Divine Human.' One or two said: 'We read that and wrote it, but when we pondered it in our hearts, they were only words, of which we had no inward notion.'

[11] (viii) Lastly they turned to the Roman Catholics and said: 'Perhaps you can name the Divine Human, because you believe that in your Eucharist Christ is wholly present in the bread and wine, and in every part of them. Moreover you worship Him, when you display and carry around the Host, as the Most Holy God. You also call Mary the mother of God. Consequently you acknowledge that she gave birth to God, that is, the Divine Human.' Then they tried to say the words, but because there then slipped in a material idea of the body and blood of Christ, and also a belief that His Human could be separated from the Divine, and in fact is so separated in the Pope, to whom only His human and not His Divine power was transferred, they could not pronounce them. Then a monk got up and said that he could think of the Divine Human in the case of the most holy Virgin Mary, or the patron saint of his monastery. Another monk came up who said: 'The idea which I now cherish in my mind enables me to say the Divine Human of his Holiness the Pope, rather than of Christ.' But then some of the Catholics pulled him back saying: 'You should be ashamed of yourself.'

[12] After this heaven appeared to open, and tongues like small flames were seen coming down and lighting on certain people. These then praised the Divine Human of the Lord, saying: 'Banish the idea of three Gods, and believe that in the Lord all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and that the Father and He are one, just as soul and body are one, and that God is not wind or ether, but is man. Then you will be linked with heaven, and the Lord will enable you to name Jesus and to say "the Divine Human."'

* This section is repeated with minor changes from AR 294.
** These words are quoted in English in the original.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 112

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 112

112. The third experience.

I once woke up around dawn and went out into the garden in front of my house. I watched the sun rising in its splendour, and around it I saw a halo, first of all narrow and later projecting further, shining as if made of gold, and under its lower edge a cloud coming up, which glittered with the sun's fire like a ruby. This then led me to think about how the earliest people had legends which described the Dawn as having wings made of silver feathers and carrying gold in her mouth.

While my mind was taking pleasure in these thoughts, I passed into the spirit, and heard some people talking to one another. 'I wish,' they were saying, 'we could talk with that original thinker who has thrown the apple of Strife among the leaders of the church; many laymen have run after it, picked it up and held it before our eyes.' They meant by that apple my little book entitled: A BRIEF EXPOSITION OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE NEW CHURCH. 'It is a new doctrine never before thought up, designed to divide the church,' they said. I heard one of them cry out: 'Divisive indeed, it is heretical!' But some of the bystanders answered: 'Be quiet, hold your tongue; it is not heretical. It quotes a large number of sayings from the Word which those who live with us - we mean laymen - pay attention to and support.'

[2] On hearing this, since I was in the spirit, I went up to them and said: Here I am. What is the trouble?'

At once one of them, a German as I learned later, a native of Saxony, said in an authoritative tone of voice: 'How have you the nerve to upset the mode of worship established for so many centuries throughout the Christian world, namely, the invocation of God the Father as the Creator of the universe, and of His Son as Mediator, and of the Holy Spirit as Worker? You are banishing the first and the last God from our Trinity of Persons, although the Lord Himself says: "When you pray, pray like this: Our Father, who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come." Is this not an instruction to us to invoke God the Father?'

This speech produced silence, and all his supporters took up their stand like the brave fighters on warships when the enemy fleet comes into view, ready to shout: 'Now let us fight, victory is surely ours.'

sRef John@1 @14 S3' sRef John@1 @1 S3' [3] So I began my speech by saying: 'You all know that God came down from heaven and became man, because we read: "The Word was with God and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh." You know all of you,' and here I looked hard at the Evangelical party, to which the spokesman who had addressed me belonged, 'that in Christ who was born of the Virgin Mary God is man, and man is God.' There was an uproar from the assembly at this, so I said: 'Do you not know this? It is in accordance with the doctrine of your sect called the Formula of Concord; it states this and adds many proofs in support of it.'

Then the spokesman turned to the assembly and asked whether they knew this. They replied: 'We paid too little attention to what that book says about the Person of Christ; but we worked hard at the section on justification by faith alone. Still, if that is what it says, we are content.' Then one who could remember it said: 'Yes, it does say that; and it adds further that Christ's human nature was raised to Divine majesty and all its attributes, and also that Christ is seated in Divine majesty at the right hand of His Father.'

sRef John@17 @10 S4' sRef John@10 @30 S4' sRef John@14 @9 S4' sRef John@10 @38 S4' [4] When they heard this, they fell silent. So having got them to agree to this, I said: 'If this is so, is not the Father then the Son, and the Son also the Father?' But since this again offended their ears, I went on: 'Listen to the Lord's actual words, and if you paid no heed to them before, do so now. He said: "The Father and I are one; the Father is in me and I in the Father; Father, all things of mine are yours, and all of yours are mine; He who sees me sees the Father." How can you understand these sayings, except as meaning that the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father, and that they are one like soul and body in man, so they are one Person? You will find that this is part of your faith too, if you believe the Athanasian Creed, which says something very much like this. But take from what I have quoted just this one utterance of the Lord: "Father, all things of mine are yours, and all of yours are mine." What does this mean, if not that the Father's Divine belongs to the Son's Human, and the Son's Human to the Father's Divine? Consequently in Christ God is man and man is God, and thus they make one as soul and body make one.

sRef Luke@1 @32 S5' sRef Luke@1 @35 S5' aRef John@1 @18 S5' [5] Everyone can say the same things about his soul and body. Each person can say: all things of yours are mine, and all of mine are yours; you are in me and I in you; he who sees me sees you, we are one in person and have one life. The reason is that the soul pervades the whole and every part of the person, for the life of the soul is the life of the body, and is possessed by them in common. It is plain from this that the Father's Divine is the Son's soul, and the Son's Human is the Father's body. Where can a son's soul come from, if not from his father, and where can his body come from, if not from his mother? When we say the Father's Divine we mean the Father Himself, since He and His Divine are the same; this is also one and indivisible. The truth of this is established by the words with which the angel Gabriel addressed Mary: "The power of the Most High will overshadow you, and the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the holy thing that shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God." Shortly before He is called "the Son of the Most High," and elsewhere "the only-begotten Son." You, however, who call Him only the Son of Mary, destroy the idea of His divinity; but the only ones who do this are some of the learned clergy and well-educated laymen, who, when they lift their thoughts above the level of the bodily senses, have in view the enhancement of their reputations. This not only casts a shadow, but actually puts out the light, through which the glory of God comes in.

sRef Matt@6 @9 S6' sRef Matt@6 @10 S6' sRef John@12 @28 S6' sRef John@14 @6 S6' sRef Isa@9 @6 S6' [6] 'But let us go back to the Lord's Prayer, which says: "Our Father, who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come." Those of you who are present here understand by these words the Father in His Divine alone; but I understand Him in His Human, and this too is the Father's name. For the Lord said: "Father, glorify your name," that is, your Human. When this happens, the kingdom of God comes. The instruction to use this prayer has been given us for the present time, that is, so that God the Father may be approached through His Human. The Lord also said: "No one comes to the Father except through Me," and the prophet said: "A child is born for us, a Son is given to us, whose name is God, Hero, the everlasting Father"; and elsewhere: "You, Jehovah, are our Father, your name is our Redeemer from of old." There are thousands of other passages where the Lord our Saviour is called Jehovah. This is the true explanation of those words in the Lord's Prayer.'

[7] On finishing this speech I looked at them and noticed that their faces had changed in accordance with the change in their mental state. Some of them supported me and were watching me; some did not, and they turned their faces away. Then I saw on the right a pearly-coloured cloud, and on the left a murky cloud, from both of which rain was falling. The rain from the dark cloud was like a shower in late autumn, that from the other like dew in early springtime. Then suddenly I passed from the spirit into the body, and so returned from the spiritual world into the natural one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 113

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 113

113. The fourth experience.*

I looked out into the world of spirits and saw an army mounted on chestnut and black horses. Those who sat upon them looked like monkeys, their faces and chests turned towards the hind quarters and tails of the horses, the backs of their heads and bodies towards the horses' necks and heads; the reins hung loosely about the necks of the riders. They raised a shout against those who rode on white horses, and pulled on the reins with both hands to keep their horses away from the battle, and they kept on doing this.

Then two angels came down from heaven, and on approaching me said: 'What do you see?' I described this ridiculous cavalry and asked: 'What is this, and who are they?'

The angels replied: 'They come from the place called Armageddon (Rev. 16:16), where some thousands have gathered to do battle with the members of the Lord's new church, which is called the New Jerusalem. They were talking there about the church and religion; yet there was not a trace of the church in them, because they were without any spiritual truth, or any trace of religion, because they were without any spiritual good. There was much talk there on their lips about both subjects, but their motive was to exercise power by their means.

[2] 'As young men they had learned to believe in faith alone, and they knew a little about God. After being promoted to the higher offices of the church, they retained their beliefs for a while. But since they then began to think no more about God and heaven, and only about themselves and the world, and so abandoned blessedness and everlasting happiness for temporal distinction and wealth, they pushed the doctrines they had learned in youth out of the interiors of the rational mind, which are in contact with heaven and so illuminated by its light, and banished them to the exteriors of the rational mind, which are in contact with the world and are illuminated only by its faint beams. They ended by relegating those doctrines to the level of the natural senses. This made them treat the doctrines of the church merely as formulas to be repeated, and no longer thought about rationally, much less affectionately loved. By making themselves like this, they do not receive the Divine truth which the church provides, nor any real good which comes from religion. To use a simile, the interiors of their minds have become like leather bags filled with a mixture of iron filings and powdered sulphur; if then water is poured in, there is first heat generated, and then flame, which makes the bags burst. In like manner, when these people hear anything about living water, which is the real truth of the Word, and it penetrates through their ears, they become furiously heated and angry, and reject it as something which would burst their heads.

[3] 'These are the people who appeared to you like monkeys riding back to front on chestnut and black horses with the reins about their necks. This is because those who do not love the truth and good which the church has from the Word, are unwilling to look towards the front of a horse, but only its hinder parts. For 'horse' means the understanding of the Word, 'a chestnut horse' understanding of the Word bereft of good, 'a black horse' understanding of the Word bereft of truth. The reason why they yelled to do battle against the riders on white horses is that 'a white horse' means the understanding of the truth and good of the Word. They seemed to be holding their horses back by the neck because they were frightened of fighting, for fear the truth of the Word might reach many people and so come to light. That is the interpretation.'

[4] The angels went on to say: 'We are from the community in heaven named Michael, and we have been ordered by the Lord to go down to the place called Armageddon, from which the cavalry you saw had broken out. Armageddon for us in heaven means the state of wishing to fight with falsified truths, which arises from the love of controlling and surpassing all others. Since we perceive you have a desire to learn about that battle, we will tell you something about it. After coming down from heaven we approached the place called Armageddon and saw several thousands of people gathered there. However, we did not go into that assembly, but there were some houses on the south side where there were boys with their teachers; we went into these, where we were made welcome, and we enjoyed their company. They were all good-looking because of the liveliness of their eyes and the animation of their conversation. The liveliness in their eyes came from their perception of truth, the animation of their conversation from their affection for good. Because of this we presented them with hats, the brims of which were ornamented with bands of gold thread intertwined with pearls, and also with clothes of a white and dark blue pattern.

'We asked them whether they had looked towards the neighbouring place called Armageddon. They said they had done so through the window they had under the roof of their house. They said they had seen a great gathering of people there, who took on varying appearances. At one time they resembled tall** men, at another no longer people at all, but they looked like images and carved statues, and around them was a crowd kneeling. These too seemed to us to have varying appearances,- some looked like human beings, some like leopards, some like goats, and these had downward-pointing horns, which they used to dig up the ground. We were able to interpret their transformations, and know whom they represented and what they meant.

sRef Matt@6 @10 S5' sRef Matt@6 @9 S5' [5] 'But to return to the story; when the people assembled heard that we had gone into those houses, they said to one another: "What are they doing, going to see those boys? Let us send some of our number to turn them out." They did so, and when they came they said to us: "Why have you gone into those houses? Where do you come from? We have authority to tell you to go away."

'But we replied: "You have no authority to tell us that. In your own eyes you may be like the Anakim, and the people here like dwarfs, but still you have no power or right here, except through trickery, and that will not work. So go back and report to your people, that we have been sent here from heaven to investigate whether there is any religion among you or not; if not, you will be thrown out of the place you occupy. So set before them the following question, which touches the very essence of the church and religion, what is the meaning of these words from the Lord's Prayer: Our Father, who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come."

'Their first reaction on hearing this was indignation, but then they agreed to put the question. So they went away and told their people what had happened, and they replied: "What does this question mean and what sort of a question is it?" But they understood the concealed point, that the questioners wished to know whether these words favoured the way their faith approaches God the Father. So they said: "These words clearly mean that we should pray to God the Father, and because Christ is our mediator, that we should pray to God the Father for the sake of His Son."

'Then in their indignation they resolved to approach us and to assert this face to face, saying too that they would tweak our ears. They actually left the place where they were, and went into the park adjacent to the houses where the boys were with their teachers. In the middle of the park there was a raised platform like an arena, and holding one another's hands they went into the arena where we stood waiting for them. There were small mounds of earth there covered with turf, and they sat on these, saying to one another: "In such company we will not remain standing, but sit down."

'Then one of them who had the trick of making himself look like an angel of light, and who had been appointed by the rest to act as their spokesman, said: "You have asked us to reveal our opinion on how we should understand the first words of the Lord's Prayer. So I beg to inform you that we understand them like this: we should pray to God the Father; and because Christ is our mediator, and our salvation depends upon His merit, we should pray to God the Father trusting in Christ's merit."

[6] 'Then we told them: "We are from the community in heaven known as Michael. We have been sent to visit you, and enquire whether you who are gathered here have any religion or not. For the idea of God enters into every part of religion, and it is this which establishes a link with God, and that link is the means of salvation. We in heaven recite that prayer every day, just as people on earth do; but then we do not think of God the Father, since He is invisible, but we think of Him in His Divine Human, since in this He is visible. In this you call Him Christ, we call Him the Lord; thus the Lord is our Father in the heavens. The Lord too taught that He and the Father are one, that the Father is in Him and He is in the Father; that he who sees Him, sees the Father; and that no one comes to the Father except through Him. He also taught that it is the Father's will that people should believe in the Son; that he who does not believe in the Son will not see life; rather the wrath of God remains upon him. From these passages it is clear that the Father is to be approached through the Son and in Him. For that reason too He also taught that all power in heaven and on earth was given to Him. The Prayer says, "Hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come," and we have proved from the Word that the Father's name is His Divine Human, and that the Father's kingdom comes when the Lord is directly approached, and not at all when God the Father is directly approached. So too the Lord told His disciples to preach the kingdom of God, and this is what is meant by the kingdom of God."

sRef Mark@16 @15 S7' sRef John@3 @35 S7' sRef Dan@7 @13 S7' sRef Mark@1 @15 S7' sRef Rev@11 @15 S7' sRef John@17 @2 S7' sRef Mark@1 @14 S7' sRef Isa@54 @5 S7' sRef Matt@28 @18 S7' sRef Dan@7 @14 S7' sRef Matt@3 @2 S7' sRef Matt@4 @23 S7' sRef Matt@4 @17 S7' sRef Matt@11 @27 S7' [7] 'On hearing this our opponents said: "You quote many passages from the Word. We may have read such things there, but we do not remember them. So open the Word in our presence, and read us those passages from it, especially the ones which say that the Father's kingdom comes when the Lord's kingdom does." Then they told the boys to fetch the Word, and when they did so, we read to them from it the following passages:

John*** preaching the Gospel of the kingdom said, The time has come, the kingdom of God is at hand. Mark 1:14, 15; Matt. 3:2.

Jesus Himself preached the Gospel of the kingdom, and said that the kingdom of God was at hand. Matt. 4:17, 23; 9:35.

Jesus ordered His disciples to preach and proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God (Mark 16:15; Luke 8:1; 9:60); likewise the seventy whom He sent out (Luke 10:9, 11.)

And many passages besides, such as Matt. 11:5; 16:27, 28; Mark 8:35; 9:1, 47; 10:29, 30; 11:10; Luke 1:19; 2:10, 11; 4:43; 7:22; 17:20, 21;**** 21:31; 22:18. The kingdom of God, the good news of which they were to proclaim, was the Lord's kingdom, and so the Father's kingdom. This is plain from the following passages: The Father gave all things into the Son's hand (John 3:35); The Father gave the Son power over all flesh (John 17:2).

All things are handed over to me by the Father. Matt. 11:27.

All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Matt. 28: 18.

Further from the following:

Jehovah Zebaoth is His name and the Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, He shall be called the God of the whole earth. Isa. 54:5.

I saw and behold, one like the Son of Man, to whom was given dominion, glory and the kingdom; and all peoples and nations shall worship Him. His dominion is a dominion for ever, which will not pass away, and His kingdom one which will not perish. Dan. 7:13, 14.

When the seventh angel sounded, mighty voices were heard in the heavens saying, The kingdoms of the world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and His Christ; and He shall reign for ever and ever. Rev. 11:15; 12:10.

sRef John@14 @9 S8' sRef Isa@9 @6 S8' sRef Isa@63 @16 S8' [8] 'In addition we instructed them from the Word that the Lord came into the world not only to redeem angels and men, but also so that they might be united with God the Father through Him and in Him. For He taught that He is in those who believe in Him and they are in Him (John 6:56; 14:20; 15:4, 5). On hearing this they asked: "How then can your Lord be called Father"? We said: "It follows from the passages we have read, and also from these:

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is God, Hero, the everlasting Father. Isa. 9:6.

You are our Father, Abraham does not recognise us, neither does Israel acknowledge us; You, Jehovah, are our Father, our Redeemer from of old is your name. Isa. 63:16.

Did He not say to Philip, when he wanted to see the Father.

Philip, do you not know me? He who sees me sees the Father. John 14:9; 12:45.

What other Father then is there, than the one whom Philip saw with his own eyes?"

'To this we added the following. "It is said throughout the Christian world that the members of the church constitute the body of Christ, and that they are in His body. How then can any person in the church approach God the Father, except through Him in whose body he is? Otherwise he would inevitably leave the body to approach Him." Finally we informed them that at the present time a new church is being established by the Lord, which is meant by the New Jerusalem in Revelation. In this church worship will be directed to the Lord alone, as it is in heaven, and thus all will be accomplished which the Lord's Prayer contains from beginning to end.

'We proved everything from the Gospels and the Prophets in the Word, and from Revelation, which deals from beginning to end with that church, and went on at such length that they became tired of listening.

[9] 'The Armageddon party listened with indignation, and wanted repeatedly to interrupt our speech. Eventually they broke in and cried: "You have spoken against the doctrine of our church, which states that God the Father is to be approached directly, and is to be believed in. You have thus become guilty of violating our faith. So begone from here, or you will be thrown out." Their tempers were so roused they passed from threats to attempted action. But then by the powers we had been given we struck them blind, so that, being unable to see us, they broke out and ran blindly in all directions. Some fell into the abyss described in Revelation (9:2), which is now in the southern quarter towards the east; this is where those are to be found who are convinced that justification is effected by faith alone. Those there who prove that doctrine by quoting the Word are cast out into a desert, where they are driven to the edge of the Christian world and mix with the pagans.'

* The first part of this section is repeated from AR 839.
** The Latin has 'leading men' (proceres), but the following reference to giants (Anakim) shows that this must be a misprint for 'tall men' (proceros).
*** Apparently a slip for 'Jesus'; John is mentioned earlier in the verse.
**** This reference was inserted in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 114

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 114

114. REDEMPTION

It is well known in the church that the Lord has two functions, the priestly and the kingly; but since few are aware of what distinguishes either of them, this needs to be stated. The Lord in His priestly function is called Jesus, in His kingly function Christ; and in the Word He is also called in His priestly function Jehovah and Lord, and in His kingly function God and the Holy One of Israel, as well as King. The distinction between them is like that between love and wisdom, or, what is the same, between good and truth. Therefore whatever the Lord did or performed from Divine love or Divine good, He did in His priestly function; whatever He did from Divine wisdom or Divine truth, in His kingly function. In the Word too priest and priesthood mean Divine good, king and royalty Divine truth, and this same pair were represented by priests and kings in the Israelite church. Redemption concerns both functions, but in what respects it concerns one or the other will be revealed in what follows. For the sake of clarity of detail the discussion will be divided into separate topics or sections, as follows:

(i) The real redemption was the conquest of the hells and the ordering of the heavens, and preparation by this means for a new spiritual church.
(ii) But for that redemption no person could have been saved, nor could the angels have remained unharmed.
(iii) The Lord thus redeemed not only men, but also angels.
(iv) Redemption was an entirely Divine deed.
(v) This redemption could only be effected by an incarnate God.
(vi) The passion on the cross was the last temptation which the Lord underwent as the greatest Prophet; this was the means by which He glorified His Human, that is, united it with His Father's Divine; so this was not in itself the redemption.
(vii) It is a fundamental error on the part of the church to believe that the passion on the cross was the real act of redemption. That error, together with the erroneous belief in three Divine Persons existing from eternity, has so perverted the whole church that there is no remainder of spirituality left in it.

These points will be discussed one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 115

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 115

115. (i) THE REAL REDEMPTION WAS THE CONQUEST OF THE HELLS AND THE ORDERING OF THE HEAVENS, AND PREPARATION BY THIS MEANS FOR A NEW SPIRITUAL CHURCH.

I can assert with complete certainty that these three events constitute redemption, since the Lord is to-day too carrying on the process of redemption, which began with the accomplishment of the Last Judgment in 1757. This redemptive process has continued from that time down to the present. The reason is that to-day the Second Coming of the Lord is taking place, and a new church is to be established, something which could not happen unless the conquest of the hells and the ordering of the heavens had taken place first. Since I have been permitted to witness all that has happened, I am able to describe how the hells were conquered and how a new heaven has been founded and arranged, but it would take a whole book to do so. However, I did reveal how the Last Judgment was carried out, in a small book published in London in 1758.*

[2] Redemption consisted in the conquest of the hells, the ordering of the heavens and the establishment of a new church, because without them no one could have been saved. This is their proper order: the hells had first to be conquered, before a new heaven of angels could be formed, and this had to be formed before a new church could be established on earth. For people in the world are so linked with the angels in heaven and the spirits in hell, that in the interiors of their minds they are identified with one party or the other. This subject will be discussed in detail in the last chapter of this book, dealing with the Ending of the Age, the Lord's Coming and the New Church.

* Entitled THE LAST JUDGMENT.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 116

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 116

sRef Isa@63 @2 S1' sRef Isa@63 @1 S1' sRef Isa@63 @7 S1' sRef Isa@63 @6 S1' sRef Isa@63 @9 S1' sRef Isa@63 @8 S1' sRef Isa@63 @5 S1' sRef Isa@63 @3 S1' sRef Isa@63 @4 S1' 116. There are many passages in the Word which prove that, when the Lord was in the world, He fought against the hells, overcame and conquered them and thus made them obedient to Him; I will quote only these few. In Isaiah:

Who is this coming from Edom, with stained clothes from Bozrah? A fine figure he is in his clothing, striding out in the excess of his strength. It is I who speak in righteousness, I who am mighty to save. Why are your clothes ruddy, like the clothing of one who treads the wine-vat? I have trodden the wine-vat alone, and of the people there was not a man with me. Therefore I trod them down in my anger, and I trampled them in my wrath. Hence their victory is sprinkled over my clothing. For the day of vengeance is in my heart, and the year of my redeemed has come. My arm was my salvation, I brought their victory down to the ground. He said, Behold, they are my people, my sons. Therefore he became a saviour for them. For his love and tenderness he redeemed them. Isa. 63:1-9.

This is a description of the Lord's battle against the hells. The clothing which is ruddy and in which He is a fine figure, means the Word, to which the Jewish people offered violence. The actual battle with the hells and His victory over them is described by His treading them down in His anger and trampling them in His wrath. His fighting alone and by His own power is described by the words 'of the people there was not a man with me, my arm was my salvation, I brought their victory down to the ground.' His saving and redeeming is described thus: 'Therefore he became a saviour for them, for his love and tenderness he redeemed them.' This was the reason for His coming, as is meant by 'the day of vengeance is in my heart, and the year of my redeemed has come.'

sRef Isa@59 @16 S2' sRef Ps@45 @6 S2' sRef Ps@45 @4 S2' sRef Ps@45 @3 S2' sRef Ps@45 @5 S2' sRef Isa@59 @17 S2' sRef Ps@45 @7 S2' sRef Isa@59 @20 S2' sRef Jer@46 @5 S2' sRef Jer@46 @10 S2' [2] In another passage of Isaiah:

He saw that there was no one, and was amazed that there was none to intercede, Therefore his arm was his salvation and righteousness raised him up. So he put on righteousness as a breast-plate, and the helmet of salvation on his head, and he put on the clothing of vengeance, and covered himself with jealous anger like a cloak. Then the Redeemer came to Zion. Isa. 59:16, 17, 20.

In Jeremiah:

They were broken, their brave men were bruised. They fled away and did not look back. That is the day of the Lord Jehovih Zebaoth, a day of revenge, that He may take vengeance on his enemies; let the sword devour and be sated. Jer. 46:5, 10.

Both of these passages describe the Lord's battle against the hells and His victory over them. In the Psalms of David:

Gird your sword on your thigh, o mighty one. Sharp are your arrows, the peoples will fall before you, the enemies of the king will lose heart. Your throne is for ever, eternal; you loved righteousness, therefore has God anointed You. Ps. 45:3-7.

There are many other passages besides.

sRef Ps@24 @8 S3' sRef Ps@24 @10 S3' sRef Luke@10 @18 S3' sRef John@12 @31 S3' sRef John@16 @11 S3' sRef John@16 @33 S3' [3] Since the Lord conquered the hells alone with no help from any angel, He is therefore called 'Hero and Man of War' (Isa. 42:13; 9:6), 'the King of glory, Jehovah the strong, the hero of war' (Ps. 24:8, 10), the strong one of Jacob (Ps. 132:2) and in many places 'Jehovah Zebaoth', that is, 'Jehovah of hosts.' His coming is called 'the day of Jehovah, terrible, cruel, the day of indignation, of anger, of wrath, of vengeance, of ruin, of war, of the trumpet, of sounding off, of uproar, etc.' In the Gospels we read:

Now is the judgment of the world; the prince of this world shall be cast out. John 12:31.
The prince of this world has been judged. John 16:11.
Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world, John 16:33.
I saw Satan falling from heaven like a thunderbolt. Luke 10:18

The world, the prince of the world, Satan and the devil all mean hell.

[4] Apart from these passages, the whole of Revelation from beginning to end describes the present state of the Christian church, and prophesies the Lord's second coming, His conquest of the hells, the creation of a new heaven of angels and then the establishment of a new church on earth. All these things were there foretold, but they have not been revealed before the present time. The reason is that Revelation, like all the prophetical parts of the Word, was written purely in correspondences, and if these had not been revealed by the Lord, hardly anyone could have correctly understood a single verse. Now for the sake of the new church all its contents have been revealed in my book THE APOCALYPSE REVEALED (published at Amsterdam, 1766). Those will see this who believe the Lord's words in Matthew, chapter 24, about the state of the church to-day and about His coming. But this is only a flickering faith so far with those who have, so deeply that it cannot be extirpated, imprinted on their hearts the faith of the present-day church about a Trinity of Divine Persons from eternity, and about Christ's passion as being the real act of redemption. But these people are (as was said above in the experience related in 113) like leather skins filled with iron filings and powdered sulphur; if water is poured in, heat is first produced, then flame which makes the skins burst. It is the same with those who hear something about living water, which is the genuine truth of the Word, and this enters through their eyes or ears; they become hot and inflamed with anger, and they reject it as something which would burst their heads.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 117

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 117

aRef 1Ki@4 @25 S0' aRef 1Ki@4 @24 S0' aRef Micah@4 @3 S0' aRef Micah@4 @4 S0' 117. A variety of similes can be used to illustrate the conquest of the hells, the ordering of the heavens and then the establishment of the church. These can be compared with a band of robbers or rebels who invade a kingdom or a city, set fire to the houses in it, loot the inhabitants' goods, divide their booty between them and enjoy themselves boasting of their prowess. The act of redemption then can be compared to a just king who attacks them with his army, puts some of them to the sword, shuts up others in labour camps, and takes away their booty and returns it to his subjects, and afterwards imposes order on his kingdom, making it safe from any similar attack. Another comparison might be with troops of wild beasts breaking out from the forests and attacking flocks and herds, and people too, so that no one dares to leave the walls of their town to till the ground; so the fields are bare and the townsmen likely to die of famine. Then redemption can be compared with the killing and putting to flight of those wild beasts, and the protection of fields and countryside from any further such attack. Another comparison might be with a swarm of locusts eating all the greenstuff on the earth, and with measures taken to block their further progress. Likewise with caterpillars in early summer which strip trees of their leaves, and thus of their fruit too, so that they stand all bare as at midwinter; and the shaking of them off, so that gardens are restored to their flowering and fruitful condition. It would be the same with the church, if the Lord had not by the act of redemption separated the good from the evil, and cast one lot into hell, and raised the others into heaven. What would happen to an empire or a kingdom devoid of justice and law-courts, designed to remove the wicked from the society of the good, and to protect the good from violence, so that everyone could live at home in safety, and, as it says in the Word, sit quietly under his own fig-tree and vine?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 118

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 118

118. (ii) BUT FOR THAT REDEMPTION NO PERSON COULD HAVE BEEN SAVED, NOR COULD THE ANGELS HAVE REMAINED UNHARMED.

It must first be stated what redemption is. To redeem means to free from damnation, to reclaim from everlasting death, to snatch from hell, and to release the captives and those in bondage from the hands of the devil. The Lord performed this by conquering the hells and founding a new heaven. The reason why people could not by any other means be saved was that the spiritual world is so closely integrated with the natural world that they are inseparable. This principally affects people's interiors, what is called their souls and minds; those of the good are linked with the souls and minds of angels, those of the wicked with the souls and minds of the spirits of hell. Their union is such that if a person were deprived of them, he would fall lifeless, like a block of wood. Likewise neither could angels and spirits remain in existence, if human beings were taken away from them. This will make it plain why redemption took place in the spiritual world, and why heaven and hell had to be brought into order before a church could be established upon earth. This is clearly stated in Revelation, where it is said that after the creation of a new heaven, the New Jerusalem, which is the new church, came down from that heaven (Rev. 21:1, 2).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 119

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 119

119. The reason why, but for redemption by the Lord, neither could the angels have remained unharmed is that the whole heaven of the angels together with the church on earth forms in the Lord's sight a single person. The heaven of the angels makes up his internal, the church his external; or in more detail, the highest heaven makes up his head, the second and lowest heavens his chest and the middle region of his body, and the church on earth his loins, legs and feet. The Lord Himself is the soul and life of this whole person. So if the Lord had not performed the act of redemption, this person would have been destroyed. The eclipse of the church on earth entails destruction of the feet, legs and loins, that of the lowest heaven the gastric region, that of the second heaven the chest, and then the head, having no correspondence with the body, loses consciousness.

[2] This can be illustrated by similes. It is as when mortification of the flesh attacks the feet, and this necrosis progressively climbs up, infecting first the loins, then the abdominal viscera, and finally the region of the heart. As everyone knows, this causes death. Another illustration is when the viscera beneath the diaphragm are diseased, and their failure produces palpitation of the heart, difficulty in respiration, and eventually the heart and lungs fail too. There is another possible simile with the internal and external man; the internal flourishes so long as the external obediently discharges its functions; but if the external man disobeys and resists, and even more if it attacks the internal, then the internal eventually is undermined, and at length is carried away by the pleasures of the external, until it takes its part and agrees with it. Another possible simile is with a man standing on top of a mountain, watching a flood cover the land below him, as the water rises stage by stage; and when it reaches the level at which he stands, he too is submerged, unless a boat comes for him across the waves to allow him to escape. Likewise if anyone standing on a mountain sees a dense fog rising higher and higher above the ground, hiding fields, villages and towns; and then when the fog reaches his level, he can see nothing, not even where he is.

sRef Rev@6 @9 S3' sRef Rev@6 @11 S3' sRef Rev@6 @10 S3' [3] The lot of the angels is like this when the church on earth fails, for then the lower heavens too fade out. The reason is that the heavens are composed of human beings from the earth; and when there is no longer any good left in their hearts nor any truth from the Word, the heavens are flooded by the rising tide of evil and drowned by it as if by the waters of the Styx. However, they are taken to safety elsewhere by the Lord, and kept until the day of the Last judgment, when they are raised to a new heaven. It is these who are meant in this passage of Revelation:

I saw underneath the altar the souls of those put to death on account of God's Word and the witness they bore. And they shouted in a loud voice, saying, How long, Lord, you who are holy and true, before you give judgment and take vengeance for our blood from the inhabitants of the earth? And each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to rest yet a little while, until the numbers should be made up of their fellow servants and brothers, who were to be put to death as they were. Rev. 6:9-11.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 120

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 120

120. There were many reasons why, but for redemption by the Lord, injustice and wickedness would have spread throughout the Christian peoples in either world, spiritual as well as natural. One of these is that everyone after death comes into the world of spirits, and is then exactly like what he was before. No one on arrival can be prevented from talking with his dead parents, brothers, relations and friends. Every husband then first seeks out his wife, every wife her husband. By these contacts of both kinds they are brought into the company of people who look outwardly like sheep, but inwardly resemble wolves. They are able to corrupt even those who led religious lives. Thus, as a result of unspeakable tricks unknown in the natural world, that world is filled with wickedness, like a pool covered with a green slime of frogs' spawn.

[2] The effect of keeping bad company there can be rendered plain to view by considering these parallels. If a person spends his time with thieves or pirates, he ends up by becoming like them; if he lives with adulterers and whores, he ends up by thinking adultery of no consequence. Again if he mixes with terrorists, he ends up by thinking nothing of using violence on anyone. All evils are contagious, and can be likened to a plague which infects people simply by their being exposed to the victims' breath; or to a cancer or gangrene which spreads, and makes first the surrounding parts, and then those further and further away, rot, until the whole body is destroyed. It is the pleasures of evil, to which everyone is prone from birth, that cause this.

sRef John@15 @4 S3' sRef John@15 @6 S3' sRef John@15 @5 S3' [3] Now these facts will establish that but for the redemption effected by the Lord no one could be saved, nor could the angels remain unharmed The sole refuge to avoid destruction is to betake oneself to the Lord, for He says:

Remain in me, and I in you. Just as the branch can bear no fruit by itself, but only if it remains part of the vine, so neither can you, unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who remains in me and I in him bears much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. Unless a person abides in me, he is cast out and withers, and is thrown into the fire and burnt. John 15:4-6.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 121

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 121

121. (iii) THE LORD THUS REDEEMED NOT ONLY MEN, BUT ALSO ANGELS.

This follows from the statement in the previous section that without the Lord's redemption neither could the angels have continued to exist. To the reasons given above the following may be added.

(1) At the time of the Lord's first coming the hells had grown to such a height that they filled the whole world of spirits, which lies midway between heaven and hell. Thus the hells had not only thrown into confusion what is called the lowest heaven, but they had even attacked the middle heaven, which was being plagued in a thousand different ways, and but for the Lord's protection would have been destroyed. Such an assault by the hells is what is meant by the tower built in the land of Shinar, the top of which reached to heaven. This attempt was stopped by the confusion of tongues, and its builders were scattered; the city was called Babel (Gen. 11:1-9) The meaning of the tower there and the confusion of tongues has been explained in ARCANA CAELESTIA, published in London.*

[2] The reason why the hells had grown to such a height was that at the time when the Lord came into the world, the whole globe had utterly alienated itself from God by the worship of idols and the practice of magic; and the church established among the Children of Israel, and at a later period among the Jews, had been totally destroyed by falsifying and adulterating the Word. All of both these parties came after death into the world of spirits, where they ended by so growing and multiplying that they could not be dislodged from there except by God Himself coming down, and then using the strength of His Divine arm. A description of how this took place was given in the short book THE LAST JUDGMENT published in London in 1758. This event was accomplished by the Lord during His time on earth. A similar act has been performed by the Lord at the present time, since, as stated above, now is His second coming, foretold throughout Revelation, in Matthew (24:3, 30), in Mark (13:26), in Luke (21:27), in the Acts of the Apostles (1:11) and elsewhere. The difference is that at His first coming the growth of the hells was due to worshippers of idols, sorcerers and falsifiers of the Word, but at His second coming it was due to the so-called Christians, both those who had been tainted with nature-worship and those who had falsified the Word by convincing themselves of their fictitious faith in three Divine Persons from eternity, and the Lord's passion as being the real act of redemption. These are the people meant by 'the dragon and his two beasts' in Revelation (chapters 12 and 13).

[3] (2) The second reason why the Lord redeemed the angels too is that not only every man, but also every angel, is held back from evil by the Lord and kept in a state of good. For no one, whether angel or man, is of himself in a state of good, but all good is from the Lord. Thus when the angels' footstool, which they have in the world of spirits, was snatched away, they suffered the same as someone sitting on a chair when the platform it stands on is removed. The angels are not pure in the sight of God, as is shown by the prophetical parts of the Word, and also from job, as well as from the fact that there is no angel who was not previously a man. These statements confirm what was said in the statement of faith of the new heaven and the new church set out both in universal and particular terms placed at the beginning of this book:

The Lord came into the world to take hell away from men, and He did this by fighting against hell and winning victories over it. In this way He subdued it and made it subject to His command.

Also the following passage:

Jehovah God came down and took upon Himself human form so as to reduce to order everything in heaven, [in hell] and in the church. For at that time the power of the devil, that is, of hell, was stronger than the power of heaven, and on earth the power of evil was stronger than the power of good, so that utter damnation stood threateningly at the gates. This impending damnation was removed by Jehovah God by means of His Human, and thus He redeemed angels and men.

These passages show that without the Lord's coming no one could have been saved. The situation to-day is similar. So unless the Lord comes into the world again, no more can anyone be saved (see above 2, 3).
* Volume 1 (1749), 1283-1328.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 122

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 122

122. The Lord's rescue of the spiritual world, and His forthcoming rescue by this means of the church from complete damnation can be illustrated by a comparison with a king, who, when his sons, the princes, have been captured by an enemy, cast into prison and held in chains, frees them by victories over the enemy and brings them back to his court. We may also use as a comparison a shepherd, who, like Samson or David, snatches his sheep from the jaws of a lion or bear, drives away the wild beasts that come out of the forests to raid the meadows, and pursues them to the furthest reaches, finally driving them into lakes or deserts; and then he comes back to his sheep and pastures them safely, and gives them drink from springs of limpid water. Another comparison might be with a person who sees a snake coiled up lying on a road, waiting for a chance to strike at the heel of a traveller; he grasps its head, and although it twists its head around to bite his hand, carries it home and there cuts its head off, throwing the remains into the fire. Another illustration would be a fiancee or husband, who, seeing an adulterer trying to force his fiancee or wife, attacks him, and either wounds his hand with his sword, or showers his legs and back with blows, or has his servants throw him into the street and chase him home with cudgels, so that he is able to bring the rescued woman to the bridal chamber. Bride and wife in the Word also mean the Lord's church, and adulterers mean those who do violence to it; these are those who adulterate His Word. It is because the Jews did this that the Lord called them 'an adulterous nation.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 123

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 123

123. (iv) REDEMPTION WAS AN ENTIRELY DIVINE DEED.

If anyone knows the nature of hell, and how high it rose to flood the whole of the world of spirits at the time of the Lord's coming, as well as the power the Lord used to cast it down and scatter it, and afterwards to reduce it, together with heaven, to order, it must make him cry out in wonder that that deed was entirely Divine. First, the nature of hell: it consists of myriads of myriads of spirits, since it contains all those who from the creation of the world have estranged themselves from God by wicked lives and false beliefs. Secondly, the height to which hell rose to flood the whole of the world of spirits at the time of the Lord's coming has been described to some extent in the preceding paragraphs. No one has had knowledge of the situation at the time of the first coming, because it was not revealed in the literal sense of the Word; but I have been permitted to see with my own eyes the situation at the time of His second coming, and this allows some conclusions to be drawn about the earlier event. A description is contained in my short book THE LAST JUDGMENT, published in London in 1758; and, thirdly, this also shows the power the Lord used to cast down and scatter that hell. But it is superfluous to repeat here the eye-witness descriptions given there, since the book is available, and there is still a large stock of copies at the printer's in London. Anyone who reads that can see clearly that it was the work of almighty God.

[2] Fourthly, I have not yet written a description of how the Lord reduced to order everything both in heaven and in hell, because the ordering of the heavens and the hells has continued from the time of the Last Judgment until the present day, and is still going on. But after the publication of this book, I shall publish this too, if there is a demand. For my part in this affair, I have seen day by day, and continue to see, the Lord's Divine omnipotence, as it were face to face. This last action is really concerned with redemption, the earlier one is really part of the Last Judgment. Those who are prepared to look for this distinction can see that much which is concealed under metaphors in the prophetical parts of the Word is none the less a description of it, when the understanding is enlightened by the explanation of the correspondences.

[3] Both of these Divine actions can only be illustrated by. comparisons, and then only to a limited extent. A possible comparison might be with a battle against the armies of all the nations of the whole world equipped with spears, shields, swords, muskets and cannon, and led by skilled and cunning generals and officers. I say this because many in hell possess skills unknown in our world, and devote themselves to practising how they can attack, ambush, besiege and engage those who are from heaven.

[4] The Lord's battle against hell can also be compared, though very imperfectly, with a battle against the wild beasts of the whole earth, in which they are killed or subdued, until not a single one dares to venture out and attack anyone under the Lord's protection. If any of them shows a threatening face, it retires at once, as if it felt a vulture battening upon its breast in the attempt to break through to its heart. The Word too describes the spirits in hell as wild beasts, and this is also the meaning of the wild beasts among which the Lord spent forty days (Mark 1:13).

[5] It can also be compared with stemming the whole ocean, when it bursts the dykes and breaks into fields and towns with its waves. The subduing of hell by the Lord is also meant by His calming the sea, when He said 'Hush, be still' (Mark 4:38, 39; Matt. 8:26; Luke 8:23, 24). The sea there, as in many other passages, means hell.

[6] The Lord employs similar Divine power to-day to fight against hell in every person who is undergoing re-birth. For all these people are attacked by hell with devilish fury, and unless the Lord resisted and subdued hell, they would inevitably be overcome. For hell is like a single monstrous person, or a huge lion, another comparison found in the Word. So unless the Lord kept that lion or monster fettered hand and foot, that person would inevitably in trying to escape one evil fall into many others, one after another, of his own accord.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 124

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 124

sRef Rev@6 @15 S0' sRef Ex@33 @20 S1' 124. (v) THIS REDEMPTION COULD ONLY BE EFFECTED BY AN INCARNATE GOD.

The previous section showed that redemption was an entirely Divine deed, and consequently it could only have been accomplished by almighty God. The reason why it had to be by means of His incarnation, that is, by making Himself man, is that Jehovah God, as He is in His infinite essence, cannot approach hell, much less enter it, since He exists at the purest and first level. Therefore if Jehovah God, being in essence of that nature, were so much as to breathe upon those in hell, He would destroy them in an instant. For He said to Moses, when he desired to see God:

You cannot see my face, for no man shall see me and live. Exod. 33:20.

Since then Moses could not, far less can those in hell, where all are at the lowest, grossest and therefore most distant level, since they are the lowest of natural men. Therefore if Jehovah God had not taken upon Himself human form, and thus clothed Himself with a body at the lowest level, it would have been vain for Him to attempt any kind of redemption. For how can anyone attack an enemy, unless he comes to grips and equips himself with weapons to fight with? How can anyone drive off and destroy snakes, hydras and basilisks in some desert, unless he protects his body with armour and his head with a helmet, and takes a spear in his hand? Or how can anyone catch whales at sea, without a ship and equipment designed for the purpose? These and similar images are not so much a comparison as an illustration of almighty God's battle with the hells, which He could not have started without first taking human form.

sRef Rev@6 @15 S2' sRef Isa@2 @19 S2' sRef Rev@6 @17 S2' sRef Rev@6 @16 S2' [2] But it needs to be known that the Lord's battle with the hells was not a battle of words, like people arguing a point or disputing in a court of law. That sort of battle is quite ineffectual here. It was a spiritual battle, Divine Truth fighting with the strength of Divine Good, that is, the very life force of the Lord. No one in the hells can stand its effects when made visible. Its power is such that at a mere glance the spirits of hell take to their heels, hurl themselves into the depths and force themselves underground to hide from it. This is the same as is described by Isaiah:

They shall go into caverns in the rocks and into cracks in the dust, for fear of Jehovah, when He arises to terrify the earth. Isa. 2:19.

and in Revelation:

All shall hide themselves in caves in the rocks and in rocky mountains; and they shall say to the mountains and the rocks, Fall upon us and hide us from the face of Him that sits upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. Rev. 6:15-17.

[3] What the Lord's strength that He has from Divine good was like when He was effecting the Last judgment in 1757 can be proved by the descriptions given of that event in my small book on the subject.* For example, it tore from their places hills and mountains in the world of spirits, which spirits from hell had seized, transferred them to different locations and made some sink into the ground; it flooded towns, villages and their surrounding land, completely upheaved their fields and cast them together with their inhabitants into chasms, lakes and marshes, and much besides. All this was accomplished by the Lord alone by the power of Divine truth coming from Divine good.

* See 123.1.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 125

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 125

125. Various comparisons may be used as illustrations of the fact that Jehovah God could not set in motion and produce such results except through His Human. For instance, an invisible man cannot shake hands with or talk to anyone except someone who is visible; not even an angel or a spirit can do so with a person, although he stands next to him or right before his face. Neither can anyone's soul talk or deal with another person, except by means of his own body. The sun cannot penetrate any person, animal or tree with its light and heat, unless it first penetrates the air and acts through it; likewise it cannot affect fish except through water.. It must act through the element in which the subject is. No more can anyone take the scales off a fish without* a knife, or pluck a crow without fingers; or go down into the depths of a lake without a diving bell. In short, each thing must be suited to the other before communication can be established, and work can be done either against or with it.

* The Latin has 'with a knife', but it is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 126

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 126

aRef Rev@21 @4 S0' 126. (vi) THE PASSION ON THE CROSS WAS THE LAST TEMPTATION WHICH THE LORD UNDERWENT AS THE GREATEST PROPHET; THIS WAS THE MEANS BY WHICH HE GLORIFIED HIS HUMAN, THAT IS, UNITED IT WITH HIS FATHER'S DIVINE; SO THIS WAS NOT IN ITSELF THE REDEMPTION.

The Lord had two purposes in coming into the world, redemption and the glorification of His Human; and by these He saved both men and angels. These two purposes are quite distinct, but still they are combined in effecting salvation. The nature of redemption was shown in the preceding paragraphs to be a battle against the hells, their subjugation and afterwards the ordering of the heavens. Glorification, however, is the uniting of the Lord's Human with His Father's Divine. This took place by stages and was completed by His passion on the cross. For every person ought for his own part to approach God, and the more nearly he does so, the more closely does God on His side enter into him. It is similar to the building of a church: its construction by human hands must come first, and then afterwards it must be consecrated, and finally prayers must be said for God to be present and unite Himself with its congregation. The reason why the actual union was fully achieved by the passion on the cross is that it was the last temptation which the Lord underwent in the world; and temptations create a link. In temptation it looks as if a person is left to himself, but he is not, since God is then most closely present in his inmost, and secretly gives him support. When therefore anyone is victorious over temptation, he is most inwardly linked with God, and in this case the Lord was most inwardly united with God His Father.

sRef John@10 @18 S2' [2] The Lord's being left to Himself, when He suffered on the cross, is evident from His cry then:

O God, why have you abandoned me? [Matt. 27:46]

as well as from these words of the Lord:

No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have the power to lay it down, and I have the power to take it back; this charge I received from my Father. John 10:18.

These passages then can prove that the Lord did not suffer in His Divine, but in His Human, and then a most inward and complete union took place. An illustration of this might be the fact that while a person is suffering physical pain, his soul feels nothing but is merely distressed. But when the victory is won, God takes away that distress, wiping it away as one does tears from the eyes.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 127

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 127

127. Redemption and the passion on the cross must be thought of as two distinct events; otherwise men's minds will ground like a ship on sandbanks or rocks and sink, steersman, captain, crew and all, that is to say, it will go astray in all matters which concern salvation from the Lord. Without a clear view of these two distinct events a person is like one who sees imaginary things in a dream, and draws inferences from things he takes to be real, but are in fact absurd. Or he is like someone walking at night-time, and when he grasps the branches of a tree, thinks it is someone's hair, so he comes closer and gets his own hair entangled. But although redemption and the passion on the cross are two distinct events, still they are combined in effecting salvation, since the Lord by His union with the Father, the result of His suffering on the cross, became the Redeemer for ever.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 128

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 128

sRef Luke@24 @26 S0' sRef John@17 @5 S0' sRef John@17 @1 S0' sRef John@13 @31 S0' sRef John@12 @27 S0' sRef John@13 @32 S0' sRef John@12 @28 S0' 128. On the subject of glorification, meaning the uniting of the Lord's Divine Human with the Father's Divine, a union which was fully accomplished by the passion on the cross, the Lord Himself speaks in the Gospels:

After Judas had gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him. If God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and will glorify Him at once. John 13:31, 32.

Here the glorification is described both of God the Father and of the Son, for it says, 'God is glorified in Him, and will glorify Him in Himself.' It is plain that this means union.

Father, the time has come, glorify your Son, so that your Son too may glorify you. John 17:1, 5.

It is put thus because the union was reciprocal and, as is said, the Father was in Him and He in the Father.

Now my soul is vexed; and He said, Father, glorify your name. And a voice came out of heaven, I have glorified it, and I will do so again. John 12:27, 28.

This is said because the uniting took place by stages.

Did not Christ have to suffer this and enter upon His glory? Luke 24:26.

Glory in the Word referring to the Lord means the Divine truth united to Divine good. These passages show clearly that the Lord's Human is Divine.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 129

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 129

sRef Deut@18 @18 S0' sRef Matt@13 @57 S0' sRef Deut@18 @17 S0' sRef Deut@18 @19 S0' sRef Luke@13 @33 S0' sRef Luke@7 @16 S0' sRef Deut@18 @16 S0' sRef Matt@21 @11 S0' sRef Deut@18 @15 S0' 129. The reason why the Lord was willing to undergo temptations even to the point of suffering upon the cross, was that He was the Prophet, and prophets in ancient times meant the church's doctrine from the Word; consequently they represented the church in its state at that time by the various unfair, harsh and even criminal acts imposed on them by God. However, since the Lord was the Word itself, by His passion on the cross as the Prophet He represented the way in which the Jewish church profaned the Word. Another reason was that He should thus be acknowledged in the heavens as the Saviour of both worlds. For all the details of His passion stand for details of the profanation of the Word; and the angels understand them spiritually, while men in the church do so naturally. The following passages establish that the Lord was the Prophet:

The Lord said, Nowhere is a prophet less honoured than in his native country and in his own home. Matt. 13:57; Mark 6:4; Luke 4:24. Jesus said, It is not fitting for a prophet to die outside Jerusalem. Luke 13:33.

Fear seized them all, and they praised God, saying that a great prophet had been raised up among them. Luke 7:16.

They called Jesus 'The Prophet from Nazareth.' Matt. 21:11; John 7:40, 41. It was said that a prophet should be raised up from among the brothers, whose words they were to obey. Deut. 18:15-19.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 130

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 130

sRef Ezek@12 @11 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @7 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @2 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @1 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @15 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @14 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @6 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @5 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @4 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @11 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @8 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @9 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @10 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @12 S0' sRef Ezek@12 @6 S0' sRef Ezek@12 @7 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @3 S0' sRef Ezek@12 @5 S0' sRef Ezek@4 @13 S0' sRef Ezek@12 @3 S0' sRef Ezek@12 @4 S0' sRef Hos@1 @2 S0' sRef 1Ki@20 @35 S0' sRef Hos@1 @8 S0' sRef 1Ki@20 @38 S0' sRef 1Ki@20 @36 S0' sRef Hos@1 @6 S0' sRef Hos@1 @9 S0' sRef 1Ki@20 @37 S0' sRef Hos@1 @3 S0' sRef Hos@1 @4 S0' sRef Hos@1 @7 S0' sRef Hos@1 @5 S0' sRef Isa@20 @3 S1' sRef Isa@20 @2 S1' 130. The following passages establish that prophets represented the state of their church as regards doctrine from the Word, and living in accordance with that doctrine. The prophet Isaiah was commanded to strip the sackcloth from his loins and his shoe from his foot, and to go naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and a token (Isa. 20:2, 3). The prophet Ezekiel was commanded to represent the state of the church by packing his bags for an exile, and to move to another place in the sight of the Children of Israel; he was to bring out his baggage during the day, and go out in the evening through a hole in the house-wall; he was to cover his face so as not to see the ground, and thus he would be a token for the house of Israel, and he was to say, 'Behold, I am your token; as I have done, so shall it be with you' (Ezek. 12:3-7, 11). The prophet Hosea was commanded to represent the state of the church by taking a prostitute as a wife; he did so, and she bore him three children, one of whom he called Jezreel, the second No-pity, and the third Not-my-people. Again he was commanded to go and love a woman who was loved by another man, an adulteress; and he bought her (Hosea 1:2-9; 3:2, 3). Another prophet was commanded to put ashes on his eyes, and to allow himself to be struck and beaten (1 Kings 20:35, 38).

The prophet Ezekiel was commanded, in order to represent the state of the church, to take a brick and to draw a picture of Jerusalem on it; to lay siege to it, and make a rampart and a mound to attack it; to place an iron griddle between himself and the city; and to lie on his left side and on his right side. Also to take wheat, barley, lentils, millet and spelt, and to make bread from them; also to make a cake of barley mixed with human dung; and because he begged off this, he was allowed to make it with cow-dung. It was said to him:

Lie on your left side, and put the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it; for the number of days that you lie on that side, you shall carry their iniquity. For I will make you carry the iniquity of the house of Israel for a number of days equal to the years of their iniquity, namely, three hundred and ninety days. When you have completed this period, you are to lie a second time on your right side, to carry the iniquity of the house of Judah. Ezek. 4:1-15.

sRef Isa@53 @11 S2' sRef Isa@53 @6 S2' sRef Ezek@4 @13 S2' sRef Ezek@4 @16 S2' sRef Ezek@4 @17 S2' sRef Isa@53 @4 S2' [2] It is clear from what follows this passage that the prophet by these actions carried the iniquities of the house of Israel and the house of Judah, and did not remove and so expiate them, but merely represented and demonstrated them:

Thus said Jehovah, the Children of Israel shall eat their bread unclean. Behold, I break the staff of bread, so that they may lack bread and water, and they shall be desolate, a man and his brother, and they shall waste away because of their iniquity. Ezek. 4:13, 16, 17.

The meaning is similar where it is said of the Lord:

He bore our sicknesses, He carried our pains. Jehovah made the iniquities of us all to fall upon Him. By His knowledge He made many righteous, in that He carried their iniquities Isa. 53:4, 6, 11.

The whole of this chapter deals with the Lord's passion.

[3] The details of the Lord's passion show clearly that as the Prophet He represented the state of the Jewish church with regard to the Word. For example, His betrayal by Judas; His arrest and conviction by the chief priests and the elders; His being beaten; His head being struck with a reed; His crowning with a crown of thorns; the dividing of His garments, and the casting of lots for His tunic; His crucifixion; His being given vinegar to drink; His side being pierced; His burial and resurrection on the third day.

His betrayal by Judas meant that He was betrayed by the Jewish nation, which possessed the Word, since Judas represented that nation. His arrest and conviction by the chief priests and elders meant that the whole of that church so behaved. His being beaten, being spat upon in the face, being flogged and having His head struck with a reed meant their similar treatment of the Word as regards the Divine truths it contains. The crowning with thorn meant that they falsified and adulterated these truths. The dividing of His garments and throwing lots for His tunic meant that they threw to the winds all the truths of the Word, but not its spiritual sense, which is what the tunic meant. The crucifixion meant that they destroyed and profaned the whole Word. Their giving Him vinegar to drink meant that they offered only falsified truths, which is why He did not drink it. The piercing of His side meant that they utterly extinguished all the truth and all the good of the Word. His burial meant the rejection of all He had left from His mother. His resurrection on the third day meant His glorification, or the union of His Human with the Father's Divine. From this it is now plain that 'carrying iniquities' does not mean removing them, but representing the profaning of truths in the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 131

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 131

sRef John@10 @11 S0' sRef John@10 @17 S0' 131. These matters too may be illustrated by comparisons for the benefit of the simple, who see better from comparisons than from analysis and deductions drawn from the Word, or on the basis of reason. Every citizen or subject becomes devoted to his king by carrying out his orders and instructions, and the more so if he suffers hardship on his behalf, more still, if he gives his life for him, as happens in war and battles. Likewise friends are drawn closer together, or a son to his father, or a servant to his master, by carrying out his wishes; and the more so, if they defend them against their enemies, more still, if they fight to defend their honour. Everyone becomes attached to the girl he seeks as a bride, if he fights a duel with those who speak ill of her, and especially if the duel with his rival reaches the point of inflicting wounds. It is a law of nature that such events bring people together. The Lord says:

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep, for which reason the Father loves me. John 10:11, 17.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 132

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 132

132. (vii) IT IS A FUNDAMENTAL ERROR ON THE PART OF THE CHURCH TO BELIEVE THAT THE PASSION ON THE CROSS WAS THE REAL ACT OF REDEMPTION. THAT ERROR, TOGETHER WITH THE ERRONEOUS BELIEF IN THREE DIVINE PERSONS EXISTING FROM ETERNITY, HAS SO PERVERTED THE WHOLE CHURCH THAT THERE IS NO REMAINDER OF SPIRITUALITY LEFT IN IT.

Is there any subject which does more to fill and pack the books of orthodox theology to-day, or any that is taught and driven home more zealously in colleges, and is more often preached and ranted about in pulpits, than the belief that God the Father in His anger with the human race not only drove it away from Him, but actually placed it under the ban of universal damnation, thus excommunicating it; but because He is gracious, He persuaded or impelled His own Son to come down and take upon Himself the sentence of damnation, so as to appease His Father's anger; and it is only in this way that He is able to look upon man with any favour? They add that this too was accomplished by means of the Son, for instance, in order to take upon Himself the damnation of the human race, by allowing Himself to be flogged by the Jews, have His face spat upon, and then be crucified as accursed in the sight of God (Deut. 21:23). The Father was propitiated when this had been done, and through His love for His Son revoked the damnation, but only for those for whom the Son interceded, so that He became in perpetuity a Mediator with His Father.

[2] These and similar phrases ring through our churches to-day, re-echoing from the walls like the echoes in woodlands and filling the ears of all listeners. But is there anyone, whose reasoning faculty is enlightened and made whole by the reading of the Word, who cannot see that God* is mercy and clemency itself, since He is love itself and good itself, and these qualities are His essence? And that it is therefore a contradiction to say that mercy itself or good itself could look upon man in anger, and pass sentence of damnation on him, and still remain what He is in His Divine essence? Such actions can hardly be attributed to an upright person, but rather to a wicked one; nor to an angel of heaven, but rather to a spirit from hell. So it is an unspeakable crime to attribute such acts to God.

sRef Isa@28 @7 S3' sRef Isa@28 @8 S3' [3] But if one enquires the reason, it is this: people have taken the passion on the cross to be the real act of redemption. From that source these errors have flowed, just as one mistake produces a whole series, or as a jar of vinegar can only yield vinegar, or a disordered mind nothing but madness. The one deduction leads to other theories of the same type, for they lie hidden in the deduction, and come forth one after another. From the belief that the passion on the cross was the redeeming act, yet more scandalous and ignoble ideas about God can emerge and be extracted, until, as Isaiah says:

The priest and the prophet go astray through strong drink. They stumble in judgment, all the tables are covered with vomit brought up. Isa. 28:7, 8.

* The Latin text here inserts qui 'who', apparently in error.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 133

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 133

133. This idea of God and redemption has reduced the whole of theology from the spiritual to the lowest natural level, by attributing to God purely natural properties. Yet everything in the church depends upon the idea of God, and the idea of redemption, which makes one with salvation. For that idea is like the head which controls all actions in the body. So long as it is spiritual, everything in the church becomes spiritual too, and as long as it is natural, everything in the church becomes natural too. Therefore, since the ideas of God and redemption have become purely natural, that is, under the influence of the bodily senses, everything too is purely natural which the heads and members of the church have made traditional in their statements of dogma. The reason why this can produce nothing but falsity is that the natural man is continually acting in opposition to the spiritual, and so looks upon spiritual things as ghosts and illusions in the air. So it can be said that that sensual idea of redemption, and thus of God, has rendered the roads to heaven, leading to the Lord God the Saviour, beset by thieves and robbers (John 10:1, 8, 9); and that the doors of the temples have been thrown down, allowing dragons, owls, tziim and iyim* to come in and howl in discordant chorus.

[2] It is well known that this idea about redemption and God has been foisted into present-day faith. This prescribes that one should pray to God the Father to forgive sins on account of the crucifixion and the shedding of His Son's blood, and to God the Son to pray and intercede for one, and to God the Holy Spirit to make one righteous and sanctified. What else is this but praying to three Gods, one after the other? How then can one think of the rule of God except in terms of aristocratic or hierarchical rule, or as it were a triumvirate such as there once was at Rome, only that instead of a triumvirate it should be called a triumpersonate?** What then is easier for the devil than, as the saying goes, to divide and rule - that is to destroy unanimity and stir up rebellious movements, at one time against one God, at others against another, as has actually happened from the time of Arius*** down to the present? And thus to dethrone the Lord God the Saviour, who has all power in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18), and enthrone instead one of one's own supporters and give him worship, or, because it is taken away from him, to take away worship from the Lord Himself.

* Hebrew words perhaps meaning 'howling creatures,' used, e.g., in Isa. 34:14, Jer. 50:9, understood by the author as birds (CL 264.4).
** On two occasions in the first century BC Rome was governed by a triumvirate or committee of three; Swedenborg here invents the word 'triumpersonate' on the model of triumvirate.
*** i.e. the early fourth century.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 134

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 134

sRef Deut@21 @22 S0' 134. At this point I shall insert more accounts of experiences, of which this is the first.

Once in the world of spirits I went into a church where there was a large congregation, and before the sermon they had a discussion on the subject of redemption. The church was square in plan without any windows in the walls, but with a large opening in the middle of the roof, allowing light from heaven to stream in, making the interior brighter than windows at the sides could have done.

While they were talking about redemption, a black cloud suddenly blew up from the north and covered the opening. This caused such thick darkness that people could not see one another, and hardly their hands in front of their faces. While they were standing struck dumb by this, the black cloud was split down the middle, and through the gap angels were seen, sent down from heaven to dispel the cloud in either direction, so that the church was filled with light again. The angels then sent down one of their number into the church to ask the congregation in their name the subject of their dispute, which had caused so dark a cloud to come over, block out the light, and spread darkness. They replied that they were talking about redemption, how this was effected by the passion of the Son of God on the cross, by which means He made expiation and rescued the human race from damnation and everlasting death.

To this the angel who has been sent down replied: 'Why do you say "by the passion on the cross"? Explain why you say it was by that means.'

aRef Deut@21 @23 S2' aRef Gala@3 @13 S2' [2] Then a priest came forward and said: 'I will give an orderly exposition of our knowledge and belief. These are that God the Father in His anger against the human race damned it and shut it out from the sphere of His clemency, declaring all its members condemned and accursed, and consigning them to hell. He was willing for His Son to take that sentence on Himself; the Son consented, and therefore came down, took human form, and allowed Himself to be crucified. He thus transferred to Himself the damnation of the human race; for we read "Cursed is everyone who hangs upon the wood of the cross." The Son thus by His intercession and mediation appeased the Father; and then the Father out of His love for the Son, and as the result of witnessing His suffering on the cross, was moved to pity, and decreed that He would forgive men, "but only those to whom I impute your righteousness. These I will turn from sons of wrath and cursing into sons of grace and blessing, and I will make them righteous and save them. Let the rest remain as previously decreed, sons of wrath." Such is our faith, and these things are what is meant by the righteousness which God the Father introduces into our faith, so that by itself it makes us righteous and saves us.'

[3] On hearing this the angel kept silent for some time, he was so astonished. But eventually he broke silence and spoke as follows: 'Can the Christian world have become so mad, and have abandoned sound reason for such ravings, as to deduce the fundamental dogma of salvation from those paradoxes? Is there anyone who cannot see that this is diametrically opposed to the Divine essence itself, that is, to God's Divine love and His Divine wisdom, and at the same time to His omnipotence and omnipresence? No decent master would treat his servants and maids like this; not even a wild beast would so treat its pups or young. It is unspeakable. Is it not contrary to His Divine essence to revoke the invitation given to every single member of the human race? Is it not contrary to the Divine essence to change the laws of order established from eternity, which prescribe that each person should be judged by the life he leads? Is it not contrary to the Divine essence to withdraw love and pity from any person, and more so from the whole of the human race? Is it not contrary to the Divine essence to be brought back to pitying by witnessing the Son's suffering, and since it is the very essence of God to pity, to be brought back to His own essence? It is utter wickedness to think that He could ever depart from it, for He is His essence from eternity to eternity.

[4] 'Is it not impossible to implant in anything, such as your faith, the righteousness of redemption, which in itself is a part of God's omnipotence, and impute or assign it to a person, and without any other means to pronounce him righteous, pure and holy? Is it not impossible to forgive anyone his sins, or to make anyone new, regenerated and saved, simply by imputing righteousness to him, which would be turning unrighteousness into righteousness, and cursing into blessing? Could one thus turn hell into heaven, and heaven into hell, or the dragon into Michael, and Michael into the dragon, and so put a stop to the battle between them? What would it take but to withdraw the imputation of your faith from one person and give it to another? In that case we in heaven would go in fear for ever. Nor is it consistent with righteousness and judgment for one person to take another's crime upon himself, so that the guilty should be held innocent, and the crime thus be purged. Is this not contrary to both Divine righteousness and human justice? The Christian world is still ignorant of the existence, even more so of the nature, of the laws of order that God introduced at the creation of the world; and that God cannot act contrary to order because that would be acting against Himself. For God is order itself.'

[5] The priest understood what the angel had said, because the angels up above poured down light from heaven. Then he gave a groan and said: 'What are we to do? Everyone nowadays preaches and prays and believes this. Everyone is saying "Gracious Father, have mercy upon us and forgive us our sins for the sake of your Son's blood, which He shed for us upon the cross." Then they pray to Christ: "Lord, intercede for us"; and we priests add, "Send us the Holy Spirit."'

Then the angel said: 'I have noticed that priests make ointments from a superficial understanding of the Word, which they smear on the eyes of those who have been blinded by their faith; or make up a poultice from the same source, which they place upon the wounds inflicted by their dogmas, but without healing them, since they have become chronic. So go to the man who is standing over there - and he pointed to me - he will teach you from the Lord that the passion on the cross was not the act of redemption, but the uniting of the Lord's Human with the Father's Divine. Redemption was the conquest of the hells and the ordering of the heavens; and had the Lord not performed these acts when He was in the world, no one on earth, nor anyone in the heavens, could have been saved. He will go on to teach you the laws of order, which were imposed from the time of creation, by which people must live to be saved. Those who live by them are counted among the redeemed and called the chosen.'

After this speech windows appeared in the sides of the church, brightness flooded in from all four quarters, and cherubs were seen flying in a radiance of light. Then the angel was lifted up through the opening in the roof to rejoin his companions, and we went away in a cheerful frame of mind.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 135

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 135

sRef Ex@33 @20 S1' 135. The second experience.

On waking up one morning I saw the sun of the spiritual world shining brightly, and below it I saw the heavens at a great distance, as remote as the earth is from its sun. From these heavens inarticulate sounds were audible, which joined to form an intelligible utterance: 'God is one, He is man and His dwelling is in that sun.' This utterance passed down through the middle heavens to the lowest, and from there into the world of spirits, where I was; and I noticed that the angels' idea of one God as it gradually descended was turned into the idea of three Gods. This observation induced me to start a conversation with those who thought of three Gods. 'What a monstrous idea!' I said, 'Where did you get it?'

'We think of three,' they replied, 'because this is how we grasp the idea of a Triune God, but still we do not allow it to pass our lips. In speaking we always say out loud that God is one. If we have a different idea in our minds, so be it, so long as it does not spill over and shatter the oneness of God when we speak. Even so, from time to time it does spill over, because it is within our minds, and at such times, if we were to speak out, we should say that there were three Gods. We take care to avoid this, so as not to become a laughing stock to our hearers.'

aRef Hebr@12 @24 S2' aRef Hebr@8 @6 S2' aRef 1Tim@2 @5 S2' aRef Gala@3 @19 S2' aRef Gala@3 @20 S2' aRef Hebr@9 @15 S2' [2] Then they began openly to speak as they thought. 'Surely there are three Gods,' they said, 'since there are three Divine Persons, each of whom is God. We cannot think differently when the leader of our church quotes a whole bookcase full of his holy dogmas, ascribing to one creation, to a second redemption, to a third sanctifying; even more so when he attributes to each of them His own characteristic, which he says cannot be shared; and these are not merely creation, redemption and sanctifying, but also imputation, mediation and performance. Is there not then one God who created us and also imputes righteousness to us? Another who redeemed us, and also acts as mediator? And a third who puts into effect the imputation which is achieved through mediation, and also sanctifies us? Is there anyone who does not know that the Son of God was sent into the world by God the Father to redeem the human race, and thus become an expiator, mediator, propitiator and intercessor? And since He is identical with the Son of God from eternity, are there not two quite distinct Persons? And since these two Persons are in heaven, one sitting at the right hand of the other, must there not be a third Person, who puts into effect in the world the decrees issued in heaven?'

[3] On hearing this I said nothing, but thought to myself: 'What idiocy! They do not have the slightest idea of what is meant by mediation in the Word.'

Then at the Lord's command three angels came down from heaven and joined me, so that I could employ inward perception in speaking with those who thought of three Gods. I was especially enabled to speak about mediation, intercession, propitiation and expiation, the functions they attribute to the second Person, the Son, but only after He had become man; and His incarnation took place many centuries after creation, so that during this period these four means to salvation did not yet exist. So then God the Father was not propitiated, no expiation had been made for the human race, nor had anyone been sent from heaven to intercede and mediate.

sRef John@1 @18 S4' sRef John@5 @37 S4' [4] Then I spoke with them by means of the inspiration I had received. 'Gather round,' I said, 'as many of you as can, and listen to what is meant in the Word by mediation, intercession, expiation and propitiation. These are the four things predicated of the grace of the one God in His Human. God the Father could under no circumstances be approached, nor can He approach any person, because he is infinite and in His Being (esse), which is Jehovah. If He approached anyone in that form, He would destroy him, as fire does wood, reducing it to ashes. This is plain from His reply when Moses desired to see Him: that no one can see Him and live (Exod. 33:20). The Lord too said that no one has ever seen God, except the Son who is in the Father's bosom (John 1:18; Matt. 11:27); and again, that no one has heard the Father's voice or seen His appearance (John 5:37). We do read that Moses saw Jehovah face to face, and spoke personally with Him; but this was done through an angel, and the same happened in the cases of Abraham and Gideon. Now because such is God the Father in Himself, He was pleased to take upon Himself human form, and in this to allow people to approach Him, so as to hear them and speak with them. It is this Human which is called the Son of God, and this it is which mediates, intercedes, propitiates and makes expiation. I shall tell you therefore what is the meaning of those four actions attributed to the Human of God the Father.

[5] 'Mediation means that the Human is the intermediary by means of which a person can approach God the Father, and God the Father can approach him, and so teach and guide him to salvation. This is why the Son of God, meaning the Human of God the Father, is called the Saviour, and on earth Jesus, which means salvation. Intercession means continual mediation; for love itself, to which mercy, clemency and grace belong, continually intercedes, that is, acts as intermediary for those who obey His commandments, and whom He loves. Expiation means the removal of the sins into which everyone would rush, if he were to approach Jehovah without mediation. Propitiation means the working of clemency and grace, to prevent anyone consigning himself to damnation through sins; likewise, protection against profaning what is holy. This was the meaning of the Mercy Seat above the Ark in the Tabernacle.*

[6] 'It is well known that in the Word God spoke in terms of appearances. For instance, He is said to be angry, take vengeance, tempt, punish, cast into hell, damn, in fact to do evil. Yet the truth is that He is angry with no one, never takes vengeance, tempts, punishes, casts anyone into hell or damns him. Such actions are as remote from God as hell is from heaven, or rather infinitely more so. This is why they are expressions of appearances. In another sense, expiation, propitiation, intercession and mediation are also expressions of appearances, meaning the characteristics of approach to God and of grace coming from God by means of His Human. Failure to understand these things has led people to divide God into three, and base all the church's doctrine upon these three, thus falsifying the Word. This is the origin of the "abomination of desolation" which was predicted by the Lord in the book of Daniel, and further mentioned in Matthew, chapter 24.'

At the end of this speech the group of spirits around me broke up, and I noticed that those who were really thinking of three Gods were looking towards hell, and those who were thinking of one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, which is in the Lord God the Saviour, were looking towards heaven. To this party there appeared the sun of heaven, in which is Jehovah in His Human.

* Exod. 25:17-22.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 136

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 136

sRef Mark@16 @19 S1' 136. The third experience.

I saw in the distance five colleges, each of which was surrounded by radiance from heaven. The first college was surrounded by a purple light, such as is seen in the clouds on earth before the sun rises in the morning. The second was surrounded by a yellowish light, like that of the dawn after sunrise. The third was surrounded by a brilliant light, like that of mid-day on earth. The fourth was surrounded by a moderate light, like that of the afternoon when the shades of evening begin to fall. The fifth actually stood in the shades of evening-time. Colleges in the world of spirits are meeting places where scholars gather to discuss various mysteries, which are of use in their progress towards knowledge, intelligence and wisdom.

On seeing them I felt a desire to visit one of them, so being in the spirit I went to that which had the moderate light. I went in and saw a gathering of scholars debating the question, what is meant by what is said of the Lord, that He was lifted up into heaven and sits at the right hand of God (Mark 16:19).

[2] Most of the gathering said that they understood the words perfectly literally, to mean that the Son sat next to the Father. But they disputed why He did so. Some said that the Son has been placed by the Father on His right on account of the redemption which He accomplished. Some said that it was out of love that He was given that seat. Some said it was so that He should be His counsellor, because He is such as to be honoured by the angels. And some said because the Father had given Him power to reign in His stead, for we read that to Him is given all power in heaven and on earth. But a large number asserted it was to hear those on the right for whom He intercedes. For all in the church to-day approach God the Father and pray to Him to have mercy for the sake of the Son; this, they said, makes the Father turn to Him to hear His mediation. But some held that only the Son of God from eternity sits at the Father's right to share His divinity with the Son of Man who was born in the world.

sRef John@14 @11 S3' sRef John@14 @10 S3' [3] On hearing this I was very surprised that learned men, although they had spent some time in the spiritual world, were still so ignorant of heavenly matters. But I could detect the reason, that they had such confidence in their own intelligence that they had not allowed themselves to learn from wise men. But to prevent them remaining any longer in ignorance about the Son's sitting on the right hand of the Father I raised my hand, and asked them to listen to a few words which I wanted to say on the subject. As they agreed to this, I said: 'Do you not know that the Word says that the Father and the Son are one, and that the Father is in the Son, and the Son in the Father? The Lord says so quite openly (John 10:30; 14:10, 11). If you do not believe this, you are dividing God into two; and this will inevitably make you think of God in a natural manner, or in the manner of the bodily senses, or even in material terms. This too has happened in the world since the time of the Council of Nicaea, which introduced the concept of three Divine Persons from eternity, and so turned the church into a theatre hung with curtains to act as scenery, in front of which actors played new scenes. Is there anyone who does not know and acknowledge that God is one? If you acknowledge this in your hearts and spirits, all your debate collapses of its own accord, and rebounds into the air, like nonsense from the wise man's ear.'

sRef Isa@62 @8 S4' sRef Ps@80 @15 S4' sRef Ps@18 @35 S4' sRef Matt@26 @64 S4' sRef Luke@22 @69 S4' sRef Ps@110 @2 S4' sRef Ps@80 @17 S4' sRef Isa@48 @13 S4' sRef Ps@110 @1 S4' [4] This speech made many of them very angry with me, and they wanted to tweak my ears and make me be silent. But the chairman of the meeting said indignantly: 'We are not talking about the oneness and plurality of God, because we believe in both. The question is, what is implied by the Son sitting at His Father's right hand; if you know anything about this subject, speak.'

'I will,' I replied, 'but please put a stop to the uproar. Sitting at the right hand does not here mean sitting on the right, but it means God's omnipotence by means of the Human which He took upon Himself in the world. This allows Him to operate at the last as well as at the first level. This enabled Him to enter, overthrow and conquer the hells, as well as to impose order on the heavens. It was by this that He redeemed men and angels, and He continues to do so for ever. If you consult the Word, and are of such a nature that you can receive illumination, you will see that "the right hand" here means omnipotence, as it does in [Isaiah and], the Psalms of David:

My hand has laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand has measured out the heavens. Isa. 48:13.

Jehovah* has sworn by His right hand, and by the arm of His strength. Isa. 62:8. Your right hand upholds me. Ps. 18:35.

Pay heed to the Son, whom you have made strong for you, your hand for the man at your right, for the Son of Man whom you made strong for you. Ps. 80:15, 17.

This shows how the following passage should be understood:

The saying of Jehovah to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a foot-stool for your feet. Jehovah will send from Zion a sceptre to show your strength, rule in the midst of your enemies. Ps. 110:1, 2.

The whole of that Psalm describes the Lord's battle with the hells and their conquest. Since "the right hand of God" means omnipotence, therefore the Lord says that He will sit "on the right hand of power" (Matt. 26:63, 64); and "on the right hand of the power of God" (Luke 22:69).'

[5] At this point I was interrupted by an uproar in the assembly; but I said: 'Take care! There may perhaps appear from heaven a hand, such as appeared to me. If it does, it strikes unbelievable fear of its power into you. This proved to me that "the right hand of God" means omnipotence.'

Hardly had I said this, when a hand was seen stretched out beneath heaven. Its appearance struck such terror into them that they rushed pell-mell to the doors; some rushed to the windows to throw themselves out, some were unable to breathe and fainted. However, I was not terrified, so I stayed behind, and then walked slowly after them. When I looked back from a distance, I saw that the college was surrounded by a dark cloud; and I was told from heaven that this was because they had spoken from their belief in three Gods, and that its earlier light would return, when more sensible people gathered there.

* Corrected in the author's copy from 'God' in keeping with the Hebrew.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 137

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 137

137. The fourth experience.

I was told that a council had been summoned, made up of people famous for their books and learning, to discuss the present state of faith, and how the chosen are made righteous by it. This took place in the world of spirits, and I was allowed to be present at it in the spirit. I saw a gathering of clergy, composed of both those who agreed and those who disagreed with this. On the right stood those who in the world were called the Apostolic Fathers, and lived in the period before the Council of Nicaea*. On the left stood men who since that time had been famous for their books, either, printed or copied in manuscript by apprentices. Many of these were clean-shaven and wore wigs made of curly women's hair; some of them had rolled collars, some winged collars. The other party, however, had beards and their own hair.

In front of the two parties stood a man who was a judge and reviewer of worldly writings. He rapped for silence on the ground with a staff he held in his hand. Then he went up the steps to his chair of office, and uttered a groan; he intended to follow it with a loud cry, but the groan choked his breath back in his throat.

[2] At length he was able to speak as follows: 'Brothers, what an age is this we live in! A person has arisen from the throng of laymen, one without the cap and gown of learning nor honoured with academic laurels, and has dislodged our faith from its place in heaven, and hurled it into the river Styx. What a dreadful crime! Yet that faith alone is our guiding star, shining like Orion by night, and like the Morning Star at dawn. For all his years that man is totally blind to the mysteries of our faith, because he has not opened it up to see in it the righteousness of our Lord and Saviour, and His mediation and propitiation; and not seeing these, he has failed too to see the wonders of how He makes us righteous, the remission of sins, regeneration, sanctifying and salvation. This man has taken away our faith with its outstanding saving power, because it is directed to three Divine Persons, and so to God in His totality, and concentrated it upon the Second Person - and not even all of that, but upon His Human. We do of course call this Divine as the result of the incarnation of the Son from eternity, but no one thinks of it as anything but purely human. And what then can come from this but a faith which is a plentiful source of nature-worship? That sort of faith, lacking spirituality, is little different from faith in the Vicar of Christ, or in a Saint. You know what Calvin in his time said about worship founded on that sort of faith. Will one of you please tell me, what is the source of faith? Surely it comes directly from God, in whom lies everything needed for our salvation?'

[3] At this his companions on the left, the party without beards, who wore curly wigs and a rolled collar about their necks, clapped their hands and shouted: 'Most wisely spoken! We know that we cannot receive anything which is not given to us from heaven. Let that prophet tell us the source of faith, and what else faith is. It is impossible for it to be other or of other origin. It is as impossible to present any other faith, which truly is a faith, as it is to ride to some constellation in the sky, catch a star, and bring it back stored in one's coat pocket.' This speech was designed to make his companions laugh at any new sort of faith whatever.

aRef Ex@32 @0 S4' [4] On hearing this the party on the right, who wore beards and had their own hair, became angry. One of them got up, an old man, though afterwards he appeared young, because he was an angel from heaven, where people of any age grow young again. He spoke and said: 'I have heard what sort of faith you have, the faith that was so highly praised by the man who holds the chair of office. But what is that faith but our Lord's tomb after the resurrection, when it was sealed again by Pilate's troops? I opened it up and I could see nothing in it but some conjurers' wands, which the wise men of Egypt used to perform their miracles. Rather, your faith is outwardly in your eyes like a bookcase of solid gold, set with precious stones, which when opened is empty, except perhaps for a little dust from the relics of Roman Catholics in its corners. For they have the same faith as you, only it is nowadays wrapped up in outward displays of holiness. To go on with comparisons, it is like the Vestal Virgin of antiquity, who allowed the sacred fire to go out, and was buried alive. I can assure you that in my eyes your faith is like the golden calf around which the Children of Israel danced, when Moses had gone away to climb Mount Sinai to Jehovah.

[5] 'You need not be surprised at my using such comparisons to speak of your faith, because that is how we speak of it in heaven. On the other hand, our faith is, has been, and ever will be in the Lord God the Saviour, whose Human is Divine and whose Divine is Human. This makes it easy for us to accept, as uniting the Divine spiritual to the natural of men. So it becomes a spiritual faith at the natural level, and this makes the natural as it were translucent, as the result of the spiritual light which illuminates our faith. The truths of which it is made up are as numerous as the verses in Holy Writ; all its truths are like stars, which by their light show it forth and give it form. A person acquires faith from the Word by means of his own natural powers of enlightenment, which are based upon knowledge, thought and false belief. But with those who believe in the Lord, He turns these into conviction, trust and confidence. This makes the natural faith spiritual, and charity gives it life. This faith appears to us like a queen decked out with as many jewels as the wall of the Holy Jerusalem (Revelation 21:17-20).

sRef Colo@2 @9 S6' sRef Acts@20 @21 S6' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S6' sRef Matt@28 @18 S6' [6] 'But to prevent you believing that my words are mere exaggeration and consequently not to be taken seriously, I will read you some passages from the Holy Word, which will show plainly that our faith is not in a man, as you think, but in the true God, in whom is all that is Divine. John says:

Jesus Christ is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

Paul says:

In Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily. Col. 2:9.

In the Acts of the Apostles:

Paul preached both to Jews and Greeks repentance toward God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Acts 20:21.

The Lord Himself said that to Him was given "all power in heaven and upon earth" (Matt. 28:18). These are but a few quotations.'

[7] After this the angel looked at me and said: 'You know what those who call themselves Evangelical believe, or should believe, about the Lord the Saviour. Recite some of their tenets, so that we can know whether they are so foolish as to believe that His Human is purely human, or whether they attribute any Divinity to it, and, if so, how.'

Then in front of the whole assembly I read out the following statements from the handbook of orthodoxy called 'The Formula of Concord,' published in Leipzig in 1756:

In Christ the Divine and the Human natures are so united as to make one Person. (pp. 606 762). Christ is truly God and Man in one undivided Person, and remains so for ever. (pp. 609 673, 762). In Christ God is Man and Man is God. (pp. 607, 765).

Christ's human nature was raised to fully Divine majesty; this is also said by many of the Fathers. (pp. 844-852, 860-865, 869-878).

Christ as to His human nature is omnipresent and fills all space. (pp. 768, 783-5.)

Christ as to His human nature has all power in heaven and on earth. (pp. 775, 776, 780).

Christ as to His human nature sits at the right hand of the Father. (pp. 608, 764).

Christ as to His human nature is to be invoked; this is proved by quotations from Scripture (p. 226).

The 'Confession of Augsburg' gives the highest degree of approval to that mode of worship (p. 19).

[8] After reading these statements I turned to the man in the chair of office and said: 'I know that everyone here is paired with someone like him in the natural world; please tell me whether you know who your colleague is.'

He answered in a solemn tone: 'Yes. I am paired with a famous man** who is a leader of the noble troops of the church militant.'

Since he spoke in such a solemn tone, I said: 'Forgive my asking, but do you know where this famous leader lives?'

'Yes,' he said, 'not far from Luther's tomb.'

I smiled at this and said: 'Why do you say "his tomb"? Do you not know that Luther has risen again, and has now renounced his erroneous doctrines about justification by faith in three Divine Persons from eternity, and has therefore been transferred to live with the blessed of the new heaven, where he sees and laughs at those who follow him in this madness?'

'I know this,' he replied, 'but how does it concern me?'

So then I addressed him in equally solemn tones: 'Put the idea,' I said, 'into the mind of your famous man who is paired with you, that I am afraid that contrary to the orthodoxy of his own church, he then for the moment took His divinity away from the Lord, or allowed his pen to plough a furrow, in which he unwittingly planted the seeds of nature-worship, when he wrote an attack on the worship of the Lord our Saviour.'

To this he answered: 'I cannot do this, because he and I are of almost one mind on this subject; but he does not understand what I say, while I have a clear understanding of everything he says.' This was because the spiritual world enters into the natural world and perceives the thoughts of people there, but not the reverse. This is the nature of the association between spirits and men.

[9] Since I had now begun a dialogue with the holder of the chair, I said: 'If I may, I should like to put in another question or two. Do you not know that Evangelical orthodoxy, as stated in their church's handbook called 'The Formula of Concord', teaches that in Christ God is Man and Man is God, and that His Divine and His Human are in one undivided Person, and so remain for ever? How then could he, and how can you, defile the worship of the Lord with nature-worship?'

To this he answered: 'This I know, and yet I do not know.'

So I went on and said: 'I put the question to him, absent as he is, or to you in his place, what was the source of the soul of the Lord our Saviour? If you answer that it was from His mother, you are mad; if that it was from Joseph, you are doing violence to the Word; but if that it was from the Holy Spirit, you are right, so long as by the Holy Spirit you understand the Divine coming forth and working, so that He is the Son of Jehovah God.

[10] 'I ask you again, what is the meaning of hypostatic union? If you answer that it is like a union between two, one of whom is above and the other below, you are mad, for in this way you could have made God the Saviour into two, just as you make God into three. But if you say that it is a union in one person, as between the soul and the body, you are right. This too is in accordance with your doctrine and that of the Fathers: see The Formula of Concord, pp. 765-768. See also the Athanasian Creed, which contains these words:

The correct belief is that we should believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ is God and Man; and though He is God and Man, there are not two, but there is one Christ. He is in every way one, not by confusion of substance, but by unity of Person. For just as the reasoning soul and the flesh make one man, so God and Man make one Christ.

sRef Jer@23 @5 S11' sRef Jer@23 @6 S11' [11] I ask yet further, what else was the abominable heresy of Arius, which led to the calling of the Council of Nicaea by the Emperor Constantine the Great, but a denial of the divinity of the Lord's Human? Tell me further, whom you understand by these words in Jeremiah:

Behold, the days will come, when I shall raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as King, and this will be his name, Jehovah our righteousness. Jer. 23:5, 6; 33:15, 16.

If you say the Son from eternity, you are mad; He was not the Redeemer. But if you say the Son born in time, who was the only-begotten Son of God (John 1:18; 3:16), you are right. He by His redeeming act became righteousness, on which you base your faith. Read too Isaiah 9:6 and other passages, which predict that Jehovah Himself was to come into the world.'

The holder of the chair kept silence at this and turned away his face.

sRef Matt@12 @30 S12' [12] When this was over, the presiding officer intended to close the meeting with prayer, but from the party on the left there suddenly sprang out a man, who had a cap on his head and a hat on top of it. He put his finger to his hat and said: 'I too am paired with a man in your world, who occupies a high position there.*** I know this because I can speak his mind like my own.'

'Where,' I asked, 'does this eminent person live?'

'At Goteborg,' he replied. 'I have on occasion gathered from his thoughts that your new doctrine smacks of Mohammedanism.'

At this I saw all the party on the right, where the Apostolic Fathers were standing, amazed and crestfallen, and heard exclamations rising from their minds to their lips: 'What an abominable thing! What an age we live in!'

To allay their righteous anger I held up my hand and requested to be heard. When permission was given, I said: 'I know that a man of the eminence you describe has written something of the sort in a letter, which was subsequently printed. But if he had then known what a grave slander it is, he would surely have torn it in pieces, and consigned it to the flames. That is the same sort of insult as was meant by the Lord's words to the Jews, when they said that Christ performed His miracles by some other power than God's (Matt. 12:22-32). In addition, the Lord also says there:

Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me, scatters. Matt. 12:30.

When I said this, his colleague lowered his gaze, but after a little raised it again to say: 'I have never heard you speak so harshly.'

'The reason,' I replied, 'is the two dogmas of nature-worship and Mohammedanism, which are criminal lies cunningly invented, and two lethal blows designed to lead men's wills astray and repel them from the holy worship of the Lord.' I then turned to the second colleague and said: 'Tell the man in Goteborg if you can, to read the Lord's words in Revelation 3:18, and also the passage at 2:16 of that book.'

[13] When I said that, uproar broke out; but it was quelled by a light which shone down from heaven. This induced many of the party on the left to cross over to those on the right. But those remained on the left whose thoughts were entirely vacuous, and who therefore hang on the lips of any teacher, as well as those who think of the Lord as wholly human. The light streaming down from heaven seemed to be reflected off both these last two groups, but to flow into those who crossed over from left to right.
* AD 325.
** The reference is to Dr Ernesti (1707-1781), who lived at Eisleben in Germany. He published a violent attack on Swedenborg, who replied briefly, referring to this passage. See 'Small Theological Works and Letters,' ed. Elliot, p. 197.
*** This may refer to Dr O. A. Ekebom, Dean of Goteborg in Sweden in 1761.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 138

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 138

138. CHAPTER THREE

THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE WAY GOD WORKS

On entering the spiritual world, which generally happens on the third day after death, all ordained priests, who have had a fairly correct idea of the Lord our Saviour, are first taught about the Divine Trinity; and in particular that the Holy Spirit is not God in His own right, but when mentioned in the Word means the Divine activity which proceeds from the one omnipresent God. The reason why they particularly need to be taught about the Holy Spirit is that most of those who claim inspiration fall after death into the crazy fancy that they are themselves the Holy Spirit. Another reason is that many in the church, who while in the world believed that the Holy Spirit spoke through them, frighten other people by quoting the Lord's saying in Matthew, that speaking against what they say by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit is an unforgivable sin (Matt. 12:31, 32). Those who after receiving instruction abandon their belief that the Holy Spirit is God in His own right, are then told about the oneness of God, that He is not divided into three Persons, each of which is individually God and Lord, as the Athanasian Creed asserts, but that the Divine Trinity is contained in the Lord the Saviour, just as soul, body and the power they exert are in any human being. They are then prepared to receive the faith of the new heaven, and when this preparation is complete, the way is opened for them to reach a community in heaven which has a similar faith, and they are given a place to live with their companions, with whom they are destined to live in a blessed state to eternity.

Now having dealt with God the Creator and the Lord the Redeemer, I must deal with the Holy Spirit. This subject, like the previous ones, needs to be split up into a series of propositions, as follows:

(i) The Holy Spirit is Divine Truth, and also the Divine power and activity which proceeds from the one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, and so from the Lord God the Saviour.
(ii) The Divine power and activity meant by the Holy Spirit are, generally speaking, reformation and regeneration, which lead to renewal, quickening, sanctification and justification; and these lead to purification from evils and the forgiveness of sins, and ultimately to salvation.
(iii) The Divine power and activity meant by the sending of the Holy Spirit, with the clergy takes the particular form of enlightenment and instruction.
(iv) The Lord confers these benefits on those who believe in Him.
(v) The Lord works of Himself from the Father, and not the reverse.
(vi) A person's spirit is his mind, and whatever comes from it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 139

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 139

139. (i) THE HOLY SPIRIT IS DIVINE TRUTH, AND ALSO THE DIVINE POWER AND ACTIVITY WHICH PROCEEDS FROM THE ONE GOD, IN WHOM IS THE DIVINE TRINITY, AND SO FROM THE LORD GOD THE SAVIOUR.

The Holy Spirit means properly the Divine Truth, so also the Word; and in this sense the Lord is Himself also the Holy Spirit. But the present-day church uses the term 'Holy Spirit' to describe the way God works, that is, the actual process of making a person righteous, so this is the meaning given here to the Holy Spirit, and this will be the principal subject discussed. Another reason is that the activity of God takes place by means of the Divine Truth which proceeds from the Lord; and that which proceeds is of one and the same essence as He from whom it proceeds. This is like the trio of soul, body and what proceeds making up a single essence, which in the case of a human being is purely human, but in the case of the Lord is Divine and human at the same time, these essences after His glorification being united as what is prior is with what follows from it, or like essence and the appropriate form. So the three essentials called the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are one in the Lord.

sRef Isa@11 @1 S2' sRef Isa@59 @19 S2' sRef Isa@59 @20 S2' sRef Isa@11 @4 S2' sRef Isa@11 @5 S2' sRef Isa@11 @2 S2' sRef Isa@61 @1 S2' [2] I showed before that the Lord is the Divine Truth itself or Divine Verity. The following passages will prove that the Holy Spirit is Divine Truth.

A shoot will come forth from the stock of Jesse. The spirit of Jehovah will rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and intelligence, the spirit of counsel and power. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be the belt around his loins, and truth the belt around his thighs. Isa. 11:1, 2, 4, 5.

He shall come like a narrow stream, the spirit of Jehovah shall advance his standard against him, then shall the Redeemer come from Zion. Isa. 59:19, 20.

The spirit of the Lord Jehovih is upon me. Jehovah has anointed me. He has sent me to preach the gospel to the poor. Isa. 61:1; Luke 4:18.

This is my covenant. My spirit which is upon you and my words shall not depart from your mouth from now on for ever. Isa. 59:21.

sRef John@16 @15 S3' sRef John@14 @17 S3' sRef John@16 @7 S3' sRef John@16 @13 S3' sRef John@14 @16 S3' sRef John@14 @18 S3' sRef Isa@59 @21 S3' sRef John@16 @14 S3' sRef John@14 @19 S3' sRef John@15 @26 S3' [3] Since the Lord is Truth itself, then everything that proceeds from Him is truth, and this is what is meant by the Comforter, who is also called the Spirit of Truth and the Holy Spirit. The following passages will prove this:

I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I should go away. For if I were not to go away, the Comforter will not come to you. But if I go away, I will send him to you. John 16:7.

When the Spirit of Truth comes, he will lead you to all truth. He will not speak of himself, but will say whatever he has heard. John 16:13.

He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and communicate it to you. All things that the Father has are mine. This is why I have said that he will take from what is mine and communicate it to you. John 16:14, 15.

I will ask the Father to give you another Comforter, the Spirit of truth, which the world cannot receive, because it neither sees nor knows him. But you know him, because he remains with you and will be in you. I shall not leave you bereft, I am coming to you and you will see me. John 14:16-19.

When the Comforter comes whom I shall send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, he will bear witness about me. John 15:26.

He is called the Holy Spirit. John 14:26.

sRef Matt@28 @20 S4' [4] The Lord meant Himself by 'the Comforter' or 'the Holy Spirit', as is clear from His own saying about the world not yet knowing him, 'But you know Him'; 'I will not leave you bereft, I am coming to you'; 'You will see Me'; and elsewhere 'Behold I am with you every day until the ending of the age' (Matt. 28:20). This is further shown by the expression 'He will not speak of Himself, but that which He receives from me.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 140

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 140

sRef Matt@1 @20 S0' sRef John@20 @22 S0' sRef Luke@1 @35 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef Matt@1 @25 S0' sRef John@7 @39 S0' sRef John@1 @14 S0' 140. Now because the Holy Spirit means the Divine truth, and this was in the Lord Himself and was the Lord Himself (John 14:6), and so because the Holy Spirit could not proceed from any other source, it is said:

The Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:39.

and after His glorification:

He breathed on His disciples and said, Receive the Holy Spirit. John 20:22.

The reason why the Lord breathed on the disciples and said this was that breathing on was the external sign standing for inspiration by God; and inspiration means being brought into contact with communities of angels. This will allow the understanding to grasp what the angel Gabriel said about the Lord's conception:

The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; so that the holy thing that is born of you will be called the Son of God. Luke 1:35.

Also:

The angel of the Lord said to Joseph in a dream, Do not be afraid to take Mary as your betrothed, for what is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit; and Joseph did not touch her until she had given birth to her first-born son. Matt. 1:20, 25.

The Holy Spirit stands there for the Divine truth proceeding from Jehovah the Father; it was this that came forth which was 'the power of the Most High' which overshadowed His mother. So this statement tallies with what John says:

The Word was with God, and the Word was God; and the Word was made flesh. John 1:1, 14.

For a demonstration that the Word there means the Divine truth see the Faith of the New Church (3 above).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 141

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 141

141. It was shown above that the Divine Trinity is in the Lord, and this will be further amplified in a following passage devoted to the subject of the Trinity [163-188]. Here I propose only to point out some of the absurdities which result from dividing that Trinity into persons. It would be as if a minister of the church were to teach from the pulpit what people should believe and do, and have another minister standing next to him whispering in his ear: 'You are right to say that, and add a little more too'; and these then say to, a third standing on the steps: 'Go down into the church, open the ears of the people and pour this out into their hearts, at the same time making them pure, holy and pledges of righteousness.'

A Divine Trinity divided into persons, each of which is by Himself God and Lord, is like having three suns in one world, one up high next to the second, and a third down below bathing angels and men with its radiation, and transmitting the heat and light of the other two in all their power to their minds, hearts and bodies, sharpening them like fire in a retort clarifying and sublimating matter. Anyone can see that, if this happened, man would be burnt to a cinder.

The rule of three Divine persons in heaven again would be like having three kings ruling in one kingdom; or having three generals of equal rank controlling one army; or better, like the Roman government before imperial times, when they had a consul, the senate and a tribune of the people, with power so divided between them that supreme authority was in the hands of all at once. Anyone can see that it is absurd, ridiculous and crazy to introduce that sort of government into heaven. Yet this is what those do who attribute the power of the supreme consul to God the Father, the power of the senate to the Son, and the power of the tribune of the people to the Holy Spirit. This is what happens if each is assigned his own peculiar office, and even more so if it is also asserted that these peculiar characteristics cannot be shared.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 142

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 142

142. (ii) THE DIVINE POWER AND ACTIVITY MEANT BY THE HOLY SPIRIT ARE, GENERALLY SPEAKING, REFORMATION AND REGENERATION, WHICH LEAD TO RENEWAL, QUICKENING, SANCTIFICATION. AND JUSTIFICATION; AND THESE LEAD TO PURIFICATION FROM EVILS AND THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS, AND ULTIMATELY TO SALVATION.

This is the series of virtues which the Lord produces in those who believe in Him, adapting and making themselves suitable for Him to be received and dwell in them. This is done by means of the Divine truth, and in the case of Christians by the Word; for this is the one and only means which allows a person to approach the Lord, and allows the Lord to come in to him. For, as stated before, the Lord is Divine truth itself, and so is whatever proceeds from Him. But it must be understood as Divine truth acting from good, which is the same as faith inspired by charity; for faith is nothing but truth, and charity is nothing but good. It is by means of Divine truth acting from good, in other words by means of faith inspired by charity that a person's reformation and regeneration is effected, and by this means too he is renewed, quickened and made holy and righteous. As all these processes advance and increase, he is cleansed from evils, and this cleansing is what is meant by the forgiveness of sins.

All of these processes effected by the Lord cannot here be discussed one by one, because each demands its own particular analysis, which must be proved from the Word and have light shed on it by the faculty of reason, and this is not the place for it. The reader is therefore referred to the following chapters of this book, which will deal in turn with charity, faith, free will, repentance, reformation and regeneration. It should be known that the Lord continually effects these means of salvation in the case of each individual, for they are steps to heaven, and the Lord desires the salvation of everyone. Thus the salvation of everyone is the end the Lord has in view, and to will the end is to will the means. His coming, redeeming and passion on the cross were all for the sake of man's salvation (Matt. 18:11; Luke 19:10). So because man's salvation was and ever will be His end, it follows that the various activities listed above are the mediate ends, and salvation is the ultimate end.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 143

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 143

sRef Ps@51 @12 S0' sRef Ezek@36 @26 S0' sRef Ps@51 @10 S0' sRef Zech@12 @1 S0' sRef Isa@26 @9 S0' sRef Ezek@18 @31 S0' sRef Ezek@36 @27 S0' 143. The production of those virtues is the province of the Holy Spirit, whom the Lord sends to those who believe in Him and make themselves fit to receive Him. This is what is meant by the Spirit in these and other passages:

I will give you a new heart and a new spirit, I will put my spirit within you, and make you walk according to my statutes*. Ezek. 36:26, 27; 11:19.

Create a clean heart in us, o God, and make new a steadfast spirit within me. Bring back to me the joy of your salvation, and let the Spirit which acts of its own accord uphold me. Ps. 51:10, 12.

Jehovah forms the spirit of man within him. Zech. 12:1.

With my soul I have waited for you by night, and with my spirit within me I have waited for you in the morning. Isa. 26:9

Make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. Why will you die, o house of Israel? Ezek. 18:31.

In these passages a new heart means the will to do good, and a new spirit the understanding of truth. It is clear from what it says there that the Lord effects these things with those who do good and believe the truth, that is, those who have the faith of charity, when it says that God gives breath to those that walk according to His statutes*, and that it is called 'the Spirit which acts of its own accord.' It is clear that man must take action on his own side from the words, 'Make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. Why will you die, o house of Israel?'

* The Latin has 'in the way of salvation', but this is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 144

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 144

144. We read that when Jesus was baptised, the heavens were opened and John saw the Holy Spirit coming down in the form of a dove (Matt. 3:16; Mark 1:10; Luke 3:21; John 1:32, 33). This was because baptism stands for regeneration and cleansing, and so does a dove. How can anyone fail to see that the dove was not the Holy Spirit, nor was the Holy Spirit in the dove? In heaven doves are often to be seen, and the angels know that, when they are, they are correspondences of affections and consequently of thoughts about regeneration and cleansing in the minds of some bystanders. So as soon as they approach them and engage them in conversation about any subject other than what they were thinking about when they appeared, the doves immediately vanish. This is similar to many of the visions seen by the prophets, as for instance John's vision of the Lamb on Mount Zion (Rev. 14:1 and elsewhere).

sRef Matt@3 @11 S2' sRef John@3 @5 S2' [2] Is there anyone who does not know that the Lord was not the Lamb, nor in it, but that the Lamb was a representation of His innocence? This makes clear as daylight the error of those who deduce the three persons of the Trinity from the dove seen over the Lord at His baptism, and the voice then heard from heaven saying, 'This is my beloved Son.' The way the Lord brings about a person's regeneration by faith and charity is meant by what John the Baptist said:

I baptise you with water for repentance, but he who will come after me will baptise with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Matt. 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16.

To baptise with the Holy Spirit and with fire is to regenerate by means of the Divine truth of faith and by means of the Divine good of charity. The following words of the Lord have a similar meaning:

Unless a person has been born by water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. John 3:5.

Water here as elsewhere in the Word means truth in the natural or external man; spirit means truth arising from good in the spiritual or internal man.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 145

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 145

145. Now since the Lord is Divine truth itself coming from the Divine good, and this is His essence, and since everyone acts as he does by reason of his essential nature, this proves that it is constantly the Lord's will to implant truth and good, that is, faith and charity, in every person, and His will could not be any different. Many things in the world can be used to illustrate this. For instance, everyone's will and thought, and, as far as can be, his speech and actions, are the product of his essential nature. For example, a loyal person has loyal thoughts and intentions, an honest, upright, pious or religious person has honest, upright, pious or religious thoughts and intentions; on the other hand a proud, cunning, deceitful or greedy person has thoughts and intentions which match his essential nature. The clown has no wish but to raise laughs, the fool none but to gabble the opposite of wise sayings. In brief, an angel's plans and efforts are all heavenly, a devil's all hellish.

[2] It is much the same with all the creatures of lower rank in the animal kingdom, for instance, birds, beasts, fish, flying and earth-bound insects. Each of these can be recognised by its essential nature, and each has instincts which are derived from and in accordance with its nature. Likewise in the vegetable kingdom, every tree, every shrub and every vegetable can be recognised by its fruit and seed, in which its essential nature is innate. Nor can they produce anything but what is their own and like them. Indeed it is its essential nature which allows us to judge every kind of soil or clay, every stone, precious as well as ordinary, every mineral and metal.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 146

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 146

sRef Acts@2 @3 S0' sRef Acts@2 @4 S0' 146. (iii) THE DIVINE POWER AND ACTIVITY MEANT BY THE SENDING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, WITH THE CLERGY TAKES THE PARTICULAR FORM OF ENLIGHTENMENT AND INSTRUCTION.

The activities of the Lord listed in the preceding section, reformation, regeneration, renewal, quickening, sanctification, justification, cleansing, the forgiveness of sins and finally salvation, are sent by the Lord to affect the clergy as well as laymen, and they are received by those who are in the Lord and have the Lord in them (John 6:56; 14:20; 15:4, 5). The reason why enlightenment and instruction are especially given to the clergy is that these things are a part of their duties, and that ordination into the ministry carries these with it. The clergy also believe that, when zeal leads them to preach, they are inspired like the Lord's disciples, on whom He breathed and said:

Receive the Holy Spirit. John 20:22; see also Mark 13:11.

Some even assert that they have felt it flowing into them. But they should take extreme care not to be convinced that the zeal, by which many are carried away while preaching, is God working in their hearts. For similar or even more ardent zeal is felt by fanatics and also by those who hold the falsest doctrines, even by those who care not a whit for the Word, but worship nature as god, and pack faith and charity away in the knapsack on their backs. When they are preaching and teaching they hang it round their necks like a sort of second stomach, from which they bring up and regurgitate such things as they know will appeal to their listeners' appetites.

Zeal considered in itself is an outburst of heat in the natural man. If it has the love of truth in it, then it is like the holy fire which affected the Apostles, as we read in Acts:

There appeared divided among them tongues as it were of fire, which settled upon each of them; and they were thus all filled with the Holy Spirit. Acts 2:3, 4.

But if that zeal or outburst of heat has the love of falsity lurking within it, then it is like fire smouldering in a log, which bursts out and sets fire to the house. Do you, reader, if you deny the holiness of the Word and the divinity of the Lord, please take your knapsack off your back and open it, which you are free to do at home, and then you will see. I know that those from Babel, who are meant by Lucifer in Isaiah, on entering a church, and even more when climbing into a pulpit, especially those who call themselves members of the Society of Jesus, are carried away by a zeal which in many cases comes from a hellish love; and this makes them cry out more violently and heave deeper sighs from their chests, than those whose zeal comes from heavenly love. There are two more ways in which the spirit works upon the clergy, which will be mentioned later (155).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 147

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 147

147. The church up to now has been almost totally ignorant of the fact that a person's every wish and thought, and consequently every action and utterance, has an internal and an external side, and people are taught from childhood to speak in accordance with the external side, no matter how much the internal disagrees. This is the origin of pretence, insincerity and hypocrisy. It follows that people are duplicitous, and the only man who is simple is the one whose external thinks and speaks, and wills and acts, in accordance with the internal. It is these people who are meant in the Word by the simple (e.g. Luke 8:15, 11:34, etc.), although they are wiser than the duplicitous. Every created thing is double or triple, as can be proved from the human body. Every nerve is composed of fibres, every fibre of fibrils; every muscle of bundles of fibres, and these bundles are composed of motor fibres; every artery is composed of a triple series of tunics. It is the same in the human mind, which is spiritually organised in the same way, because, as stated before, the human mind is divided into three levels. The highest, which is also the inmost, is called celestial, the middle spiritual, and the lowest natural. The minds of all who deny the holiness of the Word and the Lord's divinity think on the lowest level. But because they have also learned from childhood the church's teaching on spiritual matters, and they accept these though they subordinate them to natural matters - that is, various facts, political and civil behaviour - and since these lie at the bottom of the mind, ready to hand when speaking, they can draw on these when speaking in churches and meetings. The extraordinary thing is that they are then quite unaware that they are speaking and teaching otherwise than in accordance with their belief. Yet the truth is that when they are left to themselves, as they are at home, the door which blocked off the internal of their mind is thrown open, and then they sometimes laugh at what they said when speaking in public, saying in their hearts that theology is a collection of specious traps for catching doves.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 148

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 148

148. The internal and external of such people can be compared to poisonous substances coated with sugar; or to the gourds which the prophets' lads gathered and put in their porridge, so that when they came to eat it, they cried, 'Death in the pot' (2 Kings 4:38-41). Another possible comparison is with the beast from the land*, which had two horns like a lamb's and which had a voice like a dragon's (Rev. 13: 11). Later on the beast is called 'the false prophet.' Such people are like brigands in town among well-behaved citizens, who so long as they are there behave properly and speak reasonably, but when they return to the forest are wild beasts; or again like pirates who behave like human beings ashore, but like crocodiles at sea. Both of these groups, while they are ashore or in town, walk around like panthers dressed in sheepskins; or like monkeys dressed in human clothing, with a mask of a human face tied in front of their faces.

[2] They can also be likened to a prostitute who steeps herself in perfume, makes up her face with rouge, and dresses in white silk with a floral pattern; but when she returns home, she strips in front of a lascivious audience** and infects them with her contagion. Years of experience in the spiritual world have taught me that those who in their hearts deny the holiness of the Word or the divinity of the Lord are like this; for in that world all are at first kept in their external forms, but later on they are exposed in their internal forms, and then the comedy turns into tragedy.

*The Latin has 'from the sea', but this is not in this passage, but Rev. 13:1
**Latin luperci, the name of the ancient Roman worshippers of a fertility god.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 149

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 149

sRef Rev@12 @17 S0' sRef Rev@12 @11 S0' sRef Rev@19 @10 S0' 149. (iv) THE LORD CONFERS THESE BENEFITS ON THOSE WHO BELIEVE IN HIM.

The Lord confers these benefits, which are meant by the sending of the Holy Spirit, on those who believe in Him. That is to say, He reforms them, regenerates them, renews, quickens, justifies and cleanses them from evils, and so eventually saves them. This is proved by all the passages in the Word which attribute salvation and everlasting life to those who believe in the Lord, and which were quoted before (107). In addition there is this:

Jesus said, If anyone believes in me, as the Scripture says, streams of living water will flow from his belly; He said this about the spirit, which those who believe in Him are to receive. John 7:38, 39.

Also this:

The witness of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Rev. 19:10.

The spirit of prophecy means the truth of doctrine drawn from the Word. Prophecy always means doctrine, and to prophesy means to teach it; the witness of Jesus means confessing one's faith in Him. His witness has a similar meaning in this passage:

Michael's angels defeated the dragon by the blood of the Lamb, and the word of their* witness. And the dragon departed, to make war on the remainder of His seed, who kept the commandments of God, and bear witness to Jesus Christ. Rev. 12:11, 17.

* 'His' in the Latin, but corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 150

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 150

150. Those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ are to receive those spiritual benefits, because He Himself is salvation and everlasting life. He is salvation, because He is the Saviour, for this is the meaning of His name Jesus; He is everlasting life, because those in whom He is, and who are in Him, have everlasting life. This is why He is called everlasting life in 1 John 5:20. Now since He is salvation and everlasting life, it follows that He is also every means which leads to salvation and everlasting life. Thus He is the whole of reformation, regeneration, renewal, quickening, sanctification and justification, cleansing from evils, and finally salvation. In the case of every single person the Lord confers these benefits, or rather, He attempts to impart them; and when a person makes himself ready and suitable to receive them, He does impart them. The activity of readying and making oneself suitable comes from the Lord too, but if the person does not receive them with spontaneity of spirit, then the Lord cannot go beyond the attempt to introduce them, and this attempt is constantly kept up.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 151

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 151

151. Believing in the Lord is not just a matter of acknowledging Him, but includes keeping His commandments. Merely to acknowledge Him only demands some thought on the part of the understanding, but to keep His commandments requires acknowledgment too on the part of the will. The human mind is made up of the understanding and the will. It is the function of the understanding to think, of the will to act. So as long as a person's acknowledgment is merely in thought on the part of the understanding, he approaches the Lord with no more than half his mind; but when he acts, then he does so with his whole mind, and that is what believing is. Otherwise a person can split his heart in two, and force its surface to soar aloft, while its flesh sinks downwards; and so he flies like an eagle between heaven and hell. Yet he does not follow his gaze, but the delights of the flesh; and since they lie in hell, he flies down there, and after indulging in his pleasures there and tasting the demons' new wine, he puts on a jolly face, and his eyes sparkle as if with fire, so as to impersonate an angel of light. This is the satanic appearance after death of the people who acknowledge the Lord, but do not keep His commandments.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 152

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 152

152. In an earlier paragraph [150] it was shown that the salvation of men and their everlasting life are the Lord's first and last ends in view. Since the first and last ends contain within them the intermediate ends, it follows that the spiritual benefits described above are at the same time in the Lord, and in people by the Lord's gift, but they still come forth one after the other. For the human mind grows as the body does, but the one grows in size, the other in wisdom. The mind too is lifted from one level to another, from the natural to the spiritual, and from this to the celestial. At this level a person is wise, at the spiritual intelligent, at the lowest level knowledgeable. But this lifting of the mind happens only from time to time, as a person acquires truths and links them to good. This is like building a house: first of all one buys the materials for it, such as bricks, tiles, planks and beams, and then one lays the foundations, builds the walls, partitions the interior to make rooms, provides them with doorways, puts windows in the walls and constructs stairs from one floor to the next. All of these things are at the same time contained in the end in view, which is the comfortable and dignified dwelling which the builder foresees and provides. It is similar when a church is being built; all the details of its construction are contained in the end, which is the worship of God. It is the same with all other plans, for instance for gardens and farms, as well as official positions or businesses; the end in view equips itself with the supports necessary to its accomplishment.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 153

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 153

sRef John@14 @13 S0' sRef John@14 @14 S0' sRef John@15 @26 S1' sRef John@16 @7 S1' sRef John@16 @14 S1' sRef John@20 @22 S1' sRef John@7 @39 S1' sRef John@16 @13 S1' sRef John@16 @15 S1' 153. (v) THE LORD WORKS OF HIMSELF FROM THE FATHER, AND NOT THE REVERSE.

Working here means much the same as sending the Holy Spirit, since the activities listed above, which are in general reformation, regeneration, renewal, quickening, sanctification, justification, [cleansing] from evils, forgiveness of sins [and salvation], are the Lord's doing, though at the present time they are attributed to the Holy Spirit as an independent God. These things are performed by the Lord from the Father, and not the reverse, as will first be proved from the Word and then illustrated by many reasoned arguments. The following passages from the Word will serve:

When the Comforter comes whom I shall send from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes forth from the Father, he will bear witness about me. John 15:26.

If I do not go away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if I go away, I will send him to you. John 16:7.

The Comforter, the Spirit of truth, will not speak of himself, but he will receive of mine and tell it to you. Everything that the Father has is mine; it is for this reason that I said that he would receive of mine and tell it to you. John 16:13-15.

The Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:39.

Jesus breathed on the disciples and said, Receive the Holy Spirit. John 20:22.

Whatever you ask in my name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son; if you ask anything in my name, I shall do it. John 14:13, 14.

sRef John@5 @26 S2' sRef John@3 @35 S2' sRef John@1 @18 S2' sRef John@14 @20 S2' sRef John@16 @15 S2' sRef John@5 @37 S2' sRef John@6 @63 S2' sRef John@15 @26 S2' [2] These passages show clearly that it is the Lord who sends the Holy Spirit, that is to say, performs the works which at the present day are attributed to the Holy Spirit as an independent God. For He said that He would send him from the Father; that He would send him to you; that the Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified; that after He was glorified He breathed on the disciples and said, Receive the Holy Spirit; He also said, Whatever you ask in my name, I will do, and also that the Comforter will receive of mine what he is to tell. The Comforter is identical with the Holy Spirit; see John 14:26. The following passages show that God the Father does not confer these benefits of Himself acting through the Son, but the Son does so of Himself from the Father:

No one has ever seen God; the only-begotten Son, who is in the Father's bosom, He has revealed Him. John 1:18.

Elsewhere:

You have never heard the Father's voice, nor have you seen His appearance. John 5:37.

[3] So it follows from these passages that God the Father works in the Son and upon the Son, not through the Son; but the Lord works of Himself

from His Father, for He says:

All things of the Father's are mine. John 16:15. The Father has given all things into the hand of the Son. John 3:35.

Also:

As the Father has life in Himself, so did He grant the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26.

The words which I speak are spirit and life. John 6:63.

The Lord says that the Spirit of truth comes forth from the Father (John 15:26), because it comes forth from the Father into the Son, and out of the Son from the Father. For this reason too He says:

On that day you will know that the Father is in me, and I am in the Father, and you are in me and I am in you. John 14:11, 20.

These plain sayings of the Lord's show up the manifest error of the Christian world, that it is God the Father who sends the Holy Spirit to men, as well as the error of the Greek church, that God the Father sends Him without any mediation. This teaching, that the Lord of Himself sends the Holy Spirit from God the Father, and not the reverse, has come to me from heaven; the angels call it a secret, because it has not previously been revealed in the world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 154

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 154

154. These points may be illustrated by a number of reasoned arguments. For instance, it is well known that, after the Apostles had been given the Holy Spirit by the Lord, they preached the Gospel throughout much of the world, and spread the news of it by word of mouth and by their writings. They did this of themselves from the Lord; for Peter taught and wrote in one way, James in another, John in another and Paul in another, each according to his own intelligence. The Lord filled them all with His Spirit, but each drew a contribution from that source which was determined by the nature of his perception, and they carried out their duty in a way determined by the nature of the ability of each. All the angels in the heavens are full of the Lord, for they are in the Lord and the Lord is in them; but still each speaks and acts in accordance with his own mental state, some simply, some wisely, and so with infinite variety, yet each one speaks of himself from the Lord.

[2] It is the same with every minister of the church, the one who preaches truths as much as the one who preaches falsities; each has his own mouth and his own intelligence, and each speaks as he is guided by his own mind, that is, the spirit which he possesses. All Protestants, whether they go by the name of Evangelical or Reformed, once they have been taught the dogmas handed down from Luther, Melanchthon or Calvin, do not have these three or their dogmas speaking of themselves through their mouths, but they themselves speak of themselves from the leaders. Moreover, each separate dogma can be expounded in a thousand ways, for each is like a cornucopia, from which each preacher chooses what suits and matches his own character, and expounds it according to the talents he possesses.

[3] This can be illustrated by the action of the heart in and on the lungs, and by the spontaneous reaction of the lungs from the heart. These are two distinct actions, but still reciprocally connected. The lungs breathe spontaneously from the heart, but the heart does not breathe by means of the lungs. If this happened, both of them would cease working. It is the same with the heart's action in and on the viscera throughout the body. The heart circulates blood to all parts, but the viscera draw on this blood, each part taking its proper ration to enable it to perform its proper use, and acting in accordance with this, but in different ways.

[4] A further illustration of the same point is this. The evil which comes from one's parents, what is called hereditary evil, works in and on a person; and likewise the good which comes from the Lord, but this is above or within, the evil is below and outside. If the evil worked by means of the person, he could not be reformed, nor would he be liable to blame; and likewise if the good coming from the Lord worked by means of the person, he could not be reformed in that case either. But because either action depends upon a person's free choice, he incurs guilt when he acts of himself from evil, and remains innocent when he acts of himself from good. Now since evil is the devil and good is the Lord, he incurs guilt if he acts from the devil, and is innocent if he acts from the Lord. It is that free choice, which is open to every individual, that makes it possible for a person to be reformed.

[5] It is the same with everything internal and external in a person's character; internal and external are two different things, but still joined in a reciprocal bond. The internal acts in and on the external, not by means of it. For the internal has thousands of plans, from which the external selects only those which can be of use. In a person's internal, by which is meant the voluntary and perceptive mind, there is a vast heap of ideas, which if they escaped through a person's mouth would be like wind from a bellows. Since the internal is concerned with universals, it can be compared with an ocean, a flower-bed or a garden, from which the external helps itself to sufficient for its purposes. The Lord's Word is like an ocean, a flower-bed and a garden. When the Word is present in considerable fulness in a person's internal, then he speaks and acts of himself from the Word, but the Word does not act by his means. It is the same with the Lord, since He is the Word, that is, the Divine truth and Divine good it contains. The Lord of Himself or from the Word acts in and on people, but not by their means, since everyone freely acts and speaks from the Lord when he does so from the Word.

sRef John@16 @27 S6' sRef John@16 @26 S6' [6] A closer parallel to this might be the mutual relationship between the soul and the body, which are two separate things, but linked in a reciprocal bond. The soul acts in and on the body, but not by means of the body; and the body acts of itself from the soul. The soul does not act by means of the body, because they do not consult and deliberate together; nor does the soul order or beg the body to do this or that, or to speak by its own mouth. Nor does the body demand or request the soul to give it or supply something, for everything of the soul's belongs to the body, and vice versa. It is the same with the Lord's Divine and His Human; for the Divine of the Father is the soul of His Human, and the Human is His body. The Human does not ask its Divine what it is to say or do. Therefore, the Lord says:

On that day you will ask in my name; and I do not tell you that I shall ask the Father for you, for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me. John 16:26, 27.

'On that day' means after His glorification, that is, after His union with the Father was accomplished and completed. This is a secret revealed by the Lord Himself for the benefit of those who are going to belong to His new church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 155

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 155

155. It was shown in section (iii) above [146] that the particular Divine benefit meant by the working of the Holy Spirit on the clergy is enlightenment and the process of being instructed; but to these two must be added the two intermediate states of perception and disposition. There are therefore four processes which the clergy undergo in sequence: enlightenment, perception, disposition and instruction. Enlightenment comes from the Lord. Perception is on the person's part, depending upon how his mental state has been formed by what he has been taught. If the teaching is true, there is clear perception from the light which illuminates the mind. But if the teaching is false, there is only dim perception, though it may appear clear since it is supported by proofs; this, however, is the result of deceptive light, which to purely natural sight looks like clarity.

[2] Disposition, however, is the result of an affection of love on the part of the will. It is the pleasure given by this love which so disposes the mind. If this pleasure comes from the love of evil and of falsity arising from evil, it arouses enthusiasm, which outwardly appears rough, hairy, burning and spitting fire, and inwardly is anger, rage and cruelty. But if it is the pleasure which comes from the love of good and truth arising from good, the enthusiasm appears outwardly smooth, hairless, thundering and flaming, and inwardly is charity, grace and mercy. The process of being instructed follows as the result of the other processes which cause it. Thus enlightenment coming from the Lord is turned into light and heat of various kinds, differing in each person's case in accordance with his mental state.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 156

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 156

sRef Ezek@18 @31 S0' sRef Ezek@13 @3 S0' sRef Ezek@21 @7 S0' sRef Isa@57 @15 S0' sRef Ezek@20 @32 S0' sRef Hos@5 @4 S0' sRef Isa@61 @3 S0' 156. (vi) A PERSON'S SPIRIT IS HIS MIND, AND WHATEVER COMES FROM IT.

A person's spirit, regarded as an object, is nothing but his mind. It is this which lives on after death, and it is then called a spirit; if he is good, an angelic spirit and later an angel, if wicked, a satanic spirit and afterwards a Satan. Everyone's mind is his internal man, which is the real person and resides within the external man composed of his body. So when the body is cast off as the result of death, the internal man has a fully human form. Those, then, are in error who believe that a person's mind resides only in his head. There it is only in its beginnings, from which first emerge everything a person's understanding allows him to think and his will induces him to do. But in the body the mind is present in derivatives from those beginnings, and these have been so constructed as to permit sensation and action. Since it is inwardly attached to the bodily structures, it imparts to them sensation and movement, together with a feeling that the body thinks and acts of itself. Yet every intelligent person knows that this is a fallacy. Now since a person's spirit is allowed by his understanding to think and is induced by his will to act, and the body does not do so of itself but from the spirit, it follows that a person's spirit means his intelligence and the affection of his love, and everything which comes from it and acts.

sRef Ex@31 @3 S2' sRef Ps@32 @2 S2' sRef Deut@34 @9 S2' sRef Isa@33 @11 S2' sRef Gen@41 @8 S2' sRef Ps@51 @17 S2' sRef Matt@5 @3 S2' sRef Micah@2 @11 S2' sRef Ps@78 @8 S2' [2] There are numerous passages in the Word to prove that a person's spirit means such things as are to do with the mind; their mere quotation will show anyone that this is so. The following are a few among many:

Bezaleel was filled with the spirit of wisdom, intelligence and knowledge. Exod. 31:3.

Nebuchadnezzar said of Daniel that an outstanding spirit of knowledge, intelligence and wisdom was in him. Dan. 5:12, 14.

Joshua was filled with the spirit of wisdom. Deut. 34:9.

Make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. Ezek. 18:31.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for of such is the kingdom of the heavens. Matt. 5:3.

I dwell in a broken and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble. Isa. 57:15.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. Ps. 51:17.

I will give a cloak of praise in place of a depressed spirit. Isa. 61:3.

Spirit also stands for the products of a wrong and unjust mind, as these passages prove:

He said to the foolish prophets, who run after their own spirit. Ezek. 13:3.

Conceive chaff, bring forth stubble; as to your spirit, fire shall devour you. Isa. 33:11.

A man who is in spirit a vagabond and utters a lie. Micah 2:11.

A generation whose spirit is not steadfast with God. Ps. 78:8.

A spirit of whoring. Hosea 4:12; 5:4.

That every heart may melt and every spirit be depressed. Ezek. 21:7.

That which rises upon your spirit shall never be. Ezek. 20:32.

Provided there is no deceit in his spirit. Ps. 32:2.

The spirit of Pharaoh was troubled. Gen. 41:8.

Likewise that of Nebuchadnezzar. Dan. 2:3.

These and very many other passages plainly establish that spirit means a person's mind and what is to do with it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 157

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 157

sRef Ezek@3 @14 S0' sRef Ezek@3 @12 S0' sRef Ezek@11 @24 S0' sRef Ezek@8 @3 S0' sRef Ezek@11 @1 S0' sRef Ezek@40 @2 S0' 157. Since a person's spirit means his mind, 'being in the spirit', a phrase which occurs a number of times in the Word, means the state in which the mind is separated from the body. That was the state the Prophets were in when they saw the kind of things which happen in the spiritual world, so it is called 'the vision of God.' They were then in the same state as that of the spirits and angels of that world. In that state a person's spirit, as the visual capacity of his mind, can be transported from place to place while his body remains in one place. This is the state in which I have been for the last twenty-six years, with the difference that I have been simultaneously in the spirit and in the body, and only at times outside the body. Ezekiel, Zechariah, Daniel and John the writer of Revelation were evident from the following passages.

Ezekiel says: 'A spirit lifted me up, and brought me back to Chaldaea to the captives in a vision, in the spirit of God; so the vision which I had seen went up from me' (Ezek. 11:1, 24). A spirit lifted him up and he heard behind him an earthquake (Ezek. 3:12, 14). A spirit lifted him up between earth and heaven, and carried him off to Jerusalem, and he saw abominations (Ezek. 8:3ff). He saw four creatures, which were Cherubim, and various sights with them (Ezek. chapters 1 and 10); also a new earth and a new temple, and an angel measuring them (Ezek. chapters 40-48). He was then in receipt of a vision and in the spirit (Ezek. 40:2; 13:5).

sRef Zech@3 @1 S2' sRef Zech@4 @1 S2' sRef Dan@8 @1 S2' sRef Zech@5 @1 S2' sRef Zech@1 @18 S2' sRef Zech@2 @1 S2' sRef Dan@9 @21 S2' sRef Dan@9 @22 S2' sRef Zech@1 @8 S2' sRef Zech@5 @6 S2' sRef Dan@7 @1 S2' [2] Similar things happened to Zechariah, when he was with an angel and saw a man riding a horse among myrtles (Zech. 1:8ff); four horns [1:18] and a man with a measuring line in his hand (Zech. 2:1, 5ff); Joshua the high priest (Zech. 3:1ff); four chariots coming out between two mountains, and their horses (Zech. 6:1ff). Daniel was in the same state when he saw four beasts coming up out of the sea and various other details about them (Dan. 7:1ff); the fights between a ram and a he-goat (Dan: 8:1ff). He saw these things in a vision (Dan. 7:1, 2, 7, 13; 8:2; 10:1, 7, 8); the angel Gabriel appeared to him in a vision and spoke with him (Dan. 9:21).

sRef Rev@9 @17 S3' sRef Rev@17 @3 S3' sRef Rev@1 @10 S3' sRef Rev@21 @10 S3' [3] It was the same with John when he wrote Revelation. He says that he was in the spirit on the Lord's day (Rev. 1:10); that he was carried in the spirit into the desert (Rev. 17:3); onto a high mountain in the spirit (Rev. 21:10); that he saw [horses] in a vision (Rev. 9:17). Elsewhere he says that he saw what he described, as for instance the Son of Man in the midst of the seven lampstands; a tabernacle, a temple, an ark and an altar in heaven; a book sealed with seven seals, and horses that came out of it; four creatures around the throne; twelve thousand chosen from each tribe; then the Lamb upon Mount Zion; locusts coming up from the abyss; the dragon and his battle with Michael; a woman bearing a son, and fleeing into the desert because of the dragon; two beasts, one coming up from the sea, the other from the earth; a woman sitting on a scarlet beast; the dragon cast out into a lake of fire and brimstone; a white horse and a great banquet; the Holy City of Jerusalem coming down, with a description of its gates, wall and the foundations of the wall; a river of living water, and trees of life which bear fruit in every month; and much else besides. Peter, James and John were in a similar state when they saw Jesus transfigured; and so was Paul when he heard from heaven things past telling.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 158

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 158

sRef John@7 @39 S0' sRef Luke@1 @35 S0' 158. ADDITIONAL NOTE

Since this chapter has dealt with the Holy Spirit, it is of importance to note that the Holy Spirit is nowhere named in the Old Testament Word, but only 'the Spirit of holiness' in three passages, one in the Psalms of David (Ps. 51:11), and two in Isaiah (63:10, 11). But there are frequent references in the New Testament Word, as much in the Gospels as in the Acts of the Apostles and in their Epistles. The reason is that the Holy Spirit first existed when the Lord came into the world, for it came out of Him from the Father; for 'the Lord alone is holy' (Rev. 15:4). For this reason too the angel Gabriel speaking to Mary the mother of Jesus said 'the holy thing which will be born of you' (Luke 1:35). The reason why we read 'The Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified' (John 7:39), although it was said earlier that the Holy Spirit filled Elizabeth (Luke 1:41) and Zechariah (Luke 1:67), as well as Simeon (Luke 2:25), was that it was the spirit of Jehovah the Father which filled them; and it was called the Holy Spirit because the Lord was already at that time in the world.
This is why nowhere in the Old Testament Word does it say that the Prophets spoke from the Holy Spirit, but from Jehovah. For everywhere we read 'Jehovah spoke to me', 'The Word from Jehovah came to me', 'Jehovah said', 'The saying of Jehovah.'

To remove all possibility of doubt I propose to quote the passages solely in Jeremiah where these expressions occur: 1:4, 7, 11-14, 19; 2:1-5, 9, 19, 22, 29, 31; 3:1, 6, 10, 12, 14, 16; 4:1, 3, 9, 17, 27; 5:11, 14, 18, 22, 29; 6:6, 9, 12, 15, 16, 21, 22; 7:1, 3, 11, 13, 19-21; 8:1, 3, 12, 13; 9:3, 7, 9, 13, 15, 17, 22, 24, 25; 10:1, 2, 18; 11:1,[3,]6, 9, 11, 17, 18, 21, 22; 12:14, 17; 13:1, 6, 9, 11-15, 25; 14:1, 10, 14, 15; 15:1-3, 6, 11, 19, 20; 16:1, 3, 5, 9, 14, 16; 17:5, 19-21, 24; 18:1, 5, 6, 11, 13; 19:1, 3, 6, 12, 15; 20:4; 21:14, 7, 8, 11, 121, 141; 22:2, 5, 6, 11,[16,]18, 24, 29, 30; 23:2, 5, 7, 12, 15, 24, 29, 31, 38; 24:3, 5, 8; 25:1, 3, 7-9, 15, 27-29, 32; 26:1, 2, 18; 27:1, 24, 8, 11, 16, 19, 21, 22; 28:2, 12, 14, 16; 29:4, 8, 9, 16, 19-21, 25, 30-32; 30:15, 8, 10-12, 17, 18; 31:1, 2, 7, 10, 15-17, 23, 27, 28, 31-38; 32:1, 6, 14, 15, 25, 26, 28, 30, 36, 421, 441; 33:1, 2, 4, 10-13, 17, 19, 20, 23, 25; 34:1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 13, 22; 35:1, 13, 17-19; 36:1, 6, 27, 29, 30; 37:6, 7, 9; 38:2, 3, 17; 39:15-18; 40:1; 42:7, 9, 15, 18, 19; 43:8, 10; 44:1, 2, 7, 11, 24-26, 30; 45:2, 5; 46:1, 23, 25, 28; 47:1; 48:1, 8, 12, 30, 35, 38, 40, 43, 44, 47; 49:2, 5-7, 12, 13, 16, 18, 26, 28, 30, 32, 35, 37-39; 50:114, 10, 18, 20, 21, 30, 31, 33, 35, 40; 51:25, 33, 36, 39, 52, 58. These are solely from Jeremiah. There are similar expressions in all the other Prophets, but it is never said that the Holy Spirit spoke, nor that Jehovah spoke to them by means of the Holy Spirit.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 159

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 159

159. At this point I shall describe some more experiences, of which this is the first.

Once when I was in company with angels in heaven, I saw far below a huge cloud of smoke with fire bursting out of it from time to time. I remarked to the angels who were talking with me, that few people here know that the sight of smoke in the hells arises from arguments in favour of falsities, and that fire is an outburst of anger against those who contradict them. I added that this is as little known in that world, as it is in the world where I live in the body, that flame is nothing but ignited smoke. I have often observed this, when, seeing smoke rising from wood on a hearth on earth, I have applied a lighted taper to it and seen the smoke turn into flame; and the flames copied the shape of the smoke, for each particle of smoke becomes a spark, and they join to make a blaze, just as also happens with gunpowder. 'It is the same with the smoke we can see down here below. It is composed of so many falsities, and the fire bursting out as flames is the outburst of zeal in their favour.'

[2] Then the angels said to me: 'Let us beg the Lord to allow us to go down and come near, so as to find out what falsities they have that produce so much smoke and fire.'

Permission was granted, and at once a beam of light surrounded us and brought us down without a break to that place. There we saw four groups of spirits who were arguing vigorously that God the Father, because He is invisible, should be approached and worshipped, and not His Son who was born in this world, because He was a man and visible. On looking to either side I saw on the left the learned clergy, and behind them the unlearned clergy; and on the right the educated laymen, and behind them the uneducated. But between us and them yawned an unbridgeable gap.

[3] We turned our eyes and ears towards the left, where the clergy were with the learned ones in front and the unlearned behind, and heard them arguing about God in these terms. 'We know from the teaching of our church, which on the subject of God is one and the same throughout Europe, that one should approach God the Father, being invisible, and at the same time God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, who are also invisible, being co-eternal with the Father. Since God the Father is the creator of the universe, and consequently in the universe, He is present wherever we turn our gaze. When we pray to Him, He is graciously pleased to accept our prayers, and when the Son has mediated for us, He sends the Holy Spirit to put in our hearts the glory of His Son's righteousness and to make us blessed. We, who have been made doctors of the church, felt, when we preached, the holy working of the Spirit's mission in our breasts, and we breathed the devotion aroused by His presence in our minds. We feel these emotions because we direct all our senses towards the invisible God who works not in a single way on the sight of our understanding, but universally throughout our mental and bodily systems by means of His emissary, the Spirit. Such effects could not be produced by the worship of a visible God, or one apprehensible mentally as a man.'

[4] This speech was greeted with applause from the unlearned clergy, who stood behind them. 'What is the source,' they added, 'of holiness, if it is not from an invisible and imperceptible Divine? As soon as this idea crosses the threshold of our hearing, our faces break into smiles and we are cheered as by the soothing breath of an incense-laden breeze, and we also beat our breasts. It is quite different if we think of a visible and perceptible Divine; if this idea penetrates our ears, it is reduced to something purely natural and no longer Divine. It is for a similar reason that the Roman Catholics conduct their masses in the Latin language, and take the Host, the alleged subject of Divine mysteries, from repositories on the altar and display it. At this moment the people fall on their knees as if before the profoundest mystery and reverently hold their breath.'

[5] After this we turned to the right, where the educated, and behind them the uneducated, laymen stood. I heard the educated speak as follows: 'We know that the wisest of the ancients worshipped an invisible God whom they called Jehovah, but in the period which followed this they made themselves gods out of dead rulers, including Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto, Apollo as well as Minerva, Diana, Venus, and Themis, building temples to them and giving them Divine worship. This worship in the course of time led to idolatry, a madness which finally pervaded the whole world. We are therefore unanimous in assenting to the opinion of our priests and elders, that there were and are three Divine Persons from eternity, each of whom is God. It is enough for us that they are invisible.'

The uneducated behind them added: 'We agree. Surely God is God and man is man? But we know that if anyone proposed God-man, the common people, whose idea of God is only derived from the senses, will accept it.'

[6] At the end of this speech their eyes were opened and they saw us standing near them. Then they became angry that we had heard them and refused to say another word. But the angels used the power they had been given to shut off the exterior or lower levels of their thought, and open the interior or higher levels; so they compelled them to speak about God in this state. Then they said: 'What is God? We have not seen His appearance, nor have we heard His voice. God then must be merely nature in its first and last manifestations. Nature we have seen, because it is clear before our eyes, and nature we have heard, for its sounds are ever in our ears.'

On hearing this we said to them: 'Have you ever seen Socinus, who would acknowledge only God the Father? Or Arius, who denied the divinity of our Lord and Saviour? Or any of their followers?' 'No,' they replied. 'They are,' we said, 'in the depths below you.' Then some people were sent for from that place and questioned about God. They spoke in much the same way as the others had done, adding: 'What is God? We can make as many gods as we wish.'

sRef John@3 @18 S7' sRef John@14 @14 S7' sRef John@14 @13 S7' sRef John@3 @16 S7' sRef John@3 @36 S7' sRef John@14 @6 S7' sRef John@14 @9 S7' sRef John@14 @7 S7' sRef John@14 @8 S7' sRef John@14 @11 S7' sRef John@14 @12 S7' sRef John@3 @15 S7' sRef John@14 @10 S7' sRef John@14 @15 S7' [7] 'It is useless,' we said then, 'to talk to you about the Son of God born in the world, but this at least we shall say. To prevent faith about God, in Him and from Him, from becoming, merely because no one has seen Him, like a water-bubble floating in the air, full of beautiful colours in the first and second moments of its existence, but in the third and thereafter collapsing into nothing, it has pleased Jehovah God to come down and take upon Himself human form, thus putting Himself on view, and proving that God is no entity conceived by the faculty of reason, but That which was, is and shall be, from eternity to eternity. God is no three-letter* word, but the whole of reality from alpha to omega. Consequently He is life and salvation to all who believe in Him as a visible God, not to those who say that they believe in an invisible God. For believing, seeing and recognising make up a single act, which is why the Lord said to Philip:

He who sees and knows me sees and knows the Father.

and elsewhere that it is the Father's will that they should believe in the Son, and he who believes in the Son has everlasting life, but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God will rest upon him. (Both this and the previous passage are in John 3:15, 16, 36; 14:6-15.)' On hearing this many of the four groups became so furious that smoke and fire came out of their nostrils. So we went away, and after escorting me home the angels went up to their own heaven.

* This is a puzzling expression, since God in Latin is Deus; but as the conversation took place in the spiritual world, it may refer to a word in the spiritual language.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 160

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 160

160. The second experience.

I was once walking in the company of angels in the world of spirits. This lies half-way between heaven and hell, and it is where everyone comes first after death; here the good are prepared for heaven, the wicked for hell. I discussed a number of topics with the angels, one of which was that in the world where I am bodily there are to be seen at night-time countless stars of various sizes, and each of these is a sun, emitting only light to the solar system; 'and on seeing,' I said, 'that stars are to be seen in your world too, I hazarded the guess that they are as numerous as in the world where I am.'

The angels were delighted at this remark, and said that they might well be as numerous, since each community in heaven appears at times to those who are beneath shining like a star. The communities of heaven are countless, all arranged as their affections for the love of good vary; these affections are in God infinite, and under His influence therefore countless. Since these were foreseen before creation, I imagine that to agree with that number the same number of stars was provided or created in the world where human beings were to live in natural, material bodies.

[2] While we were talking like this, I saw in the north a paved road, so crowded with spirits there was hardly room to set foot between two of them. I told the angels that I had seen this road previously, with spirits passing along it in as close order as squadrons of troops; and that I had been told that this is the road along which all pass when they leave the natural world. The reason why it is crowded with such numbers of spirits is that tens of thousands of people die every week, and all after death pass into this world.

The angels went on to say: 'The road ends in the middle of this world, where we now are. The reason why it ends in the middle is that on the eastern side are the communities dedicated to love to God and towards the neighbour; on the left, towards the west, are the communities composed of those who oppose these loves. In front, to the south, are communities composed of those who are above average intelligence. That is why recent arrivals from the natural world come here first. When here they are at first outwardly exactly as they had been most recently in their previous world; but later on they are step by step brought into their inward state, and submitted to examination of their nature. After this the good are transferred to their places in heaven, the wicked to theirs in hell.'

[3] We halted at the centre, where the access road ended, and said: 'Let us wait here a little while and talk with some of the newcomers.' We selected a dozen of those arriving; and since they had all just come from the natural world, they did not know that they were not still there. We asked them their opinions about heaven and hell and life after death.

One of them replied as follows: 'Our priestly order has taught me to believe that we shall live after death, and that there are such places as heaven and hell. Consequently I have always believed that those who lead decent lives go to heaven; and since everyone lives a decent life, no one goes to hell. So hell is just a story made up by the clergy to keep people from leading wicked lives. What difference does it make whether I hold one opinion or another about God? Thought is only like froth or a bubble on the surface of water, which bursts and disappears.'

A second next to him said: 'My belief is that heaven and hell exist, and that God rules heaven and the devil rules hell. Since they are enemies and thus take opposite views, one calls evil what the other calls good. Decent people are hypocrites who can make evil appear good and good evil, so they stand on either side. What difference does it make then whether I am with one lord or the other, so long as he supports me? People take just as much pleasure in evil as in good.'

[4] A third, next to the second, said: 'How does it concern me whether I believe in heaven and hell, since no one has ever come back from there to tell me? If everyone lived on after death, surely one out of all that vast number would have come back and told us?'

The next, the fourth, said: 'I will tell you why no one has come back and told us. It is because when a person has breathed out his soul and died, then he either becomes a ghost which is quickly dissolved, or he is like the breath from the mouth, which is just air. How can anyone like that come back or talk to anyone?'

The fifth took up the tale: 'My friends,' he said, 'wait until the day of the Last judgment, for then all will return to their bodies, and you will see them and talk with them, and then each will be able to tell the others what happened to him.'

[5] The sixth, who stood opposite, said with a smile: 'How can a spirit which is just air return to a body which has been eaten by worms, or to a skeleton burnt up by the sun and reduced to dust? And how can an Egyptian, who has been mummified, and then mixed by a druggist into his extracts, emulsions, potions and pills, come back and tell anything? So if that is your belief, go on waiting for that last day, but you will wait for ever and ever in vain.'

Then the seventh said: 'If I believed in heaven and hell and so in life after death, I should believe that birds and animals would live on too; some of them are as decent and rational as human beings. But they say that animals have no life after death, so I say that people do not either. The cases are identical, one follows from the other. What is man but an animal?'

The eighth, who was standing behind him, came forward and said: 'Believe in heaven if you like, but I do not believe in hell. God is omnipotent, isn't He, and can save everyone?'

[6] Then the ninth shook his hand and said: 'God is not only omnipotent, but also gracious. He could not send anyone to everlasting fire; and if there is anyone there, He would take him out and raise him up.'

The tenth left his place and hurried to the middle saying: 'Neither do I believe in hell. Did not God send His Son, and did not He make expiation and take away the sins of the whole world? What power then has the devil against that? And if he has none, what then becomes of hell?'

The eleventh, who was a priest, was angry to hear this and said: 'Don't you know that those who have acquired faith, on which Christ's merit is imprinted, are saved, and that those whom God chooses acquire that faith? So the choice is at the discretion of the Almighty, and it depends upon His judgment who are worthy. Can anyone dispute this?'

The twelfth, who was a politician, kept silence. But when asked to sum up the replies, he said: 'I shall not offer any profound statements about heaven, hell and life after death, because there is no one who knows anything about them. But still you should not abuse the priests, but allow them to go on preaching about them. For in this way the minds of the common people are kept by an invisible bond subject to the laws and their rulers. And is this not the key to the preservation of Society?'

[7] We were astonished to hear such sentiments and said to one another: 'Although these people call themselves Christians, they are neither human beings nor animals, but human animals., However, to rouse them from their sleep we said: 'Heaven and hell do exist, and there is a life after death. You will be convinced of this when we dispel your ignorance about your present state. For everyone for some days after death is totally unaware that he is no longer living in the same world as formerly. The time that has passed is like a sleep, and when anyone wakes from it, he feels he is exactly where he was. It is the same with you at present, and this is why you spoke exactly as you thought in the previous world.'

Then the angels dispelled their ignorance, so that they saw they were in another world and among people they did not know. 'Oh, where are we?' they cried. 'You are no longer,' we said, 'in the natural world, but in the spiritual world and we are angels.'

Then, when they had woken up, they said: 'If you are angels, show us where heaven is.' 'Stay here a little while,' we replied, 'and we will come back.' After half an hour we returned and found them waiting for us, so we said: 'Follow us and we will take you to heaven.' They did so, and we went up with them, and since we were with them the guards opened the gate and let us in. We told those who received the newcomers on the threshold to examine them. So they turned them around, and saw that the backs of their heads were largely hollowed out. Then they said: 'Begone from here, for you find pleasure in the love of evil-doing, so you can have no link with heaven. In your hearts you have denied the existence of God and have despised religion.' 'Don't delay,' we told them, 'otherwise you will be thrown out.' So they hastened back down and were gone.

[8] On the way home we talked about the reason why those in this world who take pleasure in evil-doing have the backs of their heads hollowed out. I stated the reason, that human beings have two brains, one in the back of the head, which is called the cerebellum, the other in the front of the head, which is called the cerebrum. The cerebellum is the seat of loving on the part of the will, the cerebrum that of thinking on the part of the understanding. When the thought of the understanding does not guide the love of the will, the inmost regions of that person's cerebellum, which are in themselves heavenly, collapse; this causes the hollowing out.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 161

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 161

161. The third experience*.

Once in the spiritual world I heard a noise like a mill; it was in the northern region. To begin with I wondered what it was, but then I remembered that a mill and milling mean seeking support for doctrine from the Word. So I approached the place where I had heard the noise, and when I came close the noise disappeared. Then I saw a covered area above ground, the approach to which was through a cave. On seeing this I went down and went inside.

There was a room there in which I saw an old man sitting among his books, holding a copy of the Word in front of him and looking out passages in it in support of his doctrine. Slips of paper were lying around, on which he had copied out supporting passages. In the next room were scribes, who were collecting the slips and writing out what was on them on clean sheets of paper. I asked first about the books he had around him.

He said that they were all on the subject of justifying faith. 'Those from Sweden and Denmark are profound, more profound those from Germany, still more profound those from Britain, and the most profound are those from Holland.' He added that they differed in various respects, but all agreed on the subject of justification and salvation by faith alone. He went on to say that he was now gathering support from the Word for the first tenet of justifying faith, that God the Father withdrew His favour from the human race on account of its wrong-doing, and God therefore needed in order to save men to receive satisfaction, be reconciled, propitiated and have as mediator someone who would take upon himself the righteous condemnation; and there was no way this could be done except through His only Son. When this had been done, the way was opened up to God the Father for His sake, for we say: 'Father, have mercy on us for the sake of the Son.' 'I see,' he said, 'and have long done so, that this is in accordance with all sound reason and Scripture. How else could anyone approach God the Father, except through faith in the merit of the Son?'

[2] On hearing this I was amazed that he asserted it to be in accordance with sound reason and Scripture, when in fact it is contrary to both, as I told him plainly. This provoked an outburst of zeal and he retorted: 'How can you talk like that?'

So I stated my opinion and said: 'Is it not contrary to sound reason to think that God the Father withdrew His favour from the human race, reproved it and cut off communication with it? Surely Divine favour is an attribute of the Divine Essence? So withdrawing His favour would be withdrawing His Divine Essence, and that would mean ceasing to be God. Surely God cannot become estranged from Himself? Believe me, favour on God's part is both infinite and eternal. God's favour can be lost on man's part, if he fails to accept it, [but never on God's part].** If the favour shown by God were taken away, it would be the end of the whole of heaven and the whole human race. Therefore favour on God's part is shown permanently and for ever, not only to angels and men, but even to the devils in hell. Since this is in accordance with sound reason, why do you say that the sole approach to God the Father is through faith in the Son's merit, when in fact God's favour ensures that the approach is perpetually open?

[3] 'But why do you talk about approaching God the Father for the sake of the Son, rather than through the Son? Is not the Son the mediator and saviour? Why do you not approach the mediator and saviour Himself? Is He not God and Man? On earth does anyone approach directly any emperor, king or prince? Surely he finds a chamberlain to introduce him? Do you not know that the Lord came into the world so that He should introduce us to the Father, and that it is impossible to approach Him except through the Lord? This approach is perpetually open when you directly approach the Lord Himself, because He is in the Father and the Father is in Him. Now consult Scripture and you will see that this is in accordance with it, and that your approach to the Father is contrary to it, just as it is contrary to sound reason. I tell you too, it is presumptuous to go up to God the Father, except through Him who is in the Father's bosom, and who alone is with Him. Have you not read John 14:6?'

On hearing this the old man was so enraged he jumped up from his chair and shouted to his scribes to throw me out; and when I had immediately of my own accord gone out, he threw after me out of the door the book which he happened to be holding in his hand. The book was the Word.

* This section is repeated from AR 484.1-3.
** These words are inserted from the earlier use of the passage in AR 484.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 162

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 162

sRef John@3 @27 S1' sRef John@14 @6 S1' 162. The fourth experience*.

A dispute arose among some spirits, whether anyone can see any truth on a matter of theological dogma in the Word, unless he is led to it by the Lord. They all agreed that no one can do this except by Divine guidance, because

A man cannot take anything unless it is given him from heaven. John 3:27.

So the argument was about whether anyone can do this, if he does not directly approach the Lord.

One party asserted that the Lord should be directly approached, because He is the Word. The other party held that the truth of doctrine is also seen when God the Father is directly approached. So the dispute centred on this preliminary point, whether any Christian is allowed to approach God the Father directly, and thus go over the Lord's head; and whether this is not improper and rash boldness and insolence. For the Lord says that no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6). But they left this point aside and said that man can see the truth of doctrine from the Word by his own natural enlightenment; but this view was rejected. So they insisted that it can be seen by those who pray to God the Father. A passage from the Word was read to them, and then they went down on their knees and prayed God the Father to enlighten them. About the passage read to them from the Word they said that certain things were true, when in fact they were untrue. This happened so many times they became tired of it, and at last admitted that they were unable to tell. However, the other party who directly approached the Lord were able to see the truth, and they told the others.

[2] When this dispute had been decided, some people came up out of the abyss, who looked at first like locusts, but later on like tiny people. They were those who in the world had prayed to God the Father, and convinced themselves of the doctrine of justification by faith alone. They were the same people as are described in Revelation (9:1-11). They said that they could see in a clear light the doctrine that man is justified by faith alone without the actions prescribed by the Law, and that they could prove this from the Word. They were asked what faith this was, and they answered: 'Faith in God the Father.' But when they had been examined, they were told from heaven that they did not know a single truth of teaching from the Word. They retorted that they could still see their truths bathed in light.

Then they were told that they saw them by a deceptive light. 'What,' they asked, 'is this deceptive light?' They were told that deceptive light is that which comes from proving what is not true; it corresponds to the light enjoyed by owls and bats, who look upon darkness as light and light as darkness. This was proved to them by the fact that when they looked up to heaven, the source of true light, they saw only darkness, and when they looked down to the abyss from which they had come they saw light.

[3] This proof made them angry, and they said it showed that light and darkness have no real existence, but it is merely the condition of the eye that causes us to call light light and darkness darkness. However, it was shown that their light was the deceptive light which comes from proving what is not true; and that their light was only an activity of their minds arising from the fire of longings, of the same sort as the light enjoyed by cats, whose burning appetite for mice makes their eyes shine by night in cellars like candles.

On hearing this they said angrily that they were not cats or like them, since they could see if they wished. But then they went away, because they were afraid of being asked why they did not wish to see, and plunged into their abyss. The people there and those like them are also called by the angels owls and bats, as well as locusts.

[4] When they met their companions in the abyss and related that the angels had told them that 'we do not know any truth of teaching, not a single one,' and called them owls, bats and locusts, there was a riot. 'Let us pray God,' they said, 'to allow us to go up and we will give a clear demonstration that we possess many truths of teaching, which the archangels themselves will acknowledge.' Since they prayed to God, permission was granted, and they went up, to the number of three hundred.

When they appeared above ground, they said: 'In the world we were well-known and famous, because we knew and taught the secrets of justification by faith alone; and our proofs of this not only allowed us to see the light, but also to see it as a glittering sunbeam, and now we see it in the same way in our cells. Yet we have heard from our companions who visited you that this light is not light, but darkness, because you allege we have no truth of teaching from the Word. We know that every truth in the Word shines, and we have believed that that was what produced the glittering effect when we meditated profoundly on these secrets of ours. We shall therefore demonstrate that we have a vast supply of truths from the Word.'

'Do we not,' they said, 'possess this truth, that there is a Trinity, God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and that we ought to believe in the Trinity? Do we not possess this truth, that Christ is our redeemer and saviour? Do we not possess this truth, that Christ alone is righteousness, and He alone has merit, and it is wrong and impious if anyone wishes to attribute to himself any of Christ's merit and righteousness? Do we not possess this truth, that no mortal can do of his own accord any spiritual good, and that all good which is good in itself is from God? Do we not possess this truth, that there exist meritorious good and hypocritical good, and that these forms of good are evil? Do we not possess this truth, that none the less good deeds should be done? Do we not possess this truth, that there exists faith, that one ought to believe in God, and that everyone has life in accordance with his belief? We have many truths besides from the Word. Can any of you deny a single one of them? Yet you said that we in our debates do not possess any truth, not a single one. Are you not unjustified in casting such reproaches at us?'

[5] But they received the reply: 'All the statements you quoted are in themselves true, but you have falsified them; by deriving them from a false principle you make them false. We shall give you a visual demonstration that this is so. Not far from here there is a place where the light pours down directly from heaven; in the middle there is a table, and when a piece of paper is placed on it which has a truth from the Word written on it, the paper is caused by the truth written on it to shine like a star. So write your truth on a piece of paper, put it on the table, and you will see.'

They did so and gave it to the custodian, who put it on the table and said to them: 'Go to a distance and watch the table.' They went away and watched, and suddenly the paper shone like a star. Then the custodian said: 'You see that what you wrote on the paper are truths; but come closer and fix your gaze on the paper.' They did so, and suddenly the light went out, and the paper became black as if it had been covered with soot from a chimney. 'Touch the paper with your hands,' the custodian went on, 'but be careful not to touch the writing.' On their doing so, the paper burst into flame and was burnt up. When they saw this, they were told: 'If you had touched the writing, you would have heard an explosion and would have burnt your fingers.'

Then they were told by those who were standing behind: 'You have seen now that the truths which you have misused to prove your secrets about justification are in themselves truths, but in your hands they have became falsified.' Then they looked up, and heaven appeared to them like blood, and later on like total darkness. In the eyes of the angelic spirits these people appeared some like bats, some like owls, some like horned owls. So they fled away to their regions of darkness, which in their eyes shone with a deceptive light.

[6] The angelic spirits present were surprised because previously they had known nothing of that place and the table it contained. Then a voice came to them from the southern quarter which said: 'Come this way and you will see something even more wonderful.' So they went and entered a room, the walls of which shone as if made of gold, and there too they saw a table on which was laid a copy of the Word, surrounded by precious stones in a heavenly pattern. The custodian angel said: 'When the Word is opened, a light shines out from it of indescribable brightness, and at the same time the precious stones give a rainbow effect above and around the Word. When an angel from the third heaven comes near, the rainbow appears above and around the Word on a red background; when an angel comes from the second heaven and looks at it, the rainbow appears on a blue background; when an angel from the lowest heaven comes and looks, the rainbow appears on a white background. When a good spirit comes and looks, there is a variegated effect of light like marble.' They were given a visual demonstration of these effects. The custodian went on to say: 'If anyone approaches who has falsified the Word, first of all the radiance disappears; and if he comes close and fixes his gaze on the Word, the surroundings change to the colour of blood. Then he is warned to go away, as it is dangerous.'

[7] However, a certain person who in the world had been a leading writer on the doctrine of justification by faith alone, came boldly up saying, 'When I was in the world, I did not falsify the Word. Together with faith I also upheld charity, and I taught that a person in a state of faith, in which he acts charitably and does what charity requires, is renewed, regenerated and sanctified by the Holy Spirit. I also taught that there is no such thing as solitary faith, that is, separated from good deeds, just as there is no good tree without fruit, no sun without light, and no fire without heat. I also criticised those who claimed that good deeds were not necessary. Moreover I paid great attention to the Ten Commandments and to repentance, and so made a remarkable application of everything in the Word to my tenets about faith, which still I showed and proved to be the means of salvation.'

Thus confident of his claim not to have falsified the Word he approached the table, and despite the angel's warning touched the Word. There was a sudden burst of fire and smoke from the Word, and a loud explosion was heard which threw him into a corner of the room, where he lay for some time as if dead. The angelic spirits were surprised at this, but they were told that this leader had gone farther than the rest in praising the good deeds of charity as the product of faith; but still he had not put into this category any but political deeds, what are also called moral and civic duties, which need to be performed for the world's sake and one's prosperity there, and have very little to do with salvation. He had also imagined the existence of invisible activity by the Holy Spirit, quite unknown to the person concerned, which is engendered in his faith when he is in that state.

[8] The angelic spirits held a discussion about the falsification of the Word, and agreed that falsifying the Word consists in taking truths from it and using them to prove untrue propositions; this is done by taking truths from the Word out of context and murdering them. For instance, this happens if one uses all the truths mentioned above by the people from the abyss to support the present-day faith, and if one explains them in the light of that faith. It will be shown later that that faith is impregnated with false ideas. Or again, if anyone takes from the Word this truth, that one should show charity, and do good to one's neighbour; if anyone then uses it to prove that these things should be done, but not in order to be saved, since all the good a person does is not really good, because it is a way of seeking merit, that man is dragging that truth from the Word out of context and butchering it. For the Lord in His Word lays the duty on everyone who wants to be saved of loving his neighbour and doing good to him from love. It is the same with the other truths.
* This section is repeated with minor changes from AR 566.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 163

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 163

163. THE DIVINE TRINITY

I have discussed God the Creator, and at the same time the creation, and then the Lord the Redeemer, and at the same time the process of redemption; and now finally the Holy Spirit, and at the same time how God works. So having discussed God the Three-in-one, I must now also discuss the Divine Trinity, a subject familiar to Christian people, yet actually one they know nothing about. For this is the only way of acquiring a correct idea of God; and a correct idea of God is to the congregation like the sanctuary and altar in a church, or like a crown on the head and a sceptre in the hand of a king, as he sits upon his throne. From this hangs the whole body of theology, like a chain from its anchor-point. If you are prepared to believe me, the idea everyone has of God determines his place in the heavens. It is like the touchstone used to test gold and silver, that is to say, it tests the nature of the good and truth a person has. For he cannot have any good which leads to salvation except from God, nor any truth which does not get its quality from the good deep within it. But to reveal the nature of the Divine Trinity so that it can be seen by both eyes, the discussion must be split up into propositions, as follows.

(i) There is a Divine Trinity consisting of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
(ii) Those three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, are the three essentials of a single God, which make one as soul, body and activity do with a person.
(iii) This Trinity did not exist before the creation of the world, but it was provided and made after the creation of the world, when God became incarnate, and then it was in the Lord God, the Redeemer and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
(iv) A Trinity of Divine persons from eternity, or existing before the creation of the world, implies thinking about a Trinity of Gods; and this thought cannot be banished by a verbal confession of belief in one God.
(v) The Trinity of persons was unknown to the Apostolic church, but was the invention of the Council of Nicaea, leading to its introduction into the Roman Catholic church, and thus to the churches which split from it.
(vi) The Trinity as defined by the Council of Nicaea and by Athanasius caused a faith to arise which has perverted the whole Christian church.
(vii) This is the source of the abomination of desolation and the affliction such as never has been nor shall be, both of which the Lord predicted in Daniel, the Gospels and Revelation.
(viii) Further, unless a new heaven and a new church are founded by the Lord, no flesh can be saved.
(ix) From a Trinity of persons, each of which individually is God, as asserted by the Athanasian Creed, many absurd ideas of various kinds have arisen about God, which are mere fancies and abortions.

These propositions will now be explained one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 164

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 164

sRef Luke@1 @35 S0' sRef Matt@3 @17 S0' sRef Matt@3 @16 S0' sRef Matt@28 @19 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @7 S0' 164. (i) THERE IS A DIVINE TRINITY CONSISTING OF FATHER, SON AND HOLY SPIRIT.

The existence of a Divine Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is plainly demonstrated by the Word, especially the following passages:

The angel Gabriel said to Mary, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, so that the holy thing that is born of you will be called the Son of God. Luke 1:35.

Here all three are named: the Most High, who is God the Father, the Holy Spirit, and the Son of God.

When Jesus was baptised, behold, the heavens were opened, and John saw the Spirit of God* coming down like a dove, and alighting upon Him; and a voice from heaven saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Matt. 3:16, 17; Mark 1:10, 11; John 1:32.

It is even clearer in the words which the Lord used to the disciples:

Go and make all nations disciples, baptising them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Matt. 28: 19.

Moreover in this passage of John:

Three there are that bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Word and the Holy Spirit. 1 John 5:7.

In addition there is the fact that the Lord prayed to His Father, and spoke about Him and with Him, saying that He would send the Holy Spirit, and this too He did. Moreover, the Apostles frequently named in their Epistles the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. These passages show plainly that there is a Divine Trinity consisting of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

* The Latin has 'the Holy Spirit', but this is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 165

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 165

165. If the reason is left to itself, there is no way it can see how these statements are to be understood; it could be that there are three Gods, who are one in essence and therefore in name; it could be that they are three aspects of a single subject, so that it is merely qualities or attributes of one God which bear these names; or other solutions may be possible. What then are we to do? The only way is to approach the Lord God the Saviour, and read the Word under His guidance, since He is the God of the Word; we shall then be enlightened and see the truths, which the reason too will acknowledge. But if you do not approach the Lord, though you should read the Word a thousand times and see in it the Divine Trinity as well as the oneness of God, still you will never be able to grasp anything but the doctrine of three Divine persons, each of which taken singly is God; and this means three Gods. However, since this is repugnant to the general perception shared by all people throughout the world, to avoid criticism they invented the doctrine that although in truth there are three Gods, faith none the less demands that we should not speak of three Gods, but one. Moreover, to avoid having insults heaped on them, in this respect especially the understanding has to be imprisoned and kept chained under the control of faith; and this is henceforward to be prescribed by the ordained ministry of the Christian church.

[2] That is the kind of paralysed offspring which is produced by not reading the Word under the Lord's guidance. Everyone who does not read the Word under His guidance must do so under the guidance of his own intelligence; and this is as blind as an owl in matters illuminated by spiritual light, as are all the essential doctrines of the church. When such a person reads about the Trinity in the Word and is led by this to think that although there are three Gods they are none the less one, he finds this as enigmatic as a reply from the Delphic oracle*. Since he does not understand it, he rolls it round his teeth, for if he put it before his eyes, it would be a riddle, which becomes the more obscure the more he strives to solve it, until finally he begins to think about it without using his understanding, which is like seeing without using one's eyes. In brief, reading the Word under the guidance of one's own intelligence, as all do who fail to acknowledge the Lord as the God of heaven and earth and do not approach Him and worship Him alone, can be compared to children who in play tie a bandage over their eyes, and then try to walk in a straight line; they even think they are walking straight when step by step they turn to one side and end up walking in the opposite direction, so that they trip over a stone and fall down.

[3] They are also like ships' captains who sail without a compass, run their ship on rocks, and so are drowned. Or they are like a man who walking through a broad plain in a thick fog sees a scorpion and thinks it is a bird; he goes to grasp it and pick it up, and then gets a fatal sting. He is also like a sea-bird or a kite, which spots a small patch on the back of a large fish breaking the surface of the water, dives on it and jabs its beak into it, but is pulled under by the fish and drowns. He is also like a man who goes into a maze without a guide or a thread to pay out, and the farther he goes in, the more he loses track of the way out. A person who reads the Word under the guidance of his own intelligence instead of the Lord's thinks he is gifted with the vision of Lynceus**, and has more eyes than Argus*** when in fact he cannot inwardly discern the smallest truth, but only falsity. But having persuaded himself that this is the truth, he shapes the course of all his thinking by reference to this apparent cynosure. Yet then he is as blind to truth as a mole, and what he does see, he bends to suit his fancy, so perverting and falsifying the holiness of the Word.

* Literally, 'from the tripod', the source of oracles given at Delphi.
** A man in Greek myth famous for keenness of sight.
*** The hundred-eyed monster of Greek myth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 166

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 166

166. (ii) THOSE THREE, FATHER, SON AND HOLY SPIRIT, ARE THE THREE ESSENTIALS OF A SINGLE GOD, WHICH MAKE ONE AS SOUL, BODY AND ACTIVITY DO WITH A PERSON.

Each object has general essentials and particular essentials; and the two together make up a single essence. A person's general essentials are his soul, body and activity. These make up a single essence, as can be seen from the fact that one arises from the next, and exists on account of the next, in an unbroken chain. Every person starts from the soul, which is the true essence of the seed. This not only initiates but also produces one after the other the bodily structures; and later on it initiates the products of the soul and the body working together, what are called its activities. Since then one is produced by the next and by its being implanted and attached, it is plain that these three belong to a single essence. This is why they are called the three essentials.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 167

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 167

167. Everyone acknowledges that those three essentials, namely, soul, body and activity, were and are in the Lord God the Saviour. No one but Antichrist can deny that His soul was from Jehovah His Father; for in the Word, in both testaments, He is called the Son of Jehovah, the Son of the Most High God, the Only-begotten. So the Father's Divine is His first essential, as the soul is in man. It follows from this that the Son born to Mary is the body of that Divine soul, for what grows in the mother's womb is simply the body conceived and derived from the soul. So this is the second essential. Activities make up the third essential, since they are produced by the soul and the body working together; and anything so produced is of the same essence as the productive agents. The three essentials, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, make one in the Lord, as the soul, body and activity do in man. This is plainly demonstrated by the Lord's saying that the Father and He are one, and that the Father is in Him and He is in the Father; likewise that He and the Holy Spirit are one, since the Holy Spirit is the Divine which proceeds out of the Lord from the Father, as was fully proved from the Word above (153, 154). To prove it again, therefore, would be filling one's stomach* to overflowing, and like loading the table with food when one has eaten one's fill.

* This curious word means strictly the first stomach of a ruminant animal.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 168

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 168

168. When we say that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are the three essentials of a single God, in the same way as soul, body and activity are in man, it may look to the human mind as if the three essentials are three persons. This is impossible. But when we understand that the Father's Divine which makes up the soul, and the Son's Divine which makes up the body, and the Holy Spirit's Divine or the Divine which proceeds and makes up the activity, are the three essentials of a single God, then it can be grasped by the understanding. For God the Father is His own Divine, the Son out of the Father is His own, and the Holy Spirit out of both is His own. Since these are of one essence and one mind, they make up a single God. If, however, those three Divines are called persons, and each has attributed to Him His own property, imputation to the Father, mediation to the Son, and activity to the Holy Spirit, then the Divine essence is divided. Yet it is one and indivisible. In this case none of the three is fully God, but each is God to the power of one third*, a proposition no sane understanding can accept.

* i.e. the cube root.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 169

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 169

169. Can anyone fail to see how the Trinity is in the Lord, if he considers the trinity in any human being? Every person has a soul, a body and activity; likewise the Lord, 'for in the Lord all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily,' as Paul said (Col. 2:9). Therefore the Trinity in the Lord is Divine, that in men human. Is there anyone who does not see that reason plays no part in this mystic belief that there are three Divine persons, yet only one God; and that this God, for all that He is one, is still not one person? When the reason is asleep, it can still force the mouth to speak like a parrot. When the reason is asleep, can the speech which comes from the mouth be anything but lifeless? If the mouth says one thing and the reason goes a different way and disagrees, speech must inevitably be foolish. As far as the Divine Trinity is concerned, human reason to-day is fettered, as completely as a prisoner shackled hand and foot. It can also be compared to a Vestal Virgin* buried alive for having let the sacred fire go out. Yet the Divine Trinity ought to shine like a lantern in the minds of the people who make up the church, since God in His Trinity and in the oneness of the Trinity is the ultimate of all holiness in heaven and the church. To make one God out of the soul, another out of the body and a third out of the activity is no different from making three separate parts out of those three essentials of a single person; and this is dismembering and killing him.

* The Vestals were Roman priestesses, whose duty was to maintain a sacred fire.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 170

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 170

170. (iii) THIS TRINITY DID NOT EXIST BEFORE THE CREATION OF THE WORLD, BUT IT WAS PROVIDED AND MADE AFTER THE CREATION OF THE WORLD, WHEN GOD BECAME INCARNATE, AND THEN WAS IN THE LORD GOD, THE REDEEMER AND SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST.

The Christian church to-day recognises a Divine Trinity existing before the creation of the world, stating that Jehovah God fathered a Son from eternity, and the Holy Spirit issued from both of them; and each of the three is by Himself or singly God, because each is one person, who exists of Himself. Since this lies beyond the grasp of reason, it is called a mystery, which is only accessible by the belief that the three share a single Divine essence; by this is meant eternity, immensity, omnipotence and so equal Divinity, glory and majesty. But it will be proved in what follows that this is a trinity of three Gods, and thus no Divine Trinity. Yet it is obvious from everything said before that the Trinity, also of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, which was provided and made after God's incarnation, so after the creation of the world, is the Divine Trinity, because it consists of one God.

sRef Luke@24 @39 S2' [2] The reason why this Divine Trinity is in the Lord God, the Redeemer and Saviour, Jesus Christ, is that the three essentials of one God, which compose a single essence, are in Him. All the fulness of the Godhead is in Him, as Paul says, and this is clear from the words of the Lord Himself, that all things of the Father's are His, and the Holy Spirit does not speak of Himself but from Him; moreover, when He rose from the dead, He took from the tomb His whole human body, flesh as well as bones (Matt. 28:1-8; Mark 16:5, 6; Luke 24:1-3; John 20:11-15), a thing no other person can do. He gave the disciples a living proof of this when He said:

Look at my hands and my feet, as proof that it is I myself; touch me and look, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see me have. Luke 24:39.

This can convince anyone, who is willing to believe, that the Lord's Human is Divine, and thus in Him God is man and man God.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 171

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 171

sRef Ezek@34 @24 S0' sRef Ezek@34 @25 S0' sRef Ezek@34 @23 S0' 171. The idea of the Trinity which the present-day Christian church has embraced and introduced into its faith, is that God the Father fathered a Son from eternity, and the Holy Spirit then issued from both, each by Himself being God. There is no way this Trinity could be conceived by human minds except as a triad of rulers, like having three kings in one kingdom, or three generals in command of one army, or three masters in one house, each of whom has equal power. This can only lead to ruin. And if anyone wants to form a mental picture or sketch of this triad of rulers while preserving their oneness, he can only conceive of it as a man with three heads on one body, or with three bodies beneath a single head. Such is the monstrous image of the Trinity which will be seen by those who believe in three Divine persons, each of whom is by Himself God, and link them to form a single God, denying that being one makes God one person.
[2] The idea that a Son of God fathered from eternity came down and took upon Himself human form can be compared with the myths of the ancients, that human souls were created from the beginning of the world, and they enter into bodies and become men and women. It is also like the absurd idea that the soul of one person passes into another, as many of the Jewish religion have believed; for instance, that the soul of Elijah came back in the body of John the Baptist, and that David will return to his own or someone else's body, and reign over Israel and Judah, because Ezekiel says:

I will raise up over them a shepherd who shall feed them, my servant David. He shall be their shepherd, and I Jehovah will be their God, and David shall be prince in their midst. Ezek. 34:23, 24.

There are other such passages. But they do not know that David here means the Lord.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 172

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 172

172. (iv) A TRINITY OF DIVINE PERSONS FROM ETERNITY, OR EXISTING BEFORE THE CREATION OF THE WORLD, IMPLIES THINKING ABOUT A TRINITY OF GODS; AND THIS THOUGHT CANNOT BE BANISHED BY A VERBAL CONFESSION OF BELIEF IN ONE GOD.

It is perfectly plain from the following passage in the Athanasian Creed that a Trinity of Divine persons from eternity is a Trinity of Gods:

There is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Spirit. The Father is God and Lord, the Son is God and Lord, and the Holy Spirit is God and Lord; yet there are not three Gods and Lords, but one God and Lord, because just as we are forced by Christian verity to confess each person singly to be God and Lord, so we are forbidden by the catholic religion to speak of three Gods or three Lords.

This creed has been accepted by the whole Christian church as worldwide and universal, and it is the source of all current knowledge and acknowledgment of God. Anyone who reads it merely with his eyes open can see that the members of the Council of Nicaea, which gave birth as it were posthumously to the so-called Athanasian Creed, understood the Trinity as a Trinity of Gods. It follows that not only did they understand the Trinity as a Trinity of Gods, but that no other idea of the Trinity is current in the Christian world, because this creed is the source from which all gain their knowledge of God, and everyone subscribes to the belief indicated by its wording.

[2] If anyone doubts that the current belief of the Christian world is in a Trinity of Gods, let me appeal to any witness, lay as well as clerical, to the masters and doctors of universities as well as consecrated bishops and archbishops, and to cardinals in their purple, indeed to the Roman Pontiff himself. Let each consider the matter and then pronounce as the ideas in his mind dictate. Is it not as clear and transparent as water in a crystal goblet, if we follow the words of this universally accepted doctrine about God? For instance, it states that there are three persons, and each of these is God and Lord; and that in accordance with Christian verity they ought to confess or acknowledge each person singly as God and Lord, but the catholic or Christian religion or faith prohibits speaking of or naming three Gods and Lords. So verity and religion, or verity and faith, are not one, but two mutually opposed things. The additional clause, that there are not three Gods and Lords, but one God and Lord, has been inserted to prevent its authors being exposed to ridicule before the whole world, for anyone would laugh at the idea of three Gods. Can anyone fail to see the contradiction in this addition?

[3] If, however, they had said that the Father had a Divine essence, the Son had a Divine essence and the Holy Spirit had a Divine essence, but there were not three Divine essences, but a single and indivisible one, then this mystery might have been capable of explanation, to be precise, by understanding the Father as the originating Divine, the Son as the Divine Human from that origin, and the Holy Spirit as the Divine which proceeds from them, since these three belong to a single God. Or again, if we understand by the Father's Divine something resembling the soul in man, by the Divine Human something resembling the body belonging to that soul, and by the Holy Spirit something resembling the activity which comes from both, then the three essences become intelligible as belonging to one and the same person, and so making up a single, indivisible essence.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 173

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 173

173. The reason why the idea of three Gods cannot be banished by a verbal confession of belief in one God is that this idea has been planted in the memory from childhood up, and what the memory contains is the source of everyone's thought. The memory with human beings resembles the ruminatory stomach of birds and animals. They put food into it, and then they live on it bit by bit, taking it out from time to time and swallowing it into the stomach proper, where the food is digested and circulated to provide for the body's needs. The human understanding is the stomach proper, as the memory is the first stomach. Anyone can see that the idea of three Divine persons from eternity, being the same as the idea of three Gods, cannot be banished by the verbal confession of belief in one God, merely from the fact that it has still not been banished, and is still current with famous people who resist its banishment. For they insist that the three Divine persons are one God, but are so obstinate as to deny that, because God is one, He is also one person. But surely everyone who is wise thinks in his heart that 'person' cannot really be understood as person, but as a predication of some quality? But no one knows what quality, and because of this ignorance the idea remains implanted in the memory from childhood up, like the root of a tree in the ground, which even if the tree is cut down will still send up a shoot.

[2] Do not, my friend, just cut down the tree, but dig up the root, and then plant your garden with trees that bear good fruit. Take care therefore that your mind is not beset by the idea of three Gods, while your mouth, being totally devoid of ideas, rings with the sound of 'one God.' If so, then the understanding up above the memory thinking of three Gods, and the understanding underneath the memory which enables the mouth to say the words 'one God', are, taken together, like a clown on the stage, who can play two parts scuttling from one side to the other, saying one thing on one side and the opposite on the other, so that he has a quarrel with himself, calling himself wise on one side and crazy on the other. The result of this must surely be that, when he stands in the middle and looks in either direction, he thinks neither to be of any consequence, and so perhaps that, since there is neither one God nor three Gods, there cannot be a God at all. The nature-worship so prevalent to-day comes from no other source.

[3] No one in heaven can utter the words 'A Trinity of persons, each of whom singly is God.' For the very aura of heaven, the medium through which the waves of their thoughts are transmitted, as sounds are through air, offers strong resistance. The only person who can do this in heaven is a hypocrite; but the sound of his voice grates in the aura of heaven like teeth grinding together, or screeches like a crow trying to sing like a song-bird. I have also been told from heaven that it is as impossible to banish a belief in a Trinity of Gods, once it is implanted in the mind by finding proofs of it, by merely making oral confession of one God, as it is to pass a tree through its own seed, or a man's chin through a hair of his beard.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 174

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 174

sRef John@10 @1 S1' sRef John@10 @9 S1' 174. (v) THE TRINITY OF PERSONS WAS UNKNOWN TO THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH, BUT WAS THE INVENTION OF THE COUNCIL OF NICAEA, LEADING TO ITS INTRODUCTION INTO THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, AND THUS TO THE CHURCHES WHICH SPLIT FROM IT.

The Apostolic church means not only the church which existed in various places in the time of the Apostles, but also in the following two or three centuries. But eventually they began to tear the door of the temple off its hinges, and like thieves to break into its sanctuary. The temple means the church, its door the Lord God the Redeemer, and the sanctuary His Divinity. For Jesus says:

Truly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up another way, is a thief and a robber. I am the door; if anyone enters by me, he will be saved. [John 10:1, 9.]

[2] This crime was committed by Arius and his followers. Consequently a Council was summoned by Constantine the Great to meet at Nicaea, a city of Bithynia*; and its members, in order to expel the damaging heresy of Arius, invented, concluded and laid down the doctrine that the three Divine persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, existed from eternity, each of whom had a personality, and came into and continued in existence by Himself and in Himself. They also held that the second person, the Son, came down and took upon Himself human form and carried out the redemption, and by this means His Human has divinity by hypostatic union, so that by this union He has close kinship with God the Father. This was the beginning from which there spread over the earth heaps of unspeakable heresies about God and the person of Christ. Antichrist then began to rear his head, and split God into three, and the Lord the Saviour into two, thus destroying the Temple the Lord had built by means of His Apostles; this went so far that every stone was pried loose, until not one was left upon another, as predicted by His words (Matt. 24:2). Here 'Temple' does not mean just the Temple in Jerusalem, but also the church; and the whole of that chapter deals with its consummation or end.

[3] But could anything else have been expected of that Council, or those which followed it, seeing that they likewise divided the Divinity into three parts, and put the incarnate God on their footstool beneath them? For they cut off the church's head from its body by climbing up another way, that is, by by-passing the Lord and crossing over to God the Father, as if He were another God, simply keeping on their tongues the phrase 'Christ's merit,' so that He should pity them for its sake. Thus, they thought, justification would flow directly into them, together with all that accompanies it, forgiveness of sins, renewal, sanctification, regeneration and salvation, and all this without any intervention on the person's part.

* The ancient name for the north-western province of Asia Minor.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 175

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 175

175. The Apostolic church knew nothing about a Trinity of persons or three persons from eternity, as is perfectly plain from the Creed of that church which is known as the Apostles' Creed. This contains the words:

I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary; and in the Holy Spirit.

There is no mention there of any Son from eternity, but of a Son conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. For they knew from the Apostles that Jesus Christ was the true God (1 John 5:20); and in Him all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily (Col. 2:9); and the Apostles preached belief in Him (Acts 20:21); and He had all power in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 176

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 176

176. How can one trust Councils, when they do not directly approach the God of the church? Is not the church the Lord's body, and is He not its head? What use is a body without a head? And what sort of body is it that has three heads on it, under the guidance of which they debate and pass decrees? Surely then enlightenment, which, coming from the Lord alone, who is God of heaven and the church and at the same time God of the Word, is spiritual, becomes more and more natural until it finally reaches the level of the senses. Then it cannot scent out any real theological truth in its inward form without it being instantly expelled from the thinking of the rational understanding, like chaff being scattered to the winds from a winnowing shovel. In that state fallacies then take the place of truths and darkness the place of light rays. Then these people stand as it were in a cavern with spectacles on their noses, candle in hand, and keep their eyelids shut against spiritual truths illuminated by heavenly light, and open them to sense impressions illuminated by the deceptive light of the bodily senses. What happens when the Word is read is much the same; the mind then goes to sleep confronted with truths, and is wide awake confronted with falsities, becoming like the description of the beast from the sea, 'its mouth like a lion's, its body like a leopard's, and its feet like a bear's' (Rev. 13:2).

sRef Matt@24 @29 S2' [2] It is said in heaven that when the Council of Nicaea finished its work, there took place simultaneously the things the Lord foretold to the disciples:

The sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Matt. 24:29.

In fact the Apostolic church was like a new star appearing in the starry sky; but the church after the two Nicene Councils became like the same star later dimming and vanishing, an event recorded a number of times in the natural world according to astronomical observations. We read in the Word that 'Jehovah God dwells in inaccessible light' [1 Tim. 6:16]. So who could approach Him, did He not dwell in accessible light, that is, had He not come down, taken upon Himself human form, and in this become the Light of the World (John 1:9; 12:46)? Can anyone fail to see that approaching God the Father in His light is as impossible as taking the wings of the morning and using them to fly to the sun? Or living on sunlight rather than material food? Or for a bird to fly in the ether, or a stag to run through the air?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 177

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 177

177. (vi) THE TRINITY AS DEFINED BY THE COUNCIL OF NICAEA AND BY ATHANASIUS CAUSED A FAITH TO ARISE WHICH HAS PERVERTED THE WHOLE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

It was shown above (172) from the Creeds that both the Nicene and the Athanasian definitions of the Trinity were of a Trinity of Gods.

This was the source of the faith of the present-day church, in God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. It is in God the Father, so that He may impute the righteousness of His Son the Saviour and ascribe it to man; in God the Son, so that He may intercede and add His authority; in the Holy Spirit, so that He may realise the imputed righteousness of the Son by inscribing it, and when it is established sealing it, making man justified, sanctified and regenerated. This is the present-day faith, which by itself is evidence enough that it is a Trinity of Gods which is acknowledged and worshipped.

[2] The faith of any church is not only the source from which its worship flows, but all its theology. Hence it can be said that such as its faith is, such is its doctrine. It follows from this that the present faith, being faith in three Gods, has subverted everything in the church; for faith is the principle, and matters of doctrine are derivatives, and derivatives get their essence from their principle. If anyone puts to the test any points of doctrine, such as their belief about God, the person of Christ, charity, repentance, regeneration, free will, election, the use of the sacraments of baptism and the Holy Supper, he will see plainly that they each contain the idea of a Trinity of Gods. And even if this does not in fact appear to be contained in them, it is still the source from which they gush forth. Since such a testing cannot be undertaken here, useful though it would be to open people's eyes, I shall add an Appendix to this book, in which this will be proved.

[3] A church's belief about God is like the soul in relation to the body; and its doctrines are like the members of the body. Again, faith in God is like a queen, and its dogmas are like the officials of her court. just as they hang upon the queen's lips, so the dogmas depend upon the statement of faith. At least one can see from that faith how the Word is understood in that church; for faith grapples and hauls in to itself as it were by ropes whatever it can. If it is a false faith, it commits adultery with every truth in it, leading it astray and falsifying it, so that people become of unsound mind in spiritual matters. If, however, it is a true faith, then it enjoys the favour of the whole Word, and the God of the Word, who is the Lord God the Saviour, pours in light, and breathes His Divine assent upon it, so that people become wise.

[4] It will also be seen in the Appendix that the present-day faith, which in inward form is faith in three Gods, though the outward form speaks of one God, has put out the light in the Word, and banished the Lord from the church, thus chasing its morning headlong into night. This is what was done by the heretics before the Council of Nicaea, and then by the heretics in it and after it. But what reliance can be placed on Councils which do not enter the sheep-fold through the door, but climb up another way, as the Lord said in John 10:1, 9? Their debates are not far different from a blind man walking about by day, or a man with sight walking by night, neither of whom see the pitfall before falling into it. For example, what reliance can be placed in Councils which have established the position of the Pope as God's vicar, the canonisation of the dead, their invocation as if they were divine powers, the veneration of their images, the authority to grant indulgences, and the division of the Eucharist, not to mention many more things? What reliance can be placed in the Council which established the unspeakable heresy of predestination, and hung this out as an ensign in front of the churches of their sect? Rather, my friend, approach the God of the Word, and so the Word, and enter by this gate into the sheep-fold, that is, into the church, and you will be given enlightenment. Then you will see, as if you stood on a mountain, not only the way most people have gone, but also your own previous steps and wanderings in the dark wood lying below the mountain.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 178

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 178

178. The faith of any church is like a seed, from which spring all its dogmas. It may be compared to the seed of a tree, from which grow all its parts up to and including its fruit; and to the human seed from which are procreated offspring and, generation by generation, families. Therefore if one knows what is the leading faith, which is from its dominant role called necessary for salvation, one can know what kind of church it is. The following example will serve to illustrate this.

Suppose the faith is that nature is the creator of the universe. it follows from this that the universe is what is called God, and that nature is its essence; that the ether is the supreme God, whom the ancients called Jupiter, and the air is a goddess, whom the ancients called Juno, and made Jupiter's wife; that the ocean is a god of lower rank, who following the ancients can be called Neptune; and because the divinity of nature reaches right to the centre of the earth, that there is a god there too, who following the ancients can be called Pluto; that the sun is the meeting-house of all the gods, where they assemble when Jupiter summons a council; moreover, fire is life from God, and thus birds fly in a god, animals walk in a god, and fishes swim in a god; [2] further, thoughts are mere modifications of the ether, just as the speech which expresses thoughts is a modulation of the air; and the affections of love are changes of state occasioned by the radiation of sunlight impinging on them. This also involves the idea that life after death, together with heaven and hell, is a tale devised by the clergy in pursuit of honours and profit, but it is none the less a useful tale, not to be made fun of in public, because it serves the civic need to keep the minds of ordinary people rigidly obedient to the magistrates. Yet those who are hooked on religion are out of touch with reality, their thoughts are wild imagination, their behaviour ridiculous, and they are lackeys of the priests, believing what they cannot see and seeing things far beyond the reach of their minds. All these consequences, and many more of the same sort, are contained in that faith that nature is the creator of the universe, and emerge from it when it is laid open. This demonstration has been given so that people may know that the faith of the present-day church which is inwardly in three Gods, though outwardly in one, contains battalions of falsities. From this can be extracted as many falsities as there are tiny spiders in one ball produced by a female spider. Is there anyone, whose mind has become truly rational under the enlightenment the Lord gives, who does not see this? But how can anyone else see it, when the door leading to that faith and its offshoots is barred by the rule that it is unlawful for the reason to enquire into its mysteries?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 179

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 179

sRef Rev@14 @20 S0' sRef Matt@24 @11 S0' sRef Matt@24 @15 S0' sRef Rev@14 @19 S0' sRef Rev@6 @7 S0' sRef Rev@11 @7 S0' sRef Rev@6 @8 S0' sRef Rev@6 @5 S0' sRef Rev@16 @18 S0' sRef Rev@6 @6 S0' sRef Matt@24 @21 S0' sRef Dan@9 @27 S0' sRef Rev@16 @13 S0' sRef Rev@16 @17 S0' 179. (vii) THIS IS THE SOURCE OF THE ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION AND THE AFFLICTION SUCH AS HAS NEVER BEEN NOR SHALL BE, BOTH OF WHICH THE LORD PREDICTED IN DANIEL, THE GOSPELS AND REVELATION. We read in Daniel:

Finally upon the bird of abominations desolation, to the point of ending and cutting off, shall be poured drop by drop upon devastation. Dan. 9:27.

In Matthew's gospel the Lord says:

Then many false prophets shall arise and lead many astray. When therefore you see the abomination of desolation predicted by the prophet Daniel standing in the holy place, let him who reads take due notice. Matt. 24:[11,] 15.

Later in the same chapter:

Then there shall be great affliction, such as never was from the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will be. Matt. 24:21.

This affliction and the abomination are dealt with in seven chapters of Revelation. These are what is meant by the black horse and the pale horse which came out of the book, when the Lamb opened its seals (Rev. 6:5-8); and by the beast coming up out of the abyss, which made war on the two witnesses, and killed them (11:7ff.); as by the dragon which stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, to devour her child, and pursued her into the desert, and there ejected water from its mouth like a river, to drown her (chapter 12); also by the beasts of the dragon, one from the sea, the other from the land (chapter 13); also by the three spirits like frogs, who came out of the mouth of the dragon and the mouth of the beast and the mouth of the false prophet (16:13); moreover by the fact that after the seven angels had poured out the bowls of the wrath of God, in which were the seven last plagues, upon the earth, the sea, the springs and streams, the sun, the throne of the beast, the Euphrates and finally the air, a great earthquake took place such as had never occurred since the creation of man (chapter 16). The earthquake means the overthrow of the church, the result of falsities and falsifications of truth, much as is meant by the great affliction such as never has been since the beginning of the world (Matt. 24:21). The following passage has a similar meaning:

The angel put in his sickle and reaped the grape-harvest of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God; and the winepress was trodden, and blood came out up to the bridles of the horses at a distance of one thousand six hundred stades*. Rev. 14:19, 20.

Blood means falsified truth. There are many more such passages in those seven chapters.

*The stade was an ancient measure of length, roughly 170 metres; the distance is approximately 170 miles.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 180

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 180

180. In the Gospels (Matt. chapter 24; Mark chapter 13; Luke chapter 21) there are descriptions of how the Christian church stage by stage fell away and was corrupted. The mention there of the 'great affliction such as never was from the beginning of the world, nor ever will be' means, as in many other passages in the Word, the way truth was attacked by falsities, until there was no truth left which was not falsified and brought to an end. This too is the meaning of the 'abomination of desolation' there and the 'desolation upon the bird of abominations' and the 'ending and cutting off' in Daniel. It is the same thing which is described in Revelation, in the passages just quoted. It was caused by the church failing to acknowledge the oneness of God in the Trinity and His Trinity in oneness in one person, but rather dividing it into three persons. Thus they founded the church on the mental concept of three Gods, while verbally confessing belief in one God. For by this they separated themselves from the Lord, and eventually to such an extent that they had no idea left of divinity in His human nature, when in fact God the Father Himself is in the Human. This too is why He is called 'the Father of eternity' (Isa. 9:6), and He says to Philip, 'He who sees me sees the Father' (John 14:7, 9).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 181

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 181

sRef Matt@24 @21 S0' 181. The question may be asked, what is the very source and spring from which has flowed forth such an abomination of desolation, as described in Daniel (9:27), and such an affliction as never was nor ever will be (Matt. 24:21)? The answer must be that it comes from the actual faith universally held throughout the Christian world, and from its influence, activity and imputation, as traditionally taught. It is astonishing that the doctrine of justification by that faith alone plays the leading role in the Christian churches, when it is no true faith, but a chimera; that is to say, it dominates the clergy almost as if it were the only theological dogma. It is this that all the recruits to the clergy in their schools avidly learn, swallow and absorb. And afterwards, as if inspired by heavenly wisdom, this is what they teach in their pulpits, publish in their books, and use to pursue and borrow a reputation for superior learning, fame and glory. It is for this that they are presented with diplomas, degrees and prizes. And this happens despite the fact that as a result of that faith alone to-day the sun has been darkened, the moon deprived of her light, the stars have fallen from the skies, and the powers of the heavens have been shaken, as predicted by the Lord's words in Matthew (24:29). I have been given evidence that the doctrine of that faith has to-day so blinded people's minds that they are unwilling and therefore unable to see any Divine truth inwardly in sunlight, or in moonlight, but only outwardly with its rough exterior in the light of a fire by night. Therefore I am able to prophesy that if there were sent down from heaven, written in letters of silver, the Divine truths about the true linking of charity and faith, about heaven and hell, about the Lord, about life after death and about everlasting happiness, these believers in justification and sanctification by faith alone would not judge them worth reading. But it would be quite different if a paper on justification by faith alone were sent up from hell; this they would seize on, kiss and carry off home in their pockets.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 182

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 182

sRef Matt@24 @22 S1' sRef Matt@24 @21 S1' 182. (viii) FURTHER, UNLESS A NEW HEAVEN AND A NEW CHURCH ARE FOUNDED BY THE LORD, NO FLESH CAN BE SAVED.

We read in Matthew:

Then there shall be great affliction, such as never was from the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will be. Indeed, unless those days were cut short, no flesh would be saved. Matt. 24:21, 22.

That chapter deals with the completion of the age, by which is meant the end of the present-day church. Therefore 'cutting short those days' means bringing it to an end and setting up a new one. Is there anyone who does not know that if the Lord had not come into the world and carried out the redemption, no flesh could have been saved? Carrying out redemption means founding a new heaven and a new church. The Lord predicted in the Gospels that He would come into the world again (Matt. 24:30, 31; Mark 13:26; Luke 12:40; 21:27), and also in Revelation, especially in the last chapter. I have shown above in the section on Redemption [114-137], that the Lord is carrying out redemption to-day too, founding a new heaven and starting a new church, for the sake of man's salvation.

sRef Rev@12 @12 S2' sRef Rev@12 @9 S2' sRef Rev@12 @13 S2' [2] The great secret about no flesh being able to be saved, if the Lord had not started a new church, is this. So long as the dragon with his crew stays in the world of spirits, into which he was thrown, no Divine truth united with Divine good can get through to people on earth without being perverted and falsified or being destroyed. This is what is meant by this passage in Revelation:

The dragon was cast down to earth, and his angels were cast down with him. Woe to those that live on the earth and the sea, because the devil has come down to them having great wrath. Rev. 12:9, 12, 13.

But after the dragon was cast into hell (20:10), then John saw a new heaven and a new earth, and the New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven (21:1, 2). The dragon means those who hold the faith of the present-day church.

[3] I have several times in the spiritual world talked with those who believe that man is justified by faith alone, and I have told them that their doctrine is wrong and also absurd; it induces carelessness, blindness, sleep and darkness in spiritual matters, leading to the death of the soul. I have pleaded with them to abandon it. But I got the answer: 'Abandon it? Surely this is the one thing upon which the superiority of the clergy's learning over that of laymen depends.' I replied that in that case the salvation of souls was no part of their purpose, but only the superiority of their reputations. Because they had used the truths of the Word to support their false principles, thus adulterating them, they were angels of the abyss, those called Abaddons and Apollyons* (Rev. 9: 11), by whom are meant those who destroy the church by totally falsifying the Word. 'What do you mean?' they replied; 'our knowledge makes us oracles of the mysteries of that faith, and we give its replies as if from a shrine. So we are not Apollyons, but Apollos.' This made me cross and I said: 'If you are Apollos, you are also leviathans, your first rank twisted leviathans, the second elongated leviathans, whom God will visit with His hard and mighty sword (Isa. 27: 1). But at this they laughed.

* Hebrew and Greek words for 'destroyer'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 183

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 183

183. (ix) FROM A TRINITY OF PERSONS, EACH OF WHICH INDIVIDUALLY IS GOD, AS ASSERTED BY THE ATHANASIAN CREED, MANY ABSURD IDEAS OF VARIOUS KINDS HAVE ARISEN ABOUT GOD, WHICH ARE MERE FANCIES AND ABORTIONS.

The doctrine of three Divine persons from eternity, which is in itself the chief of all the doctrines held by the Christian churches, has given rise to many unbecoming ideas about God, unworthy of the Christian world, which, however, can and ought to be a light to all peoples and races in all four quarters of the globe concerning God and His oneness. All who live outside the Christian church, Mohammedans as well as Jews, and the heathen besides of whatever religion, reject Christianity solely on account of its belief in three Gods. Missionaries are well aware of this; so they take the greatest care not to speak openly of the Trinity of persons as described in the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds, since then their converts would run away and make fun of them.

[2] The absurd, ridiculous and frivolous ideas which have arisen from the doctrine of three divine persons from eternity, and which still arise in the mind of anyone who sticks to believing the wording of that doctrine, rising from the ears and eyes to the level of mental contemplation, are these. God the Father sits overhead on high, with the Son at His right hand and the Holy Spirit in front of them listening, and rushing off on the instant through the world to hand out the gifts of justification according to the decision taken, inscribing these gifts and making their recipients sons of grace instead of sons of wrath, and elect instead of damned. I challenge the learned among the clergy and educated laymen to say whether they have in their minds any other picture than this imaginary one. For this springs to mind of its own accord from the doctrine itself; see the experience described in 16 above.

[3] Another thing that springs to mind is a curiosity to guess what they talked to each other about before the creation of the world. Did they talk about creating the world, about who were predestined to be saved and justified, as the Supralapsarians believe, and also about redemption? Likewise, what do they talk to each other about since the creation of the world, the Father with His authority and power to impute, the Son with His power to mediate; that imputation, which is election, is dependent upon the mercy of the Son who intercedes for all, and individually for some; and these receive grace from the Father, who is moved by love for His Son and by seeing His suffering on the cross. Can anyone fail to see that such ideas of God are the ravings of a deranged mind? Yet in Christian churches those are the holy things to be kissed with the lips, not inspected by any mental vision, because they are above the level of reason; if anyone were to lift them above the memory level to that of the understanding, they would drive him mad. But still this does not banish the idea of three Gods, but induces a foolish faith, which makes people think about God like someone dreaming in his sleep, walking in pitch darkness at night, or like a person blind from birth walking in daylight.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 184

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 184

184. The fact that the minds of Christians are obsessed with the idea of a Trinity of Gods, for all that shame makes them deny it, is perfectly clear from the ingenuity many of them display in proving that three are one and one is three. They use various devices in geometry, solids, arithmetic and physics for the purpose, as well as folds in garments and sheets of paper. So they make the Divine Trinity a subject for games, like scenes between comic actors. This farce can be likened to the vision of patients in fevers, who see a single object, whether it be a person, a table or a candle, as three, or see three objects as one. It can also be likened to the game in which the players knead soft wax between their fingers, and pinch it into various shapes, now making it triangular to represent the Trinity, now into a ball to show it is all one, saying, 'Is it not still one and the same substance?' Yet the Divine Trinity is like a pearl* of great price; but divided into persons it is like a pearl cut into three, which is obviously completely ruined.

* The Latin word for 'pearl' is here unio, which also means 'union'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 185

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 185

185. Here I shall add some more experiences, of which this is the first.

The spiritual world contains climatic zones similar to those in the natural world. There is nothing in this world which does not have its counterpart in the other, but their origins are different. In the natural world the varying seasons depend upon how far the sun is from the equator; in the spiritual world they depend upon how remote the affections of the will, and so the thoughts of the understanding, are from true love and true faith. Everything there corresponds to these two.

The cold zones of the spiritual world look much like the cold zones in the natural world. There are stretches of frozen land to be seen there, frozen lakes and a covering of snow. The people who come and live there are those who in the world had put their understanding to sleep through being too lazy to think about spiritual matters, and at the same time too lazy to do anything useful. These are called boreal* spirits.

[2] I once had a wish to see a district in the cold zone, where these boreal spirits live. So I was taken in the spirit northwards, to an area where all the ground was snow-covered and all the water frozen over. It was Sunday, and I saw the people, or spirits, of the same physique as people on earth; but on account of the cold they had lions' skins on their heads, with the face fitting over their faces; their bodies both front and back down to the loins were covered with leopards' skins, their legs and feet with bears' skins. I also saw many of them riding in carriages; some of them were in carriages carved to resemble dragons with their horns projecting forwards. These carriages were pulled by small horses with docked tails. They ran like terrifying wild beasts, and the driver holding the reins in his hands constantly drove them on and yelled at them to run. Eventually I saw that the crowds were converging on a church, which was so deep in snow it was invisible. But the guardians of the church were clearing away the snow and digging out a way in for the worshippers as they arrived. They got out of their carriages and entered the church.

[3] I was also allowed to see the inside of the church. It was plentifully lit with lamps and lanterns. The altar was of ashlar, and behind it was hung up a board, on which was written: 'The Divine Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who are in essence one God, but three in person.'

At length the priest who was standing by the altar, after three genuflexions towards the board behind it, climbed into the pulpit holding a book in his hand, and began to preach about the Divine Trinity. 'How great a mystery it is,' he cried, 'that God in the highest fathered a Son from eternity, and through Him produced the Holy Spirit, the three of whom linked themselves by essence, but divided themselves by properties, that is, imputation, redemption and activity! But if we consider these things by the use of reason, our sight grows dim and a blot obscures our vision, such as affects anyone who gazes directly at the sun. Therefore, my listeners, in this respect let us keep the understanding subject to the dictates of faith.'

[4] After this he gave another cry and said: 'How great a mystery is our holy faith! This tells us that God the Father imputes the righteousness of the Son, and sends the Holy Spirit to effect by that imputation the rewards of justification. These are briefly the forgiveness of sins, renewal, regeneration and salvation. A person knows no more about the influence and action of the Holy Spirit than the pillar of salt into which Lot's wife was turned. Nor is he any more aware of His presence and state within him than a fish is in the sea. But, my friends, within our faith lies hidden a treasure, so hedged about and concealed that not a scrap of it is to be seen. Therefore in respect to this too let us keep the understanding subject to the dictates of faith.'

[5] He heaved a few sighs, and then cried out again, saying: 'How great a mystery is election! Anyone becomes one of the elect to whom God imputes the faith which of His free choice and purely of His grace He pours into any He wishes, whenever He wishes. When he receives the infusion the person is like a bare tree-trunk, but afterwards he becomes like a tree. But although the fruits, which are good deeds, hang from that tree, which may be taken to represent our faith, still they do not form part of it, so that the tree's value does not depend upon its fruit. However, since this, for all it is a mystic truth, has a heterodox ring to it, let us, my brethren, keep the understanding subject to the dictates of this faith.'

[6] After an interval, during which he stood as if trying to recall something from his memory, he went on to say: 'From the heap of mysteries I will extract just one more. This is that a person in spiritual matters has not a grain of free will. The leaders and champions of our rule say in their theological canons that in matters which concern faith and salvation, what are especially called spiritual matters, a person cannot will, think or understand anything, nor even prepare and devote himself to acquiring these things. So I hold for my part that a person cannot for his part on these subjects think rationally, or speak thoughtfully otherwise than a parrot, magpie or crow. So in spiritual matters he is truly a donkey, and only human in natural matters. But in this, my colleagues, as in other respects, to prevent the understanding attacking your reason, let us keep it subject to the dictates of faith. Our theology is a bottomless pit, and if you plunge your intellectual gaze into it, you will sink and perish in the wreck. But please listen to this: we are none the less enlightened by the Gospel, which shines out high above our heads; yet how painfully would it hurt, did not our hair and the bones of our skull keep it out and prevent it from penetrating into the chamber of our understanding.'

[7] At the end of this speech he came down from the pulpit, said a few prayers at the altar, and brought the service to an end. Then I went up to a group of people, including the priest, who were talking together. The people around said to the priest: 'You have our undying thanks for such a magnificent sermon, so full of wisdom.' Then I said to them: 'Surely you did not understand anything of it?' 'We strained our ears to catch every word,' they answered. 'But why do you ask whether we understood it? Are not such things likely to amaze the understanding?' The priest on hearing this added: 'Because you have heard and have not understood, you are blessed, for that is the source of your salvation.'

[8] Subsequently I talked with the priest and asked him if he had a degree; he replied that he held a master's degree. Then I said: 'Master, I have listened to you preaching of mysteries. If you know of them, but nothing of what they contain, you know nothing. For they are merely like bookcases locked with three bolts; and unless you open them and look inside, which will require the use of the understanding, you do not know whether the contents are valuable, worthless or dangerous. They may be snakes' eggs and spiders' webs, as described in Isaiah (59:5).'

When I said this, the priest gave me a black look, and the worshippers went off and got into their carriages, drunk with paradoxes, stupefied with inanities and plunged in thick darkness as regards everything conducive to faith and instrumental for salvation.

* Or 'of the north wind'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 186

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 186

186. The second experience.

Once I turned over in my mind the question in what part of the human mind theology is stored. I thought at first that since theology is spiritual and celestial, it must be at the highest level; for the human mind is divided into three levels, like a house with three storeys, or like the dwellings of the angels in three heavens.

Then an angel visited me and said: 'With those who love truth because it is truth, theology reaches the highest level, since that is where their heaven is, and they enjoy the same light as angels. Ethics, however, considered and perceived theoretically are located at the second level, because they communicate with spiritual matters; political affairs lie beneath these at the first level. Facts, however, which are of many kinds and can be classified into genera and species, constitute the door to the higher regions. Those in whom spiritual, ethical, political and factual matters are subordinated to one another in this way have their thoughts and actions controlled by righteousness and judgment. The reason is that the light of truth, which is also the light of heaven, shines down from the highest level on those beneath, just as sunlight passing through the ethers, and so eventually the air, gives light to enable men, animals and fish to see.

[2] 'The case is different, however, with theology in those who do not love truth because it is truth, but only because it enhances their own reputation. With these people theology resides at the lowest level, where factual knowledge is stored; in some cases it becomes mixed with these, in others they cannot mix. Political matters lie beneath these at the same level, and ethics beneath these, since in these cases the two higher levels are not open on the right-hand side. These people therefore do not have any power of inward judgment, nor any affection for righteousness, but only ingenuity. This allows them to talk on any subject as if they were intelligent, and to adduce what appear to be rational proofs of any proposition which comes up. But the objects of their reason, which are what they chiefly love, are false, because they are inseparable from the fallacies of the senses. This explains why there are so many people in the world who can no more see the truths of doctrine to be drawn from the Word, than those born blind; and when they hear them, they hold their noses to prevent their smell from assailing them and causing nausea. But when faced with falsities, they open every sense-organ and suck them in as whales do water.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 187

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 187

187. The third experience*.

Once when I was meditating on the dragon, the beast and the false prophet described in Revelation, an angelic spirit appeared to me and asked: 'What are you meditating about?' 'The false prophet,' I told him. Then he said: 'I will take you to a place where those live who are meant by the false prophet.' He told me that the same people are meant in chapter 13 of Revelation by the beast from the land, which had two horns like a lamb's, and spoke like a dragon.

I followed him, and came upon a crowd surrounding some leading ecclesiastics, who taught that nothing but faith in Christ's merit confers salvation on people, and that deeds are good but do not contribute to their salvation. None the less, they said, these should be taught in accordance with the Word, so that laymen, particularly the simple, should be kept more rigorously subject to the dictates of magistrates, and thus be impelled, as if by religion and thus inwardly, to exercise ethical charity.

[2] Then one of them saw me and said: 'Would you like to see our shrine, which contains a statue representing our faith?'

I went along and looked; and there was a magnificent shrine, and inside it a statue of a woman wearing a scarlet dress, holding a gold coin in her right hand and a pearl necklace in her left. But both the statue and the shrine were imaginary, for the spirits in hell can by their imagination produce magnificent representations, by closing the interiors of the mind, and opening only its exteriors. When I realised that all this was mere conjuring, I prayed to the Lord, and the interiors of my mind were suddenly opened. Then in place of that magnificent shrine I saw a ruinous building with cracks in the walls from ceiling to floor; and in place of the woman I saw hanging in that building an image with a head like a dragon's, a body like a leopard's, feet like a bear's and a mouth like a lion's, exactly as the beast from the sea is described in Revelation 13:2. Instead of the floor there was a marsh teeming with frogs. I was told that beneath the marsh there was a great squared stone, beneath which lay the Word, deeply hidden away.

[3] On seeing this I asked the conjurer: 'Is this your shrine?' He said it was. But then suddenly his interior sight was opened, which made him see what I saw. At this sight he shouted very loudly: 'What is this? Where has it come from?' I told him that it was the result of light from heaven, which reveals the true nature of every form, and consequently the true nature of his faith separated from spiritual charity.

Immediately the east wind sprang up and blew away the shrine with its statue. It also dried up the marsh, thus laying bare the stone beneath which the Word lay. After this a warm wind, as in springtime, blew from heaven, and then in the same place was to be seen a tent, of simple external construction. The angels with me said: 'This is what Abraham's tent was like, when the three angels came to him and told him that Isaac was to be born. This may appear to view as simple, but it becomes more and more magnificent as light flows in from heaven.'

They were allowed to open the heaven where the spiritual angels are, who possess wisdom, and the light which poured in from there made that tent look like a temple such as that in Jerusalem. When I looked inside, I saw the stone base under which the Word was stored inlaid all around with precious stones. A sort of radiance was projected from these on to the walls, which were decorated with carved cherubs; and these the radiance beautifully picked out in various colours.

sRef Rev@21 @3 S4' sRef Rev@21 @22 S4' [4] When I admired this, the angels said: 'Now you will see something even more wonderful.' They were allowed to open the third heaven, where the celestial angels are who possess love. Then the flame-coloured light flooding in made that whole temple vanish, and in its place was to be seen the Lord alone, standing upon the stone base which was the Word, in appearance as He was seen by John (Rev. chapter 1). But because a feeling of holiness then filled the interiors of the angels' minds, causing them to long to fall on their faces, the path of light from the third heaven was suddenly blocked by the Lord, and the path for light from the second heaven was opened up, thus restoring the previous appearance of the temple, and also of the tent, but this was inside the temple. These sights provided an illustration of what is meant by the verse in Revelation:

Here is the tabernacle of God with men, and He will dwell with them. Rev, 21:3.

and also this:

I saw no temple in the New Jerusalem, for the Lord God almighty and the Lamb are its temple. Rev. 21:22.
* This section is repeated from AR 926.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 188

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 188

188. The fourth experience*.

Since I have been allowed by the Lord to see the wonders in the heavens and in the regions below the heavens, my instructions impose on me the duty of relating what I have seen.

I saw a magnificent palace, and at its heart a church. In the middle of this was a table made of gold, on which was the Word, with two angels standing by it. Seats were arranged around it in three rows. The seats of the first row were covered in silk cloth of purple colour, those of the second row in silk cloth of blue colour, those of the third row in white cloth. Beneath the roof, high above the table, was to be seen a curtain drawn across, glittering with precious stones, from which shone a radiance resembling the rainbow to be seen when the sky clears after rain. Then suddenly there appeared clergy to the same number as the seats, all dressed in their priestly vestments. At one side was a strong-box guarded by an angel, in which lay splendid vestments arranged in beautiful order.

sRef Matt@1 @25 S2' sRef Isa@25 @9 S2' sRef Matt@1 @20 S2' sRef Luke@1 @34 S2' sRef Luke@1 @31 S2' sRef Luke@1 @35 S2' sRef Luke@1 @32 S2' [2] It was a council summoned by the Lord; and I heard a voice from heaven saying: 'Debate.' 'But on what subject?' they said. They were told to debate about the Lord the Saviour and the Holy Spirit. When they began to think about these subjects, they had no enlightenment; so they prayed for it, and then light poured down from heaven, which first of all lit up the backs of their heads, then their temples, and finally their faces. Then they began, speaking first as instructed about the Lord the Saviour.

The first question proposed for discussion was: who was it that took upon himself human form in the Virgin Mary? The angel who stood by the table holding the Word read to them this passage from Luke:

The angel said to Mary, Behold, you will conceive in your womb, and will give birth to a son; and you are to call his name Jesus. He will be mighty, and will be called the Son of the Most High. And Mary said to the angel, How will this be, seeing I have no knowledge of a man? And the angel answered and said, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; hence what is born of you will be holy, and will be called the Son of god. Luke 1:31, 32, 34, 35.

He also read this passage in Matthew:

The angel said to Joseph in a dream, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your betrothed, for what is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And Joseph did not know her, until she had given birth to her first-born son; and he called his name Jesus. Matt. 1:20, 25.

In addition he read many passages from the Gospels (such as Matt. 3:17; 17:5; John 1:18; 3: 16; 20:31), and many other passages where the Lord in His Human is called the Son of God, and where He from His Human calls Jehovah His Father, for instance, the passages in the Prophets which predict the coming of Jehovah Himself into the world. Among these were the following two from Isaiah:

On that day it will be said, Behold, He is our God, whom we have awaited to free us. He is Jehovah, whom we have awaited, let us exult and rejoice in His salvation. Isa. 25:9.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of Jehovah, make smooth in the desert a path for our God. For the glory of Jehovah will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together. Behold, the Lord Jehovih comes in might, like a shepherd will He feed His flock. Isa. 40:3, 5, 10, 11.

sRef Jer@23 @5 S3' sRef Jer@23 @6 S3' sRef Isa@54 @5 S3' sRef Isa@63 @16 S3' sRef Isa@40 @5 S3' sRef Isa@40 @3 S3' sRef Hos@13 @4 S3' sRef Isa@40 @11 S3' sRef Isa@40 @10 S3' sRef Zech@14 @9 S3' sRef Isa@48 @17 S3' sRef Jer@50 @34 S3' sRef Isa@45 @14 S3' sRef Isa@47 @4 S3' sRef Isa@45 @21 S3' sRef Isa@45 @22 S3' sRef Isa@45 @15 S3' sRef Isa@44 @24 S3' sRef Isa@43 @11 S3' sRef Isa@44 @6 S3' sRef Ps@19 @14 S3' sRef Isa@49 @26 S3' [3] The angel said: 'Since Jehovah Himself came into the world and took upon Himself human form, [and by this means saved and redeemed man]** therefore in the Prophets He is called the Saviour and the Redeemer.' Then he read to them the following passages:

Only among you is God, and there is no God besides. You surely are the hidden God, the God of Israel, the Saviour. Isa. 45:14, 15.

Am I not Jehovah, and there is no God besides me, there is no righteous God and Saviour beside me. Isa. 45:21, 22.

I am Jehovah, and there is no Saviour beside me. Isa. 43:11.

I am Jehovah your God; and you are not to acknowledge any God beside me, and there is no Saviour beside me. Hosea 13:4.

That all flesh may know that I am Jehovah your Saviour and your Redeemer. Isa. 49:26; 60:16.

As for our Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Isa. 47:4.

Their Redeemer, the mighty Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Jer. 50:34.

Jehovah, my rock and my Redeemer. Ps. 19:14.

Thus spoke Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I am Jehovah your God. Isa. 48:17; 43:3***; 49:7; 54:8.

You are Jehovah our Father, our Redeemer from eternity is your name. Isa. 63:16.

Thus spoke Jehovah your Redeemer, I am Jehovah the maker of everything, and I alone by myself. Isa. 44:24.

Thus spoke Jehovah, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth; I am the first and the last and there is no God beside me. Isa. 44:6.

Jehovah Zebaoth is His name, and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel; He will be called God of all the earth. Isa. 54:5.

Behold, the days will come, when I shall raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as King; and this is His name, Jehovah our righteousness. Jer. 23:5, 6; 33:15, 16,

On that day Jehovah will be King over all the earth; on that day Jehovah will be one, and His name one. Zech. 14:9.

[4] Both sets of passages were accepted as proofs by those who sat on the seats, and they said with one accord that Jehovah Himself took upon Himself human form to redeem and save mankind. But then a voice spoke up from the Roman Catholics, who had hidden behind the altar, saying: 'How can Jehovah God become man? Is He not the Creator of the universe?' One of those sitting in the second row of, seats turned round and said: 'Who did then?' The one who had been behind the altar stood up near it and replied: 'The Son from eternity.' But he received the reply: 'Is not the Son from eternity according to your creed also the Creator of the universe? And what is the Son but God born from eternity? How can the Divine essence, which is one and indivisible, be separated so that one part of it came down, and not the whole at once?'

sRef John@10 @30 S5' sRef John@14 @6 S5' sRef John@14 @9 S5' sRef Isa@9 @6 S5' sRef Isa@63 @16 S5' sRef John@14 @11 S5' sRef John@14 @8 S5' sRef John@12 @44 S5' sRef John@12 @45 S5' sRef John@17 @10 S5' sRef John@14 @10 S5' [5] The second debate about the Lord was whether the Father and He are one, just as the soul and the body are one. They said that this followed because the soul is from the father. Then one of those sitting in the third row read the following words from the Creed known as Athanasian:

Although our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and man, still there are not two, but one Christ; indeed He is utterly one. He is one person. For as the soul and body make up one man, so God and man is one Christ.

The reader said that the Creed containing these words is accepted throughout the Christian world, including the Roman Catholics.

'What need,' they said, 'is there to go on? God the Father and the Lord are one, just as soul and body are one. Since this is so, we see that the Lord's Human is Divine, because it is the Human of Jehovah; and the Lord is to be approached in His Divine Human, because this is the only possible way to approach the Divine called the Father.'

[6] This conclusion of theirs was confirmed by the angel citing many passages from the Word, including:

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is Wonderful, Counsellor, God, Hero, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace. Isa. 9:6.

Also:

Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You, Jehovah, are our Father, our Redeemer from eternity is your name. Isa. 63:16.

In John:

Jesus said, He who believes in me believes in Him who sent me, and he who sees me sees Him who sent me. John 12:44, 45.

Philip said to Jesus, Show us the Father. Jesus said to him, He who has seen me has seen the Father. Why then do you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? Believe me, I am in the Father and the Father is in me. John 14:8-11. Jesus said, I and the Father are one. John 10:30.

Also:

All things which the Father has are mine, and all of mine are the Father's. John 16:15; 17:10.

Finally:

Jesus said, I am the way, truth and life; no one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6.

The reader went on to say that similar statements to those made here by the Lord about Himself and His Father can also be made by a man about himself and his soul. On hearing this all declared with one heart and voice that the Lord's Human is Divine, and this must be approached in order to approach the Father, because by means of the Human Jehovah God brought Himself into the world and made Himself visible to human eyes, and thus accessible. Likewise He made Himself visible and accessible to the ancients in human form, but at that time by means of an angel. But because this form represented the Lord who was to come, among the ancients everything that concerned the church was representative.

[7] This was followed by a debate about the Holy Spirit. To begin it the popular idea about God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit was presented, namely, that God the Father sits on high, the Son at His right hand, and they send out from themselves the Holy Spirit, to enlighten, teach, justify and sanctify men. But a voice was then heard from heaven, saying. 'We find this mode of thought intolerable. Surely everyone knows that Jehovah God is omnipresent. A person who knows and acknowledges this will also acknowledge that it is He who enlightens, teaches, justifies and sanctifies, and that there is no mediating God separate from Himself, much less from two other Gods, as one person is separate from another. You must therefore rid yourselves of the first idea, seeing it is meaningless, and accept this, which is correct, and then you will see this plainly.'

[8] But at this point a voice was heard from the Roman Catholics who were standing near the altar of the church, saying: 'What then is the Holy Spirit who is mentioned in the Word, in the Gospels and Paul, and by which so many of the learned clergy, especially ours, allege they are guided? Is there any Christian to-day who denies the existence of the Holy Spirit and His activity?' On hearing this one of those sitting in the second row turned round and said: 'You claim that the Holy Spirit is a person by Himself and God by Himself. But what is the meaning of a person going forth and proceeding from a person, if it is not the activity which goes forth and proceeds? One person cannot go forth and proceed from another, but his activity can. What is meant by God going forth and proceeding from God, if not the Divine which goes forth and proceeds? One God cannot go forth and proceed from another by means of a third; but the Divine can from a single God.'

[9] On hearing this the assembly in session reached the unanimous conclusion that the Holy Spirit is not a person by Himself, so not God by Himself either, but the Holy Divine which goes forth and proceeds from the one omnipresent God, who is the Lord. The angels who were standing by the golden table on which the Word was placed said to this: 'Good. Nowhere in the Old Testament do we read that the prophets spoke the Word from the Holy Spirit, but from Jehovah; and where the Holy Spirit is mentioned in the New Testament, the Divine which proceeds is meant. This is the Divine which enlightens, teaches, quickens, reforms and regenerates.'

sRef John@3 @34 S10' sRef John@3 @35 S10' sRef Isa@42 @1 S10' sRef John@16 @14 S10' sRef John@14 @26 S10' sRef John@16 @7 S10' sRef John@7 @39 S10' sRef John@20 @22 S10' sRef John@16 @15 S10' sRef John@15 @26 S10' sRef Rev@15 @4 S10' sRef Isa@11 @2 S10' sRef Isa@11 @1 S10' [10] This was followed by another debate about the Holy Spirit: from whom does the Divine meant by the Holy Spirit proceed, from the Father, or from the Lord? While they were discussing this, a light shone on them from heaven which allowed them to see that the Holy Divine, meant by the Holy Spirit, does not proceed from the Father by means of the Lord, but from the Lord acted upon by the Father; as for comparison in man, his activity does not proceed from the soul by means of the body, but from the body acted upon by the soul.

This was confirmed by the angel standing at the table by these passages in the Word:

He whom the Father has sent speaks the words of God; not by measure does God give him the Spirit. The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into his hand. John 3:34, 35.

A shoot will come forth from the stock of Jesse; the Spirit of Jehovah will rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and intelligence, the spirit of counsel and power. Isa. 11:1, 2.

The Spirit of Jehovah was put upon him, and was in him. Isa. 42:1; 59:19, 20; 61:1; Luke 4:18.

When the Holy Spirit comes, whom I shall send you from the Father, John 35:26.

He will glorify me, because He will take from what is mine and communicate it to you. All things that the Father has are mine. That is why I have said that He will take from what is mine and communicate it to you. John 16:14, 15.

If I go away, I will send the Comforter to you. John 16:7.

The Comforter is the Holy Spirit. John 14:26.

The Holy Spirit was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:39.

But after His glorification:

Jesus breathed upon the disciples and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. John 20:22.

And in Revelation:

Who will not glorify your name, Lord, since you alone are holy? Rev. 15:4.

sRef John@14 @28 S11' sRef John@14 @18 S11' sRef Matt@28 @20 S11' sRef John@14 @20 S11' [11] Since the Holy Spirit means the Lord's Divine activity from His Divine omnipresence, so when He spoke to the disciples about the Holy Spirit, which He was to send from the Father, He also said:

I will not leave you bereft; I go away and come to you; and on that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I in you. John 14:18, 20, 28.

Shortly before He left the world, He said:

Behold, I am with you always up to the ending of the age. Matt. 28:20.

After reading these passages to them the angel said: 'It is plain from these and many other passages in the Word that the Divine called the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Lord acted upon by the Father.' Those in session replied: 'This is Divine truth.'

sRef Colo@2 @9 S12' [12] Finally the following resolution was passed: 'We have seen clearly from the deliberations in this council, and thus acknowledge as a holy truth, that in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ there is a Divine Trinity, consisting of the originating Divine called the Father, the Human Divine called the Son, and the Divine which proceeds called the Holy Spirit.' And they cried out together that in Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily (Col. 2:9). 'Thus there is one God in the church.'

[13] When this magnificent council had reached these conclusions, its members rose; and the angel in charge came and brought from the strong-box for each of those who had taken part in the session splendid garments with here and there gold threads interwoven, and said: 'Accept these wedding garments.' Then they were taken in glory to the new Christian heaven, with which the Lord's church on earth, the New Jerusalem, is to be linked.

* This section is repeated from AR 962.
** Restored from the parallel passage in AR 962.
*** The original has 43:24.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 189

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 189

189. CHAPTER FOUR

THE SACRED SCRIPTURE OR THE WORD OF THE LORD*

I

The sacred scripture, that is the Word, is Divine truth itself.

Everyone professes the Word to be from God, divinely inspired and therefore holy, but up to the present no one has known where in it the Divine is. For taken literally the Word looks like any ordinary book, written in a strange style, neither high-flown nor brilliant as many secular books appear to be. This is why if a person worships nature as God or in preference to God, so that his thought comes from himself and his own personality (proprium) rather than from heaven inspired by the Lord, he can easily fall into error about the Word and come to despise it. Thus he may say to himself when he reads it: 'What does this or that mean? Can this be divine? Can God, whose wisdom is infinite, talk like this? Where is there anything holy in it, and where does this holiness come from, except from religious belief and the conviction it carries?'

* The whole of this chapter is closely modelled on THE DOCTRINE OF THE SACRED SCRIPTURE, published in Amsterdam in 1763.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 190

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 190

sRef John@1 @4 S0' sRef John@6 @63 S0' sRef John@14 @6 S0' sRef John@6 @68 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef Rev@7 @17 S0' sRef John@7 @37 S0' sRef John@4 @14 S0' sRef John@4 @6 S0' sRef John@4 @10 S0' sRef Mark@13 @31 S0' sRef John@7 @38 S0' 190. The person who thinks like this fails to reflect that the Lord Jehovah, who is the God of heaven and earth, uttered the Word by means of Moses and the Prophets, and consequently it cannot be anything but Divine truth. For this is what everything is that the Lord Jehovah Himself speaks. He fails too to reflect that the Lord the Saviour, who is the same as Jehovah, uttered the Word in the Gospels, much of it from His own lips, and the remainder by the spirit of His mouth, which is the Holy Spirit, through His twelve Apostles. This is why, as He Himself says, His words contain spirit and life, and why He is the light that enlightens, and why He is truth. This is plain from the following passages:

Jesus said, The words which I speak to you are spirit and life. John 6:63. Jesus said to the woman at Jacob's well, if you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, Give me a drink, you would ask him, and he would give you living water. He who drinks of the water which I shall give, will never thirst, but the water which I shall give will become a well of water springing up in him to give everlasting life. John 4:6, 10, 14.

'Jacob's well' means the Word, as it also does in Deut. 33:28. That is why the Lord, being the Word, sat down there, and talked with the woman. 'Living water' means the truth of the Word.

Jesus said, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me, and drink. If anyone believes in me, as the scripture says, streams of living water will flow from his belly. John 7:37, 38.

Peter said to Jesus, You have the words of everlasting life. John 6:68. Jesus said, Heaven and earth will pass away; my words will not pass away. Mark 13:31.

The reason why the Lord's words are truth and life is that He is truth and life, as He teaches in John:

I am the way, truth and life. John 14:6.

In the same Gospel:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. John 1:1-4.

The Word means the Lord in respect of Divine truth, in which alone there is life and light. That is why the Word, which is from the Lord and is the Lord, is called 'a spring of living waters' (Jer. 2:13; 17:13; 31:9), 'a spring of deliverance' (Isa. 12:3), 'a spring' (Zech. 13:1) and 'a river of the water of life' (Rev. 22:1); and it is said that 'the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, [and bring them] to living springs of water' (Rev. 7:17). There are other passages too where the Word is called a 'sanctuary' and 'tabernacle*' in which the Lord dwells with man.

* Or: tent.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 191

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 191

191. But the natural man still cannot be convinced by these quotations that the Word is Divine truth itself, containing Divine wisdom and Divine life, because he looks at it from the point of view of its style, and in this he cannot see these things. However, the style of the Word is the actual style of God, beyond comparisons with any other style, however high-flown and magnificent. Such is the style of the Word that there is holiness in every sentence, every word, in some places even every letter. Thus the Word forms a link between man and the Lord, and opens the way to heaven. There are two things which proceed from the Lord, Divine love and Divine wisdom, or in other words Divine good and Divine truth. The Word is in its essence both of these; and because it forms a link between man and the Lord, and opens the way to heaven, as I have said, the Word therefore fills man with the good affections of love and the truths of wisdom, his will with good affections of love, his understanding with the truths of wisdom. This is how man has life by means of the Word. But it ought properly to be known that the only people to have life from the Word are those who read it with the intention of drawing Divine truths from it, like water from the spring, and at the same time with the intention of putting the Divine truths drawn from it into practice in their lives. The reverse happens to those whose only intention in reading the Word is to win honours and gain worldly advantages.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 192

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 192

192. Everyone who is unaware that the Word contains a spiritual sense, as the body contains a soul, can only judge the Word from its literal sense. Yet this is like a case full of precious goods; these are its spiritual sense. So as long as this internal sense remains unknown, one can no more judge the Divine holiness of the Word than one can a precious stone from the matrix in which it is embedded, and which sometimes looks like an ordinary stone; or from a chest made of jasper, lapis lazuli, amianthus (also called mica), or agate, but containing rows of diamonds, rubies, sardonyxes, oriental topazes, etc. So long as this remains unknown, it is no wonder that the chest is not valued more highly than the worth of its visible materials. It is similar with the literal sense in the Word. Therefore to prevent people from doubting that the Word is Divine and most holy, the Lord has revealed to me its internal sense, which in its essence is spiritual. This lies within the external or natural sense like the soul within the body. That sense is the spirit which gives life to the literal form. Consequently that sense can bear witness to the divinity and holiness of the Word, and convince even the natural man, if he is willing to be convinced.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 193

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 193

193. II

The Word contains a spiritual sense unknown up to the present.

Is there anyone who does not acknowledge and assent to the proposition that the Word, being Divine, is in its inmost spiritual? But who up to now has known what spiritual means, and where it is hidden in the Word? It will be shown in an experience recounted at the end of this chapter [280] what spiritual means; where it lies hidden in the Word will be revealed in the following paragraphs.

The reason why the Word is spiritual in its inmost is that it has come down from the Lord Jehovah and has passed through the heavens of the angels; and the actual divinity, which in itself is beyond expression and perception, has become as it came down adapted so as to permit angels, and finally men, to grasp it. Thus there is a spiritual sense, which is inside the natural sense like the soul in a person, or like the thinking of the understanding in speech, and the affection of the will in actions. If we may compare it with the kinds of things to be seen in the natural world, the spiritual sense is within the natural sense like the whole brain inside its membranes or integuments; or like the shoots of a tree within its bark and bast, or, rather, like everything needed to produce a chick inside the eggshell, and so on. But no one up to the present has guessed that the natural sense of the Word contains a spiritual sense of this kind. It is therefore necessary to make plain to the view of the understanding this secret, which is in itself far superior to all secrets disclosed so far. This can be achieved by expounding the matter in the following sequence:

(i) What the spiritual sense is.
(ii) This sense is present in every part and detail of the Word.
(iii) It is this which makes the Word divinely inspired and holy in every word.
(iv) This sense has up to the present been unknown.
(v) It will in future only be granted to those who are in possession of genuine truths from the Lord.
(vi) Remarkable effects produced by the Word from its spiritual sense.

These I shall now discuss one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 194

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 194

194. (i) WHAT THE SPIRITUAL SENSE IS.

The spiritual sense is not the one which transparently underlies the literal sense of the Word, when it is scrutinised and expounded to support some dogma of the church; such a sense can be called the literal sense of the Word as understood by the church. But the spiritual sense is not to be seen in the literal sense; it lies within it, like the soul in the body, or as what is thought by the understanding shows in the eyes, or as the affection of love shows in the face. This sense is the principal reason why the Word is spiritual, not only for human beings, but also for the angels. This is why this sense enables the Word to act as a channel of communication with the heavens. Since the Word is inwardly spiritual, it was composed simply by the use of correspondences; anything written by using correspondences emerges in its outermost sense as resembling the style used by the Prophets, the Gospels and Revelation. For all that it seems ordinary, it still has stored within it Divine wisdom and all the wisdom of the angels. The nature of correspondence may be seen from My HEAVEN AND HELL (published in London in 1758), where there is a section (87-102) on the correspondence of everything in heaven with everything in man, and another on the correspondence of everything in heaven with everything on earth (103-115); and it will be further demonstrated by the examples from the Word, which I shall quote below.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 195

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 195

195. From the Lord there proceed, one after the other, the celestial Divine, the spiritual Divine and the natural Divine. The name 'celestial Divine' is given to whatever proceeds from His Divine love, and it is good. The name 'spiritual Divine' is given to whatever proceeds from His Divine wisdom, and it is all truth. The natural Divine comes from both of these, being their totality at the outermost level. The angels of the celestial kingdom, which make up the third or highest heaven, are in the Divine called celestial which proceeds from the Lord, for they are in possession of the good of love coming from the Lord. The angels of the Lord's spiritual kingdom, who make up the second or middle heaven, are in the Divine called spiritual which proceeds from the Lord, for they are in possession of Divine wisdom coming from the Lord. The angels of the Lord's natural kingdom, who make up the first or lowest heaven, are in the Divine called natural which proceeds from the Lord, and they possess the faith of charity coming from the Lord. However, the people who make up the church are in one or other of those kingdoms, depending upon their love, wisdom and faith; and after death they come into the same kingdom as that in which they were previously. The pattern of heaven is repeated in the Word of the Lord. In its outermost sense it is natural, in a more inward sense spiritual, and in its inmost sense celestial, each sense being Divine. It is consequently suitable for the angels of the three heavens and also for men.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 196

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 196

sRef Rev@19 @11 S1' sRef Rev@19 @16 S1' sRef Rev@19 @17 S1' sRef Rev@19 @18 S1' sRef Rev@19 @15 S1' sRef Rev@19 @14 S1' sRef Rev@19 @13 S1' sRef Rev@19 @12 S1' 196. (ii) THE SPIRITUAL SENSE IS PRESENT IN EVERY PART AND DETAIL OF THE WORD.

This can be seen by examples, such as the following. John says in Revelation:

I saw heaven open, and there was a white horse; and he who sat on it was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and fights. And his eyes were a flame of fire; and on his head were many diadems. He had a name written, which no one but he knows. And he was clothed in a garment dyed in blood; and his name is called The Word of God. His armies in heaven followed him on white horses, clothed in white, clean linen. He has written on his garment and on his thigh his name: King of kings and Lord of lords. I saw further an angel standing in the sun, who cried in a loud voice, Come and gather for the great feast, to eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of captains and the flesh of strong men, and the flesh of horses and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all free men and slaves, both small and great. Rev. 19:11-18.

No one can see what all this means except from the spiritual sense of the Word; and no one can see this except by knowing the correspondences. For every word corresponds to something and not one is without meaning. A knowledge of correspondences shows the meaning of 'a white horse', 'him who sat on it', 'eyes like a flame of fire', the 'diadems' on his head, 'the garment dyed in blood', 'the white linen' worn by His army in heaven, 'the angel standing in the sun', 'the great feast' to which they were to come and gather, as well as 'the flesh of kings and captains' and many more, which they were to eat.

sRef Rev@17 @14 S2' [2] The meaning in the spiritual sense of all these details has been expounded in My APOCALYPSE REVEALED (820-838), and my short work THE WHITE HORSE, so it would be superfluous to expound them further. It was shown there that this is a description of the Lord as the Word. His eyes like a flame of fire mean the Divine wisdom of His Divine love. The diadems on His head and the name which no one but He knows mean the Divine truths in the Word which come from Him, and that no one sees what the Word is like in its spiritual sense except the Lord and those to whom He reveals it. A garment dyed in blood means the natural sense of the Word, that is, the literal sense, to which violence was done. It is quite plain that it is the Word which is so described, for it says 'His name is called The Word of God.' It is also quite plain that it is the Lord who is meant, for it says that the name of him who sat on the white horse was 'King of kings and Lord of lords', much as in Revelation 17:14, where it says: 'And the Lamb shall overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings'.

[3] The spiritual sense of the Word being laid bare at the end of the church is what is meant not only by what is said about the white horse and him who sat on it, but also by the great feast, to which the angel standing in the sun invited all to come, and to eat the flesh of kings and captains, etc.; this means making one's own all the kinds of good given by the Lord. All the expressions used there would be meaningless, devoid of life and spirit, if they did not inwardly contain a spiritual sense, just as the body contains a soul.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 197

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 197

197. In Revelation, chapter 21, the New Jerusalem is described as having in it a source of light like a most precious stone, similar to the jasper stone, shining like crystal. It had a great and high wall with twelve gates, and twelve angels above the gates, and the names inscribed of the twelve tribes of the Children of Israel. The wall was one hundred and forty-four cubits, which is the measure of a man, that is, an angel. The material of the wall was jasper, and its foundation of every precious stone, jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, sardonyx, sardius, chrysolite, beryl, topaz, chrysoprase, jacinth and amethyst. Its gates were twelve pearls. The city itself was of pure gold, resembling clear glass; and it was four-square, its length, width and height all equal, twelve thousand stades*, and other details [Rev. 21:11, 12, 16-21].

All this must be understood spiritually, as is evident from the fact that the New Jerusalem means the new church which is to be founded by the Lord, as shown in APOCALYPSE REVEALED (880). Since Jerusalem there means the church, it follows that everything which is said of that city, its gates, its wall, their foundations, and its measurements contain a spiritual sense, because anything that relates to the church is spiritual. Their meaning was demonstrated in APOCALYPSE REVEALED (896-925), so it is unnecessary to pursue this demonstration here. It is enough to know from this that the details of the description contain a spiritual sense, as the body does a soul. Without that sense nothing of what is written there could be understood as referring to the church; for instance, that the city was of pure gold, its gates were of pearls, its wall of jasper, the foundations of the wall of precious stones, the wall measured one hundred and forty-four cubits, which is the measure of a man, that is, an angel; and the city was twelve thousand stades in length, width and height, and so forth. Anyone who knows the spiritual sense from a knowledge of correspondences can understand these statements; as for instance, the wall and its foundations mean the doctrines of that church derived from the literal sense of the Word; and the numbers twelve, one hundred and forty-four, and twelve thousand mean everything belonging to it, truths as well as various kinds of good, all taken together.

* See note on 179; i.e. about 1350 miles.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 198

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 198

sRef Isa@13 @9 S0' sRef Isa@13 @11 S0' sRef Isa@13 @10 S0' sRef Matt@24 @30 S0' sRef Matt@24 @31 S0' sRef Joel@2 @2 S0' sRef Joel@2 @10 S0' sRef Ezek@32 @8 S0' sRef Matt@24 @29 S0' sRef Ezek@32 @7 S0' sRef Joel@2 @1 S0' 198. Where the Lord speaks in the presence of His disciples about the ending of the age, meaning the last stage of the church, He says towards the end of the predictions of its successive changes of state:

Immediately after the affliction of those days the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then will the sign of the Son of Man appear in the sky, and all the tribes of the earth will wail; and they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send forth angels with a loud blast of the trumpet, and they will gather His chosen from the four winds from one end of the heavens to the other. Matt. 24:29-31.

In the spiritual sense this does not mean that the sun and the moon will be darkened, stars will fall from the sky, and the Lord's sign will appear in the skies, and that they will see Him in the clouds accompanied by angels with trumpets. All the expressions here have spiritual meanings referring to the church; and they describe its state at its end. In the spiritual sense the sun, which will be darkened, means love to the Lord. The moon, which will not give its light, means faith in Him. The stars which will fall from the sky, mean items of knowledge concerning truth and good. The sign of the Son of Man in the sky means the Divine truth given by Him in the Word being made visible. The tribes of the earth, who will wail, means the failure of all truth to do with faith and of all good to do with love. The coming of the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven with power and glory means the Lord's presence and His revelation in the Word. The clouds of heaven mean the literal sense of the Word, the glory the spiritual sense of the Word. The angels with the loud blast of the trumpet mean heaven from which Divine truth comes. Gathering the chosen from the four winds from one end of the heavens to the other means the new heaven and the new church, composed of those who have faith in the Lord and live in accordance with His commandments. It is quite plain that the darkening of the sun and the moon is not meant, nor the falling of stars to earth, because of the Prophets, where similar statements are made about the state of the church at the time the Lord was to come into the world. For instance, in Isaiah:

Behold the fierce day of Jehovah will come and the blaze of His anger. The stars of the skies and their constellations will not shine with their light, the sun will be darkened in its rising, and the moon will not cause its light (lumen) to shine, I shall visit upon the world its wickedness. Isa. [13:9-11;] 24: 21, 23.

In Joel:

The day of Jehovah is coming, a day of darkness and murk. The sun and the moon will be turned black, and the stars will abate their shining. Joel 2:1, 2, 10; 3:15.

In Ezekiel:

I shall cover the heavens and make the stars black. I shall cover the sun with a cloud and the moon will not cause it light to shine. I shall darken all the luminaries that give light, and make darkness upon the earth. Ezek. 32:7, 8.

The day of Jehovah means the Lord's coming, which took place when there was no more good of love and truth of faith left in the church, nor any knowledge of the Lord. That is why it is called a day of darkness and murk.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 199

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 199

sRef Matt@25 @4 S0' sRef Matt@25 @3 S0' sRef Matt@25 @12 S0' sRef Matt@25 @6 S0' sRef Matt@25 @5 S0' sRef Matt@25 @9 S0' sRef Matt@25 @10 S0' sRef Matt@25 @2 S0' sRef Matt@25 @1 S0' sRef Matt@25 @11 S0' sRef Matt@25 @7 S0' sRef Matt@25 @8 S0' 199. The Lord, when He was in the world, spoke by means of correspondences; so He spoke spiritually as well as naturally. This can be proved by His parables, the individual expressions of which contain a spiritual sense. Let us take as an example the parable of the ten virgins. He said:

The kingdom of the heavens is like ten virgins, who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were wise, but five were foolish. The foolish ones, when they took their lamps, failed to take oil, but the wise ones took oil in their lamps. But when the bridegroom was late, they all became drowsy and went to sleep. However, in the middle of the night a cry went up, Look, the bridegroom is coming, go out to meet him. Then all those virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps. But the foolish ones said to the wise ones, Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out. The wise ones, however, replied and said, Perhaps there may not be enough for us and for you; go rather to the sellers and buy some for yourselves. While they were away buying it, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut. At length the other virgins came too, and said, Lord, Lord, open the door to us. But he replied and said, In truth I tell you, I do not know you. Matt. 25:1-12.

No one who does not know that there is a spiritual sense, and what sort of sense it is, can see that each of these details contains a spiritual sense, and therefore a Divine holiness. In the spiritual sense the kingdom of the heavens means heaven and the church, the bridegroom means the Lord, the wedding the Lord's marriage with heaven and the church by means of the good of love and the truth of faith. The virgins mean those who belong to the church, ten means all, five a part. The lamps mean things to do with faith, oil things to do with the good of love. Sleeping and waking mean a person's life in the world, which is natural, and his life after death, which is spiritual. Buying means acquiring, going to the sellers and buying oil means acquiring the good of love from others after death. Because it cannot then any longer be acquired, although they came with their lamps and the oil they had bought to the door where the wedding was, still the bridegroom told them, I do not know you. This is because after his life in the world a person remains such as his life in the world made him. It is plain from this that the Lord spoke purely in correspondences, and this was because He spoke from the Divine which was in Him and was His. It is because virgins stand for those who belong to the church that we find so often in the prophetic parts of the Word mention of the virgin and daughter of Zion, of Jerusalem, of Judah, or of Israel, and it was because oil stands for the good of love, that all the holy things of that church were anointed with oil. It is the same in the rest of the parables and in every expression which the Lord used; thus it is that the Lord says that His words are spirit and life (John 6:63).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 200

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 200

200. (iii) IT IS THE SPIRITUAL SENSE WHICH MAKES THE WORD DIVINELY INSPIRED AND HOLY IN EVERY WORD.

People in the church say that the Word is holy, and that this is because the Lord Jehovah spoke it. But because its holiness is not apparent in the literal sense by itself, if anyone for this reason once begins to doubt its holiness, he finds, when he subsequently reads the Word, much there to support his belief; for he says to himself: 'Surely this cannot be holy? Surely this is not Divine.' Therefore, to prevent this way of thinking from affecting a large number of people and then becoming prevalent, so that the Word would be rejected as a worthless book and the link it makes between such a person and the Lord would be broken, it is the Lord's good pleasure now to reveal its spiritual sense, in order that it may be known where the Divine holiness is hidden within it. Let us take examples to illustrate this.

At various places in the Word there is talk of Egypt, Assyria, Edom, Moab, the Children of Ammon, the Philistines, Tyre and Sidon, and Gog. Anyone who does not know that their names stand for matters that relate to heaven and the church, may be led into the erroneous belief that the Word has much to say about peoples and nations, and only a little about heaven and the church, much, that is, on worldly subjects and little on heavenly ones. But when he knows what is meant by these peoples or their names, he can be rescued from his error and brought back to the true belief.

[2] It is similar when one sees in the Word so many mentions of a garden, a grove, a wood, or the trees in them, such as the olive, the vine, the cedar, the poplar or the oak; or so many mentions of the lamb, the sheep, the goat, the calf or the ox; or of mountains, hills, valleys and the springs, rivers and waters in them, or many other similar things. Anyone who knows nothing of the spiritual sense of the Word cannot help thinking that it is merely these things which are intended. For he is unaware that garden, grove and wood mean wisdom, intelligence and knowledge, or that olive, vine, cedar, poplar and oak mean the good and truth of the church in their celestial, spiritual, rational, natural and sensual forms. Nor does he know that lamb, sheep, goat, calf and ox mean innocence, charity and natural affection; or that mountains, hills and valleys mean the highest, lower and lowest elements in the church. [3] Nor does he know that Egypt means factual knowledge, Assyria the faculty of reason, Edom the natural level, Moab the adulteration of good, the Children of Ammon the adulteration of truth, the Philistines faith without charity, Tyre and Sidon the knowledge of good and of truth, Gog external worship without any internal. In general, Jacob in the Word means the natural church, Israel the spiritual church, Judah the celestial church. When one knows all these meanings, it is possible to reflect that the Word speaks only of heavenly matters, and those worldly matters are merely the underlying supports for the others. Let us take an example from the Word to illustrate this point too.

sRef Isa@19 @25 S4' sRef Isa@19 @23 S4' sRef Isa@19 @24 S4' [4] We read in Isaiah:

On that day there shall be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, so that Assyria may come to Egypt and Egypt to Assyria, and the Egyptians may serve with Assyria. On that day Israel shall be a third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth; and Jehovah Zebaoth shall bless them, saying, Blessed is Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my inheritance. Isa. 19:23-25.

In the spiritual sense this passage means that at the time of the Lord's coming factual knowledge, the faculty of reason and the spiritual will make one; and factual knowledge will then serve the faculty of reason and both of these will serve the spiritual. For, as said before, Egypt means factual knowledge, Assyria the faculty of reason and Israel the spiritual. The twice repeated mention of the day refers to the Lord's first and second comings.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 201

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 201

201. (iv) THE SPIRITUAL SENSE OF THE WORD HAS UP TO THE PRESENT BEEN UNKNOWN.

I showed in my book HEAVEN AND HELL (87-105), that every single thing to be found in nature corresponds to something spiritual, and likewise every single part of the human body. But up to the present it has remained unknown what correspondence is. Yet in the most ancient times it was very well known; for those who lived at that period regarded the knowledge of correspondences as the outstanding science, and it was so universally known that all their documents and books were written by means of correspondences. The book of Job, which is a book of the Ancient Church, is full of correspondences The hieroglyphic writings of the Egyptians, as well as the myths of the most ancient peoples, were nothing else. All the ancient churches served to represent spiritual ideas; their rites and the rules which governed the establishment of their modes of worship were made up of nothing but correspondences. The same is true of all the details of the church among the Children of Israel. Their burnt offerings, sacrifices, sacrificial cakes and libations in all their particulars had meaning as correspondences; likewise the tabernacle and all its contents, as well as their festivals, such as the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of tabernacles and the feast of first-fruits, and also the priesthood of Aaron and the Levites, together with their holy vestments. I have shown in ARCANA CAELESTIA (published in London) what were the spiritual ideas to which all these things correspond. In addition to these, all the laws and judgments governing their worship and way of life had meaning as correspondences. Now since Divine ideas are presented in the world as correspondences, this and no other is the way the Word was written. Therefore the Lord, since He spoke from the Divine, spoke in correspondences. For whatever is Divine descends at the natural level into the kind of things which correspond to Divine ones, and then contain in their inmost the Divine things called celestial and spiritual.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 202

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 202

202. I have been taught that the people of the Most Ancient church, which existed before the flood, had such heavenly characters that they conversed with angels in heaven. They were able to do this by correspondences. So they reached such a pitch of wisdom that they not only thought naturally about anything they saw on earth, but at the same time also thought spiritually about it, and this established their link with angels in heaven. I was also taught that Enoch, who is mentioned in Genesis 5:21-24, together with his colleagues collected these correspondences by listening to their talk, and transmitted this science to posterity. As a result the science of correspondences was not merely known but held in high esteem in many Asiatic kingdoms, especially in the land of Canaan, Egypt, Assyria, Chaldaea, Syria, Arabia, Tyre, Sidon and Nineveh. From there it was transmitted to Greece, but was there transformed into myths, as is evident in the earliest Greek authors.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 203

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 203

203. To show that the science of correspondences was long preserved among the nations of Asia, by those who were called soothsayers and wise men, in some cases scorcerers, I should like to quote one example from 1 Samuel, chapters 5 and 6. There is there a description of how the Ark containing the two tables on which the Ten Commandments were inscribed was captured by the Philistines and placed in the shrine of Dagon in Ashdod. Dagon fell to the ground in the presence of the Ark, and later his head torn from the body, together with the palms of his hands, was found lying on the threshold of the shrine. On account of the Ark the people of Ashdod and of Ekron to the number of several thousand were smitten with haemorrhoids, and their territory was laid waste by rats. Consequently the Philistines summoned satraps* and soothsayers, and as a remedy for their plague they decreed that they were to make five models of haemorrhoids and five models of rats out of gold, and a new wagon, and to put the Ark upon it, with the gold haemorrhoids and rats next to it. Then the Ark was to be sent back to the Children of Israel pulled by two cows, which lowed on the way before the wagon. The Children of Israel sacrificed the cows and the wagon, and by this the God of Israel was propitiated.

[2] It is clear from their meaning that all these details were thought up by the Philistines' soothsayers as correspondences. The meanings are as follows. The Philistines themselves mean those whose faith is separated from charity; Dagon symbolised their religion. The haemorrhoids with which they were smitten meant natural loves, which, when separated from spiritual love, are unclean. The rats meant the wasting of the church by falsifying truth. The new wagon meant the natural teaching of the church, for a vehicle in the Word means teaching derived from spiritual truths. The cows meant natural good affections. The haemorrhoids made of gold meant natural loves which have been purified and made good. The rats made of gold meant the wasting of the church being removed by good, since gold in the Word means good. The lowing of the cows on the way meant the difficult transformation of the evil longings of the natural man into good affections. The cows together with the wagon being sacrificed as a burnt-offering meant that the God of Israel was by this propitiated. All these things which the Philistines did on the advice of their soothsayers were correspondences; and this shows plainly that the science of correspondences was long preserved among the gentiles.

* 'Priests' in most versions of the Bible.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 204

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 204

204. Since the representative rites of the church, which were correspondences, began in the course of time to be turned into idolatrous practices, and also into magical rites, the Lord's Divine providence ensured that the science should be gradually lost, and among the Israelite and Jewish people totally wiped out. This people's worship consisted purely of correspondences, and was therefore representative of heavenly things; but still they were unaware what each detail meant. For they were purely natural people, so that they neither wished nor were able to have any knowledge of spiritual and celestial things. Consequently they could not know anything about correspondences, since these are the use of natural objects to represent spiritual and celestial things.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 205

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 205

205. The reason why the idolatrous practices of the gentiles in antiquity originated from the science of correspondences was that everything to be seen on earth has a corresponding meaning; this is true not only of trees, but also animals and birds of every kind, as well as fish and other things. The ancient people who possessed the science of correspondences made themselves images to correspond to heavenly ideas; and they took pleasure in them because they stood for such things as concern heaven and the church. They placed these images therefore not only in their temples, but also in their houses, not so as to worship them, but to call to mind the heavenly ideas they stood for. Hence it was that in Egypt and elsewhere they used images of calves, oxen and snakes, not to mention children, old men and young women. Calves and oxen meant the affections and powers of the natural man, snakes the prudence and craftiness of the man who relies upon his senses. Children meant innocence and charity, old men wisdom, young women affections for truth, and so on. Once the knowledge of correspondences had been wiped out, their descendants started to worship as holy, and finally as deities, the images and statues their ancestors had erected, because they were in or near temples. This too was the reason why the ancients worshipped in gardens and plantations, depending on the species of tree, as well as on mountains and hills. Gardens and plantations meant wisdom and intelligence, and each tree meant some particular detail of them. For instance, the olive meant the good of love, the vine truth coming from that good, the cedar rational good and truth; a mountain meant the highest heaven and a hill the heaven below this.

[2] The fact that the science of correspondences was preserved among a number of eastern peoples right down to the Lord's coming can be established by the wise men from the east, who came to visit the Lord at the time of His birth; therefore the star went before them, and they brought gifts with them, gold, frankincense and myrrh (Matt. 2:1, 2, 9-11). The star which went before them meant knowledge learned from heaven, gold celestial good, frankincense spiritual good, and myrrh natural good; it is these three kinds of good which are the source of all worship. Nonetheless correspondences were totally unknown to the Israelite and Jewish people, even though all the details of their worship, all their laws and judgments given them by Moses, and everything in the Word were nothing but correspondences. The reason was that they were at heart idolatrous, and therefore of such a character that they did not even want to know that anything in their worship had a celestial or spiritual meaning, since they believed that these things were all in themselves holy. If therefore the celestial and spiritual meanings had been revealed to them, they would not only have rejected them, but also profaned them. On account of this heaven was so closed to them that they scarcely knew that there was an everlasting life. The truth of this is perfectly plain from the fact that they failed to acknowledge the Lord, even though the whole of Sacred Scripture was a prophecy about Him and foretold His coming. The only reason why they rejected Him was that He taught them about a kingdom in heaven, not one on earth. For they wanted a Messiah who would make them superior to all peoples throughout the world, not one who would provide for their eternal salvation.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 206

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 206

206. The reason why the science of correspondences, which allows one to grasp the spiritual sense of the Word, was not revealed after this period was that the Christians of the earliest church were very simple people, so it could not be revealed to them, since, had it been, it would not have been understood and would have been of no use to them. After their times darkness arose to cover the whole Christian world, first by the spread of a number of heresies, and soon afterwards by the decisions and decrees of the Council of Nicaea, about the existence of three Divine Persons from eternity, and about the Person of Christ as being the Son of Mary and not the Son of Jehovah God. That is the source from which gushed forth the current belief in justification, according to which three gods are approached in turn. On this belief depends every single detail of the church to-day, just as all the parts of the body are dependent upon the head. Because they used everything in the Word to prove this erroneous belief, the spiritual sense could not be revealed, for had it been, they would have used this sense for the same purpose. By this they would have profaned the very holiness of the Word, and thus completely closed heaven to themselves and banished the Lord from the church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 207

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 207

207. The science of correspondences, which allows the spiritual sense to be grasped, has been revealed at the present time, because the Divine truths of the church are now coming into light, and it is of these that the spiritual sense of the Word consists. When people possess these, the literal sense of the Word cannot be corrupted. The literal sense of the Word can be bent in either direction; if it is bent towards falsehood, then its inward, and with it its outward, holiness is destroyed. But if it is bent towards truth, its holiness is maintained. But I shall have more to say on this subject in the following pages.

The opening out of the spiritual sense at the present time is meant by John's vision of heaven being opened and of a white horse, and also by his seeing and hearing an angel standing in the sun, inviting all to a great feast, as described in Revelation (19:11-18). The fact that for a long time it would not be recognised is meant by the beast and the kings of the earth, who were going to make war on the rider of the white horse (Rev. 19:19); and also by the dragon's pursuit into the desert of the woman who had borne a son, and there emitting water from its mouth like a river, to drown her (Rev. '12:13-17).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 208

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 208

208. (v) THE SPIRITUAL SENSE OF THE WORD WILL IN FUTURE ONLY BE GRANTED TO THOSE WHO ARE IN POSSESSION OF GENUINE TRUTHS FROM THE LORD.

The reason is that no one can see the spiritual sense, except only if it is granted him by the Lord, and if he is in possession of Divine truths given by the Lord. For the spiritual sense of the Word is solely concerned with the Lord and His kingdom. That is the sense known to His angels in heaven, since it contains His Divine truth. A person who knows the science of correspondences, and wants to use his own intelligence to explore the spiritual sense of the Word, can do violence to this Divine truth. For a knowledge of a few correspondences will enable him to corrupt that sense, and even misapply it to proving false propositions. This would be to do violence to Divine truth, and thus to heaven where that truth resides. Therefore if anyone wishes to lay bare that sense, relying on himself instead of on the Lord, heaven is closed to him, and this results in his being unable to see any truth at all, or becoming spiritually deranged.

Another reason is that the Lord teaches every person by means of the Word, and uses in teaching the knowledge he already has, rather than directly implanting new knowledge. Therefore, if a person is not in possession of Divine truths, or only a few truths accompanied by false notions, he can use these to falsify the truths. This too is what all heretics do with the literal sense of the Word. So to prevent anyone coming into possession of the spiritual sense and perverting genuine truth, the Lord has established guards, who are meant by the cherubim in the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 209

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 209

209. (vi) REMARKABLE EFFECTS PRODUCED BY THE WORD FROM ITS SPIRITUAL SENSE.

In the natural world the Word does not produce any remarkable effects, because the spiritual sense is not evident there, and is not inwardly accepted by a person in its real form. In the spiritual world, however, remarkable effects can be seen produced by the Word, because all the people there are spiritual, and spiritual things affect people just as natural things do natural people. There are many remarkable effects produced by the Word in the spiritual world, a few of which I shall describe here.

The Word itself kept in the sanctuaries of churches there is seen by the angels shining like a great star, at times resembling the sun, and the most beautiful rainbows are to be seen produced by its radiance. This happens as soon as the sanctuary is opened.

aRef Ex@34 @29 S2' [2] I was able to establish that every single truth in the Word shines from the fact that, if a verse from the Word is written out on a piece of paper and the paper is tossed into the air, the paper itself shines, outlining the shape into which it has been cut. Spirits are therefore able to use the Word to make various shining shapes, including birds and fishes. Something even more remarkable is that when anyone rubs his face, his hands or the clothes he is wearing with the open Word, putting the writing against them, his face, hands and clothes shine, as if he were standing in a star with its light streaming round him. I have often seen this happen to my astonishment. This showed me how it was that Moses' face shone when he carried down the tablets of the covenant from Mount Sinai.

[3] Apart from these there are many more remarkable effects in the spiritual world produced by the Word. For instance, if someone who is full of false notions looks towards the Word as it lies in its holy place, thick darkness descends upon his eyes making the Word look black to him, at times as if coated in soot. If the same person touches the Word, there is a loud explosion and he is hurled into the corner of the room, where he lies for some time as if dead. If anyone full of false notions copies out anything from the Word on a piece of paper, and then tosses the paper up towards heaven, then there is a similar explosion in the air between his eye and heaven, and the paper is shredded and disappears. The result is the same, if the paper is thrown towards the angel* who stands near by. I have seen this happen many times.

[4] This has made it plain to me that there can be no communication with heaven by means of the Word for those who have false notions about doctrine; their reading falls apart on the way up and vanishes, like gunpowder wrapped in a screw of paper, set alight and tossed into the air. The opposite is the case with those who have true ideas about doctrine, learned from the Lord by means of the Word; when they read the Word it reaches all the way to heaven and makes a link with angels there. The angels themselves, when they come down from heaven to perform a duty below, appear to be surrounded by small stars, especially round their heads; this is a sign that they possess Divine truths from the Word.

[5] Moreover, the spiritual world contains similar things to those on earth, but every one of them has a spiritual origin. So there are gold and silver there too, and precious stones of all kinds. The spiritual origin of these is the literal sense of the Word. That is why in Revelation the foundations of the wall of the New Jerusalem are described as of twelve precious stones. The reason is that the foundations of its wall mean the teachings of the new church derived from the literal sense of the Word. That too is why the ephod of Aaron contained twelve precious stones called Urim and Thummim, and replies were given from heaven by means of them.

In addition, there are still more remarkable effects produced by the Word, relating to the power of truth there, which is so immense that no one would believe a description. Its power there is enough to overturn mountains and hills, carry them to a distance, throw them into the sea, and other things. In short, the Lord's power derived from the Word is boundless.

* An emendation for 'corner' (reading angelum for angulum); cf. 164.6-7.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 210

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 210

210. III

The literal sense of the Word is the basis, container and support of its spiritual and celestial senses.

Everything Divine contains a first, middle and last; the first passes through the middle to the last, and so it comes into and remains in existence; the last is consequently its basis. The first is also present in the middle term, and through this in the last. So the last is a container; and because it is a container and basis, it is also a support. An educated reader will grasp that those three terms can be named end, cause and effect; and also being, becoming and coming-into-being; the end is being, the cause is becoming and the effect is coming-into-being. Consequently everything contains a triad, called first, middle and last, or end, cause and effect. When this is grasped, it will also be grasped that every Divine work is complete and perfect in its last, and that the last contains everything, because the prior terms are simultaneously present in it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 211

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 211

sRef 1Sam@20 @41 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @39 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @22 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @23 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @38 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @40 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @35 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @31 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @29 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @30 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @34 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @6 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @32 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @33 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @28 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @24 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @25 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @37 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @36 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @27 S0' sRef 1Ki@17 @21 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @26 S0' sRef 1Ki@18 @34 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @21 S0' sRef Matt@26 @42 S0' sRef Matt@26 @43 S0' sRef Matt@26 @40 S0' sRef Matt@26 @41 S0' sRef Matt@26 @44 S0' sRef Matt@13 @33 S0' sRef Isa@20 @3 S0' sRef Matt@26 @61 S0' sRef Jonah@1 @17 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @7 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @8 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @5 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @4 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @3 S0' sRef Matt@26 @34 S0' sRef Matt@26 @39 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @2 S0' sRef 1Sam@3 @1 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @15 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @16 S0' sRef Matt@28 @1 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @14 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @42 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @19 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @20 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @17 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @18 S0' sRef John@21 @15 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @13 S0' sRef John@21 @17 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @5 S0' sRef 1Sam@20 @12 S0' sRef John@21 @16 S0' 211. That is why three in the Word means in the spiritual sense complete and perfect, as well as the whole taken together. This meaning of the number three explains why it is used so many times in the Word, whenever anything of this sort is mentioned; for instance, in the following passages. Isaiah was told to go naked and barefoot for three years (Isa. 20:3). Jehovah called Samuel three times, and Samuel three times ran to Eli, and the third time Eli understood (1 Sam. 3:1-8). Jonathan told David to hide in the country for three days; Jonathan later shot three arrows beside the stone, and David then bowed down three times before Jonathan (1 Sam. 20:5, 12-42). Elijah measured his length three times upon the widow's son (1 Kings 17:21). Elijah ordered them to pour water on the burnt-offering three times (1 Kings 18:34). Jesus said that the kingdom of the heavens is like yeast, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole should be leavened (Matt. 13:33). Jesus said to Peter that he would deny Him three times (Matt. 26:34). Jesus said three times to Peter, Do you love me? (John 21:15-17). Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17). Jesus said that they would destroy the Temple and He would rebuild it in three days ([John 2:19;] Matt. 26:61). In Gethsemane Jesus prayed three times (Matt. 26:39-44). Jesus rose again on the third day (Matt. 28:1). There are many other passages where the number three is mentioned, in each case where a finished and perfect work is described, because this is the meaning of that number.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 212

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 212

212. There are three heavens, the highest, the middle and the lowest. The highest heaven makes up the Lord's celestial kingdom, the middle heaven His spiritual kingdom, the lowest heaven His natural kingdom. Just as there are three heavens, there are three senses in the Word, a celestial, a spiritual and a natural sense. What was said above in 210 applies to these too; that is to say, the first is contained in the middle and through the middle in the last, exactly as the end is contained in the cause and through the cause in the effect. This makes plain the nature of the Word; its literal sense, which is natural, contains an interior sense which is spiritual, and this contains an inmost sense which is celestial. Thus the last sense, the natural one called the literal sense, is the container, basis and support of the two interior senses.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 213

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 213

sRef Isa@4 @5 S0' 213. It follows from this that the Word without its literal sense would be like a palace without any foundations, a palace built not on land but in the air, which would be the mere evanescent shadow of a palace. The Word without its literal sense would be like a church containing a number of sacred objects and in its centre a sanctuary, but devoid of the roof and walls which hold it together. If they were missing or removed, the sacred objects would be stolen by thieves and ruined by land animals or the birds of the air, and thus scattered. It would also be like the Tabernacle of the Children of Israel in the desert (in the inmost part of which was the Ark of the Covenant, and in its midst a golden lampstand, a golden altar bearing incense and a table for the bread of the Presence), if this were stripped of its outer covering, that is, curtains, veils and posts. Rather, the Word without its literal sense would resemble the human body without its outer covering called skin, or its framework called bones. If deprived of these two, all the contents of the body would fall apart. Again it would be like the heart and lungs in the chest deprived of their covering called the pleura, and its supports called ribs. Or like the brain without its coverings called the dura and pia mater and without its general covering, container and support called the skull. That is what the Word would be like without the literal sense, and this is why it is said in Isaiah that Jehovah creates a covering over all glory (Isa. 4:5).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 214

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 214

sRef John@6 @63 S0' 214. IV

The Divine truth in the literal sense of the Word is in its fulness, holiness and power.

The Word in its literal sense is in its fulness, holiness and power, because the two prior or interior senses, called the spiritual and celestial senses, are simultaneously present in the natural or literal sense, as stated above (210, 212). But it needs to be explained further in what way they are simultaneously present. In heaven and in the world there exist two kinds of order, successive and simultaneous order. In the case of successive order one comes after and follows the other from highest to lowest; in simultaneous order, however, one is alongside the other from inmost to outermost. Successive order is like a column which spreads out in steps from top to bottom; but simultaneous order is like an object made up of cohering rings from centre to outermost surface.

[2] It must now be explained how at the lowest level successive order becomes simultaneous. It is like this. The highest levels of a successive order become the inmost parts of a simultaneous order, and the lowest levels of a successive order become the outermost parts of a simultaneous order. This can be illustrated by a stepped column subsiding to become a coherent object in a single plane. So the simultaneous is formed from the successive, and this operates in every single thing in the natural world, and in every single thing in the spiritual world. For everywhere there is a first, middle and last, and the first reaches out through the middle and advances towards its last. But it needs to be clearly understood that it is degrees of purity which determine the development of either order.

[3] Now if we apply this to the Word, the celestial, spiritual and natural proceed from the Lord in successive order, and are in simultaneous order at the last level. So that is how the celestial and spiritual senses of the Word are simultaneously present in its natural sense. Once this has been grasped, it can be seen how the natural sense of the Word is the container, basis and support of its spiritual and celestial senses, as well as how Divine good and Divine truth are present in the literal sense of the Word in their fulness, holiness and power. From this it can be established that the Word in its literal sense is the real Word, for it contains in itself spirit and life. This is what the Lord said:

The words which I speak to you are spirit and life. John 6:63.

For the Lord uttered His words in their natural sense. The celestial and spiritual senses without the natural sense are not the Word, for that would be like spirit and life without a body; and they are (as said before in 213) like a palace which has no foundations.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 215

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 215

215. The truths in the literal sense of the Word are in part not bare truths, but appearances of truth. They are like similes and comparative analogies taken from appearances in the natural world. Thus they are adapted and brought down to the level at which they may be understood by simple people and even children. But because they are at the same time correspondences, they serve to receive and make a home for genuine truth. They are containers in the sense that a crystal cup is a container of vintage wine, a silver salver of tempting foods; or like the clothes which we wear, whether a baby's shawls or the pretty dresses of a girl. They are also like the facts stored in the memory of the natural man, which include his perception of and affections for spiritual truth. The bare truths themselves which are wrapped, contained, clothed and grasped, exist in the spiritual sense of the Word; the bare forms of good exist in its celestial sense. But illustrations must be given from the Word.

sRef Matt@23 @25 S2' sRef Matt@23 @26 S2' [2] Jesus said:

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, because you clean the outside of the cup and dish, but the insides are full of robbery and intemperence. You blind Pharisee, clean first the inside of the cup and dish, so that the outside too may be clean. Matt. 23:25, 26.

In saying this the Lord spoke in similes and comparisons which are at the same time correspondences. When He said 'the cup and dish', cup not only means but stands for the truth of the Word, since cup implies wine and wine stands for truth. Dish, however, implies food, and food stands for good. Therefore cleaning the inside of the cup and dish means purifying the interior parts of the mind, the seats of will and thought, by means of the Word. 'So that the outside may be clean' means that in this way the exterior things too, what we do and say, are purified, for their essence is drawn from the interior.

sRef Luke@16 @19 S3' sRef Luke@16 @20 S3' [3] Again Jesus said:

There was a certain rich man who dressed in purple and fine linen, and feasted magnificently every day; and there was a poor man named Lazarus, who lay in his entrance porch full of sores. Luke 16:19, 20.

Here too the Lord spoke in similes and comparisons which were correspondences and had a spiritual content. The rich man means the Jewish nation, which is called rich, because it possessed the Word containing spiritual riches. The purple and fine linen which he wore mean the good and truth of the Word, purple its good and fine linen its truth. Feasting magnificently every day means taking pleasure in having the Word, and hearing many things from it in their temples and synagogues. The poor man Lazarus means the gentiles who did not possess the Word. The contempt and rejection they suffered at the hands of the Jews are meant by Lazarus lying in the entrance porch of the rich man. Full of sores means that the gentiles were plagued by many false notions due to their ignorance of truth.

[4] The reason the gentiles were meant by Lazarus was that the gentiles were loved by the Lord, just as Lazarus, who was revived after being dead, was loved by the Lord (John 11:3, 5, 36). He is also called the Lord's friend (John 11: 11), and he reclined at table with the Lord (John 12:2). These two passages show plainly that the truths and kinds of good in the literal sense of the Word are like vessels and garments serving to clothe bare good and truth, which both lie hidden in the spiritual and celestial senses of the Word.

The Word being like this in the literal sense, it follows that those who possess Divine truths, and believe that the Word inwardly in its depths is something holy and Divine, and more so those who believe that the Word is like this because of its spiritual and celestial senses, these people, when they read the Word and receive enlightenment from the Lord, see Divine truths by natural light. For the light of heaven, which illuminates the spiritual sense of the Word, exerts an influence on the natural light which illuminates its literal sense, and enlightens man's intellectual, also called rational, faculty, enabling it to see and recognise Divine truths, whether plain to view or hidden. The light of heaven has this effect upon people, sometimes even without their knowing it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 216

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 216

216. At its very heart the celestial sense of the Word makes it like a gentle flame setting on fire; at the intermediate level its spiritual sense makes it like a light giving illumination. Consequently at its outermost level its natural sense makes it like a diaphanous object which the flame turns red as purple, and the light turns white as snow. It resembles either a ruby or a diamond, the celestial flame making it like a ruby, the spiritual light like a diamond. Since the Word is like this in its literal sense, this is what is meant by:

(i) The precious stones forming the foundations of the New Jerusalem.
(ii) The Urim and Thummim on Aaron's ephod.
(iii) The precious stones in the garden of Eden, in which the King of Tyre is said to have been.
(iv) The curtains, veils and posts of the Tabernacle.
(v) Likewise, the external features of the Temple at Jerusalem.
(vi) The Word in its glory was represented in the Lord at His transfiguration.
(vii) The power of the Word at its outermost level was represented by the Nazirites.
(viii) The Word's power is beyond description.

These points must now be illustrated one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 217

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 217

sRef Rev@21 @18 S0' sRef Rev@21 @17 S0' sRef Rev@21 @20 S0' sRef Rev@21 @19 S0' 217. (i) THE TRUTHS OF THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD ARE MEANT BY THE PRECIOUS STONES FORMING THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE NEW JERUSALEM IN REVELATION (21:17-21).

I mentioned above (209) that in the spiritual world precious stones are to be found just as in the natural one, and that they have a spiritual origin from the truths in the literal sense of the Word. Incredible as it may seem, this is in fact the truth. This is the reason why, every time there is a reference in the Word to precious stones, they mean in the spiritual sense truths, It follows from this that the precious stones, of which the foundations of the wall surrounding the city of the New Jerusalem are said to have been built, mean the truths of doctrine in the new church. For the New Jerusalem means the new church in respect of the doctrine it derives from the Word. Therefore its wall and the foundations of the wall must mean the external of the Word. This is its literal sense as the source of its doctrine, and by means of its doctrine the church. This sense is like a wall with its foundations, surrounding a city and making it secure.

[2] The description in Revelation of the New Jerusalem and its foundations is this:

The angel measured the wall of the city of Jerusalem as one hundred and forty-four cubits, which is the measure of a man, that is, an angel. The wall had twelve foundations, decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third chalcedony, the fourth emerald, the fifth sardonyx, the sixth sardius, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh turquoise, the twelfth amethyst. Rev. 21:15-20.

The reason why the wall had twelve foundations, made of the same number of precious stones, is that the number twelve means the whole of truth derived from good, so here the whole of doctrine. These matters, together with the preceding and following parts of that chapter, can be found expounded in detail, with confirmations drawn from parallel passages in the Prophets, in my book APOCALYPSE REVEALED.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 218

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 218

sRef Ex@28 @21 S1' sRef Ex@28 @20 S1' sRef Ex@28 @6 S1' sRef Ex@28 @29 S1' sRef Ex@28 @30 S1' sRef Ex@28 @15 S1' sRef Ex@28 @17 S1' sRef Ex@28 @16 S1' sRef Ex@28 @18 S1' sRef Ex@28 @19 S1' 218. (ii) THE FORMS OF GOOD AND TRUTH IN THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD ARE MEANT BY THE URIM AND THUMMIM ON AARON'S EPHOD.

The Urim and Thummim were mounted on Aaron's ephod, and his priesthood represented the Lord in respect of Divine good and the effecting of salvation. The garments of priesthood or of holiness represented Divine truths coming from the Lord. The ephod represented Divine truth in its outermost form, that is, the Word in its literal sense, for this is Divine truth in its outermost form. Thus the twelve precious stones called Urim and Thummim, which bore the names of the twelve tribes of Israel, represented Divine truths coming from Divine good and all that goes with them. We read about these in the writings of Moses:

They are to make the ephod of [gold]*, violet and purple, with doubledyed scarlet and lawn interwoven. (Later) you are to make the breastpiece of judgment, of similar workmanship to the ephod, and you are to fill it with settings for stones. There are to be four rows of stones: ruby, topaz and emerald in the first row; chrysoprase, sapphire and diamond in the second row; turquoise, agate and amethyst in the third row; aquamarine, sardius and jasper in the fourth row. These stones are to answer to the names of the sons of Israel. The inscriptions as on a seal are to have each the name of one of the twelve tribes. And Aaron is to wear upon the breast-plate of judgment the Urim and Thummim; and let them be upon Aaron's heart, when he comes into the presence of Jehovah. Exod. 28:6, 15-21, 29, 30.

[2] The representations of Aaron's garments, his ephod, mantle, tunic, turban., and sash, have been explained in ARCANA CAELESTIA (published in London) in the commentary on this chapter. It was there shown that the ephod represented Divine truth in its outermost form; the precious stones the truths made pellucid by good; the twelve set out in four rows represented the whole from first to last; the twelve tribes the whole of the church. The breast-plate represented Divine truth coming from Divine good in the universal sense; the Urim and Thummim the splendour of Divine truth coming from Divine good in its outermost form. Urim is shining fire and Thummim splendour in the language of the angels, or wholeness in Hebrew. Again, replies were given by changes in the quality of light, accompanied by an unspoken perception, or by direct speech, and there is much besides. These explanations establish that these stones stood for truths coming from good in the outermost sense of the Word. For this is the only source by which replies are given from heaven, because that sense contains the Divine which proceeds in all its fulness.

* Apparently omitted by accident.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 219

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 219

sRef Ezek@28 @13 S0' sRef Ezek@28 @12 S0' 219. (iii) THE PRECIOUS STONES IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN, IN WHICH THE KING OF TYRE IS SAID TO HAVE BEEN, HAVE A SIMILAR MEANING. We read in Ezekiel:

King of Tyre, you who set the seal upon your measured space, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, God's garden; every kind of precious stone was your covering, ruby, topaz and diamond, chrysolite, sardonyx and jasper, sapphire, chrysoprase and emerald, and gold. Ezek. 28:12, 13.

Tyre in the Word means the church in respect of its knowledge of good and truth; king means the church's truth, the garden of Eden wisdom and intelligence derived from the Word. Precious stones mean truths with light shining through them from good, of the sort found in the literal sense of the Word. It is because these were the meanings of those stones that they are called his covering. The literal sense is a covering for the interiors of the Word; see above (213).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 220

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 220

sRef Ex@26 @1 S0' sRef Ex@26 @31 S0' sRef Ex@26 @36 S0' 220. (iv) TRUTHS AND DIFFERENT KINDS OF GOOD IN THEIR OUTERMOST FORMS, OF THE SORT FOUND IN THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD, WERE REPRESENTED BY THE CURTAINS, VEILS AND POSTS OF THE TABERNACLE.

The tabernacle constructed by Moses in the desert was a representation of heaven and the church. That is why its description was revealed by Jehovah on Mount Sinai. Thus all its contents, the lampstand, the golden altar for incense and the table holding the bread of the Presence, represented and stood for the holy things of heaven and the church. The holy of holies, where the Ark of the Covenant stood, represented and so stood for the inmost of heaven and the church. The Law itself inscribed upon two tables stood for the Word, and the cherubim above it meant protection to prevent the holiness of the Word being violated.

Now since externals derive their essence from internals, and both of these derive theirs from the inmost, which in this case was the Law, therefore all the details of the tabernacle represented and stood for the holy things of the Word. Hence it follows that the outermost parts of the tabernacle, the curtains, veils and posts which covered, contained and supported it, meant the outermost form of the Word, which is the truths and forms of good contained in its literal sense. It was because that was their meaning that all the curtains and veils were made of lawn interwoven and violet and purple, and double-dyed red, with cherubim (Exod. 26:1, 31, 36). I explained in ARCANA CAELESTIA in the commentary on that chapter of Exodus the general and the specific representations and meanings of the tabernacle and all its contents. It was there shown that the curtains and veils represented the externals of heaven and the church, so also those of the Word; and that lawn or fine linen meant truth of spiritual origin, violet truth of celestial origin, purple celestial good, double-dyed red spiritual good, and the cherubim the protection of the interiors of the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 221

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 221

sRef 1Ki@6 @30 S0' sRef 1Ki@6 @29 S0' sRef 1Ki@6 @7 S0' sRef John@2 @19 S0' sRef John@2 @21 S0' 221. (v) LIKEWISE, THE EXTERNAL FEATURES OF THE TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM.

This was because the Temple, exactly like the Tabernacle, represented heaven and the church; but the Temple represented the heaven of the spiritual angels, the Tabernacle that of the celestial angels. Spiritual angels are those who possess wisdom from the Word, celestial angels are those who possess love from the Word. The Lord Himself teaches us in John that the Temple at Jerusalem means in the highest sense the Lord's Divine Human:

Break up this Temple, and in three days I will raise it again. He was speaking about the temple of His body. John 2:19, 21.

When the Lord is meant, so too is the Word, for He is the Word. Now since the interior parts of the Temple represented the interiors of heaven and the church, and so those of the Word, therefore its external parts also represented and stood for the exteriors of heaven and the church, and so those of the Word, that is, its literal sense. We read of the exterior of the Temple that it was built of whole, undressed stones, and inside of cedar-wood; all its walls were carved inside with cherubim, palms and open flowers, and the floor was overlaid with gold (1 Kings 6:7, 29, 30). All these things too stand for the externals of the Word, which are the holy things in its literal sense.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 222

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 222

sRef Matt@17 @1 S0' sRef Matt@17 @3 S0' sRef Matt@17 @4 S0' sRef Matt@17 @5 S0' sRef Matt@17 @2 S0' 222. (vi) THE WORD IN ITS GLORY WAS REPRESENTED IN THE LORD AT HIS TRANSFIGURATION.

We read about the Lord's transfiguration in the presence of Peter, James and John that His face shone like the sun, His clothes became like light, and Moses and Elijah were seen speaking with Him; a shining cloud overshadowed the disciples, and a voice was heard from the cloud saying, This is my beloved Son, listen to Him (Matt. 17:1-5).

I have been taught that the Lord then represented the Word. His face, which shone like the sun, represented the Divine good of His Divine love; His clothes, which became like light, the Divine truth of His Divine wisdom. Moses and Elijah represented the historical and prophetic sections of the Word; Moses the part of the Word written by his instrumentality and the historical parts as a whole, Elijah the whole of the prophetic part of the Word. The shining cloud which overshadowed the disciples represented the Word in its literal sense; that is why a voice was heard from it saying, 'This is my beloved Son, listen to Him'. For all statements and replies given from heaven are only given through the outermost forms, such as is the literal sense of the Word; they acquire their fulness from the Lord.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 223

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 223

223. (vii) THE POWER OF THE WORD AT ITS OUTERMOST LEVEL WAS REPRESENTED BY THE NAZIRITES.

We read in the Book of Judges that Samson was a Nazirite from his mother's womb, and that his strength lay in his hair. A Nazirite and the fact of being one also means having hair. He himself showed that his strength lay in his hair when he said:

A razor has not gone over my head, because I have been a Nazirite from my mother's womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will depart from me, and I shall become weak and be like any other man. Judg. 16:17.

No one can know why the institution of Naziriteship, standing for hair, took place, or why Samson's strength came from his hair, unless he knows the meaning of the head in the Word. The head stands for the intelligence angels and men have from the Lord by means of Divine truth. Thus the hair stands for intelligence derived from Divine truth at the outermost or remotest level. It was this meaning of the hair that caused the rule to be made for Nazirites that they should not shave the hair of their heads, for this is the Naziriteship of God upon their heads (Num. 6:1-21). There was also a rule that the highest priest and his sons should not shave their head, lest they die and the whole house of Israel incur anger* (Lev. 10:6).

sRef Rev@1 @14 S2' [2] It was because the hair was sacred on account of its meaning, which is due to its correspondence, that the Son of Man, who is the Lord in respect of the Word, is also described as having hair like wool, white as snow (Rev. 1:14), and likewise the Ancient of Days (Dan. 7:9). Since the hair means truth at the outermost level, or the literal sense of the Word, those who despise the Word become bald in the spiritual world, while on the other hand those who made much of the Word and held it sacred have a good head of hair. It was because of this correspondence that the forty-two children were torn apart by two she-bears, for calling Elisha bald (2 Kings 2:23, 24); for Elisha represented the church as regards its teaching from the Word, and she-bears stand for the power of truth at the outermost level. The power of Divine truth, or the Word, lies in its literal sense, because the Word is there in all its fulness, and this is the sense possessed alike by the angels of each of the Lord's kingdoms and by men.

*The Latin strictly means 'be angry', but this appears to be what is intended.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 224

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 224

sRef John@1 @3 S1' sRef John@1 @10 S1' sRef Ps@33 @6 S1' sRef John@1 @1 S1' 224. (viii) THE WORD'S POWER IS BEYOND DESCRIPTION.

Hardly anyone at the present time knows that truths possess any power. People think that truth is merely something said by a person in a position of power, which they must therefore do. Thus they regard it as merely the breath issuing from the mouth and a sound heard in the ear. Yet in fact truth and good are the fundamental principles which underlie everything in both worlds, the spiritual and the natural. Hardly anyone knows that they are the means by which the universe was created and is now preserved, and the means by which man was made, so these two are the all in all. It is openly stated in John that the universe was created by means of Divine truth:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God; everything that was made was made by means of it, and the world was made by means of it. John 1:1, 3, 10.

Also in the Psalms of David:

By the word of Jehovah the heavens were made. Ps. 33:6.

In both passages the Word means Divine truth. Since the universe was created by Divine truth, therefore it is also preserved by it, for just as continuing in existence is continuous coming into existence, so preservation is continuous creation.

[2] The reason why man was made by means of Divine truth is that everything in man has reference to the understanding and the will; the understanding is for receiving Divine truth, the will for receiving Divine good. Consequently the human mind, being composed as it is of those two principles, is neither more nor less than a form of Divine truth and Divine good organised in a spiritual and natural pattern. The human brain is such a form; and because the whole of a person depends upon his mind, everything in his body is a dependency, acted upon and endowed with life by those two principles.

sRef Matt@16 @16 S3' sRef Matt@16 @17 S3' sRef Matt@16 @18 S3' [3] These facts can now establish the reason why God came into the world as the Word and became Man. This was for the sake of redemption. For God then by means of the Human, which was Divine truth, clothed Himself in all power, and cast down, conquered and reduced to obedience the hells, which had grown up even to the level of the heavens inhabited by angels. He did this not by word of mouth, but by the Divine Word, which is Divine truth; and afterwards He opened up a great gap between the hells and the heavens, which no one from hell can cross. If anyone tries to do so, at his first step he experiences torments like those of a snake put on a red-hot iron plate or on an ant-hill. For devils and satans at the first whiff of Divine truth cast themselves at once into the depths, rush into caves and block their entrances so carefully that not a chink is left open. The reason is that their wills are subject to evils and their understandings to falsities, and are thus opposed to Divine good and Divine truth; and because, as has been said, the whole man is made up of those two principles of life, they are totally, from head to heel, struck a severe blow as soon as they perceive their opposite.

[4] These facts will be sufficient to prove that the power of Divine truth is beyond description; and since the Word possessed by the Christian church contains Divine truth in its three degrees, it is obvious that this is what is meant in John (1:3, 10). I can produce many proofs from my own experience to prove that the power of the Word is beyond description, but because they pass belief and appear incredible, I forbear to present them; a few details however, you can find related above (209). I shall give from this source this one memorable statement: the church which possesses Divine truths from the Lord is stronger than the hells. It was of this church that the Lord said to Peter:

On this rock shall I build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Matt. 16:18.

The Lord said this after Peter had made the admission that Christ was the Son of the living God (Matt. 16:16). It is this truth which is meant in that passage by rock; for a rock throughout the Word means the Lord in respect of Divine truth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 225

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 225

225. V

The doctrine of the church is to be drawn from the literal sense of the Word and supported by it.

It was shown in the preceding paragraph that the Word is in its fulness in the literal sense and endowed with holiness and power. Since the Lord is the Word and is the First and the Last, as He says in Revelation (1:17), it follows that the Lord is most especially present in that sense and by means of it teaches and enlightens men. But these points must be demonstrated in due order:

TCR (Chadwick) n. 226

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 226

226. (i) THE WORD IS NOT TO BE UNDERSTOOD WITHOUT DOCTRINE.

This is because the Word in its literal sense is composed of nothing but correspondences, in order that it should simultaneously hold spiritual and celestial meanings; and every single word is a container and support for these. That is why in the literal sense the Divine truths are rarely uncovered, but are clothed. They are then called appearances of truth, and in many cases are made suitable to be understood by the simple, who do not lift their gaze above what is in front of their eyes. Some appear to be contradictions, when in fact there is no contradiction, if the Word is looked at by its own spiritual light. Moreover in some passages of the Prophets there are collections of place-names and personal names, from which no sort of sense can be extracted. Seeing that the Word is like this in its literal sense, it can easily be established that it could not be understood without doctrine.

The Word is not to be understood without doctrine. Doctrine is to be drawn from the literal sense of the Word. But Divine truth, on which doctrine is based, is not visible to any but those who are enlightened by the Lord.

sRef Deut@24 @16 S2' sRef Ex@32 @14 S2' sRef Num@14 @18 S2' sRef Num@23 @19 S2' sRef Ex@32 @12 S2' sRef 1Sam@15 @29 S2' [2] But let us take examples to illustrate this. It is said that Jehovah regrets (Exod. 32:12, 14; Jonah 3:9; 4:2); and also that Jehovah does not regret (Num. 23:19; 1 Sam. 15:29). These statements cannot be reconciled without doctrine. It is said that Jehovah visits the wickedness of the fathers upon the sons, to the third or fourth generation (Num. 14:18); and also that a father shall not die on account of his son, nor a son on account of his father, but each in his own sin (Deut. 24:16). Doctrine can show that these statements do not conflict, but are in harmony.

sRef Matt@7 @7 S3' sRef John@15 @7 S3' sRef Matt@7 @8 S3' [3] Jesus says:

Ask and it shall be given you; seek and you shall find. To him that knocks, the door shall be opened. Matt. 7:7, 8; 21:21, 22.

Without doctrine one might believe that each will receive what he asks for; but we know from doctrine that whatever a person asks from the Lord, that is granted. For this too is what the Lord teaches:

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you will, and it will be done for you. John 15:7.

sRef Matt@5 @3 S4' sRef Luke@6 @20 S4' [4] The Lord says:

Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of God. Luke 6:20.

Without doctrine one might think that heaven was for the poor and not the rich; but doctrine instructs us that the poor in spirit are meant, for the Lord says:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of the heavens. Matt. 5:3.

sRef John@7 @24 S5' sRef Matt@7 @2 S5' sRef Matt@7 @1 S5' [5] The Lord says further:

Do not judge, so that you are not judged; with whatever judgment you judge, so will you be judged. Matt. 7:1, 2; Luke 6:37.

Without doctrine anyone could be induced to assert that we must not judge wicked people to be wicked; but doctrine tells us we may judge, so long as we do so justly. For the Lord says:

Give just judgments. John 7:24.

sRef Matt@23 @8 S6' sRef Matt@23 @9 S6' sRef Matt@23 @10 S6' [6] Jesus says:

Do not have yourselves called teacher, for you have one teacher, Christ. Do not call anyone on earth your father, for you have one father in the heavens. And do not have yourselves called master, for you have one master, Christ. Matt. 23:8-10.

Without doctrine this would mean that we are not to call anyone teacher, father or master; but doctrine tells us that we may do so in the natural sense, but not in the spiritual.

sRef Matt@19 @28 S7' [7] Jesus said to the disciples:

When the Son of Man sits on the throne of His glory, you too will sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Matt. 19:28.

One might infer from these words that the Lord's disciples too are to act as judges, though in fact they can judge no one. Doctrine therefore will reveal the mystery by the fact that the Lord alone, who is omniscient, and knows the hearts of all, can and will be judge. His twelve disciples mean the church in respect of all its truths and all its kinds of good, which are given to it by the Lord by means of the Word. Doctrine infers from this that it is the truths and kinds of good which will judge everyone, as the Lord said in John (3:17, 18; 12:47, 48). There are many more passages like this in the Word, which show plainly that the Word cannot be understood without doctrine.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 227

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 227

227. As a result of doctrine the Word not only becomes intelligible, but is a light to the understanding, for it resembles a lampstand with its lamps lit. Then a person sees more than he had seen before, and understands too things he had not previously understood. What is obscure and in disagreement he either does not see and passes over, or he sees and explains them so that they are in harmony with the doctrine. The experience of Christians is evidence that doctrine determines how the Word is viewed, and also how it is to be explained. All the Reformed churches view the Word in the light of their doctrine and this determines how they explain it; likewise the Roman Catholics view it in the light of their doctrine, and their explanation is determined by this. Even the Jews view it in the light of their doctrine, and their explanation is determined by this. Thus false doctrine produces false ideas, true doctrine true ideas. These facts show that true doctrine is like a lamp shining in the darkness, and like a sign-post on a road.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 228

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 228

228. These facts establish that those who read the Word without doctrine are in the dark as regards every truth. Their minds are vacillating and uncertain, prone to errors and easily led into heresies, and indeed they embrace these, if they have the slightest popularity or authoritative support, and provided there is no risk to one's own reputation. For them the Word is like a lampstand without any lights, and in the dim light they think they see much, when in fact they can see hardly anything, since it is only doctrine which is a source of light. I have witnessed such people being tested by angels, who found that they could prove from the Word anything they wished; and what they proved was especially what arose from their self-love or the love of those whom they favour. But I saw them stripped of their clothes, a sign that they were devoid of truths, for clothing in that world consists of truths.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 229

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 229

229. (ii) DOCTRINE IS TO BE DRAWN FROM THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD, AND PROVED BY MEANS OF IT.

This is because the Lord is present in that sense, and He teaches and enlightens us. For the Lord never performs any act except in fulness, and the Word is in its fulness in the literal sense, as was shown above. This is why doctrine is to be drawn from the literal sense. The doctrine of genuine truth can even fully be drawn from the literal sense of the Word, for the Word in that sense resembles a person wearing clothes, but whose face and hands are bare. Everything needed for a person's faith and life, and so everything needed for his salvation, is there uncovered, though the remainder is clothed. In many passages where it is clothed it still shows through, like a woman's features through a thin silk veil over her face. Moreover, since the truths of the Word increase in number as they are loved and this love gives them shape, so they show through and become visible more and more clearly.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 230

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 230

230. It might be thought that the doctrine of genuine truth could be acquired by means of the spiritual sense of the Word, of which we are granted knowledge by correspondences. But doctrine is not acquired through this, merely illustrated and confirmed; for, as was said before (208), a person who knows a few correspondences can falsify the Word, by combining and applying them to prove whatever the principles he has adopted have established in his mind. What is more, the spiritual sense is not granted to anyone except by the Lord, and He guards it, just as the heaven of the angels is guarded, for this heaven possesses this sense.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 231

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 231

sRef John@14 @23 S1' sRef John@14 @21 S1' sRef John@14 @20 S1' 231. (iii) THE GENUINE TRUTH IN THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD, ON WHICH DOCTRINE IS BASED, IS NOT VISIBLE TO ANY BUT THOSE WHO ARE ENLIGHTENED BY THE LORD.

Enlightenment comes only from the Lord, and to those who love truths because they are true, and make them their guide to a useful life. No others find enlightenment in the Word. Enlightenment comes only from the Lord, because the Word is from Him and so He is in it. The reason only those are enlightened who love truths because they are true, and make them a guide to a useful life, is that they are in the Lord and the Lord is in them; for the Lord is truth itself, as was shown in the chapter on the Lord. The Lord is loved when one lives in accordance with His Divine truths, and so useful deeds are done by their guidance, as stated in this passage of John:

On that day you will know that you are in me and I in you; he who has my commandments and keeps them loves me, and I shall love him, and I shall show myself to him, and come to him, and make my dwelling with him. John 14:20, 21, 23.

Those are meant who are enlightened when they read the Word, and for whom the Word shines and shows through.

[2] The reason why for them the Word shines and shows through is that the details of the Word contain a spiritual and a celestial sense, and these senses are filled with the light of heaven. Therefore the Lord by means of them and their light floods into the natural sense of the Word and the light this sheds on man. So it is that a person acknowledges truth by an inward perception, and then sees it in his thought processes; this happens whenever he has affection for truth for truth's sake. The affection leads to perception, the perception to thought, and thus comes the acknowledgment we call faith.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 232

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 232

sRef Matt@13 @15 S0' sRef Matt@13 @14 S0' 232. The reverse befalls those who follow a doctrine of false religion in their reading of the Word, and the more so in the case of those who prove that doctrine from the Word, having in view then their own glory and worldly wealth. For these people the truths of the Word are as if plunged in the shades of night, while falsities are as if in daylight. They read the truths, but do not see them; and if they see their shadow, they falsify them. These are those of whom the Lord says that they have eyes and do not see, they have ears and do not understand (Matt. 13:14, 15). Thus their enlightenment in spiritual matters, which concern the church, becomes purely natural, and their mental vision like that of one in bed who on waking sees ghosts, or like a sleepwalker, who believes he is awake when he is really asleep.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 233

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 233

233.* I have been permitted to talk with many people, who believed that after death they would shine like stars in heaven. For, so they said, they had regarded the Word as holy, frequently read it right through, and collected many passages from it to prove the dogmas of their faith, and by this means gained a reputation for their learning. As a result, they thought they would become like Michael or Raphael. Many of these, however, were tested to see what love had impelled them to study the Word; and it was discovered that some had been impelled by self-love, wishing to receive the reverence due to the leaders of the church, and some by worldly love, hoping thereby to become wealthy. When they went on to be tested to see what they had learned from the Word, it proved that they had learned no genuine truth from it, but only the sort called falsified truth. This really is rotten falsity, for in heaven it stinks. They were told that the reason this happened to them was that the ends they had in view in reading the Word were themselves and the world, not the truth of faith and the good of life. When one's ends in view are oneself and the world, then while reading the Word the mind cannot rise above oneself and the world; and one's thinking is constantly dominated by the self, and a person's self is enveloped in thick darkness in all he thinks about heaven or the church. In that state a person cannot be withdrawn by the Lord and lifted into the light of heaven, and so cannot receive any influence from the Lord through heaven.

I have also seen these people allowed into heaven; and when it was discovered there that they were devoid of truths, they were thrown out. Yet they still retained their proud conviction that they had deserved admission. Quite different was the treatment of those whose study of the Word had been impelled by a desire to know the truth because it is true and serves to promote a useful life, not only their own, but their neighbour's too. These I saw lifted up to heaven, to enjoy the light which there surrounds Divine truth, and at the same time they were raised to a state of angelic wisdom and the happiness it brings, which the angels of heaven enjoy.

* This section is repeated with minor changes from AR 255.5, 6.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 234

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 234

234. VI

The literal sense of the Word produces a link with the Lord and association with the angels.

The Word produces a link with the Lord, because He is the Word, that is, Divine truth itself and Divine good itself contained in it. The link is produced by the literal sense, because in that sense the Word is in its fulness, holiness and power, as was shown above in the section on this subject [214-224]. That link is not visible to man, but lies in the affection for truth and the perception of truth. The reason why the literal sense produces association with the angels in heaven is that the spiritual and celestial senses are contained in it, and these are the senses the angels possess; the angels of the Lord's spiritual kingdom possess the spiritual sense of the Word, those of His celestial kingdom its celestial sense. These two senses are unwound from the Word, when a person who regards it as holy reads it. The unwinding takes place instantly, and so therefore does the association.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 235

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 235

235. It has been made evident to me by long experience that the spiritual angels possess the spiritual sense of the Word, and the celestial angels its celestial sense. I have been allowed to perceive that, when I read the Word in its literal sense, communication was established with the heavens, at one time with one community there, at another time with another. The words which I understood in their natural sense were understood by the spiritual angels in their spiritual sense, and by the celestial angels in their celestial sense, and this too upon the instant. Since I have perceived this communication some thousands of times, I have no doubt left concerning it. There are also spirits below the heavens who misuse this communication; for they repeat some verses from the literal sense of the Word, and immediately notice and mark down the community with which communication is established. This too I have seen and heard many times. These direct experiences have enabled me to know that the Word in its literal sense is a Divine means of being linked with the Lord and associated with the angels in heaven.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 236

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 236

236. Examples will be given to illustrate how, when a person reads the Word, the spiritual angels perceive their sense and the celestial angels theirs, each arising from the natural sense. Let us take as examples four of the Ten Commandments. The fifth is 'You are not to kill.' A man understands by this not one killing, but hating and harbouring thoughts of revenge going as far as murder. A spiritual angel by killing understands playing the part of the devil and murdering a person's soul. A celestial angel, however, by killing understands hating the Lord and the Word.

[2] The sixth commandment is 'You are not to commit adultery.' A man by committing adultery understands promiscuous behaviour, obscene acts, improper suggestions and filthy thoughts. A spiritual angel by committing adultery understands adulterating the good of the Word and falsifying its truths. A celestial angel, however, by committing adultery understands denying the divinity of the Lord and profaning the Word.

[3] The seventh commandment is 'You are not to steal.' A man by stealing understands stealing, defrauding and depriving the neighbour of his goods on some pretext. A spiritual angel by stealing understands depriving others of the truths and different kinds of good of his faith by falsities and evils. A celestial angel, however, by stealing understands attributing to oneself what is the Lord's and claiming for oneself His righteousness and merit.

[4] The eighth commandment is 'You are not to bear false witness.' A man by bearing false witness understands telling lies and slandering someone. A [spiritual] angel by bearing false witness understands saying and persuading others that falsity is truth and evil is good, and vice versa. A celestial angel, however, by bearing false witness understands blaspheming against the Lord and the Word.

[5] From these examples it can be seen how the spiritual and celestial contents are unwrapped and drawn out of the natural sense of the Word, which contains them. It is a remarkable fact that the angels draw out their own senses without knowing what the person reading is thinking. Yet the thoughts of angels and men make one by means of correspondences, just as do an end, its cause and its effect. In fact the ends are in the celestial kingdom, the causes in the spiritual kingdom and the effects in the natural kingdom. So it is in this way that human beings are associated with angels by means of the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 237

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 237

237. The reason why a spiritual angel draws out and elicits spiritual meanings from the literal sense of the Word, and a celestial angel celestial meanings, is that such meanings are in harmony with their nature and are of the same type as they are. This fact can be illustrated by similar facts in the three kingdoms of nature, the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms. In the animal kingdom, from food reduced to chyle the vessels of the body draw and extract the blood they need, the fibres of the nerves draw their liquid, and the substances from which the fibres originate draw their spirit. In the vegetable kingdom, a tree with its trunk, branches, leaves and fruits stands upon its root, and by means of the root draws out and extracts from the soil a thick sap for the trunk, the branches and leaves, a purer sap for the flesh of the fruits, and the purest for the seeds inside the fruits. In the mineral kingdom, there are in certain places hidden deep in the earth mineral ores rich in gold, silver, copper and iron; from exhalations and effluvia from the rocks gold attracts its own element, silver its, [copper its]* and iron its, and a solution circulates them.

* These two words are missing in the original edition, but are supplied in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 238

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 238

238. The Word in its literal sense is like a treasure-chest, in which lie arranged in rows precious stones, pearls and diadems. If a person regards the Word as holy and reads it as a useful guide to life, the thoughts in his mind can be compared to one who holds such a chest in his hand, and throws it heavenwards; and as it rises it flies open and the treasures inside reach the angels, who take great pleasure in seeing and carefully examining them. The pleasure they get from this is shared with men and brings about association and also the sharing of perceptions. It was for the sake of this association with angels, and at the same time being linked with the Lord, that the Holy Supper was instituted; in this the bread becomes in heaven Divine good and the wine becomes Divine truth, in both cases coming from the Lord. This kind of correspondence is from creation, and was established in order that the heaven of the angels and the church on earth, and in general the spiritual world and the natural one, should be one, and so that the Lord might link Himself with both at once.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 239

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 239

sRef John@6 @27 S0' sRef John@6 @63 S0' sRef Matt@4 @4 S0' sRef John@4 @14 S0' 239. The fact that the association of men with angels takes place by means of the natural or literal sense of the Word is also the reason why in every person there are from creation three degrees of life: celestial, spiritual and natural. A person, however, remains in the natural degree so long as he is in the world, and at that time is only in the spiritual degree shared by the angels to the extent that he possesses genuine truths; and he is in the celestial degree to the extent that he lives a life guided by those truths. Yet he does not enter into the real spiritual or celestial degrees until after death, because these two are wrapped up and concealed in his natural ideas. When therefore death removes the natural degree, the spiritual and celestial are left, and these then dictate the ideas he thinks about. These facts can establish that the Word alone is the source of spirit and life, as the Lord says:

The words which I speak to you are spirit and life. John 6:63.

The water which I shall give you will become a spring of water rising up to give everlasting life. John 4:14.

Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth out of the mouth of God. Matt. 4:4.

Work for the food which lasts to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. John 6:27.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 240

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 240

240. VII

The Word is to be found in all the heavens and is the source of the angels' wisdom.

It has not previously been known that the Word is to be found in the heavens; nor could it be known so long as the church was unaware that angels and spirits are human beings, in face and body exactly like those in our world, and having surroundings in all respects exactly like those men have. The only difference is that they are spiritual and everything about them comes from a spiritual origin, while people in this world are natural and everything about them comes from a natural origin. So long as this fact remained hidden, no one could know that the Word is also to be found in the heavens and is read by the angels there, as well as by the spirits who are below the heavens. But to ensure that this should not remain a secret for ever, I have been allowed to enjoy the company of angels and spirits, talking with them, seeing their surroundings, and then reporting much of what I have seen and heard. I did this in the book entitled HEAVEN AND HELL (published in London in 1758). From this one can see that angels and spirits are human beings and that everything people in this world have is there in profusion for angels and spirits. It may be seen in that book that angels and spirits are human beings (73-77, 453-460); that they have similar surroundings to those people have in this world (170-190); also that they have Divine worship and sermons in their churches (221-227), also writings and books (258-264), and the Holy Scripture or the Word (259).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 241

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 241

241. The Word in heaven is written in a spiritual style which is quite different from the natural style. The spiritual style is composed simply of letters, each one of which denotes a particular meaning; and there are dashes, curves and points above, between and within the letters, which heighten the meaning. The letters used by the angels of the spiritual kingdom resemble printed type in our world; the letters used by the angels of the celestial kingdom are in some cases like Arabic letters, in others like ancient Hebrew letters, but with curves above and below, and pointing above, between and inside them. Even a single one of these points conveys a complete meaning.

[2] Since this is the nature of writing among the angels, the names of persons and places are marked in their copies of the Word, so that the wise may understand the spiritual and celestial meaning of each. For instance, Moses stands for the Word of God written through him, what is generally known as the historical Word; Elijah for the prophetic Word; Abraham, Isaac and Jacob for the Lord as regards the celestial, spiritual or natural Divines. Aaron stands for priesthood, David for kingship, in both cases that of the Lord. The names of the sons of Jacob, that is, of the twelve tribes of Israel, stand for various meanings connected with heaven and the church; and the meaning of the names of the Lord's twelve disciples is similar. Zion and Jerusalem stand for the church as regards doctrine learned from the Word; the land of Canaan for the church itself; the places and cities in it either side of the Jordan for various meanings associated with the church and its doctrine. It is the same with numbers; these do not even exist in the vocabulary of heaven, but instead there are the subjects to which the numbers correspond. These facts may establish that the Word in heaven is like ours in its literal sense and at the same time corresponds to it, so that they form one.

[3] It is a remarkable fact that the Word in the heavens is so written as to be understood straightforwardly by the simple and in a learned way by the wise. For it contains many curves and marks over the letters which, as said before, heighten the meaning. The simple pay no attention to them and do not recognise them; but the wise notice them and give them meanings dependent upon their degree of wisdom even up to the highest. All the larger communities have a copy of the Word written by angels inspired by the Lord, which is kept stored in their shrine, for fear the Word elsewhere should be changed in even a point. The Word we have in our world resembles that in heaven in as much as the simple understand it straightforwardly and the wise in a learned way; but the way this happens is different.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 242

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 242

242. The angels themselves declare that all their wisdom comes through the Word; for the light they enjoy depends upon how deep is their understanding of the Word. The light of heaven is Divine wisdom, which is visible to their eyes as light. In the shrine where a copy of the Word is stored, the light is flame-like and brilliant, surpassing in intensity any light in heaven outside it. The wisdom of the celestial angels exceeds that of the spiritual angels, more or less to the same extent as that exceeds that of human beings. This is because the celestial angels have the good of love from the Lord, and the spiritual angels have the truths of wisdom from the Lord. Where the good of love is, there too dwells wisdom; but where truths are, wisdom does not dwell except to the extent that the good of love is there too. This is why the Word is written differently in the Lord's celestial kingdom from that in His spiritual kingdom. For in the Word of the celestial kingdom the expressions convey the different kinds of good of love and the characters the affections of love; in the Word of the spiritual kingdom the expressions convey the truths of wisdom, the characters the inward perceptions of truth. These facts will allow one to conclude what wisdom there is lurking hidden in the Word we have in the world. For in it lies hidden all the wisdom of the angels, which is beyond description; and a person after death enters into possession of this wisdom, if by means of the Word he is made an angel by the Lord.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 243

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 243

243. VIII

The church depends on the Word, and what the church is like in the case of each person depends on how he understands the Word.

There can be no doubt that the church depends upon the Word, for it has been shown above that the Word is Divine truth (189-192), that the Word is the source of the church's doctrine (225-233), and that the Word produces a link with the Lord (234-239). However, it may be questioned whether it is the understanding of the Word which makes the church, since there are those who believe that they belong to the church, because they possess the Word and read it, or hear it preached and know something of its literal sense. But they are unaware how this or that passage in the Word is to be understood, and some of them do not regard this as of much importance. I shall therefore prove here that it is not the Word which makes the church, but how it is understood; and that what the church is like depends on how those who belong to the church understand the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 244

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 244

244. The reason why the church is like its understanding of the Word is that the church is like its truths of faith and its kinds of good of charity. These are the two universals which are not only scattered around throughout the literal sense of the Word, but also lie hidden within it, like precious objects in treasure-houses. What it contains in its literal sense is plain to any person, since it is directly visible to the eye. But what lies hidden in its spiritual sense is unseen, except by those who love truths because they are true, and do good deeds because they are good. For these people the treasure is displayed, which is hidden and protected by the literal sense. It is these universals which in essence make the church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 245

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 245

245. It is well known that a church is like its doctrine, and the Word is the source of doctrine. Yet it is not doctrine which establishes a church, but the wholeness and purity of its doctrine, and consequently its understanding of the Word. But in the case of the particular church which exists in the individual, it is not doctrine which establishes and makes it, but faith and life in accordance with faith. Likewise it is not the Word which establishes and makes the particular church in the case of a person, but faith in accordance with truths, and life in accordance with the kinds of good which he draws from this source and applies to himself. The Word is like a mine, the depths of which are rich in gold and silver; or like a mine containing richer and richer veins of gems the further one goes into it. It is the understanding of the Word which opens up these mines. If it is not understood as it is in itself, in its inmost recesses and in its depth, the Word would no more bring about a church in the case of a person than the mines in Asia would make a European wealthy. It would be quite different, if he were among the mine-owners and operators.

[2] For those who probe the Word to extract from it the truths of faith and the kinds of good which are needed for life, the Word is like treasures owned by the Shah of Persia or the Mogul or Chinese Emperors. People belonging to the church are like their treasurers, who have permission to take out as much as they want for their own purposes. On the other hand those who merely possess the Word and read it, without seeking for genuine truths to establish faith, and genuine kinds of good to guide life, are like those who know from the newspapers that there are vast treasures there, but never get a penny from them. Those who possess the Word without drawing from it any understanding of genuine truth or any will for genuine good, are like those people who think themselves wealthy because they have taken huge loans from others, or large proprietors on the strength of renting other people's estates, houses and merchandise. Anyone can see that this is imaginary. They are also like people who walk about in magnificent costume, ride in gilded carriages with outriders behind and on either side and runners in front, yet do not actually own any of these things.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 246

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 246

246. The Jewish people was like this, and this is why, since it possessed the Word, the Lord likened it to a rich man, who was clothed in purple and fine linen and feasted magnificently every day, yet had not drawn from the Word even so much truth and good as to be sorry for Lazarus, the poor man, who lay before his door covered in sores. That people had not only failed to make any truths from the Word its own, but had absorbed such vast quantities of falsities that finally they could not see any truth; for falsities do not merely eclipse truths, but wipe them out and drive them away. That was why they did not recognise the Messiah, although all the prophets had foretold His coming.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 247

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 247

sRef Gen@48 @14 S0' sRef Deut@33 @14 S1' sRef Deut@33 @15 S1' sRef Deut@33 @13 S1' sRef Gen@48 @5 S1' sRef Deut@33 @17 S1' sRef Deut@33 @16 S1' 247. There are many passages in the prophets describing how the church among the Israelite or Jewish race was utterly destroyed and annihilated by their falsifying the meaning or understanding of the Word; for it is this and nothing else which destroys a church. The understanding of the Word, both true and false, is described in the prophets, especially Hosea, by Ephraim; for this name stands in the Word for the understanding of the Word in the church. Since the understanding of the Word makes the church, Ephraim is called the precious son and the child of delight (Jer. 31:20); the first-born (Jer. 31:9); the strength of Jehovah's head (Ps. 60:7; 108:8); the powerful one (Zech. 10:7); the one armed with the bow (Zech. 9:13). The sons of Ephraim are called armed men and shooters of the bow (Ps. 78:9); for a bow means doctrine from the Word militating against falsities. For the same reason too Ephraim was transferred to Israel's right hand and blessed, and also received in place of Reuben* (Gen. 48:5, 11ff). Also Ephraim with his brother Manasseh was raised above all others by Moses when he blessed the sons of Israel in the name of Joseph their father (Deut. 33:13-17).

sRef Hos@9 @3 S2' sRef Hos@5 @11 S2' sRef Hos@5 @9 S2' sRef Hos@5 @14 S2' sRef Hos@5 @5 S2' sRef Hos@5 @12 S2' sRef Hos@5 @13 S2' sRef Hos@6 @4 S2' [2] What the church, however, is like when its understanding of the Word is destroyed is also described by Ephraim in the prophets, especially in Hosea, as in the following passages:

Israel and Ephraim will fall; Ephraim will become a wilderness. Ephraim is overwhelmed and shaken in judgment. Hosea 5:5, 9, 11-14.

What shall I do to you, Ephraim? For your holiness has departed, like the clouds of dawn and like the dew that falls in the morning. Hosea 6:4.

They will not dwell in the land of Jehovah; Ephraim will return to Egypt, and will eat unclean food in Assyria. Hosea 9:3.

The land of Jehovah is the church; Egypt is the factual knowledge of the natural man; Assyria is reasoning from this. It is these two together which lead to falsification of the Word in respect of its inward understanding. This is why it is said that Ephraim will return to Egypt and eat unclean food in Assyria.

sRef Hos@6 @10 S3' sRef Hos@5 @3 S3' sRef Hos@12 @1 S3' [3] Ephraim pastures the wind and pursues the east wind; every day he increases the lie and devastation; he makes an agreement with Assyria and oil is carried down into Egypt. Hosea 12:1.

Pasturing the wind, pursuing the east wind and increasing the lie and devastation is falsifying truths and so destroying the church. Ephraim's whoring has a similar meaning, as whoring means the falsification of the understanding of the Word, that is, of its genuine truth, in the following passages:

I know Ephraim, that he has utterly given himself to whoring, and Israel is defiled. Hosea 5:3.

In the house of Israel I have seen a foul thing; there Ephraim went whoring and Israel is defiled. Hosea 6:10.

Israel is the church itself, and Ephraim is the understanding of the Word, the source which determines what sort of church it is. This is why it says that Ephraim went whoring and Israel is defiled.

sRef Hos@11 @8 S4' sRef Hos@0 @0 S4' [4] The church among the Israelite and Jewish people was utterly destroyed by falsifying the Word, so therefore it is said of Ephraim:

I shall give you up, Ephraim, I shall hand you over, Israel, like Admah and I shall make you like Zeboyim. Hosea 11:8.

So because the book of the prophet Hosea from the first chapter to the last is about the falsification of the genuine understanding of the Word and the resultant destruction of the church, and because whoring there means the falsification of truth, that is why the prophet was ordered to represent that state of the church by taking to wife a whore and having sons by her (chapter 1), and again by taking an adulterous woman (chapter 3).

These passages have been quoted to provide knowledge and proof from the Word that what the church is like depends on how the Word is understood in it. It is excellent and valuable, if its understanding is based upon genuine truths from the Word, but ruined and actually foul, if based upon falsified truths.

* Thought by some editors to be an error for Manasseh, but the reference may be to verse 5: 'Ephraim and Manasseh shall be mine as Reuben and Simeon are.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 248

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 248

248. IX

The details of the Word all contain a marriage of the Lord and the church, and so a marriage of good and truth.

Up to now it has not been seen that the details of the Word contain a marriage of the Lord and the church, and so a marriage of good and truth. Nor could this be seen, because the spiritual sense of the Word has not before been revealed, and that marriage can only be seen by means of that sense. The Word has two senses hidden in its literal sense; these are called the spiritual and the celestial senses. In the spiritual sense the contents of the Word refer chiefly to the church, and in the celestial sense chiefly to the Lord. Again in the spiritual sense its contents refer to Divine truth, and in the celestial sense to Divine good. Hence there is this marriage in the Word. But this is not apparent except to those who have learned from the spiritual and celestial senses of the Word the meanings of the words and names. For certain words and names are used of good, and certain of truth, and some include both. So without this knowledge it was impossible to see this marriage in the details of the Word. This is the reason this secret was not previously revealed.

It is because this kind of marriage is contained in the details of the Word, that it so often uses two expressions which appear to repeat the same thing. Yet they are not really repetitions, but one refers to good, the other to truth; and the two taken together make this link and so form a single unit. This too is the source of the Divine holiness of the Word; for in every Divine act good is joined with truth and truth with good.

It is because this kind of marriage is contained in the details of the Word, that it so often uses two expressions which appear to repeat the same thing. Yet they are not really repetitions, but one refers to good, the other to truth; and the two taken together make this link and so form a single unit. This too is the source of the Divine holiness of the Word; for in every Divine act good is joined with truth and truth with good.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 249

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 249

249. There is said to be a marriage of the Lord and the church in the details of the Word, and thus a marriage of good and truth, because where there is a marriage of the Lord and the church, there too there is a marriage of good and truth, for the one is the result of the other. So long as a church or its individual members are in possession of truths, the Lord acts upon the truths with good and makes them come alive; or, what is the same thing, so long as a person belonging to the church is able to understand truth, the Lord acts upon his understanding by means of the good of charity and thus pours life into it. Every person has two life-faculties, known as the understanding and the will. The understanding receives truth and hence wisdom; the will receives good and hence charity. These two faculties must act as one for a person to be a true member of the church; and they do so, so long as a person forms his understanding from genuine truths, and this appears to be his own doing, and so long as his will is filled by the good of love, which is the Lord's doing. Hence a person has a life of truth and a life of good, the life of truth in the understanding, the life of good in the will. So long as they are united, they make not two, but one life. This is the marriage of the Lord and the church, or the marriage of good and truth in the case of the individual.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 250

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 250

250. Attentive readers may observe that there seem to be pairs of expressions in the Word which look like repetitions of the same thing. For instance, brother and companion, poor and needy, wilderness and solitude, void and emptiness, enemy and opponent, sin and iniquity, anger and wrath, nation and people, joy and gladness, grief and weeping, righteousness and judgment, etc. These appear to be synonyms, yet they are not; for brother, poor, wilderness, [void,] enemy, sin, anger, nation, joy, grief and righteousness are used in speaking of good, and, in the opposite sense, of evil. Companion, needy, solitude, emptiness, opponent, iniquity, wrath, people, gladness, weeping and judgment are used in speaking of truth, and, in the opposite sense, of falsity. Yet it looks to the reader, who does not know this secret, that poor and needy, wilderness and solitude, void and emptiness, etc., are one and the same; still they are not, but they are joined to make a single unit.

Many expressions in the Word are coupled, like fire and flame, gold and silver, bronze and iron, wood and stone, bread and wine*, purple and fine linen, etc. Fire, gold, bronze, wood, bread and purple are used in speaking of good; but flame, silver, iron, stone, water, wine and fine linen are used in speaking of truth. Likewise when it is said that one is to love God with all one's heart and with all one's soul, or that God would create in a person a new heart and a new spirit. The heart is used in speaking of the good of love, the soul or spirit of the truths of faith. There are also words which are used by themselves without other additions, because they relate to both good and truth, but these and many other things do not become evident except to angels, and to those who, while having the natural sense, are also able to receive the spiritual sense.

* It is possible that the phrase 'bread and water' has been omitted here before 'bread and wine'; cf. AC 9323.1.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 251

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 251

sRef Ezek@36 @15 S0' sRef Zeph@2 @9 S0' sRef Ps@106 @5 S0' sRef Ps@18 @43 S0' sRef Isa@14 @6 S0' sRef Isa@10 @5 S0' sRef Ps@106 @4 S0' sRef Isa@10 @6 S0' sRef Ps@33 @10 S0' sRef Dan@7 @14 S0' sRef Isa@34 @1 S0' sRef Ps@47 @3 S0' sRef Ps@47 @8 S0' sRef Isa@25 @7 S0' sRef Zech@8 @22 S0' sRef Isa@25 @3 S0' sRef Ps@47 @9 S0' sRef Luke@2 @30 S0' sRef Ps@67 @4 S0' sRef Luke@2 @31 S0' sRef Luke@2 @32 S0' sRef Isa@11 @10 S0' sRef Isa@1 @4 S0' sRef Rev@10 @11 S0' sRef Isa@18 @7 S0' sRef Isa@9 @2 S0' sRef Ps@44 @14 S0' sRef Ps@67 @2 S0' sRef Joel@2 @17 S0' sRef Ps@67 @3 S0' sRef Rev@5 @9 S0' sRef Isa@43 @9 S0' sRef Jer@6 @23 S0' sRef Jer@6 @22 S0' sRef Isa@55 @4 S0' sRef Isa@55 @5 S0' sRef Isa@9 @3 S0' sRef Isa@42 @6 S0' sRef Isa@49 @22 S0' 251. To demonstrate from the Word that it contains pairs of expressions which look like repetitions of the same thing would be tedious, since it would fill pages. But in order to remove any doubt, I should like to quote passages where nation and people, and joy and gladness are mentioned together. The passages in which nation* and people are named are the following:

Woe to the nation of sinners, a people burdened with iniquity. Isa. 1:4.

The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light; you have increased the nation. Isa. 9:2, 3.

Assyria is the rod of my anger; I shall send him against a nation of hypocrites, against the people of my wrath shall I order him to march. Isa. 10:5, 6.

It will happen on that day, the nations will seek the root of Jesse, who stands as a sign to the peoples. Isa. 11:10.

Jehovah who struck the peoples an incurable blow, mastering the nations with wrath. Isa. 14:6.

On that day there will be brought as a gift to Jehovah Zebaoth a people torn apart and plundered, and a nation measured out and trampled. Isa. 18:7.

A strong people will honour you, the city of powerful nations will fear you. Isa. 25:3.

Jehovah will swallow up the veil over all peoples, the pall over all nations. Isa. 25:7.

Approach, you nations, and listen, you peoples. Isa. 34:1.

I have called you to be a covenant to the people, a light to the nations. Isa. 42:6.

Let all the nations be gathered together, and let the peoples assemble. Isa. 43:9.

Look, I shall raise my hand towards the nations, and my signal towards the peoples. Isa. 49:22.

I made him a witness to the peoples a prince and law-giver to the nations. Isa. 55:4, 5.

Look, a people coming from the land of the north, and a mighty nation from the corners of the earth. Jer. 6:22, 23.

I shall make you not to hear any longer the slander of the nations, and you will no longer bear the reproaches of the peoples. Ezek. 36:15.

All peoples and nations will worship Him. Dan. 7:14.

Lest the nations make a by-word of them, and say among the peoples, Where is their God? Joel 2:17.

The survivors of my people will plunder them, and the remnant of my nation will take their inheritance. Zeph. 2:9.

Many people and numerous nations will come to seek Jehovah in Jerusalem. Zech. 8:22.

My eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared before the face of all peoples, a light to be a revelation to the nations. Luke 2:30-32.

You have redeemed us by your blood from every people and nation. Rev. 5:9.

You must prophesy again over the peoples and nations. Rev. 10:11.

You will set me to be head of the nations; a people whom I knew not shall serve me. Ps. 18:43.

Jehovah makes vain the counsel of the nations, overthrows the thoughts of the peoples. Ps. 33:10.

You make us a proverb among the nations, a wagging of the head among the peoples. Ps. 44:14.

Jehovah will set peoples subject to us, and nations beneath our feet. God reigns over the nations: the willing ones of the peoples are gathered. Ps. 47:3, 8, 9.

The peoples shall confess you, and the nations shall shout for joy; because you will judge the peoples with righteousness and will lead the nations on the earth. Ps. 67:3, 4.

Remember me, Jehovah, in showing favour to your people, that I may rejoice in the joy of your nations. Ps. 106:4, 5.

There are other passages too.

The reason why nations and peoples are mentioned together is that nations means those who are in possession of good, and in the opposite sense, those who are in possession of evil; and peoples means those who are in possession of truths, and in the opposite sense, those who are in possession of falsities. Therefore, those who belong to the Lord's spiritual kingdom are called peoples, and those who belong to His celestial kingdom are called nations. For all who possess truths and the intelligence they give are in the spiritual kingdom, and all who possess various kinds of good and the wisdom they give are in the celestial kingdom.

* The Latin word here translated 'nation' is frequently used in the plural to mean 'the heathen.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 252

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 252

sRef Ps@96 @11 S0' sRef Jer@7 @34 S0' sRef Isa@66 @10 S0' sRef Isa@22 @13 S0' sRef Jer@25 @10 S0' sRef Joel@1 @16 S0' sRef John@3 @29 S0' sRef Ps@51 @8 S0' sRef Luke@1 @14 S0' sRef Zech@8 @19 S0' sRef Isa@51 @3 S0' sRef Jer@33 @11 S0' sRef Isa@35 @10 S0' sRef Lam@4 @21 S0' sRef Jer@33 @10 S0' 252. It is similar with many other expressions, as, for instance, when joy is mentioned, there is also a mention of gladness. This is clear in the following passages:

Look, joy and gladness, the slaughtering of an ox. Isa. 22:13.

Joy and gladness will escort them; sorrow and groaning will flee away. Isa. 35:10; 51:11.

Cut off from the house of our God are gladness and joy. Joel 1:16.

The sound of joy and the sound of gladness shall be banished. Jer. 7:34; 25: 10.

The fast of the tenth [month] will become joy and gladness for the house of Judah. Zech. 8:19.

Be glad in Jerusalem, rejoice in her. Isa. 66:10.

Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Edom. Lam. 4:21.

The heavens will be glad, and the earth will rejoice. Ps. 96:11.*

You** will make me hear joy and gladness. Ps. 51:8.

Joy and gladness will be found in Zion, confession and the sound of song. Isa. 51:3.

There will be gladness, and many will rejoice over his birth. Luke 1:14.

I shall cause to cease the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. Jer. 7:34; 16:9; 25:10.

There will still be heard in this place the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, and the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. Jer. 33:10, 11.

There are other passages too.

The reason why both joy and gladness are mentioned is that joy is used referring to good and gladness referring to truth, in other words joy is used of love and gladness of wisdom. For joy is an emotion of the heart, gladness of the spirit, in other words, joy is of the will and gladness of the understanding. It is plain that there is a marriage of the Lord and the church also in these, because it is said:

The voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. Jer. 7:34; 16:9; 25:10; 33:10, 11.

The Lord is the bridegroom and the church is the bride. For the Lord as bridegroom see Matt. 9:15; Mark 2:19, 20; Luke 5:34, 35; and for the church as bride, Rev. 21:2, 9; 22:17. This is why John the Baptist said of Jesus:

He who has the bride is the bridegroom. John 3:29.

* Reference corrected in the author's copy from 68.4.
** The Latin has 'they.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 253

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 253

253. On account of the marriage of Divine good and Divine truth in the details of the Word, in very many passages Jehovah and God, or Jehovah and the Holy One of Israel are mentioned as if they were two, when in fact they are one. Jehovah means the Lord as regards the Divine good of Divine love, God and the Holy One of Israel mean the Lord as regards the Divine truth of Divine wisdom. For the numerous passages in the Word where Jehovah and God, or Jehovah and the Holy One of Israel, are mentioned, while still meaning one, see on the doctrine of the Lord the Redeemer [93].

TCR (Chadwick) n. 254

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 254

254. X

Heresies can be extracted from the literal sense of the Word, but confirming them leads to damnation.

It was demonstrated above that the Word cannot be understood without doctrine, and that doctrine resembles a lantern which allows genuine truths to be seen; and that this is because the Word is entirely written by means of correspondences [226-228]. That is why many things in it are appearances of truth and not bare truths, and why many things are written to be intelligible to purely natural people, and yet in such a way that the simple can understand it simply, the intelligent intelligently and the wise wisely. Seeing the Word is like this, the appearances of truth, which are truths wrapped up, can be taken for bare truths; and when these are confirmed, they become fallacies, which in themselves are falsities. It is the taking and confirming of appearances of truth for genuine truths which have given rise to all the heresies, which there ever have been and still exist in the Christian part of the world. But what damns people is not the heresies themselves, but drawing on the Word and using reasonings on the part of the natural man to confirm the falsities contained in the heresy, and living a wicked life.

For everyone by birth acquires the religion of his country or his parents. From childhood he is introduced to it and afterwards retains it; nor can he extricate himself from its falsities, both on account of his worldly business and on account of the weakness of the understanding in sighting truths of that description. But living a wicked life, and confirming falsities to the point that genuine truth is destroyed, this is what brings damnation. For the person who stays with his religion, believes in God, and if he is in Christian countries believes in the Lord, regards the Word as holy, and lives conscientiously according to the Ten Commandments - he does not swear allegiance to falsities. So when he hears truths and perceives them in his own fashion, he can embrace them and so be extricated from falsities. But this is not the case with the person who has confirmed the falsities taught by his religion, for falsity once confirmed remains and cannot be rooted out. For when it has been confirmed, falsity is as if one had sworn allegiance to it, especially if it has stuck fast to it self-love or pride in one's own intelligence.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 255

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 255

255. I have spoken with people in the spiritual world who lived many centuries ago and convinced themselves of the falsities taught by their religion; and I learned that they still steadfastly remain convinced of them. I have also spoken with some there who belonged to the same religion and thought just as the others, but had not confirmed the falsities in their minds; and I learned that these under instruction by angels have rejected the falsities and accepted truths. These people have been saved, but not the others.

After death everyone is instructed by angels, and those are accepted who see truths, and falsities in the light of truths. But the only ones to see truths are those who have not convinced themselves of falsities; those who have are unwilling to see truths, and if they do, they turn away, and then either laugh at them or turn them into falsities. The real cause of this is that confirmation enters into the will, and the will is the very essence of the person, and has the understanding at its beck and call. But bare knowledge only enters the understanding, and this has no control over the will; so it is no more inside the person than someone who stands in the forecourt or at the door, and has not yet been admitted to the house.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 256

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 256

256. Let us take an example to illustrate this point. In many passages of the Word anger, wrath and vengeance are attributed to God; and He is said to punish, cast into hell, tempt people and so forth. Anyone who believes this in his simplicity and like a child, and therefore fears God and takes care not to sin against Him, is not damned for holding that simple faith. But if anyone so convinces himself of these things as to believe that anger, wrath and vengeance, and so actions characteristic of a wicked person, can be attributed to God, and that He punishes people and casts them into hell, he is damned for destroying a genuine truth. This is that God is Love itself, Mercy itself and Good itself; and one who is all these cannot be angry or wrathful or demand vengeance. These things are ascribed to God in the Word, because this is how it appears; such things are appearances of truth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 257

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 257

257. An example from nature may serve to illustrate this idea, that many things in the literal sense of the Word are appearances of truth, in which genuine truths are hidden; and that it is not injurious to think and to speak in simple terms according to the appearances of truth, but that it is injurious to confirm them, since this destroys the Divine truth hidden within them. This example is offered because what is natural provides a clearer illustration and proof than what is spiritual.

It appears to the eye that the sun travels round the earth every day and also once every year. Thus we talk of the sun rising and setting; causing morning, noon, evening and night, as well as the seasons, spring, summer, autumn and winter, and thus days and years. Yet the sun stands unmoved, for it is a sea of fire, and it is the earth which rotates every day and travels around its orbit every year. A person, who in simplicity or ignorance thinks that the sun travels round the earth, does not destroy the natural truth, which is that the earth rotates on its axis and every year travels around the ecliptic. But if a person convinces himself of the sun's apparent motion by the reasonings of the natural mind, and more so if he does so from the Word, because it speaks of the sun rising and setting, he weakens the truth and destroys it; and afterwards he is hardly able to see it, even though he is given a visual demonstration that the whole starry sky rotates similarly every day and every year in appearance, although not a single star changes its fixed position relative to another. The movement of the sun is an apparent truth; its not moving is a genuine truth. Yet everyone speaks according to the apparent truth, saying that the sun rises and sets. This is allowed, because it could not be otherwise. But to think like this from conviction blunts and dulls the rational understanding.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 258

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 258

258. The reason why it is injurious to confirm the appearances of truth in the Word, thus leading to the creation of a fallacy and so the destruction of the Divine truth hidden within it, is precisely because every detail of the literal sense of the Word communicates with heaven. For, as was shown above, every detail of its literal sense contains a spiritual sense, which is revealed in passing from man to heaven. Everything in the spiritual sense is a genuine truth. Therefore, when a person with false beliefs applies the literal sense to confirm them, then there are falsities in it; and when falsities come in, the truths are scattered, as happens on the passage from man to heaven, This may be compared to a shiny bladder full of gall being tossed to another person, but before reaching him it bursts in the air and the gall is sprinkled around; on this happening, when the other person becomes aware of the air being polluted with gall, he turns away and shuts his mouth to prevent it touching his tongue. Again it is like a leather bottle bound with cedar twigs containing vinegar full of worms; and if the bottle is shattered on the road and another person smells the stench, it immediately makes him feel sick and he fans the air to prevent the stench entering his nostrils.

[2] Again it is like an almond in its shell, but instead of an almond there is a newly hatched viper inside; when the shell is broken open, the tiny viper seems to be blown by the wind into another person's eyes, but he turns away to prevent this happening. This is self-evident. It is similar when the Word is read by a person with false beliefs, who applies some things in its literal sense to confirm his falsities; then the Word is rejected on the way to heaven, to prevent anything of the kind affecting the angels and distressing them. For when falsity comes into contact with truth, it is like the point of a needle touching the fibril of a nerve, or the pupil of the eye. It is well known that the nerve fibril immediately curls up and retreats into itself; and likewise the eye as soon as it is touched covers itself with the eyelids. These comparisons make it plain that the falsification of truth breaks communication with heaven and shuts it off. This is why it is injurious to confirm any heretical falsity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 259

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 259

259. The Word is like a garden, which may be called the heavenly paradise, containing dainties and delights of every kind. The dainties are composed of fruits, the delights of flowers, and in their midst are the trees of life growing hard by springs of living water; and the garden is surrounded by woodland trees. A person who through doctrine has possession of Divine truths is in the middle of this garden, where the trees of life are, and in fact he enjoys the dainties and delights. A person whose knowledge of truths is not from doctrine, but only drawn from the literal sense, is on the circumference and sees only the woodland. But one who has been taught a false religion, and has convinced himself of that falsity, is not even in the wood, but outside it in a sandy plain, where there is not even any grass. I have shown in my book HEAVEN AND HELL that such is the condition of these people after death.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 260

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 260

aRef Ex@37 @9 S0' sRef Gen@3 @24 S1' sRef Gen@3 @23 S1' 260. It should furthermore be known that the literal sense is a protection to prevent the genuine truths hidden within being harmed. It acts as a protection because that sense can be twisted in different directions and explained as it is understood, without its internal being harmed or violated. For it does no harm for the literal sense to be understood differently by different people; but harm is done, if a person introduces falsities which are in opposition to the Divine truths, and this is only done by those who have convinced themselves of false ideas. This is what does violence to the Word. The literal sense acts as a protection to prevent this happening, and this occurs with those whose religion has given them false ideas, but who have not convinced themselves of these falsities. The literal sense of the Word acting as a protection is what is meant by cherubim in the Word, and it is there described by them. This protection is meant by the cherubim which were placed at the entrance to the garden of Eden after Adam and his wife were expelled from it. We read of these:

When Jehovah God had cast out the man, He made cherubim to dwell on the east of the garden of Eden, and the flame of a sword turning this way and that, to guard the way to the tree of life. Gen. 3:23, 24.

sRef 1Ki@6 @29 S2' aRef Ex@26 @36 S2' sRef 1Ki@6 @35 S2' sRef 1Ki@6 @32 S2' sRef Ex@26 @31 S2' sRef Ex@25 @19 S2' sRef Ex@25 @18 S2' sRef Ex@25 @20 S2' sRef Ex@25 @21 S2' [2] No one can know what this means, unless he knows the meaning of cherubim, of the garden of Eden and the tree of life in it; and also of the flame of a sword turning this way and that. These details have been explained in the section dealing with this chapter in ARCANA CAELESTIA, published in London. This shows that cherubim mean protection, the way to the tree of life means the approach to the Lord, which people make by means of the truths of the spiritual sense of the Word; the flame of a sword turning means Divine truth at the outermost level, which resembles the Word in its literal sense, in being capable of being twisted like this. The meaning of the cherubim made of gold placed on the two ends of the mercy-seat, which was above the ark in the tabernacle (Exod. 25:18-21), is similar. The ark meant the Word, because the Ten Commandments contained in it were the rudiments of the Word; the cherubim there meant protection, which is why the Lord spoke with Moses from between them (Exod. 25:22; 37:9; Num. 7:89). He spoke in the natural sense, for He does not speak with man except in fulness, and in the literal sense Divine truth is in its fulness (see 214-224 above). Nor was anything else meant by the cherubim on the hangings of the tabernacle and on the veil (Exod. 26:1, 31). For the hangings and veils of the tabernacle meant the outermost of heaven and the church, and so also of the Word (see 220 above). Likewise the cherubim carved on the walls and the doors of the temple at Jerusalem (1 Kings 6:29, 32, 35; see 221 above); and equally the cherubim in the new temple (Ezek. 41:18-20).

sRef Ezek@28 @14 S3' sRef Ps@18 @10 S3' sRef Ezek@28 @12 S3' sRef Ezek@28 @13 S3' sRef Ps@99 @1 S3' sRef Ezek@28 @16 S3' sRef Ps@80 @1 S3' sRef Ps@18 @9 S3' [3] Since cherubim meant protection to prevent the Lord, heaven and Divine truth as it is inwardly in the Word, being directly approached, but only indirectly through the outermost, this is why it is said of the king of Tyre:

You who set the seal on your measured space, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty, you were in Eden the garden. Every kind of precious stone was your covering. You, cherub, were the expanse of the covering. I have destroyed you, cherub who cover, in the midst of the stones of fire. Ezek. 28:12-14, 16.

Tyre means the church as regards its knowledge of truth and good, and so the king of Tyre means the Word, which is the place and source of that knowledge. It is obvious that in this passage the king means the Word at the outermost level, and cherub means protection, for it says 'You who set the seal on your measured space; every kind of precious stone was your covering; you, cherub, were the expanse of the covering' as well as 'cherub who cover'. The precious stones which are also named there mean the contents of the literal sense (see 217, 218 above).

Because cherubim mean the Word at the outermost level and also its protection, it is said in the Psalms of David:

Jehovah tilted the heavens and came down, and rode upon a cherub. Ps. 18:9, 10.

Shepherd of Israel, who sits upon the cherubim, shine forth. Ps. 80:1. Jehovah that sits upon the cherubim. Ps. 99:1.

Riding on the cherubim or sitting on them means the outermost sense of the Word. The Divine truth in the Word and its nature are described by the four creatures, which are also called cherubim (in Ezekiel, chapters 1, 9 and 10); and also by the four creatures in the midst of the throne and beside the throne (Rev. 4:6ff). (See APOCALYPSE REVEALED published by me at Amsterdam, 239, 275, 3-14.)

TCR (Chadwick) n. 261

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 261

sRef John@1 @2 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' 261. XI

The Lord when in the world fulfilled everything in the Word, and thus became the Word, that is, Divine truth, even in its outermost form.

The Lord's fulfilling when in the world everything in the Word, and thus becoming Divine truth, that is, the Word, even in its outermost form, is what is meant by these words in John:

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14.

Being made flesh is becoming the Word in its outermost form. The Lord showed the disciples, when He was transfigured, what the Word is like in its outermost form (Matt. 17:2ff; Mark 9:2ff; Luke 9:28ff). In these places it is said that Moses and Elijah were seen in glory; Moses means the Word which was written by means of him, and the historical part of the Word in general, Elijah the prophetical part. The Lord as seen by John in Revelation (1:13-16) was also represented as the Word in its outermost form. All the details of His description there mean the outermost form of Divine truth, that is, the Word. The Lord had indeed previously been the Word or Divine truth, but in its first beginnings; for it is said:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1, 2.

But when the Word was made flesh, then the Lord became the Word even in its outermost form. That is why He is called 'the First and the Last' (Rev. 1:8, 11, 17; 2:8; 21:6; 22:12, 13; Isa. 44:6).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 262

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 262

sRef Luke@4 @21 S0' sRef Luke@24 @44 S0' sRef Luke@24 @45 S0' sRef Luke@4 @16 S0' sRef Luke@24 @25 S0' sRef Luke@24 @27 S0' sRef Luke@24 @26 S0' sRef Luke@4 @19 S0' sRef Luke@4 @18 S0' sRef Luke@4 @20 S0' sRef Luke@4 @17 S0' sRef Matt@5 @18 S1' sRef Matt@5 @17 S1' sRef Matt@26 @56 S1' sRef Mark@14 @21 S1' sRef John@13 @18 S1' sRef Matt@26 @54 S1' sRef Mark@15 @28 S1' sRef Mark@14 @49 S1' sRef Matt@26 @52 S1' sRef John@19 @37 S1' sRef John@19 @24 S1' sRef John@18 @9 S1' sRef John@17 @12 S1' sRef John@19 @30 S1' sRef John@19 @36 S1' sRef John@19 @28 S1' 262. It is plain that the Lord fulfilled everything in the Word from a consideration of the passages where it is said that the Law and the Scripture were fulfilled by Him, and that everything was brought to completion, as in these where Jesus said:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law and the Prophets. I have come not to abolish, but to fulfil. Matt. 5:17, 18.

Jesus entered the synagogue, and got up to read. Then there was handed to Him the book of the prophet Isaiah; and He unrolled the book and found the passage where it is written: The spirit of Jehovah is upon me, because He has anointed me; He has sent me to bring good news to the poor, to heal the broken in heart, to bring good news of release to those who are in bonds, and sight to the blind, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. Afterwards He rolled up the book and said, To-day this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. Luke 4:16-21. That the Scripture should be fulfilled, He who eats bread with me has lifted up his heel upon me. John 13:18.

None of them has perished, but the son of perdition, that the Scripture should be fulfilled. John 17:12.

That the word should be fulfilled which said, Of those you gave me, I have not lost one. John 18:9. Jesus said to Peter, Put your sword away in its place. How then could the Scripture be fulfilled, which says that it must be thus. This was done so that the Scripture might be fulfilled. Matt. 26:52, 54, 56.

The Son of Man goes away, as it is written of Him, so that the Scriptures should be fulfilled. Mark 14:21, 49.

Thus the Scripture was fulfilled which said, He was counted with the irreligious. Mark 15:28; Luke 22:37.

That the Scripture might be fulfilled, they divided my* garments among them, and cast lots for my tunic. John 19:24.

After this Jesus knowing that all things were now completed, that the Scripture should be fulfilled. John 19:28.

When Jesus had received the vinegar, He said, it is completed (that is, fulfilled). John 19:30.

These things were done so that the Scripture might be fulfilled, A bone you shall not break in him; and again another Scripture says, They shall see him whom they pierced. John 19:36, 37.

He also taught His disciples, before He went away, that the whole Word was written about Him, and that He had come into the world to fulfil it, in these words:

He said to them, Foolish people and slow at heart to believe all that the Prophets have said! Surely this is what Christ ought to suffer, and enter into glory? Then beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He explained to them the references to Himself in all the Scriptures. Luke 24:25-27.

Further, Jesus said that all things ought to be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms about me (Luke 24:44, 45).

It is plain from the Lord's words that, while He was in the world, He fulfilled everything in the Word down to the last details:

Amen I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all things are done. Matt. 5:18.

This will now make it possible to see clearly that by the Lord fulfilling everything in the Law is not meant fulfilling all the Ten Commandments, but everything in the Word. These further passages will establish that the Law means everything in the Word:

Jesus said, Is it not written in your law, I said, You are gods. John 10:34.

This is written in Psalm 82:6.

The crowd replied, We have heard from the law that the Christ shall remain for ever. John 12:34.

This is written in Psalm 89:30[, 37]; Psalm 110:4; Daniel 7:14.

That the word should be fulfilled which is written in their Law, They hated me without cause. John 15:25.

This is written in Psalm 35:19.

It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one dot of the Law to be lost. Luke 16:17.

The Law here, as in many other passages, means the whole of Sacred Scripture.

* A correction of the author's copy for 'his.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 263

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 263

263. Few people understand how it is that the Lord is the Word. For they consider that the Lord can by means of the Word illuminate and teach people, without this entitling Him to be called the Word. But they should know that each individual is his own will and his own understanding, and this is what makes one person distinct from another. Since the will is the organ for the reception of love, and thus for all the kinds of good which make up his love, and since the understanding is the organ for the reception of wisdom, and thus for all the forms of truth which make up his wisdom, it follows that each individual is his own love and his own wisdom, or what is the same, his own good and his own truth. This is the only thing that makes him a man and being a man consists in nothing else. As for the Lord, He is love itself and wisdom itself, and so good itself and truth itself; He became these by fulfilling every good and every truth in the Word. For one who thinks and speaks nothing but truth becomes that truth; and one who wills and does nothing but good becomes that good. Since the Lord fulfilled all the Divine truth and Divine good which are in the Word, both in its natural as well as its spiritual sense, He became good itself and truth itself, and so the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 264

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 264

sRef Num@22 @13 S0' sRef Num@24 @17 S0' sRef Num@25 @3 S0' sRef Num@22 @18 S0' sRef Num@25 @2 S0' sRef Num@25 @1 S0' sRef Num@22 @40 S0' sRef Ps@110 @4 S0' sRef Ex@34 @13 S0' 264. XII

Before the time of the Word which we have in the world to-day, there was another Word, now lost.

It can be established from what is recorded in the books of Moses, that before the time of the Word, which was given to the Israelite nation by means of Moses and the Prophets, worship by sacrifices was well known, and that prophecies were given from the mouth of Jehovah. The following passages show that worship by sacrifices was known. It was commanded that the Children of Israel should overturn the altars of the gentiles, break in pieces their statues, and cut down their sacred groves (Exod. 34:13; Deut. 7:5; 12:3.) Israel in Shittim began to wanton with the daughters of Moab; they invited the people to the sacrifices offered to their gods, and the people ate of them (Num. 25:1-3). Balaam, who came from Syria, had altars built and sacrificed cattle and sheep (Num. 22:40; 23:1, 2, 14, 29, 30). He also prophesied about the Lord, saying that a star should arise from Jacob and a sceptre from Israel (Num. 24:17). And he gave prophecies from the mouth of Jehovah (Num. 22:13, 18; 23:3, 5, 8, 16, 26; 24:1, 13). It is plain from these passages that the gentiles had Divine worship almost exactly like that established for the Israelite nation through Moses. Some words in the books of Moses show clearly that it existed even before the time of Abraham (Deut. 32:7, 8); but it is even more obvious from the case of Melchizedek, king of Salem:

He brought out bread and wine, and blessed Abram; and Abram gave him tithes of everything. Gen. 14:18-20.

Melchizedeck represented the Lord, for he is called the priest of God Most High (Gen. 14:18); and it is said of the Lord in the Psalms of David:

You are priest for ever, after the fashion of Melchizedek. Ps. 110:4.

That was why Melchizedek brought out bread and wine, as being the most holy things of the church, just as they are the holy things in the Holy Supper. Apart from these there are extant many indications that there was a Word before the Israelite Word, which was the source of such revelations.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 265

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 265

sRef Num@21 @15 S0' sRef Num@21 @14 S0' 265. It is established by the books of Moses, who names and quotes from it, that the ancient peoples had a Word (Num. 21:14, 15, 27-30). The historical parts of that Word were called 'The Wars of Jehovah', and the prophetical parts 'The Utterances.' The following is a quotation taken by Moses from the historical parts of that Word:

Therefore it is said in the book of the Wars of Jehovah, Vaheb in Suphah and the rivers Arnon, and the water-channel of the river, which went down, where Ar dwelt and rested towards the boundary of Moab. Num. 21:14, 15.

The 'Wars of Jehovah' in that Word, as in ours, meant and described the Lord's battles with the hells and His victories over them, at the time when He was to come into the world. The same battles too are meant and described in many of the historical passages of our Word, as in the wars of Joshua against the nations of the land of Canaan, and in the wars of the Judges and Kings of Israel.

sRef Num@21 @30 S2' sRef Num@21 @29 S2' sRef Num@21 @27 S2' sRef Num@21 @28 S2' [2] The following passage is taken from the prophetical parts of the ancient Word:

Therefore the authors of Utterances say: Come into Heshbon; the city of Sihon shall be built and strengthened. For fire has gone forth from Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon. It has devoured Ar of Moab, those who possess the high places of Arnon. Woe to you, Moab; you are done for, people of Kemosh. He has made his sons fugitives, and his daughters the captives of the Amorite king Sihon. We have despatched them with arrows. Heshbon has perished as far as Dibon, and we have laid waste as far as Nophah, which is as far as Medeba. Num. 21:27-30.

The translators render the phrase 'the composers of proverbs', but it ought to be 'the authors of utterances' or 'the prophetic utterances', as is evident from the meaning of the word moshalim in the Hebrew language, which is not only 'proverbs' but also 'prophetic utterances' (as at Num. 23:7, 18; 24:3, 15). There it is said that Balaam 'gave forth' his utterance; this was a prophecy, also about the Lord. His utterance is called mashal in the singular; moreover, the passages quoted by Moses from this source are not proverbs, but prophecies.

sRef 2Sam@1 @18 S3' sRef Josh@10 @12 S3' sRef 2Sam@1 @17 S3' sRef Jer@48 @45 S3' sRef Josh@10 @13 S3' sRef Jer@48 @46 S3' [3] That Word was likewise divinely inspired, as is plain from Jeremiah, where very similar words occur:

Fire has gone forth from Heshbon, and a flame from among Sihon, which has devoured the corner of Moab and the crown of the head of the sons of Shaon. Woe to you, Moab; the people of Kemosh is done for, for your sons are taken by force into captivity, into captivity your daughters. Jer. 48:45, 46.

In addition a prophetical book of the ancient Word, called the book of Jashar, that is, the book of the Upright, is mentioned by David and Joshua. In the case of David:

David made a lament for Saul and for Jonathan; and he wrote on it, For teaching the sons of Judah the bow. Look, it is written in the book of Jashar. 2 Sam. 1:17, 18.

In the case of Joshua:

Joshua said, Be still, sun, in Gibeon, and you, moon, in the valley of Aijalon. Is not this written in the book of Jashar? Josh. 10:12, 13.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 266

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 266

266. These examples serve to establish that there was an ancient Word in the world, especially in Asia, before the Israelite Word. This Word is preserved in heaven among the angels who lived during those centuries; and at the present time it also survives among the nations in Great Tartary; on this see the third experience following this chapter on the Sacred Scripture [279].

TCR (Chadwick) n. 267

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 267

267. XIII

The Word also serves to enlighten those who are outside the church and do not possess the Word.

There can be no link with heaven unless somewhere on earth there is a church, which possesses the Word, and so the Lord is known because the Lord is the God of heaven and earth, and without Him salvation is impossible. A link with the Lord is established by means of the Word, and so is association with angels: see 234-239*. It is enough if there is a church which possesses the Word, even though it is composed of relatively few people, The Lord is still present by its means throughout the world, for the Word effects a link between heaven and the human race.

* The Latin text has 240.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 268

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 268

268. I must explain how the Lord and heaven are present in every land and linked to it by means of the Word. The whole heaven of angels is in the sight of the Lord like one person, and so is the church on earth. They really look like a person, as may be seen in my book HEAVEN AND HELL (59-86)*. That person contains the church, where the Word is read and thus the Lord is known, just as the body contains a heart and lungs; the Lord's celestial kingdom serves as the heart, His spiritual kingdom as the lungs. Just as these two sources of life in the human body supply all the remaining limbs, viscera and organs with continued existence and life, so too the linking of the Lord and heaven with the church by means of the Word supplies continued existence and life to all those throughout the world who have a religion, worship one God and live good lives. Thus they form part of that person, and answer to the limbs and viscera outside the chest, which is the seat of the heart and lungs. For the Word possessed by the Christian church is life to the remainder, given by the Lord through heaven, just as the life of the limbs and viscera throughout the body comes from the heart and lungs. The communication between them too is similar. This too is why Christians, who hear the Word read, make up the chest of that person. They are also at the midmost point of all, surrounded by the Roman Catholics; outside them come the Mohammedans who acknowledge the Lord as the greatest prophet and as the Son of God. After them come the Africans, and the outermost circumference is made up of the peoples and nations in Asia and the Indies.

* The Latin text has 87.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 269

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 269

sRef John@1 @5 S0' sRef John@1 @9 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' 269. It can be deduced that this happens in heaven as a whole from the similar phenomena in each community in heaven. For each community is a heaven on a smaller scale, also resembling a person. (On this see my book HEAVEN AND HELL, 41-87.) In every community in heaven those who are at its centre likewise answer to the heart and lungs, and they enjoy the strongest light. The light itself, and consequently the perception of truth, spreads from that centre in all directions towards the circumference, thus reaching all the members of the community and bringing them spiritual life. A demonstration showed that on the removal of those at the centre, who made up the province of the heart and lungs and enjoyed the strongest light, the surrounding people had a shadow cast upon their understandings, and had such a tenuous perception of truth that they complained. But as soon as those at the centre returned, they saw the light and their perception of truth was as before.

This can be compared with heat and light coming from the sun of the world, which gives trees and plants the power to grow, even if they are placed to one side and are under a cloud, so long as the sun is above the horizon. The same is true of the light and heat of heaven coming from the Lord as the sun there. This light is in essence Divine truth, the source of all intelligence and wisdom for angels as well as men. This is why it is said of the Word that it was with God and was God, that it enlightens everyone who comes into the world; and that the light also shines in the darkness (John 1:1, 5, 9). The Word there means the Lord in respect of Divine truth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 270

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 270

sRef Isa@9 @2 S0' 270. These facts can establish that the Word possessed by the Protestants and the Reformed churches is the source of enlightenment to all nations and peoples by means of spiritual communication. They also show that the Lord provides that there should always be on earth a church where the Word is read and thus the Lord becomes known. Therefore when the Word was more or less rejected by the Roman Catholics, by the Lord's Divine providence the Reformation took place, and so the Word was, so to speak, dragged out of its hiding place and put to use. Also, when the Word possessed by the Jewish nation was utterly falsified and adulterated, so that it became practically null, then it pleased the Lord to come down from heaven, to come as the Word and fulfil it, thus renewing and restoring it, and to give light again to the inhabitants of the earth, as these words of the Lord relate:

The people that sat in darkness have seen a great light; for those who sat in the region and shadow of death, upon them a light has dawned. Isa. 9:1 and Matt. 4:16.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 271

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 271

sRef Matt@24 @30 S0' sRef Matt@24 @29 S0' 271. Since it has been predicted that at the end of the present church too darkness will arise, due to its failure to know that the Lord is the God of heaven and earth, and due to the separation of faith from charity, it has now pleased the Lord, so that this should not result in the loss of a genuine understanding of the Word and so the loss of the church, to reveal its spiritual sense, and to demonstrate that the Word in that sense, and from this in the natural sense, contains countless means whereby the light of truth coming from the Word, which is almost extinguished, may be restored. Many passages in Revelation predict that the light of truth will be almost extinguished at the end of the present church; and this too is the meaning of these words of the Lord:

Immediately after the affliction of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with glory and power. Matt. 24:29, 30.

The sun there means the Lord in respect of love, the moon the Lord in respect of faith; the stars, the Lord in respect of knowledge of truth and good. The Son of Man means the Lord in respect of the Word, a cloud, the literal sense of the Word, glory, the spiritual sense of the Word, and the way it is visible through its literal sense; powers mean its strength.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 272

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 272

272. By repeated experience I have been granted the knowledge that the Word is for man a means of communication with heaven. When I read through the Word, from the first chapter of Isaiah to the end of Malachi, and also the Psalms of David, keeping my thoughts fixed on the spiritual sense, I was granted a clear perception that each verse communicated with some community in heaven, and that thus the whole Word communicated with heaven as a whole. From this fact it became clear that just as the Word is the Lord, so too the Word is heaven, since heaven's being heaven comes from the Lord, and the Lord by means of the Word is the all in all of heaven.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 273

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 273

273. XIV

If the Word did not exist, no one would know of the existence of God, heaven and hell, and life after death, even less of the Lord.

As for those who decide and have proved to themselves that without the Word a person could know of the existence of God, and also of heaven and hell, as well as all the other things the Word teaches, it is not possible to argue with them from the Word, but only from the natural enlightenment of reason, since they do not believe the Word, but only themselves. Use the enlightenment of reason to enquire into it, and you will find that a person has two life-faculties, called the understanding and the will, and that the understanding is subject to the will, and not the will to the understanding. For the understanding merely shows and indicates what the will decides must be done. That is why many people with keen minds excel others in their grasp of moral issues, yet do not follow these principles in the way they live; it would be otherwise, if these were what they willed. Enquire again and you will find that a person's will is his self*, and the self is evil from birth, and the source of false ideas in the understanding.

[2] When you have reached these conclusions, you will see that a person left to himself is unwilling to grasp intellectually anything that is not from the self in his will; and that if there were no other source for that knowledge, the self in his will would be unwilling to grasp anything intellectually other than selfish and worldly interests. Anything above this level is shrouded in darkness. For instance, when he looks upon the sun, the moon and the stars, if he happens to think about their origin, he can only suppose that they arose by themselves. Is this thinking any deeper than that of many experts in the world, who despite knowing from the Word that all things were created by God, still attribute their origin to nature? What then would these same people think, if they had learned nothing from the Word? Do you believe that the ancient sages, such as Aristotle, Cicero, Seneca and others, who wrote about God and the immortality of the soul, got this idea first from their own understanding? No, they derived it by borrowing from others, who learned it first from the ancient Word, which I mentioned above. Nor do the writers on natural theology draw any such ideas from themselves; they merely support by rational arguments what they learn from the church, which possesses the Word. There may too be those among them who support these ideas without actually believing them.

* Latin proprium.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 274

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 274

274. I have been allowed to see peoples born in the islands*, who had reasonable ideas of civil life, yet were totally ignorant about God. In the spiritual world they look like baboons. But because they were born human beings, and consequently have the faculty of receiving spiritual life, they are taught by angels and endowed with life by learning about the Lord as Man. What a person is like left to himself is plainly to be seen by considering those in hell, who include some leaders of the church and scholars. These are not even willing to listen to anything about God, and therefore neither can they name God. I have seen these people and talked with them. I have also talked to people who became fired with anger and wrath, when they heard anyone speaking of the Lord. Imagine then what a person would be like who had heard nothing about God, when people are in such a condition who have talked about God, written about God, and preached about God. Their nature is the result of their will, which is evil; and the will, as said before, guides the understanding, and carries away the truth from the Word that there is there. If a person could know by himself that God exists and there is life after death, why would he not know that a person remains a person after death? Why does he believe that his soul, that is, his spirit, is like wind or ether, with no eyes to see, no ears to hear and no mouth to speak with, until it is joined and coalesces with his corpse or skeleton? Suppose then a doctrine hatched from nothing but the enlightenment of reason - would it not prescribe the worship of oneself? That is what has happened for ages, and is what is still done to-day by people who have learned from the Word that God alone is to be worshipped. No other kind of worship could exist based upon the human self, not even a worship of the sun and the moon.

* i.e. of the Pacific.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 275

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 275

275. Religion existed from the most ancient times, and the inhabitants of all parts of the world knew about God, and something about life after death. This knowledge did not come from them themselves or their own intelligence, but from the ancient Word (described above, 264-266), and later on from the Israelite Word. Religious beliefs based upon these two Words spread to the Indies and the adjacent islands, and by way of Egypt and Ethiopia to the kingdoms of Africa; and from the coasts of Asia to Greece and so to Italy. But because the Word had to be written by means of representatives, which are the sort of things in the world which correspond to heavenly things and so stand for them, the religious beliefs of the heathen turned to idolatry, and in Greece to fables. The attributes and qualities of God became so many gods, and they set over them the highest whom they called Jove, perhaps after Jehovah. It is well known that they knew about paradise, the flood, the sacred fire, and the four ages beginning with the golden and ending with the iron age (as in Daniel 2:31-35).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 276

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 276

aRef 1Sam@17 @49 S0' 276. Those who believe that their own intelligence can enable them to acquire knowledge about God, heaven and hell, and the spiritual ideas relating to the church, are unaware that the natural man considered in himself is opposed to the spiritual man; and consequently he wants to root out or entangle in fallacies the spiritual ideas which enter his mind. These fallacies resemble the worms which devour the roots of vegetables and grain-crops. Such people can be compared to dreamers who imagine they are mounted on eagles and soaring high; or on winged horses flying over the hill of Parnassus to Helicon. In fact they are like Lucifers in hell, who even there still call themselves the sons of the dawn (Isa. 14:12). They are also like those in the valley of the land of Shinar, who set out to build a tower, the top of which should reach heaven (Gen. 11:2, 4). They are as self-confident as Goliath, little foreseeing that, like him, they could be laid low by a sling-stone striking their forehead. I will describe the fate which awaits them after death: first of all they become as if drunk, then as if out of their minds, and finally idiots, sitting in darkness. Let them beware therefore of such a madness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 277

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 277

277. Here I shall add some accounts of experiences, of which this is the first.

One day I wandered in the spirit around various parts of the spiritual world, with the intention of observing the representations of heavenly things, which are displayed in many places there. In one house occupied by angels I saw great money-bags, in which a large sum of money was stored. Since they were open, it looked as though anyone could help themselves to the money stored there, or even steal it all. But two young men sat next to the money-bags, to guard them. The place where they were put looked like a manger in a stable. In the next room some modest young women were to be seen accompanied by a respectable wife. Near that room stood two children, and I was told not to play with them like children, but to treat them wisely. Afterwards a whore appeared and a horse lying dead.

After seeing these scenes I was instructed that they represented the natural sense of the Word, which contains the spiritual sense. The large bags full of money meant an abundant supply of knowledge of truth. Their being open but guarded by young men meant that anyone can help himself to the knowledge of truth from this source, but precautions are taken to prevent anyone doing violence to the spiritual sense, which contains the bare truths. The manger as in a stable meant spiritual nourishment for the understanding; this is the meaning of a manger because a horse, which eats from it, means the understanding. The modest young women seen in the next room meant the affections for truth, and the respectable wife the joining of good and truth. The children meant the innocence of wisdom, for the angels of the highest heaven, who excel in wisdom, have as the result of their innocence the appearance of children, when seen at a distance. The whore with the dead horse meant the falsification of truth practised by many people at the present time, which destroys all understanding of truth; the whore meant falsification, the dead horse the understanding of truth reduced to zero.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 278

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 278

sRef Luke@16 @17 S0' sRef Matt@5 @18 S0' 278. The second experience.

Once a paper was sent down to me from heaven written in Hebrew letters, but in the script used in ancient times; the letters which nowadays have in places straight lines were curved, with flourishes pointing upwards. The angels who were then present with me said that they gathered complete ideas from the letters themselves, knowing them especially from the curves of the lines and the serifs of the letters. They explained what these meant separately and what when combined. They said that H, which was added to the names of Abram and Sarai, meant what is infinite and eternal. They also explained in my presence the meaning of a verse of the Word, Psalm 32:2, simply from the letters or characters; their meaning was in short that the Lord is merciful to those who do wrong.

They told me that writing in the third heaven consists of letters bent into various curves, each of which conveys some meaning. Vowels there stood for the sound which corresponds to an affection. In that heaven they cannot pronounce the vowels i and e, but substitute for them y and eu*, They used the vowels a, o and u, because they give a full sound. They also said that they did not pronounce any consonants harshly, but softly; and this was why certain Hebrew letters have a point inside, as a sign they are pronounced softly. They said that harshness in letters was used in the spiritual heaven, because there they possess truths, and the truth admits harshness, but good does not, and the angels of the Lord's celestial kingdom, that is, the third heaven, possess good.

They also said that they had among themselves the Word written in curved letters with flourishes and serifs which conveyed a meaning. This made it plain what these words of the Lord mean:

Not a jot nor a stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all things are done. Matt. 5:18.

Also:

It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the Law to fall out. Luke 16:17.

*These letters must be understood as having values as in modern Italian, but y means the sound of French u or German u.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 279

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 279

279. The third experience.

Seven years ago, when I was collecting the passages which Moses wrote drawing on the two books called The Wars of Jehovah and The Utterances (Num. chapter 21), some angels were present who told me that those books were the ancient Word; its historical parts are called The Wars of Jehovah, the prophetical parts The Utterances. They said that this Word was still preserved in heaven and was used by the ancients there, whose Word it had been when they were in the world. The ancients, among whom this Word is still in use in heaven, were in part from the land of Canaan and the neighbouring countries, for instance, Syria, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Chaldaea, Assyria, Egypt, Sidon, Tyre and Niniveh. The inhabitants of all these kingdoms had a representative form of worship, and thus a knowledge of correspondences. The wisdom of those times came from that knowledge, which endowed them with inward perception and communication with the heavens. Those who knew the correspondences of that Word were called wise and intelligent, and in later times soothsayers and sorcerers.

[2] But because that Word was full of the sort of correspondences which conveyed celestial and spiritual ideas distantly, so that many people began to falsify it, therefore by the Lord's Divine providence in course of time it vanished, and another Word was given written by correspondences not so distant; this was done through the prophets among the Children of Israel. This Word retains many place names, not only in the land of Canaan, but also in the adjacent parts of Asia; all of these meant matters concerning the church and its states. But these meanings were taken over from the ancient Word. That was the reason why Abram was ordered to go into that land, and his descendants through Jacob were brought into it.

[3] I am allowed to report this new piece of information about the ancient Word, which was in Asia before the Israelite Word existed. It is still preserved there among the peoples who live in Great Tartary. I have spoken with spirits and angels in the spiritual world who came from there. They said that they possess the Word, and have done so from ancient times; and they conduct their Divine worship in accordance with that Word. It is composed purely of correspondences. They said that it also contains the book of Jashar mentioned in Joshua (10: 12, 13), and in the Second Book of Samuel (1:17, 18); they also have the books called The Wars of Jehovah and The Utterances, which are mentioned by Moses (Num. 21:14, 15 and 27-30). When I read in their presence the words which Moses took from this source, they looked to see whether they were there, and they found them. This made it clear to me that they still have the ancient Word. During our conversation they mentioned that they worship Jehovah, some of them as an invisible God, and some as visible.

aRef Gen@3 @0 S4' sRef Gen@2 @0 S4' sRef Gen@7 @0 S4' sRef Gen@6 @0 S4' sRef Gen@5 @0 S4' aRef Gen@4 @0 S4' [4] They went on to say that they do not allow foreigners to enter their territory, except the Chinese, with whom they have peaceful relations, because the Chinese Emperor comes from there.* They added that they are so populous that they do not believe any region in all the world is more so. This too is plausible when one considers the wall so many miles long, which the Chinese in former times constructed as a defence against invasion by them.

Moreover I was told by angels that the first chapters of Genesis, dealing with creation, Adam and Eve, the Garden of Eden, their sons and descendants down to the flood, as well as Noah and his sons, are also found in that Word, and were copied from it by Moses. Angels and spirits from Great Tartary are to be seen in the southern quarter towards the east. They are separated from others by living on a higher level. They do not allow anyone from Christian countries to visit them, and if any do go up, they put them under guard to prevent them leaving. The reason for this isolation is that they possess a different Word.

* This may refer to the Yuan dynasty (13th-14th centuries) who were of Mongol origin; but perhaps the reference is to the non-Chinese Manchu dynasty who ruled China from 1644.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 280

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 280

280 The fourth experience.

I once saw a long way off some walks between avenues of trees, and young men gathered together there in large groups; each of these was a meeting where people were discussing matters relating to wisdom. This took place in the spiritual world. I approached, and on coming near saw one whom the others reverenced as their leader, because he surpassed the rest in wisdom.

On seeing me he said: 'I was surprised when I watched you on your way here and saw you at one time becoming visible to me, at another dropping out of sight; now I saw you, now you vanished. You must surely not be in the same state of life as the people in our country.'

I replied to this with a smile: 'I am no actor, or Vertumnus*, but I am by turns sometimes in light and sometimes in shade to your eyes. So here I am both a stranger and native.'

At this the wise man gazed at me and said: 'What you say is unusual and strange. Tell me who you are.'

'I am,' I said, 'in the world where you once were and which you have now left, what is called the natural world. I am also in the world where you now are, what is called the spiritual world. Consequently I am in the natural state and at the same time in the spiritual state, the natural state when with people on earth, the spiritual state when with you. When I am in the natural state, I am invisible to you; when in the spiritual state, I am visible. I have been granted by the Lord the ability to be like this. You as an enlightened man are well aware that a person who belongs to the natural world cannot see one who belongs to the spiritual world, and vice versa. Therefore when I plunge my spirit into the body, you do not see me, but when I release it from the body, you do. This is the result of the distinction between the spiritual and the natural.'

[2] When he heard me mention the distinction between the spiritual and the natural, he said: 'What distinction is that? Is it not like that between what is purer and less pure? So what is the spiritual but a purer kind of the natural?'

'It is not that sort of distinction,' I replied, 'The natural can never become refined enough to approach the spiritual, so that it becomes spiritual. It is the sort of distinction there is between prior and posterior, which have no finite relationship. For the prior is in the posterior, as the cause is in its effect; and the posterior derives from the prior, as the effect derives from its cause. That is why one is not visible to the Other.'

To this the wise man said: 'I have pondered this distinction, but up to now in vain. I only wish I could grasp it.' 'You will,' I said, 'not only grasp the distinction between the spiritual and the natural, you will actually see it.' Then I went on: 'You are in the spiritual state among your people here, but in the natural state with me. For you talk with your people in the spiritual language, which is shared by every spirit and angel, but you talk with me in my native language. Every spirit or angel who talks with a man speaks his own language, French with a Frenchman, Greek with a Greek, Arabic with an Arab, and so on.

[3] 'So in order to be aware of the distinction between the spiritual and the natural as they appear linguistically, do this: go inside to your people, say something there, and memorise the words; then come back keeping them in mind, and pronounce them in my presence.'

He did so and came back to me with those words on his tongue, and uttered them; they were words completely strange and foreign, not to be found in any language of the natural world. Repeating the experiment several times showed clearly that all in the spiritual world have a spiritual language, which has nothing in common with any natural language. Everyone comes of his own accord into possession of that language after his death. I once also discovered by experience that the actual sound of the spiritual language is so different from that of a natural language, that even a loud spiritual sound is inaudible to a natural person, and so is a natural sound to a spiritual person.

[4] Later I asked him and the by-standers to go inside to their own people, and write a sentence on a piece of paper, and then to bring the paper out and read it to me. They did so, and came back with the paper in their hands, but when they went to read it, they could not, since the script was merely composed of some letters of the alphabet with curly lines over them, each one of which conveyed as its meaning a particular matter. Since each letter of the alphabet there conveys a meaning, it is obvious why the Lord is called 'alpha and omega'. When they again and again went in, wrote and came back, they learned that the script entailed and comprehended countless things which no natural script can ever express. They were told that this is because the thoughts of the spiritual man are incomprehensible and inexpressible to the natural man, and they cannot be transferred to another script and another language.

[5] Then, since the by-standers were unwilling to grasp that spiritual thought is so far beyond natural thought, that it is relatively inexpressible, I said to them: 'Carry out an experiment. Go inside to your spiritual community, think of an idea, keep it in mind, and come back and expound it in my presence.'

They went inside, thought and, keeping the thought in mind, came out; and when they went to expound what they had thought, they were unable to do so. For they could not find any idea of natural thought capable of matching an idea of purely spiritual thought, so they could not find any words to express it, for the ideas of thought become words in speech. Thereupon they went back inside, came back, and convinced themselves that spiritual ideas were far above natural ones, inexpressible, unutterable and incomprehensible to the natural man. Because the spiritual ideas excelled the natural ones so much, they said that spiritual ideas or thoughts, compared to natural ones, were ideas of ideas, and thoughts of thoughts, and could therefore express qualities of qualities and affections of affections. It followed that spiritual thoughts were the beginnings and origins of natural thoughts. This also showed that spiritual wisdom is the wisdom of wisdom, and so incapable of expression by anyone, however wise, in the natural world.

[6] Then they were told from the higher heaven that there is a still more inward or higher wisdom, called celestial, which stands in the same relationship to spiritual wisdom as this does to natural wisdom. These forms of wisdom flow in regularly, depending upon which heaven is concerned, from the Lord's Divine wisdom, which is infinite.

At this point the man conversing with me said: 'I see this, because I have perceived that a single natural idea is a container for many spiritual ideas; and also that a single spiritual idea is a container for many celestial ideas. This leads too to this conclusion, that what is divided becomes not more and more simple, but more and more complex, because it approaches closer and closer to the infinite, in which everything is at infinity.'

[7] At the conclusion of this conversation I said to the by-standers: 'You see from these three experimental proofs the nature of the distinction between the spiritual and the natural. Likewise, why the natural man is invisible to the spiritual, and the spiritual man to the natural, although either of them has a complete human form. Because of this form it seems to each as if one could see the other. But it is the interiors, which are mental, which constitute that form, and the mind of spirits and angels is composed of spiritual elements, whereas the mind of men, so long as they live in the world, is composed of natural elements.'

After this a voice was heard from the higher heaven saying to one of the by-standers, 'Come up here.' He went up, and on his return he said that the angels had not previously known the differences between the spiritual and the natural, because they had never before been given the opportunity of making the comparison with a person who was simultaneously in both worlds; and these differences can only become known by making a comparison and examining the relationship.

aRef 2Cor@12 @2 S8' aRef 2Cor@12 @4 S8' aRef 2Cor@12 @3 S8' [8] Before we parted we had another conversation on this subject, and I said that these distinctions arise solely, 'because you in the spiritual world are substantial, not material, and substantial things are the starting points of material things. What is matter but a gathering together of substances? So you are at the level of beginnings and therefore singulars, we, however, are at the level of derivatives and compounds. You are at the level of particulars, we, however, at that of general ideas. Just as general ideas cannot enter into particulars, so natural things, which are material, cannot enter into spiritual things, which are substantial. It is just as a ship's rope cannot enter or be pulled though the eye of a sewing needle, or just as a nerve cannot be introduced into one of the fibres which compose it. This then is the reason why the natural man cannot think the thoughts of the spiritual man, and therefore neither can he express them. So Paul calls what he heard from the third heaven "beyond description."

[9] 'A further point is that thinking spiritually means thinking without using time and space; thinking naturally involves time and space. For every idea of natural thought, but not of spiritual thought, has something of time and space clinging to it. This is because the spiritual world is not in space and time, as is the natural world, though it has the appearance of both of them. Thoughts and perceptions also differ in this respect. For this reason you can think of God's essence and omnipresence from eternity, that is, of God before the creation of the world, because you think about God's essence with no idea of time, and about His omnipresence with no idea of space. Thus you grasp ideas which are far beyond the natural ideas of men.'

[10] I went on to relate how I had once thought about God's essence and omnipresence from eternity, that is, about God before the creation of the world, and because I could not yet banish space and time from the ideas I thought about, I became worried, since the idea of nature entered my mind in place of God. But I was told: 'Banish the ideas of space and time and you will see.' Then I was granted the power to banish them, and I did see. From that time on I have been able to think about God from eternity, without thinking of nature from eternity, because God is non-temporally in all time and non-spatially in all space, but nature is temporally in all time and spatially in all space. Nature with its time and space must inevitably have a beginning, but not so God, who is not in time and space. Therefore nature is from God, not from eternity, but exists in time together with its properties of time and space.

* A Roman god believed constantly to change shape.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 281

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 281

281. The fifth experience.

The Lord has permitted me to be simultaneously in the spiritual and the natural worlds, so that I have been able to talk with angels just as I do with men, and thus to discover the states of those who after death arrive in that hitherto unknown world. For I have talked with all my relations and friends, as well as with kings and dukes, not to mention scholars, who have met their fates; I have been doing this now constantly for twenty-seven years. I can therefore describe from direct experience the nature of the states people undergo after death, both those who have lived good as well as those who have lived wicked lives. At this point I shall only relate something about the state of those who have convinced themselves from the Word of false doctrines, in particular those who have favoured the doctrine of justification by faith alone. The stages through which they pass are the following:

(i) When they have died and come alive again in the spirit, an event which commonly takes place on the third day after the heart has ceased to beat, they seem to themselves to have a body exactly like the one they had while living in the former world. This is so much the case that they are quite unaware that they are not still living in the former world, but it is not in a material but a substantial body, which appears to their senses to be material, though it is not.

[2] (ii) After a few days they see that they are in a world where there are various communities established. This is called the world of spirits, and it lies midway between heaven and hell. All the communities there, though countless in number, are arranged in wonderful order, according to whether their natural affections are good or evil. Those communities which are arranged in accordance with good natural affections are in touch with heaven; those arranged in accordance with evil affections are in touch with hell.

[3] (iii) The newly arrived spirit, that is, the spiritual man, is taken and introduced to various communities, good as well as evil, and tested to see whether he responds to various kinds of good and truth, and in what way; or whether he responds to evils and falsities, and in what way.

[4] (iv) If he responds to various kinds of good and truth, he is taken away from evil communities, and brought into good ones. He visits various of these communities until he comes to one which answers to his natural affection. There he enjoys the good corresponding to that affection, and this continues until he puts off his natural affection and puts on a spiritual one, then he is raised to heaven. This is what happens to those who have lived in the world a life of charity, and thus also a life of faith; that is to say, they have believed in the Lord and shunned evils as sins.

[5] (v) Not so those who have used logical arguments and especially the Word in order to convince themselves of false ideas, thus living a purely natural, that is, evil life. For evils are the companions of false ideas and cling closely to them. Since these people do not respond to various kinds of good and truth, but only to evils and falsities, they are taken away from good communities and brought into evil ones. They visit various of these communities until they come to one which answers to the longings of their love.

[6] (vi) But because in the world they have made a show on the surface of good affections, although inwardly all their affections were evil or lustful, they are by turns kept in their outward character. Those who in the world had been in charge of groups, are here and there put in charge of communities in the world of spirits, either in general or in sections depending upon the seniority of the offices they had previously held. But since they have no love for truth or justice, and cannot even be sufficiently enlightened to know what truth and justice are, they are dismissed after a few days. I have seen such people moved from one community to another, and in each given administrative duties, but after a short while each time dismissed.

[7] (vii) After repeated dismissals some of them are too upset to want, and some are too afraid of losing their good name to dare, to take on any more posts. So they withdraw and sit looking sad. Then they are taken away to a wilderness where there are huts; they go into these, and are given some work to do. They receive rations proportionate to the work done; if they do none, they go hungry and get no food, so that their need forces them to work. The kinds of food there are like those in our world, but of spiritual origin. The food is provided for all from heaven by the Lord, in keeping with the useful work performed. The idle, being useless, receive none.

[8] (viii) After some time they get tired of the work, so they leave the huts. If they were formerly priests, they have a desire to build. At once there appear piles of shaped stones, bricks, beams and planks, and heaps of reeds and rushes, clay, lime and tar. On seeing these they are seized with a passionate desire to build. So they begin to make a house, taking up now a stone, now a piece of wood, now a reed and now mud, and placing one on top of the other without any orderly arrangement, though to their eyes it appears well arranged. What they build in the course of the day falls down during the night. The next day they collect the fallen pieces from the rubble, and start building again. This continues repeatedly, until they get tired of building. This is the result of correspondence, because they have heaped up passages from the Word with the intention of proving the false ideas of their faith, and their falsities cannot build any other sort of church.

[9] (ix) When they tire of this, they go away and sit by themselves, doing nothing. Since, as I said, the idle receive no food from heaven, they begin to feel hungry. Then they can think of nothing but how they can get some food and allay their hunger. While they are in this condition, people come to them, from whom they beg alms. But they are told: 'Why do you sit idle like this? Come home with us and we will give you work to do, and feed you.' Then they get up cheerfully and go home with them, where each is given work to do and food as a reward for work. But because all who have convinced themselves of false ideas of faith cannot do good and useful work, but only work with wicked purposes, they do not work fairly, but cheat and work only under compulsion. So they abandon their work, and only want to meet others, talk, stroll about and sleep. Since their masters can no longer make them work, they are sent away as useless.

[10] (x) When they are sent away, their eyes are opened so that they see a road leading to a sort of cavern. When they reach it, the door opens, and they go in to see whether there is any food there. On being told that there is, they ask permission to stay there. Permission is given and they are taken in, and the door shuts behind them. Then the overseer of the cavern comes and says to them: 'You cannot go out again. Look at your companions; they are all working, and in proportion to their work they receive food from heaven. I am telling you this so that you may know how it is.' Their companions also say: 'Our overseer knows what work each of us is fitted for, and he gives us a suitable task each day. Every day that you complete your task, you get food. If you do not, you get neither food nor clothing. If anyone hurts another, he is thrown into a corner of the cavern onto a sort of bed of hellish dust, where he undergoes wretched torments. This continues until the overseer sees some sign of repentance from him. Then he is taken out, and told to get on with his work. Each man is also told that, when he has done his work, he may stroll about and chat, and later go to sleep. He is taken still deeper into the cavern, where there are whores; each is allowed to pick one for himself and call her his woman, but promiscuity is forbidden under severe penalties.

[11] Hell is composed of such caverns, which are nothing less than eternal labour-camps. I have been allowed to enter some and look around, so that I could make this known. All the people there seemed to be of low status, nor did any of them know who he had been and what position he had held in the world. But the angel who accompanied me told me that this one had been a servant in the world, this one a soldier, this an officer, this a priest, this of high birth, this a wealthy man. Yet all of them know nothing but that they were servants or people of similar status. This is because they were inwardly alike, despite their outward dissimilarity. It is the inward character which brings people together in the spiritual world.

[12] The hells in general consist of nothing but such caverns and labour-camps, but there is a difference between those containing satans and those containing devils. Satans is the name given to those who are subject to false ideas and to the evils that arise from them; devils is the name given to those who are subject to evils and the false ideas that arise from them. In the light of heaven satans look livid like corpses, some of them dark like mummies. Devils in the light of heaven have a dark, fiery look, some of them pitch black like soot. All of them have monstrous faces and bodies. But in their own light, which resembles that from burning coals, they look not like monsters, but like human beings. This concession is made to them, so that they can associate with one another.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 282

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 282

282. CHAPTER FIVE

THE CATECHISM OR THE TEN COMMANDMENTS EXPLAINED IN BOTH THE EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL SENSES

There is no nation throughout the world which does not know that it is wrong to commit murder or adultery, steal, and bear false witness. Equally it is known that were there no laws against such wickedness, any kingdom, republic or established society would be at an end. So would anyone suppose that the Israelite nation was so much more stupid than the rest as to be ignorant that these acts were wrong? One might therefore be amazed that these laws, which are universally known on earth, were proclaimed in such a miraculous fashion by Jehovah Himself from Mount Sinai. But pay attention: they were proclaimed in such a miraculous fashion, so that it should be known that those laws were not just civil and moral legislation, but also Divine laws, so that acting against them was not only wronging the neighbour, that is, one's fellow citizens and society, but also sinning against God. So by being proclaimed by Jehovah from Mount Sinai they became religious laws. It is obvious that any commandment given by Jehovah is intended to be a religious command, something that must be done, if one is to be saved. But before explaining the commandments I must first speak of their holiness, to make it clear that they have a religious content.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 283

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 283

283.
The Ten Commandments were the height of holiness for the Israelite church.

The Ten Commandments, being the starting-point of the Word and so of the church which was to be established among the Israelite nation, and being in short compass a summary of the whole of religion, making a link between God and man and man and God, were so holy that nothing holier could exist. Their outstanding holiness is evident from the following points.

The Lord Jehovah Himself came down on Mount Sinai in fire and accompanied by angels, and from there proclaimed them out loud, and the mountain was hedged about to prevent anyone approaching and being killed. Neither the priests nor the elders came near, but only Moses. The Commandments were written on two stone tablets by the finger of God. When Moses brought the tablets down the second time, his face shone. The tablets were afterwards laid up in the Ark, and this was at the centre of the Tabernacle. It was surmounted by the mercy-seat, above which were placed cherubim made of gold. This central area of the Tabernacle, where the Ark was, was called the Holy of Holies. Outside the veil, inside which the Ark was, were placed many objects to represent the holy things of heaven and the church; these were a table overlaid with gold on which the bread of the Presence was put, a golden altar on which to put incense, and a golden lamp-stand with seven lamps; also curtains all round made of fine linen, purple and scarlet. The holiness of the whole of this Tabernacle was entirely due to the law contained in the Ark.

[2] It was on account of the holiness of the Tabernacle as containing the Ark, that the whole people of Israel were commanded to camp around it in the order of their tribes; and that they set out in order after it; and that there was a cloud over it by day and fire by night. It was because of the holiness of the law, and Jehovah's presence in it, that Jehovah spoke with Moses upon the mercy-seat between the cherubim; and that the Ark was called 'Jehovah-is-there'; and that Aaron was not allowed to go inside the veil except with sacrifices and incense, on pain of death. It was because of Jehovah's presence in and around the law, that miracles were done by means of the Ark containing the law. For instance, the waters of Jordan were parted, and the people crossed over on dry land so long as the Ark rested in its midst. Its being carried round the walls of Jericho caused them to fall down. Dagon, the god of the Philistines, first of all fell on his face in the presence of the Ark, and later was found lying with his head cut off together with the palms of his two hands upon the threshold of the shrine. On account of the Ark the men of Bethshemesh were smitten to the number of many thousands. Uzzah was killed by touching the Ark. The Ark was brought into Zion by David with sacrifice and jubilation. Later it was put by Solomon into the Temple at Jerusalem, and he made its inner shrine there. From these and many other details it is plain that the Ten Commandments were the height of holiness for the Israelite church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 284

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 284

sRef Josh@6 @18 S0' sRef Josh@6 @19 S0' sRef Josh@6 @17 S0' aRef Ex@20 @8 S0' sRef Josh@6 @16 S0' sRef Josh@3 @9 S0' sRef Josh@6 @20 S0' aRef Ex@20 @9 S0' sRef Josh@3 @10 S0' sRef Josh@3 @4 S0' sRef Josh@3 @5 S0' sRef Josh@3 @2 S0' sRef Josh@3 @3 S0' sRef Josh@3 @8 S0' sRef Josh@3 @6 S0' sRef Josh@3 @7 S0' sRef Josh@3 @1 S0' aRef Ex@20 @6 S0' aRef Ex@20 @7 S0' sRef Josh@6 @15 S0' sRef Ex@34 @29 S0' sRef Ex@34 @30 S0' sRef Ex@34 @31 S0' sRef Ex@34 @35 S0' sRef Ex@34 @32 S0' sRef Ex@34 @33 S0' sRef Ex@34 @34 S0' sRef Josh@6 @3 S0' sRef Josh@6 @2 S0' sRef Josh@6 @1 S0' sRef Josh@6 @5 S0' sRef Josh@6 @4 S0' sRef Josh@3 @15 S0' aRef Ex@20 @12 S0' sRef Josh@3 @13 S0' sRef Josh@3 @14 S0' sRef Josh@3 @11 S0' sRef Josh@6 @11 S0' sRef Josh@6 @10 S0' sRef Josh@6 @14 S0' sRef Josh@6 @13 S0' sRef Josh@6 @12 S0' sRef Josh@6 @9 S0' sRef Josh@6 @7 S0' aRef Ex@20 @11 S0' sRef Josh@6 @6 S0' aRef Ex@20 @10 S0' sRef Josh@3 @12 S0' sRef Josh@6 @8 S0' sRef Josh@3 @17 S0' aRef Ex@20 @15 S0' aRef Ex@20 @17 S0' sRef Ex@40 @38 S0' aRef Ex@20 @16 S0' aRef Ex@20 @14 S0' aRef Ex@20 @13 S0' sRef Josh@3 @16 S0' sRef Lev@16 @3 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @13 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @12 S0' sRef Lev@16 @5 S0' sRef Lev@16 @4 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @14 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @11 S0' sRef Lev@16 @2 S0' sRef Ex@19 @15 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @18 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @17 S0' sRef Lev@16 @10 S0' sRef Lev@16 @12 S0' sRef Lev@16 @11 S0' sRef Lev@16 @7 S0' sRef Lev@16 @6 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @15 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @16 S0' sRef Lev@16 @9 S0' sRef Lev@16 @8 S0' sRef Ex@26 @33 S0' sRef Ex@19 @23 S0' sRef Ex@19 @22 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @19 S0' sRef Lev@16 @14 S0' sRef Lev@16 @13 S0' sRef Ex@19 @17 S0' sRef Ex@19 @16 S0' sRef Ex@19 @20 S0' sRef Ex@19 @21 S0' sRef Ex@19 @18 S0' sRef Ex@25 @18 S0' sRef Ex@25 @17 S0' sRef Ex@25 @19 S0' sRef Ex@25 @21 S0' sRef Ex@25 @20 S0' sRef Ex@25 @16 S0' aRef Ex@20 @5 S0' sRef Ex@19 @12 S0' sRef Ex@25 @22 S0' sRef Ex@19 @10 S0' sRef Ex@19 @11 S0' sRef 1Ki@6 @19 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @5 S0' sRef John@3 @18 S0' sRef Num@10 @35 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @6 S0' sRef Num@10 @36 S0' sRef Ex@31 @18 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @10 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @9 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @7 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @8 S0' aRef Ex@20 @2 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @1 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @2 S0' sRef Ex@19 @13 S0' aRef Ex@20 @3 S0' aRef Ex@20 @4 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @3 S0' sRef 2Sam@6 @4 S0' 284. The details just quoted about the proclamation of the law, its holiness and power, are to be found in the following passages of the Word. Jehovah came down on Mount Sinai in fire, and the mountain then smoked and shook, there was thunder and lightning, an oppressive cloud and the sound of a trumpet: Exod. 19:16-18; Deut. 4:11; 5:22-26. The people prepared and sanctified themselves for three days before Jehovah came down: Exod. 19:10, 11, 15. The mountain was hedged about to prevent anyone approaching its foot and coming near and being killed; not even the priests approached, only Moses: Exod. 19:12, 13, 20-23; 24:1, 2. The law was proclaimed from Mount Sinai: Exod. 20:2-17; Deut. 5:6-21. The law was inscribed on two stone tablets, and written by the finger of God: Exod. 31:18; 32:15, 16; Deut. 9:10. When Moses carried the tablets down from the mountain the second time, his face shone so that he had to cover his face with a veil when talking with the people: Exod. 34:29-35. The tablets were laid up in the Ark: Exod. 25:16; 40:20; Deut. 10:5; 1 Kings 8:9. The mercy-seat was mounted upon the Ark, and over it were placed cherubim made of gold: Exod. 25:17-21. The Ark together with the mercy-seat and the cherubim was put into the Tabernacle, constituting its first and thus most inward part; the table overlaid with gold, upon which was the bread of the Presence, the incense-altar of gold, and the lamp-stand and lamps of gold, made up the external part of the Tabernacle; the ten curtains of fine linen, purple and scarlet were its outermost part: Exod. 25:1-end; 26:1-end; 40:17-28. The place, where the Ark was, was called the Holy of Holies: Exod. 26:33. The whole people of Israel camped around the Tabernacle in the order of their tribes, and set out in order after it: Num. 2:1-end. There was then a cloud over the Tabernacle by day and fire by night: Exod. 40:38; Num. 9:15-end; 14:14; Deut. 1:33. Jehovah spoke with Moses above the Ark, between the cherubim: Exod. 25:22; Num. 7:89. The Ark was called from the law in it 'Jehovah-is-here'; for Moses said when the Ark set out 'Arise, Jehovah', and when it rested 'Return, Jehovah': Num. 10:35, 36; and further 2 Sam. 6:2*; Ps. 132:7, 8. On account of the holiness of the law Aaron was not allowed to go inside the veil, except with sacrifices and incense: Lev. 16:2-14ff. By the presence of the Lord's power in the law contained in the Ark the waters of Jordan were parted, and the people crossed over on dry land, so long as it rested in the midst: Josh. 3:1-17; 4:5-20. When the Ark was carried round them, the walls of Jericho fell down: Josh. 6:1-20. Dagon, the god of the Philistines, fell to the ground in the presence of the Ark, and afterwards was found lying on the threshold of the shrine with his head torn off and the palms of his hands cut off: 1 Sam. chapter 5. The men of Bethshemesh were smitten because of the Ark to the number of many thousands: 1 Sam. chapters 5 and 6. Uzzah was killed by touching the Ark: 2 Sam. 6:7. The Ark was brought into Zion by David with sacrifices and jubilation: 2 Sam. 6:1-19. The Ark was brought by Solomon into the Temple at Jerusalem, where he made its inner shrine: 1 Kings 6: 19ff; 8:3-9.

* The author's copy has in the margin: '2 Chron. 6:14' for '2 Sam. 6:2'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 285

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 285

sRef Rev@3 @20 S0' 285. Since this law is the means of linking the Lord with man and man with the Lord, it is called a covenant and a testimony. It is called a covenant because it serves as a link, and a testimony because it establishes the terms of the covenant. For covenant in the Word means linking, testimony the establishment and witnessing of its terms. That is why there were two tablets, one for God and the other for man. The link is provided by the Lord, but only when man does what is written in his tablet. For the Lord is continually present, and wishes to enter; but man must open the door by the free will which the Lord gives him. For He says:

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20.

The stone tablets on which the law was written are called the tablets of the covenant, and the Ark is called from them the Ark of the covenant; the law itself is called the covenant: see Num. 10:33; Deut. 4:13, 23; 5:2, 3; 9:9; Josh. 3:11; 1 Kings 8:21; Rev. 11:19; and elsewhere.

Since a covenant means being joined, it is said of the Lord that He will be a covenant for the people (Isa. 42:6; 49:8); He is called the messenger of the covenant (Mal. 3:1); and His blood is called the blood of the covenant (Matt. 26:28; Zech. 9:11; Exod. 24:4-10). That is why the Word is called the Old and the New Covenants*, for covenants are made on account of love, friendship, association and linking.

* The author uses the correct Latin translation of the Greek word, which was erroneously translated into Latin in antiquity as testamentum, hence our Testament.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 286

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 286

286. The reason why such great holiness and power lay in the law was that it was a summary of the whole of religion. It was written on two tablets, one of which summarises all the provisions concerning God, the other all the provisions concerning man. That is why the commandments of the law are called the Ten Words (Exod. 34:28; Deut. 4:13; 10:4); they are so called because ten means all, and words mean truths. For they contain more than ten words. For ten meaning all, and the institution of tenths* because of this meaning, see APOCALYPSE REVEALED (101). It will be seen in the following pages that the law is a summary of the whole of religion.

* Or tithes.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 287

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 287

sRef Matt@22 @37 S0' sRef Matt@22 @38 S0' sRef Matt@22 @40 S0' sRef Luke@10 @27 S0' sRef Luke@10 @26 S0' sRef Matt@22 @39 S0' sRef Luke@10 @28 S0' sRef Luke@10 @25 S0' 287. The literal sense of the Ten Commandments contains general instructions on doctrine and life; but their spiritual and celestial senses contain universal instructions.

It is well known that the Ten Commandments are called in the Word the Law par excellence, because they contain everything concerning doctrine and life, not only everything which concerns God, but also everything which concerns man. That is why the law was written on two tablets, one dealing with God, the other with man. It is also well known that the whole of doctrine and life relate to love to God and love towards the neighbour. The whole of these loves is contained in the Ten Commandments. This is the teaching of the whole Word, as is evident from these words of the Lord:

Jesus said, You are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself. The law and the prophets depend upon these two commandments. Matt. 22:35-37, 40.

The law and the prophets mean the whole Word. And further:

A lawyer testing Jesus said, Master, what must I do to inherit everlasting life? And Jesus said to him, What is written in the law? What is your reading of it? And he in answer said, You are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself. And Jesus said, Do this, and you will live, Luke 10:25-28.

[2] Now since love to God and love towards the neighbour are the whole of the Word; and since the first tablet of the Ten Commandments contains in summary form the whole of love to God, and the second tablet contains the whole of love towards the neighbour, it follows that they contain the whole of doctrine and life. A look at the two tablets makes it plain that they are so linked that God from His tablet has man in view, and man in his turn from his has God in view. Thus there is a reciprocal viewing, such that on God's part He never fails to keep man in view and perform the actions needed for his salvation; and if a person accepts and does the things laid down in his tablet, the link becomes reciprocal. Then, as the Lord's words promised to the lawyer, 'Do this, and you will live.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 288

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 288

288. The law is frequently mentioned in the Word. I must state what the law means in the strict sense, what in a wider sense, and what in the widest sense. In the strict sense the law means the Ten Commandments; in a wider sense the rules given by Moses to the Children of Israel, and in the widest sense the whole Word.

It is well known that the law in the strict sense means the Ten Commandments. The law in a wider sense means the rules given by Moses to the Children of Israel, as is evident from the individual rules in Leviticus each being called a law:

This is the law of the sacrifice. Lev. 7:1.

This is the law of the sacrifice for making one's peace. Lev. 7:7, 11.

This is the law of the grain-offering. Lev. 6:14ff

This is the law of the burnt-offering, the grain-offering, the sin-sacrifice and the guilt-sacrifice, and the completions. Lev. 7:37.

This is the law of beast and bird. Lev. 11:46, 47.

This is the law of the woman who gives birth to a son or a daughter. Lev. 12:7.

This is the law of leprosy. Lev. 13:59; 14:2, 32, 54, 57

This is the law of the person with a discharge. Lev. 15:32.

This is the law of jealousy. Num. 5:29, 30.

This is the law of the Nazirite. Num. 6:13, 21.

This is the law of cleansing. Num. 19:14.

This is the law concerning the red cow. Num. 19:2.

The law for the king. Deut. 17:15-19.

In fact the whole book of Moses* is called the law (Deut. 31:9, 11, 12, 26; also in the New Testament, as Luke 2:22; 24:44; John 1:45; 7:22, 23; 8:5; and elsewhere).

sRef John@12 @34 S2' sRef Luke@16 @17 S2' sRef John@15 @25 S2' sRef John@10 @34 S2' [2] The context plainly shows that these rules were what Paul meant by 'the deeds prescribed by the law', when he says that man is justified by faith without the deeds prescribed by the law (Rom. 3:28). The same is shown by his words to Peter, whom he criticised for behaving like the Jews, when he says three times in one verse that no one is justified by the deeds prescribed by the law (Gal. 2:14, 16).

The law in its widest sense means the whole of the Word, as is plain from these passages:

Jesus said, Is it not written in your law, you are gods? John 10:34.

This is said in Ps. 82:6.

The crowd answered, We have heard from the law that the Christ remains for ever. John 12:34.

This is said in Ps. 89:29; Ps. 110:4; Dan. 7:14.

That the word should be fulfilled which is written in their law, They hated me without cause. John

This is said in Ps. 35:19.

The Pharisees said, Have any of the princes believed in him? But the crowd which does not know the law.... John 7:48, 49.

It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one dot of the law to fall out. Luke 16:17.

The law in these passages means the whole of Holy Scripture; and there are a thousand further passages in the Psalms of David.

* I.e. the Pentateuch (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 289

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 289

289. The reason why the Ten Commandments in their spiritual and celestial senses contain in universal form all the commandments relating to doctrine and life, and so the whole of faith and charity, is that the literal sense of the Word in every single detail, both generally and in every part, conceals two inner senses, one called spiritual, the other celestial. And these senses contain Divine truth with its own light and Divine goodness with its own heat. Now since the Word is like this both generally and in every part, each of the Ten Commandments must be explained in those three senses, the natural, the spiritual and the celestial. The nature of the Word has already been shown to be like this by the demonstrations given in the chapter on the Sacred Scripture or the Word (193-208 above).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 290

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 290

sRef Matt@13 @31 S0' sRef Matt@13 @32 S0' 290. No one who is ignorant of the nature of the Word can have the slightest idea that infinity is contained in its details, that is to say, that its contents are countless, so that not even the angels can exhaust them. Anything found there can be compared to a seed, which planted in the ground can grow into a great tree, and produce an abundance of seeds; these again produce similar trees to form a garden, and their seeds in turn form other gardens, and so on to infinity. The Word of the Lord is like this in its details, and such above all are the Ten Commandments. For since they teach love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour, they are a short summary of the whole Word. The Lord also shows that the Word is like this by a comparison:

The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his land. This seed is smaller than all other seeds; but when it has grown up, it is larger than any plant, and it becomes a tree, so that the birds of the sky come and nest in its branches. Matt. 13:31, 32; Mark 4:31, 32; Luke 13:18, 19; cf. also Ezek. 17:2-8.

The fact that such an infinity of spiritual seeds or truths lies in the Word, can be established from the wisdom of the angels, the whole of which is derived from the Word, In their case wisdom goes on growing for ever. The wiser they become, the more clearly do they see that wisdom has no end; and they perceive that they are merely at its entrance, and they cannot reach even the minutest part of the Lord's Divine wisdom. They call this bottomless. Now since this is the source of the Word, coming as it does from the Lord, it is plain that all its details contain a sort of infinity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 291

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 291

sRef Ex@20 @3 S0' sRef Ex@20 @3 S0' sRef Ex@20 @5 S0' sRef Ex@20 @6 S0' sRef Ex@20 @4 S0' 291. THE FIRST COMMANDMENT

There is not to any other God before my face.

These are the words of the first commandment (Exod. 20:3; Deut. 5:7). Their ordinary meaning in the natural or literal sense is that idols are not to be worshipped; for it continues:

You are not to make for yourself a carving or any likeness of anything in the heavens above and on the earth beneath, and in the waters under the earth. You are not to bow down before them or worship them, because I, Jehovah your God, am a jealous God. Exod. 20:4, 5.

The reason why the ordinary meaning of this commandment is that idols are not to be worshipped, is that before this time and afterwards down to the Lord's coming, much of Asia practised idolatrous worship. The reason was that all the churches before the time of the Lord were representative and symbolic. The symbols and representations were such that ideas about God were presented in the form of various likenesses and carvings; and when their meanings became lost, the common people began to worship these as gods. Even the Israelite nation had this sort of worship when they were in Egypt, as is clear from the golden calf, which they worshipped in the desert instead of Jehovah. It is also clear that later on they were by no means averse to that sort of worship, as many passages in both the historical and prophetic books of the Word show.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 292

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 292

292. This commandment 'There is not to be any other God before my face' also means in the natural sense that no human being, alive or dead, is to be worshipped as a god, another practice found in Asia and various surrounding countries. Many of the heathen gods were no more than this, such as Baal, Ashtaroth, Chemosh, Milkom, Beelzebub; and at Athens and Rome, Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, Pluto, Apollo, Pallas, etc. Some of these were first worshipped as saints, then as divine powers, and finally as gods. It is clear from the edict of Darius the Mede that they also worshipped living human beings as gods. This decree stated that for a period of thirty days no one should ask anything of God, but only of the king; otherwise he would be thrown into the lions' den (Dan. 6:8-end).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 293

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 293

293. In the natural or literal sense this commandment also means that no one is to be loved above all except God, nor anything except what comes from God. This too agrees with the Lord's words (Matt. 22:37-39; Luke 10:25-28). Anyone or anything which is loved above all is, to the lover, God and divine. For instance, if anyone loves himself or the world above all else, then he or the world is his own god. This is why such people do not in their hearts acknowledge any God. They are therefore linked with like minds in hell, where all are gathered who have loved themselves or the world above all.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 294

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 294

sRef Isa@25 @9 S0' sRef Isa@63 @16 S0' sRef Jer@23 @5 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @21 S0' sRef Isa@9 @6 S0' sRef Isa@40 @5 S0' sRef Isa@40 @3 S0' sRef Jer@23 @6 S0' sRef Isa@40 @10 S0' sRef Isa@40 @11 S0' sRef Isa@54 @5 S0' sRef Isa@49 @26 S0' sRef Isa@45 @14 S0' sRef Isa@45 @15 S0' sRef Colo@2 @9 S0' sRef Isa@48 @17 S0' sRef Isa@45 @22 S0' sRef Isa@47 @4 S0' sRef Isa@44 @24 S0' sRef John@14 @9 S0' sRef John@14 @8 S0' sRef Isa@45 @21 S0' sRef John@14 @11 S0' sRef Ps@19 @14 S0' sRef John@14 @10 S0' sRef Isa@44 @6 S0' sRef Isa@43 @11 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S0' 294. The spiritual sense of this commandment is that no other God is to be worshipped except the Lord Jesus Christ, because He is Jehovah, who came into the world and carried out the redemption, without which no man, nor any angel, could have been saved. The following passages in the Word show that there is no other God beside Him.

On that day it will be said, Behold, He is our God, whom we have awaited to free us. He is Jehovah, whom we have awaited; let us exult and rejoice in His salvation. Isa. 25:9.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of Jehovah, make smooth in the desert a path for our God. For the glory of Jehovah will be revealed, and all flesh will see it together. Behold, the Lord Jehovah comes in strength. Like a shepherd will He feed His flock. Isa. 40:3, 5, 10, 11.

Only among you is there God, there is no other God besides; surely, you are a hidden God, O God the Saviour of Israel. Isa. 45:14, 15.

Am I not Jehovah, and there is no other God beside me? There is no* righteous God and Saviour beside me. Isa. 45:21, 22.

I am Jehovah, and there is no Saviour beside me. Isa. 43:11; Hosea 13:4.

That all flesh may know that I am Jehovah your Saviour and your Redeemer. Isa. 49:26; 60:16.

As for our Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Isa. 47:4; Jer. 50:34.

Jehovah, my rock and my Redeemer. Ps. 19:14.

Thus spoke Jehovah your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I am Jehovah your God. Isa. 48:17; 43:14; 49:7; 54:8.

Thus spoke Jehovah your Redeemer, I am Jehovah the maker of all things, alone, by myself. Isa. 44:24.

Thus spoke Jehovah, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, Jehovah Zebaoth, I am the first and the last, and there is no God beside me. Isa. 44:6.

Jehovah Zebaoth is His name, and your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; He will be called the God of the whole earth. Isa. 54:5.

Abraham does not know us, Israel does not acknowledge us. You, Jehovah, are our Father, Redeemer from eternity is your name. Isa. 63:16.

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is Wonderful, Counsellor, God, Hero, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace. Isa. 9:6.

Behold, the days will come, when I shall raise up for David a righteous shoot, who will reign as king; and this is His name, Jehovah our righteousness. Jer. 23:5, 6; 33:15, 16.

Philip said to Jesus, Show us the Father. Jesus said to him, He who sees me sees the Father. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me? John 14:8-10.

In Jesus Christ all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily. Col. 2:9.

We are in truth, in Jesus Christ. He is the true God and everlasting life. My sons, beware of idols. 1 John 5:20, 21.

These passages plainly show that the Lord our Saviour is Jehovah Himself, who is at once the Creator, the Redeemer and the Regenerator. This is the spiritual sense of this commandment.

* 'No' is added in the margin of the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 295

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 295

295. The celestial sense of this commandment is that the Lord Jehovah is infinite, measureless and eternal; He is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent. He is the first and the last, the beginning and the end, who was and who is and who shall be. He is love itself and wisdom itself, or good itself and truth itself, and consequently life itself, Thus He is the sole source of everything.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 296

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 296

296. Everyone sins against this first commandment if he acknowledges and worships any God other than the Lord, the Saviour, Jesus Christ, who is Jehovah God Himself in human form. In much the same way do those too who convince themselves of the actual existence from eternity of three Divine persons. The more these people convince themselves of that erroneous belief, the more do they become natural and immersed in the body, until they are unable to grasp inwardly any Divine truth, and even if they do hear one and accept it, they besmirch it and smother it in fallacies. They can, therefore, be compared to those who live on the bottom floor or in the basement of a building, and so cannot hear anything of the conversation of those who live on the second or third floors, since the ceilings overhead prevent the sound penetrating.

[2] The human mind resembles a building with three floors; the lowest is occupied by those who have convinced themselves of three Gods from eternity, the second and third floors by those who acknowledge and believe in one God in visible human form, and in Him as the Lord God the Saviour. The person who relies on the senses and is immersed in the body, being purely natural, is, regarded in himself, a mere animal, differing from other animals only in being able to talk and reason. So he is like someone living in a zoo containing wild animals of every sort, and there he sometimes acts the part of a lion, sometimes a bear, sometimes a tiger, leopard or wolf; indeed, he can even act the part of a sheep, but if he does so, he is at heart laughing.

[3] A purely natural person cannot form any concept of Divine truths except from worldly ideas, which are subject to the fallacies of the senses, since he cannot lift his mind above that level. His doctrine of faith then may be compared to a porridge made of bran, which he eats as if it were a delicacy. It is also like the command given to the prophet Ezekiel, to mix together wheat, barley, beans, lentils, and spelt with human or cow-dung, and to make himself bread and cakes, so as to represent the church as it was in the case of the Israelite nation (Ezek. 4:9ff). So it is with the doctrine of a church which is founded and built upon a belief in three Divine persons from eternity, each of whom is separately God.

[4] Could anyone fail to see how monstrous this faith is, if it were presented to the eye in its true colours in a picture? If, for instance, the three persons stood in a row, the first dignified with a crown and sceptre, the second holding in his right hand a book (the Word), and in his left a blood-stained cross made of gold; and the third equipped with wings, and standing on one foot as if about to take off and go into action; and a label written over the picture 'These three persons or three gods are one God.' Any wise person seeing this picture would say to himself 'Oh dear, what a delusion!' But he would say something very different, if he saw a picture of one Divine person with rays of heavenly light around his head, with the label: 'This is our God, at once Creator, Redeemer and Regenerator, and so Saviour.' Would not a wise man kiss such a picture and take it home in his pocket, so that his own mind, and those of his wife, children and household, might take pleasure in looking at it?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 297

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 297

297. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT

You are not to take the name of Jehovah your God in vain, for Jehovah will not hold anyone guiltless, who takes His name in vain.

Taking the name of Jehovah God in vain means in the natural or literal sense the misuse of the name itself in all sorts of conversation, especially false statements or lies, and in swearing without good cause, or in order to avoid being blamed, in evil intentions, which are curses, and in witchcraft and spells. On the other hand, swearing by God and His holiness, the Word and the Gospel, at coronations, ordination into the priesthood, or inauguration into offices of trust, is not taking the name of God in vain, unless the one who takes the oath subsequently rejects his promises as worthless. The name of God, being holiness itself, is to be constantly employed in the sacred business of the church, as in prayers, hymns and all forms of worship, as well as in sermons and writings on religious subjects. This is because God is present in everything to do with religion, and when He is duly invoked, His presence is summoned by His name, and He listens. In these ways the name of God is hallowed.

[2] The sanctity of the name of Jehovah God can be established from the name of Jehovah, which the Jews after their earliest period did not, and still do not, dare to utter; and on their account no more were the Evangelists and Apostles willing to use it. Therefore in place of Jehovah they said 'the Lord'. This is evident from a number of passages of the Old Testament quoted in the New, where 'the Lord' is substituted for Jehovah; e.g. Matt. 22:37; Luke 10:27 compared with Deut. 6:5, and elsewhere. It is well known that the name of Jesus is likewise holy, from the Apostle's saying that at that name every knee does and should bow in the heavens and on earth; and moreover that it cannot be uttered by any devil in hell. There are many names of God which are not to be taken in vain, such as Jehovah, Jehovah God, Jehovah Zebaoth, the Holy One of Israel, Jesus and Christ, and the Holy Spirit.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 298

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 298

sRef Deut@12 @13 S0' sRef Deut@12 @11 S0' sRef Matt@18 @20 S0' sRef Deut@12 @5 S0' sRef John@17 @26 S0' sRef John@17 @6 S0' sRef Rev@3 @4 S0' sRef John@3 @18 S0' sRef Micah@4 @5 S0' sRef Isa@41 @25 S0' sRef Mal@1 @11 S0' sRef John@20 @31 S0' sRef Mal@1 @13 S0' sRef Mal@1 @12 S0' sRef Deut@16 @16 S0' sRef John@1 @12 S0' sRef Deut@16 @2 S0' sRef Deut@12 @14 S0' sRef Deut@12 @18 S0' sRef Deut@16 @11 S0' sRef Deut@16 @6 S0' sRef Deut@16 @15 S0' 298. In the spiritual sense the name of God means the whole of the church's teaching taken from the Word, and through which the Lord is invoked and worshipped. All of this is summed up in the name of God. Therefore taking the name of God in vain means using anything from this source in idle talk, false statements, lies, curses, witchcraft and spells; for this too is slandering and blaspheming God, and so His name. The following passages will show that the Word and all the church takes from it, and so all worship, is the name of God.

From the rising of the sun men shall call upon my name. Isa. 41:25*.

From the rising of the sun to its setting, great is my name among the nations, and in every place incense is offered to my name. You profane my name, when you say, The table of Jehovah is defiled. And you sniff at my name, when you bring as an offering what is mauled, lame and sick. Mal. 1:11-13.

All peoples walk in the name of their God, and we shall walk in the name of Jehovah our God. Micah 4:5.

They shall worship Jehovah in one place, where He will set His name. Deut. 12:5, 11, 13, 14, 18; 16:2, 6, 11, 15, 16.

His name means His worship.

Jesus said, Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in their midst. Matt. 18:20.

As many as received Him, to them He gave the ability to be sons of God, if they believed in His name. John 1:12.

He who does not believe is already judged, since he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. John 3:18.

Those who believe will have life in His name. John 20:31.

Jesus said, I showed forth your name to men, and I made known to them your name. John 17:[6,]26.

The Lord said, You have a few names in Sardis. Rev. 3:4.

There are many other passages in which, as in these, the name of God means the Divine which goes forth from God, and through which He is worshipped. The name of Jesus Christ, however, means the whole of redemption, and the whole of His teaching, and so the whole of salvation. Jesus means the whole of salvation by means of redemption; Christ the whole of salvation by means of His teaching.

* The Latin text has Isa. 26:8, 13, a reference perhaps intended to be quoted.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 299

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 299

sRef Matt@12 @32 S0' sRef John@14 @13 S0' sRef Matt@12 @31 S0' sRef John@12 @28 S0' sRef John@14 @14 S0' sRef Matt@6 @9 S0' 299. In the celestial sense, taking the name of God in vain means what the Lord said to the Pharisees:

A man shall be forgiven every sin and blasphemy, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven, Matt. 12:31, 32.

Blasphemy against the Spirit means blasphemy against the divinity of the Lord's Human, and the holiness of the Word. It is evident from the following passages that the Lord's Divine Human is meant in the celestial or highest sense by 'the name of Jehovah God':

Jesus said, Father, glorify your name; and a voice came forth from heaven saying, I have glorified it and I will do so again. John 12:28.

Whatever you ask in my name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in my name, I shall do it. John 14:13, 14.

This too is the meaning in the celestial sense of 'May your name be hallowed' in the Lord's prayer; and likewise of 'name' in Exod. 23:21; Isa. 63:16. Since blasphemy against the Spirit is not forgiven anyone (as stated in Matt. 12:31, 32), and this is the meaning in the celestial sense, the phrase is added to the commandment: 'For Jehovah will not hold anyone guiltless, who takes His name in vain.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 300

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 300

sRef John@10 @3 S1' sRef Rev@3 @12 S1' sRef Rev@3 @4 S1' sRef John@10 @11 S1' 300. The names used in the spiritual world make it plain that someone's name does not mean just his name, but his whole character. In that world no one keeps the name he received at baptism and from his father or family in the world, but everyone there is named to suit his character, and angels have names to suit their moral and spiritual lives. It is these whom the Lord meant when He said:

I am the good shepherd. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. John 10:3[, 11]

Likewise by these words:

You* have a few names in Sardis who have not defiled their clothes. As for him who has overcome, I will write upon him the name of the city of the New Jerusalem, and my new name. Rev. 3:4, 12.

Gabriel and Michael are not the names of two people in heaven, but those names mean everyone in heaven who possesses wisdom about the Lord and worships Him. The names of persons and places in the Word too do not mean actual people and places, but matters which concern the church.

[2] Even in the natural world a name does not mean just the name, but at the same time a person's whole character, since this is inseparable from the name. In ordinary speech we say, 'He is doing this for the sake of his name', or 'for the sake of the reputation of his name'; or 'this man has a famous name.' We mean by this that he is famous for qualities he possesses, such as ingenuity, learning, achievements, and so on. Everyone knows that if anyone insults and slanders someone by name, he is also insulting and slandering the way he lives. The ideas are linked, so that the reputation of his name is destroyed. In much the same way, if anyone utters the name of a king, duke or high dignitary in an insulting fashion, he heaps abuse also on their majesty and dignity. Equally, if anyone pronounces a person's name in a contemptuous tone, he at the same time shows his contempt for the way he lives. It is the same with every person; the laws of all kingdoms forbid a person's name to be slandered or insulted, because the name is equivalent to his character and reputation.

* The Latin text has 'I' for 'You'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 301

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 301

sRef Ex@20 @10 S0' sRef Ex@20 @9 S0' sRef Ex@20 @8 S0' 301. THE THIRD COMMANDMENT

Remember to keep the Sabbath day holy; for six days you are to labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath for Jehovah your God.

For this third commandment, see Exod. 20:8-10; Deut. 5:12, 13. In the natural or literal sense this means that six days are for man and his work, and the seventh is for the Lord, and for Him to give man rest. Sabbath in the language of the original means rest. Among the Children of Israel the Sabbath was the holiest of observances, because it represented the Lord. The six days represented the Lord's toils and battles against the hells, the seventh His victory over them, and so rest. Since that day represented the completion of the Lord's whole act of redemption, it was for that reason the height of holiness. When, however, the Lord came into the world, so that representations of Him ceased, that day became a day for instruction in Divine matters, and also a day of rest from work, for meditation about matters conducive to salvation and everlasting life, and a day for love towards the neighbour. Its being a day for instruction in Divine matters is plain from the fact that the Lord taught in the Temple and in synagogues on that day (Mark 6:2; Luke 4:16, 31, 32; 13:10). Also from His saying to the man He had cured, 'Pick up your bed and walk', and to the Pharisees, that His disciples might pick ears of grain and eat them on the Sabbath day (Matt. 12:1-9; Mark 2:23-end; Luke 6:1-6; John 5:9-19).

All these details mean in the spiritual sense being instructed on matters of doctrine. The things the Lord did and taught show that that day also became a day for love towards the neighbour (Matt. 12:10-14; Mark 3:1-9; Luke 6:6-12; 13:10-18; 14:1-7; John 5:9-19; 7:22, 23; 9:14, 16). Both of those sets of passages make it plain why the Lord said that He was also Lord of the Sabbath (Matt. 12:8; Mark 2:28; Luke 6:5). It follows from His saying this that that day was to represent Him.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 302

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 302

302. In the spiritual sense this commandment means man's reformation and regeneration by the Lord. 'Six days of work' means the fight against the flesh and its lusts, and at the same time against the evils and falsities which are implanted in one by hell. The seventh day means his being linked with the Lord, and his consequent regeneration. It will be shown later on, in the chapter on reformation and regeneration, that, so long as that fight continues, a person is engaged in spiritual labour; but when he is regenerated, he has rest. The important points made there are these:

(i) Regeneration is an exact replica of a person's conception, gestation in the womb, birth and training.
(ii) The first act of a new birth is called the reformation of the understanding, its second act is the regeneration of the will and hence of the understanding.
(iii) The internal man must first be reformed, and the external man by means of the internal.
(iv) At that time a struggle takes place between the internal and external man; the one who wins becomes master over the other.
(v) A person's regeneration is having a new will and a new understanding, etc.

The reason why this commandment in the spiritual sense means a person's reformation and regeneration is that it parallels the Lord's toils and battles with the hells, and His victory over them, followed by rest. For the way in which the Lord glorified His Human and made it Divine is the same as the way in which He reforms man and regenerates him, making him spiritual. This is what is meant by 'following Him'. It is plain from Isaiah chapters 53 and 63 that the Lord engaged in battles and these are called toils; and similar events with men are called toils (Isa. 65:23; Rev. 2:2, 3).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 303

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 303

sRef Ps@85 @8 S0' sRef Isa@52 @7 S0' sRef Ps@85 @10 S0' sRef Ps@55 @18 S0' sRef Luke@10 @5 S0' sRef Luke@10 @6 S0' sRef John@14 @27 S0' sRef Isa@9 @6 S0' sRef Isa@32 @18 S0' sRef Isa@32 @17 S0' sRef John@16 @33 S0' sRef Isa@9 @7 S0' 303. In the celestial sense this commandment means being linked with the Lord, leading to peace as the result of protection from hell. The Sabbath means rest and, in this highest sense, peace. That is why the Lord is called the Prince of peace, and He calls Himself peace; this can be seen from the following passages:

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, on whose shoulder is the dominion, and his name will be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God, Hero, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace. Of the extension of his dominion and peace there will be no end. Isa. 9:6, 7.

Jesus said, I leave peace with you, my peace I give to you. John 14:27.

Jesus said, I have said these things so that you may have peace in me. John 16:33.

How pleasant upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news and makes us hear of peace, saying, Your God* reigns. Isa. 52:7.

Jehovah shall redeem my soul in peace. Ps. 55:18.

The work of righteousness** is peace, the toil of righteousness is rest, and safety for ever, so that they may dwell in the dwelling of peace, and in the tents of safety and in tranquil ease. Isa. 32:17, 18.

Jesus said to the seventy whom He sent out, Whatever house you enter, first say, Peace be upon this house***; and if there be a son of peace there, let your peace rest upon him. Luke 10:5, 6; Matt. 10:12-14.

Jehovah will speak peace to His people, righteousness and peace will kiss each other. Ps. 85:8, 10.

When the Lord Himself appeared to the disciples, He said, Peace be with you. John 20:19, 21, 26.

Moreover, Isaiah (chapters 65 and 66 and elsewhere) deals with the state of peace, into which the Lord will bring them. The people who will be brought into this state are those who are received into the new church which is being established by the Lord at the present time. It may be seen in my book HEAVEN AND HELL (284-290) what is the essence of this peace enjoyed by the angels of heaven and those who are in the Lord. This reference also makes it plain why the Lord calls Himself the Lord of the Sabbath, that is, of rest and peace.

* The Latin text has 'Your King', but this is corrected in the author's copy; cf. AC 8331.
** The Latin text has 'Jehovah', but this is corrected in the author's copy; cf. AC 3780, HH 287
*** The Latin text has 'The peace of the Lord', but this is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 304

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 304

sRef Micah@4 @4 S0' 304. Heavenly peace, which prevents evils and falsities rising up from the hells and assaulting us, can be compared with natural peace in many respects, For instance, the peace which follows wars, when everyone lives protected from enemies, safe in his town and in his house, his estates and gardens; as the prophet said speaking in natural fashion about heavenly peace:

They will sit each man under his vine and under his fig-tree, unafraid. Micah 4:4; Isa. 65:21-23.

It can also be compared with mental relaxation and rest after hard work; or with the solace mothers experience after childbirth, when their maternal love* affords its delights. Another comparison might be with fine weather after storms, black clouds and thunder; and with spring at the end of a severe winter, and the flourishing of new crops in the fields, and the gardens, meadows and woods bursting into flower. It can equally be compared with the state of mind of those who after storms and dangers on the sea reach harbour, and set foot on the land they hoped for.

* Or the love called storge.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 305

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 305

sRef Ex@20 @12 S0' 305. THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT

Honour your father and your mother, so that your days may be long and you may prosper upon earth.

This commandment is found in Exodus 20:12 and Deuteronomy 5:16. Honouring your father and mother means in the natural or literal sense honouring one's parents, obeying them, being attached to them, and showing gratitude for the kindnesses they do. These include feeding and clothing their children, and bringing them into the world, so that there they may live civilised and respectable lives; also bringing them into heaven by teaching them the rules of religion. In this way they provide for their temporal prosperity as well as their eternal happiness. They do all this because of the love they have from the Lord, in whose place they act. It also means, in appropriate cases, the honouring of guardians by their wards, if the parents are dead.

In a wider sense this commandment means that one should honour one's king and magistrates, since these provide all with the necessities of life in general, just as parents do in particular cases. In the widest sense the commandment means that one should love one's country, since it feeds and protects one; hence it is called one's fatherland. Honour should be shown by parents to both one's country and its rulers, and they should implant this idea in their children.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 306

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 306

sRef Matt@6 @9 S0' sRef Matt@12 @49 S0' sRef Matt@12 @48 S0' sRef Isa@50 @1 S0' sRef Hos@2 @5 S0' sRef Hos@2 @2 S0' sRef Matt@23 @9 S0' 306. In the spiritual sense honouring one's father and mother means reverencing and loving God and the church. In this sense father means God, who is the Father of all, and mother means the church. Children and angels in the heavens know of no other father or mother, since the Lord causes them to be born anew there by means of the church. This is why the Lord says:

Do not call anyone on earth your father, for you have one Father, who is in the heavens. Matt. 23:9.

This is said for the benefit of children and angels in heaven, not for children and people on earth. The Lord teaches the same lesson in the prayer shared by all Christian churches: 'Our Father in the heavens, may your name be hallowed.'

The reason why mother in the spiritual sense means the church, is that just as a mother on earth feeds her children with natural food, so the church does with spiritual food. This too is why in the Word the church is frequently called mother. For instance, in Hosea:

Strive with your mother; she is not my wife, and I am not her husband. Hosea 2:2, 5.

In Isaiah:

Where is the divorce document of your mother, whom I have sent away? Isa. 50:1; also Ezek. 16:45; 19: 10.

And in the Gospels:

Jesus, stretching out his hand to the disciples, said, My mother and my brothers are those who hear the Word of God, and do it. Matt. 12:49, 50; Mark 3:33-35; Luke 8:21; John 19: 25-27.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 307

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 307

sRef Rev@21 @10 S0' sRef Isa@9 @6 S0' sRef Rev@21 @9 S0' sRef Rev@19 @9 S0' sRef Rev@19 @7 S0' sRef John@14 @10 S0' sRef Rev@21 @2 S0' sRef John@14 @9 S0' sRef John@14 @7 S0' sRef Isa@63 @16 S0' sRef John@14 @11 S0' sRef John@14 @8 S0' 307. In the celestial sense father means our Lord Jesus Christ, and mother means the communion of saints, that is, His church scattered throughout the world. It is clear from the following passages that the Lord is father:

A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is God, Hero, the everlasting father, the Prince of peace. Isa. 9:6.

You are our father. Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You are our father, our Redeemer from eternity is your name. Isa. 63:16.

Philip said, Show us the Father; Jesus says to him, He who sees me sees the Father. Why then do you say, Show us the Father? Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. John 14:8-11; 12:45.

It is clear from the following passages that mother in this sense means the Lord's church:

I saw the holy city the New Jerusalem arrayed like a bride adorned for her husband. Rev. 21:2.

The angel said to John, Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb; and he showed me the city, the holy Jerusalem. Rev. 21:9, 10.

The time has come for the wedding of the Lamb, and his wife has made ready; blessed are those who are invited to the wedding-feast of the Lamb. Rev. 19:7, 9. (See further Matt. 9:15; Mark 2:19, 20; Luke 5:34, 35; John 3:29; 19:25-27.)

On the New Jerusalem meaning the new church now being established by the Lord, see APOCALYPSE REVEALED (800, 881). It is this church, not the earlier one, which is wife and mother in this sense. The spiritual offspring born of this marriage are the various kinds of good which constitute charity, and the truths which constitute faith; and those whom the Lord puts in possession of these are called 'sons of the wedding,' 'sons of God,' and 'born of God.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 308

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 308

sRef Job@12 @9 S0' sRef Job@12 @7 S0' sRef Job@12 @8 S0' sRef Ps@148 @11 S0' sRef Ps@148 @6 S0' sRef Ps@148 @12 S0' sRef Ps@148 @10 S0' sRef Ps@148 @8 S0' sRef Ps@148 @7 S0' sRef Ps@148 @9 S0' sRef Ps@148 @2 S0' sRef Ps@148 @5 S0' sRef Ps@148 @4 S0' sRef Ps@148 @3 S0' sRef Ps@148 @1 S0' 308. It must be grasped that there proceeds constantly from the Lord a Divine sphere of heavenly love towards all who embrace the teaching of His church, and who, just as children in the world obey their father and mother, obey Him, are attached to Him, and seek food, that is, instruction from Him. This heavenly sphere is the origin of the natural sphere of love towards infants and children. This is extremely universal, affecting not only human beings but also birds and beasts, even down to snakes; and not only animate creatures, but even inanimate objects. But the Lord, in order to work on these as He does on spiritual things, created the sun to be a sort of father in the natural world, and the earth to be a sort of mother. For the sun is so to speak the common father, and the earth the common mother, from whose marriage spring all the products of germination which adorn the earth's surface. The action of that heavenly sphere on the natural world produces those wonderful developments of plants from seed to fruit and to new seeds. That too is why there are many kinds of plants which by day turn their faces, so to speak, towards the sun, and turn them away when the sun sets. That too is why there are flowers which open as the sun rises and close as it sets. That too is why song birds sing sweetly in the early morning, and likewise when they have been fed by mother earth. So it is that all these things honour their father and their mother. All of these occurrences are evidence that the Lord, by means of the sun and the earth in the natural world, provides all necessities for living creatures and for inanimate matter. That is why we read in the Psalms of David:

Praise Jehovah from the heavens. Praise Him, sun and moon; praise Him from the earth, whales and deeps. Praise Him, fruit tree and all cedars; wild beast and every animal, reptile and birds with wings; the kings of the earth and all peoples, young men and maidens. Ps. 148:1-12.

And in Job:

Ask, I beg you, the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of the sky, and they will report to you; or the plant of the earth, and it will instruct you; and the fish of the sea will tell you. Who does not know from all these things that the hand of Jehovah has done this? Job 12:7-9.

'Ask and they will teach' means look, pay attention and judge from them that the Lord Jehovih* created them.

* Here possibly a misprint for 'Jehovah'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 309

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 309

sRef Ex@20 @13 S0' sRef Matt@5 @22 S0' sRef Matt@5 @21 S0' 309. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT

You are not to commit murder.

This commandment, 'You are not to commit murder', means in the natural sense that it is forbidden to kill a human being or inflict upon him any wound that might prove fatal; also to mutilate his body. It also means not doing any drastic injury to his name or reputation, since to many people their reputation is as precious as their life. In a wider natural sense murder includes feelings of enmity, hatred and revenge which are murderous in intent. For these have the idea of murder lurking in them, like fire in wood beneath ashes; and the fire of hell is precisely this. This is why we talk of burning with hatred and being hot for vengeance. These are murders in intention, but not in deed. If fear of the law, of retaliation and being punished in the same way were removed, such people would break out into actions, especially if the intention contains an element of deceit or savagery. These words of the Lord prove that hatred is a kind of murder:

You have heard that it was said by the men of old, You are not to commit murder, and anyone who kills will be subject to judgment. But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother unjustifiably will be subject* to the hell of fire. Matt. 5:21, 22.

The reason is that everything intentional is an act of the will, and thus is essentially a deed.

* The quotation is abbreviated at this point, possibly by error.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 310

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 310

sRef Isa@27 @7 S0' sRef Isa@27 @6 S0' sRef Zech@11 @5 S0' sRef Zech@11 @7 S0' sRef Zech@11 @4 S0' sRef Ps@44 @23 S0' sRef Ps@44 @22 S0' sRef John@10 @10 S0' 310. In the spiritual sense murders mean all manners of killing and destroying human souls. These are of many and varied kinds, for instance, turning them away from God, religion and the worship of God, making these things the subject of scandal, and persuading people of things which cause them to be hated and rejected. Such are all the devils and satans in hell, and linked with them are those in this world who offer violence to and prostitute the holiness of the church. It is those who destroy souls by means of falsities who are meant by the king of the abyss, called 'Abaddon' or 'Apollyon', that is, the destroyer, in Rev. 9:11; and in the prophetic parts of the Word by 'the slain', as in these passages:

Jehovah God has said, Feed the sheep to be slain, which their owners slaughtered. Zech. 11:4, 5, 7.

We were slain all day long; we were considered sheep for slaughter. Ps. 44:22.

Jacob will cause those who are to come to take root; has he not been slain even as he slew others? Isa. 27:6, 7.

A thief* does not come except to steal and slaughter sheep; I have come so that they may have life and plenty. John 10:10.

There are further passages of this kind, such as Isa. 14:21; 26:21; Ezek. 37:9**; Jer. 4:31; 12:3; Rev. 9:4, 5; 11:7. This is why the devil is called 'a murderer from the beginning' (John 8:44).

* The Latin text has 'a stranger', but this is corrected in the author's copy. The word 'sheep' has been added to the quotation.
** This reference appears to be wrong; possibly Ezek. 34:9, 10 is intended.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 311

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 311

311. In the celestial sense murdering means being unjustifiably angry with the Lord, hating Him and wanting to blot out His name. These are the people who are said to crucify Him; and they would actually do so, as the Jews did, if He came into the world as before. This is meant by the 'lamb standing as if slain' (Rev. 5:6; 13:8); and by 'being crucified' (Rev. 11:8; Heb. 6:6; Gal. 3:1).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 312

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 312

312. The nature of the human internal, if not reformed by the Lord, has been made plain to me by seeing the devils and satans in hell. For these are constantly minded to kill the Lord, and because they cannot do this, they keep trying to kill those who are devoted to the Lord. Because they cannot do this, as they can kill people in the world, they make every effort to attack them in order to destroy their souls, that is, to destroy the faith and charity they possess. Thoughts of hatred and revenge actually appear in their vicinity like fires, either smoky or white-hot ones; hatred looks like a smoky fire, revenge like a white-hot one. But they are not real fires, only appearances. Sometimes the savage thoughts in their hearts are made visible in the air above them as battles with angels, in which the angels are killed and slaughtered; it is their anger and hatred for heaven, which causes such horrible scenes to be staged.

[2] Moreover the same spirits look from a distance like wild animals of every kind, such as tigers, leopards, wolves, foxes, dogs, crocodiles and snakes of all kinds. When they see peaceful animals, which are representative forms, they imagine they are attacking them and trying to butcher them. They came into my view looking like dragons, standing next to women who had babies, which they were trying to swallow, exactly like what is described in Revelation, chapter 12. These visions are simply representations of their hatred for the Lord and His new church. It is not apparent to their companions that the people in the world who want to destroy the Lord's church are like this. The reason is that their bodies allow them to behave properly, thus absorbing and hiding these appearances. But in the sight of the angels, who do not look at their bodies but their spirits, they appear in similar shapes to the devils described above. How could anyone know such facts, if the Lord had not opened his sight and given him the ability to gaze into the spiritual world? But for this these facts, along with many others equally memorable, would have remained hidden from human beings for ever.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 313

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 313

sRef Matt@5 @27 S0' sRef Matt@5 @28 S0' sRef Ex@20 @14 S0' 313. THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT

You are not to commit adultery.

In the natural sense, this commandment forbids not only committing adultery, but also having obscene desires and realising them, and so indulging in lascivious thoughts and talk. It is clear from these words of the Lord that even lusting is committing adultery:

You have heard that it was said by the men of old, You are not to commit adultery. But I say to you, that if anyone looks at another man's wife so as to lust after her, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Matt. 5:27, 28.

The reason is that when lust is in the will, it becomes like a deed; for the enticement only enters the understanding, but the intention enters the will, and a lustful intention is a deed. More on this subject can be found in my book CONJUGIAL LOVE AND SCORTATORY* LOVE, published at Amsterdam in 1768. This contains sections on he opposition of [scortatory and] conjugial love (423-443); fornication (444a-460); types and degrees of adultery (478-499); the lust for deflowering (501-505); the lust for variety (506-510); the lust for rape (5-11, 512); the lust for seducing the innocent (513, 514); the imputation of either love, both scortatory and conjugial (523-531). All these ideas are meant by this commandment in the natural sense.

* A term to describe love which is the opposite of marriage love.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 314

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 314

sRef Lev@20 @6 S0' sRef Rev@19 @2 S0' sRef Jer@29 @23 S0' sRef Jer@23 @14 S0' sRef Rev@17 @2 S0' sRef Ex@34 @15 S0' sRef Rev@17 @1 S0' sRef Jer@5 @7 S0' sRef Rev@14 @8 S0' sRef Matt@12 @39 S0' sRef Jer@5 @1 S0' sRef Hos@4 @10 S0' 314. In the spiritual sense committing adultery means adulterating the various kinds of good in the Word and falsifying its truths. These meanings of committing adultery have until now been unknown, because the spiritual sense of the Word has until now been hidden. It is perfectly plain from the following passages that this and nothing else is meant in the Word by 'committing fornication, committing adultery, and whoring.'

Run up and down the streets of Jerusalem, and seek to find a man who acts righteously and seeks the truth; when I gave them plenty, they went after whores. Jer. 5:1, 7.

Among the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen horrible obstinacy, in committing adultery and going about lying. Jer. 23:14.

They acted foolishly in Israel, they went after whores, and spoke my Word untruthfully. Jer. 29:23.

They went after whores, because they have abandoned Jehovah. Hosea 4:10.

I will cut off the soul which pays attention to soothsayers and fortunetellers, to go whoring after them. Lev. 20:6.

No treaty is to be made with the inhabitants of the land, for fear the people should go whoring after their gods. Exod. 34:15.

Since Babylon stands pre-eminent in adulterating and falsifying the Word, that is why she is called the great prostitute, and the following things are said about her in Revelation:

Babylon has given all nations to drink from the wine of anger of her whoring. Rev. 14:8.

The angel said, I will show you the judgment of the great prostitute, with whom the kings of the earth have gone whoring. Rev. 17:1, 2.

He has judged the great prostitute, who corrupted the earth with her whoring. Rev. 19:2.

It was because the Jewish nation falsified the Word that it was called by the Lord 'an adulterous generation' (Matt. 12:39; 16:4; Mark 8:38) and 'the seed of an adulterer' (Isa. 57:3). In many other passages too adulteries and whoring are to be understood as meaning adulteration and falsification of the Word: e.g. Jer. 3:6, 8; 13:27; Ezek. 16:15, 16, 26, 28, 29, 32, 33; 23:2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 14, 17; Hosea 5:3; 6:10; Nahum 3:4.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 315

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 315

315. In the celestial sense committing adultery means denying the holiness of the Word and profaning it. It follows from the spiritual sense given above, which is adulterating the good and falsifying the truth of the Word, that this is the meaning in the celestial sense. The holiness of the Word is denied and profaned by those who in their hearts ridicule everything connected with the church and religion; for in Christian countries everything of this sort is derived from the Word.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 316

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 316

316. There are a number of reasons why a person may appear chaste, not only to others, but even to himself, when in fact he is utterly unchaste. For he is unaware that when lust is present in the will it constitutes a deed, and this lust can only be removed by the Lord after the person has repented. It is not abstaining from the act which makes a person chaste, but abstaining from willing it, when the opportunity is there, because it is a sin. Suppose for example someone abstains from adultery and fornication simply out of fear of the civil law and its penalties; from fear of losing his reputation and respectability; from fear of catching diseases by this means; from fear of quarrelling with his wife at home and thus upsetting his life; from fear of a husband or relatives taking revenge, and of being beaten by their servants; or from greed; or from weakness due to disease, abuse or age, or impotence for any other reason; even if he abstains from these actions as the result of any natural or moral law, and not at the same time as the result of spiritual law, yet that person is inwardly an adulterer and fornicator. For in spite of this he believes these actions not to be sins, and so in his spirit does not treat them as unlawful in the sight of God. Consequently he commits them in spirit, even if he does not do so bodily in the sight of the world. After death therefore, when he becomes a spirit, he openly speaks in favour of them.

Moreover, adulterers can be compared with the forsworn, who break their promises, or with the satyrs and priapi* of the ancients, who roamed the woods shouting, 'Where are the girls, the brides and wives for us to have fun with?' Adulterers actually look like satyrs and priapi in the spiritual world. They can also be likened to stinking he-goats; or to dogs which run about the streets, looking around to sniff out bitches with whom to wanton, and so forth. Their virility, when they become husbands, can be likened to the flowering of tulips in spring-time, which within a month wither and droop.

* Priapus, a Roman god of lechery.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 317

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 317

sRef Ex@20 @15 S0' 317. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT

You are not to steal.

In the natural sense this commandment means literally not stealing, engaging in brigandage or piracy in peacetime; and in general not depriving anyone of his goods secretly or on any pretext. It also extends to all imposture and unlawful gain, usury and extortion, as well as fraud in payment of dues and taxes and in repaying debts. Workers who do not work in good faith and without deceit offend against this commandment; so do merchants who cheat over their wares, weights, measures and calculations; so do officers who withhold their troops' pay; and judges who are influenced in their judgments by friendship, bribery, nepotism or other reasons, so perverting laws or legal processes, and depriving others of the lawful possession of their goods.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 318

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 318

sRef John@10 @10 S0' sRef Matt@6 @19 S0' sRef John@10 @1 S0' sRef Matt@6 @20 S0' sRef Obad@1 @15 S0' sRef Joel@2 @9 S0' sRef Obad@1 @5 S0' sRef Hos@7 @1 S0' 318. In the spiritual sense stealing means depriving others of the truths they get from their faith; this is the effect of falsities and heretical beliefs. Priests, whose ministry is conducted solely for the sake of profit or to seek honours, and who teach the sort of things which they see, or could see, from the Word not to be true, are spiritual thieves, since they take away from the people their means of salvation, the truths of faith. Such people are called thieves in the following passages of the Word:

He who does not enter into the sheepfold through the gate, but climbs in somewhere else, is a thief and a robber. A thief does not come except to steal, to slaughter and destroy. John 10:1, 10.

Lay up your treasures not upon earth, but in heaven, where thieves do not come and steal. Matt. 6:19, 20.

If thieves come to you, if wreckers come by night, how will you be cut off? Will they not steal enough to satisfy them? Obad. verse 5.

They will run about the city, they will run on the wall, they will climb into houses, they will enter through windows like a thief. Joel 2:9.

They made a lie, and a thief comes, and his troop pours out of doors. Hosea 7:1.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 319

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 319

319. In the celestial sense thieves mean those who strip the Lord of His Divine power, and those who claim for themselves His merit and righteousness. Although these people worship God, yet it is not in Him they trust, but in themselves; and they do not either believe in God, but in themselves.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 320

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 320

320. Teachers of false and heretical beliefs, who persuade the common people that these are true and orthodox, although they read the Word, so that they can know from it what is false and what is true - as well as those who support false religious ideas by fallacies that lead people. astray - these can be compared with impostors and every sort of trickery. Since these actions are in essence thefts in the spiritual sense, they can be compared with impostors who coin false money, gild the coins or apply a gold colour to them, and pass them off as genuine. Or with those who know how to cut and polish crystals cunningly, and to harden them, so that they can be sold as diamonds. Or with those who take around the towns baboons or monkeys dressed up as human beings, with veils over their faces, and mounted on horses or mules, proclaiming them noblemen of ancient stock. They are also like those who cover their natural, living faces with masks painted in colours, thus hiding their beauty. They are also like those who display selenites and mica, which glitter as if made of gold and silver, and put them up for sale as veins of valuable minerals. They can also be likened to those who use theatrical performances to lead people astray from the true Divine worship, enticing them out of churches and into play-houses. Those who support falsities of every kind, putting no value on truth, and who use their priestly office for the sake of profit or the pursuit of honours, so that they are spiritual thieves, these can be likened to thieves who carry keys that will open the doors of any house; or to leopards and eagles, who turn their sharp gaze in all directions to spy out the richest prey.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 321

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 321

sRef Ex@20 @16 S0' 321. THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT

You are not to bear false witness against your neighbour.

Appearing as a false witness against one's neighbour or giving false evidence means in the strictest natural sense not being a false witness before a judge, or before other people out of court, against someone who is wrongly accused of some crime, and asserting this in God's name, or swearing by anything else holy, or by oneself, or by such things as affect the reputation of one's name. In a wider natural sense this commandment forbids all kinds of lying and hypocrisy in public life with evil intent; also, criticising and slandering one's neighbour so as to undermine his honour, name and reputation, on which the whole of a person's character depends. In the widest natural sense it includes using trickery, guile and deliberate wrong-dealing against someone for various causes, such as enmity, hatred, revenge, envy, rivalry, etc. These evil actions contain bearing false witness hidden within them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 322

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 322

sRef Jer@8 @10 S0' sRef Ps@5 @6 S0' sRef John@9 @41 S0' sRef Jer@9 @6 S0' sRef Isa@30 @9 S0' sRef Isa@28 @15 S0' sRef John@8 @44 S0' sRef Micah@6 @12 S0' sRef Jer@9 @5 S0' 322. In the spiritual sense bearing false witness means persuading others that false ideas of faith are true and that evil ways of life are good, and that true ideas are false and good ways are evil. But in both cases it means doing so deliberately, and not out of ignorance; that is, after knowing what truth and goodness are, but not before. For the Lord says:

If you were blind, you would not be committing a sin; but now you say, We see, therefore your sin remains. John 9:41.

This falsity is meant in the Word by 'lie' and this intention by 'deceit', in these passages:

We have struck an agreement with death, we have made a vision with hell. We have turned a lie into trust, and hidden ourselves behind a falsehood. Isa. 28:15.

A rebellious people are they, lying sons who are unwilling to hear the law of Jehovah. Isa. 30:9.

From prophet to priest, everyone acts a lie. Jer. 8:10.

The inhabitants utter a lie, and as for their tongue, deceit is in their mouth. Micah 6:12.

You will destroy those who utter a lie, Jehovah abominates the man of deceit. Ps. 5:6.

They taught their tongue to utter a lie; their dwelling is in the midst of deceit. Jer. 9:5, 6.

It is because 'lie' means falsehood that the Lord says that the devil utters a lie of his own (John 8:44). 'A lie' also means falsity and untruth in these places: Jer. 23:14, 32; Ezek. 13:6-9; 21:29; Hosea 7:1; 12:1; Nahum 3:1; Ps. 120:2, 3.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 323

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 323

sRef John@14 @6 S0' 323. In the celestial sense bearing false witness means speaking blasphemy against the Lord and the Word, thus chasing truth out of the church. For the Lord is truth itself, and so equally is the Word. On the contrary, bearing witness in this sense means speaking the truth, and testimony means truth itself. That too is why the Ten Commandments are called the testimony (Exod. 25:16, 21, 22; 31:7, 18; 32:15; 40:20; Lev. 16:13; Num. 17:4, 10). Because the Lord is truth itself, He says of Himself that He bears witness. The Lord is truth itself (John 14:6; Rev. 3[:7, 14]). He bears witness and is Himself His own witness (John 3:11; 8:13-19; 15:26; 18:37, 38).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 324

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 324

324. Those who deliberately or with intent to deceive speak falsehoods, and utter them in a tone which imitates spiritual affection - even more so if they intersperse them with truths from the Word, which are thus falsified - these people were called by the ancients spell-makers (on these see APOCALYPSE REVEALED 462); and also soothsayers and serpents of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. These counterfeiters, liars and deceivers can be likened to people who chat in pleasant and friendly fashion with their enemies, and all the time they are talking hold a dagger behind their backs with which to kill them. They can also be likened to those who dip their swords in poison before attacking their enemies; and to those who mix aconite in water or poisonous substances in new wine and sugar icing. They might also be likened to charming and attractive whores, who are infected with a dire disease, or to twigs covered in prickles, which if put to the nose damage the olfactory fibrils; or to sugar-coated poisons; and to dung which when dried in autumn gives off an agreeable smell. Such people are described in the Word as leopards (see APOCALYPSE REVEALED 572).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 325

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 325

sRef Ex@20 @17 S0' 325. THE NINTH AND TENTH COMMANDMENTS

You are not to covet your neighbour's house, you are not to covet your neighbour's wife, nor his man-servant nor his maid-servant, nor his ox nor his ass, nor anything that is your neighbour's.

In the Catechism* in general use today this passage is divided into two commandments. One, the ninth, is 'You are not to covet your neighbour's house'; the other, the tenth, is 'You are not to covet your neighbour's wife, nor his man-servant nor his maid-servant, nor his ox nor his ass, nor anything that is your neighbour's.' Since these two commandments make a single whole and occupy one verse (Exod. 20:17 and Deut. 5:21), I have chosen to treat them together. This, however, is not because I would like to have them coupled to form a single commandment, but I intend them to be divided into two in the usual way, since they are all called together the Ten Words (Exod. 34:28; Deut. 4:13; 10:4).

* As used by the Roman Catholics and Lutherans.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 326

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 326

sRef Matt@5 @28 S1' sRef Matt@23 @25 S1' sRef Matt@23 @26 S1' 326. These two commandments look back to all the preceding ones, and teach and command that evil actions must not be done, nor even longed for. They are therefore not merely for the external man, but also for the internal; for if anyone refrains from evil actions, but still longs to do them, he actually does them. For the Lord says:

If anyone lusts after another man's wife, he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Matt. 5:27, 28.

The external man does not become internal, or act as one with the internal, until lusts have been removed. This too is taught by the Lord, when He says:

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, because you clean the outside of the cup and dish, but the insides are full of robbery and intemperance. You blind Pharisee, clean first the inside of the cup and dish, so that the outside too may be clean. Matt. 23:25, 26.

See in addition the whole of that chapter from beginning to end. The internals which are Pharisaical are longings for the things prohibited by the first, second, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth commandments.

[2] It is well known that while He was in the world the Lord taught the interior doctrines of the church; and these forbid one to long for evil actions. This He taught, so that the internal and external man should make one. This is being born anew, as the Lord said to Nicodemus (John chapter 3). No one can be born anew or regenerated, and so become an internal man, except by the Lord's doing. In order to make these two commandments look back to all that go before, forbidding longing for them, the house is named first, then the wife, and then the man-servant, maid-servant, ox and ass, and lastly everything belonging to the neighbour. The house implies all that follows, for it contains husband, wife, man-servant, maid-servant, ox and ass. The wife who is mentioned next implies what follows, since she is the mistress, just as her husband is master in the house. The man-servant and maid-servant are under their control, and the oxen and asses under the control of the servants. Then finally come everything beneath or outside, which is called 'everything that is your neighbour's.' This makes it plain that these two commandments look back to all the preceding ones in general and in particular, both in a broad and a strict sense.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 327

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 327

sRef Jame@1 @15 S0' sRef Jame@1 @14 S0' sRef Gala@5 @17 S0' 327. In the spiritual sense these commandments forbid all longings which are against the spirit, that is to say, those which oppose the spirituality of the church, which relates chiefly to faith and charity. If these longings were not tamed, the flesh left to its own devices would rush into every crime. For it is well known from the writings of Paul that the longings of the flesh are contrary to the spirit, those of the spirit contrary to the flesh (Gal. 5:17). Also from James:

Anyone is tempted by his own longing when he is enticed; then longing conceives and later brings forth sin; and sin, when it is brought to full development, brings forth death. James 1:14, 15.

Also from Peter:

The Lord keeps back the unrighteous to be punished on the day of judgment, especially those who walk after the flesh in longing. 2 Pet. 2:9, 10.

In short, these two commandments as understood in the spiritual sense look to all the things previously mentioned in that sense, which are not to be longed for, and likewise all in the celestial sense. It is superfluous to go over these again.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 328

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 328

328. The longings of the flesh, the eyes and the remaining senses, if separated from the longings, that is, the affections, desires and pleasures of the spirit, are exactly like the longings of animals, essentially bestial. But the affections of the spirit are such as the angels have, so that they can be called truly human. In so far therefore as anyone indulges the longings of the flesh, so far is he an animal and a wild beast; but in so far as anyone yields to the desires of the spirit, so far is he a human being and an angel. The longings of the flesh can be compared with dried up and parched grapes and with wild grapes; but the affections of the spirit with juicy and tasty grapes, and also with the taste of wine pressed from them. The longings of the flesh can be compared with stables containing asses, goats and pigs; but the affections of the spirit with stables containing thoroughbred horses, as well as sheep and lambs. The difference is like that between an ass and a horse, or between a goat and a sheep, a pig and a lamb*; or in general terms between dross and gold, or between chalk and silver, coral and ruby, and so on. The longing and the deed cling together like blood and flesh, or like flame and oil. For the longing is in the deed, like the air from the lungs when it becomes breath and speech, or like the wind in a sail when a ship is sailing, or like water in a mill-wheel, which produces the movement and functioning of the machinery.

* The Latin has 'a lamb and a pig'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 329

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 329

sRef Isa@1 @15 S0' 329. The Ten Commandments contain everything to do with love for God and everything to do with love towards the neighbour.

Eight of the Ten Commandments, the first, second, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth contain no mention of love for God and love towards the neighbour. They do not tell us that God is to be loved, nor that God's name is to be kept holy, nor that the neighbour is to be loved, nor that he should be treated honestly and uprightly; they merely say 'There is not to be any other God before my face; you are not to take the name of God in vain; you are not to commit murder; you are not to commit adultery; you are not to steal; you are not to bear false witness; you are not to covet what is your neighbour's.' In general, they prescribe that evil is not to be willed, thought or done, either against God or against the neighbour. The reason why we are not commanded to do what is directly the work of love and charity, but only to avoid doing their opposites, is that in so far as a person shuns evils as sins, so far does he will the good actions of love and charity. It will be seen in the chapter on charity [Chapter 7] that the first point of love for God and love towards the neighbour is not to do evil, and their second point is to do good.

[2] There are two contradictory loves, the love of willing and doing good, and the love of willing and doing evil. The latter love is the love of hell, the former the love of heaven. The whole of hell possesses the love of doing evil, the whole of heaven possesses the love of doing good. Now since human beings are by birth prone to evils of every kind, and from birth on they tend towards the pursuits of hell, being unable to enter heaven unless they are born again, that is, regenerated, the evils which belong to hell must first be removed, before a person can will the good deeds which belong to heaven. For no one can be adopted by the Lord, until he has parted with the devil. The manner in which evils are removed and a person is brought to do good will be demonstrated in two chapters, those on Repentance [Chapter 9] and Reformation and Regeneration [Chapter 10].

sRef Jer@7 @3 S3' sRef Isa@1 @16 S3' sRef Jer@7 @2 S3' sRef Jer@7 @4 S3' sRef Isa@1 @18 S3' sRef Isa@1 @17 S3' [3] The Lord teaches in Isaiah that evils must first be removed before the good deeds performed by a person become good in the sight of God:

Wash yourselves, purify yourselves, remove the wickedness of your works from before my eyes; [cease to do evil;] learn to do good. Then if your sins were as scarlet, they will become white as snow; if they were red like purple, they will be like wool. Isa. 1:16-18.

There is another passage like this in Jeremiah:

Stand in the gate of Jehovah's house, and there proclaim this word.

Thus spoke Jehovah Zebaoth, the God of Israel: make your ways good, and your works also. Put not your trust in lying words, saying, This is Jehovah's temple, this is Jehovah's temple, this is Jehovah's temple (that is, His church). Will you, after stealing, murdering and committing adultery and swearing falsely, then come and stand in my presence in this house, upon which my name is written, and say, We were carried away, when you do all these abominations? Has this house become a robbers' cave? Behold, even I have seen it, this is the word of Jehovah. Jer. 7:2-4, 9-11.

sRef Jer@7 @10 S4' sRef Isa@1 @4 S4' sRef Jer@7 @9 S4' sRef Jer@7 @11 S4' sRef John@14 @23 S4' sRef John@14 @21 S4' [4] We are also taught in Isaiah that before washing or purification from evils, prayers addressed to God are not heard:

Jehovah says, Woe to the nation that sins, the people weighed down with iniquity. They have banished themselves back again; from which place when you spread out your hands, I hide my eyes from you. Even though you pray time and again, I do not hear. Isa. 1:4, 15.

The person who keeps the Ten Commandments and shuns evils is attended by love and charity; this is proved by the Lord's words in John:

Jesus said, He who has my commandments and does them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I shall love him and show myself to him; and we shall make our dwelling with him. John 14:21, 23.

Commandments there mean especially the Ten Commandments, which state that evil actions are not to be done nor longed for, and that thus a person's love for God, and God's love for him, follow, just as good does when evil has been removed.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 330

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 330

sRef Rom@13 @10 S0' sRef Rom@13 @8 S0' sRef Rom@13 @9 S0' 330. We said that in so far as a person shuns evils, so far does he will good actions. The reason is that evil and good are opposites; for evils come from hell, and what is good from heaven. So to the extent that hell, that is, evil, is removed, to that extent does heaven approach and so far does a person have good in view. The truth of this is made quite plain by eight of the Ten Commandments considered in the light of this. Thus (i) in so far as anyone does not worship other gods, so far does he worship the true God. (ii) In so far as anyone does not take the name of God in vain, so far does he love what comes from God. (iii) In so far as anyone does not wish to commit murder and act out of hatred or revenge, so far does he wish his neighbour well. (iv) In so far as anyone does not wish to commit adultery, so far does he wish to live chastely with his wife. (v) In so far as anyone does not wish to steal, so far does he practise honest conduct. (vi) In so far as anyone does not wish to bear false witness, so far does he wish to think the truth and speak it. (vii and viii) In so far as anyone does not covet what is his neighbour's, so far does he wish his neighbour the enjoyment of what is his.

This proves that the Ten Commandments contain everything to do with love for God and love towards the neighbour. This is why Paul says:

He who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, You are not to commit adultery, you are not to commit murder, you are not to steal, you are not to bear false witness, you are not to covet, and any other commandment there may be, these are all summed up in this phrase, You are to love your neighbour as yourself. Charity does not do evil to the neighbour; therefore charity is the fulfilment of the law. Rom. 13:8-10.

To these must be added two rules intended for the new church: (i) No one can of himself shun evils as sins, and do good actions which are good in God's sight; but in so far as anyone shuns evils as sins, so far does he do good actions, not of himself, but from the Lord. (ii) A person should shun evils as sins, and fight against them as if of himself. If anyone shuns evils for any other reason than because they are sins, he is not shunning them, but merely ensuring that they are not visible to the eyes of the world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 331

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 331

331. Evil and good cannot exist together, and in so far as evil is removed, good is sought and felt. This is because in the spiritual world a sphere of his love radiates from everyone. This spreads around and affects others, making them to like or dislike the person. It is these spheres which effect the separation of the good from the wicked. There are many parallels in the natural world to show that evil must be removed before good is recognised, felt and loved. For instance, no one can approach someone who keeps a leopard or a panther in his room, and lives safely with them because he feeds them, unless he has first removed those wild animals.

[2] Is there anyone who on being invited to dine with a king or queen does not wash his face and hands before making his appearance? Is there anyone who on getting married enters the bridal chamber without first taking a bath and dressing in a wedding garment? Is there anyone who does not use fire to purify minerals and separate them from slag, before he obtains pure gold and silver? Is there anyone who does not separate the tares from his wheat crop before storing it in the granary? Or who does not beat the husks* off a crop of barley with threshing tools, before gathering it up and taking it home?

[3] Is there anyone who does not submit raw meat to cooking before it becomes eatable and is served at table? Is there anyone who does not shake the grubs out of the leaves of his garden trees, to prevent the leaves being eaten and the fruit lost? Is there anyone who does not loathe dirt in houses or courtyards, and clean them out, especially when a prince, or a princess coming as a bride, is expected? Does anyone love a girl, and aim to marry her, if she is tainted with malignant diseases or covered in spots or pimples, however much she makes up her face, dresses up in fine clothes, and tries to make herself attractive by paying compliments?

[4] A person ought to purify himself of evils, and not wait for the Lord to do this for him directly, as can be seen by comparison with a servant coming in with his face and clothes filthy with soot and dung and going up to his master and saying: 'Please wash me, Sir.' Would not his master say to him: 'What do you mean, you fool? Here are water, soap and a towel. Haven't you got hands and the ability to use them? Wash yourself.' So the Lord God will say: 'The means of purification I have given you, and your will and ability also are given by me; so use these gifts and talents of mine as if they were yours, and you will be purified,' and so on. The Lord teaches us that the external man is to be cleansed, but by means of the internal: see Matthew chapter 23 from beginning to end.

* Reading aristas 'husks' for Latin cristas 'crests'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 332

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 332

332. At this point I shall add four accounts of experiences, of which this is the first.

I once heard some shouting, which welled up from the lower regions as if through water. One shout on the left was 'How just!'; another on the right 'How learned!'; and a third behind me 'How wise!' This made me wonder whether even in hell there were righteous, learned and wise people; and I had a strong desire to see whether there were such people there. A voice from heaven told me: 'You will see and hear.'

Then I left home in the spirit and saw in front of me an opening in the ground; on approaching and looking into it I saw steps, so I went down. When I reached the lower level I saw plains covered with bushes mixed with thorns and nettles. I asked whether this was hell. 'It is the lower earth,' they said, 'just above hell.' Then I went towards each of the shouts in turn, first to that of 'How just!' I saw a gathering of those who in the world had been judges influenced by partiality and bribery. Then I went towards the second shout 'How learned!' and saw a gathering of those who in the world had been fond of logic; and then to the third shout 'How wise!' and saw a gathering of those who in the world had been keen to prove everything.

But I left the others and went back to the first group, the judges influenced by partiality and bribery, those who were being hailed as just. On one side I saw a sort of amphitheatre built of bricks and roofed with black tiles; I was told that it was their court-house. It had three entrances on the north side, and three on the west, but none on the south or east sides; this was an indication that their judgments were not equitable but arbitrary. [2] In the middle of the amphitheatre was to be seen a hearth, on which stokers threw torches dipped in sulphur and full of pitch. Their light projected on to the plastered walls produced pictures of birds of the evening and night. But the hearth and the flickering light projected from it to form these pictures were representations of their judgments, indicating their ability to depict the truth of any question in false colours and make it look favourable to the side they preferred.

[3] Half an hour later I saw some old and young men in robes and gowns filing in; they took off their hats and sat down on chairs at the tables to hold a session. As I listened I realised with what skill and ingenuity they leaned towards the side they favoured, and twisted their judgments to make them appear equitable. Indeed they went so far that they themselves could see injustice as just and justice instead as unjust, It could be seen from their faces and heard in the sound of their voices that they had such delusions. Then I was granted enlightenment from heaven, so that I was able to grasp whether each point was valid or not. I then saw how zealously they wrapped up injustice and gave it the appearance of justice, selecting from the laws the one which suited their case, and using clever arguments to set the rest aside. When judgment had been passed, their sentences were relayed to their clients, friends and supporters outside, and they, to repay the partiality shown to them, went off far down the street crying 'How just, how just!'

[4] After this I talked about these judges to some angels from heaven, and told them some of what I had seen and heard. The angels said that such judges appear to others to be endowed with the sharpest powers of understanding, when in fact they are unable to see a grain of justice and equity. 'If you take away their partiality,' they said, 'they sit in court like statues, and only say, "I agree, I concur with the judgment of so-and-so or so-and-so." The reason is that all their judgments are based on prejudice, and prejudice treats the case from beginning to end with partiality. Consequently they can see no other side than their friend's; if anything comes to oppose it, they avert their eyes and look at it askance. If they do take the opposing point up again, they entangle it in arguments, like a spider's web wrapped round its prey, and swallow it. So it is that they cannot see any point as valid, unless it fits into the web of their prejudice. They were tested to see whether they could, and were found to be unable. The inhabitants of your world will be astonished that this is so, but you can tell them that this is a true statement which has been checked by angels from heaven. Since they cannot see any justice, we in heaven do not regard them as human beings, but as monstrous effigies of people, their heads made of partiality, their chests of injustice, their hands and feet of proofs and the soles of their feet of justice, so that, if this does not support their friend's case, they can tread it underfoot and trample on it. [5] What they are really like you are going to see, since their end is at hand.'

Then suddenly the earth split open, tables fell one on another, and together with the whole amphitheatre the people were swallowed up, and thrown into prison in caves. Then I was asked whether I wanted to see them there. They appeared to have faces of polished steel, their bodies from neck to legs like carvings dressed in leopard skins, and feet like snakes. I saw that the law books, which they had had placed on the tables, had turned into playing cards; and now instead of delivering judgments the task assigned to them was to make vermilion into rouge, to daub on the faces of prostitutes and make them look like beauties.

After seeing this I wanted to visit the other two groups, the one which consisted of people fond of nothing but logic, and the other of those who want to prove everything. 'Wait a bit,' I was told, 'and you will be given an escort of angels from the community closest above them. By their help enlightenment will come to you from the Lord, and you will see astonishing sights.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 333

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 333

333. The second experience.

Some time later I heard again from the lower earth the same cries as before 'How learned, how learned!' On looking around to see who was there, I found myself in the presence of angels from the heaven exactly above the people who were shouting 'How learned!'

When I talked to them about the shouting, they said that these were learned people who only argue whether a thing exists or not, and rarely reach the thought that it is so. 'They are therefore like winds which blow and pass on, or like bark around trees that have no heartwood, or like almond shells with no kernel, or like the peel around fruits with no flesh inside. For their minds are devoid of interior judgment, and merely coupled to the bodily senses. So if the senses themselves are unable to judge, they can reach no conclusions. In short, they are creatures of their senses, and we call them logicmongers. We call them this because they never reach any conclusions, but they pick up anything they hear and argue whether it exists, continually speaking for and against. Nothing gives them more pleasure than attacking truths and by subjecting them to argument tearing them in pieces. These are the people who consider themselves learned beyond anyone in the world.'

[2] On hearing this I begged the angels to take me down to visit them. So they took me down to a hollow, from which steps led down to the lower earth. We went down and followed the sound of shouting 'How learned!' There we found some hundreds of people standing in one place stamping on the ground. I was surprised at this and asked: 'Why are they standing like that stamping on the ground? They might,' I added, 'make a hole in the ground like that.'

The angels smiled at this and said: 'They seem to stand in one place because they never think about anything being so, but only whether it exists, and this they argue about. When thought makes no further progress, they seem merely to trample and wear out one clod of earth without advancing.'

The angels went on: 'Those who arrive in this world from the natural one, and are told that they are in a different world, form groups in many places, and try to find out where heaven and hell are, and likewise where God is. But even after being taught this, they still begin reasoning, debating and arguing whether God exists. They do so because at the present time so many people in the natural world are nature-worshippers, and when the talk turns to religion this is the subject they discuss among themselves and with others. This proposition and discussion rarely ends in an affirmation of faith in the existence of God. Afterwards these people associate more and more with the wicked; this happens because no one can do any good from the love of good, except by God's help.'

[3] After this I was taken to a meeting, and there I saw people with not unpleasing faces and well dressed. 'They look like this,' said the angels, 'in their own light, but if light is shed from heaven, there is a change in their faces, and in their clothes.' This happened, and their faces turned swarthy and they seemed to be wearing black sackcloth. But when this light was shut off, they returned to their previous appearance.

A little later I spoke with some of the people in the meeting and said: 'I have heard the crowd around you crying out "How learned!" So I should like, if I may, to enter into conversation with you about matters of the most profound learning.' 'Say anything you like,' they replied, 'and we will satisfy you.'

'What sort of religion,' I asked, 'will effect people's salvation?'

'We shall split up this question,' they said, 'into several, and we cannot give a reply until we have settled these. The order of discussion will be: (1) whether religion is of any importance; (2) whether or not there is such a thing as salvation; (3) whether one religion is more efficacious than another; (4) whether heaven and hell exist; (5) whether there is everlasting life after death; and many more questions.'

So I asked about the first question, whether religion is of any importance; and they started discussing it with many arguments. So I asked them to refer it to the meeting, which they did. The agreed reply was that this proposition requires so much investigation that it would not be finished before evening. 'Could you,' I asked, 'finish it within a year?' One of them said it could not be finished in a hundred years. 'So,' I said, 'in the meantime you have no religion, and since salvation depends upon it, you have no idea of salvation, no belief in it or hope for it.'

'Wouldn't you like us,' he replied, 'to prove first whether religion exists, what it is, and whether it is of any importance? If it exists, it will be for the wise too; if it does not, it will be only for the common people. It is well known that religion is called a bond; but the question may be asked, "For whom?" If it is only for the common people, it is not really of any importance; but if it is for the wise, then it is.'

[4] On hearing this I said: 'You are anything but learned, since you can think of nothing but whether it exists, and argue this in either direction. Can anyone be learned, unless he knows something for certain, and advances to that conclusion, just as a person advances step by step, and in due course achieves wisdom? Otherwise you do not so much as touch truths with your finger-tips, but drive them further and further from your sight. Therefore reasoning only whether it exists is like arguing about a hat without wearing it, or about a shoe without putting it on. What can come of this, except ignorance whether anything exists, whether anything is more than an idea, and so whether salvation exists, or everlasting life after death, whether one religion is better than another, or whether heaven and hell exist? You cannot have any thoughts on these subjects, so long as you are bogged down at the first step and pound the sand there, unable to put one foot in front of the other and make progress. Take care that, while your minds stand in the open outside the court, they do not inwardly grow ossified and turn into pillars of Salt.'

With these words I left them, and they were so incensed they threw stones after me. Then they looked to me like carvings, totally devoid of human reason. I asked the angels what was their fate. They said that the worst of them are plunged into the depths, and there they find a desert, where they are forced to carry loads. Since they can then make no reasonable utterance, they chatter and make idle remarks, Seen from a distance there they look like donkeys carrying loads.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 334

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 334

334. The third experience.

After this one of the angels said: 'Come with me to the place where they are shouting "How wise!" You will see monstrous people there, with the faces and bodies of human beings, though they are not human beings.'

'Are they animals then?' I asked.

'No,' he replied, 'they are not animals, but bestial people. They are those who are utterly unable to see whether truth is truth or not, although they can make anything they wish appear to be true. We call such people proof-mongers.'

We followed the noise of shouting and reached its source. There we found a group of men surrounded by a crowd. There were in the crowd some people of noble lineage, who, on hearing that they proved everything they said, and so obviously agreed in supporting each other, turned around and said 'How wise!'

[2] But the angel said to me, 'Let us not approach them, but let us call out one from the group.' We did so, and took him aside; we discussed a variety of subjects, and he proved each point so that it seemed exactly as if it were true. So we asked him whether he could also prove the opposite. He replied he could do so as well as the earlier points. Then he spoke openly and from the heart: 'What is truth? Is there any truth in the whole of nature other than what someone makes true? Say anything you please, and I will make it true.'

'Establish then,' I said, 'the truth of the following proposition: faith is all the church needs.' He did so, with such cleverness and skill that the learned men who were present clapped to express their admiration. Next I asked him to establish the truth of the proposition that charity is all the church needs; and this too he did. Then I asked him about the proposition that charity is of no use to the church; and he so dressed up either proposition and adorned them with plausible arguments that the bystanders looked at one another and said: 'Isn't he wise?'

'Don't you know,' I said, 'that living a good life is charity, and having a correct belief is faith? Does not the person who lives a good life also have a correct belief? And consequently faith is a part of charity, and charity a part of faith? Can't you see that this is true?'

'I shall establish the truth of it,' he said, 'and then I shall see.' He did so, and then remarked: 'Now I see.' But a moment later he established the truth of the opposite, and then he said: 'I see that this too is true.' We smiled at this and said: 'Are they not opposites? How can two opposite propositions both appear to be true?' He was indignant at this and answered: 'You are wrong. Both propositions are true, because there is no truth other than what someone establishes as true.'

[3] A man was standing nearby who in the world had been an ambassador of the highest rank. He was astonished at this and said: 'I admit that something like this goes on in the world, but still you are crazy. Establish, if you can, the truth of the proposition that light is darkness and darkness is light.'

'Nothing easier,' he replied. 'What are light and darkness but conditions of the eye? Is not light changed into shadow, when the eye comes in from sunlight, and also when one stares fixedly at the sun? Everyone knows that then the condition of the eye changes, and light then seems like shadow; and in the opposite case when the eye returns to its normal condition, the shadow seems like light. Does not the owl see the darkness of the night like broad day, and daylight like the darkness of the night? And then it actually sees the sun itself as a dark and dim ball. If a person had the eyes of an owl, which would he call light and which darkness? So what is light but a condition of the eye? And if so, is not light darkness, and darkness light? So just as one proposition is true, so also is the other.'

[4] But seeing that this proof had confused some people I said: 'I have observed that this proof-monger is unaware of the existence of true light and false light. Both of these forms of light appear to be light; but false light is not really light, but compared with true light is darkness. The owl operates by false light, for its eyes are filled with a desire to pursue and devour birds; this light enables its eyes to see by night, exactly like cats' eyes, which glitter like candles in cellars. The false light in this case arises from the desire to pursue and devour mice which fills their eyes and has this effect. This makes it plain that the sun's is the true light, and the light of desire is a false light.'

[5] After this the ambassador asked the proof-monger to establish the truth of the proposition that a raven is white and not black. 'Another easy task,' he replied. 'Take,' he said, 'a needle or a razor and open up the feathers and plumage of a raven; or take away the feathers and plumage and look at the bare skin of the raven, is it not white? What is the blackness that surrounds it but a shadow, which must not be used to judge the raven's colour? Consult the experts on optics, and they will tell you that blackness is merely shadow; or grind a black stone or a piece of black glass into fine powder, and you will see that the powder is white.'

'But when you look at it,' said the ambassador, 'surely the raven appears black?' But the proof-monger replied: 'As a human being are you willing to think about anything from appearances? Of course you can speak from appearances of the raven as black, but you cannot really think so. For instance, you can speak from appearances of the sun rising and setting; but as a human being you cannot really think it does, because the sun remains unmoving, and it is the earth which moves. It is the same with the raven; appearances are only appearances. Say whatever you like, the raven is utterly and completely white. It also turns white when it grows old, a fact I have observed.'

At this the bystanders looked at me. So I said that it is true that the feathers and plumage of the raven have inside a whitish tinge, and so does its skin. But this is true not only of ravens, but of all birds throughout the world; and everyone distinguishes birds by their colouring. If not, we should have to say that every bird is white, which is absurd and useless.

[6] Then the ambassador asked whether he could establish the truth of the proposition that he himself was insane. 'Yes,' he said, 'I can, but I don't want to. Everyone is insane.'

Then they asked him to speak from the heart and say whether he was joking, or whether he really believed that there was no truth but what someone established as true. He replied, 'I swear I do so believe.'

Afterwards this universal proof-monger was sent to some angels to have his nature examined. After doing this they said that he did not possess a grain of understanding. 'The reason is,' they said, 'that in his case everything above the rational level is shut off, and only what is below this level is open. Spiritual light is above the rational level, and natural light is below it, and it is natural light which enables a person to prove whatever he likes. But if there is no spiritual light flowing into natural light, a person cannot see whether some truth is true, and consequently not whether a falsehood is false either. The ability to see either comes from the presence of spiritual light in the natural light, and spiritual light comes from the God of heaven, who is the Lord. Therefore the universal proof-monger is neither a man nor an animal, but a beast-man.'

[7] I asked the angels about the fate of such people; how could they be in the company of the living, since spiritual light is the source of people's life; and this is the source of their understanding. They said that as long as such people are alone, they cannot think or talk about anything, but they stand as dumb as machines and as if fast asleep. But they wake up as soon as their ears catch any sound. They added that it is those who are inmostly wicked who become like that. Spiritual light from above cannot flow into them, but only some spirituality through the world; this is what gives them the ability to make up proofs.

[8] When they had said this, I heard one of the angels who had examined him say: 'Make a general conclusion out of what you have heard.' My conclusion was this: it is not the mark of an intelligent person to be able to prove anything he likes; but to be able to see that truth is true and falsehood is false, and to prove that, is the mark of an intelligent person.

After this I looked towards the gathering where the proof-mongers stood with the crowd around them shouting 'How wise!'; and suddenly a dark cloud overshadowed them, with owls and bats flying about in it. I was told: 'The owls and bats flying about in that cloud are correspondences, so as to display their thoughts. The proving of falsities, so that they seem like truths, is represented in the spiritual world in the form of birds of nocturnal habit, whose eyes are inwardly enlightened by a false light; this enables them to see objects in darkness as if in daylight. Those who prove false propositions until they seem true and are afterwards believed to be true, have a similar, spiritual, false light. They are all able to see behind them, but nothing at all before them.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 335

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 335

335. The fourth experience.

I woke from sleep one morning while it was still twilight, and saw as it were apparitions of various sorts before my eyes. Then when it was full morning, I saw mirages of different types. Some were like sheets of paper covered with writing, which were folded over so many times that at last they looked like shooting stars, failing into the air and vanishing. Some looked like open books, some of which glittered like small moons, others burnt like candles. Among them were books which soared aloft, and high in the air disappeared; others fell to the ground and there were reduced to dust. On seeing these things I guessed that beneath these appearances in the air stood people arguing about imaginary matters, which they regarded as of great importance. For in the spiritual world such phenomena in the atmospheres are to be seen arising from the reasoning of those beneath.

A little later the sight of my spirit was opened, and I observed a number of spirits with their heads wreathed in laurel leaves, and their bodies dressed in flowery robes. This was a sign that they were spirits who in the natural world had been famous for their learning. Being in the spirit, I approached and joined the gathering. Then I heard that they were engaged in a bitter and intense debate about connate ideas, that is to say, whether human beings have any ideas directly from birth, as animals do.

Those who denied this were withdrawing from those who asserted it, and finally they stood divided into two parties, like the lines of two armies about to fight with swords. But lacking swords they were fighting with verbal thrusts.

[2] Suddenly an angelic spirit took his stand in their midst, and cried in a loud voice: 'I have heard from a distance, but not too far from you, that on both sides you are engaged in fierce debate, whether human beings have any connate ideas, as animals do. I tell you that human beings do not have any connate ideas, and that animals do not have any ideas at all. So your quarrel is about nothing, or, as the saying goes, about goats' wool or the beard of this age*.'

On hearing this they all flew into a rage and yelled: 'Throw him out, what he says is contrary to common sense.' But when they attempted to throw him out, they saw that he was surrounded by light from heaven, through which they could not break, for he was an angelic spirit. So they retreated and kept a short distance from him. When the light was re-absorbed, he said to them: 'Why do you fly into a rage? Listen first and take in the arguments I shall use, and then reach your own conclusion from them, I foresee that those who have good powers of judgment will agree and will calm the storms which have arisen in your minds.' In reply to this they said, though with indignation in their voices; 'Speak then, and we will listen.'

[3] Then he began speaking and said: 'You believe that animals have connate ideas, and you have deduced this from the fact that their actions seem to spring from thought. Yet they do not have the slightest capacity for thought, and it is only resulting from thought that we may speak of ideas. It is the mark of thought that one acts in such and such a way for this or that reason. Consider then whether the spider weaving its so skillfully designed web thinks in its tiny head: "I will stretch threads out in this order, and join them together with cross threads, so that my web will stand up to the air pressure it will encounter. And where the inside ends of the threads meet to make the centre, I will make myself a place to sit, so that I can detect anything falling into the web and run to it. So if a fly flies into it, it will be ensnared, and I shall quickly attack and wrap it up, so that it will be food for me." Again, does the bee think in its tiny head: "I will fly off. I know where there are meadows in flower, and there I shall suck up wax from some flowers and honey from others; and from the wax I shall build a series of adjoining cells, leaving as it were streets so that I and my companions may freely enter and go out again. Then we shall store large amounts of honey in the cells, to last through the coming winter, so that we do not die." There are many other wonderful details in which bees not only rival the social and economic provisions of men, but in some actually surpass them. (see above 12[.7]).

[4] 'Again, does the hornet think in its tiny head: "My companions and I will construct a dwelling of thin paper, with the walls inside curving around to make a labyrinth; and in the middle we shall make a kind of square, equipped with a way in and a way out, but so artfully contrived that no other creature than our own species will find its way to the middle where we hold our meetings." Or does the silk-worm, while still in the grub stage, think in its tiny head: "Now is the time for me to prepare to spin silk, so that, when it is spun, I can fly out, and in the air, an element previously beyond my reach, play with my mates and provide myself with offspring"? And likewise the other grubs, when they crawl through walls, and turn into nymphs, pupas, chrysallises, and finally butterflies? Does any fly have an idea about meeting another fly in one place and not another?

[5] 'It is much the same with larger animals as it is with these insects; as for instance birds and winged creatures of every kind, which know when to meet, when to prepare nests, lay eggs in them, sit on them and hatch their young, offer them food, bring them up until they fly away, and afterwards drive them from their nests as if they were not their own offspring, and countless things besides. It is much the same with land animals, snakes and fish. Is there any among you who cannot see from what I have said that their spontaneous actions do not result from any process of thought, the only context in which we can speak of ideas? The erroneous belief that animals have ideas has arisen solely from the false idea that animals think just as much as human beings, and the power of speech is the only difference.'

[6] After this speech the angelic spirit looked around, and since he saw that they were still wavering about whether animals have thought-processes or not, he went on speaking and said: 'I perceive that the similarity of the actions of animals to those of men has left you still dreaming about their thought-processes. So I will tell you the source of their actions. Every animal, every bird, fish, creeping thing and insect has its own natural, sensual and bodily love; these reside in their heads, and in the brains in them. By this route the spiritual world acts directly upon their bodily senses, and by these it directs their actions. This is why their bodily senses are much more sensitive than those of human beings. This impulse from the spiritual world is what is called instinct, and it is given this name because it arises without the mediation of thought. There are also secondary instincts arising from habit. But their love, by which the impulse from the spiritual world directs their actions, is concerned only with feeding and the propagation of the species, not with any knowledge, intelligence and wisdom, the means by which love develops successively in human beings.

[7] 'Nor does man have any connate ideas, as can be clearly established from the fact that he has no connate thought-process, and in the absence of thought-processes no idea can exist, for the one is dependent upon the other. This can be deduced from newly born babies, who are unable to do anything but take milk and breathe. Their ability to take milk is not the result of being born with it, but of having continually been sucking in the mother's womb. Their ability to breathe is the result of being alive, for this is something which is universal among living creatures. Even their bodily senses are extremely feeble; and little by little they work away from this state by contact with objects, likewise they learn by practice to move. Little by little too they as it were learn to make babbling sounds, at first uttered without any idea, but something dim arises in their mental imagery; and as this becomes clearer, a dim kind of imagination arises, and from this the same kind of thought. In proportion to the formation of this state ideas arise, which, as was said before, are inseparable from thought, and thinking develops from nothing by instruction. This is how human beings come to have ideas; they are not connate, but formed, and from them their speech and actions are derived.'

For man having nothing by birth other than a faculty for knowing, understanding and being wise, and an inclination to love not only these faculties but also his neighbour and God, see the experience recorded above (48); and in one of those to follow.

After this I looked round and saw close by Leibnitz and Wolff**, who were listening intently to the arguments put forward by the angelic spirit. Then Leibnitz approached and signified his approval and assent; but Wolff went away both assenting and dissenting, since he lacked the inner powers of judgment which Leibnitz had.

* Proverbial expressions for what does not exist.
** Leibnitz (1646-1716) and Wolff (1679-1754), both famous German philosophers.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 336

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 336

336. CHAPTER SIX

FAITH

The wisdom of the ancients was the source of the dogma that the universe and everything in it relate to good and truth; and thus everything to do with the church relates to love or charity and to faith, since everything arising from love or charity is called good, everything arising from faith is called truth. Now because charity and faith are quite clearly separate, but must be combined in anyone who is going to be a member of the church, that is, have the church in him, the ancients disputed and argued about which of the two came first, and so which could properly be called the elder. Some of them said it was truth, and therefore faith; others said it was good, and therefore charity. For they observed that after being born a person at once begins to learn to talk and think; this gradually develops his understanding by the acquisition of knowledge, and he thus learns and understands what truth is; and by these means he later learns and understands what good is. So he grasps first what faith is, and afterwards what charity is. Those who have understood the matter like this have concluded that the truth of faith is the first-born, and the good of charity is born later. For this reason they have assigned to faith the privileged position and right of the first-born. However, these people have so swamped their understanding with a mass of arguments in favour of faith, that they have failed to see that faith is no faith if not combined with charity, and neither is charity charity if not combined with faith, so making up a single whole. If this is not so, then neither has any value to the church. It will be shown in the following pages that they form a complete single whole.

[2] But by way of introduction I shall reveal briefly how or in what way they make up a single whole. This is important as throwing some light on what follows. Faith, which also means truth, is first in time, but charity, which also means good, is first in intention. That which is first in intention is really first, because it is primary and so also the first-born. That which is first in time is not really first, but only seems to be.

To make this comprehensible comparisons will be drawn with the building of a church and a house, the laying-out of a garden and the preparation of a field. The first thing in time in building a church is laying the foundations, building the walls, putting the roof on, and then putting an altar inside and constructing a pulpit; but the first thing in intention is the worship of God in the church, which is the reason why the other things are done. The first thing in time in building a house is making its outer fabric, and equipping it with all the necessities of life; but the first thing in intention is a convenient dwelling for oneself and the others who are to live in the house. The first thing in time in laying out a garden is levelling the ground, preparing the soil, and planting trees and sowing seed to raise useful plants; but the first thing in intention is the profit to be derived from these things. The first thing in time in preparing a field is levelling the ground, ploughing, harrowing, and then sowing; but the first thing in intention is the crop, so also the use it will serve. [3] These comparisons will allow anyone to deduce what is essentially first. Surely everyone who wants to build a church or a house, or to lay out a garden, or till a field, first of all intends its use, and holds this constantly in mind and considers it, while seeking the means to effect it? We deduce then that the truth of faith is first in time, but that the good of charity is first in intention, and since this therefore plays the leading role it is really the first-born in the mind.

But we need to know what both faith and charity are in essence, and this cannot be known unless the subject is divided into propositions, both faith and charity having their own series. Those dealing with faith are as follows:

I Saving faith is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ.
II Faith in brief is this, that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is saved by the Lord.
III A person acquires faith by approaching the Lord, learning truths from the Word, and living by them.
IV The mass of truths, which cohere as it were in a bundle, raises the level of faith and brings it to perfection.
V Faith without charity is no faith, and charity without faith is no charity, and both are lifeless unless the Lord gives them life.
VI The Lord, charity and faith make one, just as in a person life, will and understanding do; if they are separated, each of them is destroyed, like a pearl collapsing into dust.
VII The Lord is charity and faith in the person, and the person is charity and faith in the Lord.
VIII Charity and faith are present together in good deeds.
IX There is true faith, spurious faith and hypocritical faith.
X The wicked have no faith.

These propositions must now be explained one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 337

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 337

sRef John@16 @9 S0' sRef John@6 @29 S0' sRef John@6 @28 S0' sRef John@12 @36 S0' sRef John@3 @18 S0' sRef John@3 @16 S0' sRef John@8 @24 S0' sRef John@6 @35 S0' sRef John@20 @31 S0' sRef John@3 @36 S0' sRef John@6 @40 S0' sRef John@16 @8 S0' sRef John@11 @26 S0' sRef John@11 @25 S0' sRef John@6 @48 S0' sRef John@3 @15 S0' sRef John@6 @47 S0' 337. I

Saving faith is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ.

Saving faith is in God as Saviour, because He is God and man, and He is in the Father and the Father is in Him, so that they are one. Those therefore who approach Him, at the same time approach the Father, that is, the one and only God, and saving faith is in no other. We are to believe or have faith in the Son of God, the Redeemer and Saviour, who was conceived of Jehovah and born of the Virgin Mary,, and was named Jesus Christ. This is evident from His own often-repeated commands, and later from those of the Apostles. The following passages show clearly that He commanded faith in Himself:

Jesus said, This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him should have everlasting life, and I should raise him up on the last day. John 6:40.

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him. John 3:36.

So that everyone who believes in the Son may not perish, but have everlasting life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:15, 16.

Jesus said, I am the resurrection and life. He who believes in Me shall not ever die. John 11:25, 26.

In truth I say to you, he who believes in me has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. John 6:47, 48.

I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will not be hungry, and he who believes in Me will never be thirsty. John 6:35.

Jesus cried out saying, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. If anyone believes in me, as the Scripture says, streams of living water will flow from his belly. John 7:37, 38.

They said to Jesus, What shall we do to perform God's work? Jesus answered, This is God's work, to believe in Him whom the Father has sent. John 6:28, 29.

So long as you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may be sons of light. John 12:36.

He who believes in the Son of God is not judged; but he who does not believe has already been judged, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. John 3:18.

These things have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and so that by believing you may have life in His name. John 20:31.

If you do not believe that I am, you will die in your sins. John 8:24.

Jesus said, When the Comforter, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will try the world concerning sin, righteousness and judgment; concerning sin, for not believing in Me. John 16:8, 9.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 338

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 338

sRef 1Joh@5 @12 S0' sRef Rom@3 @22 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @13 S0' sRef Acts@16 @31 S0' sRef Acts@16 @30 S0' sRef Gala@2 @20 S0' sRef Rom@3 @28 S0' sRef Phlp@3 @9 S0' sRef Acts@20 @21 S0' sRef Gala@5 @6 S0' sRef Rom@3 @26 S0' sRef Rev@14 @12 S1' sRef Gala@2 @16 S1' sRef Gala@2 @15 S1' 338. The faith of the Apostles was solely in the Lord Jesus Christ, as is evident from many passages in their Epistles, of which I shall quote only the following:

It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; but the reason that I now live in the flesh is that I live in faith, which is in the Son of God. Gal. 2:20.

Paul to Jews and Greeks proclaimed repentance before God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Acts 20:21.

The man who brought Paul outside said, What must I do to be saved? He replied, Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, so shall you be saved and your household. Acts 16:30, 31.

He who possesses the Son has life; he who does not possess the Son of God has no life. I have written this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have everlasting life and you may believe in the name of the Son of God. 1 John 5:12, 13.

We are by birth Jews, not sinners of gentile origin, but we know that man is not justified by the deeds prescribed by the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ; so we too have believed in Jesus Christ. Gal. 2:15, 16.

Since their faith was in Jesus Christ, and such faith also comes from Him, they called it 'the faith of Jesus Christ', as in Gal. 2:16 just quoted, and in the following passages:

The righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ [is manifested] to all and upon all who have believed, with a view to the justification of him who is of the faith of Jesus. Rom. 3:22, 26.

To have the righteousness which comes from the faith of Christ, the righteousness of faith which comes from God. Phil. 3:9.

Those that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus*. Rev. 14:12.

By faith which is in Christ Jesus. 2 Tim. 3:15.

In Jesus Christ is faith working through charity. Gal. 5:6.

sRef 2Tim@3 @15 S2' [2] These passages may serve to establish what faith was understood by Paul in the saying so often repeated nowadays in the church:

We conclude therefore that man is justified by faith without the deeds prescribed by the law. Rom. 3:28.

This was not faith in God the Father, but in His Son; much less was it in a sequence of three Gods, one from whom, another for whose sake and a third through whom. The church's belief that his faith in three persons was meant by Paul in that saying is due to the fact that for the last fourteen centuries, that is, from the time of the Council of Nicaea, the church acknowledged no other faith, and so was unaware of the existence of any other, believing it to be the sole and only possible faith. Consequently, wherever the Word of the New Testament mentions faith, this is thought to be the faith intended, and everything said there about it is attributed to this faith. As a result the only saving, faith, that in God the Saviour, has been lost, and so many fallacies too have crept into its teachings, as well as so many paradoxes which are repugnant to sound reason. For any teaching of the church which is intended to teach and point out the way to heaven, that is, to salvation, is dependent upon faith; and because, as I have said, so many fallacies and paradoxes have crept into its teaching, they were obliged to propound the dogma, that the understanding must be kept in obedience to faith. Now since in Paul's saying (Rom. 3:28) faith does not mean faith in God the Father, but in His Son, and 'the deeds prescribed by the law' do not there mean those prescribed by the Ten Commandments, but by the law of Moses given to the Jews (as is evident from the sequel to this passage, and also similar statements in the Epistle to the Galatians 2:14, 15), the foundation stone of modern faith collapses, together with the shrine erected upon it, like a house subsiding into the ground until nothing is left showing but the top of the roof.

* The Latin has 'of Jesus Christ', but this is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 339

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 339

339. The reason why we must believe, that is, have faith in God the Saviour Jesus Christ is that it is faith in a visible God, in whom there is an invisible God; and faith in a visible God, who is man and at the same time God, enters into a person. For faith is in its essence spiritual, but in its form natural. With a person therefore faith becomes spiritual-natural, for everything spiritual must be accepted in the natural, in order to be of any value to a person. The bare spiritual does in fact enter into a person, but is not accepted. It is like the ether which flows in and out again without producing any effect; for an effect to be produced, it must be perceived and so accepted, both of these being processes in the human mind, and this cannot happen in a person except at the natural level.

On the other hand a purely natural faith, one, that is, devoid of spiritual essence, is no faith, merely a firm conviction or knowledge. A firm conviction mimics faith externally, but, lacking any inward spirituality, cannot therefore contribute anything to salvation. Such is faith in the case of all who deny the divinity of the Lord's Human; such too was the faith of the Arians and also the Socinians*, both of whom rejected the Lord's divinity. What is faith without a goal towards which it is directed? Is it not like a look directed towards the universe, a look which falls as if on empty space and thus comes to naught? It is also like a bird soaring above the atmosphere into the ether, where it dies, as if in a vacuum. The time this faith resides in the human mind can be compared with that of the winds in the halls of Aeolus**, or that of light in a shooting star. It arises like a comet with a long tail, but, like a comet, it passes and disappears.

sRef John@14 @6 S2' sRef John@5 @37 S2' sRef John@1 @18 S2' sRef John@6 @46 S2' sRef John@14 @7 S2' [2] In brief, faith in an invisible God is in fact blind faith, since the human mind cannot see its God; and the light of this faith, not being spiritual-natural, is a false light. This light resembles that of a glowworm, or the light seen at night on marshes or sulphurous ground, or that from rotting wood. Nothing can come of such light but pure imagination, which make appearances seem real when they are not. Faith in an invisible God sheds only this kind of light; especially so, when one reflects that God is a spirit, and thinks of spirit as the ether. What result can this have except to make a person look on God as he does the ether? So he looks for God in the universe, and not finding Him there, believes that Nature is God. This is the source of the nature-worship which is prevalent at the present time. Did not the Lord say that no one has ever heard the Father's voice or seen His appearance (John 5:37)? And also that no one has ever seen God, and that the only-begotten Son, who is in the Father's bosom, has revealed Him (John 1:18)? No one has seen the Father except Him who is with the Father; He has seen the Father (John 6:46). And that no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6). Further we read that a person who sees and knows Him sees and knows the Father (John 14:7ff).

sRef John@14 @23 S3' sRef John@14 @21 S3' [3] It is, however, different with faith in the Lord God the Saviour. Since He is God and man, and can be approached and seen in the mind's eye, this faith is not without a goal, but has a goal from which it proceeds and to which it is directed; and once accepted, it remains. It is as when one has seen an emperor or king; whenever one recalls them, their likeness recurs to the mind. The vision that faith gives is like looking at a shining cloud, with an angel in its midst, calling the person to himself so that he can be raised to heaven. That is how the Lord appears to those who have faith in Him, and He comes near to each individual, to the extent that he knows and acknowledges Him. This happens in so far as he knows and does His commandments, that is, to shun evils and do good deeds; and finally He comes to his house and makes His dwelling with him together with the Father, who is in Him, as this passage of John promises:

Jesus said, He who has my commandments and does them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I shall love him and show myself to him. And we shall come to him and make our dwelling with him. John 14:21, 23.

This was written in the presence of the Lord's twelve Apostles, who were sent to me by the Lord while I was writing this.

* Arians were heretics of the early 4th century, Socinians of the 16th century.
** Aeolus in Greek mythology controlled the winds: the Latin reads 'wings (alis) of Aeolus', but 'halls' (aulis) is clearly intended.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 340

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 340

340. II

Faith in brief is this, that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is saved by the Lord.

A human being is created for everlasting life, and any person can inherit that life, so long as he lives in accordance with the means of salvation prescribed in the Word; every Christian, as well as every non-Christian who possesses a religion and sound reason, assents to this proposition. There are many means of salvation, but each and every one concerns living a good life and holding a proper belief, that is, charity and faith; for charity is living a good life, faith is holding a proper belief. These two general principles are not merely laid down for human beings in the Word as the means of salvation, but are actually imposed on them as a duty. Because of this it follows that by their means a person can ensure his everlasting life by the power planted in him and conferred by God; and that so far as a person makes use of that power, at the same time looking to God, so far does God strengthen it and turn every part of natural charity into spiritual charity, and every part of natural faith into spiritual faith. Thus God makes dead charity and dead faith come alive, and at the same time He does the same to the person.

[2] There are two things which must be present at once for a person to be termed 'living a good life and holding a proper belief': in the church these two are known as the internal man and the external man. When the internal man wills good and the external man acts well, then the two become one, the external impelled by the internal, the internal acting through the external. So too man is impelled by God, and God acts through him. On the other hand, if the internal man wills evil, and yet the external man acts well, then nonetheless each of them acts from hell, because this is the source of his willing, and his acts are hypocritical. Every hypocritical act has its will lurking in it, and this is hellish, like a snake in the grass or a worm in the bud.

[3] If a person not only knows of the existence of the internal and external man, but also knows what they are, that they can really act as one, and also appear to do so, and if he knows too that the internal man lives on after death, while the external is buried, such a person is potentially in possession of the secrets of heaven as well as earth, and in abundance. If anyone links those two men in himself with a view to good, he achieves eternal happiness; but if he separates those two, and more so if he links them with a view to evil, his lot is eternal unhappiness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 341

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 341

341. To believe that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is not saved, but that God has freedom to save or damn at His whim anyone He wishes, would enable the person who is lost justifiably to accuse God of lack of mercy and unforgivingness, not to say cruelty. In fact it would amount to denying that God was God, and to asserting that what He said in His Word was worthless and that His commandments were of no, or at any rate trifling, importance. Moreover, if a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is not saved, he too can convict God of breaking His covenant which He made on Mount Sinai and wrote with His finger on two tables. It is evident from the Lord's words (in John 14:21-24) that God cannot avoid saving those who live in accordance with His commandments and have faith in Him. Indeed anyone who has a religion and sound reason can convince himself of this, if he reflects that God, who is continually present with man, giving him life and the ability to understand and love, must inevitably love him, and by His love link Himself to those who live a good life and hold a proper belief. This is surely something God has imprinted on every human being and on every living thing. Can a father or mother reject their young children, can a bird reject its chicks, an animal its whelps? Not even tigers, panthers and snakes can do this. For God to act differently would be contrary to the order in which He is and according to which He acts, as well as contrary to the order He imposed by creation on man.

sRef Luke@16 @17 S2' [2] Now just as it is impossible for God to damn anyone who lives a good life and holds a proper belief, so in the reverse case it is impossible for God to save anyone who lives a wicked life and as a result holds a false belief. This second proposition is also contrary to order, and therefore contrary to His omnipotence, which can only proceed by way of justice; and the laws of justice are immutable truths. For the Lord says:

It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one dot of the law to fall out. Luke 16:17.

Anyone who knows anything of the essence of God and of man's free will can grasp this, For example, Adam was free to eat of the tree of life, and of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If he had only eaten of the tree or trees of life, would it have been possible for God to drive him out of the garden? I hardly think so. But after he had eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, would it have been possible for God to keep him in the garden? Again, I hardly think so. Likewise I hardly think God could cast any angel who had been received into heaven down to hell, nor admit anyone judged a devil into heaven. Neither of these things are possible for God by His own omnipotence, as may be seen in the section on the Divine omnipotence (49-70 above).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 342

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 342

sRef Luke@1 @34 S0' sRef Luke@1 @35 S0' sRef Luke@1 @32 S0' sRef Acts@6 @37 S0' sRef Luke@1 @31 S0' sRef Matt@3 @17 S1' sRef Matt@17 @5 S1' sRef Matt@3 @16 S1' 342. The previous section (336-339) showed that saving faith is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ. But the question may be raised, what is the leading point of faith in Him? The answer is that it is acknowledgment that He is the Son of God. This was the leading point of faith which the Lord revealed and announced, when He came into the world. For if people had not first acknowledged that He was the Son of God, thus God proceeding from God, He Himself, and afterwards the Apostles, would in vain have preached faith in Him. Now because the situation at the present day is similar, but in the case of those who think from the self, that is, only from the external or natural man, saying to themselves, 'How can Jehovah God beget a son, and how can a man be God?', this leading point of faith must be proved and established from the Word. I shall quote therefore the following passages:

The angel said to Mary, You will conceive in your womb and give birth [to a son], and you are to give him the name of Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High. And Mary said to the angel, How shall this be, seeing I have no knowledge of a man? The angel replied, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, so that the holy thing that is born of you will be called the Son of God. Luke 1:31, 32, 34, 35.

When Jesus was being baptised, a voice came from heaven, saying, This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. Matt. 3:16, 17; Mark 1:10, 11; Luke 3:21, 22.

Then when Jesus was transfigured, again a voice came from heaven which said, This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased, listen to him. Matt. 17:5; Mark 9:7; Luke 9:35.

sRef 1Joh@4 @15 S2' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S2' sRef 1Joh@5 @13 S2' sRef Matt@26 @64 S2' sRef Acts@9 @20 S2' sRef Matt@26 @63 S2' sRef Matt@16 @17 S2' sRef Matt@16 @18 S2' sRef John@1 @49 S2' sRef John@6 @69 S2' sRef Matt@16 @16 S2' sRef John@1 @14 S2' sRef Matt@16 @13 S2' sRef Matt@14 @33 S2' sRef John@1 @34 S2' sRef John@1 @18 S2' sRef John@20 @31 S2' sRef John@5 @23 S2' sRef Ps@2 @12 S2' sRef John@5 @25 S2' sRef John@5 @24 S2' sRef John@5 @19 S2' sRef Ps@2 @7 S2' sRef John@5 @20 S2' sRef John@5 @22 S2' sRef John@5 @21 S2' sRef John@5 @26 S2' sRef John@5 @27 S2' sRef John@3 @18 S2' sRef John@5 @25 S2' [2] Jesus asked his disciples, Who do men say I am? Peter replied, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus said, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah. I tell you, on this rock I shall build my church. Matt. 16:13, 16-18.

The Lord said that He would build His church on this rock, that is to say, on this truth and admission, that He was the Son of God. For rock means truth, and also the Lord in His capacity as Divine truth. Therefore where anyone fails to admit this truth, that He is the Son of God, the church is not present. That is why it was stated above that this is the leading point of faith in Jesus Christ, and so the true source of faith.

John the Baptist saw and bore witness that He is John 1:34.

Nathanael the disciple said to Jesus, You are the Son of God, you are the King of Israel. John 1:49.

The twelve disciples said, We believe that you are the Christ, the Son of the living God. John 6:69.

He is called the only-begotten Son of God, the only-begotten of the Father, who is in the Father's bosom. John 1:14, 18; 3:16.

Jesus Himself admitted before the High Priest that He was the Son of God. Matt. 26:63, 64; 27:43; Mark 14:61, 62; Luke 22:70.

Those who were in the boat came and worshipped Jesus, saying, Truly, you are the Son of God. Matt. 14:33.

The eunuch who wished to be baptised said to Philip, I believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Acts 8:37.

Paul after his conversion preached Christ* as being the Son of God. Acts 9:20.

Jesus said, The hour will come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. John 5:25.

He who does not believe has already been judged, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. John 3:18.

These things have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, so that by believing you may have life in His name. John 20:31.

I have written this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have everlasting life and you may believe in the name of the Son of God. 1 John 5:13.

We know that the Son of God came and gave [us understanding,] so that we might know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

If anyone shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 1 John 4:15.

Also elsewhere, as Matt. 8:29; 27:40, 43, 54; Mark 1:1; 3:11; 15:39; Luke 8:28; John 9:35; 10:36; 11:4, 27; 19:7; Rom. 1:4; 2 Cor. 1:19; Gal. 2:20; Eph. 4:13; Heb. 4:14; 6:6; 7:3; 10:29; 1 John 3:8; 5:10; Rev. 2:18.

There are also many passages where Jesus is called Son by Jehovah, and He calls Jehovah God His Father, as in this:

Whatever the Father does, this the Son does; as the Father raises up the dead and gives them life, so does the Son; so that all may honour the Son, as they honour the Father. As the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted to the Son to have life in Himself.' John 5:19-27.

There are very many examples elsewhere; and it is the same in the Psalms of David:

I will bring news of a decree. Jehovah said to me, You are my son, today have I begotten you. Kiss the son, so that he may not be angry and so that you do not perish on the way. For in a short while his wrath will blaze up; blessed are all who trust in him. Ps. 2:7, 12.

[3] These passages now permit the conclusion that everyone who wishes to be a true Christian and to be saved by Christ should believe that Jesus is the Son of the living God. Anyone who does not believe this, but only that He is the son of Mary, is implanting in his mind various ideas about Him which are damning and destructive of his salvation; see above on this (92, 94, 102). Much the same might be said of these people as of the Jews, that in place of a King's crown they put on His head a crown of thorns; and also that they give Him vinegar to drink and cry, 'If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross' [Matt. 27:29, 34, 40]. Or as the devil said tempting Him, 'If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread' or 'If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down' (Matt. 4:3, 6). These people profane His church and temple, and make it a robbers' cave. These are those who make His worship like the cult of Mohammed, and do not distinguish between true Christianity, which is the worship of the Lord, and nature-worship. They can be likened to people riding in a carriage or a trap over thin ice, when the ice breaks beneath them and they are drowned, as freezing water closes over them, the horses and the carriage. They can also be likened to those who fashion a boat out of rushes and reeds, and glue it with pitch to make it hold together, and entrust themselves to it on the open sea; but the pitch that holds it together comes unstuck, and they are drowned and swallowed up in sea-water, and find their grave in its depths.

* The Latin has 'Jesus', but this is corrected in the author's copy.
** The quotation is re-arranged in the Latin text; the translation here follows the correction entered in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 343

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 343

343. III

A person acquires faith by approaching the Lord, learning truths from the Word, and living by them.

Before starting to show the origin of faith, which is approaching the Lord, learning in addition truths from the Word, and living by them, I must first present a summary of faith, which will allow a general idea to be formed on each detail of faith. For this will make more readily intelligible not only what is said in this chapter about faith, but also what will be said later on about charity, free will, repentance, reformation and regeneration, and imputation. For faith enters into each and every part of a theological system like the blood into the parts of the body, and gives them life. The teaching of the present day church about faith is widely known in the Christian parts of the world, and particularly among the ordained clergy of the church; for the libraries of the theologians of the church are full of books about nothing but faith, and about faith alone. Indeed hardly anything but that is regarded as really theological at the present time. But before the doctrines of the present-day church regarding its faith are taken up, scrutinised and evaluated (which will be the subject of an appendix), I present the general doctrines of the new church on the subject of its faith, as follows.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 344

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 344

344. The being of the faith of the new church is: (1) Complete faith in the Lord God, the Saviour Jesus Christ; (2) Trust, that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is saved by Him.

The essence of the faith of the new church is: Truth from the Word.

The coming into being of the faith of the new church is: (1) Spiritual sight. (2) A harmony of truths. (3) Conviction. (4) Acknowledgment imprinted on the mind.

The states of the faith of the new church are: (1) Infant faith, youthful faith and adult faith. (2) Faith from genuine truth and faith from the appearances of truth. (3) Faith from memory, faith from reason, faith from enlightenment. (4) Natural faith, spiritual faith, celestial faith. (5) Living faith and miraculous faith. (6) Free faith and faith under compulsion.

The real form of the faith of the new church, both in general and in particular, can be seen above (2 and 3 [pp. 1-3]).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 345

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 345

345. Having given a summary of the things which go to make up spiritual faith, I shall now give too a summary of the things which go to make up purely natural faith. This is essentially a firm conviction which pretends to be faith, but is a conviction of falsity, known as heretical faith. Its various types are: (1) Spurious faith, in which falsities are mixed with truths. (2) Meretricious faith coming from falsified truths, and adulterous faith coming from different kinds of adulterated good. (3) Concealed or blind faith, which is faith in mysteries which are believed in, despite ignorance whether they are true or false, or whether they are above the level of reason or contrary to it. (4) Erratic faith, which is in a plurality of gods. (5) One-eyed faith, which is in some god other than the true one, and in the case of Christians in a god other than the Lord God the Saviour. (6) Hypocritical or Pharisaical faith, faith, which is a faith of the lips, but not the heart. (7) Imaginary or upside-down faith, which is falsity made by clever arguments to seem like truth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 346

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 346

346. It was said above that faith in its coming into being in the case of a person is spiritual sight. Now since spiritual sight, which is a faculty of the understanding and thus mental, and natural sight, which is a faculty of the eye and thus bodily, correspond to each other, each state of faith can be compared to a condition of the eye and the faculty of sight. The state of faith from truth corresponds to every healthy condition of the eyesight; the state of faith from falsity to every morbid condition of the eyesight. I shall make a comparison between the correspondences of the two kinds of sight, mental and bodily, in respect of the morbid conditions of either.

Spurious faith, in which falsities are mixed with truths, can be compared with the defect of the eye and sight called white spot on the cornea, which makes the sight dim. Meretricious faith, which arises from falsified truths, and adulterous faith, which arises from different kinds of adulterated good, can be compared with the defect of the eye and sight called glaucoma, which is a drying-up and hardening of the crystalline humour.

[2] Concealed or blind faith, which is faith in mysteries which are believed in, despite ignorance whether they are true or not, or whether they are above the level of reason or contrary to it, can be
compared with the defect of the eye called gutta serena or amaurosis, which is a loss of sight arising from the obstruction of the optic nerve, although the eye appears to be intact and seeing. Erratic faith, which is in a plurality of gods, can be compared with the defect of the eye called cataract, which is loss of sight due to blockage between the sclerotic tunic and the uvea. One-eyed faith, which is in some god other than the true one, and in the case of Christians in a god other than the Lord God the Saviour, can be compared with the defect of the eye called squinting. Hypocritical or Pharisaical faith, which is a faith of the lips, but not the heart, can be compared with atrophy of the eye leading to loss of sight. Imaginary or upside-down faith, which is falsity made by clever proofs to seem like truth, can be compared with the defect of the eye called nyctalopia, which is the ability to see by deceptive light in darkness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 347

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 347

sRef John@15 @4 S1' sRef John@15 @5 S1' 347. As for the formation of faith, this takes place by a person approaching the Lord, learning truths from the Word, and living by them. First: faith is formed by a person approaching the Lord, because faith which is real faith, that is, the faith which saves, is from the Lord and directed to the Lord. The Lord's words to His disciples show plainly that it comes from the Lord:

Remain in me, and I in you, because without me you can do nothing. John 15:4, 5.

It is plain that it is faith directed to the Lord from the numerous passages which have been cited (337, 338), stating that one must believe in the Son. Now since faith is from the Lord and directed to the Lord, it can be said that the Lord is faith itself, for its life and essence are in the Lord, and so come from Him.

[2] Secondly: the reason why faith is formed by a person learning truths from the Word is that faith essentially is truth; for all the ingredients of faith are truths. Thus faith is nothing but a collection of truths casting light in a person's mind. For truths teach not only that one should believe, but in whom one should believe and what one should believe. Truths must be taken from the Word, because it contains all the truths which lead to salvation; and they are effective because they have been given by the Lord, and are as a result imprinted upon the whole heaven of the angels. When therefore a person goes on to learn truths from the Word, he comes into communion and association with angels, without being aware of it. Faith devoid of truths is like seed devoid of kernel, which if milled produces only bran. But faith derived from truths is like good seed, which if milled produces flour. In short, the essentials of faith are truths; if these are not contained in it and compose it, faith is no more than the sound of a whistle; but when truths are contained in and compose faith, then it is the sound of something that brings salvation.

sRef Matt@13 @23 S3' sRef Matt@7 @26 S3' sRef John@13 @17 S3' sRef Matt@7 @24 S3' [3] Thirdly: faith is formed by a person living by truths, because spiritual life is living in accordance with truths, and truths do not really come alive until they are realised in deeds. Truths unconnected with deeds belong merely to a person's thinking; if they are not also accepted by the will, they merely stand at a person's door and so are not within him. For the will is the person himself, and thought is a person to the extent that it joins the will to itself, and the nature of thought is determined by this joining. A person who learns truths without putting them into practice is like someone scattering seeds over a field and not harrowing it; then the rain makes the seeds swell so that they become empty husks. But a person who learns truths and puts them into practice is like someone who sows seed and ploughs the seed in; then the rain makes the seeds grow into a crop, and they become a useful source of food. The Lord says:

If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. John 13:17.

and in another passage:

The person who sows on good ground is the one who hears the Word and pays attention to it, so that he brings forth and produces fruit. Matt. 13:23.

Also:

Everyone who hears my words and acts upon them, I will compare to a prudent man, who built his house upon a rock; but everyone who hears my words and does not act upon them will be compared to a foolish man who built his house upon sand. Matt. 7:24, 26.

The Lord's words are all of them truths.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 348

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 348

348. It is plain from what has been said above that there are three things which form faith in the case of a person: the first is to approach the Lord, the second is to learn truths from the Word, the third is to live by them. Since these three stages are distinct one from the other, it follows that they can be separated. One can approach the Lord without knowing any but historical truths about God and the Lord. One can also know large numbers of truths from the Word without living by them. But the person who has these three stages separated, that is to say, one without the other, has no saving faith. This sort of faith comes about when the three are linked together, and indeed the nature of the faith depends upon the degree to which they are linked.

Where the three are separated, there faith is like infertile seed, which when put in the ground dissolves into dust; but where the three are linked, there faith is like seed in the ground which grows up into a tree, and the fruit of that faith is dependent upon their being linked. Where the three are separated, faith is like an egg lacking any fertility; but where they are linked, faith is like the fertile egg of a beautiful bird.

[2] In the case of those with whom the three are separated, faith can be likened to the eye of a cooked fish or crab; but faith with those who have them linked together can be likened to an eye which is rendered pellucid by the crystalline humour right up to and through the uvea of the pupil. Faith separated is like a painting made with colours of dark tones on a black stone, but faith linked is like a painting done with beautiful colours on a pellucid crystal. The light of separated faith can be compared with that of a fire-brand in the hand of a traveller at night, but the light of linked faith can be compared with the light of a torch, which when shaken lights up the details of the path. Faith without truths is like a vine which bears wild grapes; but faith derived from truths is like a vine which bears clusters of grapes yielding a fine wine. Faith in the Lord devoid of, truths can be compared with a new star appearing in the sky, which grows dim in time, but faith in the Lord accompanied by truths can be compared with a fixed star, which lasts permanently. Truth is the essence of faith, and therefore the nature of truth determines the nature of faith; without truths it is errant, with them it is stable. Faith based on truths also shines in heaven like a star.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 349

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 349

sRef John@15 @7 S0' 349. IV

The mass of truths, which cohere as it were in a bundle, raises the level of faith and brings it to perfection.

Looking at present-day faith does not permit one to recognise that faith taken all around is a collection of truths. Still less does it suggest that a person can make some contribution to the acquisition of his faith. Yet faith is in essence truth, being truth in its own light, and so just as truth can be acquired, so can faith. Is there anyone who cannot approach the Lord, if he wishes? Or who cannot gather truths from the Word, if he wishes? Every truth in the Word and taken from the Word shines, and truth in light is faith. The Lord, who is light itself, flows into everyone; and if a person possesses truths from the Word, He makes them shine in them, so making them part of faith. This is what the Lord says in John, that they should remain in Him and His words would remain in them (John 15:7). The Lord's words are truths. But in order to allow the idea to be correctly grasped, that the mass of truths cohering, as it were in a bundle, raises the level of faith and brings it to perfection, the comments on this must be split into the following parts:

(i) The truths of faith are capable of being multiplied to infinity.
(ii) Their arrangement is into groupings, thus, so to speak, into bundles.
(iii) Faith is perfected in proportion to their volume and coherence.
(iv) However numerous the truths are and however varied they appear, they are made one by the Lord, who is the Word, the God of heaven and earth, the God of all flesh, the God of the vineyard or the church, the God of faith, and light itself, truth and everlasting life.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 350

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 350

350. (i) It is evident that the truths of faith are capable of being multiplied to infinity from the wisdom of the angels in heaven being for ever increasing. The angels also say that there is never any limit to wisdom, and the only source of wisdom is from Divine truths analytically arranged by means of the light which falls on them, coming from the Lord. Nor is there any other source of human intelligence, if it is truly intelligence. The reason why Divine truth can be infinitely multiplied is that the Lord is Divine truth itself, that is, truth in an infinite degree, and it attracts all men to itself. But angels and men, being finite, can only respond to the attractive force by their prescribed amounts, though the attractive force constantly strives towards infinity. The Lord's Word is an unfathomable mine of truths, the source of all the wisdom of the angels. Yet in the case of a person who knows nothing about the spiritual and celestial meanings of the Word, this is no more visible than water is when contained in a jar.

[2] The way the truths of faith multiply to infinity can be compared with human seed, each one of which can propagate families for century after century. The way the truths of faith reproduce can also be compared with the way seeds in fields or gardens reproduce; these can be propagated to make hundreds of millions and for ever. Seed in the Word means simply truth, a field means doctrine, a garden wisdom. The human mind resembles the soil in which spiritual and natural truths are planted like seeds, and they can multiply without limit. People acquire this capacity from the infinity of God, who is perpetually present giving His light and heat, and the capacity to beget.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 351

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 351

351. (ii) The truths of faith are arranged into groupings, and thus, so to speak, into bundles, a fact that up to the present has been unknown. The reason for this ignorance is that the spiritual truths, out of which the whole of the Word is woven, have been rendered invisible, because of the mystical and enigmatic faith which plays the leading role in present-day theology. As a result, they have sunk into the ground like silos.

It needs to be explained what is meant by groupings and bundles. The first chapter of this book, dealing with God the Creator, is divided into grouped topics, the first of which is on the oneness of God; the second is on the being of God, that is, Jehovah; the third on the infinity of God; the fourth on the essence of God, which is Divine love and Divine wisdom; the fifth on the omnipotence of God; and the sixth on creation. The separate points in each make up the grouping; they tie together the contents, as it were into handfuls. These groupings in common and in particular, so both taken all together and individually, contain truths, which in proportion to their volume and coherence raise the level of faith and bring it to perfection.

[2] If anyone is unaware that the human mind is organised, or is a spiritual organism terminating in a natural organism, in which and controlled by which the mind operates on its ideas or thinks, he cannot help holding the opinion that perceptions, thoughts and ideas are merely rays and variations of light falling upon the head and presenting forms which he sees and acknowledges as reasons. But this is nonsense, for everyone knows that the head is filled with brains, the brains are organised, and the mind lives in them, and its ideas are fixed and remain in it as they are received and proved. So the question is, what sort of Organisation is there? The answer is that everything is arranged into groupings, as it were into bundles, and this is how the truths that make up faith are arranged in the human mind. This fact can be illustrated by the following considerations.

[3] The brain consists of two substances, one glandular, called the cortical and grey matter; the other is fibrillary and is called the medullary substance. The first substance, the glandular one, is arranged in clusters like grapes on a vine; these clusters are its groupings. The second substance, called medullary, is composed of continuous bundles of fibres projecting from the glands of the first substance. These bundles are its groupings. All the nerves, which project from those and lead down into the body to perform various functions, are simply handfuls and bundles of fibres; so too are all the muscles, and generally speaking all the viscera and organs of the body. Both classes are of such a nature because they correspond to the groupings in which the mind is organised.

[4] Moreover throughout Nature there is nothing which is not composed of bunches to form groupings. Every tree, every bush, plant and vegetable, indeed every ear of corn or blade of grass is both generally and in detail so constructed. The universal cause of this is that this is the way Divine truths are structured; for we read that all things were created by the Word, that is, by Divine truth, and that the world too was made by the Word (John 1:1ff). These facts can allow us to see that, if the human mind did not contain such an orderly arrangement of substances, human beings would not possess any powers of analytical reasoning. Everyone has such powers in proportion to the orderly arrangement of his mind, and so in proportion to the volume of truths cohering as it were in a bundle; and this arrangement depends upon his free use of his reason.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 352

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 352

352. (iii) It follows from what has been said above that faith is brought to perfection in proportion to the volume and coherence of the truths. This is demonstrated in the case of everyone who assembles the reasons, and perceives the effectiveness of multiple groups, when they cohere as one. For then one strengthens and confirms another, and they compose a form which, in action, performs a single act. Now since faith in its essence is truth, it follows that in proportion to the volume and coherence of truths faith becomes more and more perfectly spiritual, and so less and less natural-sensual. For it is raised into the higher region of the mind, from where it sees below itself rank upon rank of proofs of itself in the natural world. A great volume of truths cohering as it were in a bundle makes true faith more enlightened, more easily perceived, more outstanding and clear. It also becomes more easily linked to the various kinds of good belonging to charity, and consequently more easily freed from evils, and by stages less subject to the enticements of the eye and the longings of the flesh, thus becoming essentially happier. In particular its resistance to evils and falsities is increased, and so it becomes more and more alive and conducive to salvation.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 353

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 353

353. I said above that every truth shines in heaven, and consequently truth when shining is faith in essence. The beauty and charm faith gets from this illumination, as the truths in it increase in number, can be compared with various shapes, objects and pictures, formed by different colours harmoniously juxtaposed; also with the precious stones of different colours in Aaron's breastplate, which were collectively called Urim and Thummim. Likewise they can be compared with the precious stones of which the foundations of the wall of the New Jerusalem were to be built (as described in Revelation chapter 21); or with the precious stones of different colours in a king's crown. Moreover, precious stones mean the truths of faith. Comparison is also possible with the beauty of the rainbow, or of a meadow full of flowers, and of a garden in bloom in early springtime.

[2] The light and glorious appearance of faith, which it gets from the volume of truths which form its structure, can be compared with the lighting of churches by a great number of lamp-stands, of houses by lamps and of streets by lanterns. The raising of faith to a higher level by the volume of truths can be illustrated by comparison with the increase in the volume of sound and the accompanying melody produced by playing a number of musical instruments in harmony; and also with the increase in fragrance produced by the grouping together of sweet-smelling flowers, and so on.

The resistance to falsities and evils of a faith formed from a large number of truths can be compared with the strength of a church built of well-fitted masonry, with columns to buttress the walls and support the ceiling. It can also be compared with troops drawn up to make a square formation, standing shoulder to shoulder and thus making up and acting as a single strongpoint. It can also be compared with the muscles which form the structure of the whole body, and, although they are so numerous and widely dispersed, none the less in action exert a single force; and so on and so forth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 354

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 354

354. (iv) However numerous the truths of faith are and however varied they appear, they are made one by the Lord, who is the Word, the God of heaven and earth, the God of all flesh, the God of the vineyard or the church, the God of faith and light itself, truth and everlasting life. The truths which make up faith are varied and to human sight appear different. For example, some are concerned with God the Creator, others with the Lord the Redeemer, others with the Holy Spirit and the way God works, others with faith, and charity, others with free will, repentance, reformation and regeneration, imputation, and so on. Yet they all make one in the Lord, and are made one by the Lord in human beings, like many branches on one vine (John 15:1ff). For the Lord links together scattered and divided truths, so to speak, into a single form, so that they present the appearance of being one and function as one.

This can be illustrated by a comparison with the limbs, viscera and organs in a single body: despite their variety and their apparent difference to our sight, still the person whose whole form they compose is only aware of them as a single unit, and when he uses them all in action, he acts as if with a single unit. It is much the same with heaven: although it is divided into countless communities, yet it looks like one in the sight of the Lord. I showed above that it looks like one person. It is much the same with a kingdom, which although divided into many administrative districts, provinces and towns, still acts as one under the guidance of a king endowed with righteousness and judgment. The reason why, by the Lord's doing, the truths that make up faith and make the church truly a church behave in the same way, is that the Lord is the Word, the God of heaven and earth, the God of all flesh, the God of the vineyard or the church, the God of faith, and light itself, truth and everlasting life.

sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S2' sRef John@12 @46 S2' sRef John@15 @5 S2' sRef John@1 @9 S2' sRef Phlp@3 @9 S2' sRef Isa@5 @2 S2' sRef John@17 @2 S2' sRef Matt@28 @18 S2' sRef Isa@5 @1 S2' sRef John@1 @14 S2' sRef John@1 @1 S2' sRef John@14 @6 S2' [2] It is evident in John's gospel that the Lord is the Word, and thus all the truth of heaven and the church.

The Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word was made flesh. John 1:1, 14.

It is evident in Matthew that the Lord is the God of heaven and earth.

Elsewhere:

Jesus said, All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Matt. 28:18.

The Lord is the God of all flesh, in John:

The Father gave the Son power over all flesh. John 17:2.

The Lord is the God of the vineyard or the church, in Isaiah:

My beloved had a vineyard. Isa. 5:1, 2.

In John:

I am the vine and you are the branches. John 15:5.

The Lord is the God of faith, in Paul:

Having righteousness, which is from faith in Christ, from faith in God. Phil. 3:9.

The Lord is light itself, in John:

He was the true light, which enlightens everyone who comes into the world. John 1:9.

Elsewhere:

Jesus said, I have come as a light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in darkness. John 12:46.

The Lord is truth itself, in John:

Jesus said, I am the way, truth and life. John 14:6.

The Lord is everlasting life, in John:

We know that the Son of God came, so that we might Know Him who is true, and we are in Him who is true in His son Jesus Christ.* He is the true God and everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

[3] It needs to be added that worldly affairs prevent people from acquiring more than a few truths to make up faith. Still, if anyone approaches the Lord and worships Him alone, he is enabled to get to know all truths. As soon, therefore, as every true worshipper of the Lord hears some truth of faith previously unknown to him, he immediately sees, acknowledges and accepts it. The reason is that the Lord is in him, and he is in the Lord. Consequently the light of truth is in him, and he is in the light of truth, for, as was said above, the Lord is light itself and truth itself.

The following experience can support this. I saw a spirit who in the company of others appeared simple, because he had acknowledged the Lord alone as God of heaven and earth, and had established his faith by means of a few truths taken from the Word. He was carried up into heaven to join the wiser angels, and I was told that there he was as wise as they were; in fact, he uttered numerous truths, entirely as if of himself, of which he had previously been totally ignorant.

sRef Isa@11 @9 S4' sRef Isa@11 @8 S4' sRef Isa@11 @10 S4' sRef Jer@31 @34 S4' sRef Jer@31 @33 S4' sRef Isa@11 @7 S4' sRef Isa@11 @1 S4' sRef Isa@11 @6 S4' sRef Isa@11 @5 S4' [4] The state of those who are to come into the Lord's new church will be similar. This is the same state as is described by Jeremiah:

This shall be the covenant which I shall make with the house of Israel after these days. I will set my law in their midst, and I will write it upon their heart. Nor shall they any more teach a man his companion, or a man his brother, saying, get to know Jehovah**; for all shall know Me, from the least to the greatest of them. Jer. 31:33, 34.

That state will also be as described by Isaiah:

A shoot will come forth from the stock of Jesse. Truth will be the belt around his thighs. Then the wolf will stay with the lamb, and the leopard will lie down with the kid. The sucking child will play on the hole of the viper, and the weaned child will thrust his hand on the den of the basilisk. For the earth will be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea. On that day the nations will seek the root of Jesse, and peace will be his glory. Isa. 11:[1, 5,]6-10.

* The first edition reads strictly '. . . came into the world, so that we might know the truth. And we are in the truth in Jesus Christ.' But the author's copy has been corrected in keeping with the original Greek.
** Corrected from 'the Lord' in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 355

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 355

355. V

Faith without charity is no faith, and charity without faith is no charity, and both are lifeless unless the Lord gives them life.

It is perfectly plain from the Epistles written by the Apostles that it never so much as entered the mind of any of them, that the present-day church would have separated faith from charity, alleging that faith alone without the deeds prescribed by the law justifies a person and saves him; and that as a result charity cannot be linked with faith, since faith comes from God, and charity, in so far as it is realised in deeds, comes from man. But this separation and division was introduced into the Christian church at the time when they split the one God into three persons, attributing to each equal divinity. It will be explained in the next section that there is no faith without charity, nor any charity without faith, and both are lifeless unless the Lord gives them life, Here to smooth the path I shall prove that:

(i) A person can acquire faith for himself;
(ii) also charity;
(iii) and a life of faith and charity,
(iv) But still faith, charity or life in either of them is not in the least created by man, but only by the Lord.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 356

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 356

aRef John@14 @16 S0' sRef John@6 @40 S0' sRef John@3 @36 S1' sRef John@16 @7 S1' sRef John@16 @8 S1' sRef John@16 @9 S1' 356. (i) It was shown above in the third section (343-348) that a person can acquire faith for himself. This showed that faith is in its essence truth, and anyone can acquire truths from the Word; and that in so far as anyone acquires them for himself and loves them, so far does he begin to acquire faith. To this must be added the following point, that if a person were unable to acquire faith for. himself, everything about faith which is commanded in the Word would be said in vain. For it says there that it is the Father's will that people should believe in the Son, and that he who believes in Him has everlasting life, and he who does not believe will not see life. We also read that Jesus was to send the Comforter, who should convict the world of sin, 'for not believing in me.' There are many other passages, which were quoted above (337, 338). Moreover, all the Apostles preached faith, faith in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ. What use would all these passages be, if a person were to stand with his hands hanging down like a carved puppet fitted with movable joints, and wait for God to act upon him? In such a case, instead of the joints being able to adapt themselves to receiving this influence, they would be stimulated from within to some action which had nothing to do with faith. [2] For the received doctrine at the present day in the part of Christendom separated from the Roman Catholics teaches that:

Man is utterly corrupt and dead to good, so that after the fall and before regeneration not a spark of spiritual strength has been left or remains in man's nature, so as to enable him to be prepared for God's grace, or to grasp it when offered, or to be capable of receiving grace of his own accord or by his own efforts; or in spiritual matters to understand, believe, embrace, think, will, begin, complete, act, work or collaborate, or to devote or fit himself for grace or do anything of himself towards conversion, either wholly or half or to the smallest extent. Man in spiritual matters relating to the salvation of the soul is like Lot's wife turned into a pillar of salt, or like a lifeless block of wood or stone, unable to use its eyes, its mouth or any senses. Yet man possesses the power of locomotion, that is, of controlling his outward parts, of attending public gatherings, and listening to the Word and the Gospel.

These statements are from the book of the Evangelical Church called 'The Formula of Concord' published in Leipzig in 1756 (pp. 656, 658, 661-3, 671-3). When priests are ordained they swear on this book and so swear to uphold this faith. The Reformed Churches have a similar faith. But is there anyone, endowed with reason and a religion, who would not howl down these views as nonsensical and absurd? For he would say to himself, 'If that were so, what use would the Word be, what use would religion be, or the priesthood, or preaching? Would it be more than an empty noise signifying nothing?' If you were to say this sort of thing to a heathen with some power of judgment whom you wanted to convert, telling him he was like this as regards conversion and faith, could he fail to look on Christianity otherwise than as an empty vessel? For if you take away from a person any power to believe as of himself, what else could he do? This subject will be set in a clearer light in the chapter on free will.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 357

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 357

sRef John@13 @35 S0' aRef John@16 @27 S0' sRef John@13 @34 S0' 357. (ii) A person can acquire charity for himself.

This is the same as with faith. For what else does the Word teach except faith and charity, the two essentials for salvation? We read:

You are to love the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul, and your neighbour as yourself. Matt. 22:34-39.

And Jesus said, I give you a [new] commandment, to love one another. By this you will be known to be my disciples, by loving one another. John 13:34, 35; similarly 15:9; 16:27.

We also read that man is to bring forth fruit like a good tree; and that those who do good deeds will be rewarded at the resurrection [Luke 14:14]; and many similar statements. What would be the point of them if a person could not display charity of himself, or acquire it for himself in any way? Surely he can give alms, help the needy, and do good deeds in his home or at his work? Surely he can live in accordance with the Ten Commandments? Has he not got a soul to make him act like this, and also a rational mind which can induce him to act for some purpose or other? Surely he can think that he will do* these actions because they are enjoined in the Word, and so by God? There is no one who lacks this ability; and the reason for its not being lacking is that the Lord confers it on everybody, and He confers it as if it were something of the person's own. For is there anyone who when he does a charitable act is aware of doing it otherwise than of himself?

* Reading facturus for fructurus, which makes no sense.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 358

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 358

sRef John@5 @21 S0' sRef John@5 @26 S0' sRef John@6 @33 S0' sRef John@11 @25 S0' sRef John@14 @19 S0' sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S0' sRef John@6 @35 S0' sRef John@10 @10 S0' sRef John@14 @6 S0' sRef John@8 @12 S0' sRef John@7 @37 S0' sRef John@6 @37 S0' sRef John@20 @31 S0' sRef John@6 @63 S0' sRef Matt@22 @4 S0' sRef Matt@22 @3 S0' sRef Matt@22 @2 S0' sRef Matt@22 @8 S0' sRef Matt@22 @7 S0' sRef Matt@22 @6 S0' sRef Matt@22 @5 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' sRef Matt@22 @9 S0' sRef John@1 @4 S0' 358. (iii) A person can acquire for himself a life of faith and charity.

It is the same with this, for he acquires it when he approaches the Lord, who is life itself. Nor is the approach to Him blocked for anyone, since He constantly invites everyone to come to Him. For He said:

He who comes to me will not be hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. And I will not cast out anyone who comes to me. John 6:35, 37.

Jesus stood and cried, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. John 7:37.

Elsewhere:

The kingdom of the heavens is like [a king]*, who held his son's wedding, and sent his servants to summon the guests. And finally he said, Go to the ends of the streets**, and invite to the wedding anyone you find. Matt. 22:1-9.

Surely no one can help knowing that the invitation or summons is addressed to everyone, and so is the grace shown in receiving them.

The reason why a person is given life by approaching the Lord is that the Lord is life itself, not only the life of faith, but also the life of charity. It is evident from the following passages that the Lord is life, and man's life comes from the Lord:

In the beginning was the Word. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. John 1:1, 4.

As the Father raises up the dead and makes them live, so the Son makes him whom He wishes live. John 5:21.

As the Father has life in Himself, so did He grant the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26.

The bread of God it is which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. John 6:33.

The words which I speak to you are spirit and life. John 6:63.

Jesus said, He who follows me will have the light of life. John 8:12.

I have come so that they may have life, and have it in abundance. John 10:10.

He who believes in me, though he die, shall live. John 11:25.

I am the way, truth and life. John 14:6.

Because I live, you too shall live. John 14:19.

These things have been written so that you may have life in His name. John 20:31.

He is everlasting life. 1 John 5:20.

Life in faith and charity means spiritual life, which is given to a person by the Lord during his natural life.

* These words, omitted in the Latin, were added in the author's copy.
** The Latin has 'waters', but this is corrected in the author's copy.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 359

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 359

sRef John@14 @21 S0' sRef Rev@3 @20 S0' sRef John@3 @27 S0' sRef John@15 @5 S0' sRef John@14 @23 S0' 359. (iv) But still faith, charity or life in either of them is not in the least created by man, but only by the Lord.

For we read that man cannot take anything, unless it is given him from heaven (John 3:27). And Jesus said:

He who remains in me, and I in him, brings forth much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. John 15:5.

This, however, must be understood to mean that a person can only acquire by his own efforts natural faith, which is a firm belief that a thing is so because an authoritative person so declared it. He can also acquire only natural charity, which is working in someone's favour for the sake of some reward. These two contain man's self, and there is no life as yet from the Lord. Still a person by either of these prepares himself to receive the Lord. In so far as he prepares himself, so far does the Lord come in and make his natural faith spiritual, and likewise his charity, and so make both living. These results follow when a person approaches the Lord as the God of heaven and earth.

Since man was created an image of God, he was created to be a dwelling for God. Therefore the Lord says:

He who has my commandments and does them, he it is who loves me; and I shall love him, and come to him and make my dwelling with him. John 14:21, 23.

Also:

Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20.

From these statements the conclusion follows, that in so far as a person prepares himself on the natural level to receive the Lord, so does the Lord come in and make everything within him spiritual, so giving everything life. On the other hand, however, in so far as a person does not prepare himself, to that extent he distances the Lord from himself, and does everything of himself; and what a person does of himself has no life in it. But it is impossible to cast much light on this subject until I have discussed charity and free will, and I shall come back to it later in the chapter on reformation and regeneration.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 360

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 360

360. I stated before that faith present in a person is to begin with natural, and as he comes closer to the Lord it becomes spiritual, and the same with charity. But no one yet knows the distinction between natural and spiritual faith and charity. So this important fact so far unknown must be revealed.

There are two worlds, the natural and the spiritual. Both of them have a sun, and either sun is the source of heat and light. But the heat and light from the sun of the spiritual world have life in them; their life comes from the Lord, who is in the midst of that sun. Heat and light from the sun of the natural world, however, have no life in them, but serve as receivers for the two previous kinds of heat and light (as is commonly the relationship of instrumental causes to leading causes) so as to transmit them to mankind. So it must be known that the heat and light from the sun of the spiritual world are the source of everything spiritual. The heat and light too are spiritual, because they contain spirit and life. But the heat and light from the sun of the natural world are the source of everything natural, and these are, taken by themselves, devoid of spirit and life.

[2] Now since faith is related to light and charity to heat, it is clear that in so far as a person is in the light and heat radiated by the sun of the spiritual world, so far is he in spiritual faith and charity. But in so far as he is in the light and heat radiated by the sun of the natural world, so far is he in natural faith and charity. From these considerations it is evident that just as spiritual light is contained within natural light, as it were in its container or repository, and likewise spiritual heat is contained within natural heat, so too is spiritual faith contained within natural faith, and likewise spiritual charity within natural charity. This happens in step with a person's progress from the natural to the spiritual world; and this progress is dependent upon belief in the Lord, who is light itself, the way, truth and life, as He Himself teaches us.

[3] This being so, it is clear that when a person is in spiritual faith, he is also then in natural faith; for spiritual faith is, as has been said, contained within natural faith. And since faith relates to light, it follows that by being so inserted one in the other, the person's natural becomes as it were diaphanous, and that, according to the way it is linked with charity, it acquires beautiful colouring. The reason is that charity shines with a reddish glow, faith with a brilliant white light. It is the flame of spiritual fire which makes charity glow red, and the brilliance of light produced by it which makes faith shine white. The opposite happens if the spiritual is not within the natural, but the natural is within the spiritual, as happens with people who reject faith and charity. In their case the internal of their mind, which controls them when they are left to their own thoughts, is hellish; and they actually derive their thoughts from hell, although they are unaware of this. The external of their mind, however, which controls their conversation with companions in the world, looks as if it were spiritual, but is crammed with the sort of filth found in hell. Consequently these people are actually in hell, being in the opposite state to those described before.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 361

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 361

361. When therefore it is appreciated that the spiritual is within the natural in the case of those who are in faith in the Lord and at the same time charity towards the neighbour, and that this makes their natural diaphanous, it follows that a person is to that extent wise in spiritual matters, and consequently also in natural matters. For when he thinks or reads or hears anything, he sees inwardly in himself whether it is the truth or not. This perception comes to him from the Lord, who is the source of the spiritual light and heat flowing into the upper level of his understanding.

[2] In so far as a person's faith and charity become spiritual, so far is he withdrawn from the self and does not have in view himself, a reward or recompense, but only the delight of perceiving the truths which make up faith and of performing the good actions which make up love. In so far as that spirituality is increased, so far does that delight become blessedness; this is the source of his salvation, which is what is called everlasting life. The state a person is then in can be compared with the loveliest and most beautiful sights in the world; indeed it is compared with these in the Word. For instance, it is compared with fruit-trees and gardens full of them, with flowery meadows, with precious stones, with delicious food, and with weddings, as well as festivities and celebrations.

[3] In the opposite case, however, that is, when the natural is within the spiritual, and the person is consequently inwardly a devil, though outwardly like an angel, then he can be compared with a dead man in a casket of costly and gilded wood. He can also be compared with a skeleton dressed up in clothes like a person and riding in a splendid carriage; and also with a corpse in a tomb built like the temple of Diana.* In fact his internal state can be represented as like a knot of snakes in a pit, but his external state as like butterflies with wings displaying every sort of colour, but which stick their filthy eggs on the leaves of useful trees, so that their fruit is eaten up. In fact, their internal can be compared with a hawk, and their external with a dove; then the person's faith and charity are like the hawk flying above a dove which is trying to get away, and at length it tires, whereupon the hawk pounces and devours it.

* A reference to the celebrated temple of Diana or Artemis at Ephesus, one of the wonders of the ancient world.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 362

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 362

362. VI

The Lord, charity and faith make one, just as in a person life, will and understanding do; if they are separated, each of them is destroyed, like a pearl collapsing into dust.

We shall begin by relating some facts which have up to now been unknown to the learned world, and so to the ecclesiastical establishment. They are as unknown as if they had been buried in the earth, although they are treasuries of wisdom, and unless they are dug up and made public, men seek in vain to arrive at a proper knowledge of God, faith, charity, and of the state of their own lives; they do not know how to control it and to prepare for the state of everlasting life. The following facts are unknown. A person is nothing but an organ of life. Life together with all it entails flows in from the God of heaven, who is the Lord. There are two faculties which give men life, called the will and the understanding, the will being a receiver for love, the understanding a receiver for wisdom. The will is also thus a receiver for charity and the understanding a receiver for faith. [2] Everything a person wills and everything he understands flow in from outside; the kinds of good which belong to love and charity, and the truths which belong to wisdom and faith come from the Lord; but on the other hand everything opposed to these comes from hell. It has been arranged by the Lord that what flows in from outside is felt by the person in himself as if it belonged to him, so that he can bring it forth from himself as if it were his own, although nothing of it belongs to him. However, it is reckoned as his on account of the free will enjoyed by his faculties of will and thought, and on account of the knowledge of good and truth granted to him, from which he can freely choose whatever is for the benefit of his temporal or everlasting life.

[3] Anyone looking at these facts crookedly or askance can reach many crazy conclusions from them. Anyone who looks at them straight in the eye can reach many wise conclusions from them. So as to achieve the latter instead of the former result, it has been necessary to state as a premise judgments and dogmas about God and the Divine Trinity, and after this to establish judgments and dogmas about faith, charity, free will, reformation and regeneration, and about imputation, as well as about repentance, baptism, and the Holy Supper, which act as means.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 363

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 363

363. However, so that this article of faith - that the Lord, charity and faith make one, just as in a person life, will and understanding do, and if they are divided, each of them is destroyed, like a pearl collapsing into dust - may be seen and recognised as truth, it needs to be discussed in the following sequence.

(i) The Lord flows into every human being with all His Divine love, all His Divine wisdom, and so with all His Divine life.
(ii) He does this likewise with the whole essence of faith and charity.
(iii) But how these are received by the person depends upon his form.
(iv) The person, however, who separates the Lord, charity and faith is not a form which can receive them, but rather one which destroys them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 364

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 364

364. (i) The Lord flows into every human being with all His Divine love, all His Divine wisdom, and so with all His Divine life.

We read in the Book of Creation that man was created an image of God, and God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (Gen. 1:27; 2:7). This description means that he is an organ of life, not life itself. For God could not have created another like Himself; if He could have done so, there would be as many gods as there are people. Nor could He create life, just as neither can light be created. But He could create man to be a form for life to act on, just as He created the eye to be a form for light to act on. Nor could God, nor can He, divide His essence, since it is one and indivisible. So since God alone is life, it follows indubitably that God uses His own life to give life to every human being. Without that quickening man would be as regards flesh nothing but a sponge, and as regards bones nothing but a skeleton, no more alive than a clock, which is kept running by a pendulum together with a weight or a spring. Since this is so, it also follows that God flows in with every person with all His Divine life, that is, with all His Divine love and Divine wisdom. These two make up His Divine life (see 39, 40 above); for the Divine cannot be divided.

sRef Matt@5 @45 S2' [2] However, the manner in which God flows in with all His Divine life can be grasped as somewhat resembling the way the sun of the world flows in with all its essence, which is heat and light, into every tree, into every shrub and flower, into every stone, ordinary as well as precious, so that each single object draws its ration from this common inflow; but the sun does not split up its light and heat, giving part to this object and part to that. It is much the same with the sun of heaven, which radiates Divine love as heat and Divine wisdom as light. These two flow into human minds, just as the heat and light of the sun of the world flow into human bodies, giving them life depending on the nature of their form; the form of each takes from the common inflow what it needs. The following saying of the Lord can be applied to this:

Your Father makes His sun rise upon the wicked and the good, and sends rain upon the righteous and the unrighteous. Matt. 5:45.

[3] Also, the Lord is omnipresent, and where He is present, there He is with His whole essence. It is impossible for Him to take anything away from that essence, so as to give a part to one and another part to another, but He gives it in its entirety, enabling a person to take a little or much. He says too that He has His dwelling with those who keep His commandments, and that the faithful are in Him and He is in them. In short, everything is full of God, and from that fulness each takes his own share. Everything held in common is like this, for instance, the atmospheres or the oceans. The atmosphere is the same on the smallest as it is on the largest scale. It does not assign a part of itself to a person's breathing, to a bird's flying, or to the sails of a ship, or the sails of a wind-mill; but each takes from it its own portion and uses for itself as much as is enough. It is also similar with a granary full of wheat; the owner each day takes from it his own rations, and it is not the granary that distributes them.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 365

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 365

365. (ii) The Lord flows in likewise in the case of every person with the whole essence of faith and charity.

This follows from the previous proposition, since the life of Divine wisdom is the essence of faith, and the life of Divine love is the essence of charity. Therefore, when the Lord is present with His own particular attributes, namely Divine wisdom and Divine love, He is also present with all the truths which make up faith and all the kinds of good which make up charity. For faith means every truth which the Lord enables a person to perceive, think and speak, and charity means every kind of good for which the Lord inspires an affection, and which the person consequently wills and does.

[2] I said above that the Divine love which radiates from the Lord as a sun is felt by the angels as heat, and the Divine wisdom from the same source is perceived as light. Anyone who is unable to pass beyond appearances in his thinking might hold the view that that heat is nothing but heat, and that light is nothing but light, such as are the heat and light radiated by the sun of our world. But the heat and light radiated by the Lord as a sun contain within themselves all the infinite possibilities in the Lord, the heat containing all the infinite possibilities of His love, the light all the infinite possibilities of His wisdom. Thus they also contain to an infinite degree all the good which makes up charity and all the truth which makes up faith. The reason is that that very sun is everywhere present in the form of its heat and light; and that sun is a circle most closely surrounding the Lord, and emanating from His Divine love and at the same time from His Divine wisdom. For, as has been said a number of times before, the Lord is in the midst of that sun.

[3] These statements now show plainly that there cannot be anything lacking to prevent a person drawing from the Lord, since He is omnipresent, all the good which makes up charity and all the truth which makes up faith. The fact that nothing of this is lacking is evident from a consideration of the love and wisdom of the angels of heaven; these they have from the Lord, and they are beyond description, passing the comprehension of a natural person, and they are capable of being increased for ever.

The infinite possibilities contained in the heat and light radiated by the Lord, even though they are perceived as simply heat and light, can be illustrated by various phenomena of the natural world. For instance, the sound of a person's voice and speech is heard as a simple sound, yet the angels on hearing it perceive in it all the affections which make up the person's love, and they also show which affections and of what kind they are. The fact that these things lie hidden within the sound one can even to some extent grasp from the sound of someone talking: for instance, whether it has in it a ring of contempt, or mockery, or hatred; and equally whether it has a ring of charity, good will, or cheerfulness, or other affections. The look the eye has when gazing at someone has something similar hidden in it.

[4] Another illustration might be the scents of a large garden, or the scents from broad expanses of flowering meadows. The fragrant odour they exhale is composed of thousands and myriads of various scents, yet they are still perceived as one. It is similar with many other things which, uniform as they appear externally, are still inwardly multifarious.

Sympathetic or antipathetic feelings are nothing but affections given off from the mind; they attract another the more strongly the more they resemble his, and repel him the more they differ from his. Although these feelings are countless and not felt by any bodily sense, they are still perceived by the sensory organs of the soul as one; and it is these which determine who are linked together and associated in the spiritual world. I have brought in these comparisons in order to illustrate what was said above about the spiritual light radiated by the Lord containing the whole of wisdom and the whole of faith; and to show that this is the light which allows the understanding to see and submit to analysis rational arguments, just as the eye sees and estimates the proportions of natural objects.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 366

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 366

366. (iii) How the influences flowing in from the Lord are received by the person depends upon his form. Form here means the person's state as regards his love together with his wisdom, in other words, as regards his affections for the various kinds of good of charity, and at the same time his perceptions of the truths of his faith. I have shown above that God is one, indivisible, and the same from eternity and for ever, but not the same as a simple object but infinitely the same, all the variation being due to the subject in whom God is. The form or state of the receiver brings about the variations, as is evident from the life of babies, children, youths, adults and the aged. Everyone has the same life, because he has the same soul, from infancy to old age; but as its states change in keeping with different ages and adjustments, so too does the person's perception of life.

[2] God's life is present in all its fulness not only with good and religious people, but also with wicked and irreligious people; and in no way differently with the angels of heaven and the spirits of hell. The difference is that the wicked block the path and close the door, to prevent God entering the lower levels of their minds; whereas the good smooth the path and open the door, also inviting God to enter the lower levels of their minds, even as He dwells in the highest levels. By this they adjust the state of the will to receive the inflowing love and charity, and the state of the understanding to receive the inflowing wisdom and faith, in other words, so as to receive God. The wicked, however, block that inflow by various longings of the flesh and spiritual pollutions, which they place in the way and so prevent passage. But all the while God resides in their highest levels with the whole of His Divine essence, and gives them the ability to will good and to understand truth. Every person has this ability, and this could by no means be the case, if life coming from God were not in his soul. I have been enabled to learn by long experience that even the wicked have this ability.

[3] How the life everyone receives from God depends upon his form can be illustrated by comparisons with every kind of plant. Every tree, every bush, every shrub and every grass receives the inflowing heat and light in accordance with its form. So this is true not only of the good and useful plants, but even of those which are harmful. The sun with its heat does not cause changes in their forms, but the forms in themselves modify the effects produced. It is much the same with things in the mineral kingdom. Each one of them, the noble as much as the base, receives into itself the inflow in accordance with the form presented by the structure of its parts. Thus one stone differs in this from another, one mineral from another and one metal from another. Some of them display the most beautiful variations of colour; some transmit the light without variegation; and some break up the light in themselves and absorb it. These few illustrations may serve to establish that, just as the sun of the world is equally present with its heat and light in one object as in another, but the receiving forms produce its varied effects, likewise the Lord is present from the sun of heaven. For He is in its midst with His heat, which is in its essence love, and with His light, which is in its essence wisdom. But it is a person's form, determined by his states of life, which produces the varied effects; and consequently the Lord is not responsible for a person not being reborn and saved, but it is the person himself who is.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 367

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 367

sRef 1Joh@5 @20 S0' 367. (iv) The person, however, who separates the Lord, charity and faith is not a form which can receive them, but rather one which destroys them.

Anyone who separates the Lord from charity and faith takes away life from them; charity and faith without life either are non-existent or are abortions. The Lord is life itself; see on this 358 above. Anyone who acknowledges the Lord and separates charity from Him, only acknowledges Him with the lips. His acknowledgment and confession are merely cold, lacking any faith; for they lack spiritual essence, since charity is the essence of faith. Anyone, however, who does charitable deeds and fails to acknowledge the Lord as being the God of heaven and earth, one with the Father, as He Himself teaches, can perform only deeds of natural charity, which do not contain everlasting life. People in the church know that all good which is essentially good comes from God, consequently from the Lord, who is the true God and everlasting life (1 John 5:20). The same is true of charity, since good and charity are one.

[2] Faith separated from charity is no faith, because faith is the light of a person's life, and charity is its heat. Therefore, if charity is separated from faith, the result is like separating heat from light. This causes a person's state to resemble the state of the world in winter, when everything above ground dies off. Charity and faith, if they are to be real charity and real faith, can no more be separated than the will and the understanding; if they are separated, the understanding is reduced to nothing, and the will soon follows. It is the same with charity and faith, because charity dwells in the will, and faith in the understanding.

[3] Separating charity from faith is like separating essence from form. The learned world is well aware that essence without form and form without essence are nothing, since essence cannot have any quality except from its form, nor is form any continuing entity except from its essence. Hence nothing can be predicated of either if they are separated one from the other. Charity is also the essence of faith, and faith is the form of charity, precisely as was said before, that good is the essence of truth and truth is the form of good.

[4] These two, good and truth, are in every single thing which comes into existence in essence. Since therefore charity relates to good, and faith to truth, they can be illustrated by comparisons with many features of the human body, and with many phenomena on earth. An exact comparison is with the respiration of the lungs and the systolic motion of the heart; for charity can no more be separated from faith than the heart can from the lungs. For if the heart-beat ceases, the respiration of the lungs ceases at once; and if the respiration of the lungs ceases, total unconsciousness supervenes, and inability to move any muscle, so that shortly afterwards the heart also stops and all trace of life vanishes. This comparison is exact, because the heart corresponds to the will and thus also to charity, and the respiration of the lungs to the understanding and thus also to faith. For, as stated above, charity dwells in the will and faith in the understanding; this and nothing else is the meaning of 'heart' and 'breath' in the Word.

[5] The separation of charity and faith also agrees exactly with the separation of blood and flesh. Blood separated from flesh is gore and turns into rotting blood; and flesh separated from blood becomes progressively rotten and breeds worms. 'Blood' too in the spiritual sense means the truth of wisdom and faith, and 'flesh' means the good of love and of charity. This meaning of blood was demonstrated in my APOCALYPSE REVEALED, 379; and of flesh, 832.

[6] Charity and faith, for one or the other to be anything, can no more be separated than in the human body food and water, or bread and wine. For food or bread taken without water or wine merely distend the stomach and ruin it as undigested lumps, turning into rotting mud. Water or wine without food or bread also distend the stomach, as well as the vessels and passages, which being thus deprived of nutriment cause wasting in the body to the point of death. This comparison too fits, since 'food' and 'bread' in the spiritual sense mean the good of love and of charity, and 'water' and 'wine' mean the truth of wisdom and faith (see APOCALYPSE REVEALED 50, 316, 778, 932),

[7] Charity combined with faith and faith combined in return with charity can be likened to the beauty of a girl's face coming from the mixture of red and white in it. This likeness too is exact, since love and the charity that comes from it in the spiritual world glows red with the fire of the sun there, and truth, and the faith that comes from it, shine white with the light of that sun. Charity separated from faith can therefore be likened to a face inflamed with spots, and faith separated from charity to the colourless face of a corpse. Faith separated from charity can also be likened to a paralysis down one side, known as hemiplegia, which, if it advances, proves fatal. It can also be likened to St Vitus' or Guy's dance, which attacks people bitten by a tarantula. The faculty of reason becomes like this, and like the victim dances madly, believing itself then to be alive, yet it is no more able to assemble rational thoughts together and think about spiritual truths, than when someone is lying in bed in the grip of a nightmare. These remarks are enough to demonstrate the two theses of this chapter, first, that faith without charity is no faith and charity without faith is no charity, and both are lifeless unless the Lord gives them life; and secondly, that the Lord, charity and faith make one, just as in a person life, will and understanding do, and if they are separated, each of them is destroyed, like a pearl collapsing into dust.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 368

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 368

sRef John@6 @56 S0' sRef John@15 @4 S0' sRef John@15 @5 S0' sRef John@14 @20 S0' sRef 1Joh@4 @15 S0' 368. VII

The Lord is charity and faith in the person, and the person is charity and faith in the Lord.

It is evident from the following passages in the Word that a member of the church is in the Lord, and the Lord is in him:

Jesus said, Remain in me, and I in you. I am the vine and you are the branches. He who remains in me, and I in him, bears much fruit. John 15:4, 5.

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. John 6:56.

On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. John 14:20.

If anyone shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 1 John 4:15.

But the person cannot himself be in the Lord; it is the charity and faith which the Lord grants to be in a person which can, and it is these which make a human being to be essentially human. However, to throw some light upon this secret and allow the understanding to grasp it, we must study it in the following order.

(i) It is being linked with God, which affords a person salvation and everlasting life.
(ii) A link is impossible with God the Father, but it is possible with the Lord, and through Him with God the Father.
(iii) The link with the Lord is reciprocal, so that the Lord is in the person, and he is in the Lord.
(iv) This reciprocal link is created by means of charity and faith.

The truth of these propositions will become plain from the succeeding explanation.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 369

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 369

369. (i) It is being linked with God, which affords a person salvation and everlasting life.

Man was created to be capable of being linked with God. For he was created a native of heaven and also a native of the world. In so far as he is a native of heaven, he is spiritual, but in so far as he is a native of the world, he is natural. A spiritual person can think about God and grasp ideas relating to God; he can also love God, and be attracted by what comes from God. It follows from this that he can be linked with God.

It is beyond the remotest possibility of doubt that a person can think about God, and grasp ideas relating to God. For he can think about the oneness of God, about the being of God, which is Jehovah, the immensity and eternity of God, Divine love and Divine wisdom, which comprise the essence of God, His omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence; about the Lord the Saviour His Son, and redemption and mediation; also about the Holy Spirit, and finally about the Divine Trinity. All of these are ideas relating to God; in fact, they are God. He can, moreover, think about the activities of God, which are in the first place faith and charity, as well as many other things which come forth from these two.

sRef Matt@22 @37 S2' sRef John@14 @21 S2' sRef Matt@22 @38 S2' sRef Matt@22 @39 S2' [2] It is evident that a person can not only think about God, but also love God, from the two commandments of God Himself, which run like this:

You are to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. This is the first and great commandment. The second is similar to it: you are to love your neighbour as yourself. Matt. 22:37-39; Deut. 6:5.

It is evident from the following passage that a person can perform God's commandments, and that this is loving God:

Jesus said, He who has my commandments and does them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I shall love him and show myself to him. John 14:21.

[3] Furthermore, what is faith but a link with God by means of truths, which belong to the understanding and thus to thought; and what is love but being linked with God by means of various kinds of good, which belong to the will and thus to the affection? God's link with man is a spiritual link in the natural; and man's link with God is a natural link derived from the spiritual. It was for the purpose of this linking that man was created a native of heaven and at the same time of the world. As a native of heaven he is spiritual, and as a native of the world he is natural. So if a person becomes spiritually rational and at the same time spiritually moral, he is linked to God, and this link affords him salvation and everlasting life. However, if a person is only naturally rational and also naturally moral, God is certainly linked with him, but he is not linked with God. The result is his spiritual death, which considered in itself is natural life devoid of spiritual life; for the spirituality, in which is God's life, in his case is extinguished.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 370

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 370

sRef John@6 @46 S1' sRef Ex@33 @20 S1' sRef Matt@11 @27 S1' sRef John@5 @37 S1' 370. (ii) A link is impossible with God the Father, but it is possible with the Lord, and through Him with God the Father.

This is taught by Scripture and is to be seen by the reason. Scripture teaches that God the Father has never been seen or heard, and cannot be seen or heard either; nor likewise can anything from Him, such as He is in His being and His essence, work upon man. For the Lord says:

No one has seen God, except Him who is with the Father; He has seen the Father. John 6:46.

No one knows the Father, except the Son, and any to whom the Son has wished to reveal Him. Matt. 11:27.

You have never heard the Father's voice, nor have you seen His appearance. John 5:37.

The reason is that He is in the first principles and beginnings of everything, and so is far and away above any level attainable by the human mind. For He is in the first principles and beginnings of the whole of wisdom and the whole of love, and with these man can have no link. Therefore if He should approach a person, or a person should approach Him, he would be consumed and dissolved, like a piece of wood in the focus of a large burning glass, or rather like an image thrown into the sun itself. That is why Moses was told, when he desired to see God, that man cannot see Him and live (Exod. 33:20).

sRef John@14 @6 S2' sRef John@10 @1 S2' sRef John@14 @20 S2' sRef John@14 @7 S2' sRef John@12 @45 S2' sRef John@15 @6 S2' sRef John@17 @22 S2' sRef John@10 @9 S2' sRef John@17 @26 S2' sRef John@17 @23 S2' [2] It is evident from the passages just quoted that a link is possible with God the Father through the Lord. These state that it is not the Father, but the only-begotten Son, who is in the Father's bosom and has seen the Father, who has expounded and revealed what is of God and from God. Moreover, it is evident from the following.:

On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me and I am in you. John 14:20.

I have given them the glory which you gave me, so that they might be one, as we are one; I in them and you in me. John 17:22, 23, 26.

Jesus said, I am the way, truth and life. No one comes to the Father except through me. And then Philip wished to see the Father, but the Lord answered him, He who sees me sees the Father also, and he who knows me knows the Father also. John 14:6, 7ff.

Elsewhere:

He who sees me sees Him who sent me. John 12:45.

Moreover He says that He is the door, and he who enters by Him is saved, and he who climbs up another way is a thief and a robber (John 10:1, 9). He also says that he who does not remain in Him is cast out of doors, and thrown into the fire like a withered branch (John 15:6).

[3] This is because the Lord our Saviour is Jehovah the Father himself in human form; for Jehovah came down and became man, so that He could approach men and men could approach Him, thus establishing a link, and by the link give men salvation and everlasting life. For when God became man, and so man also became God, then by adapting Himself suitably He could approach men, and be linked with them as God-man and Man-god. There are three stages which follow in sequence: adaptation, application and linking. There must be adaptation before there can be application; and there must be adaptation and application together before linking is possible. Adaptation was achieved by God by becoming man. Application by God is constant, in so far as man in turn applies himself; and as this happens, so linking takes place. These three stages follow and proceed in their proper sequence in all details, which become one and come into existence together.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 371

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 371

sRef 1Joh@3 @24 S0' sRef 1Joh@4 @15 S0' sRef John@15 @4 S1' sRef John@10 @38 S1' sRef John@14 @11 S1' sRef Rev@3 @20 S1' sRef John@15 @5 S1' sRef John@14 @20 S1' sRef John@14 @10 S1' sRef John@17 @1 S1' sRef John@6 @56 S1' 371. (iii) The link with the Lord is reciprocal, so that the Lord is in the person, and he is in the Lord.

Scripture teaches, and the reason too can see, that the link is reciprocal. The Lord teaches that His link with the Father is reciprocal, for He says to Philip:

Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? Believe me, I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. John 14:10, 11. So that you may know and believe that the Father is in me and I am in the Father. John 10:38.

Jesus said, Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, so that your Son too may glorify you. John 17:1.

Father, all that is mine is yours, and all that is yours is mine. John 17:10.

The Lord's description of His link with man is similar, that is, as being reciprocal; for He says:

Remain in me and I in you. He who remains in me, and I in him, bears much fruit. John 15:4, 5.

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. John 6:56.

On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. John 14:20.

If anyone performs Christ's commands, he remains in Christ and Christ in him. 1 John 3:24; 4:13.

If anyone shall confess that Jesus* is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 1 John 4:15.

If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I shall come in to him, and dine with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20.

[2] These plain statements make it obvious that the link between the Lord and man is reciprocal; and it follows inevitably from this that a person ought to link himself with the Lord, so that the Lord may link Himself with him. It also follows that the consequence would otherwise be not linking, but removal and separation, though this is not on the Lord's part, but on man's. In order to make the link reciprocal, man has been given free choice, allowing him to set foot on the road to heaven, or the road to hell. This gift of freedom is the source of man's ability to reciprocate, so that he can link himself with the Lord or with the devil. But more illustrations will be offered of that freedom, its nature and the reason it has been given to man, in the following chapters dealing with free will, repentance, reformation and regeneration, and imputation.

[3] It is to be deplored that the reciprocal linking of the Lord and man, despite the clarity of its statement in the Word, is still unknown to the Christian church. The reason for this ignorance is the theories held about faith and free will. The theories about faith are that faith is conferred without man contributing anything to its acquisition, or adapting himself to receive it or making any more effort than a block of wood. The theories about free will are that man has not so much as a grain of free will in spiritual matters. But to prevent the reciprocal linking of the Lord and man, on which the salvation of the human race depends, from remaining any longer hidden in ignorance, I am compelled to make it known; and there is no better way of doing this than through illustrative examples.

[4] There are two kinds of reciprocation leading to linking: one is alternate, the other mutual. Alternate reciprocation leading to linking can be illustrated by the breathing of the lungs. A person inhales air, using it to expand the chest, and then expels the inhaled air, so contracting the chest. The act of inhaling and the consequent expansion is effected by means of the force exerted by the atmospheric pressure; but the expulsion of air and consequent contraction is effected by means of the muscular effort operating on the ribs. Such is the reciprocal link between the air and the lungs, and on it depends the functioning of the senses and movement throughout the body; for if respiration ceases, both of these fail.

[5] Reciprocal linking by alternate action can also be illustrated by the heart's link with the lungs and the lungs' link with the heart. The heart supplies blood from its right chamber to the lungs, and the lungs return it to the left chamber of the heart. This produces a reciprocal link, and on it the life of the whole body is totally dependent. There is a similar link of the blood with the heart, and of the heart with the blood; the blood from the whole of the body flows through the veins into the heart, and flows out of the heart through the arteries to the whole of the body, so that its action and reaction constitute a link. There is a similar action and reaction, which keeps a link in being, between the embryo and the mother's womb.

[6] However, the reciprocal link between the Lord and man is not of this sort; it is a mutual link, achieved not by actions and reactions, but by co-operation. For the Lord acts, and the man receives the action from the Lord, and works as if of himself, to be precise, of himself from the Lord. This working on the man's part coming from the Lord is imputed to him as if it were his, since he is perpetually kept by the Lord in a state of free will. The freedom which he has in consequence is the ability to will and think from the Lord, that is, from the Word, and also the ability to will and think from the devil, that is, contrary to the Lord and the Word. The Lord gives man this freedom so that he can enter into a reciprocal link, and by its means be granted everlasting life and blessedness; for this is unattainable without a reciprocal link.

[7] This kind of mutual reciprocal link too can be illustrated by various features of man and the world. Such is the link between the soul and the body in each individual. Such is the link between the will and action or between the thought and speech. Such is the link between the two eyes, the two ears and the two nostrils. The linking of the two eyes being, in its own fashion, reciprocal, is clear from the optic nerve; in this fibres from either hemisphere of the brain are twined round one another, and thus entwined proceed towards either eye. The case with the ears and nostrils is similar.

[8] There is a similar mutual reciprocal link between light and the eye, sound and the ear, smell and the nose, taste and the tongue, and touch and the body. For the eye is in light and light is in the eye, sound is in the ear and the ear is in sound, smell is in the nose and the nose is in smell, taste is in the tongue and the tongue is in taste, and touch is in the body and the body is in touch. This sort of reciprocal linking can also be compared with that of a horse with a carriage, that of an ox with a plough, that of a wheel with a machine, that of a sail with the wind, that of a flute with the air. To sum up, such is the reciprocal link between end and cause, or between cause and effect. There is, however, no room to explain all these one by one, since it would take a great many pages.

* The Latin has 'Christ'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 372

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 372

sRef John@6 @56 S1' 372. (iv) This reciprocal link between the Lord and man is created by means of charity and faith.

It is known at the present time that the church constitutes the body of Christ, and that each individual, in whom the church is, is in some member of that body, as Paul says (Eph. 1:23; 1 Cor. 12:27; Rom. 12:4, 5). But what is the body of Christ but Divine good and Divine truth? This is what is meant by the Lord's words in John:

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. John 6:56.

The Lord's flesh means Divine good, as bread does too; His blood means Divine truth, as wine does too; for these meanings, see the chapter on the Holy Supper [698-752].

[2] It follows from this that in so far as a person is in possession of the kinds of good which make up charity and the truths which make up faith, so far is he in the Lord and the Lord is in him. For linking with the Lord is spiritual linking, and this takes place solely through charity and faith. It was shown in the chapter on the Sacred Scripture (248-253) that every detail of the Word contains a linking of the Lord and the church, and so of good and truth; and because charity is good and faith is truth, there is at every point in the Word a linking of charity and faith. From these propositions it now follows that the Lord is charity and faith in a person, and a person is charity and faith in the Lord. For the Lord is the spiritual charity and faith in a person's natural charity and faith, and a person is the natural charity and faith coming from the Lord's spiritual charity and faith. These when linked constitute spiritual-natural charity and faith.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 373

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 373

sRef Luke@6 @44 S0' sRef Luke@6 @45 S0' 373. VIII

Charity and faith are present together in good deeds.

In every deed which proceeds from a person his whole nature is fully present, as regards his mind, or essential character. By mind is meant the affection of his love and his thought from this; these form his nature and, in general terms, his life. If we consider deeds in this way, they are so to speak mirrors reflecting the person. This can be illustrated by similar facts about animals and wild beasts: an animal is an animal, and a wild beast is a wild beast, in every one of its acts. A wolf is a wolf in every one of its acts, a tiger is a tiger in every one of its, a fox is a fox in every one of its, and a lion is a lion in every one of its. Likewise a sheep and a kid in all of their acts. The same is true of man, but his nature is such as it is in the internal man. If in this he is like a wolf or a fox, every internal deed of his is wolf-like or fox-like; and on the other hand the same is true if he is like a sheep or a lamb. But the fact that he is like this in every one of his deeds is not plain in his external man, for this can be twisted round the internal, although this character lies concealed within. The Lord says:

The good man brings forth good from the good treasury of his heart, and the wicked man brings forth wickedness from the wicked treasury of his heart. Luke 6:45.

And again:

Every tree is known by its own fruit; they do not gather figs from thorns, nor harvest grapes from the bramble. Luke 6:44.

[2] After death it is vividly shown that such as a person is in his internal man, such he is also in all the details proceeding from him. For then he lives as an internal man, and the external is no more. There is good in a person, and every deed proceeding from him is good, when the Lord, charity and faith dwell in his internal man, as will be shown in the following order.

(i) Charity is having good will, and good deeds are doing good from a good will.
(ii) Charity and faith are merely unstable mental concepts unless, when possible, they are realised in deeds and come into existence together in them.
(iii) Charity alone does not produce good deeds, much less does faith alone, but charity and faith together do.

These propositions will be examined one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 374

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 374

374. (i) Charity is having good will, and good deeds are doing good from a good will.

Charity and deeds are distinct from each other, just as are the will and the action, and as are the affection on the part of the mind and the functioning of the body. This is the same distinction as between the internal and the external man; these are respectively like cause and effect, since the causes of everything take form in the internal man, and all the effects arise from this source in the external. Therefore charity, being a quality of the internal man, is having a good will; and deeds, which belong to the external man, are doing good from a good will.

[2] Still there is infinite diversity between one person's good will and another's. For everything which anyone does to favour another is believed or appears to flow from good will or benevolence, but still it remains unknown whether the good deeds arise from charity, not to mention whether the charity is genuine or spurious. That infinite diversity between one person's good will and another's arises from his end in view, intention and so objective. These are hidden within his will to do good, and this is the source of the quality of each person's will. The will seeks means and ways of achieving its ends, which are the effects, in the understanding; and there it exposes itself to light, in order to see not only the methods, but also the opportunities when and how it can realise itself in actions, and thus produce its effects, which are deeds. At the same time in the understanding the will puts itself in a position to act. From this it follows that deeds in essence belong to the will, in form to the understanding, and in performance to the body. That is how charity comes down to become good deeds.

[3] This can be illustrated by a comparison with a tree. A person in all his particulars can be likened to a tree. In its seed lies hidden as it were an end in view, an intention and objective - to produce fruit. Here the seed corresponds to the will in a person, which, as has been said, contains these three factors. Next the seed is impelled by what it contains to sprout from the earth, and clothe itself with branches, boughs and leaves, thus acquiring for itself the means to its ends, the fruit. Here the tree corresponds to the understanding in a person, Finally when its time has come and it is ready to realise itself, it blossoms and produces fruit. Here the tree corresponds to the person's good deeds. It is obvious that these are in essence the work of the seed, in form the work of the boughs and leaves, and in performance the work of the wood of the tree.

[4] This can also be illustrated by a comparison with a temple. As Paul says, man is a temple of God (1 Cor. 3:16, 17; 2 Cor. 6:16; Eph. 2:21, 22). A person's end in view, intention and objective as a temple of God are salvation and everlasting life; here there is a correspondence with the will, to which these three belong. Then he absorbs doctrinal teachings concerning faith and charity from his parents and teachers and from preachers, and when he comes to years of discretion from the Word and religious books, all of which are means to the end. Here the correspondence is with the understanding. Finally the end is realised in the form of uses in accordance with the teachings which serve as means; this happens by bodily actions, which are known as good deeds. So the end produces effects by mediating causes; these effects are in essence the product of the end, in form that of the teachings of the church, and in performance of uses. That is how a person becomes God's temple.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 375

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 375

375. (ii) Charity and faith are merely unstable mental concepts unless, when possible, they are realised in deeds and come into existence together in them.

Does not man possess a head and a body, which are linked by a neck? Does not the head contain a mind which wills and thinks, and the body a potentiality which performs and executes actions? So if a person merely had a good will, or thought from charity without doing good and performing useful deeds as a result of charity, would he not be like an isolated head or mind, which lacking a body could not continue in existence alone? Who from this can fail to see that charity and faith are not charity and faith, so long as they are only in the head and mind, and not in the body? Then they are like birds flying through the air without anywhere to rest upon the ground; and also like birds carrying eggs without nests to lay them in, so that their eggs would be discharged into the air or on a branch of a tree, and so would fall to the ground and be broken.

sRef Matt@13 @3 S2' sRef Matt@7 @26 S2' sRef Matt@13 @4 S2' sRef Matt@7 @24 S2' [2] There is nothing in the mind which does not have a corresponding part in the body, and this corresponding part can be called the embodiment of what is in the mind. Charity and faith therefore, so long as they are in the mind, have no embodiment in the person, and they can then be likened to an airy phantom, what is called a ghost, much as Fame was depicted by the ancients with a laurel wreath around her head and a horn of plenty in her hand. Since they are such ghosts, though still able to think, they cannot help being excited by fantastic ideas, a result also produced by reasoning from various sophistries; very much as reeds in marshes are shaken by the wind, while on the bottom below them lie shells and on the surface frogs croak. Can anyone fail to see that such are the results of merely knowing some things from the Word about charity and faith without practising them? The Lord also says:

Everyone who hears my words and acts upon them, I will compare to a prudent man, who built his house upon a rock; but everyone who hears my words and does not act upon them will be compared to a foolish man, who built his house upon sand or on ground without a foundation. Matt. 7:24, 26; Luke 6:47-49.

Charity and faith together with their invented ideas, when a person does not put them into practice, can also be compared with butterflies on the wing, which a sparrow on seeing swoops on and swallows. The Lord also says:

A sower went out to sow; and some seeds fell on the hard path, and the birds came and ate them up. Matt. 13:3, 4.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 376

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 376

sRef Matt@13 @9 S0' sRef Matt@13 @3 S0' sRef Rom@2 @13 S0' sRef Matt@13 @8 S0' sRef Hos@4 @9 S0' sRef Zech@1 @6 S0' sRef Jer@32 @19 S0' sRef 2Cor@5 @10 S0' sRef Matt@13 @5 S0' sRef Rom@2 @5 S0' sRef Rom@2 @6 S0' sRef Luke@8 @21 S0' sRef Matt@13 @6 S0' sRef Matt@13 @4 S0' sRef Matt@13 @7 S0' sRef John@14 @16 S1' sRef John@9 @31 S1' sRef Matt@7 @19 S1' sRef John@14 @23 S1' sRef Matt@7 @21 S1' sRef Matt@7 @20 S1' sRef John@13 @17 S1' sRef Rev@14 @13 S1' sRef John@14 @21 S1' sRef Rev@20 @13 S1' sRef Rev@22 @13 S1' sRef Rev@22 @12 S1' sRef John@15 @8 S1' sRef John@14 @15 S1' sRef John@14 @17 S1' sRef John@14 @20 S1' sRef John@14 @18 S1' sRef Rev@20 @12 S1' sRef John@14 @19 S1' 376. Charity and faith are of no use to a person, so long as they remain merely in the bodily hemisphere, that is, in his head, and are not given a firm base in deeds; this is evident from a thousand passages in the Word, of which I shall quote only the following.

Every tree which does not produce good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire. Matt. 7:19-21.

He who sows on good soil is the person who hears the Word and pays attention to it, and bears and produces fruit. When Jesus said this, he cried out saying, He who has ears to hear with, let him hear. Matt. 13:9, 23.

Jesus said, My mother and my brothers are these who hear the Word of God and act upon it. Luke 8:21.

We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone worships God, and does His will, He listens to him. John 9:31.

If you know these things, you are blessed if you act upon them. John 13:17.

He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me, and I shall love him, and show myself to him; and I shall come to him and make my dwelling with him. John 14:15-21[, 23].

In this my Father is glorified, in that you bear much fruit. John 1.5:8, 16.

It is not those who hear the law, but those who keep it, who are made righteous by God. Rom. 2:13; James 1:22.

On the day of wrath and righteous judgment, God will render to each in accordance with his deeds. Rom. 2:5, 6.

We must all be put on show before the tribunal of Christ, so that each may be rewarded for our bodily acts, whether good or ill. 2 Cor. 5:10.

The Son of Man is to come in the glory of His Father, and then He will reward each man in accordance with his deeds. Matt. 16:27.

I heard a voice from heaven saying, Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. So says the Spirit, so that they may rest from their labours; their deeds accompany them. Rev. 14:13.

The book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged according to what was written in the book, everyone according to his deeds. Rev. 20:12, 13.

Behold I come quickly, and my reward is with me, so that I may give to each according to what he has done. Rev. 22:12.

Jehovah, whose eyes are open upon all the behaviour of men, to give to each in accordance with his behaviour, and in accordance with the fruit of his deeds. Jer. 32:19.

I will punish his behaviour, and his deeds I will repay him. Hosea 4:9.

Jehovah deals with us according to our behaviour and according to our deeds. Zech. 1:6.

There are a thousand other such passages.

[2] These prove that charity and faith are not charity and faith until they are realised in deeds, and if they merely exist above the level of deeds in space, or in the mind, they are as it were images of a tent or a temple in the air, which are nothing but atmospheric phenomena which vanish of their own accord; or they resemble paintings on paper which are eaten by bookworms; or they are like dwellings on a roof, lacking a bedroom, and not in the house. These comparisons will enable one to see that charity and faith are unstable, so long as they remain mental concepts, unless, when possible, they are realised in deeds and come into existence jointly in deeds.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 377

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 377

sRef John@7 @38 S0' sRef John@7 @37 S0' sRef John@3 @21 S1' 377. (iii) Charity alone does not produce good deeds, much less does faith alone, but charity and faith together do.

This is because charity without faith is not charity, neither is faith without charity faith, as was shown above (355-361). Therefore charity by itself does not exist, neither does faith by itself; hence it cannot be said either that charity produces some good deeds by itself, nor that faith does by itself. This is similar to the case of the will and the understanding. The will does not exist by itself, so neither does it produce anything; nor does the understanding exist by itself, or produce anything. Everything that is produced comes from both acting together, and is the product of the understanding activated by the will. The reason why this is similar is that the will is the dwellingplace of charity, and the understanding is that of faith. Faith alone is said to be much less productive, because faith is truth, and its function is to create truths, and these enlighten charity and its exercise. The Lord teaches about this enlightenment when He said:

He who does the truth comes to the light, so that his deeds may be made apparent, since they are done in God. John 3:21.

When therefore a person does good deeds in accordance with truths, he does them in light, that is to say, intelligently and wisely.

[2] The linking of charity and faith is like a marriage between husband and wife. All natural offspring are born of the husband as father and the wife as mother. Likewise all spiritual offspring are born of charity as father and faith as mother; and these are items of knowledge about good and truth. These enable us to recognise the parentage of spiritual families. In the Word too husband and father mean in the spiritual sense the good of charity, wife and mother mean the truth of faith. From this it is plain too that neither charity alone nor faith alone can produce good deeds, just as neither a husband alone nor a wife alone can produce any offspring. The truths of faith not only throw light on charity, they also give it its quality and, moreover, nourish it. Therefore a person who possesses charity and not the truths of faith is like one walking in a garden by night, and snatching fruit from the trees without knowing whether they are good or bad to use. Since the truths of faith not only throw light on charity, but also give it its quality, as said above, it follows that charity without the truths of faith is like a fruit with no juice in it, such as a dried fig or a grape after the wine has been pressed out of it. Since truths nourish faith, as was also said above, it follows that if charity is deprived of the truths of faith, it gets no more nourishment than a person does from eating toasted bread and drinking dirty water from a pool.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 378

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 378

sRef Dan@9 @27 S0' sRef Matt@24 @15 S1' sRef Matt@24 @14 S1' 378. IX

There is true faith, spurious faith and hypocritical faith.

From its cradle the Christian church began to be attacked and split by schisms and heresies, and in course of time to be torn apart and butchered, very much as we read of the man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and was surrounded by robbers, who, after stripping and beating him, left him half-dead (Luke 10:30). The result was like the description of that church in Daniel:

Finally upon the bird of abominations desolation, to the point of ending and cutting off, shall be poured drop by drop upon devastation. Dan. 9:27.

and in the Lord's words:

Then the end shall come, when you will see the abomination of desolation predicted by the prophet Daniel. Matt. 24:14, 15.

Its fate may be compared with a ship laden with a very valuable cargo, which immediately on leaving harbour is struck by storms and soon afterwards is wrecked and sunk at sea, so that its cargo is partly ruined by water and partly consumed by fish.

[2] The Christian church from its infancy was so tossed and shattered, as is evident from ecclesiastical history, for instance even in the time of the Apostles by Simon, who was of the Samaritan nation, and a practicer of sorcery, as related in The Acts of the Apostles (8:9ff). Also by Hymenaeus and Philetus, who are mentioned by Paul in his Epistle to Timothy [2 Tim. 2:17]; as also by Nicolas, who gave his name to the Nicolaitans (mentioned in Rev. 2:6 and Acts 6:5), as well as by Cerinthus. After the time of the Apostles many more heretical sects arose, such as the Marcionites, Noetians, Valentinians, Encratites, Cataphrygians, Quartodecimans, Alogians, Cathars, Origenists or Adamantines, Sabellians, Samosatenes, Manichaeans, Meletians and finally Arians. After their times whole regiments of heretical leaders assailed the church, such as the Donatists, Photinians, Acatians or Semiarians, Eunomians, Macedonians, Nestorians, Predestinarians, Papists, Zwinglians, Anabaptists, Schwenckfeldians, Synergists, Socinians, Antitrinitarians, Quakers, Herrenhuters, and many more besides.* Finally these succumbed to Luther, Melanchthon and Calvin, whose dogmas hold the field today.

There are three principal causes of the divisions and separatist movements in the church; first, the failure to understand the Divine Trinity; second, the lack of any proper knowledge of the Lord; third, the assumption that the passion on the cross was the actual process of redemption. Ignorance on these three matters, which are nonetheless the very essentials of faith, and the faith on which the church is based and the reason it is called a church, inevitably results in everything connected with the church being given a sinister twist and steered away until its course is reversed, while still believing that in these circumstances it has the true faith in God and believes all God's truths. The case of these people is similar to those who blindfold their eyes and, while fancying they are walking in a straight line, yet step by step deviate from it, until they are facing the opposite direction, where there are pits into which they fall. But a person who belongs to the church can only be led away from his wanderings and into the way of truth by knowing what true faith is, what spurious faith is, and what hypocritical faith is. The following propositions will therefore be proved:

(i) There is only one true faith, and this is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ, and is possessed by those who believe Him to be the Son of God, the God of heaven and earth, and one with the Father.
(ii) Spurious faith is any faith which departs from the true and only faith, and is possessed by those who climb up another way and look upon the Lord not as God, but merely as a human being.
(iii) Hypocritical faith is no faith at all.

* This list of heretics seems to have been taken from the Concordia Pia, referred to by the author as the 'Formula of Concord', published in Leipzig in 1756; cf. 356.2.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 379

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 379

sRef Ephe@4 @6 S0' sRef 1Joh@4 @15 S0' sRef Ephe@4 @5 S0' sRef Ephe@4 @4 S0' sRef Ephe@4 @12 S0' sRef Ephe@4 @13 S0' 379. (i) There is only one true faith, and this is in the Lord God the

Saviour Jesus Christ, and is possessed by those who believe Him to be the Son of God, the God of heaven and earth, and one with the Father.

There is only one true faith, because faith is truth, and truth cannot be shattered and carved up, so that one part verges to the left, and one part to the right, and still remain its own truth. Faith as generally understood is composed of countless truths, for it is a collection of truths. But all these countless truths make up, as it were, a single body, to which the truths as its parts belong. Some make up the parts which are attached to the chest, such as arms and hands, some those which are attached to the hips, as the feet and soles. But the more inward truths make up the head, and those which are most nearly dependent upon them make up the sense organs in the face. The reason the more inward truths make up the head is that when what is more inward is mentioned, what is higher is also understood, for in the spiritual world everything more inward is also higher. So it is with the three heavens there. The soul and life of this body and all its parts is the Lord God the Saviour. This is why Paul calls the church the body of Christ, and people belonging to the church make up its parts depending upon their states of charity and faith. Paul also teaches that there is only one faith in these words:

There is one body and one spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. He gave the task of ministry for the building of the body of Christ, until we all attain to oneness of faith and knowledge of the Son of God, and the perfect man* measured by the full stature of Christ. Eph. 4:4-6, 12, 13.

It has been shown fully above (337-339) that the one true faith is in the Lord God the Saviour Jesus Christ.

sRef Matt@16 @16 S2' sRef Matt@16 @18 S2' sRef Matt@16 @17 S2' [2] The reason, however, why true faith is in the possession of those who believe the Lord to be the Son of God, is that they also believe that He is God, and faith if not in God is no faith at all. This is the leading tenet of all the truths which enter into faith and form it, as is clear from the Lord's words to Peter, when he said:

You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. You are blessed, Simon; I tell you, on this rock shall I build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Matt. 16:16, 17, 18.

Rock here, as in other parts of the Word, means the Lord in respect of Divine truth, and also the Divine truth received from the Lord. This truth is pre-eminent, and is like a crown upon the head and like a sceptre in the hand of the body of Christ, as is clear from the Lord's saying that on that rock He would build His church and the gates of hell would not prevail against it, The following passage of John also proves that this is the nature of this tenet of faith:

If anyone shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 1 John 4:15.

sRef John@10 @38 S3' sRef John@10 @30 S3' sRef Colo@2 @9 S3' sRef John@14 @7 S3' sRef John@3 @35 S3' aRef John@16 @15 S3' sRef Matt@28 @18 S3' [3] Besides this mark, that they are in possession of the true and only faith, there is another, their belief that the Lord is the God of heaven and earth; this follows from the former point, that He is the Son of God, and from these passages:

In Him is all the fulness of the Godhead. Col. 2:9.

He is the God of heaven and earth. Matt. 28:18.

All things of the Father's are His. John 3:35; 16:15.

The third indication that those who believe in the Lord are inwardly in possession of faith in Him, and so of the one true faith, is their belief that the Lord is one with God the Father. This fact, that He is one with God the Father and is the Father Himself present in the Human, was fully shown in the chapter on the Lord and Redemption, and is obvious from the sayings of the Lord Himself, that He and the Father are one (John 10:30); that the Father is in Him, and He is in the Father (John 10:38; 14:10, 11); that He said to the disciples that from that time on they had seen and known the Father, and that He looked at Philip and said that he then saw and knew the Father (John 14:7ff).

[4] The reason why these three things are the characteristic evidences of being in possession of faith in the Lord, and so in the one true faith, is that not all those who approach the Lord have faith in Him; for true faith is simultaneously internal and external. Those who possess these three treasures of faith are in possession of both its internals and its externals, so that it forms not only a treasury in their heart, but a jewel in their mouth. The case is different with those who do not acknowledge Him as God of heaven and earth, nor as one with the Father. These people also inwardly regard other gods as possessing similar power, which, however, is to be exercised by the Son, either regarded as a substitute or one who on account of His redeeming act has deserved to reign over those He has redeemed. But these people shatter the true faith by splitting the oneness of God; and when it is shattered it is no longer faith, but only the ghost of faith, which to the natural view may be some sort of image of faith, but to the spiritual view is a chimaera. Can anyone deny that true faith consists in belief in one God, who is the God of heaven and earth, and consequently in God the Father within a human form, that is, the Lord?

[5] Those three marks, witnesses and indicators, that faith in the Lord is faith itself, are like touchstones by which gold and silver are identified; or like stones or sign-posts by the roadside showing the way to a church, where the one, true God is worshipped; or like lighthouses on rocks at sea, which allow sailors to know their position at night, and how to shape their course. The first mark of faith, that the Lord is the Son of the living God, is like the morning star to all who come into His church.

* The Latin text has 'life' for 'man'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 380

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 380

sRef John@10 @1 S1' sRef John@10 @9 S1' 380. (ii) Spurious faith is any faith which departs from the true and only faith, and is possessed by those who climb up another way and look upon the Lord not as God, but merely as a human being.

It is self-evident that spurious faith is any faith which departs from the true and only faith; for when one faith is the truth, it follows that anything that departs from it is not the truth. All good and truth in the church spring from the marriage between the Lord and the church. Thus everything which is in essence charity, or which is in essence faith, is the product of that marriage. But anything in charity and faith which is not the product of that marriage is not from a legitimate union but an illegitimate one. Thus it is the product either of a polygamous marriage or union, or of adultery. Any faith is the product of polygamy, if it acknowledges the Lord and espouses the falsities contained in heresies; a faith is the product of adultery, if it acknowledges three Lords in one church. For it is like a woman who is a prostitute, or one married to one man, but hiring herself out for the night to two others, each of whom she calls her husband when she sleeps with him. This is the reason their faiths are called spurious.

The Lord calls these people in many passages 'adulterers', and this too is what He means by 'thieves and robbers' in John:

Truly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up another way, is a thief and robber. I am the door; if anyone enters by me, he will be saved. John 10:1, 9.

Entering the sheepfold is entering the church, and also heaven. It entails entering heaven too, because they make one, and it is nothing but the presence of the church in it which makes heaven. Therefore just as the Lord is the bridegroom and husband of the church, so too is He the bridegroom and husband of heaven.

[2] It is possible to investigate and recognise whether a faith is a legitimate offspring or an illegitimate one by using the three indicators described above. These are the acknowledgment of the Lord as the Son of God, the acknowledgment of Him as the God of heaven and earth, and the acknowledgment that He is one with the Father. Therefore in so far as any faith departs from these essentials, so far is it a spurious faith. There is a spurious and adulterous faith with those who look on the Lord not as God, but as merely a man. The truth of this is evident from the two unspeakable heresies, those of the Arians and the Socinians, which were made anathema in the Christian church and excommunicated from it. This was because they deny the divinity of the Lord, and climb up another way. But I am afraid that these abominations lurk hidden in the general attitude of the people in the church to-day. It is an astonishing fact that the more anyone believes himself to excel others in learning and judgment, the more prone he is to seize on and make his own ideas about the Lord being a human being and not God, arguing that because He is a human being He cannot be God. Anyone who makes those ideas his own betakes himself to the company of the Arians and Socinians, who in the spiritual world are in hell.

[3] The reason why this is the general attitude of people in the church today is that every person possesses a companion spirit. Without him the person could not think analytically, rationally and spiritually, so that he would not be a human being, but an animal. And each person attracts a spirit who resembles him in the affection of his will and thus the perception of his understanding. If someone brings himself into good affections by means of truths taken from the Word and by living in accordance with them, the companion assigned him is an angel from heaven. But if someone brings himself into evil affections by proving falsities to himself and living a wicked life, the companion assigned to him is a spirit from hell. Once so assigned, the person enters more and more into a kind of brotherhood with satans, and then strengthens more and more his belief in falsities in opposition to the truths in the Word, and in the abominable Arian and Socinian attacks on the Lord. The reason is that all satans cannot bear to hear any truth from the Word, or even the name of Jesus; if they do hear them, they become like furies, running about blaspheming. Then if light floods in from heaven, they throw themselves headlong into caves and the thick darkness they love; in this they enjoy the kind of light that owls do in the dark, and like that enjoyed by cats hunting mice in cellars. This is the fate after death of all who in their heart and faith deny the divinity of the Lord and the holiness of the Word; and this is the nature of their internal man, however much the external puts on an act and plays the role of a Christian. I know this is the case, because of what I have seen and heard.

sRef Gen@3 @5 S4' [4] All who honour the Lord as Redeemer and Saviour merely with their mouth and lips, while in their heart and spirit they look upon Him as purely a human being, when they utter and teach such ideas have a mouth like a skinful of honey, but a heart like a skinful of gall. Their words are like sugared loaves, but their thoughts are like poisoned draughts of wine, or like curlicues of cake containing flying serpents.* If they are priests, they are like pirates at sea who fly the flag of a country which is not hostile, but when a passing ship approaches them as friends, they hoist the pirate flag instead of the former one, and seize the ship and make prisoners those on board. They are also like the serpents of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, who come up to one in the guise of angels of light, holding in their hand apples from it coloured with golden tints as if they had been plucked from the tree of life, offering them with the words:

God knows that on the day you eat of them, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. Gen. 3:5.

When they have eaten, they follow the serpent down to the underworld and live with him. Around that underworld are the satans who have eaten the apples of Arius and Socinus. It is they too who are meant by the man who went in not wearing a wedding garment, and who was cast into outer darkness (Matt. 22:11-13). The wedding garment is faith in the Lord as the Son of God, the God of heaven and earth, and one with the Father. Those who honour the Lord merely with their mouth and lips, but in their heart and spirit look upon Him purely as a human being, if they reveal their thoughts and persuade others, are spiritual murderers, and the worst of them are spiritual cannibals. A person's life comes from his love and faith in the Lord; but if this essential of faith and love, the belief that the Lord is God-man and Man-god, is taken away, his life is turned into death. So in this way the person is killed and devoured like a lamb by a wolf.

* This and the previous sentence are given rhetorical point by verbal assonances in Latin, which cannot be reproduced in English.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 381

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 381

381. (iii) Hypocritical faith is no faith at all.

A person becomes a hypocrite when he thinks a great deal about himself and sets himself above others. For by so doing he directs and concentrates the thoughts and affections of his mind into his body, linking them to his bodily senses. As a result he becomes natural, sensual and corporeal, so that his mind cannot be removed from the flesh to which it clings and be raised to God, nor can it see anything of God's in the light of heaven, that is, anything spiritual. Because he is a fleshly person, the spiritual ideas that enter his mind, passing by hearing into the understanding, seem to him nothing but ghosts or motes in the air, or rather like flies around the head of a horse sweating as it runs. Consequently in his heart he laughs at them; for it is well known that the natural man regards the things of the spirit, anything, that is, spiritual, as hallucinations.

[2] The hypocrite is the lowest among natural men, since he is sensual; for his mind is tightly tied to his bodily senses, so that he does not like seeing anything but what his senses suggest. Since the senses are in the realm of nature, they compel the mind to think on every subject in natural terms, and this is true also of all matters concerned with faith. If that hypocrite becomes a preacher, he retains in his memory the sort of things that were said about faith when he was a boy or youth. But since they contain inwardly nothing that is spiritual, but only what is wholly natural, when he utters them before an audience, they are nothing but lifeless sounds. The reason they sound as if alive is that this comes from the pleasures of self-love and love of the world. These cause them to ring eloquently and charm the ears, very much as does harmonious singing.

[3] The hypocritical preacher on returning home after his sermon laughs at all he said and expounded from the Word to his audience on the subject of faith; and he may perhaps say to himself: 'I cast a net into the lake, and caught flat-fish and shell-fish.' For this is how all those who have true faith look to such people in their delusion. A hypocrite is like a carved image with a double head, one inside the other; the inner head is attached to the trunk or body, the outer one, which can swivel around the inner one, has its face painted with colours resembling the human face, rather like the wooden heads to be seen in the shop-windows of wig-makers. The hypocrite is like a boat which a sailor by trimming the sail can make go at will with the wind or against it. Such is his sailing that the boat is prone to everything which favours the pleasures of the flesh and the senses,

[4] Ministers who are hypocrites are consummate comedians, mimics and actors, who can play the parts of kings, dukes, primates and bishops; and a little later, when they have taken off their costumes, they go to brothels and spend their time with whores. They are also like doors hung on swivelling hinges, so that they can swing to and fro; that is what their mind is like, since it can be opened on the side of hell or on that of heaven. When it is open in one direction, it is closed in the other. For the extraordinary thing is that while they are engaged in their sacred duties and are teaching truths from the Word, they are quite unaware of anything but believing them; for at these times the door is closed to hell. But a little later, on returning home, they believe nothing, because then the door is closed to heaven.

sRef Matt@7 @15 S5' [5] The worst hypocrites have an implacable enmity for truly spiritual people, resembling that satans have for the angels of heaven. They do not feel that this is so, as long as they live in the world, but it shows up after death, when their external, which allowed them to make a pretence of being spiritual people, is taken away, since it is their internal man which is this sort of Satan. But I will explain how the angels of heaven see these spiritual hypocrites, who are those who go around in sheeps' clothing while inwardly they are ravening wolves (Matt. 7:15). They look like clowns walking on the palms of their hands and praying; they cry from the heart with their mouth to demons and embrace them; but they clap their shoes in the air, and thus make a noise to God. But when they stand on their feet, their eyes have the look of leopards, their gait looks like that of wolves, their mouth like foxes', their teeth like crocodiles'; and as regards faith they look like vultures.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 382

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 382

382. X

The wicked have no faith.

All those who deny the creation of the world by God, and so deny God, are wicked, for they are godless nature-worshippers. The reason they are all wicked is that all good, which is not only naturally but also spiritually good, is from God. Those, therefore, who deny God are unwilling and for that reason unable to accept anything good from any source except their own self. A person's self is the longing of his flesh, and whatever arises from this is spiritually evil, however good it seems naturally. These people are wicked in theory; and the wicked in practice are those who pay no heed to God's commands, which are summed up in the Ten Commandments, and live outside the law. The reason why they too at heart deny God, although many of them confess God with their lips, is that God and His commands make one. This is why the Ten Commandments are addressed as the presence of Jehovah (Num. 10:35, 36; Ps. 132:7, 8). But to make it plainer that the wicked have no faith, a conclusion will be drawn from two propositions:

(i) The wicked have no faith because evil belongs to hell and faith to heaven.
(ii) All those in the Christian world have no faith who reject the Lord and the Word, although they live moral lives, and talk, teach and write rationally, even about faith.

But these propositions must be examined one by one.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 383

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 383

sRef Matt@6 @24 S1' 383. (i) The wicked have no faith because evil belongs to hell and faith to heaven.

Evil belongs to hell, because that is the source of all evil; faith belongs to heaven, because every truth that makes up faith is from heaven. So long as a person lives in the world, he is held and walks midway between heaven and hell, and is there in spiritual equilibrium, which gives him free will. Hell is beneath his feet, heaven is above his head, and whatever rises from hell is evil and falsity; but whatever comes down from heaven is good and truth. A person, being midway between these two opposites, and at the same time in spiritual equilibrium, can freely choose, adopt and make his own one or other. If he chooses evil and falsity, he links himself with hell; if good and truth, he links himself with heaven. These facts not only make it plain that evil belongs to hell and faith to heaven, but also that those two cannot exist together in one subject or one person. For if they were present together, the person would be pulled apart as if he had two ropes tied round him, one pulling him upwards, the other downwards, so that he would find himself swinging in the air. He would be like a blackbird, flying now up, now down. When he flew up, he would worship God, when he flew down, the devil. Anyone can see that this is irreligious. No one can serve two masters, but must hate the one and love the other, as the Lord teaches in Matthew 6:24.

[2] There are various comparisons which can illustrate the fact that where there is evil there is no faith. For example: evil is like fire (the fire of hell is nothing but the love of evil) and consumes faith like straw, reducing it and everything connected with it to ashes. Evil dwells in thick darkness, faith in light; and evil through falsities extinguishes faith, just as thick darkness does light. Evil is black like ink, faith is white like snow, and clear like water; and evil blackens faith, as ink does snow or water. Again, evil and the truth of faith cannot be linked except as a stench can with a sweet smell, or as urine with a fine wine. They can no more be together than a foul-smelling corpse with a living person in one bed. They can no more dwell together than a wolf in a sheepfold, or a hawk in a dovecote, or a fox in a chicken-run.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 384

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 384

sRef Rev@20 @8 S0' 384. (ii) All those in the Christian world have no faith who reject the Lord and the Word, although they live moral lives, and talk, teach and write rationally, even about faith.

This follows as the conclusion to be drawn from all that has been said before. For it was shown that the true and only faith is in the Lord and comes from the Lord, and that faith which is not in Him and from Him is not spiritual, but natural faith; and a purely natural faith does not contain in itself the essence of faith. Moreover, faith is from the Word and from no other source. This is because the Word is from the Lord and so the Lord Himself is in the Word; which is why He says that He is the Word (John 1:1, 2). From this it follows that those who reject the Word also reject the Lord, since they make an indissoluble whole. It also follows that those who reject one or the other of these also reject the church, because the church is from the Lord by means of the Word; and further, that those who reject the church are outside heaven, because the church is the way into heaven, Those who are outside heaven are among the damned, and these have no faith at all.

The reason why those who reject the Lord and the Word have no faith, although they live moral lives and speak, teach and write rationally, even about faith, is that they have no spiritual, but only natural moral life, and no spiritual but only a natural rational mind; and morality and rationality which are wholly natural are in essence dead. So, being dead, these people cannot have any faith. A person who is wholly natural, who is dead so far as faith is concerned, can certainly talk and teach about faith, charity and God, but not under the impulse of faith, charity or God.

sRef John@3 @18 S2' sRef Matt@24 @22 S2' sRef Ps@2 @7 S2' sRef John@3 @36 S2' sRef Ps@2 @12 S2' sRef Luke@18 @8 S2' sRef Matt@24 @29 S2' sRef John@16 @8 S2' sRef Matt@24 @21 S2' sRef John@16 @9 S2' sRef Matt@24 @15 S2' sRef John@8 @24 S2' [2] The following passages prove that faith is possessed only by those who believe in the Lord, and that the rest have none:

He who believes in the Son is not judged; but he who does not believe has already been judged, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. John 3:18.

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him. John 3:36.

Jesus said, When the Spirit of truth comes, He will try the world concerning sin, for not believing in me. John 16:8, 9.

And addressing the Jews:

If you do not believe that I am, you will die in your sins. John 8:24.

For this reason David says:

I will bring news of a decree, said Jehovah. You are my son, to-day have I begotten you. Kiss the son, so that he may not be angry and so that you do not perish on the way. Blessed are all who trust in him. Ps. 2:7, 12.

The Lord predicts in the Gospels that at the ending of the age there will be no faith, because there will be none in the Lord as the Son of God, God of heaven and earth and one with the Father; the ending of the age means the final period of the church, when He says that the abomination of desolation will come about, and affliction such as has never been nor shall be; and that the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky (Matt. 24:15, 21, 29). Also in Revelation, that Satan when released from his imprisonment will go out to lead astray the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, and whose number is like the sand of the sea (Rev. 20:7, 8). Because the Lord foresaw this, He also said:

Yet when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith upon the earth? Luke 18:8.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 385

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 385

385. I shall here add accounts of some experiences, of which this is the first.

An angel once said to me: 'You want to see clearly what faith and charity are, and so what faith is when separated from charity, and what it is when joined to charity; I will give you a visual demonstration.'

'Please do,' I replied.

'Instead of faith and charity,' he said, 'think of light and heat, and you will see clearly. Faith in its essence is truth belonging to wisdom, and charity in its essence is affection belonging to love. In heaven truth belonging to wisdom is light, and affection belonging to love is heat. The light and heat the angels enjoy are essentially this and nothing else. From this you can see clearly what faith separated from charity is like, and what faith joined to charity is like. Faith separated from charity is like light in wintertime, and faith joined to charity is like light in springtime. Light in wintertime, being light without heat but combined with cold, completely strips the trees of their leaves, kills off the grass, makes the ground hard and freezes water. But light in springtime, being light combined with heat, makes the trees grow, putting forth first leaves, then flowers, and finally fruits; it opens up and softens the ground, to bring forth grass, plants, flowers and shrubs, and it also melts the ice so that water flows from springs.

[2] 'It is exactly the same with faith and charity: faith separated from charity makes everything die off, and faith combined with charity makes everything come to life. This coming to life, as well as that dying off, can be seen actually happening in our world, the spiritual one, because here faith is light and charity is heat. For where faith is combined with charity, there are parkland gardens, flower-gardens and shrubberies, the more beautiful, the more closely they are combined. But where faith is separated from charity, not so much as grass grows; and any patch of greenery is produced by thorns and briars.'

Not far off were standing some clergymen, whom the angel called believers in men's justification and sanctification by faith alone, as well as mystery-mongers. We told them the same and demonstrated it to them so that they could see that it was so. When we asked whether it was not so, they turned their backs and said, 'We did not hear.' But we shouted at them and said, 'So listen to it again.' However, then they put both hands over their ears and cried: 'We do not want to hear.'

[3] After hearing this I spoke with the angel about faith on its own and said that I had been allowed to know by personal experience that that sort of faith is like the light of wintertime. I told him how for some years past spirits who had different kinds of faith had passed by me; and whenever those who had separated faith from charity came near, such a chill attacked my feet, and then by degrees my loins and finally my chest, that I hardly knew otherwise than that all the vitality in my body was going to be extinguished. This would actually have happened, if the Lord had not driven those spirits away and freed me.

It seemed to me surprising that those spirits did not in themselves feel any chill, as they admitted. So I compared them to fish under ice, for they too do not feel any chill, since their life and thus their nature is essentially so cold. I perceived then that this chill spread from the deceptive light of their faith, much like that which rises after sunset from marshy and sulphurous ground in midwinter. Travellers in all parts see this deceptive, cold light.

They can be compared with the icebergs which are torn from their places in arctic lands and are carried hither and thither on the ocean. Of these I have heard it said, that on their approach the crews of ships all shiver with cold. Groups of spirits whose faith is separated from charity can therefore be likened to these icebergs, and if you like you can so call them,

It is well known from the Word that faith without charity is dead; but I will say why it dies. It dies of cold, and this kills off faith like a bird in a severe winter. First of all its sight goes, and at the same time its ability to fly; finally its breathing stops, and it falls headlong off the branch into a snowy grave.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 386

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 386

386. The second experience.

One morning on waking from sleep I saw two angels coming down from heaven, one from the south, the other from the east of heaven; they were both in chariots to which were harnessed white horses. The chariot in which the angel from the south of heaven rode shone as if of silver, and that in which the angel from the east of heaven rode shone as if of gold; and the reins they held in their hands shone as if touched by the flame-coloured light of dawn. That was how the two angels looked to me at a distance; but when they came near, they did not appear in a chariot, but in the form of angels, which is the human form. The one coming from the east of heaven wore a shining purple robe; the one from the south of heaven a violet robe. When these angels reached the lower levels beneath the heavens each ran towards the other, as if racing to see who could arrive first, and embraced and kissed each other.

I was told that the two angels had been very close friends during their lives in the world, but one was now in the eastern heaven, the other in the southern one. The eastern heaven is the home of those who have love from the Lord, the southern heaven is that of those who have wisdom from the Lord. After talking for some time about the splendours of their heavens, their talk turned to this topic: whether heaven in its essence is love or whether it is wisdom. They agreed at once that one depends on the other, but they discussed which was the origin of the other.

[2] The angel from the heaven of wisdom asked the other: 'What is love?' He replied that love arising from the Lord as a sun is the heat which gives life to angels and men, so it is the Being of their life; and the things derived from love are called affections, and it is these which give rise to perceptions and thus to thoughts. 'From this flows the consequence that wisdom is by its origin love, consequently thought is by its origin an affection belonging to that love. It can be seen by considering the derivatives in their proper sequence that thought is nothing but the form taken by affection. This fact is unknown because thoughts are exposed to light, but affections to heat, so that people reflect on thoughts, but not on affections. Thought being nothing but the form taken by an affection belonging to some love or other can also be illustrated by speech, since this is nothing but a form of sound; it is also similar in that sound corresponds to affection, and speech to thought, so that affection makes a sound, and thought articulates it into words. This can also be made obvious, if we say: "Take sound away from speech - is there anything left of speech? Likewise take affection away from thought - is there anything left of thought?" It is now plain from this that love is the whole of wisdom, and consequently the essence of the heavens is love, and their coming-into-being is wisdom; or what is the same thing, the heavens are the product of Divine love, and they come into existence from Divine love by means of Divine wisdom. Therefore, as I said before, one depends upon the other.'

[3] At that time I had with me a recently arrived spirit, who on hearing this asked whether it was similar with charity and faith, since charity belongs to affection, and faith to thought.

'Yes, exactly similar,' replied the angel. 'Faith is nothing but the form of charity, just as speech is of sound. Faith is also formed by charity, as speech is by sound. We in heaven know how this forming occurs, but I have not time to explain it here. By faith,' he added, 'I mean spiritual faith, in which life and spirit come solely from the Lord by means of charity, for this is spiritual and the means by which faith is acquired. Faith without charity therefore is purely natural faith, and this is lifeless faith; it also links itself with purely natural affection, which is nothing but longing.'

[4] The angels were talking on this subject spiritually, and spiritual speech includes thousands of things beyond the power of natural speech to express, and remarkably enough these things cannot enter into the ideas of natural thought. After talking on both these subjects the angels went away, and as they receded, each towards his own heaven, stars appeared round their heads; and when they were at some distance from me I saw them again in chariots, as before.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 387

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 387

387. The third experience.

When the two angels were out of sight, I saw a garden on the right containing olives, figs laurels and palm-trees, planted in order in accordance with their correspondences. As I looked in that direction I saw angels and spirits walking among the trees in conversation. One of the angelic spirits then looked back and saw me. (Angelic spirits is what those in the world of spirits are called who are being prepared for heaven.) He came out of the garden to me and said: 'Would you like to come with me into our park? You will hear and see wonders.'

So I went with him, and then he said to me: 'These whom you see' (for there were many of them) 'are all in possession of the love of truth, and thus in the light of wisdom. There is also here a palace, which we call the Temple of Wisdom; but no one can see it who thinks himself very wise, much less one who thinks he is wise enough, even less one who thinks he is wise on his own account. The reason is that these people do not have a love of genuine wisdom to enable them to receive the light of heaven. Genuine wisdom is when a person sees by the light of heaven that what his knowledge, intelligence and wisdom embrace compared with what they do not are as a drop of water is to the ocean, consequently virtually nothing. Everyone in this parkland garden, who by perception and sight acknowledges within himself that his wisdom is comparatively so small, can see the Temple of Wisdom. For it is the internal light in a person's mind, not the external light without the internal, which allows him to see it.'

[2] Now because I had often thought this, and knowledge, then perception and finally internal light led me to acknowledge that man's wisdom is so scanty, I was suddenly allowed to see the temple. Its form was remarkable. It stood up high above the ground, four-square, with walls of crystal, a roof of translucent jasper elegantly arched, the substructure of various precious stones. There were steps leading up to it of polished alabaster, and at the sides of the steps figures of lions with cubs. Then I asked whether I might go inside, and I was told I might. So I went up, and when I got inside I saw what looked like cherubs flying beneath the roof, but they quickly vanished. The floor on which I was walking was made of cedar planks, and the whole temple with its translucent roof and walls was built as a form for light to play upon.

[3] The angelic spirit came in with me, and I repeated to him what I had heard from the two angels about love and wisdom, and about charity and faith. Then he said: 'Did they not also talk about the third?' 'What third?' I said.

'It is the good of use,' he replied. 'Love and wisdom without the good of use are nothing; they are mere mental abstractions, which are only realised, when they are employed in use. Love, wisdom and use make an inseparable group of three. If they are separated, none of them is anything. Love is nothing without wisdom, but in wisdom it is formed to some purpose; and the purpose to which it is formed is use. Therefore when love by means of wisdom is put to use, it actually exists, because it is realised in action. These three are exactly like end, cause and effect; the end is nothing unless by means of the cause it is realised in the effect. Take one of the three away, and the whole falls to pieces and becomes as if it had never been.

[4] 'It is much the same with charity, faith and deeds. Charity without faith is nothing, nor is faith without charity, nor are charity and faith without deeds; but in deeds they are something, and the nature of that something is determined by the use the deeds serve. It is much the same with affection, thought and performance; and it is much the same with will, understanding and action. For will without understanding is like the eye without the power of sight, and either of them without action is like the mind without the body. The truth of this can be clearly seen in this temple, because the light we enjoy here is the light which enlightens the interiors of the mind.

[5] 'Geometry too proves that there is nothing complete and perfect unless it is triple. For a line is nothing unless it becomes an area, nor is an area anything unless it becomes a solid. So one must be multiplied by the other for them to come into existence; and they come into existence jointly in the third. Just as in this case, so it is with every single created thing; they reach their end in the third term. This now is why three in the Word means complete and utterly. In view of this I cannot help being surprised at some people professing belief in faith alone, some in charity alone, and some in deeds alone, when in fact one without the other is nothing, and so are one together with another but without the third.'

[6] But then I put the question: 'Cannot a person have charity and faith and still do no deeds? Could a person not be fond of something and think about it, and yet not do it?' The angelic spirit* replied to me: 'This is impossible, except as a mental abstraction; it cannot actually happen. He will still be striving and wanting to do it; and the will or effort is in itself an act, because it is a continuing impulse to action, and it becomes an act when externalised by being directed towards an object. Therefore effort and will, as an internal act, is accepted by every wise man, because it is accepted by God, exactly as if it were an external act, provided there is no failure to act when the opportunity arises.'

* The Latin has here 'angel', but cf. AR 875.8.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 388

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 388

388. The fourth experience.

I talked with some of those who are meant in Revelation by the dragon, and one of them said: 'Come with me, and I will show you what delights our eyes and hearts.'

So he took me through a dark wood and up a hill, from which I could watch the pleasures of the dragons. I saw an amphitheatre constructed in the shape of a ring surrounded by benches running up in tiers, on which the spectators were sitting. Those sitting on the lowest benches looked to be from a distance like satyrs and priapi*; some had clothing to conceal their private parts, and some without it were totally naked. On the benches above them sat fornicators and prostitutes, as it appeared to me by the gestures they made.

Then the dragon said to me: 'Now you will see our sport.' I saw let into the space in the ring what looked like calves, rams, ewes, kids and lambs; and when they were inside, a gate was opened and in rushed what looked like young lions, panthers, tigers and wolves. These furiously attacked the cattle, tore them in pieces and massacred them. After this bloody slaughter the satyrs sprinkled sand over the place where they had been killed.

[2] Then the dragon said to me: 'These are the sports which delight our minds.' 'Away with you, demon,' I replied, 'in a short while you will see this amphitheatre turned into a lake of fire and brimstone.' He laughed at this and went away. But afterwards I began to reflect why such things are permitted by the Lord. I received a reply in my heart, that they are permitted so long as people are in the world of spirits; but once their time in that world is up, such theatrical scenes are turned into the torments of hell.

[3] Everything which I saw had been the product of the dragon's imagination. So they were not really calves, rams, ewes, kids and lambs, but they made the genuine kinds of good and truth in the church, which they hated, appear in this form. The lions, panthers, tigers and wolves were the forms taken by the desires of the people who looked like satyrs and priapi. The ones with no clothing around their private parts were those who believed that evils were not manifest to God; those who had some clothing were those who believed that evils were manifest, but did not damn a person so long as he had faith. The fornicators and prostitutes were those who falsify the truths of the Word, for fornication means the falsification of truth. In the spiritual world everything at a distance looks like what it corresponds to, and when these take visible form they are called representations of spiritual things in the form of objects resembling those in the natural world.

[4] Later on I saw them emerging from the wood, the dragon in the midst of satyrs and priapi, with servants and camp-followers, who were the fornicators and prostitutes, coming after them. The column they formed grew as they went, and then I heard what they were discussing.

They were saying they had seen in a meadow a flock of sheep with lambs, and this was a sign that close by was one of the Jerusalem cities, where charity is the leading characteristic. 'Let us go,' they said, 'and capture that city, expel the inhabitants and plunder their property.' So they approached, but there was a wall around it, and angels on the wall to guard it. So then they said: 'Let us capture it by a trick. Let us send them someone skilled in sophistry, who can make black appear white and white black, and put a colourable gloss on anything.'

So they found someone who was an expert in metaphysics, able to turn real ideas into terminological ones, conceal the facts under forms of words, and so fly off like a hawk with its prey beneath its wings. He was told what to say to the people in the city, that they were co-religionists and should be let in. He went up to the gate and knocked, and when it was opened he said that he wished to speak with the wisest person in the city. He went in and was taken to someone, whom he addressed in these words: 'My brethren are outside the city, begging to be admitted. They-are your co-religionists, for you and we both make faith and charity the two essentials of religion. The only difference is, that you put charity first and derive faith from it, and we put faith first and derive charity from it. What does it matter which is put first, when we believe in both?'

[5] The wise citizen replied: 'Let us not discuss this subject by ourselves, but in the presence of a larger audience who can act as umpires and judges. Otherwise we shall not reach a decision.' So more people were soon summoned, and they were addressed by the dragon's ambassador in similar words to those he had previously used.

Then the wise citizen made his reply: 'You have said that it is much the same whether charity or faith is regarded as the leading matter in the church, so long as there is agreement that either of them constitutes the church and its religion. Yet the difference is like that between prior and posterior, cause and effect, principal and instrumental, and essential and formal. I use these terms because I notice that you are an expert on metaphysics, a subject we call mere sophistry, and some people call magic formulas. But let us drop these terms. The difference is like that between what is above and what is beneath. Or rather, if you will believe me, it is the difference between the minds of those in this world who live on the upper level and the minds of those on the lower level. For the leading point constitutes the head and chest, and what is derived from it the feet and the soles of the feet. But first of all let us agree on the definition of charity and faith. Charity is the affection of the love of doing good to the neighbour for the sake of God, salvation and everlasting life; and faith is thinking from a trust in God, salvation and everlasting life.

[6] But the ambassador said: 'I agree that this is the definition of faith, and I also agree that charity is that affection for the sake of God, because it is for the sake of His commandment, but not for the sake of salvation and eternal life.' After this partial agreement and partial disagreement, the wise citizen said: 'Is not affection or liking the leading point, and thought derived from it?' The dragon's ambassador said: 'This I deny.'

But he was answered: 'You cannot deny it. Surely anyone thinks as the result of some liking. Take away the liking, and can he think at all? It is exactly as if you removed the sound from speech; if you took away the sound, could you say anything? Sound too is the product of the affection of some love or other, and speech is the product of thought, for love makes a sound and thought puts it into words. It is also like a flame and light; if you take away the flame, is not the light extinguished? It is much the same with charity, because this is the product of love, and with faith, because this is the product of thought. Can you not thus grasp that the leading point is all-important for the secondary, exactly as the flame is for the light? It is obvious from this that if you do not put the leading point first, you cannot have the second either. Therefore, if you put faith, which is in the second place, in first place, you cannot fail to appear in heaven as upside down, with your feet uppermost and your head down, or like a clown who walks upside down on the palms of his hands. When you look like this in heaven, what then will your good deeds look like, which are charity in action? They can only be the sort of things the clown does with his feet, since he cannot do them with his hands. That is why your charity is natural rather than spiritual, since it is upside down.'

[7] The ambassador understood this, since every devil can understand truth when he hears it; but he is unable to keep it in his memory, because the affection for evil, which is essentially the longing of the flesh, on its return expels thought of the truth. Afterwards the wise citizen showed at some length what is the nature of faith when. it is taken as the leading point, namely, that it is purely natural, a conviction devoid of any spiritual life, and in consequence no faith at all. 'And I can almost say that there is no more spirituality in your faith, than there is in thinking about the Mogul empire, the diamond mine in it, and the treasury or court of that emperor.' On hearing this the dragon's man went off in anger and reported to his companions outside the city. When they heard it had been said that charity is the affection of the love of doing good to the neighbour for the sake of [God,]** salvation and everlasting life, they all shouted: 'This is a lie!', and the dragon himself cried: 'Ah, what a crime! Surely all charitable deeds if they are done for the sake of salvation, are merit-seeking?'

sRef Rev@20 @9 S8' sRef Rev@20 @8 S8' [8] Then they said to one another: 'Let us summon still more of our people, and lay siege to this city, and let us expel these paragons of charity.' But when they attempted this, a sudden flash of fire from heaven consumed them. But the fire from heaven was a manifestation of their anger and hatred directed against the people in the city, since they had cast down faith from first to second place, or rather to the lowest place beneath charity, since they claimed that it was no faith. The reason they appeared to be consumed by fire was that hell opened up beneath their feet, and they were swallowed up. Similar events to this occurred in many places on the day of the Last Judgment; this too is the meaning of the following passage in Revelation:

The dragon will come forth to lead astray the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, to assemble them for war; and they went up on the surface of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints, and the beloved city. But fire came down from God out of heaven and consumed them. Rev. 20:8, 9.

* Priapus, a Roman god of lechery.
** Restored from AR 655.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 389

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 389

389. The fifth experience.

I once saw a document sent down from heaven to a community in the world of spirits, where there were two leading churchmen together with a retinue of canons and presbyters. The document contained an exhortation to acknowledge the Lord Jesus Christ as God of heaven and earth, as He taught (Matt. 28: 18), and to abandon as erroneous the doctrine that faith justifies without the deeds prescribed by the law. Many people read and copied out that document, and its contents were considered and talked over judiciously by many of them. But after receiving it, they said to one another: 'Let us hear the opinion of our leaders.'

So they listened to them, but they spoke against it and rejected it. However, the leaders of that community were hard of heart as the result of the falsities they had absorbed in their former world. After a short consultation, therefore, they sent the document back to heaven where it came from. When this was done, after some muttering most of the laymen abandoned their former acceptance, and then the light of their judgment in spiritual matters, which had previously been bright, was suddenly snuffed out. After a second, but vain, warning, I saw that community sinking down, though I could not see how deeply; but it sank out of sight of those who worship the Lord alone, and turn their backs on justification by faith alone.

[2] A few days later I saw perhaps as many as a hundred coming up from the lower earth, to which that small community had sunk; they approached me and one of them said: 'Listen to this extraordinary occurrence. When we sank down, we saw what looked like a lake, and after a while dry land; then later a small town in which many found a home for themselves. Next day we got together to discuss what we should do. Many people said that the two leaders of the church should be approached and gently reproved for sending the document back to the heaven it came from, since it was because of that this had happened to us. They also chose a few people (and the man talking to me said he had been one of them) who went off to the leaders, where one of their number who was especially wise addressed them as follows: "We believed that we excelled others in possessing the church and religion, because we heard it said that we enjoy the strongest light of the Gospel. But some of us have been granted enlightenment from heaven, and this enlightenment has been accompanied by the perception that at the present time there is no longer a church, because there is no religion, in the Christian world."

[3] 'The leaders said: "What is this you are saying? Is not the church where there is the Word, where Christ the Saviour is known, and where there are the sacraments?" Our spokesman replied to this: "They belong to the church, for they make the church; but they make it inside, not outside, a person." He went on to say: "Can there be a church where three Gods are worshipped? Can there be a church where its whole teaching is based upon a misinterpretation of a single saying of Paul, and thus not upon the Word? Can there be a church, when the Saviour of the world, who is the God of the church Himself, is not approached? Can anyone deny that religion is shunning evil and doing good? Is there any religion [where it is taught] that faith alone saves, and not together with charity? Is there any religion where it is taught that the charity which man exercises is only moral and civil charity? Is there anyone who does not see that that sort of charity contains nothing religious? Does faith alone involve any act or deed, though religion consists in action? Is there a nation anywhere in the whole world which attributes no saving power to the good of charity, which is good deeds? Yet the whole of religion consists in good, and the whole of the church consists in the teaching of truths, and by means of truths the teaching of various kinds of good. How glorious our lot would have been, if we had welcomed the teachings at the heart of the document sent down from heaven!"

[4] 'Then the leaders said: "Your remarks aim too high. Surely faith in action, which is the faith which fully justifies and saves, is the church? Surely faith at rest, which is the faith that goes forth and accomplishes, is religion? You must grasp this, my children." But then our wise man said: "Listen, fathers. Surely according to your dogma man resembles a block of wood in conceiving faith in action? Can a block be made alive so as to become a church? Surely faith at rest is according to your notion the continuation and progress of faith in action? And when, as your dogma insists, all saving power resides in faith, and the good of charity on man's part makes no contribution, where is religion then?" Then the prelates said: "Friend, you talk like this because you do not know the secrets of justification by faith alone; and if one is ignorant of these, one cannot know inwardly the way to salvation. Your way is external and fit only for the common people. Go that way if you like. But you should know that all good is from God, and nothing of it from man, so that in spiritual matters man can achieve nothing by himself. How then can a man by himself do good which is spiritual good?"

[5] 'To this our spokesman replied with great indignation: "I know more about your secrets of justification than you do, and I tell you frankly that I have seen nothing inwardly in your secrets but phantoms. Surely religion consists in acknowledging [and loving] God, and shunning and hating the devil? Is not God good itself and the devil evil itself? Is there anyone anywhere in the world, who, if he has a religion, does not know this? Is not acknowledging and loving God doing good, because this is God's and from God; and is not shunning and hating the devil not doing evil, because this is the devil's and from the devil? Or to put it another way, does your faith in action, which you called the faith that fully justifies and saves, or in other words your act of justification by faith alone, teach you to do any good deed which is God's and from God, or to shun any evil because it is the devil's and from the devil? None at all, since you lay down that there is no salvation in either. What is your faith at rest, which you called the faith that goes forth and accomplishes, but the same as faith in action? How can this be perfected, since you exclude all good done by man as if of himself, saying in your secret doctrines: 'How can anyone be saved by any good done by himself, when salvation is a free gift?' Or 'What good can be done by man except with a view to seeking merit, when yet Christ's merit is all-sufficient? Thus doing good to achieve salvation would be attributing to oneself what belongs to Christ alone, and it would also be wishing to justify and save oneself.' Or 'How can anyone do a good deed, when the Holy Spirit performs everything with no help from man? What need then is there for any extra good from man, when all good from man is not in essence good at all?'

[6] There are many other questions; are not these your secrets? But in my eyes they are simply quibbles and tricks invented in order to get rid of good deeds, which are the good deeds of charity, so as to establish firmly your doctrine of faith alone. And because you do so, you consider man as regards faith, and in general as regards all spiritual matters relating to the church and religion as a block of wood, or like a lifeless effigy, not as a human being created in the image of God, who has been given and is continually given the ability to understand and to will, to believe and to love, and to speak and act, exactly as if of himself, especially in spiritual matters, since they are what make a human being human. If a human being were not to think and act in spiritual matters as if of himself, what then would become of the Word? What would then become of the church and religion? And what of worship? You know that doing good to the neighbour as the result of love is charity; but you do not know what charity is. Yet it is the soul and essence of faith. And since charity is both these things, how can faith divorced from charity be anything but dead? Dead faith is nothing but a phantom. I call it a phantom, because James 12:171 calls faith without good deeds not only dead, but even diabolical."

[7] Then one of the leaders, on hearing his faith called dead, diabolical and a phantom, became so furious that he snatched the mitre off his head and threw it on the table saying: 'I will not put it on again until I have taken vengeance on the enemies of the faith of our church.' So he shook his head murmuring 'That man James! That man James!' On the front of the mitre was a plate, with the words 'Faith alone justifies' engraved on it. Then there suddenly appeared a monster rising out of the ground; it had seven heads, feet like a bear's, a body like a leopard's, a mouth like a lion's, exactly like the beast described in Revelation (13:1, 2), and of which an image was made and honoured (13:14,:15). This phantom took the mitre from the table, pulled its lower edge apart and put it on its seven heads. At this the ground gaped open beneath its feet and it sank down. On seeing this the leader cried: 'Assault, assault.' Then we left them, and found steps before our eyes which we went up; so we came back upon the earth and into sight of heaven, where we had been before.'

This was the story told me by the spirit who with a hundred companions had come up from the lower earth.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 390

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 390

390. The sixth experience.

In the northern region of the spiritual world I heard what sounded like a rushing of waters. So I went towards it, and when I came close the noise stopped, and I heard a hum as if from a large gathering. Then I saw a building full of holes surrounded by a wall, and this was the source of the hum I heard. I went up and there was a door-keeper there; I asked him who were the people there. He said that they were the wisest of the wise, debating supernatural questions. He said this out of his own simple faith.

'May I go in?' I asked.

'Yes,' he said, 'so long as you do not say anything. I have permission to admit the gentiles to stand at the door with me.'

So I went in, and found a circle with a platform in the middle, and a group of so-called wise men discussing the mysteries of their faith. At this time the subject or proposition for discussion was whether the good which a person does in the state of justification by faith, or in its progress after the action, is religious good or not. They declared unanimously that by religious good they meant good which contributes to salvation.

[2] The debate was fierce; but the view prevailed of those who said that the good deeds a person does in a state of faith or during its progress are merely morally good, conducing to worldly prosperity, but making no contribution to his salvation. Faith alone could contribute to that. Their proof of this went like this: 'How can any good dependent upon a person's will be linked to a free gift? Is not salvation a free gift? How can any good coming from a man be linked with Christ's merit? Is not this the sole means of salvation? And how can what a man does be linked to what the Holy Spirit does? Does not the Holy Spirit do everything without any help from man? Are not these things the only effective means of salvation in the action of justification by faith, and do not the three of them remain the only means of salvation in the state of faith and its progress? So any extra good performed by man cannot by any means be called religious good, that is, as said before, good that contributes to salvation. But if anyone does this in order to be saved, since a person's will is involved in it, and this must inevitably look upon it as meritorious, it should rather be called religious evil.'

[3] Two gentiles were standing in the vestibule next to the door-keeper and heard this speech. One said to the other: 'These people have no religion. Anyone can see that doing good to the neighbour for God's sake, that is, with God and from God, is what is called religion. "Their faith,' said the other one, 'has driven them mad.' Then they asked the door-keeper who they were. 'Christian wise men,' said the doorkeeper. 'Nonsense,' they said, 'you are telling lies. They are playactors, to judge by the way they talk.'

So I went away. My coming to that building and the fact that they were then discussing that subject, and what I have described happening, were all the result of the Lord's Divine guidance.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 391

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 391

391. The seventh experience.

I have become aware as the result of conversations in the spiritual world with many laymen and many clergy what desolation of the truth and theological poverty exists in the Christian world at the present time. There is such spiritual famine among the clergy that they hardly know anything beyond the existence of the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and the fact that faith alone saves. About the Lord Christ they know only the historical facts about Him related in the Gospels. The rest, however, of what either Testament of the Word teaches, as that the Father and He are one, that He is in the Father and the Father in Him, that He has all power in heaven and earth, that it is the Father's will that men should believe in the Son, and that he who believes in Him has everlasting life, and much else - all this is to them as unknown and remote as what lies on the ocean bed, or rather, what lies at the centre of the earth. When these statements are extracted from the Word and read, they stand as if listening but hear nothing. The words do not penetrate deeper into their ears than the sighing of the wind or the beating of a drum. The angels who from time to time are sent out by the Lord to visit the Christian communities in the world of spirits, that is, below heaven, complain bitterly. They say that such is their stupidity and as a result the darkness under which they labour in matters relating to salvation that it is almost like listening to a talking parrot. Even their learned men say that in spiritual matters and those relating to God they do not understand more than so many statues.

[2] An angel once told me of a conversation he had with two clerics, one whose faith was separated from charity and another whose faith was not so separated. With the one whose faith was separated from charity the conversation ran like this.

'Friend, what are you?' 'I am a Christian of the Reformed church,' he replied. 'What is your doctrine and thus your religion?' 'Faith,' he answered. 'What is your faith?' said the angel. 'My faith,' he replied, 'is that God the Father sent the Son to take upon Himself the damnation of the human race, and by this means we are saved.' Then he asked him, 'What more do you know about salvation?' He replied that salvation is achieved by that faith alone. Next he said, 'What do you know about redemption?' He replied that it was accomplished by the passion on the cross, and that Christ's merit is imputed by means of that faith. Next, 'What do you know about regeneration?' He replied that it is the result of that faith. 'Say what you know about love and charity.' He replied that they are the same as that faith. 'Tell me what you think about the Ten Commandments and the remainder of the Word.' He replied that they are contained in that faith. Then he said: 'So you will do nothing?' 'What can I do?' he replied, 'I cannot of myself do any good which is good.' 'Can you,' he said, 'have faith of yourself?' 'I don't enquire into that,' he answered, 'I shall have faith.' Finally he said, 'Do you know anything at all more about salvation?' 'What more is there,' he replied, 'when salvation comes solely by means of that faith?' The angel then said, 'Your answers are like someone playing a single note on the flute; I hear nothing but faith. If you know that and nothing else, you know nothing. Go away and look for your companions.' So he went away and came upon them in a desert where there was no grass. He asked there why this was, and was told it was because they had no church among them.

[3] The angel's conversation with the one whose faith was linked with charity went thus. 'Friend, what are you?' 'I am a Christian of the Reformed church,' he replied. 'What is your doctrine and so your religion?' 'Faith and charity,' he replied. 'These,' said the angel, 'are two.' 'They cannot be separated,' he replied. 'What is faith?' he asked. 'Believing what the Word teaches,' he replied. 'What is charity?' 'Doing what the Word teaches.' 'Have you only believed these things or have you also done them?' 'I have also done them,' he replied. The angel from heaven looked at him and said, 'My friend, come with me and live with us.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 392

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 392

392.. CHAPTER SEVEN

CHARITY, OR LOVE TOWARDS THE NEIGHBOUR, AND GOOD DEEDS

After the chapter on faith, there follows one on charity, because faith and charity are linked like truth and good; and these two are linked like light and heat in springtime. This expression is used because spiritual light, the light radiated by the sun of the spiritual world, is in essence truth. Therefore, wherever truth is to be seen in that world, it shines with a radiance in proportion to its purity. Spiritual heat, which is also radiated by that sun, is in essence good. These statements have been made because charity and faith stand in the same relationship to each other as good and truth; and charity is all the good taken together a person does to his neighbour, and faith is all the truth taken together a person thinks about God and the things that are His.

[2] Since then the truth of faith is spiritual light, and the good of charity is spiritual heat, it follows that these two stand in the same relationship as the two things in the natural world which share these names. That is to say, when they are combined everything on earth flourishes, and in the same way when charity and faith are combined everything in the human mind flourishes, the only difference being that on earth the flowering is the result of natural heat and light, while in the human mind it is the result of spiritual heat and light. This flowering, being spiritual, is wisdom and intelligence. There is too a correspondence between the two, and for this reason the human mind, in which charity is linked with faith and faith with charity, is likened in the Word to a garden; and this is the meaning of the Garden of Eden, as was fully shown in ARCANA CAELESTIA (published in London).

[3] Furthermore it should be known that unless a discussion of charity follows that of faith, it is impossible to grasp what faith is, since, as the preceding chapter stated and showed, faith without charity is no faith, and charity without faith is no charity, and it is only the Lord who gives life to them both (355-361). It was also shown that the Lord, charity and faith make one, just as do life, the will and the understanding; and if they are separated, each of them is destroyed like a pearl collapsing into dust (362-367). Moreover charity and faith are together present in good deeds (373ff).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 393

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 393

393. It is an unchanging truth that faith and charity cannot be separated, if a person is to have a spiritual life and so be saved. This is a fact which falls within the grasp of any person's understanding, even if it has not been polished by vast amounts* of learning. Is there anyone who is not led by some inward perception to see and so to accept the idea intellectually, when he hears someone say that a person who lives a good life and holds a proper belief is saved? And is there anyone whose understanding does not reject, like a speck of dust getting into the eye, the statement that a person who holds a proper belief is saved too, even if he does not lead a good life? For his inward perception at once causes the thought to strike him, how could anyone hold a proper belief when he does not lead a good life? And what would believing be then but a painting of faith, rather than its living image? Likewise, if anyone were told that a person who lives a good life is saved even if he does not believe, does not his understanding, as he turns it over and over or considers it in his mind, see, perceive and think that neither is this a coherent statement, since leading a good life comes from God? For all good which is essentially good comes from God. Leading a good life then and not believing is like clay in the potter's hand, which cannot be formed into any vessel of use in the spiritual kingdom, but only in the natural one.

[2] Moreover, can anyone fail to see the contradiction in those two statements: the one, that a person is saved who believes but does not lead a good life, the other that a person is saved who leads a good life but does not believe? Now because at the present time it is known, yet not known, what leading a good life is - it is known what leading a good life is on the natural level, but not what it is on the spiritual level - since this concerns charity, it must be discussed. This will be done by splitting it up into a number of propositions.

* The Latin phrase is literally 'talents and minas', the largest units of weight employed in antiquity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 394

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 394

394. I*

There are three universal loves, the love of heaven, the love of the world, and self-love.

These three loves make the starting point, because they are universal and the foundation of all others, and because charity has something in common with each of them. The love of heaven means love to the Lord, and also love towards the neighbour, and since either of these has some service as its end in view, it may be called the love of service. The love of the world is not only the love of wealth and possessions, but also the love of everything the world supplies for the delight of the bodily senses; for instance the beauty that charms the A eyes, the harmony that charms the ears, the fragrance that charms the nose, the delicacies that charm the tongue, the soothing touches that charm the skin, not to mention fine clothes, comfortable homes, parties, and all the pleasures given by these and many other objects. Self-love is not only the love of honours, glory, fame and eminence, but also the love of winning and angling for offices, and thus dominating others. The reason charity has something in common with each of these three loves is that charity regarded in essence is the love of being of service. Charity wants to do good to the neighbour (and good is the same as being of service); and each of these loves has services as its end in view, the love of heaven spiritual services, the love of the world natural services, which can be termed civic, and self-love bodily services, which can also be termed domestic ones for oneself and one's own people.

*From this point on the sections are not numbered in the original, but numbers have been supplied to match the practice of the first part of the book.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 395

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 395

395. I shall prove in the next section [403-405] that every person is by creation and therefore from birth endowed with these three loves; and when they are properly ordered they increase a person's perfection, and when they are not, they corrupt him. For the moment it may be enough to remark that these three loves are properly ordered when the love of heaven makes up the head, the love of the world the chest and belly, and self-love the feet and soles of the feet. The human mind is divided into three levels, as I have said several times before; on the highest level a person looks towards God, on the second or middle level the world, and on the third or lowest level himself. Since the mind is like this, it can be raised or it can lift itself up, by looking to God and heaven; it can be spread or spread itself laterally in every direction, by looking to the world and nature in it; and it can sink or let itself down, by looking to the ground and to hell. In these respects the body's sight copies the mind's, for it too can look up, look around and look down.

[2] The human mind is like a house with three floors communicating by staircases. On the top floor live angels from heaven, on the middle floor people in the world, and on the bottom floor genii*. If a person has those three loves properly ordered, he can at will go up or down. When he climbs to the top floor he is with the angels and like one himself; when he comes down from there to the middle floor, there he is with people, like a man-angel; and when he comes even further down, he is with genii like a person in the world, and he instructs, reproves and tames them.

[3] When a person has those three loves properly ordered, they are also arranged among themselves so that the highest love, which is that of heaven, is inside the second, the love of the world, and by means of this in the third or lowest, which is self-love. The love which is inside also has complete control over the one which is outside. So if the love of heaven is inside the love of the world, and is by this means in self-love, then the person is guided by the God of heaven in the services he performs at each level. The three loves function like the will, the understanding and action. The will acts upon the understanding, and there seeks out means for itself which allow it to perform the action. But there will be more to be seen on this subject in the next section, where it will be proved that these three loves if properly ordered increase a person's perfection, and if not properly ordered, corrupt him and turn him upside down.

* Genii is a name used by Swedenborg for a class of evil spirits.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 396

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 396

396. However, in order to cast the light of reason on and so make clear what follows in this chapter, and the next chapters on free will, reformation and regeneration, etc., some preliminary remarks are needed, dealing with the will and the understanding, good and truth, love in general, the love of the world and self-love in particular, the external and internal man, and the purely natural and sensual man. This revelation is needed to prevent a rational person from having his ability to perceive the more remote consequences taken away as if by a fog, and as it were wrapped in fog running through the streets of a city, until he does not know his way home. For what use is theology without understanding? If the understanding is not enlightened when one is reading the Word, is it any more use than holding a lantern in the hand without the lamp lit, such as those in the hands of the five foolish virgins, who had no oil? So I will take up each subject in turn.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 397

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 397

397.* (i) THE WILL AND THE UNDERSTANDING.

1. Man possesses two faculties which make up his life, one is called the will, the other the understanding. They are distinct, but so created as to make one, and when they are one they are called the mind. So the human mind consists of them, and there the whole of a person's life is in its beginnings, and this is the source from which it is present in the body.

2. Just as everything in the universe which is in due order has reference to good and truth, so everything in a person has reference to his will and understanding, for good in a person has to do with his will and truth to his understanding. For these two faculties, his twin lives, act as receivers and subjects upon which good and truth act. The will is the receiver for everything to do with good and the subject on which it acts; and the understanding is the receiver for everything to do with truth and the subject on which it acts. There is nowhere else in a person for the various kinds of good and truth; and since there is nowhere else in a person for them, nor is there therefore for love and faith, seeing that love belongs to good and good to love, and faith belongs to truth and truth to faith.

3. The will and the understanding also make up a person's spirit. For that is where his wisdom and intelligence reside, as also do his love and charity, and in general it is the seat of his life. The body is merely an obedient servant.

4. There is nothing it is more important to know than how the will and the understanding make up one mind. They do so, just as good and truth make one, for there is a marriage between the will and the understanding similar to that between good and truth, The facts about to be cited concerning good and truth will make clear what sort of a marriage that is; namely, that just as good is the very being (esse) of a thing, and truth is its coming-into-being (existere) as a result, so in a person his will is the very being of his life, and the understanding is the coming-into-being of his life as a result. For good belonging to the will takes on form in the understanding and becomes visible.

* 397-402 are repeated from HD 28-32, 11-19, 54-61, 55-78 and 36-46.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 398

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 398

398. (ii) GOOD AND TRUTH.

1. Everything in the universe, which is arranged in accordance with God's order, has reference to good and truth. Nothing exists either in heaven or in the world which does not have reference to those two. The reason is that both, good as well as truth, come from God the source of all things.

[2] 2. This makes it plain that a person needs to know what good and truth are, and how each looks towards the other, and how one is linked to the other; and it is above all needful for a person who belongs to the church to know this. For just as everything in heaven has reference to good and truth, so does everything in the church, because the good and truth of heaven are also the good and truth of the church.

[3] 3. God's order demands that good and truth should be linked and not separated, so that they make one, not two. For linked they come forth from God, and linked they are in heaven, so linked they must be in the church. The linking of good and truth is called in heaven the heavenly marriage, for all there are in this marriage. This is why heaven in the Word is compared to a marriage, and the Lord is called bridegroom and husband, and heaven is called bride and wife; and the church is described in the same way. The reason why heaven and the church are so called is that those in them receive Divine good in truths.

[4] 4. All the intelligence and wisdom the angels have comes from that marriage, none of it from good separated from truth or truth from good. It is much the same with people who belong to the church.

[5] 5. Since the linking of good and truth resembles a marriage, it is plain that good loves truth and truth in turn loves good, so that each desires to be linked to the other. A person in the church who lacks such a love and desire is not in the heavenly marriage; so the church is not yet really present in him, since it is the linking of good and truth which makes the church.

[6] 6. There are many kinds of good; in general one may speak of spiritual good and natural good, and both of these are linked in true moral good. Such as the kinds of good are, so are those of truth, because truths belong to good and are forms of good.

[7] 7. Evil and falsity are like good and truth, but are their opposites. Thus just as everything in the universe which is in keeping with God's order has reference to good and truth, so everything which is contrary to God's order has reference to evil and falsity. Also, just as good loves to be linked with truth, so evil loves to be linked with falsity, and falsity with evil. Or again, just as all intelligence and wisdom is born from the linking of good and truth so all madness and folly is born from the linking of evil and falsity. The linking of evil and falsity viewed inwardly is not a marriage, but adultery.

[8] 8. It is plain from the fact that evil and falsity are the opposites of good and truth, that truth cannot be linked with evil, nor good with the falsity of evil. If, however, truth is linked with evil, it ceases to be truth, because it is falsified; and if good is linked with the falsity of evil, it ceases to be good, because it is adulterated, But the falsity which is not that of evil can be linked with good.

[9] 9. No one who from conviction or manner of living is in a state of evil and the falsity which comes from it can know what good and truth are, since he regards his own evil as good and he believes his falsity which comes from it to be truth. But anyone who is from conviction and manner of living in a state of good and the truth that comes from it, can know what evil and falsity are. The reason is that all good, and all the truth that belongs to it, is in essence heavenly, but all evil, and the falsity that comes from it, is in essence hellish; and everything heavenly is in light, and everything hellish in darkness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 399

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 399

399. (iii) LOVE IN GENERAL.

1. A person's life really is his love, and the nature of his love determines the nature of his life, and in fact the whole person. But it is the dominant or ruling love which makes the person. This love has a number of other loves subordinate to it, which are derivatives of it. These look to be different, but are each of them present in the dominant love, and together with it make up a single kingdom. The dominant love is, so to speak, their king and head; it controls them, and by using them as mediate aims keeps in view and pursues its own aim, which is both the primary and ultimate aim of all, and this both directly and indirectly.

[2] 2. It is characteristic of a dominant love that it is loved above all else. What a person loves above all else is constantly present in his thoughts, because it is in his will, and constitutes the very essence of his life. For instance, anyone who loves wealth above all else, whether it be money or possessions, is continually turning over in his mind how to acquire wealth; he experiences the most intense pleasure on acquiring it, the most intense grief on losing it, for his heart is in it. Anyone who loves himself above all else keeps himself in mind at every moment, thinks of himself, talks about himself, acts to his own advantage, for his life is the life of self.

[3] 3. A person's aim is what he loves above all else; that is what he keeps in view in every single thing. It is in his will, like an invisible current in a river, deflecting and carrying him away, even when he is doing something else; for that is what animates him. It is the sort of thing one person looks for in another, and seeing it, uses it either to lead him or to act together with him.

[4] 4. A person is exactly like the dominant feature of his life; this is what distinguishes him from others, and this determines his heaven, if he is good, and his hell, if he is wicked. This is his very will, his self (proprium) and his nature, for it is the very being of his life. After death this cannot be changed, because it is the person himself.

[5] 5. Everyone's sense of pleasure, bliss and happiness comes from his dominant love, and is dependent on this. For a person calls pleasant what he loves, because he feels pleasure in it. Something, however, he thinks about without loving he may also call pleasant, but this is not the pleasure of his life. The pleasure of love is what a person regards as good, and the unpleasant is what he regards as evil.

[6] 6. There are two loves from which all the kinds of good and truth come into being, as from their sources; and there are two loves which are the sources of all evils and falsities. The two loves which are the sources of all the kinds of good and truth are love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour. But the two loves which are the sources of all evils and falsities are self-love and the love of the world. When these two latter loves are dominant, they are the exact opposites of the two former loves.

[7] 7. The two loves, being as has been said love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour, make heaven exist with a person, since they are dominant in heaven. And because they make heaven, they also make the church exist with him. The two loves which are the sources of all evils and falsities, being as has been said self-love and the love of the world, make hell exist with a person, for they are dominant in hell. Consequently they also destroy the church with him.

[8] 8. The two loves which are the sources of all the kinds of good and truth, being as stated the loves of heaven, open up and form the internal spiritual man, because that is where they dwell. But the two loves which are the sources of all evils and falsities, being as stated the loves of hell, when dominant shut off and destroy the internal spiritual man, causing a person to be natural and sensual in proportion to the extent and nature of their dominion.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 400

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 400

400. (iv) SELF-LOVE AND THE LOVE OF THE WORLD IN PARTICULAR.

1. Loving oneself is wishing oneself alone well, and no others except for one's own sake, so neither the church, nor one's country, nor any human community or fellow citizen. It also includes for instance doing good to them solely for the sake of one's own reputation, honour and glory. If someone does not see these advantages in the good deeds he does to them, he says in his heart, 'What does this matter? Why should I do this, and what do I get out of it?' So he puts a stop to them. From this it is plain that a person who is in a state of self-love does not love the church, his country or community, nor his fellow citizen, nor anything that is truly good, but only himself and what is his.

[2] 2. A person is in a state of self-love when in his thoughts and deeds he does not pay regard to the neighbour, so not to the public, much less the Lord, but only to himself and his own people; and consequently when he does everything for his own sake or for the sake of his people. If he does something for the sake of the public, it is only for show; and if he does it for his neighbour's sake, it is to win his favour.

[3] 3. We say for his own sake or for the sake of his people, because the person who loves himself also loves his people. These are in particular his children and grandchildren, and generally speaking all who act as one with him and whom he calls his own. Loving either of these groups is also loving oneself, for he looks on them as, so to speak, in himself, and he sees himself in them. The people he calls his own include also all who praise, honour and respect him. Other people he may regard as human beings with his physical eyes, but with the eyes of his spirit as hardly more than ghosts.

[4] 4. A person is in a state of self-love, when he despises the neighbour compared with himself, when he treats him as an enemy if he does not take his part, revere and respect him. He is even more in a state of self-love if on this account he hates the neighbour and persecutes him; more still, if on this account he burns to get his revenge on him and longs for his ruin. Such people end up by loving cruelty.

[5] 5. A comparison with heavenly love can show what self-love is like. Heavenly love is loving to perform services for their own sake, or the good deeds which a person does for the church, his country, his fellow men and fellow citizens for the sake of the good deeds themselves. On the other hand the person who loves them for his own sake, only loves them as he would servants, because they are of use to him. It follows from this that a person who is in a state of self-love wants the church, his country, the communities he belongs to and fellow citizens to be of use to him, rather than himself to be of use to them; so he sets himself above them and them beneath him.

[6] 6. Further, in so far as anyone has heavenly love, which is loving forms of service and good deeds and being heartily pleased when he performs them, so far is he led by the Lord, because that is the Lord's love and the love that comes from Him. On the other, in so far as anyone loves himself, so far does he lead himself, and so far is he led by the self (proprium). A person's self is inevitably evil, for it is his hereditary evil, which is loving oneself more than God, and the world more than heaven.

[7] 7. Another characteristic of self-love is that in so far as its restraints are relaxed, so far, that is, as external bonds are removed - fear of the law and legal penalties, fear of losing one's reputation, honours, profit, office and life - so far does it rush headlong, until it not only wants to rule over the whole world, but even heaven, in fact, God Himself. Nowhere does it set itself an end or limit. This desire lurks hidden in every person in a state of self-love, even if it is not plain for the world to see, since there the restraints and bonds just mentioned hold him back; and anyone of this character, when confronted with an impossibility, simply stops there until it does become possible. The result of both these facts is that a person who is in that state is unaware that such a crazy, limitless craving lies hidden within him. Yet the truth of this must be apparent to everyone in the case of dictators and kings who meet none of these restraints, bonds or impossibilities. They rush to subdue provinces and kingdoms so far as their success permits and they aspire to unlimited power and glory; even more so, if they extend their dominion to heaven and arrogate to themselves all the Lord's Divine power. These people continually seek to go further.

[8] 8. There are two types of power, one based on love towards the neighbour, the other on self-love. These two types of power are opposites. A person who wields power as a result of love to the neighbour, wishes the good of all, and likes nothing better than performing uses, or being of service to others. (Being of service to others is doing good to others because one wishes them well, and performing uses.) This is his love, and this is the pleasure of his heart. Also, in so far as he is advanced to high rank, he is pleased, not because of his rank, but because of the uses he is then better able to perform, and in more cases. Such is power in the heavens. On the other hand, the person who wields power as a result of self-love, wishes no one well, only himself and his own people. The services he performs are for his own honour and glory, for these are the only uses he recognises. He is of service to others only for the sake of having services done to him, of being honoured and given power. He seeks high rank not so as to be able to do good, but so as to hold a leading position and be highly honoured, and so fulfil his heart's pleasure.

[9] 9. The love of power still remains with everyone after his life in the world; but those who wielded power out of love towards the neighbour have power entrusted to them in the heavens too, but then it is not they, but the services and good deeds they love, which wield the power. It is the Lord who wields the power when services and deeds do. Those, however, who wielded power in the world out of self-love, are, after their life in the world is over, deposed and reduced to slavery.

These are the signs by which those who are in a state of self-love can be recognised. It makes no difference what they look like in outward appearance, whether they are proud or submissive. For such things belong in the internal man, and most people hide the internal, and train the external to put on a pretence of love for people and the neighbour, the opposite of what he really feels. They do this for their own sakes, for they know that loving people and the neighbour inwardly disposes all in their favour, so that they are the more esteemed. The reason people are so disposed is the influence heaven exerts on that love.

[10] 10. The evils to be found in those who are in a state of self-love are in general contempt for others, envy, unfriendliness to those who do not take their part, hostility arising from this, various kinds of hatred, vengeful behaviour, trickery, guile, hard-heartedness and cruelty. Where such evils exist, there is also contempt for God and what is God's, the truths and kinds of good which belong to the church. Any respect they pay to these is mere lip-service and not from the heart. Since evils of this sort arise from this love, there are also similar falsities, because falsities arise from evils.

[11] 11. The love of the world, however, is wanting by any means to divert others' wealth to oneself, setting one's heart on riches, and allowing worldly considerations to withdraw and seduce one from spiritual love, which is love towards the neighbour and so of heavenly origin. Those who love the world are those who desire to divert others' goods to themselves by various means, especially those who do so by guile and trickery, paying no heed to the neighbour's good. Those in the power of that love long for other people's goods, and, in so far as they are not afraid of the laws or loss of reputation by seeking gain, they deprive them of their goods, or rather plunder them.

[12] 12. But the love of the world is not so diametrically opposed to heavenly love as is self-love, since there are no such great evils hidden within it.

[13] 13. The love of the world takes many forms. It includes the love of wealth as a means of advancement to honours; the love of honours and distinctions as a means to acquiring wealth; the love of wealth for various purposes which give pleasure in the world; the love of wealth simply for the sake of wealth (that is the love of the miserly), and so on. The purpose for which wealth is desired is called its use; and it is the purpose or use which gives a love its quality, for the quality of love is determined by the purpose for which it is desired - all else serves as its means.

[14] 14. In short, self-love and the love of the world are totally opposed to love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour. Self-love and the love of the world, as described above, are therefore hellish loves; they are dominant in hell, and also cause hell to exist in a person. Love to the Lord, however, and love towards the neighbour are heavenly loves; they are dominant in heaven and also cause heaven to exist in a person.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 401

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 401

401. (v) THE INTERNAL MAN AND THE EXTERNAL MAN.

1. Man has been created so that he should be simultaneously in the spiritual and natural worlds. The spiritual world is the abode of angels, the natural world that of men. Since man has been so created, he has been endowed with an internal and an external, the internal to allow him to be in the spiritual world, the external to allow him to be in the natural one. His internal is what is called the internal man, the external what is called the external man.

[2] 2. Every person has an internal and an external, but there is a difference here between the good and the wicked, The good have their internal in heaven and its light, the external in the world and its light. For the good the light of the world is enhanced by the light of heaven, so that for them the internal and external act as one, like cause and effect, or prior and posterior. But the wicked have their internal in hell and its light, and this light is thick darkness compared to the light of heaven, though their external may enjoy light similar to that enjoyed by the good. So the situation is reversed, and this enables the wicked to talk and teach about faith, charity and God without being motivated by faith, charity and God, as the good are.

[3] 3. It is the internal man who is called spiritual, because he is in the light of heaven, which is spiritual light; it is the external man who is called natural, because he is in the world's light, which is natural light. If a person has his internal in the light of heaven and his external in the world's light, he is spiritual in both respects, since spiritual light coming from within enhances the natural light and makes it like its own. The reverse, however, happens in the case of the wicked.

[4] 4. The internal spiritual man regarded in essence is an angel of heaven; and while he lives in the body, he is also in company with angels, although unaware of it, and after the dissolution of the body goes to join them. In the case of the wicked, however, the internal man is a Satan, and while he lives in the body is also in company with satans, and after the dissolution of the body goes to join them.

[5] 5. The interiors of the mind in the case of spiritual people are really lifted towards heaven, for heaven is their primary aim; in the case of the purely natural, the interiors of the mind are turned away from heaven and towards the world, for this is their primary aim.

[6] 6. Those who cherish only a general notion about the internal and external man believe that it is the internal man who thinks and wills, and the external who speaks and acts, since thinking and willing are internal, but speaking and acting are external. But it needs to be known that when what a person thinks or wills concerning the Lord and what is His is good, and when what he thinks and wills concerning the neighbour and what is his is good, then this thinking and willing proceed from a spiritual internal, because they are the result of faith in truth and of love for good. But when his thinking and willing about them is evil, then they proceed from a hellish internal, because they are the result of faith in falsity and of love for evil. In short, in so far as a person feels love for the Lord and love towards the neighbour, to that extent is he in the spiritual internal, and this is the source of his willing and thinking, and also of his speaking and acting. But in so far as a person feels self-love and love for the world, to that extent his thinking and willing come from hell, despite the fact that he speaks and acts differently.

[7] 7. The Lord has provided and ordained that in so far as a person allows heaven to guide his thinking and willing, to that extent his spiritual man is opened up and developed. A path is opened to heaven reaching to the Lord, and his development is to conform with what is heavenly. On the other hand, however, in so far as a person allows not heaven but the world to guide his thinking and willing, to that extent his internal spiritual man is shut off, and the external is opened up and developed. The path is opened to the world, and his development is to conform with what is hellish.

[8] 8. Those who have their internal spiritual man opened up to heaven and to the Lord enjoy the light of heaven and enlightenment from the Lord, so that they possess intelligence and wisdom. They see truth by truth's light and experience good by their love for good. Those, however, who have their internal spiritual man shut off do not know what the internal man is, nor do they believe in the Word or life after death, or anything to do with heaven and the church. Since they enjoy only natural light, they believe nature is self-created instead of created by God, and they see falsity as truth and experience evil as good.

[9] 9. The internal and external I have been speaking of are the internal and external of a person's spirit; his body is merely an extra external, within which the others come into existence, for the body does nothing of itself, but as the result of the spirit in it. It needs to be known that after its release from the body a person's spirit thinks and wills, and speaks and acts, just as before. Thinking and willing is then his internal, speaking and doing his external.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 402

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 402

402. (vi) THE PURELY NATURAL AND SENSUAL MAN.

Few know who are meant by the term 'sensual men' or what sort of people they are, so, since it is important to know this, they must be described.

1. The term 'sensual man' is applied to a person whose every judgment relies upon the bodily senses, and who believes nothing but what he can see with his eyes and touch with his hands, regarding these things as real and rejecting all else. So the sensual man is the lowest level of the natural man.

[2] 2. The interiors of his mind, which would allow him to see by the light of heaven, are shut off, so that he can see there no truth at all that has to do with heaven or the church, since he thinks at the most superficial level with no inward enlightenment from any spiritual light.

[3] 3. Since he enjoys the gross light of nature, he is inwardly opposed to anything to do with heaven or the church, even though outwardly he can speak in their favour, with passion if he seeks power by their means.

[4] 4. Sensual men are sharp and clever in reasoning, because their thought is so close to their speech that it is virtually in it, so to speak, on their lips; and because in speaking they regard all intelligence as based solely upon memory.

[5] 5. Some of them are able to prove anything they wish, and with great skill what is false; and after proving them they believe these ideas are true. But their reasoning and proofs are based upon illusions produced by the senses, and these serve to attract the attention of and persuade ordinary people.

[6] 6. Sensual men surpass others in trickery and malice.

[7] 7. The interiors of their minds are foul and filthy, since through them they are in touch with the hells.

[8] 8. The spirits in the hells are sensual, and the deeper their hell, the more sensual they are. The sphere emanating from spirits in hell links itself to a person's sensual faculty from behind.

[9] 9. Sensual men cannot see any genuine truth in light, but reason and dispute on all subjects whether it is so. These disputes are heard by others as the sound of gnashing of teeth; this is, on a correct view, the noise of falsities in conflict with one another and the conflict of falsity and truth. Hence it is plain what is meant by 'gnashing of teeth' in the Word. This is because reasoning from the illusions produced by the senses corresponds to the teeth.

[10] 10. Educated and learned people who have become deeply convinced of false ideas are more sensual than other people, and even more so, if they oppose the truths of the Word, though they may not appear so to the world's eyes. Heresies have chiefly sprung from people who were sensual.

[11] 11. Hypocrites, tricksters, pleasure-seekers, adulterers and misers are for the most part sensual.

[12] 12. Those who reasoned solely from sense impressions, and against the genuine truths of the Word, and therefore of the church, were called by the ancients serpents of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Since sense impressions mean things impinging on the bodily senses and apprehended by their means, it follows that:

[13] 13. By sense impressions a person is in touch with the world, and by rational ideas above their level with heaven.

[14] 14. Sense impressions supply such things from the natural world as may be of service to the interiors of the mind in the spiritual world.

[15] 15. There are sense impressions which supply the understanding (these are the various natural phenomena known as physics), and there are sense impressions which supply the will (these are the pleasures of the senses and the body).

[16] 16. If thought is not raised above the level of sense impressions, a person's wisdom is very restricted; - a wise man thinks on a higher level than sense impressions. When his thought is raised above this level, he comes into brighter illumination, and eventually into the light of heaven. This is how a person perceives truth, which is what intelligence really is.

[17] 17. The ancients were well acquainted with the raising of the mind above sense impressions and its withdrawal from them.

[18] 18. If sense impressions are in the last place, they serve to open the way for the understanding, and truths are refined by the method by which they are extracted. But if sense impressions occupy the first place, they serve to block that way, and a person can only see truths as if in a mist, or as if at night.

[19] 19. Sense impressions occupy the last place in the case of a wise person, and they are subject to more inward things; but in the case of an unwise person they occupy the first place and are dominant. It is these people who are properly called sensual.

[20] 20. Human beings have some sense impressions which are shared with animals, and others which are not. [21] To the extent that a person thinks above the level of sense impressions, he is truly a human being. But no one can think above this level and see the truths of the church, unless he acknowledges God and lives in accordance with His commandments. For it is God who raises the level and enlightens the mind.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 403

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 403

403. II

When the three loves are duly subordinated, they increase a person's perfection; but when they are not, they corrupt and turn him upside down.

Something must first be said about how the three universal loves - love of heaven, love of the world and self-love - are subordinated one to another. Then I shall discuss the way one is introduced into another and exerts an effect upon it; and finally how a person's state depends upon this subordination. The three loves are related like the three regions of the body; the highest is the head, the middle one is the chest and belly, the third the knees, feet and soles of the feet. When the love of heaven makes up the head, the love of the world the chest and belly, and self-love the feet and soles, then a person is in the perfect state for which he was created, since then the two lower loves are at the service of the highest, just as the body and all its parts are at the service of the head. So when the love of heaven makes up the head, this then exerts its influence on the love of the world, which is chiefly the love of wealth, and employs wealth in order to perform services; and through the medium of the love of the world it influences self-love, which is chiefly the love of honours and employs these in order to perform services. Thus the influence each of these loves exerts on another makes all these three loves aim at being of service.

sRef Matt@6 @22 S2' [2] Can anyone fail to understand that when a person wishes to perform services because he is moved by spiritual love - that is, love from the Lord, or what is meant by the love of heaven - it is the natural man who does them by means of his wealth and other possessions, and the sensual man who employs his offices for their production, and this is his honour? Again can anyone fail to understand that all the deeds a person performs with his body are dependent upon the mental state in his head, and if his mind is set on the love of services, the body performs them by means of its limbs? This is because the will and the understanding are present in their origins in the head, but in the derivatives from these in the body, just as the will is present in deeds and thought in the utterances of speech. As a comparison, it is like the fructifying power of the seed present in every single part of a tree, which it employs to serve its purposes, namely to produce its fruits. It is also like fire and light inside a crystal vase, which by their effect becomes warm and shines. So it is with the spiritual vision in the mind and equally the natural vision in the body in the case of a person in whom the three loves are properly and duly subordinated, as the result of the light which flows in from the Lord through heaven; this can be likened to the pomegranate which is translucent to the centre, where the seed-container is. The meaning of these words of the Lord is similar:

The eye is the lamp of the body; if the eye is single (that is, good), the whole body is full of light. Matt. 6:22; Luke 11:34.

[3] No sane person can condemn wealth, for in the body politic it plays the part blood plays in the person; nor can he condemn the honours attached to offices, for officials are the king's hands and pillars of society, so long as their natural and sensual loves are subordinated to spiritual love. There are administrative offices in heaven too, and these have honours attached to them, but those who discharge these offices have no greater love than the performance of services, because they are spiritual people.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 404

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 404

404. But a person assumes a totally different state, if the love of the world or wealth makes up the head, if, that is, this is the dominant love. For then the love of heaven is banished from the head and transfers itself to the body. A person in this state puts the world before heaven; he may worship God, but as the result of a purely natural love, which sees merit in every act of worship; he may also do good to the neighbour, but for the sake of what he gets in return. What belongs to heaven is to these people like robes, in which they walk in splendour to men's eyes, but in drab attire to the eyes of angels. For when the love of the world occupies the internal man, and the love of heaven the external, then the love of the world darkens everything to do with the church and hides it as if behind a veil.

[2] There is, however, a great deal of variation in this love. It is worse the more it tends to avarice; in this case the love of heaven turns black. It is much the same if it tends to pride and ambition to dominate others as the result of self-love. It is different, however, if it tends towards prodigality; this is less harmful, if it aims at worldly splendour, such as palaces, ornaments, fine clothes, servants, horses and carriages for show and such like. The quality of any love is determined by the end which is its aim and purpose.

This love can be likened to a blackened crystal which chokes the light, and does not break it up into colours, except dull and fleeting ones. It is also like mist and clouds, which take away the radiance of the sun. Or it is like new unfermented wine, which, for all its sweet taste is bad for the stomach. Such a person, seen from heaven looks like a hunchback, walking with his head bowed to the ground; and when he lifts it to the sky, he wrenches his muscles, and quickly reverts to his downward gaze. The ancients in the church called such people by the name of Mammon and the Greeks by the name of Pluto.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 405

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 405

405. However, if self-love or the love of controlling others makes up the head, then the love of heaven passes through the body to the feet. The more self-love increases, the more the love of heaven sinks through the ankles to the soles of the feet; and if it goes on increasing, it passes through the shoes and is trampled underfoot. The love of controlling others is of two kinds, that resulting from love of the neighbour and that resulting from self-love. Those who are set on the love of controlling others as the result of love of the neighbour seek power in order to perform services to the public and to individuals; these therefore have power entrusted to them in the heavens.

[2] Emperors, kings and dukes, who were born and brought up to positions of power, if they humble themselves before God, are sometimes less set on the love of power than those of lowly origin, who from pride seek high rank more than others. But those who are set on the love of controlling others as the result of self-love treat the love of heaven like a foot-stool; for the sake of the common people they rest their feet upon it, but, when the common people are not to be seen, throw it into a corner or out of doors. The reason is that they love only themselves, and therefore plunge their wills and the thoughts of their minds in the self (proprium), which regarded in itself is hereditary evil; and this is diametrically opposed to the love of heaven.

[3] The evils which beset those who love to control others as the result of self-love are generally speaking the following: contempt for others, envy, unfriendliness directed against those who do not show them favour, hostility resulting from this, hatred, the taking of revenge, pitilessness, ferocity and cruelty. Where such evils exist, there too are found contempt for God and what is God's, that is, the various kinds of truth and good which belong to the church. If they respect these, it is only with the lips, to prevent their reputations being attacked by the clergy and abused by everyone else.

[4] But there is a difference in this love between the clergy and laymen. In the case of the clergy, if this love is freed from restraint, it rises so high they want to become gods; but in the case of laymen, they want to become kings. That is the height to which the fantasising caused by that love carries away their minds.

[5] In the case of the perfect person, the love of heaven occupies the highest position and, so to speak, forms the head of all the loves that follow; the love of the world is below it and is, so to speak, the chest beneath the head; and self-love is below this in the position of the feet. This being so, if self-love made up the head, the person would be turned completely upside down. He would then appear to the angels as if lying with his head bowed down to the ground and with his back to the sky. While engaged in worship, he would seem as if dancing on his hands and feet, like a panther cub. Moreover such people might appear in the shape of various animals with two heads, one above with the face of a wild animal, the other below with a human face, constantly pushed down by the upper one and forced to kiss the ground. All these people are sensual men, and such as have been described above in 402.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 406

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 406

406.* III

Every person taken singly is the neighbour who is to be loved, but he should be loved according to the quality of his good.

Man was not born for his own sake, but for the sake of others; that is, so that he should not live for himself alone, but for others. Otherwise no society could hold together, nor could there be any good in it. The common saying goes, that each person is his own neighbour; but the doctrine of charity teaches us how we ought to understand this. It means that each person should procure for himself the necessities of life, such as food, clothing, somewhere to live and many other things demanded by the society in which he lives. These he should procure not only for himself, but for his people; and not only for the present, but also for the future. For unless a person provides himself with the necessities of life, he is not in a position to exercise charity, being in want of everything.

In what way, however, each person ought to be his own neighbour can be seen from this analogy. Everyone ought to provide his body with food; this is the first consideration, but for the purpose of having a healthy mind in a healthy body. Everyone ought also to provide his mind with the food it needs, such things as fall within the domain of intelligence and judgment, but in order that he may as a result be in a position to be of service to his fellow citizen, his community, country, the church and so the Lord. Anyone who does this provides well for himself for ever. This shows plainly what is first in time, and what is first in purpose; and it is this which all else has in view. This is also like someone building a house: first he lays the foundations, but the purpose of the foundations is the building of a house, and the purpose of the house is to be somewhere to live. Anyone who thinks being his own neighbour comes first or takes the leading position is like someone who regards the foundations as the purpose rather than having somewhere to live; when in fact this is the first and last purpose in building, and the house with its foundations is only a means to this end.

* This passage is closely modelled on HD 97, 98.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 407

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 407

407. It needs to be said what loving the neighbour means. Loving the neighbour is not only wishing well and doing good to a relative, a friend or a good person, but also to a stranger, one who is no friend, or a wicked person. But charity is exercised in different ways with these two groups: by means of direct kindnesses to a relative or friend, but by indirect kindnesses to one who is no friend or wicked. These indirect kindnesses are done by way of appeals, penalties and punishments, and so by attempts to reform him. The following can serve as an illustration. A judge who punishes a wrong-doer according to the law and justice, is loving his neighbour. For thus he reforms him, and takes care to prevent his fellow citizens being wronged. Everyone knows that a father who chastises his children when they do wrong loves them; and in the opposite case if he does not chastise them for it, he loves their faults, and this cannot be called charity. Moreover, if anyone repels an unfriendly attack and strikes the attacker in self-defence, or hands him over to a judge, so as to avoid suffering harm, still with the intention of becoming his friend, his actions are in the mainstream of charity. Neither are wars which are intended to protect one's country or church contrary to charity. The purpose for which they are undertaken determines whether or not they are charitable.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 408

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 408

408. Since then charity is in origin wishing well, and wishing well resides in the internal man, it is plain that when anyone who possesses charity resists an attacker, punishes a guilty party, and chastises wicked people, he does so by means of the external man. After doing so therefore he returns to charity, which is in the internal man, and then so far as he can or it is beneficial, he wishes him well and as a result he does good to him. Those who possess genuine charity are zealous for good. That zeal can appear in the external man as anger and flaming fire; but it is quenched and allayed as soon as the opponent returns to his senses. The case is different with those who lack charity; their zeal is anger and hatred, which cause their internal man to seethe and catch fire.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 409

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 409

sRef Matt@5 @43 S0' sRef Matt@18 @22 S0' sRef Matt@18 @21 S0' sRef Matt@5 @44 S0' sRef Matt@5 @45 S0' 409. Before the Lord came into the world hardly anyone knew what the internal man was or what charity was. This is why in many places He taught loving care, which is charity; and this is a difference between the Old and New Testaments (or Covenants). The Lord taught that kindness should be done out of charity to an opponent or enemy in this passage of Matthew:

You have heard that the men of old were told, You are to love your neighbour and hate your enemy. But I tell you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who hurt and persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father in the heavens. Matt. 5:43-45.

And when Peter asked Him how many times he should forgive one who sinned against him, whether it should be as many as seven times, He replied:

Not up to seven times, I tell you, but up to seventy times seven times. Matt. 18:21, 22.

I have been told from heaven that the Lord forgives everyone his sins, and never punishes him for them, or even imputes them to him, because He is love itself and good itself. Nevertheless the sins are not wiped away by this, for it is only by repentance that they can be wiped away. For if he told Peter to forgive up to seventy times seven times, is there anything that the Lord Himself would not do?

TCR (Chadwick) n. 410

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 410

410. Since charity itself resides in the internal man, the seat of the good will, and is from there in the external, the seat of good actions, it follows that it is the internal man who is to be loved, and the external man as a consequence. It also follows that a person should be loved for the quality of good there is in him; good itself therefore is essentially the neighbour. This can be illustrated by these examples. When anyone chooses from three or four persons a steward to run his household, or to be a servant, does he not investigate that person's internal man, and choose one who is honest and faithful, and so love him? Similarly a king or magistrate chooses from three or four candidates one who is suitable for office and rejects one who is unsuitable, however fine he looks and however much he speaks and acts to curry favour.

[2] Since therefore every person is the neighbour, and people display infinite variety, and each of them is to be loved as the neighbour in accordance with the good in him, it is clear that love towards the neighbour has genera and species, as well as degrees. Now because the Lord is to be loved above all else, it follows that the degrees of that love are to be measured by love to Him; in other words, by how much of the Lord or what is from the Lord he possesses in himself, for this is a measure of how much good he possesses too, because all good comes from the Lord.

[3] But because these degrees exist in the internal man, who is rarely to be discerned in the world, it is sufficient for one to love the neighbour in terms of the degrees one does know. After death these are clearly perceived, for in that world the affections of the will and the resulting thoughts of the understanding create a spiritual sphere around them, which is felt in various ways. But in the world that spiritual sphere is absorbed by the material body and is enveloped in the natural sphere which then emanates from the person. The existence of degrees of love towards the neighbour is proved by the Lord's parable about the Samaritan, who had pity on the man wounded by robbers, though the priest and the Levite saw him and passed by; and when the Lord asked which of the three would seem to have been the neighbour, he received the reply, 'The one who had pity' (Luke 10:30-37).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 411

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 411

sRef Matt@7 @12 S0' sRef Luke@10 @27 S0' 411. We read:

You are to love the Lord God above all and your neighbour as yourself. Luke 10:27.

Loving the neighbour as oneself means not despising him compared with oneself, dealing justly with him, and not passing wicked judgment upon him. The law of charity promulgated and given by the Lord Himself is this:

Whatever you wish people to do to you, do the same to them; for this is the Law and the Prophets. Matt. 7:12, Luke 6:31, 32.

That is how those who are impelled by the love of heaven love the neighbour; but those who are impelled by the love of the world love the neighbour in worldly fashion and for worldly reasons, and those who are impelled by self-love love the neighbour in selfish fashion and for selfish reasons.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 412

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 412

412. IV

Man collectively, which is one's community, great or small, and as a group of communities, which is one's country, is the neighbour who is to be loved.

Those who are ignorant of the true meaning of the term 'the neighbour' think that it is an individual, and doing him kindnesses is loving the neighbour. But the neighbour and love for him have a wider range of meaning, rising to a higher level as the number of people increases. Can anyone fail to grasp that loving a number of people in a group is loving the neighbour more than just loving one out of the group? The reason why a community, great or small, is the neighbour is that it consists of a number of people. It follows from this that a person who loves a community loves its members, so that if he wishes well and does good to the community, he takes thought for each of its members. A community resembles an individual, and those who belong to it make up as it were a single body, with mutual differences like those of the parts of the body. The Lord, and by His guidance the angels, on looking down to the earth see a whole community in the form of a single person, whose appearance depends upon what its members are like. I too have been permitted to see a certain community in heaven looking exactly like a person, and of the same size as a person in the world.

[2] Love towards the neighbour takes a fuller form when it is love towards a community than when its object is a separate individual. This is clearly shown by the fact that higher rank is granted to governors depending on the size of the communities in their charge, and they are honoured in proportion to the services they perform. Offices in the world are of higher or lower rank in a hierarchy depending upon whether their control of a community is more or less universal, the king having the most universal control; each person is rewarded, honoured and generally loved in proportion to the importance of his office and the good his service does.

[3] But rulers of the present time can perform useful functions and take thought for their community without loving the neighbour, as in the case of those who are motivated to perform useful functions and take thought for worldly or selfish reasons, so that they may seem good rulers or deserving promotion to higher ranks. But although such rulers are not distinguishable in the world, they are in heaven. Those therefore who have been led by love towards the neighbour to perform useful functions are also made rulers of a community in heaven, and enjoy magnificent surroundings and honours; but they do not set their hearts on these things, but on the services they can perform. The rest, however, who have been led by love of the world or self-love to perform useful functions, are rejected.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 413

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 413

413. The difference between love towards the neighbour and its exercise, when directed towards an individual and when it is directed towards a group of people or a community, is like that between the functions of an ordinary citizen, a magistrate and a duke; or between one trading with two talents and one with ten talents* (Matt. 25:14-30). It is like the difference in value between a shekel and a talent**; or between the produce of a vine and that of a vineyard, or an olive tree and an olive grove, or a tree and an orchard. Love towards the neighbour can rise to ever more interior levels in a person; and as it rises it is directed towards the community rather than an individual, and towards the country rather than the community. Now since charity consists in wishing well and so doing good, it follows that it ought to be exercised in much the same way towards the community as towards the individual. But a distinction should be drawn between a community of good people and one of wicked people. In this latter case charity should be exercised in accordance with natural equity, in the former case in accordance with spiritual equity. The difference between these two kinds of equity will be discussed elsewhere.

* The Gospel has 'five talents', but cf. Luke 19:11-27.
** 3000 shekels make one talent.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 414

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 414

414. The reason one's country is more the neighbour than one's community is that it is composed of a number of communities, so that love directed towards it is wider and higher. Moreover, loving one's country is loving the well-being of the people. One's country is the neighbour because it is a kind of parent; it is where one was born; it has fed and feeds one; it has protected and protects one from injury. One should do good to the country one loves according to its needs, some of which are natural, some spiritual. Natural needs are concerned with its secular life and order, spiritual ones with its spiritual life and order.

[2] There is a law engraved on the hearts of men that one's country should be loved, not as a person loves himself, but more than oneself. This law commands, and this is what every righteous man declares, that if one's country is threatened with destruction by an enemy or any other danger, it is a noble act to die in its defence, and a soldier should take pride in shedding his blood for it. People say this because one's country ought to be loved that dearly. It needs to be known that those who love their country and do good to it as the result of their good will, after death love the Lord's kingdom, since this is then their country; and those who love the Lord's kingdom love the Lord, because the Lord is all in all to His kingdom.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 415

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 415

415. V

The neighbour who is to be loved in a higher degree is the church, and in the highest degree the Lord's kingdom.

Since man is born destined for everlasting life, and it is the church which brings him to this, the church ought to be loved as neighbour in a higher degree. For the church's teaching is the means leading to and giving entry to everlasting life. It is the truths of its teaching which lead and the good deeds performed which give entry to it. This does not mean that the priesthood is to be loved in a higher degree, and the church because of the priesthood. It is the good and truth of the church which ought to be loved, and the priesthood for their sake. The priesthood only serves as a means, and should be honoured to the extent that it so serves.

[2] Another reason why the church is the neighbour to be loved in a higher degree, and so more than one's country, is that one's country introduces one to secular life, but the church introduces one to spiritual life, the life which distinguishes man from living purely as an animal. Moreover, secular life is temporary, having an end, and is then as if it had never been. But spiritual life, having no end, is everlasting, so that the term 'being' may be used of it, but 'not-being' of the other form of life. The difference is like that between the finite and the infinite, which are incommensurable; for what is everlasting is infinite in respect of time.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 416

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 416

sRef Dan@7 @14 S0' sRef Matt@6 @33 S0' sRef Dan@7 @13 S0' 416. The reason why the Lord's kingdom is the neighbour to be loved in the highest degree is that the Lord's kingdom means the church throughout the whole world, what is called the communion of saints, and it also means heaven. If therefore a person loves the Lord's kingdom, he loves everyone in the whole world who acknowledges the Lord and has faith in Him and charity towards the neighbour, as well as all in heaven. Those who love the Lord's kingdom love the Lord above all else, and consequently have greater love to God than all others. For the church in the heavens and upon earth is the Lord's body, since its members are in the Lord and the Lord in them.

[2] Love for the Lord's kingdom then is love towards the neighbour in the fullest sense. For those who love the Lord's kingdom not only love the Lord above all else, but also love the neighbour as themselves. Love to the Lord is universal love, thus pervading every detail of spiritual life and also every detail of natural life. For that love dwells at the highest level in a person, and what is highest flows into what is lower, bringing it to life, just as the will does into every intention and thus every action, and as the understanding into every thought and thus every utterance. This is why the Lord says:

Seek first the kingdom of the heavens and its righteousness, then everything will be given to you in addition. Matt. 6:33,

The kingdom of the heavens is the Lord's kingdom, as is established by this passage in Daniel:

Behold, one like the Son of Man was coming with the clouds of the heavens. And to him was given dominion, glory and the kingdom, and all peoples, nations and tongues will worship him. His dominion will be a dominion for ever, which will not pass away and his kingdom one which will not perish. Dan. 7:13, 14.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 417

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 417

417. VI

The essence of loving the neighbour is not loving a person, but the good in him.

Everyone knows that what makes a human being human is not having a human face and a human body, but the wisdom in his understanding and the goodness in his will. The higher the levels these reach, the more human he is. Man at birth is more of a brute than any animal, but he becomes a human being by receiving instruction, which forms his mind, and as a result of this and in proportion to it he becomes truly human. There are animals with faces which look like human ones, but they enjoy no ability to understand or to do anything as the result of understanding. They act by instinct, which is aroused by their natural love. The difference is that an animal makes noises to express the affections of its love, while a human being submits these to thought and utters them in words. Also an animal faces downwards and looks at the ground, while a human being holds his face up and looks at the sky all around. From this it can be inferred that a human being is human in so far as he speaks with sound reason and keeps in mind his stay in heaven; and he is not human in so far as he speaks contrary to reason and keeps in mind only his stay on earth. Still such people are human beings, not in fact but potentially. For every person enjoys the potentiality of understanding truths and willing good deeds; but to the extent that he does not wish to do good deeds and understand truths, to that extent he can externally pretend to be human and ape human behaviour.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 418

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 418

418. The reason why good is the neighbour is that good belongs to the will, and the will is the being (esse) of a person's life. The truth in the understanding is also the neighbour, but only so far as it is the product of good in the will. For good in the will takes on form in the understanding and there makes itself visible in the light of reason. All experience goes to show that good is the neighbour. Does anyone love a person except for what his will and understanding are like, that is, for the goodness and righteousness in him? For example, does anyone love a king, a prince, a duke, a provost or governor or magistrate of any rank, or any kind of judge, except for the [righteousness and]* judgment they display in speech or action? Does anyone love a bishop or any church minister or a person in holy orders, except for his learning, uprightness of life and zeal for saving souls? Does anyone love the general of an army, or any of the officers under his command, except for a combination of bravery and prudence? Does anyone love a trader except for his honesty? Or a workman or servant except for his faithfulness? To go further, does anyone love a tree except for its fruit, a piece of ground except for its fertility, a stone except for its value, and so on? The extraordinary thing is that not only does an upright man love goodness and fairness in another, but so does a dishonest man, because he knows that in dealing with him he need have no fear of losing his reputation, rank or wealth. But the dishonest man's love of good is not love of the neighbour, for the dishonest man does not inwardly love any other, except in so far as they serve his purposes. Loving the good in another out of the goodness in oneself is the real love for the neighbour; then the goodness in each kisses the other and establishes a mutual bond.

* It would appear that the text is incomplete at this point.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 419

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 419

419. A person who loves good because it is good, and truth because it is true, is the one who above all loves the neighbour, because he loves the Lord, who is good itself and truth itself. There is no other source of the love of good and of truth from good, and so of the neighbour. This is how love towards the neighbour is formed from its heavenly origin. It makes no difference whether we say service or good; performing services is doing good, and good deeds are good depending to what extent and in what way they are of use.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 420

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 420

420. VII

Charity and good deeds are two different things, as are wishing well and doing good.

Everyone has an internal and an external. The internal is what is called the internal man, the external is what is called the external man. Anyone who is unaware of what the internal and external man are, might think that the internal man is the one who thinks and wills, and the external man is the one who speaks and acts. Admittedly speech and action are functions of the external man, and thought and will of the internal man; but they are not essentially what constitute the external and internal man. As commonly understood it is a person's mind which is the internal man; but the mind itself is divided into two zones, and the one which is higher and interior is spiritual, the other which is lower and exterior is natural. The spiritual mind concentrates on the spiritual world and the objects of its attention are the contents of that world, either the kind of things to be found in heaven, or the kind to be found in hell; both heaven and hell are part of the spiritual world. The natural mind, however, concentrates upon the natural world, and the objects of its attention are the contents of that world, whether good or evil. Every action and utterance by a person comes directly from the lower zone of his mind, and indirectly from the higher zone, since the lower zone of the mind is closer to the bodily senses, and the higher zone is more distant from them. Human beings have this division of the mind, because they were created to be simultaneously spiritual and natural, and thus not animals but human beings.

[2] This shows plainly that a person who looks to the world and himself in the first place is an external man, because he is natural not only in body but also in mind, while a person who looks in the first place to what belongs to heaven and the church is an internal man, because he is spiritual in both mind and body. He is spiritual in body too, because his actions and utterances come from his higher mind, which is spiritual, by way of the lower mind, which is natural. For it is well known that effects come from the body, and the causes which produce them from the mind, and the cause is wholly in the effect. This division of the human mind is obvious from the fact that a person can put on a pretence, or play the part of a toady, hypocrite and actor; he can assent to another's statements, while yet laughing at them. The laughter comes from his higher mind, the assent from the lower.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 421

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 421

421. These points can show how we must understand the assertion that charity and good deeds are as different as willing well and doing good; that is to say, they are formally distinct as is the mind which thinks and wills from the body which the mind uses to speak and act. But there is also an essential distinction, because the mind itself is distinguished into an interior zone which is spiritual, and an exterior which is natural, as was said previously. If therefore deeds come from the spiritual mind, they come from its good will, which is charity; but if they come from the natural mind, they come from good will which is not charity. Even though it may seem in external appearance like charity, it is not charity in its interior appearance. Charity merely in external appearance may indeed look like charity, but it does not possess the essence of charity.

This can be illustrated by a comparison with seeds in the earth. Each separate seed grows into a plant, either useful or useless, depending on what the seed is. The same happens with spiritual seed, which is the truth the church learns from the Word. Doctrine is formed from this, useful doctrine if formed from genuine truths, useless if from falsified truths. It is exactly the same with the formation of charity from willing well, depending whether this is for selfish or worldly reasons, or for the sake of the neighbour, whether this is narrowly or broadly interpreted. If it is for selfish or worldly reasons, it is spurious charity, but if for the sake of the neighbour, it is genuine charity. However, more on this subject may be found in the chapter on faith, in particular in the section where it was shown that charity is having a good will, and that good deeds are doing good from having a good will (374); and that charity and faith are merely unstable mental concepts unless, when possible, they are realised in deeds and come into existence together in them (375, 376).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 422

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 422

422. VIII

Real charity is dealing fairly and faithfully in whatever position, business or work one is engaged in, and with those with whom one comes into contact.

Real charity is dealing fairly and faithfully in whatever position, business or work one is engaged in, because everything a person so does is of use to the community; and use is good; and good, leaving persons out of account, is the neighbour. (It was shown above that not only the individual but also the community, [great or]* small, and one's country is the neighbour.) For example, if a king sets his subjects an example by his good deeds, if he desires them to live in accordance with the laws of justice, rewarding those who do so, treating all according to their deserts, if he protects them from injury and invasion, acts as father to his kingdom and in general takes thought for the prosperity of his people, he has charity in his heart and his acts are good deeds. If a priest teaches truths from the Word, and uses them to lead people to live a good life, and so to reach heaven, he is a prime example of the exercise of charity, because he takes thought for the souls of the people in his church. If a judge bases his decisions on justice and the law, and is not influenced by bribes, friendship or nepotism, he takes thought for the community in general and the individual in particular; for the community, because this keeps it obedient to the law and afraid of breaking it; for the individual, by the fact that justice triumphs over injustice. If a business man acts honestly and not fraudulently, he takes thought for the neighbour with whom he has dealings. The same is true of a workman or craftsman, if he does his work properly and honestly, without pretence or deceit. The same is true of other occupations, such as ship-captains and sailors, or farmers and servants.

* For the insertion, cf. 412.1.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 423

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 423

aRef Jer@31 @33 S0' 423. This is real charity, because it can be defined as doing good to the neighbour daily and constantly, not only to the neighbour as an individual but also collectively; and the only way of doing this is by good and fair dealing in the position, business or work in which one is engaged and with anyone with whom one comes into contact. For this is what one does every day, and when one is not doing it, it still constantly occupies one's mind, one's thoughts and intentions. A person who exercises charity in this way becomes more and more a living form of charity; for justice and faithfulness develop his mind, and* exercise does his body, and in process of time the formation of his mind prevents him from willing and thinking of anything but such things as have to do with charity. These people end up by becoming like those described in the Word as having the law engraved on their hearts. Also they do not regard deeds as meritorious, since they never think of that, but rather about the duty which makes a decent citizen act like this. But a person can by no means act from spiritual justice and faithfulness of himself, for everyone inherits from his parents the trait of doing good and acting fairly for selfish and worldly reasons, and no one does so for the sake of goodness and fairness. If therefore anyone worships the Lord, and while acting of himself acts under the Lord's guidance, it is he who acquires spiritual charity, and by its exercise absorbs it.

* Perhaps ut 'as' should be read here for et 'and'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 424

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 424

424. There are many people who fairly and faithfully perform their duties, and although in this way they do the deeds of charity, yet possess no charity in themselves. These are the people in whom self-love and love of the world are dominant, not the love of heaven; or if this is present, it is subject to another love, like a slave under his master, or a common soldier under his officer, and it resembles a door-keeper standing in a doorway.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 425

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 425

425. IX

The kindnesses of charity are giving to the poor and helping the needy, but with prudence.

A distinction must be drawn between the duties of charity and its kindnesses. By the duties of charity is meant the exercise of charity arising directly from charity itself; as was shown just above, these chiefly have to do with one's work. But by kindnesses we mean the secondary actions which go beyond the first group. They are called kindnesses, because a person is free to do them as he chooses; and when they are done, they are regarded by the recipient as nothing but kindnesses. They are distributed in accordance with the reasons and intentions the person who does them has in mind. It is generally believed that charity consists only in giving to the poor, helping the needy, taking care of widows and orphans, making donations to the building of hospices and hospitals, hostels, orphanages, and above all churches, and to their decoration and their income. But the majority of these are not the proper work of charity, but are additional to it.

[2] Those who suppose these kindnesses to be real charity cannot help believing their deeds are meritorious; and despite their verbal protestations that they do not want them to be meritorious, they still have lurking in them the belief that they are. This is plain to see after their death. Then they count up their deeds and demand salvation as their reward. But then enquiry is made into the origin and thus the nature of their deeds; and if it is found that they arose either from pride, or seeking a reputation, or from mere generosity, or from friendship, or from purely natural inclination, or from hyprocrisy, then that origin judges them, since the nature of its origin is present in every deed. True charity, however, is the product of those who have employed fairness and careful judgment in their deeds, which they perform without any intention of being rewarded, in accordance with the Lord's words (Luke 14:12-14). These people also call the sort of actions mentioned above kindnesses, as well as duties, though they are a part of charity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 426

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 426

426. It is well known that some people who have performed those kind acts which the world counts as pictures of charity hold the belief and think that they have carried out the deeds of charity, regarding them, as many Roman Catholics do indulgences, as reasons why they have been cleansed of their sins, and why they should be granted admission to heaven as regenerate. Yet they still do not regard as sins acts of adultery, hatred, revenge, fraud and in general the longings of the flesh, which they indulge in as they like. But in this case what are those good deeds of theirs but paintings showing angels associating with devils, or boxes of lapis lazuli containing poisonous snakes? But it is quite different if those acts of kindness are done by people who shun the wicked deeds listed above as hateful to charity.

[2] For in fact those kindnesses are in many ways beneficial, particularly giving to the poor and to beggars. They are a means by which boys and girls, servants and maids, and generally speaking all simple folk are introduced to charity; these are the external acts which lead people to absorb the functions of charity. They are its beginnings, and then like unripe fruit; and in the case of those who are later perfected by acquiring a proper knowledge of charity and faith, they become like ripe fruit. When this happens they look on their previous deeds as performed out of simplicity of heart, and nothing more than duties.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 427

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 427

427. Those kind acts are at the present time believed to be the proper deeds of charity meant in the Word by good deeds, because charity is in many passages described in the Word by giving to the poor, helping the needy, and taking care of widows and orphans. But up to now it has not been known that the Word in its literal meaning names only such things as form the external, in fact, the outermost aspects of worship, but uses them as a means of conveying spiritual or internal ideas. On this see above in the chapter on the Sacred Scripture (193-209). It will be clear from what is said there that when the poor, the needy, widows and orphans are mentioned, it is not they who are meant, but those who are spiritually like them. 'The poor' means those who lack the knowledge of truth and good: see APOCALYPSE REVEALED 209. 'Widows' means those who lack truths, but still want them (AR 764), and so on.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 428

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 428

428. Those who are born with a disposition to mercy, but do not make their natural acts of mercy spiritual, as they would if they did them out of true charity, believe that charity consists in giving to everyone who is poor and helping everyone who is needy, without previously enquiring whether the poor or needy person is good or wicked. For they claim that this is unnecessary, since God has regard only to the help or alms given. But after death these people are easily distinguished and separated from those who have performed the kind acts of charity with prudence. For those who did them from that blind notion of charity, are as kind to the wicked as to the good, and the wicked use these kindnesses to do evil, and so to harm the good. So it is that the people who do kindnesses are to blame too for the harm done to the good. Doing a kindness to an evil-doer is like giving bread to a devil, which he turns into poison. Any bread in the hands of a devil is poison, or if it is not, he turns it into poison, an action accomplished by enticing someone to evil by being kind to him. It is also like offering one's opponent a sword, with which he can kill someone. Or like giving a werewolf a shepherd's staff to lead the sheep to pasture; yet when he has got it he leads the sheep away from the pastures into deserted places and there slaughters them. It is like giving the office of magistrate to a robber, whose only purpose is to keep his eyes open for booty; he dispenses justice and makes his decisions with an eye on how wealthy and affluent his victim is.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 429

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 429

429. X

Some charitable duties are public, some domestic and some private.

There is a difference between charitable kindnesses and charitable duties, like that between acts undertaken by free choice and those done of necessity. Still, by charitable duties we do not here mean the duties attached to office in a kingdom or republic, such as that of ministers to administer, of judges to judge, and so on, but the duties of every individual whatever his occupation. They come therefore from a different origin and are the result of a different act of will, so that those who are charitable do them out of charity, and in the opposite case the uncharitable do them out of lack of charity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 430

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 430

430. Public charitable duties are chiefly taxes and excise duties, which must not be confused with the duties of office. Those who are spiritual feel differently about paying them from those who are purely natural. Spiritual people pay them with a good will, because they are collected to run the country, to protect it and the church, and to pay for its administration by officials and governors, whose salaries and stipends have to be paid out of the public treasury. Those therefore who regard their country and their church as the neighbour pay their taxes freely and willingly, thinking it wrong to cheat and evade them. But those who do not regard their country and church as the neighbour pay them unwillingly and reluctantly, defrauding the collector and withholding money whenever they have an opportunity. For these people their home and their flesh are the neighbour.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 431

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 431

431. Domestic charitable duties are those of a husband to his wife and a wife to her husband; as well as those of a father and mother to their children, and those of children to their parents; also those of a master or mistress to their servants and maids, and theirs to their masters. These duties, being concerned with the bringing up of children and the running of a home, are so numerous that if they were listed they would fill a book. It is a different kind of love which urges each person to these duties from that which urges them to the duties of office. In the case of a husband's duties to his wife and a wife's to her husband it is the result of conjugial love and dependent upon this. In the case of a father's and mother's love for their children, it is the result of the instinctive love everyone has, what is called parental affection. In the case of children for their parents it is the result of and dependent on another love which is closely connected with dutiful obedience. The duties, however, of a master or mistress to their servants and maids draw something from the love of controlling others, and this varies according to each person's state of mind.

[2] But conjugial love, and the love for children, together with their duties and the fulfilment of these duties, do not create love towards the neighbour, as does the fulfilment of the duties of office. For what is called parental affection exists just as much with the wicked as the good, and is sometimes stronger in the case of the wicked; it also exists with animals and birds, which are incapable of the development of charity. It is well known that this exists with bears, tigers and snakes just as much as with sheep and goats, with owls just as much as with doves.

[3] On the particular subject of parents' duties to their children, there is an intrinsic difference between those of the charitable and the uncharitable, although outwardly they appear similar. In the case of the charitable that love is linked with love towards the neighbour and love to God, for these people love their children for their morals, their virtues, their enthusiasms, and their talents for public service. But in the case of the uncharitable there is no linking of charity with parental affection. Most of these people therefore love their children even if they are wicked, immoral and sly more than if they are good, moral and prudent; in other words, they love those who are no use to the public more than those who are useful.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 432

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 432

432. Private charitable duties are also numerous; for instance, paying workmen their wages, paying interest on loans, honouring promissory notes, keeping deposits safe and such like. Some of these are duties imposed by criminal or civil law, some by moral law. Here too there is a difference in mental attitude between the charitable and the uncharitable. The charitable do these things fairly and in good faith; for it is a commandment of charity that one should deal fairly and in good faith with all with whom one has business or commercial dealings (see above, 422ff). The same acts are performed quite differently by the uncharitable.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 433

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 433

433. XI

Charitable recreations are lunches, dinners and parties.

It is well known that lunches and dinners are customary everywhere, and that they are given for various purposes; in many cases for the sake of friendship, on account of relationship or celebrations, to gain an advantage or to reward services. They are also a means of gaining favour corruptly, in the case of important people, to do them honour, in kings' courts for show. But charitable lunches and dinners are to be found only with those who in mutual love share a like belief. In the earliest Christian church there were lunches and dinners, called feasts, for precisely this reason, set up to give hearty pleasure and at the same time bring people together. Dinners in their times meant social gatherings and getting together at the first stage in the establishment of the church, that being the meaning of the evening, when they took place. Lunches had the same meaning at the second stage when the church was established, since that is the meaning of morning and day.

[2] At table various matters were discussed, both domestic and political, but the chief subject was matters of concern to the church. Because they were charitable feasts, the talk on any subject was full of charity, together with its joys and pleasures. The spiritual sphere dominant at those feasts was that of love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour, which made everyone's mind cheerful, softened his tone of voice and spread a joyful feeling from the heart to all the senses. Every person has a spiritual sphere radiating from him, which is the product of the affection of his love and so of his thought, and this inwardly affects his companions, especially at feasts. It is radiated both by the face and by the breathing. It is because such associations of minds were meant by lunches, dinners or feasts that they are so often mentioned in the Word; and such too is the meaning of these terms in its spiritual sense. The same is true in the highest sense of the Passover dinner among the Children of Israel, and by banquets at other festivals, as well as by feeding on the products of sacrifice beside the Tabernacle. The act of linking was then represented by breaking and distributing bread, and by drinking out of the same cup and passing it on to the next person.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 434

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 434

434. As for parties, in the earliest church these took place among such people as called themselves brothers in Christ. They were therefore charitable parties, because there was a spiritual brotherhood. They served also as a consolation when the church encountered difficulties, as a celebration of its increase, and also to restore spirits exhausted by study and work, and for discussions of various matters. Since the source from which they sprang was spiritual love, their reason and morality had a spiritual origin. Parties are given at the present time among friends, the purpose of which is intended to be the pleasures of social intercourse, the cheering of the mind by conversation, and as a result the broadening of the mind, the release of bottled-up thoughts and so the revival of the sensory functions of the body, and their restoration to complete health.

[2] But charitable parties no longer exist; for the Lord says:

At the completion of the age (that is, the end of the church) injustice will increase greatly and charity will grow cold. Matt. 24:12.

The reason was that the church had ceased to acknowledge the Lord God the Saviour as God of heaven and earth, and approach Him directly, who is the only source and giver of real charity. Parties, however, where there is no friendship with its imitation of charity to link minds together, are nothing but pretences of friendship, specious demonstrations of mutual love, seductive attempts to worm one's way into favour, and indulgence in bodily pleasures, especially those of the senses. They sweep other people along, like ships with their sails filled and a following sea; and on them stand sycophants and hypocrites on the poop holding the tiller in their hands.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 435

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 435

435. XII

The first thing in charity is to banish evils, the second is to do good deeds which may be of use to the neighbour.

The leading role in the doctrine of charity is played by this statement, that the first thing is not to do evil to the neighbour, the second is to do good to him. This dogma forms as it were a gateway leading to the doctrine of charity, It is well known that from birth everyone has evil lodged in his will; and because every evil is aimed at people both near and far, as well as one's community and country, it follows that hereditary evil is evil directed against the neighbour of whatever degree. Reason itself can show anyone that in so far as the evil lodged in the will is not removed, so far is the good he does impregnated with that evil. For in that case the evil is inside the good, like a kernel in a nut-shell or marrow in a bone. Although therefore the good done by such a person looks like good, it is not intrinsically good. For it is like a glistening shell within which the kernel is eaten away by maggots; and like a white almond which is rotten inside, so that rotting passages extend to the surface.

[2] Willing evil and doing good are essentially two opposites. For evil is the product of hatred directed against the neighbour, good that of love towards the neighbour; or if you like, evil is the neighbour's enemy, good is his friend. These two cannot both exist in one mind, that is, the evil in the internal man, the good in the external man; if it does, the good in the external is like a wound treated with palliatives, but containing rotten pus inside it. A person then resembles a tree with a worn-out root, yet producing fruit which outwardly seems to be tasty and fit to use, but inwardly is bitter and useless. Such people are also like dross thrown away, which when superficially polished and given pretty colouring is put up for sale as precious stones. In short, they are like owl's eggs passed off as those of a dove.

[3] People should know that the good a person does in his body comes from his spirit, that is, the internal man. (The internal man is the spirit which lives on after death.) Consequently when such a person puts off the body, which made up his external man, then he is totally and utterly in the grip of evils, and takes pleasure in them, eschewing good as attacking his life.

sRef Matt@23 @25 S4' sRef Matt@23 @26 S4' sRef Matt@7 @17 S4' sRef Isa@1 @17 S4' sRef Matt@7 @16 S4' sRef Isa@1 @18 S4' sRef Matt@7 @18 S4' sRef Isa@1 @16 S4' [4] The Lord teaches in many passages that a person cannot do good which is essentially good until evil has been removed:

They do not gather the grape from thorns, nor figs from thistles; a rotten tree cannot produce good fruit. Matt. 7:16-18.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees; you clean the outside of the cup and dish, but the insides are full of robbery and intemperance. You blind Pharisee, clean first the inside of the cup and dish, so that the outside too may be clean. Matt. 23:25, 26.

And in Isaiah:

Wash yourselves, remove the wickedness of your deeds; cease to do evil, learn to do good, seek judgment. Then if your sins were as scarlet, they will become white as snow, if they were red like purple, they shall be like wool. Isa. 1:16-18.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 436

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 436

436. The following comparisons will serve to illustrate this further. There is no approaching someone who keeps a leopard or a panther in his room, and lives safely with them because he feeds them, unless one first gets rid of the wild animals. If anyone is invited to dine with a king and queen, does he not wash his face and hands before coming to table? Does anyone fail to heat minerals to purify them and separate them from slag before he gets pure gold and silver? Is there anyone who does not separate the tares from his wheat crop, before storing it in the granary? Is there anyone who does not boil raw meat to cook it, before it becomes eatable and is served at table? Does anyone fail to shake grubs off the leaves of his garden trees, to prevent the leaves being eaten and the fruit lost? Does anyone love a girl and aim to marry her, if she is tainted with malignant disease or covered in spots or pimples, however much she makes up her face, dresses up in fine clothes, and tries to make herself attractive by paying compliments? A person's duty to cleanse himself from evils is like a servant coming in with his face or clothes filthy with soot or dung, and going to his master and saying: 'Please wash me, Sir.' Would not the master say to him: 'You foolish servant, what is this you say? Look, here are water, soap and a towel; haven't you got hands and the power to use them? Wash yourself.' So the Lord God will say: 'The means of cleansing I have provided; and you have been given by me the power to will and act. So use the gifts and talents I have given you, and you will be cleansed.'*

* This passage is largely repeated from 331.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 437

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 437

sRef Luke@16 @13 S0' sRef Rev@3 @15 S0' sRef Rev@3 @16 S0' 437. The current belief is that charity is no more than doing good, and that then a person does no evil; consequently it is the first thing in charity to do good and the second not to do evil. But the exact opposite is the case. The first thing in charity is to banish evil, and the second is to do good. For it is a universal law in the spiritual world, and so also in the natural world, that so far as a person does not will evil, he wills good. So in as far as he turns away from hell, from where all evil comes up, so far does he turn towards heaven, from where all good comes down. And in the same way, to the extent that anyone rejects the devil, so far does the Lord accept him. No one can stand between the two twisting his neck around so as to pray simultaneously to both; it is people like this of whom the Lord says:

I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were cold or hot. But because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I shall spit you out of my mouth. Rev. 3:15, 16.

Can anyone skirmish with his squadron between two armies and be on both sides at once? Can anyone cherish evil against his neighbour and at the same time good towards him? If he does, the evil conceals itself in the good. Although evil which conceals itself may not be seen in actions, still it shows itself in many things when they are properly considered. The Lord says:

No servant can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and Mammon. Luke 16:13.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 438

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 438

438. No one, however, can cleanse himself of evils by his own ability and strength; yet neither could it be done without a person's ability and strength, employed as if they were his own. But for them no one could fight the flesh and its longings, yet this is a duty laid on everyone. In fact, he would not even think about fighting them, but would give free rein to his mind to indulge in every sort of evil, and would only be restrained by the laws established in the world to administer justice, and the penalties they impose. He would inwardly be like a tiger, leopard or snake, which are incapable of reflecting on the cruel pleasures they love to take. This makes it plain that a person, who is endowed with powers of reason beyond those of an animal, ought to resist evils using the ability and strength given him by the Lord, which seem to him in every sense his own. This appearance of being his own is the Lord's gift to everyone, to bring about in him regeneration, imputation, linking to Himself, and salvation.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 439

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 439

439. XIII

In the exercise of charity a person avoids attributing merit to deeds, so long as he believes that all good is from the Lord.

To attribute merit to deeds executed to gain salvation is ruinous; for evils lie hidden in this of which the doer is quite unaware. Among these are denial of God's influence and working on people, trust in one's own powers in matters concerning salvation, faith in oneself and not in God, self-justification, salvation by one's own strength, the cancelling of Divine grace and mercy, the rejection of reformation and regeneration by Divine means; in particular they detract from the merit and righteousness of the Lord God the Saviour, since they claim these for themselves. Moreover they have constantly in view the reward which they regard as their first and last aim; they drown and kill love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour. They are totally ignorant of and unable to feel the pleasure of heavenly love, which is free from all idea of merit; all they feel is self-love. Putting the reward first and salvation second, so that salvation is for the sake of the reward, turns the order upside down; and such people plunge the interior desires of their minds in the self (proprium), and in the body they befoul them with the evils of the flesh. That is why in the sight of the angels good done to gain merit looks like rust, and good not done to gain merit like purple.

sRef Luke@6 @34 S2' sRef Luke@6 @36 S2' sRef Luke@6 @33 S2' sRef Luke@6 @35 S2' sRef John@15 @5 S2' sRef John@3 @27 S2' sRef John@15 @4 S2' [2] The Lord teaches in Luke that good is not to be done to gain merit:

If you do kindnesses to those who do them to you, what credit is that to you? Rather love your enemies, and do kindnesses, and lend without expecting any return. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Luke 6:33-36.

We learn in John that a person can do no good which is essentially good, except from the Lord:

Remain in me, and I in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it remains part of the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me, because without me you can do nothing. John 15:4, 5.

And elsewhere:

A man cannot take anything, unless it is given him from heaven. John 3:27.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 440

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 440

sRef Matt@25 @34 S0' sRef Matt@5 @11 S0' sRef Matt@5 @12 S0' 440. However, thinking about going to heaven, and good needing to be done for this reason, is not regarding reward as one's aim and attributing merit to deeds, for so too do those think who love the neighbour as themselves, and God above all things. For they think this, trusting in the Lord's words, that their reward will be great in the heavens (Matt. 5:11, 12; 6:1; 10:41, 42; Luke 6:23, 35; 14:12-14; John 4:36); that those who have done good deeds will possess as their inheritance the kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world (Matt. 25:34); and that each person will be repaid according to his deeds (Matt. 16:27; John 5:29; Rev. 14:13; 20:12, 13; Jer. 25:14; 32:19; Hosea 4:9; Zech. 1:6; and elsewhere). These people do not trust in getting a reward by their merit, but believe it is promised them by grace. Their reward is the pleasure of doing good to the neighbour. The angels in heaven enjoy this pleasure, and it is a spiritual pleasure, which is everlasting and immeasurably exceeds any natural pleasure, Those who enjoy that pleasure are unwilling to listen to talk of merit, for they like to act, and that is what makes them feel pleased. They are saddened if they think that their actions are done for the sake of being repaid. They are like those who do good to their friends for friendship's sake, to their brother for brotherhood's sake, to their wife and children for their wife's and children's sakes, to their country for their country's sake, so that they act from friendship and love. When they do a kindness, they also say and convince others that it is not for themselves but for others.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 441

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 441

441. The case is quite different with those who regard the reward for their deeds as their aim. They resemble those who embark on friendship for what they can get out of it, and send presents, perform services and give evidence of heartfelt friendship; but when they do not get what they hoped for, they turn their backs, declare the friendship is at an end, and join the ranks of their enemies and detractors. They are like wet-nurses, who only feed babies for pay, and so long as the parents are watching kiss and fondle them; but as soon as they are not given the best food and rewarded at the slightest whim, they neglect the babies, treat them harshly and beat them, laughing at their crying.

[2] They are also like those whose patriotism springs from love of self and the world; they say they are willing to give their fortunes and their lives for their country, yet if they do not succeed in getting honours and wealth as a reward, they speak ill of their country and ally themselves to its enemies. They are also like shepherds, who only tend their sheep for pay; and if this is late in being paid, they use their staff to drive the sheep from the pastureland into the desert. They are like priests who perform their duties only for the stipends attached to them; it is plain that they care nothing for the salvation of the souls whose guidance is put in their charge.

[3] It is much the same with people holding magistracies, who only have regard to the rank and income attached to their office; when they do good, it is not for the public good, but for the pleasure that comes of love of self and the world, which is the breath of life to them and the only good they recognise. It is very similar with others of this sort; the aim which motivates them is totally dominant, and the intermediate causes, which belong to their office, are dismissed if they do not assist that aim.

aRef John@10 @13 S4' [4] Such is the case with those who demand a reward as earned in matters relating to salvation. After death they with great confidence demand to go to heaven; but when they have been found to possess no love at all to God and none at all towards the neighbour, they are sent to be instructed about charity and faith. If they reject this teaching, they are banished to join people like them, among whom are some who are angry with God, because they have not been rewarded, and call faith an item standing to their credit. These are the people who are meant in the Word by hired labourers; they are assigned to the most menial forms of service in church courtyards. Seen from a distance they appear to be splitting wood.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 442

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 442

442. It needs to be thoroughly known that charity and faith in the Lord are closely linked, so that the nature of faith determines the nature of charity. It may be seen above that the Lord, charity and faith make one, like life, will and understanding, and if they are separated each of them is destroyed like a pearl collapsing into dust (362ff); and charity and faith are present together in good deeds (373-377). It follows from this that the nature of faith determines the nature of charity; and the nature of faith and charity taken together determines the nature of deeds. Now if faith claims that all the good a person does as if of himself is from the Lord, then the person is its instrumental cause, and the Lord is its principal cause. To human sight these two causes appear as one, yet in fact the principal cause is all-important to the instrumental cause. It follows from this that if a person believes that all good which is essentially good is from the Lord, he does not ascribe merit to deeds; and as this belief becomes more and more perfect in a person, this imagined notion of merit is removed from him by the Lord.

[2] When a person is in this condition he exercises charity freely with no fear that he is seeking merit, and eventually feels the spiritual joy of charity; and then he begins to loathe merit as injurious to his life. The notion of merit is easily wiped out by the Lord in the case of those who absorb charity by acting fairly and faithfully in their work, business or position and with those with whom they have any dealings (on this see 422-424 above). But the idea of merit is very hard to remove from those who think charity is acquired by alms-giving and helping the needy. For when these people do such things, their minds are at first openly, and later tacitly, wanting to be rewarded, and they seek for merit.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 443

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 443

443. XIV

When a moral life is at the same time spiritual, this is charity.

Everyone is taught by his parents and teachers to lead a moral life, that is, to be a good citizen, and act in an honest fashion. Honesty refers to various virtues which are its essentials; and he learns by means of these to give formal expression to honesty and this constitutes its graces. As he advances in age, he learns in addition rational arguments, and so to perfect the morality of his life. Moral life for boys up to the beginning of adolescence is natural, and from then on becomes more and more rational. Careful reflexion can show that a moral life is the same thing as a charitable one; it is dealing well with the neighbour, and controlling one's life so as to prevent it being contaminated with evils. This follows from the demonstration in 435-438 above. Still, in the first period of one's life, a moral life is only in its outermost form a charitable one; that is, it affects only its outward form and front, not the inward parts.

[2] From infancy to old age man passes through four stages of life. In the first he acts as he is taught by others. In the second he acts of his own accord, as governed by the understanding. In the third the will acts on the understanding and the understanding modifies the will. In the fourth he follows the course of action he has convinced himself is right and set before himself as his aim. These are stages in the life of a person's spirit and are not paralleled in his body. The body is capable of acting in moral fashion and talking rationally, while the spirit can will and think the opposite. It is obvious that the natural man is like this from looking at pretenders, toadies, liars and hypocrites, who as is well known have duplicitous minds, that is, their minds are split into two parts which disagree. The case is different with those who will good and think rationally, and as a result do good deeds and talk rationally; they are the people meant by 'the simple in spirit' in the Word, being called simple because they are not duplicitous.

[3] These remarks can show plainly the real meaning of the terms 'external' and 'internal man'. No one can draw any conclusions from the morality of the external about that of the internal, since he may be facing the opposite direction, and hiding as a tortoise does its head in its shell, or a snake its in its coils. The so-called moral man of this sort is like a highwayman in town and in the woods; in town he adopts the role of a moral citizen, but in the woods he preys on travellers. It is quite different in the case of those who are inwardly moral, that is, in spirit, the result of being regenerated by the Lord; these are the people meant by 'the spiritually moral.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 444

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 444

sRef Rom@13 @10 S0' sRef Rom@13 @9 S0' sRef Rom@13 @8 S0' sRef Matt@7 @12 S1' 444. The reason why, when a moral life is at the same time spiritual, this is charity, is that the practices of a moral life and a charitable one are the same. Charity is willing good to the neighbour and as a result dealing well with him; and this too is the concern of a moral life. The spiritual law is the one prescribed by the Lord:

Everything you wish people to do to you, do the same to them; this is the Law and the Prophets. Matt. 7:12.

This same law applies universally to moral life. But it would take a great many pages to list all charitable deeds and compare them with the deeds prescribed by a moral life, so merely six commandments of the second table of the Ten Commandments can serve as an illustration. It is plain to anyone that they are the commandments of moral life; and it may be seen above (329-331) that they also contain everything to do with love towards the neighbour. Charity fulfils all these commandments, as is clear from the following passage of Paul:

Love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, You are not to commit adultery, You are not to commit murder, You are not to steal, You are not to be a false witness,
You are not to covet, and any other commandment there may be, these are all summed up in this phrase: You are to love your neighbour as yourself. Charity does not do evil to the neighbour; it is the fulfilment of the law. Rom. 13:8-10.

[2] If anyone's thinking comes solely from the external man, he cannot fail to be surprised that the seven commandments of the second table were delivered by Jehovah on Mount Sinai amid such miraculous circumstances, when those same rules were enjoined by the laws of the civil legal system in every kingdom upon earth, including therefore Egypt, which the Children of Israel had just left; for no kingdom can last without them. But the fact that they were delivered by Jehovah, and written by His finger on two stone tables, caused them to be not only the commandments of the civil community, and so of natural moral life, but also the commandments of the heavenly community, and so of spiritual moral life. Thus to break them would not only be acting against one's fellow men, but also against God.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 445

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 445

445. Contemplation of moral life in its essence can show that it is life in accordance with human laws and at the same time Divine laws. If anyone therefore lives in accordance with those two sets of laws treating them as one, he is a truly moral person, and his life is charity. Anyone can grasp, if he wants, the nature of charity by considering external moral life. Simply copy external moral life, as it is to be seen in civilised society, in the internal man, so that his will and thought are similar to and in conformity with the deeds of the external, and you will see an ideal example of charity.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 446

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 446

446. XV

A bosom friendship* contracted with a person without regard to his spiritual character is harmful after death.

A bosom friendship means one so intimate that it involves loving not only the friend's external man but also his internal man, and this without enquiry into what sort of a person he is inwardly or in spirit. This means without enquiring whether the affections of his mind derive from love towards the neighbour and love to God, and are thus capable of association with the angels of heaven; or whether they derive from love directed against the neighbour and love directed against God, so being capable of association with devils. Many people enter into such friendships for various reasons and for various purposes. This kind of friendship is to be distinguished from external friendship which is merely personal, and exists for the sake of various pleasures of the body and the senses, and for various kinds of contact. This personal sort of friendship can be contracted with anyone, even with the clown who plays the fool at a duke's table. This is simply called friendship, the other, bosom friendship; friendship is a link at the natural level, love a link at the spiritual level.

* The Latin phrase means literally 'a friendship of love'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 447

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 447

447. Bosom friendship is harmful after death, as can be established by considering the situation of heaven, that of hell, and that of a person's spirit relative to them. The situation in heaven is that it is divided into countless communities which differ in keeping with all the varieties of affections belonging to love for good. Hell on the other hand is similarly divided in keeping with all the varieties of affections belonging to the love for evil. After death a person, being then a spirit, is at once allotted to a community in keeping with his life in the world, and this is where his dominant love is. It is a heavenly community, if love to God and towards the neighbour were chief among his loves, a community in hell, if self-love and love of the world were his chief loves. Immediately after entering the spiritual world, a process accomplished by dying and consigning the material body to the grave, a person is over a period prepared for the community to which he is allotted. This preparation is effected by rejecting the loves which are not in harmony with his principal one. One person is therefore parted from another, one friend from another, an underling from his lord, and a parent from his children, and a brother from his brother. Each of them is inwardly brought into contact with people of like disposition, with whom he is destined to live a harmonious life, one that is really his own, for ever. But in the first stage of preparation they meet and have friendly conversations as they did in the world; but little by little they drift apart without being aware of it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 448

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 448

448. Those, however, who in the world have mutually entered into bosom friendships cannot be separated in orderly fashion like other people, and be allotted to the community which corresponds to their life. For they are inwardly tied at the level of the spirit, and cannot be torn apart because they are like branches grafted on to other branches. If one, therefore, is inwardly in heaven and the other is inwardly in hell, they stick to each other like a sheep tied to a wolf, or a goose to a fox, or a dove to a hawk. The one whose interiors are in hell breathes his hellish ideas into the one whose interiors are in heaven. For it is one of the facts which are well known in heaven that wicked ideas can be breathed into good people, but not good ideas into wicked people. The reason is that everyone is by birth pervaded by evils. So when good people stick like this to wicked ones their interiors are shut off, and both are cast down into hell, where the good one suffers severely and only after some time has elapsed is he released, and only then does he begin his preparation for heaven.

[2] I have been permitted to see ties of this sort, especially between brothers and other relations, as well as between lords and their underlings, and of many with toadies, who had opposite affections and different characters. I saw some looking like kids with leopards, and then they embraced each other, swearing to maintain their previous friendship. Then I was aware of the good absorbing the pleasures of the wicked, holding hands, and going together into caves, where crowds of wicked people were to be seen in their hideous forms, though they have the illusion that they seem to themselves attractive. But some time later I heard the good wailing in fear as if they were to be hanged, and the wicked rejoicing as if they had taken booty from an enemy, and other such doleful scenes. I was told that later on the good after being released were prepared for heaven by being reformed, but with more difficulty than others.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 449

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 449

449. The case of those who love the good in another is totally different; those, for instance, who love fairness, judiciousness, sincerity and the kindness that comes from charity, and particularly those who love faith in and love to the Lord. They do so because they love what is inside a person without regard to what is outside him. If therefore they do not observe the same features in a person after death, they at once break off their friendship, and are associated by the Lord with those who share a like good. It might be said that no one can search out the interiors of the minds of those in whose company he is and with whom he has dealings. But there is no need for this; one must just take care to avoid a bosom friendship with anyone at all. Outward friendship for various purposes does no harm.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 450

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 450

450. XVI

Spurious charity, hypocritical charity and dead charity.

True charity which is alive is impossible except when it makes one with faith, and except when both jointly look to the Lord. For these three, the Lord, charity and faith, are the three essentials for salvation, and when they are one, charity is charity, faith is faith and the Lord is in them, and they are in the Lord (see above 363-367 and 368-372). However, where these three are not linked together, charity is either spurious or hypocritical or dead. From the time it was founded Christianity has been beset by various heresies, and these continue also at the present time; and in each one of these the three essentials - God, charity and faith - have been and are acknowledged, since in their absence there can be no religion, As regards charity specifically, it can be attached to any heretical belief, such as that of Socinians, Enthusiasts or Jews, even the belief of idolaters. And all these can believe that it is really charity, since it resembles that in outward form; but it actually changes its nature depending on the belief to which it is attached or linked. For a demonstration of this, see the chapter on faith.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 451

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 451

451. All charity which is not linked to a faith in one God, in whom is the Divine Trinity, is spurious. Such for example is the charity of the present-day church, which believes in three persons in the same Godhead, one after the other, Father, Son and Holy Spirit; and since it believes in three persons, each of whom is God existing by Himself, it believes in three Gods. Charity can be attached to this faith, as in fact is done by those who uphold this faith, but it can never be linked to it. Charity which is attached to faith is merely natural and not spiritual, so it is spurious charity. It is similar with the charity of many other heresies, for instance, of those who deny the Divine Trinity and therefore approach only God the Father, or only the Holy Spirit, or both of these without God the Saviour. Charity cannot be linked with the faith of these people, and if it is linked or attached, it is spurious. It is called spurious, because it springs as it were from an illicit union, like Hagar's son by Abraham, who was cast out of the house (Gen. 21:9, 10). This sort of charity is like fruit which does not grow on a tree, but is pinned on; and it is like a carriage with the horses in front of it attached only by the reins in the driver's hands; and when the horses start to run, they pull the driver from his seat and leave the carriage standing.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 452

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 452

sRef Luke@11 @44 S0' sRef Matt@23 @15 S0' sRef Matt@23 @13 S0' sRef Matt@23 @25 S0' sRef Matt@6 @5 S0' sRef Matt@6 @2 S0' sRef Mark@7 @6 S0' 452. Hypocritical charity, however, is characteristic of those who in church or at home bow before God almost touching the paving stones, pour out long devotional prayers, keep solemn faces, kiss crucifixes and the bones of the dead, and then genuflect towards their tombs, muttering over them phrases expressing holy veneration of God, while yet turning over in their hearts the worship of themselves, and addressing to themselves adoration as if to divine powers. These people resemble those whom the Lord describes in these words:

When you give alms, do not have a trumpet sound before you, as hypocrites do in synagogues and in the streets, to get glory from men. And if you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites, who like to pray standing up in synagogues and at street-corners, so that people can see them. Matt. 6:2, 5.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of the heavens in men's sight, since you do not go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who want to go in to do so. Woe to you, hypocrites, because you tour sea and dry land to make one proselyte; and when you have got one, you make him twice as much a son of Gehenna as yourselves. Woe to you, you hypocrites, because you clean the outside of the cup and dish, but the insides are full of robbery and intemperance. Matt. 23:13, 15, 25.

Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites, saying, This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Mark 7:6.

Woe to you, you hypocrites, because you are like hidden tombs, so that people walking over them are unaware. Luke 11:44.

There are other passages too. These people are like flesh without blood, or like ravens and parrots which have been taught to repeat the words from a psalm; and like birds trained to sing the tune of a religious hymn. The sound of their speech is like the sound of a fowler's lure.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 453

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 453

453. Dead charity is characteristic of those whose faith is dead, since the nature of charity is like the nature of faith. It was shown in the chapter on faith, that faith and charity make a single whole. Faith is dead in the case of those who perform no deeds, as is clear from the Epistle of James (2:17, 20). Moreover faith is dead in the case of those who do not believe in God, but in men, either alive or dead, and worship images as holy in themselves, as the pagans once did. The offerings of those of this faith which are given to images that work miracles, as they call them, in order to gain salvation, and are counted by them as charitable deeds, are nothing but gold and silver thrown into the urns and caskets containing the dead; or rather, like the sops given to Cerberus*, and the fare paid to Charon** to ferry souls across to the Elysian fields. However the charity of those who believe that God does not exist, but take Nature to be God, is neither spurious, nor hypocritical nor dead, but non-existent, since it is not attached to any faith. It cannot be called charity, for it is faith which determines its nature. When viewed from heaven charity on the part of such people is like bread made of ashes, pate made of fish-scales, or fruit made of wax.

* The three-headed dog of Greek mythology who guarded the gate of the under-world.
** The ferryman of Greek mythology who took souls to the underworld.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 454

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 454

454. XVII

Bosom friendship between the wicked is implacable hatred between them.

It was shown above that everyone has an internal and an external, the internal being called his internal man and the external his external man. To this must be added the fact that the internal man exists in the spiritual world and the external in the natural world. The reason why man was so created is so that he can associate with spirits and angels in their world, and as a result think analytically, and after death be transferred from his own world to the other. The spiritual world means both heaven and hell. Since the internal man is together with spirits and angels in their world, and the external man is among living men, it is plain that a person can consort with the spirits in hell or with the angels in heaven. The ability and power to do this distinguish man from animals. It is what a person is like in his internal man, not in his external man, that determines what he is essentially like, because the internal man is his spirit, and acts by means of the external. The material body, with which his spirit is clothed in the natural world, is an extra, needed for procreation and for the formation of the internal man. For this is formed in the natural body, like a tree in the ground, and a seed in the fruit. More facts about the internal and external man can be seen above (401).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 455

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 455

455. The following brief description of hell and heaven can serve to show what a wicked person is like in his internal man, and what a good person is like in his, for in the case of the wicked the internal man is linked with devils in hell, in the case of the good it is linked with angels in heaven. Hell as the result of its loves is devoted to the pleasures of all evils, that is, the pleasures of hatred, revenge, and slaughter, those of looting and stealing, those of cursing and blaspheming, those of denying the existence of God and profaning the Word. These all lie concealed in a person's longings, so that he does not reflect on them. These pleasures make his longings burn like lighted torches, and this is what is meant in the Word by hell fire. But the pleasures of heaven are those of love towards the neighbour and of love to God.

[2] Since the pleasures of hell are the opposites of the pleasures of heaven, there is a great gap between them; the pleasures of heaven pour down from above into this gap, those of hell well up into it from below. While a person is alive in the world he is in the middle of the gap, so that he can be in equilibrium, and so free to turn either to heaven or to hell. It is this gap which is meant by the 'great gulf' fixed between those in heaven and those in hell (Luke 16:26).

[3] These facts can serve to establish what a bosom friendship is like between the wicked. As regards the external man it is accompanied by gestures and mimicry, and makes a pretence of morality, for the purpose of spreading its nets and looking to see where there is a chance of enjoying the pleasures of its loves, which burn hot in their internal man. It is only fear of the law, and as a result fear for one's reputation and way of life, which restrains and prevents them from acting thus. So their friendship resembles a spider in the sugar, a viper in the bread, a young crocodile in a honey-cake, and a snake in the grass.

[4] The friendship of the wicked with anyone is like this. But between those who are confirmed villains, as between thieves, highwaymen and pirates, friendship is close, so long as they are in full agreement in gloating over their robberies; then they embrace one another like brothers, entertain one another with feasts, singing and dancing, and conspire to ruin others. In fact each deep within himself looks on his companion as an enemy does an enemy. The cunning robber even sees this in his companion, and is afraid of him. It is plain from this that between such people there is no friendship, but implacable hatred.

455A* Anyone who has not openly sided with wrongdoers and taken to robbery, but who has led a moral life as a good citizen, aiming to be of service in various ways, without, however, restraining the longings which reside in the natural man, might believe that his friendship is not like this. But I have been allowed to know for certain as the result of many instances in the spiritual world that friendship is like this, more or less, with all who have rejected faith and despised the holy things of the church, thinking them of no consequence for themselves, but only for the common people. In the case of some of them the pleasures of hellish love lay hidden like fire in smouldering logs covered with bark; with some like burning coals under ash; with some like wax tapers which burst into flame at the touch of a light; with some in other ways. That is what everyone is like who banishes from his heart everything to do with religion. Their internal man is in hell, and so long as they live in the world - when they are unaware of it on account of the semblance of morality they display in externals - they do not acknowledge as neighbour any but themselves and their children. They treat everyone else either with contempt, when they resemble cats stalking birds in their nests, or with hatred, when they resemble wolves on the watch for dogs to devour. These remarks have been introduced so that it may be known what charity is like by reference to its opposite.

* The original has two paragraphs numbered 455.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 456

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 456

456. XVIII

The linking of love to God and love towards the neighbour.

It is well known that the law delivered from Mount Sinai was written on two tablets, one of them relating to God, the other to men; and that these were in Moses' hand a single tablet, with the writing about God on the right side and that about men on the left.* Thus when it was presented to human eyes, the writing on both sides would be seen together; so one part would be visible to the other, like Jehovah talking with Moses, and Moses with Jehovah face to face, as we read. This was done so that the tablets thus joined should represent the linking of God with men, and reciprocally that of men with God. This was the reason why the law so written was called a covenant and a witness; a covenant means linking, and witness means living in accordance with agreements.

[2] These two tablets so joined allow us to see the linking of love to God and love towards the neighbour. The first tablet is concerned with everything to do with love to God, and these occupy the leading position: we should acknowledge one God, the divinity of His Human, and the holiness of the Word, and God is to be worshipped by means of the holy things coming from Him. It is clear that this is the subject of this tablet from the remarks made in Chapter 5 about the Ten Commandments. The second tablet is concerned with everything to do with love towards the neighbour; its first five commandments deal with actions and are called deeds, and the last two with matters of the will, so what is to do with charity in its origin. In these last it says, 'You are not to covet,' and when a person does not covet what is his neighbour's, then he wishes him well. The Ten Commandments contain everything to do with love to God and everything to do with love towards the neighbour; see 329-331 above. It was also shown there that the linking of the two tablets takes place with those who possess charity.

* Since Hebrew writing is from right to left, the right-hand column would be written first.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 457

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 457

sRef John@10 @9 S1' sRef John@10 @1 S1' 457. The case is different with those who only worship God and do not at the same time perform good deeds out of charity. These people are like those who tear up an agreement. It is different again with those who divide God into three, and worship each one separately; and different yet again with those who approach God, but not in His Human. These are the people who do not go in by the door, but climb up another way (John 10:1, 9). It is different yet again with those who are confirmed unbelievers in the Lord's divinity. None of these groups can achieve linking with God, and as a result salvation. Their charity too can only be spurious, and this does not allow linking face to face, but only at the side or back.

[2] A few words must be said on how the linking takes place. God flows into what everyone knows about God, bringing about an acknowledgment of God, and at the same time imparting His love for mankind. If a person receives only the first and not the second, the inflow reaches only his understanding, and not his will, and he remains knowing about God without any inward acknowledgment of God, so that his condition resembles that of a garden in wintertime. But if a person receives both the first and the second, the inflow reaches his will and comes from there into his understanding, so occupying his whole mind. Then he makes an inward acknowledgment of God, which brings to life what he knows about God, so that his condition resembles that of a garden in springtime.

[3] The reason why linking is produced by charity is that God loves each and every human being; and because He cannot do good to them directly, but only indirectly by means of other people, He therefore breathes into people His love, just as He breathes into parents love for their children. Anyone who receives that love is linked to God, and the love of God makes him love the neighbour. In him, the love of God is contained within his love towards his neighbour, and it is this which gives him his will and ability to act.

[4] Since no one can do any good deed unless it seems to him as if his ability, will and activity come from himself, this appearance is granted to him; and when he does it freely as if of his own accord, it is imputed to him, and accepted as the reciprocal act which brings about linking. This is like the relationship between active and passive, and the co-operation of the passive being produced in it as the result of the active. Or it is like the will being present in actions, and thought being present in speech, and the soul working at the innermost level on each of these. Or it is like effort in motion; and like the reproductive principle of the seed, which acts from within on the juices, causing the tree to grow until it produces fruit, and by means of the fruit to produce fresh seeds. Or it is like light falling on precious stones, the reflexion of which depends on the texture of the parts it strikes, thus producing various colours, which seem to belong to the gems, when in fact they are properties of the light.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 458

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 458

sRef John@14 @23 S0' sRef 1Joh@4 @21 S0' sRef 1Joh@3 @24 S0' sRef John@14 @21 S0' sRef 1Joh@4 @20 S0' sRef John@14 @22 S0' sRef John@14 @20 S0' 458. These illustrations make plain the origin and nature of the link between love to God and love towards the neighbour; the love of God towards mankind flows in, and it is its reception by the person and his co-operation which are love towards the neighbour. In short, it is linking, as expressed in this saying of the Lord's:

On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I in you. John 14:20.

And as this saying puts it:

He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me; and I shall love him, and show myself to him, and I shall make my dwelling with him. John 14:21-23.

All the Lord's commandments have to do with love towards the neighbour, and they are, in short, not to do evil to him, but to do him good. These people love God and God loves them, as stated by the Lord's words just quoted. It is because those two loves are so linked that John says:

He who keeps the commandments of Jesus Christ remains in Him, and He in him. If anyone says, 'I utterly love God,' but hates his brother, he is a liar. For if someone does not love his brother whom he can see, how can he love God whom he cannot see? We have this commandment from Him, that if anyone loves God, he should also love his brother. 1 John 3:24; 4:20, 21.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 459

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 459

459. I will add here the following accounts of experiences, of which this is the first,

I saw at a distance five schools, which were bathed in light of different colours, the first in flame-coloured light, the second in yellow, the third in brilliant white, the fourth in light mid-way between that of midday and that of evening, the fifth hardly visible at all, since it was as if placed in the shades of evening. On the roads I saw some people riding horses, some in carriages, and some on foot. Some of them were running or hurrying, and these were bound for the first school, the one surrounded by flame-coloured light. On seeing them I was seized and driven by a desire to go there and listen to the discussion, So I quickly prepared myself and joined the group which was hurrying to the first school, and I went in together with them. There was a large gathering to be seen there, some moving to the right and some to the left, to sit down on the benches round the walls. In front I saw a low platform, on which stood the person who had the duty of presiding; he had a staff in his hand, a hat on his head, and clothing tinged with the flame-coloured light of the school.

[2] When they were assembled, he raised his voice and said, 'Brethren, to-day's subject for discussion is: "What is charity?" Anyone of you may know that charity in its essence is spiritual, and in its exercise natural.'

At once someone on the first bench to the left, where those who had a reputation for wisdom were seated, got up and began to speak as follows. 'My opinion is that charity is morality with faith breathed into it.' He supported his opinion like this. 'Is there anyone who does not know that charity follows faith, as an attendant does her mistress? And that a person, if he has faith, carries out the law, and so charity, so spontaneously that he is unaware that it is the law and charity which he lives by. For if he did know and so acted, thinking at the same time of obtaining salvation on this account, he would sully his holy faith with his self (proprium) and thus maim its efficacy. Surely this is in accordance with the dogma of people in our country?' Here he looked at those sitting beside him, who included some clergy, and they nodded assent.

[3] 'Yet what is spontaneous charity but morality, something we are all taught from childhood? This is therefore essentially natural, but it becomes spiritual when faith is breathed into it. Can anyone tell by looking at the morality of their lives whether people have faith or not? Everyone lives a moral life, but only God, who puts in and seals faith, knows and can tell the difference. I hold therefore that charity is morality with faith breathed in, and this morality coming from faith is in its inmost productive of salvation; all other is not productive of salvation, because it aims at merit. So it is a waste of effort to mix charity and faith together, at least if they are linked from within and not attached from without. Mixing and linking them would be like putting the footman who stands at the back into the carriage with the bishop, or like bringing the door-keeper into the dining-room to sit at table with the lord.'

sRef Matt@7 @7 S4' [4] Next someone on the first bench to the right got up and said: 'My opinion is that charity is piety with pity breathed into it, and I support this view by the consideration that nothing else but piety coming from humility of heart could propitiate God. Piety prays continually that God may grant faith and charity; and the Lord says:

Ask and it shall be granted you. Matt. 7:7.

And since it is granted, both faith and charity are contained in it. I say that charity is piety with pity breathed into it, because all devout piety is pitying. Piety moves a person's heart to groan, and what is this but pitying? Admittedly this goes once the prayer is said, but it returns when the prayer is repeated, and when it returns piety is in it and so piety is in charity. Our priests ascribe everything conducive to salvation to faith, and nothing to charity; what then remains except piety pityingly praying for both? When I read the Word, I could not help seeing that faith and charity were the two means to salvation; but when I consulted the ministers of the church, I was told that faith was the sole means, and charity was no use. Then it seemed to me as if I was at sea in a ship being tossed about between two reefs; so fearing shipwreck, I climbed into the lifeboat and sailed away. My lifeboat is piety; and what is more, piety is useful for all purposes.'

[5] He was followed by someone from the second bench on the right, who said: 'My opinion is that charity is doing good both to the upright and to the criminal. I support this view like this. What is charity but goodness of heart? A good heart wishes well to all, upright as well as criminal. The Lord said too that we should do kindnesses to our enemies. If therefore you take your charity away from anyone, does not charity then become to that extent non-existent, and thus you become like a man who has lost one leg and walks by hopping on the other? The criminal is just as much a human being as the upright man; charity looks on everyone as human, so if he is a criminal, what has that to do with me? Charity behaves like the heat of the sun, which gives life to both harmful as well as harmless animals, to wolves as much as to sheep. And it makes bad trees grow just as much as good ones, and thorns as much as vines.' On saying this he took in his hand a fresh grape, and said: 'Charity behaves like this grape; cut it open and all that is in it is lost.' Then he cut it open, and its contents were lost.

[6] After this speech someone else got up from the second bench on the left and said: 'My opinion is that charity means looking after one's relatives and friends in every way, and this is how I support it. Is there anyone who does not know that charity begins with oneself? Everyone is one's own neighbour. Charity therefore advances from itself through degrees of nearness, first to brothers and sisters, from them to nearer and more distant relatives, and so the advance of charity is limited by itself. Those outside the group are strangers, and strangers are not inwardly acknowledged, so they are estranged from the internal man. But blood-relations and other relatives are naturally linked to one; and habit, which is second nature, does the same for friends, so that they become the neighbour. Charity joins another person to oneself from within, and so from without. Those who are not joined from within should merely be termed companions.

'Surely all birds recognise their kindred, not by their plumage, but by their call; and when they are close, by the vital sphere spreading from their bodies. This affection for their kin which brings them together is called instinct in the case of birds, but the same affection in the case of human beings, when directed towards one's family and people, is the instinct of truly human nature. What is it that makes us kin but blood? This is what a person's mind, which is also his spirit, feels and, so to speak, scents. The essence of charity consists in this kindred feeling and the sympathy it induces. On the other hand, however, absence of kinship, which also gives rise to antipathy, is as it were the absence of blood and so of charity. Because habit is second nature, and this too makes a sort of kinship, it follows that charity includes doing good to friends. Does not anyone who has been at sea and puts in to a port and is told that it is a foreign country, where he does not recognise the languages and customs of its inhabitants, find himself as it were out of place and feel no pleasure in love towards them? But if he is told that it is his native land, and recognises the languages and customs of the inhabitants, he feels as it were at home, and then he feels pleasure from love, a pleasure which is also that of charity.'

[7] Next someone on the third bench to the right got up, and speaking in a loud voice said: 'My opinion is that charity is giving alms to the poor and helping the needy. There is no doubt that this is charity, because this is what the Divine Word teaches, and its dictates admit no rebuttal. Giving to the rich and those with ample resources is nothing but boastful vanity, devoid of charity but motivated by imagining a reward. In this there can be no real affection of love towards the neighbour, but only a spurious affection which is acceptable on earth, but not in the heavens. It is need and want therefore which call for assistance, since here the idea of reward is excluded. In the city where I live, where I know who are upright and who are wicked, I have observed that on seeing a poor man in the street all the upright stop and give him alms; but the wicked, catching sight of the poor man to one side, go past as if blind to the sight of him, and as if deaf to his voice. Does not everyone know that the upright have charity and the wicked do not? A person who gives to the poor and helps the needy is like a shepherd who leads his hungry and thirsty sheep to pasture and to water; but a person who only gives to the rich and affluent is like a person who worships tin gods, and presses food and drink on those who are suffering from overindulgence.'

[8] Next someone got up from the third bench on the left and said: 'My opinion is that charity is building hospices, hospitals, orphanages and hostels, and supporting them with donations. I support this view by the fact that such acts of kindness and assistance are public, and surpass by miles private acts. Charity as a result becomes richer and more full of goodness, because the good deeds are numerous, and the reward to be hoped for according to the promises contained in the Word becomes larger. For as anyone prepares the ground and sows, so shall he reap. Is not this giving to the poor and helping the needy on a larger scale? Is there anyone who does not by this aim at approval by the world, and at the same time hope for praise and humble, grateful thanks expressed by those who are so supported? Does not this lift up the heart, together with the affection which is called charity, right to its peak? Rich people who do not walk in the streets, but ride, cannot notice the beggars sitting by the walls on either side, and hand out small coins to them; but they make contributions to enterprises which are of advantage to many people at once. Lesser folk, however, who walk in the streets and do not possess such resources, do the other thing.'

sRef Luke@21 @3 S9' sRef Luke@21 @1 S9' sRef Luke@21 @2 S9' [9] On hearing this another on the same bench suddenly shouted him down and said: 'Still the rich ought not to rate the munificence and excellence of their charity higher than the pittance one poor man gives another. For we know that everyone acts in a manner appropriate to his station, the king to his, the judge to his, the officer to his, the courtier to his. Charity regarded in essence does not depend upon the rank of the person and thus on the gift he can confer, but on the depth of affection which motivates the charitable act. Thus the footman who gives a small coin may bestow his gift in fuller charity than the lord who gives or bequeaths a fortune. This too is in accordance with this passage:

Jesus watched the rich throwing their offerings into the treasury, and saw too a poor widow throwing in two pennies. He said, Truly I tell you that this poor widow has contributed more than all the others. Luke 21:1-3.'

[10] After these someone got up from the fourth bench to the left, and spoke. 'My opinion,' he said, 'is that charity is endowing places of worship, and doing kindnesses to their ministers. I support this view by the fact that a person who does so has a holy purpose in mind and that is what motivates his acts; in addition he sanctifies his gifts. Charity demands this, because it is essentially holy. Is not all worship in churches holy? For the Lord says:

Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst. [Matt. 18:20.]

Priests who are His servants conduct that worship. I deduce from this, that gifts which are given to priests and to churches are superior to those which are handed out to other people and for other purposes. Moreover, a minister has been given the authority to bless, by which he sanctifies the gifts. And afterwards nothing so much broadens and cheers the mind as seeing one's offerings as so many sanctuaries.'

[11] Then someone got up from the fourth bench to the right and said: 'My opinion is that charity is the Christian brotherhood of old; and I support that view by the fact that every church which worships the true God begins with charity, as did the Christian church of old. So since charity joins minds, and makes one out of many, they called themselves brethren, in Jesus Christ their God. Since they were then surrounded by barbarous nations who made them afraid, they held their property in common. In this they rejoiced together and with one mind, and at their meetings every day talked about the Lord God their Saviour, Jesus Christ; and at their lunches and dinners they discussed charity, and this was the source of their brotherhood. But after their time, when schisms began to arise, culminating in the heinous Arian heresy, which for many people did away with the idea of the divinity of the Lord's Human, charity went out of fashion and the brotherhood fell apart. It is true that all who in truth worship the Lord and keep His commandments are brothers (Matt. 23:8), but brothers in spirit. Since at the present time no one is recognisable for what he is in the spirit, there is no need for them to call one another brothers. A brotherhood based on faith alone, much less on faith in any other God than the Lord God the Saviour, is no brotherhood, because charity, which makes it a brotherhood, is lacking in that faith. So I deduce that charity was the Christian brotherhood of old, but this in time past, not now. Yet I prophesy that it will come again.' When he said this a flame-coloured light showed through an east window, and tinged his cheeks. The gathering was astonished to see this.

sRef Isa@1 @18 S12' sRef Isa@1 @17 S12' sRef Isa@1 @4 S12' sRef Isa@1 @16 S12' sRef Isa@1 @15 S12' aRef Matt@6 @12 S12' [12] Lastly someone got up from the fifth bench on the left and asked permission to add a contribution to what the last speaker had said. When this was granted, he said: 'My opinion is that charity is forgiving everyone his faults. I got this opinion from the way people are accustomed to speak on going to the Holy Supper; for some then say to their friends, "Forgive me any wrong I have done," thinking that by this they have fulfilled all the requirements of charity. But I thought to myself that this is merely a painted picture of charity, and not the real form of its essence. For this saying is uttered as much by those who do not forgive as by those who make no effort to acquire charity; and such people are not included among those mentioned in the prayer which the Lord Himself taught: "Father, forgive us our faults, just as we forgive those who wrong us." For faults are like ulcers, which, if they are not lanced and healed, form a collection of pus; and this infects the adjacent areas, and creeps around like a snake, turning blood everywhere into pus. It is much the same with faults against the neighbour; unless they are removed by repentance and by living in accordance with the Lord's commandments, they linger and become embedded. Those who without repenting only pray to God to forgive them their sins, are like the citizens of a city smitten with plague, who go to the governor and say, "Sir, heal us." The governor will tell them, "What do you mean, heal you? Go to the physician and find out the remedies, buy them from the chemist, use them, and you will be cured." So the Lord will say [to those] who beg for their sins to be forgiven without really repenting, "Open the Word, and read what I said in Isaiah:

Woe to the nation that sins, weighed down with iniquity. When you spread out your hands, I hide my eyes from you; even though you pray time and again, I do not hear. Wash yourselves, put away the wickedness of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good. And then your sins will be taken away and forgiven. Isa. 1:4, 15-18."'

[13] When the speeches were over, I held up my hand and asked permission, although I was a stranger, to give my opinion. The presiding officer put this to the meeting, and when it was agreed, I spoke as follows: 'My opinion is that charity is acting in every deed and employment from a love of justice combined with judgment; but from love that has no other source than the Lord God the Saviour. All that I have heard from those sitting on the benches on the right and the left are well-known examples of charity. But as the presiding officer of this gathering said in his introductory remarks, charity is in its origin spiritual, but in what is derived from this it is natural. Natural charity, if inwardly it is spiritual, appears to the sight of angels transparent, like a diamond. But if inwardly it is not spiritual, but purely natural, it appears to the sight of angels pearly, like the eye of a boiled fish.

[14] 'It is not for me to say whether the well-known examples of charity, which you have brought forward one after another, are inspired by spiritual charity or not. But I can say what the spirituality in it must be, for them to be natural expressions of spiritual charity. Their spirituality consists in their being done from a love of justice combined with judgment, that is, in a person looking to see, when he does something charitable, whether he acts from justice; and it is judgment which allows him to see this. For a person can do harm by kindnesses, and do good by things that look like doing harm. For example, harm is done by kindnesses if anyone supplies a hard-up highwayman with the money to buy himself a sword, although in asking he will not say this is his intention. Or if anyone helps him break out of prison and shows him the way to the woods, saying to himself, "It is not my fault that he robs travellers; I helped a fellow human being." To take another example: if someone feeds an idler, and takes care he is not compelled to work, saying, "Come into a room in my house and lie in bed; why tire yourself out?" anyone doing this is fostering idleness, Or again, if anyone promotes relations and friends of bad character to high office, in which they can set on foot many kinds of mischief. Can anyone fail to see that charitable deeds of this sort are not motivated by any love of justice combined with judgment?

[15] 'On the other hand, a person may do a kindness by acts which look like wrong-doing; for instance, a judge who acquits a wrong-doer because he weeps, utters pious expressions and begs to have his offence overlooked, on the grounds that he is his neighbour. Yet the judge in fact acts charitably, when he imposes the sentence prescribed by law, for by so doing he prevents him from doing further wrong and harming the community, which is the neighbour in a superior degree; and he sees to it that such a judgment is not a cause of scandal. Is anyone unaware that it is for their own good that servants are chastised by their masters, and children by their parents, for doing wrong? It is much the same with those in hell, all of whom love to do wrong, being kept shut up in prison and punished when they act wickedly, a punishment permitted by the Lord to reform them. This happens because the Lord is justice itself, and does whatever He does as the result of judgment itself.

sRef Matt@28 @18 S16' sRef John@15 @5 S16' [16] 'These facts allow us to see clearly why it is that, as I said before, spiritual charity arises from a love of justice combined with judgment, but from love from no other source than the Lord God the Saviour. The reason is that all the good of charity is from the Lord; for He says:

He who remains in me and I in him brings forth much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. John 15:5.

also:

He has all power in heaven and on earth. Matt. 28:18.

All love of justice combined with judgment has no other origin than the God of heaven, who is justice itself, and the source of all human powers of judgment (Jer. 23:5; 33:15).

[17] 'This leads to the conclusion that everything said about charity from the seats to right or left - that it is morality with faith breathed into it, piety with pity breathed into it, doing good to the upright and to the wicked, looking after one's relatives and friends in every way, giving to the poor and helping the needy, building hospitals and supporting them with gifts, endowing places of worship and doing kindnesses to their ministers, that it is the Christian brotherhood of old, or forgiving everyone his faults - all of these are splendid examples of charity, when they are done out of a love of justice combined with judgment. Otherwise they are not charity, but only like watercourses cut off from the spring that feeds them, and like branches torn from a tree. True charity consists in believing in the Lord, and acting fairly and righteously in every deed and employment. Anyone therefore who at the Lord's bidding loves justice and executes it with judgment is an image and likeness of charity.'

[18] This speech was greeted with the sort of silence typically kept by those who are led by the internal man to see and acknowledge that something is so, but do not yet do so in their external man; I could observe this from their faces. But I was then suddenly carried up out of their sight, for from being in the spirit I re-entered my material body. A natural person, being clothed in a material body, is invisible to any spiritual person, that is, any spirit or angel, and so are they to him.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 460

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 460

460. The second experience*.

Once when I was looking around the spiritual world I heard a noise like the grinding of teeth, and also a throbbing sound, and mixed with them hoarse cries. I asked what this was. 'There are colleges,' said the angels with me, 'which we call places of entertainment, where they hold disputations. Their debates sound like this if heard from a distance, but from close by they are heard only as disputations.'

On approaching I saw some huts made of plaited reeds stuck together with mud. I wanted to see in through a window, but there was none. I was not allowed to go in through the door, because if I did light would flood in from heaven and cause confusion. Then suddenly a window was made on the right, and then I heard complaints that they were in darkness; but a little later a window was made on the left and that on the right was shut, and then little by little the darkness was dispelled, and they could see one another by their own sort of light. After this I was permitted to go in by the door and listen.

There was a table in the middle with benches round it; but it seemed to me that they were all standing on the benches disputing hotly about faith and charity. One party claimed that faith was the essential of the church, the other that charity was. Those who made faith the essential said: 'Surely faith guides our dealings with God and charity our dealings with men. Is not faith then heavenly and charity earthly? Surely it is by heavenly things, not earthly ones, that we are saved. Again, surely God can from heaven give us faith, because it is heavenly, while a person can give himself charity, because it is earthly; and what a person gives himself has nothing to do with the church and therefore does not save. Surely like this no one can be justified in the sight of God by so-called charitable deeds. Believe us, it is by faith alone that we are not only justified, but also sanctified, provided that faith is not polluted by the presence of merit-seeking deeds among the charitable ones.' They added many more arguments.

[2] But those who made charity the essential of the church hotly contested these arguments, claiming that it is charity, not faith, which saves. 'Surely God holds all men dear and wishes good to all? How can God do this except by means of men? Surely God does not grant only the ability to talk with men about matters that concern faith, without enabling men to do charitable acts? Do you not see how absurd it is of you to talk of charity being earthly? Charity is heavenly, and because you do not do charitable good, your faith is earthly. How do you receive your faith, except like a block of wood or a stone? "By listening to the Word" you will say. But how can the Word act on someone if he merely listens to it? How can it act upon a block of wood or a stone? Perhaps you are quickened without any awareness of it; but what sort of quickening is it, apart from your ability to say that faith alone justifies and saves. But you do not know what faith is, or what sort of faith is saving faith.'

[3] Then someone got up whom the angel talking with me called a syncretist. He took off his wig and put it on the table, but immediately put it back on his head, because he was bald. 'Listen,' he said, 'you are all wrong. The truth is that faith is spiritual and charity is moral, but they are none the less linked. The link is effected by means of the Word, as well as by the Holy Spirit, and by the result produced, which can indeed be called obedience, though man has no part in it; because when faith is introduced, a person knows no more about it than a statue. I have pondered the subject for a long time, and finally reached the solution, that a person can receive from God faith which is spiritual, but he cannot be moved by God to charity which is spiritual, any more than a block of wood can.'

[4] This speech was greeted by applause from those who championed faith alone, but with disapproval from those who championed charity. They said indignantly: 'Listen, friend, you are unaware that there is moral life which is spiritual, and moral life which is purely natural. Spiritual moral life is found in those who do good coming from God, but still as if of their own accord, purely natural moral life in those who do good coming from hell, and yet still as if of their own accord.'

[5] I said that the dispute sounded like the grinding of teeth, and a throbbing sound, with hoarse cries mixed with them. The dispute which sounded like the grinding of teeth came from those who made faith the sole essential of the church, and the throbbing came from those who made charity the sole essential of the church, the hoarse cries mixed with them came from the syncretist. The reason why they sounded like this at a distance was that they had all in the world engaged in disputes, and had not shunned any evil; consequently they had not done any good of spiritual lineage. They were also totally ignorant of the fact that the whole of faith is truth and the whole of charity is good, and that truth without good is not truth in spirit, and good without truth is not good in spirit, so that one makes the other.

* This passage is repeated from AR 386.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 461

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 461

461. The third experience*.

Once when I was in the spirit I travelled deep into the southern region in the spiritual world, and came into a park there; and I saw that this one was better than the others I had so far visited. The reason was that a garden means intelligence; and it is to the south that all are sent who are especially intelligent. It was this that was meant by the Garden of Eden, where Adam lived with his wife; so their being driven out implies that they were deprived of intelligence, and thus also of uprightness of life. As I was walking in this southern park I noticed some people sitting under a laurel-bush eating figs. I went up to them and asked them to give me some figs. They did so, and at once the figs in my hand turned into grapes. I was surprised by this, but an angelic spirit standing next to me said: 'The figs in your hand turned into grapes, because the meaning of figs by their correspondence is the kinds of good of charity and hence of faith in the natural or external man, and grape means the kinds of good of charity and hence of faith in the spiritual or internal man. As you love what is spiritual, so this happened to you. For in our world everything happens and comes into existence, and also undergoes change, in accordance with correspondences.'

[2] I was at once struck with a keen desire to know how a person can do good coming from God, and yet do it exactly as if of himself. So I asked those who were eating figs how they understood the point. They said that they could only understand this as meaning that God performs this inwardly in a person while he is unaware of it. For if he were conscious of it, and did it in that state, he would do only apparent good, which is inwardly evil. 'Everything,' they said, 'which comes from man comes from his self (proprium), and this is evil from birth. How then can good coming from God and evil coming from man be linked, and so jointly proceed to action? A person's self in matters of salvation is constantly seeking merit; and in so far as he does so, he takes away from the Lord His merit, which is the height of injustice and impiety. In short, if the good which God performs in a person were to flow into his willing and thence into his doing, that good would be utterly defiled and profaned, something God never permits. A person can of course think that the good he does comes from God, and call it God's good done by his means; still we do not understand that it is good.'

sRef John@5 @26 S3' [3] Then I disclosed what I was thinking and said: 'You do not understand because your thinking is based upon appearances, and this sort of thinking if supported by argument is fallacy. The appearance and hence the fallacy you are involved in is because you believe that everything a person wills and thinks, and so does and says, is in him and consequently comes from him. Yet in fact nothing of this is in him, except the condition of receiving what flows in. Man is not life in himself, but he is an instrument for receiving life. The Lord is life in Himself, as He also says in John:

As the Father has life in Himself, so He granted to the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26; and elsewhere, for instance 11:25; 14:6, 19.

[4] 'There are two things which produce life, love and wisdom, or, what is the same, the good of love and the truth of wisdom. These flow in from God, and are received by a person as if they were his own; and because they are felt like this, they also come from a person as if they were his. The Lord grants that they are felt like this by a person, so that what flows in affects him, and so by being accepted remains with him. But because all evil also flows in, not from God, but from hell, and accepting this gives pleasure, man being by birth such an instrument, for this reason only so much good can be accepted from God as there is evil taken away by the person as if by himself, which is achieved by repentance together with faith in the Lord.

[5] 'It can be plainly seen from a consideration of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch that love and wisdom, charity and faith, or to use a more general expression, the good of love and charity, and the truth of wisdom and faith, flow into a person; and that what flows in appears in a person as if it were entirely his own, and it proceeds from him as if it were his own. All the sensations produced in the organs of those senses come from an external source and are felt in the organs concerned. It is the same with the organs of the internal senses, the only difference being that these are affected by spiritual things, which are undetectable, flowing in, whereas the external senses are affected by natural things, which are detectable. In short, man is an instrument for the reception of life from God; it follows that he receives good to the extent that he desists from evil. Everyone is granted by the Lord the potentiality of desisting from evil, because he is granted the power to will and to have understanding; and whatever a person does from his will in accordance with his understanding, or what is the same thing, from his freedom to will in accordance with the power of reason in his understanding, is permanent. By this means the Lord brings a person into a state of being linked with Himself, and in this state He reforms, regenerates and saves him.

[6] 'The life which flows in is life coming forth from the Lord; this life is also called the Spirit of God, and in the Word the Holy Spirit, and of this it is said that it enlightens and quickens, in fact that it works on him. But this life varies and is modified depending on the organisation brought about by love. You can also know that all the good of love and charity, and all the truth of wisdom and faith flow in and are not actually in the person, if you reflect that when anyone thinks that man has such a capability from creation, he must inevitably think that God poured Himself into man, so that people are partially gods. Yet those who think this as a result of firm belief become devils, and in our world stink like corpses.

[7] 'Moreover, what is human action but a mind acting? What the mind wills and thinks, it does and speaks by means of its instrument, the body. When therefore the mind is guided by the Lord, so is its action and speech. Action and speech are guided by the Lord, when He is believed in. If this were not so, tell me if you can, why did the Lord in thousands of places in His Word order man to love his neighbour, perform the good deeds of charity, to produce fruit like a tree and keep His commandments, and to do both one and the other in order to be saved? Again, why did He say that a person would be judged according to his deeds or what he had done, those whose deeds were good going to heaven and life, those whose deeds were wicked going to hell and death? How could the Lord have said such things, if everything coming from a person was done to acquire merit and therefore wicked? You ought therefore to know that if the mind is charity, so too is action; but if the mind is faith alone, and this too is faith separated from spiritual charity, action also is that faith.'

[8] On hearing this those who were sitting under the laurel said: 'We grasp that you have spoken fairly, but still we do not grasp the point.' 'You grasp,' I answered them, 'that I have spoken fairly by means of the general perception which all people enjoy as the result of the light which flows in from heaven when they hear something true. Your failure to grasp the point is due to your own personal perception, which everyone has as a result of light flowing in from the world. In the case of the wise those two kinds of perception, internal and external, or spiritual and natural, act as one. You too can make them act as one, if you look to the Lord and put away evils.' Since they understood this, I took some shoots off a vine and held them out to them saying, 'Do you think this is from me or from the Lord?' They said it was from the Lord through me; and at once the shoots in their hands put forth grapes.

When I left, I saw a table of cedar-wood, on which was a book, under a flourishing olive-tree with a vine wound about its trunk. When I looked, I saw to my surprise that the book was the one written through me called ARCANA CAELESTIA**. I said that that book contained a full demonstration that man is an instrument for the reception of life, and was not himself life; and that life could not be created and so by being created be in man, any more than light could be created in the eye.

* This passage is based upon AR 875.9-15.
** Or 'The secrets of heaven'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 462

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 462

462. The fourth experience*

In the spiritual world I looked towards the sea-coast and saw a splendid port. On approaching I looked inside and there lay boats both great and small, containing cargoes of every kind; and on their thwarts sat boys and girls who distributed the goods to any that wished. 'We are waiting,' they said, 'for our lovely turtles to appear. They will come out of the sea to us at any moment.'

Then I saw turtles, both small and great, on whose shells and scales sat baby turtles, all looking towards the surrounding islands. The father turtles had two heads, a large one covered with shell like that of their bodies, which gave them a ruddy look; the other a small one of the sort turtles have, which they could draw back into the forepart of their bodies, and could make invisible by inserting it into the larger head. But I kept my gaze on the large, ruddy head, and made out that it had a face like a human being, and was talking with the boys and girls on the thwarts and was licking their hands. The boys and girls fondled them and gave them tit-bits and delicacies, as well as valuable goods such as silk for clothes, citron-wood for tables, purple for ornament and scarlet for dyeing.

[2] On seeing these I wanted to know what they represented, because I know that all sights seen in the spiritual world are correspondences, representing the spiritual effects of affection and the thought it produces. Then I was spoken to from heaven and told: 'You know yourself what the port and the ships represent, as well as the boys and girls on the thwarts; but you do not know what the turtles are. They represent,' they said, 'those of the clergy there who totally separate faith from charity and its good deeds, insisting to themselves that there is obviously no possibility of linking them, but the Holy Spirit by means of faith in God the Father for the sake of the Son's merit enters into a person and purifies him inwardly even as far as his own will, which they imagine as a sort of oval plane. When the working of the Holy Spirit approaches this plane, it twists aside around its left edge without touching it at all, so that the interior or upper part of the person's character is for God, and the exterior or lower part is for man. Thus nothing the person does appears in God's sight, neither good nor bad; the good does not, because this would be to acquire merit, and the bad does not because it is bad. Either of these, if it were presented to God's sight, would destroy the person, Since this is so, a person may will, think, speak and do whatever he pleases, so long as he takes precautions from a worldly point of view,'

[3] I asked whether they also held that one might think of God as not being omnipresent and omniscient. I was told from heaven that this too is allowed them, because in the case of one who has acquired faith and been purified and justified by it, God pays no attention to any thought or will on his part, but he still retains in the inward recess or higher region of his mind or character the faith which he had received by its activity, and that this activity may from time to time recur without the person's knowledge. 'These facts are represented by the small head which they draw back into the forepart of their bodies and also insert into the larger head when talking to laymen. For in speaking to them they do not use the small head, but the large one, the front of which has a kind of human face. Their talk with them is based on the Word, about love, charity, good deeds, the Ten Commandments, repentance; and they quote from the Word almost everything which is said there on these subjects. But then they insert the small head into the large one, which allows them inwardly to understand that these things are not to be done for God's sake or for salvation, but only for the sake of public or private advantage.

[4] 'But because they base their remarks on these subjects on the Word, especially in speaking with great charm and elegance of the Gospel, the working of the Holy Spirit and salvation, they seem to their hearers like handsome men endowed with wisdom beyond all others on the globe. This was why you saw them being given delicacies and valuable goods by the boys and girls sitting on the thwarts in the boats. So these are the people you saw represented as turtles. In your world they are hard to tell apart from others, except for the fact that they think they excel all others in wisdom, laughing at others, including those who hold similar views on faith, but are not privy to their secrets. They carry a seal with them in their clothing, by which they can make themselves known to others of their sort.'

[5] The person talking with me said: 'I shall not tell you their opinions on other matters to do with faith, such as the elect, free will, baptism and the Holy Supper. These are opinions that they do not divulge, though we in heaven know them. However, since this is the sort of people they are in the world, and after death no one is allowed to speak otherwise than he thinks, they are considered insane, because they are then unable to speak except for the mad ideas that fill their thoughts. So they are ejected from their communities, eventually being cast down into the pit of the abyss (mentioned in Rev. 9:2), becoming bodily spirits and looking like Egyptian mummies. A hard skin is drawn over the interiors of their minds, because in the world too they had set up a barrier there. The community they form in hell is adjacent to the one there composed of Machiavellians; they constantly visit one another and call themselves companions. But they leave them on account of their difference, in that they have some religious feeling about the act of justification by faith, while the Machiavellians have none.'

[6] After seeing them expelled from their communities and brought together ready to be cast down, I saw in the air a ship sailing under seven sails, and in it ships' officers and seamen dressed in purple with magnificent laurels on their hats. 'Here we are in heaven,' they shouted, 'we are purple-clad doctors, adorned with finer laurels than anyone else, because we are the leading wise men of all the clergy in Europe.' I wondered what this was, and I was told that they were pictures of pride and imaginary thoughts, known as fantasies, arising from those who previously appeared as turtles; now being cast out of their communities as insane, they were gathered into one group and were now standing in one place.

Then wishing to talk with them I approached the place where they were standing and greeted them. 'Are you,' I said, 'the people who separated people's internals from their externals, and the working of the Holy Spirit as in faith from the Spirit's co-operation with man outside of faith, thus separating God from man? Did you not by this take away not only charity itself and its deeds from faith, as many other doctors of the clergy do, but also faith itself in so far as it is displayed by man in the sight of God? [7] But would you prefer me to talk to you on this subject by the light of reason, or by drawing upon Holy Scripture?' 'Speak first,' they said, 'by the light of reason.'

So I spoke and said: 'How can a person's internal and external be separated? Can anyone endowed with normal powers of perception fail to see, or fail to be capable of seeing, that all of a person's interiors extend into and are continued into his exteriors, reaching even to his outermost level so as to bring about their effects and perform what they want to do? Surely the internals exist for the sake of the externals, so that these may be where they end, and they may rest on them, so coming into being, very much as a column stands on its base. You can see that, if they were discontinuous and so not joined, the outermost layers would collapse and burst like a bubble in the air. Can anyone deny that the inward workings of God in a person number billions, all unknown to the person concerned; and what profit is it to know about them, so long as the outermost layers are known, the point at which he is in his thought and will together with God?

[8] 'Let us take an example to illustrate this. Surely no one is aware of the inward workings of his speech: how the lungs draw in air, which fills the vesicles, bronchi and lobes; how he expels the air into the trachea and there turns it into sound; how the sound is modified in the glottis by the help of the larynx, and how the tongue then articulates it, the lips completing the articulation, so that speech is produced. All those inward workings, of which the person is totally unaware, are for the sake of the end product, the person's ability to speak. Take away or separate one of those internal processes so that it is no longer continuous with the end product, and a person could no more talk than a block of wood.

[9] 'Let us take another example. The two hands form the extremities of the human body. But the internal parts which form a continuous link with them run from the head through the neck, then the chest, shoulder-blades, arms and elbows; and there are countless muscular tissues, countless rows of motor fibres, countless bundles of nerves and blood-vessels, and many joints of bones with their ligaments and membranes - is anyone aware of any of this? Yet it takes every single one of them to make the hands function. Suppose the internal parts twisted back to the left or the right around the wrist-joint and did not continue into the hands; would not the hand then fall away from the elbow and rot away like any lifeless part torn off? Or if you prefer the idea, it would be like what happens to the body when a person is beheaded. This is exactly what would happen to the human mind, together with its two kinds of life, the will and the understanding, if the Divine workings which have to do with faith and charity stopped mid-way, and did not extend without a break to man. To be sure, man then would be not merely an animal, but a rotten block of wood. Such conclusions are the product of reason.

sRef Matt@25 @28 S10' sRef Matt@25 @27 S10' sRef Matt@25 @30 S10' sRef Matt@25 @29 S10' sRef Matt@25 @17 S10' sRef Matt@25 @16 S10' sRef Matt@25 @19 S10' sRef Matt@25 @18 S10' sRef Matt@25 @15 S10' sRef John@15 @4 S10' sRef Matt@25 @14 S10' sRef John@15 @5 S10' sRef Matt@25 @24 S10' sRef Matt@25 @26 S10' sRef Matt@25 @25 S10' sRef Matt@25 @23 S10' sRef Matt@25 @21 S10' sRef Matt@25 @20 S10' sRef Matt@25 @22 S10' sRef Rev@3 @20 S10' [10] 'Now if you are willing to listen, the same things are in accordance with Holy Scripture. Does not the Lord say:

Remain in me and I in you. I am the vine and you are the branches. If someone remains in me and I in him, he bears much fruit. John 15:4, 5.

Surely the fruits are the good deeds which the Lord does by means of man, and man does of himself under the Lord's guidance. The Lord also says that He stands at the door and knocks, and He goes in to anyone who opens the door, and dines with him and he with the Lord (Rev. 3:20). Does not the Lord give minas and talents for man to trade with and make a profit, and does He not give everlasting life in accordance with his profit (Matt. 25:14-30; Luke 19:13-26)? Or again, does He not give each man his pay in proportion to the work he does in the Lord's vineyard (Matt. 20:1-17)? These are but a few examples; pages could be filled with quotations from the Word showing that man should produce fruit like a tree, should act according to the commandments, love God and the neighbour, and much more besides.

[11] 'But I know that your own intelligence cannot have anything in common, regarded as it is essentially, with these teachings from the Word. Although you talk about them, your ideas pervert them. Nor can you help yourselves, because you take away from man everything that is God's as regards communication and the linking it produces. What is then left, but merely everything that has to do with public worship?'

Later on these people appeared to me in the light of heaven, which uncovers and makes visible what sort of person each one is. Then they did not appear as before in a ship sailing through the air as if in heaven, nor did the people in it have purple clothing and laurels around their heads. But they were in a sandy place, clothed in rags, with nets like fishermen's round their lower parts, through which their nakedness was visible. Then they were sent down to join a community which was adjacent to that of the Machiavellians.

* Repeated from AR 463.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 463

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 463

463. CHAPTER EIGHT

FREE WILL

Before preparing to set down the teaching of the new church on free will, I must preface my remarks with an account of the views on this subject expressed by the present-day church in its theological books. But for this anyone of sound reason and religion might think that it is not worth while writing anything new on the subject. He might say to himself: 'Is there anyone who does not know that man has free will in spiritual matters? What else would be the point of priests preaching that people should believe in God, be converted, live in accordance with the commandments in the Word, fight against the lusts of the flesh, and turn themselves into new creations,' and much more of the same sort. He cannot therefore help thinking that these expressions would be merely empty verbiage, if there were no element of free will in matters affecting salvation, and it would be madness to deny this, as being contrary to common sense. Yet the present-day church goes in the opposite direction and banishes it from its buildings, as is evident from the book called the Formula of Concord, a book the Evangelicals swear to uphold, as the following extracts will show. The Reformed churches have similar teaching and thus belief about free will, so the situation is similar throughout the Christian world, and consequently in Germany, Sweden, Denmark, England and Holland, as is clear from their theological books. The following passages are transcribed from the Formula of Concord, published at Leipzig in 1756.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 464

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 464

464. (i) 'The scholars of the Confession of Augsburg hold that as the result of the fall of our first parents, man is so utterly corrupt that in spiritual matters relating to our conversion and salvation he is by nature blind, and on hearing the Word of God preached he neither understands it nor can understand it, but judges it a foolish thing; and he never of himself approaches God, but is rather an enemy of God and so remains, until by the power of the Holy Spirit on hearing the Word preached he is by pure grace, without any co-operation on his own part, converted, endowed with faith, regenerated and made new' (pp. [655,] 656).

[2] (ii) 'We believe that the understanding, heart and will of a person who has not been born again cannot of his own natural abilities in spiritual and Divine matters understand, believe, embrace, think, will, begin, complete, do, perform or co-operate in anything whatever; but that man is so corrupt and dead to good, that since the fall and before regeneration there remains left over not so much as a spark of spiritual ability, to enable him to prepare himself for God's grace, or to grasp it when offered, or to fit himself for it or of his own accord to receive it. Nor can he of his own ability contribute to his own conversion either totally or to the extent of a half or even the slightest extent, or act, work or co-operate of his own accord, or as if of his own accord; but man is a slave to sin and in bondage to Satan, by whom he is impelled. Thus by reason of the corruption of his abilities and the depravity of his nature his natural free will is active and effective only in matters which displease and oppose God' (p. 656).

[3] (iii) 'In secular and natural matters man is industrious and clever, but in spiritual and Divine matters which concern the salvation of his soul he is like a tree-trunk, a stone or the pillar of salt into which Lot's wife was turned, unable to use eyes, mouth or any senses' (p. 661).

[4] (iv) 'None the less man has the power of movement and is able to control his external parts, to listen to the Gospel, and in some way to meditate on it, but still in his unexpressed thoughts he despises it as a folly, and he is unable to believe it, being in this respect worse than a tree-trunk, unless the Holy Spirit is effective in him, and kindles and produces in him faith, the other virtues pleasing to God and obedience' (p. 662).

[5] (v) 'It can in a way be argued that man is not a stone or a tree-trunk: these do not offer resistance, nor do they understand or feel what is done to them, in the way that man by his will resists God, until he has been turned towards God. Yet it is true that before conversion man is a rational creature, endowed with understanding, though not in Divine matters, and with a will, though incapable of willing any good which might lead to his salvation; yet he is unable to make any contribution to his conversion, and in this respect he is worse than a tree-trunk or a stone' (pp. 672, 673).

[6] (vi) 'The whole act of conversion is the action, gift and work of the Holy Spirit alone, who by His strength and power brings about and effects this, by means of the Word, in man's understanding, heart and will, as if in a passive object, where man does nothing but is only worked on. However, this is not like the way a statue is shaped from a block of stone or a seal is imprinted on wax, because the wax has neither knowledge nor will' (p. 681).

[7] (vii) 'The writings of certain Fathers and modern scholars have alleged that God draws man but only with his consent, so that man's will plays some part in his conversion; but these statements are not in accordance with sound discourse, for they support a false view of the powers of human choice in conversion' (p. 582).

[8] (viii) 'In outward, worldly matters, which are open to reason, man has left to him a certain amount of understanding, ability and faculties, although these wretched remains are very weak; and these same talents, small as they are, are poisoned and contaminated by inherited disease, so that they are worthless in the sight of God' (p. 641).

[9] (ix) 'Man in his conversion, which turns him from a son of wrath into a son of grace, does not co-operate with the Holy Spirit, seeing that man's conversion is the work of the Holy Spirit alone and unaided' (pp. 219, 579f, 663ff, Appendix p. 143). 'However, once he has been born again, man can co-operate by the power of the Holy Spirit, although there is at the same time great weakness in him. He does good deeds to the extent that and so long as the Holy Spirit leads, controls and guides him; but he does not co-operate with the Holy Spirit like two horses together pulling a carriage' (p. 674).

[10] (x) 'Original sin is not a crime which is perpetrated in action, but something intimately implanted and inherent in man's nature, substance and essence, acting as the spring from which well up all sins realised in action, such as wicked thoughts, conversations and evil deeds' (p. 577). 'The inherited disease which has corrupted his whole nature is a dreadful sin, and indeed the beginning and chief of all sins, the root and source from which flow forth all transgressions' (p. 640). 'By that sin, as it were by spiritual leprosy, completely lodged in even the inmost viscera and the deepest recesses of the heart, man's nature is in God's sight totally infected and corrupted; and on account of this corruption man's person is accused and condemned by God's law, so that we are by nature sons of wrath, slaves of death and damnation, unless benefiting by Christ's merit we are freed and saved from these evils' (p. 639). 'As a result we suffer a total lack or deprivation of original righteousness or the image of God which was created along with us in Paradise, and this is the source of the powerlessness, ineptitude and stupidity which unfits man for all Divine or spiritual concerns. In place of the lost image of God man suffers an intimate, most evil and deep, inscrutable and unspeakable corruption of his whole nature, and of all his powers, particularly the higher and principal faculties of the soul, in mind, understanding, heart and will' (p. 640).

TCR (Chadwick) n. 465

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 465

465. These are the precepts, dogmas and prescriptions of the present-day church about man's free will in spiritual and natural matters, as well as about original sin. These have been cited so as to show up more clearly the precepts, dogmas and prescriptions on these subjects of the new church, Setting the two forms alongside like this puts their truth in the light, a practice followed by painters, who put an ugly face next to a beautiful one, so that seeing them together clearly shows the eye the beauty of the one and the ugliness of the other. The prescriptions of the new church are the following.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 466

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 466

sRef Gen@4 @14 S0' sRef Gen@4 @16 S0' sRef Gen@4 @15 S0' aRef Gen@2 @9 S0' sRef Gen@4 @17 S0' 466. I

The fact that two trees, one of life and one of the knowledge of good and evil, were put in the Garden of Eden, means that man was given free will in spiritual matters.

Many people have believed that by Adam and Eve in the book of Moses are not meant the first human beings to be created, and in support of this view they have employed proofs that there were people before Adam, drawn from computations and chronologies preserved by some peoples. It is also supported by what Cain, Adam's firstborn, said to Jehovah:

I shall be a wanderer, driven to and fro on the earth, so that anyone meeting me will kill me. For which reason Jehovah set a mark on Cain, that anyone meeting him should not kill him. Gen. 4:14, 15.

And after he went from before the face of Jehovah, he dwelt in the land of Nod, and built a city. Gen. 4:16, 17.

It follows from this that the earth was inhabited before Adam.

I proved at length in the work called ARCANA CAELESTIA, which I published in London, that Adam and his wife mean the most ancient church on this earth. I also proved there that the Garden of Eden means the wisdom of the people in that church, the tree of life means the Lord being in man and man being in the Lord, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil means man not being in the Lord but immersed in his own self (proprium), as is everyone who believes that he does everything, even good, of himself. Eating from this tree means making evil one's own.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 467

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 467

sRef Ezek@28 @12 S0' sRef Ezek@28 @13 S0' sRef Ezek@28 @4 S0' 467. In the Word the Garden of Eden does not mean a garden, but intelligence, and a tree does not mean a tree, but man. The Garden of Eden can be shown to mean intelligence and wisdom from the following passages:

In your intelligence and wisdom you made riches for yourself.* Ezek. 28:4.

and in the continuation of this chapter:

Full of wisdom, you were in Eden, God's garden; every kind of precious stone was your covering. Ezek. 28:12, 13.

This is said of the prince and king of Tyre, to whom wisdom is attributed, because Tyre in the Word means the church in respect of knowledge of truth and good, which is the means to wisdom. The precious stones which are to be his covering also mean things known about truth and good; for the prince and king of Tyre were not in the Garden of Eden.

sRef Ezek@31 @9 S2' sRef Ezek@31 @3 S2' sRef Ezek@31 @8 S2' sRef Ezek@31 @18 S2' [2] In another passage in Ezekiel:

Asshur is a cedar in Lebanon. The cedars have not hidden it in the garden of God. All the trees in the garden of God were not its equal in beauty; all the trees of Eden in the garden of God envied it. Ezek. 31:3, 8, 9.

And further on:

To whom you thus became like in glory and size among the trees of Eden. Ezek. 31:18.

This is said of Asshur, because in the Word Asshur means rationality and intelligence arising from this.

sRef Rev@22 @2 S3' sRef Isa@51 @3 S3' sRef Rev@2 @7 S3' [3] In Isaiah:

Jehovah will comfort Zion, and turn its desert into an Eden and its wilderness into a garden of Jehovah. Isa. 51:3.

Zion there is the church, Eden and the garden of Jehovah are wisdom and intelligence. In Revelation:

To him who overcomes I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the paradise** of God, Rev. 2:7.

In the midst of the street, on either side of the river was the tree of life. Rev. 22:2.

[4] These passages show plainly that the garden in Eden, in which we are told Adam was placed, means intelligence and wisdom, because similar things are said of Tyre, Asshur and Zion. A garden also means intelligence in other passages of the Word, such as Isa. 58:11; 61:11; Jer. 31:12; Amos 9:14; Num. 24:6. This spiritual way of understanding a garden is due to the representations seen in the spiritual world. There parks are to be seen, wherever angels possess intelligence and wisdom; it is the intelligence and wisdom themselves, which they get from the Lord, which produce such appearances around them. This is due to the correspondence, because everything which comes into being in the spiritual world is an example of correspondence.

* The Latin text repeats here the phrase 'you were in Eden, God's garden' from the next quotation.
** The Greek word paradeisos, used here in its Latin form, means properly an enclosed garden or park; the meaning 'paradise' arose only later.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 468

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 468

sRef Lev@19 @23 S0' sRef Ezek@17 @24 S0' sRef Ps@1 @3 S0' sRef Jer@11 @17 S0' sRef Matt@12 @33 S0' sRef Lev@19 @24 S0' sRef Jer@11 @16 S0' sRef Ezek@20 @47 S0' sRef Ps@148 @9 S0' sRef Ps@52 @8 S0' sRef Matt@3 @10 S0' sRef Ps@104 @16 S0' sRef Ps@1 @2 S0' sRef Rev@11 @4 S0' 468. A tree means man, as is proved by the following passages in the Word:

All the trees of the countryside shall know that I, Jehovah, will lay low the tall tree, and raise up the low tree; and I will wither the green tree and make the dry tree sprout. Ezek. 17:24.

Blessed is he whose pleasure is in the law; he shall be like a tree planted near streams of water, which shall give fruit at its proper time. Ps. 1:2, 3; Jer. 17:8.

Praise Jehovah, fruit-trees. Ps. 148:9.

Jehovah's trees are fully watered. Ps. '104:16.

The axe lies at the root of the tree; every tree which does not produce good fruit will be cut out. Matt. 3:10; 7:16-21.

Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree rotten [and its fruit rotten]; for by its fruit the tree is known. Matt. 12:33; Luke 6:43, 44.

I shall light a fire which will consume every green tree and every dry tree. Ezek. 20:47.

It was because a tree means man, that it was commanded that the fruit of a tree used for food in the land of Canaan should be accounted uncircumcised (Lev. 19:23, 24). Since an olive-tree means a man of the celestial church, it is said of the two witnesses who were prophesying, that they were two olive-trees standing close by the God of the whole earth (Rev. 11:4; similarly Zech. 4:3, 11, 12). Also, in David's Psalms:

I am like a flourishing olive-tree in the house of God. Ps. 52[:8].

Also, in Jeremiah:

A flourishing olive-tree with fair fruit has Jehovah called your name. Jer. 11:16, 17.

There are many other passages, too numerous to quote here.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 469

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 469

469. Anyone today possessed of any inward wisdom can perceive or guess that the descriptions of Adam and his wife have some spiritual meaning, though what this is no one up to now has known, since the spiritual sense of the Word has only been revealed at the present time. Surely anyone can see even from a distance that Jehovah would not have put two trees in a garden, one of them to be a stumbling-block, unless this represented something spiritually. The idea that they were both cursed for eating from a tree, and this curse is attached to every person from their time, so that the whole human race was condemned for one man's fault, and one that involved no evil of carnal lust or injustice of the heart - can this be squared with Divine justice? In particular, why did Jehovah not deter Adam from eating, seeing that He was there to see it, and why did He not cast the serpent down into the underworld before it persuaded them?

[2] But, my friend, God did not do this, because by doing so He would have taken away man's free will; and it is this which makes man a man and not an animal. Once this is known, it is perfectly plain that the two trees, one leading to life and the other to death, represent man's free will in spiritual matters. Moreover, hereditary evil is not from this source, but from the parents, who pass on to their children a tendency to that evil which beset them themselves. The truth of this is clearly to be seen by anyone who studies the behaviour, minds and faces of the children, or even of whole families, descended from one father. Yet it depends upon each member of the family whether he wants to embrace or withdraw from his inheritance, since everyone is left to make his own choice. The particular meaning of the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil may be seen fully expounded in the experience described in 48 above.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 470

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 470

470. II

Man is not life, but a receiver of life from God.

It is generally believed that the life which a person has is his own, so that he is not merely a receiver of life but also is life. This general belief exists because he appears to live, that is, to feel, think, speak and act exactly as if of himself. The result is that the statement that man is a receiver of life and is not life must inevitably seem an unheard-of idea or a kind of paradox to those whose thought is based on the senses, because it is contrary to appearances. I have traced to appearances the reason for this wrong belief that man is also life, and that consequently life is implanted in man from creation, and propagated subsequently by transfer. But the reason for this mistake based on appearances is that most people at the present time are natural, and only a few are spiritual; and a natural man bases his judgment on appearances and the mistakes these lead to, and these are diametrically opposed to this truth, that man is merely a receiver of life, and is not life.

[2] The fact that man is not life, but a receiver of life from God, is proved by the following clear evidence, that all created things are in essence finite, and man, being finite, could only be created of finite substances. That is why the Book of Creation tells us that Adam was made of earth and its dust, and this is the reason for his name, since Adam means the ground. In fact every person is composed exclusively of substances to be found in the earth or emitted from the earth into the atmosphere. The emanations from the earth in the atmosphere are absorbed by people by means of the lungs and by pores throughout the body; the denser substances are absorbed in the form of food made from the earth's products.

[3] As for man's spirit, however, this too was created from finite substances. What is man's spirit but a receiver of mental life? The finite materials of which it is composed are spiritual substances, to be found in the spiritual world, and also transferred to our earth and there stored up. If they were not present there along with material substances, no seed could at the inmost level have been made fertile, and so grow in a wonderful way without any aberration from its first structure until it produces fruits and new seeds. Nor would any worms be procreated by effluvia from the earth and from gases given off by plants and impregnating the atmosphere.

sRef Gen@3 @5 S4' sRef Gen@2 @7 S4' [4] Can anyone reasonably suppose that the Infinite could create anything other than that which is finite, or that man, being finite, is anything but a form, which the Infinite can bring to life by the life in itself? This is what is meant by the following:

Jehovah God formed man, dust from the earth, and He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. Gen. 2:7.

God, being infinite, is life in Himself. This cannot be created and copied into man, for this would be making him God. The idea that this happened was the madness of the serpent, or the devil, which he passed on to Eve and Adam, for the serpent said:

On the day when you eat of the fruit of that tree, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God. Gen. 3:5.

[5] This deadly conviction, that God infused and copied Himself into men, was held by the people of the most ancient church in its final period leading up to its termination, as I have heard from their own lips. On account of their horrendous belief that they were thus gods, they lie hidden deep within a cavern, which no one can approach closely without falling victim to an inner vertigo. The previous section made it known that Adam and his wife mean and describe the most ancient church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 471

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 471

471. Anyone can see, if he is able in his thinking to raise his reason above the level of the senses, that life cannot be created. For what is life but the activity of love and wisdom in the inmost? And these are in God, and are God. This life too can be called the life force itself. Anyone seeing this can also see that that life cannot be copied into any man, except together with love and wisdom. Does anyone, can anyone deny that all the good of love and all the truth of wisdom are from God alone, and that in so far as a person receives these from God, so far does he have life from God and is called born of God, that is, regenerated? Then by contraries, in so far as anyone does not receive love and wisdom, or what is much the same, charity and faith, so far is he unable to receive life from God, which is essentially life, but only from hell. This is nothing but an inversion of life and is known as spiritual death.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 472

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 472

472. From what has been said we can reach the perception and conclusion that the following are not capable of being created, viz: (1) the Infinite, (2) love and wisdom, (3) and so life, (4) and light and heat, (5) in fact activity regarded in itself. Organs, however, for receiving these can be and have been created. These matters can be illustrated by the following comparisons. Light cannot be created, but the appropriate organ, the eye, can. Sound which is an activity of the atmosphere cannot be created, but the appropriate organ, the ear, can. Neither can heat be created, and heat is the prime source of activity, but everything in the three realms of nature has been created so as to receive heat, and in proportion to its reception everything is acted upon rather than acts.

[2] A law of creation ensures that active elements are accompanied by passive ones, and that the two are linked to form a single whole. If the active elements could be created, as the passive ones are, would there be any need of the sun and the heat and light it emits? All created things would continue in existence without them, would they not? Yet if heat and light were taken away, the created universe would collapse into chaos.

[3] The very sun of this world consists of created substances, and their activity produces fire. These examples are given as illustrations. It would be much the same with man, if spiritual light, which is in essence wisdom, and spiritual heat, which is in essence love, were not flowing into man and being received by him. The whole man is nothing but a form so organised as to be capable of receiving both of these, emanating from the natural as well as the spiritual world, since they correspond one to the other. A denial that man is a form for the reception of love and wisdom from God would involve denying also that anything flows in, including all good from God, as well as the possibility of being linked with God. So to say that man can be a dwelling-place and temple of God would be utterly meaningless.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 473

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 473

473. The reason why man is not sufficiently enlightened by his reason so as to know this, is that mistakes arising from believing in the appearances perceived by the body's external senses cast a shadow across that light. The reason why man cannot help feeling that it is his own life that makes him alive, is that the instrumental feels the principal as belonging to itself, so as to be unable to distinguish them. The principal and the instrumental causes act as a single cause according to a theorem well known to the learned. The principal cause is life, the instrumental cause is the human mind. Even animals seem to possess life created in them, but this is a similar fallacy, for they are organs created to receive light and heat from the natural world, and at the same time from the spiritual world. Each species is a form taken by some natural love, and it receives light and heat from the spiritual world transmitted through heaven and hell; through heaven in the case of gentle animals, through hell in the case of dangerous ones. Man is the only creature to receive light and heat, that is, wisdom and love, directly from the Lord, and this is the difference between man and animals.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 474

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 474

sRef John@14 @6 S0' sRef John@1 @4 S0' sRef John@8 @12 S0' sRef John@5 @26 S0' sRef John@1 @1 S0' 474. The Lord Himself teaches us in John that He is life in Himself, and so life itself.

The Word was with God and the Word was God. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. John 1:1, 4.

As the Father has life in Himself, so He granted to the Son to have life in Himself. John 5:26.

I am the way, truth and life. John 14:6.

He who follows me will have the light of life. John 8:12.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 475

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 475

475. III

So long as a person lives in the world, he is kept midway between heaven and hell, and he is there in spiritual equilibrium. This is free will.

In order to know what free will is and what it is like, one needs to know its origin, It is chiefly by knowing its origin that one gets to know not only of its existence, but what it is like. It originates from the spiritual world, where a person's mind is kept by the Lord. A person's mind is his spirit, which lives after death; and his spirit is constantly in company with spirits in that world who are like himself, while his spirit is equally by means of the material body surrounding it in company with people in the natural world. The reason for a person's not knowing that as regards his mind he is surrounded by spirits, is that the spirits, in whose company he is in the spiritual world, think and talk spiritually, while so long as a person is in the material body, his spirit thinks and talks naturally. Spiritual thought and speech cannot be understood or heard by the natural man, and vice versa; this is why spirits cannot be seen either. However, when a person's spirit associates with spirits in their world, then he joins them in spiritual thought and speech, because his mind is inwardly spiritual, though outwardly natural. Therefore its interior permits him to communicate with those spirits, and its exterior with men. It is this communication which allows a person to perceive things, and to think about them analytically. Without this a man's thought would not go beyond or differ from an animal's; and if he were deprived of all contact with spirits, he would instantly die.

[2] But to render comprehensible how a person can be kept midway between heaven and hell, and by that means in spiritual equilibrium, I must explain briefly the origin of his free will. The spiritual world consists of heaven and hell; heaven there is overhead, hell is beneath the feet, yet not in the middle of the globe which men live on, but beneath the lands of the spiritual world. These too are of spiritual origin, and so not in space, though there is an appearance of space.

sRef Luke@16 @26 S3' [3] Between heaven and hell there is a wide gap, which to those in it looks like a whole world. Into this gap there rise from hell exhalations of evil in boundless profusion, and, on the other hand, from heaven there flows in good, also in boundless profusion. This is the gap which Abraham described to the rich man in hell:

Between us and you a great gulf is fixed, to prevent those who want from passing across to you, and those there from passing across to us. Luke 16:26.

Everyone is as regards his spirit in the middle of this gap, for the sole purpose of allowing him to have free will.

[4] Because this gap is so huge and looks to those there like a great world, it is called the world of spirits. It is also full of spirits, for this is where everyone comes first after death, and is there prepared either for heaven or for hell. He is there in company with spirits, as he previously was with people in the world. There is no purgatory there; this is a fable invented by the Roman Catholics. I dealt in detail with that world in my book HEAVEN AND HELL (421-535), published in London in 1758.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 476

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 476

476. From childhood to old age everyone changes his place or location in the world of spirits. As a young child he is kept towards the north of the eastern sector. As a boy, as he begins to learn the rudiments of religion, he moves away by stages from the north towards the south. As a young man, as he begins to think for himself, he moves southwards; and later on, when he can exercise his own judgment and be his own master, in proportion to his development in matters which inwardly concern God and love towards the neighbour, south-eastwards. However, if his preference is for evil and he absorbs that, he moves towards the west. Everyone in the spiritual world has his dwelling-place determined by compass-points. The east is inhabited by those who have good from the Lord, for this is where the sun is, in the midst of which is the Lord. The north is inhabited by those who lack knowledge, the south by those who are intelligent, the west by those who are wicked.

[2] The person himself is not kept bodily in this gap or mid-region, but in his spirit; and as this changes its state, approaching good or else evil, the spirit is moved to places or locations in one or the other quarter, and comes into company with those who live there. It must, however, be known that it is not the Lord who moves them hither and thither, but the person moves himself in different ways. If he chooses good, then he together with the Lord, or rather the Lord together with him, moves his spirit eastwards. But if he chooses evil, then he together with the devil, or rather the devil together with him, moves his spirit westwards. It should be noted that where heaven is mentioned in this connection, the Lord is also meant, because the Lord is the all-in-all of heaven; and where the devil is mentioned, hell is meant, since that is where all the devils are.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 477

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 477

477. A person's being kept in this great gap, and constantly in the middle of it, is solely for the purpose of giving him free will in spiritual matters. For this is spiritual equilibrium, since it is between heaven and hell, and so between good and evil. All who are in that great gap are linked as regards their interiors either with the angels of heaven or with the devils of hell; at the present time however, with Michael's angels or the dragon's angels. Everyone after death betakes himself to his own people in that gap, and associates with those with a love similar to his. For it is love that links each person there to people like him, and makes him breathe freely and resume his state during his previous life. But then by stages the externals which do not make one with the internals are shed, and when this is done the good person is raised to heaven, and the wicked person takes himself to hell, each going to people like himself, with whom he makes one in respect of his ruling love.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 478

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 478

478. This spiritual equilibrium, which is free will, can be illustrated by instances of natural equilibrium. It is like the equilibrium of someone who is tied around the body or by the arms between two men of equal strength, one of whom pulls the person in the middle to the right, and the other to the left. Then the person in the middle can freely turn in one direction or the other, as if there were no force acting on him; and if he moves to the right, he pulls the man on the left violently towards himself, even to the point of making the man on the left fall to the ground. It would be the same if even a weak* man were tied between three men on the right and the same number of and just as strong men on the left; and likewise if he were tied between camels or horses.

[2] Spiritual equilibrium, which is free will, can be compared with a balance, in either scale of which are placed equal weights; if then a little is added to the scale on one side, the balancing beam above rocks. It is the same too with a lever, or with a large beam balanced on its fulcrum. Every single part inside the human body, such as the heart, the lungs, the stomach, the liver, the pancreas, the spleen, the intestines, and so on, is in such a state of equilibrium; and this is what allows each of them to perform its functions in the greatest tranquillity. It is the same with all muscles; if there were no such equilibrium in them, all action and reaction would cease, and the person would no longer be able to act as a person. Since then everything in the body is in such a state of equilibrium, and also everything in the brain is in like equilibrium, it follows that everything in the mind is too; and these things relate to the will and the understanding.

[3] Animals, birds, fish and insects also have freedom; but these are impelled by their bodily senses at the promptings of appetite and pleasure. A person would not be very different from them, if he were as free to act as he is free to think; he too would be impelled only by his bodily senses at the promptings of lust and pleasure. The case is different if he drinks in the spiritual teachings of the church and uses them to control his free will. The Lord leads him away from lusts and wicked pleasures and the innate longings he has for these; he strives after good, and turns his back on evil. He is then moved by the Lord nearer to the east and at the same time to the south in the spiritual world, and brought into heavenly freedom, which is true freedom.

* Reading imbecillis 'weak' for imbellis 'unwarlike'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 479

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 479

479. IV

The fact that evil is permitted, a state enjoyed by everyone's internal man, makes it obvious that man has free will in spiritual matters.

The assertion that man has free will in spiritual matters must first be supported by general considerations, and after-wards by particular ones, such as anyone will acknowledge on first hearing. The general considerations are these. (1) Adam, the wisest of men, and his wife allowed themselves to be seduced by the serpent. (2) Their first son, Cain, killed his brother Abel, and Jehovah God did not deter them by talking to them, but only by cursing Cain after the event. (3) The Israelite nation in the desert worshipped the golden calf, although Jehovah saw this from Mount Sinai, and did not prevent it. (4) David counted the people and on account of this a plague was sent on them, of which so many thousands died; and it was not before but after this happened that God sent the prophet Gad to him and pronounced his punishment. (5) Solomon was permitted to set up idolatrous cults. (6) Many kings after him were permitted to profane the Temple and the holy things of the church; and finally that nation was permitted to crucify the Lord, (7) Mohammed was permitted to establish a religion which in many respects did not agree with Holy Scripture. (8) The Christian religion was divided into numerous sects, and each of these into heretical movements. (9) In Christendom there are so many ungodly people, and so much boasting about ungodly acts, as well as trickery and deceit, even practised on godly, just and honest people. (10) Injustice sometimes triumphs over justice in lawsuits and business dealings. (11) Even the ungodly are advanced to honours and become leaders in civil and religious life. (12) Wars are permitted, and then so many thousands are killed, and so many cities, nations and families have their goods looted, and suffer much besides. How can anyone explain such things except as the result of the free will enjoyed by every individual? In my book DIVINE PROVIDENCE (printed in Amsterdam in 1764, 234-274) it may be seen that the laws of permission too are laws of Divine providence; there too the facts mentioned above were explained.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 480

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 480

480. There are countless particular considerations showing that there is just as much free will in spiritual matters as in natural ones. Let everyone, if he will, ask himself whether he can think seventy times a day, or three hundred times a week, about God, the Lord, the Holy Spirit, and the Divine matters known as the spiritual things of the church. Is he then aware of any compulsion, if any pleasure, even if any desire, prompts him to do so, and this whether he is a believer or not? Test yourself too, whatever your present state, to see if you can think anything at all without free will, whether in your conversation, in your prayers to God, and your preachings or your listenings. Is not free will the all-important feature in them? In fact, without free will in each respect, even the tiniest details, could you breathe any more than a statue? For breathing follows thought and the speech that expresses it at every step. I say no more than a statue, and not any more than an animal, for an animal's breathing depends upon its natural free will, but a human being's breathing depends upon his free will in natural and spiritual matters at once, since man does not acquire abilities at birth like an animal. An animal with all the ideas which attend upon its natural love acquires by birth a knowledge of such matters as are necessary for feeding and reproduction. Man, however, lacks any ideas born with him, and only acquires by birth the capacity to know, understand and be wise, and a tendency to love himself and the world, and also the neighbour and God. Therefore, if he were deprived of free will in every act of will and thought, we say that he would not breathe any more than a statue, not any more than an animal.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 481

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 481

481. No one denies that man has free will in natural matters. But this is the result of his free will in spiritual matters, because the Lord flows in from a higher or more inward level filling everyone with Divine good and Divine truth, as I showed before, and by this means breathes into man life quite different from that of animals; and to enable him to receive these gifts and act upon them He confers the ability and will, which are never taken away. It follows from this that the Lord perpetually wills man to receive truth and do good, thus becoming spiritual, the destiny for which he was born. To become spiritual without free will in spiritual matters is as impossible as pushing a camel through the eye of a sewing-needle, or like touching one of the stars in the sky with one's hand.

[2] I have had personal experiences to show that everyone is given the ability to understand truth and to will it; even devils receive it, and it is never taken away. One of those who were in hell was once brought up into the world of spirits, and was there questioned by angels from heaven, to see whether he could understand what they were saying to him; the subject was spiritual ideas about God. He answered that he did. And when asked why he had not accepted similar ideas, he said that he did not like them and so did not wish to accept them. He was told again that he could have so wished. This surprised him, and he said he could not. The angels therefore filled his understanding with pride in his reputation together with its delights. On feeling this he then so wished and even liked the ideas. But soon afterwards he was brought back to his earlier state, in which he had been a thief and adulterer who cursed his neighbour; then, since he did not wish to do so, he was no longer able to understand those ideas. This shows plainly that it is free will in spiritual matters that makes a man a man; without this he would be like a tree-trunk, a stone, or the pillar Lot's wife became.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 482

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 482

482. Man would have no free will in political, moral and natural matters, did he not have free will in spiritual ones. This is evident from the fact that spiritual matters, what is called theology, occupy the highest region in the human mind, like the soul in the body. The reason they occupy that place is that it contains the gateway through which the Lord enters a person. At a lower level are the political, moral and natural matters, which in a person take all their life from the spiritual ones which have their seat above them. And because life from the Lord flows in from the highest levels, and man's life consists in the ability freely to think, will and thus to speak and act, it follows that this and no other is the source of free will in political and natural matters. That spiritual freedom allows a person to perceive good and truth, justice and fairness in social matters; and that ability is what the understanding itself is in essence.

[2] A person's free will in spiritual matters is, to use a comparison, like the air in the lungs; it is drawn in, held and released as his thoughts constantly change. Without it he would be worse off than if he suffered from a nightmare, angina or asthma. Again it is like the blood in the heart; any failure of the blood would make the heart first palpitate, then after convulsions become totally still. Or it might be like a body in motion, which travels so long as it has any energy, and comes to rest when its energy is exhausted. So too it is with the freedom man's will enjoys; both of these, freedom of choice and will, can in man be called active energy, for if the will ceases to operate, so does the power to act, and if freedom of choice ceases to operate, so does the will.

[3] If man's spiritual freedom were taken away from him, it would be, to use a comparison, like taking the wheels away from a machine, the arms that catch the wind from a mill, or the sails from a ship. In fact, it would be like a man parting with his spirit when he dies; for the life of man's spirit consists in his free will in spiritual matters. The angels groan at the mere mention of the fact that this free will is denied by many ministers of the church at the present time; they call this denial madness on top of madness.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 483

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 483

sRef Rev@22 @13 S0' sRef Rev@22 @12 S0' sRef Luke@6 @48 S0' sRef Luke@3 @8 S0' sRef Luke@6 @46 S0' sRef Luke@8 @21 S0' sRef Luke@6 @47 S0' sRef Luke@3 @9 S0' sRef Luke@6 @49 S0' 483. V

Without free will in spiritual matters the Word would not be of any use, nor in consequence would the church be.

It is well known throughout the Christian world that the Word is, broadly speaking, the Law, that is, a book of laws in accordance with which a person must live, in order to be granted everlasting life. Is there anything it says more often than that man must do good and not evil, and he must believe in God and not in idols? The Word is also full of commands and exhortations to these actions, with blessings and promises of rewards for those who do so, and curses and threats of punishment for those who do not. Unless man had free will in spiritual matters, that is, in matters concerned with salvation and everlasting life, what would all this be but empty words serving no use? And if anyone were to cling to the idea that he lacked any power or freedom in spiritual matters, so that he was without any will-power in these matters, would not Holy Scripture look to him like a blank piece of paper with no letters on it, or like a piece of paper over which a whole pot of ink had been emptied, or just serifs and dots with no letters, that is to say, a book with nothing in it?

sRef Isa@1 @16 S2' sRef Matt@3 @8 S2' sRef John@15 @16 S2' sRef John@15 @14 S2' sRef John@13 @17 S2' sRef Isa@1 @17 S2' sRef John@5 @29 S2' sRef John@9 @31 S2' sRef Rev@14 @13 S2' sRef Jer@32 @19 S2' sRef Matt@13 @23 S2' sRef Matt@21 @43 S2' sRef John@14 @21 S2' sRef John@15 @8 S2' sRef Matt@12 @33 S2' sRef John@4 @36 S2' sRef Zech@1 @6 S2' [2] There would hardly be any need to prove this from the Word, but since present-day churches have plunged so deeply into mental inanity in spiritual matters, citing certain passages in support which they have wrongly interpreted, I am obliged to quote some passages which tell men how to act and believe. These are:

The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation that produces its fruits. Matt. 21:43.

Produce fruit worthy of repentance; at any moment now the axe is put to the root of the tree. So every tree which does not produce good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire. Luke 3:8, 9.

Jesus said, why do you call me, Lord, Lord, and not do what I say? Everyone who comes to me and listens to what I say and does that is like a man building a house upon rock. But one who listens and does not do it, is like a man building his house on soil with no foundation. Luke 6:46-49.

Jesus said, My mother and my brothers are these who hear the Word of God and act upon it. Luke 8:21.

We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone worships God and does His will, He listens to him. John 9:31.

If you know these things, you are blessed if you act upon them. John 13:17.

He who possesses my commandments and does them is the one who loves me, and I will love him. John 14:21.

In this is my Father glorified, by your bringing forth much fruit. John 15:8.

You are my friends, if you do whatever I bid you. I have chosen you to bear fruit, and for your fruit to keep. John 15:14, 16.

Make the tree good; by its fruit the tree is known. Matt. 12:33.

Produce fruit worthy of repentance. Matt. 3:8.

The one who sowed seed on good land is the one who hears the Word and bears fruit. Matt. 13:23.

He who reaps receives his wage, and gathers the fruit for everlasting life, John 4:36.

Wash yourselves, cleanse yourselves, put away the wickedness of your deeds; learn to do good. Isa. 1:16, 17.

The Son of Man is to come in the glory of His Father, and He will then deal with each according to his deeds. Matt. 16:27.

Those who have done good deeds will go forth to be resurrected to life. John 5:29.

Their deeds accompany them. Rev. 14:13.

Behold, I come soon and my reward is with me, so that I may give to each according to what he has done. Rev. 22:12.

Jehovah, whose eyes are open, to give to each in accordance with his behaviour; He deals with us according to our deeds. Jer. 32:19; Zech. 1:6.

sRef John@3 @16 S3' sRef John@3 @15 S3' sRef John@3 @36 S3' sRef Matt@22 @37 S3' sRef John@11 @25 S3' sRef John@11 @26 S3' sRef Matt@22 @39 S3' sRef Matt@22 @40 S3' sRef Matt@22 @38 S3' [3] The Lord teaches the same lesson in the parables, many of which imply that those who do good are accepted and those who do evil are rejected: as in the parable of the workers in the vineyard (Matt. 21:33-44), that of the talents and minas, with which they had to trade (Matt. 25:14-30; Luke 19:13-25). Likewise Jesus said about faith:

He who believes in me shall never die, but live. John 11:25, 26.

This is the Father's will, that everyone who believes in the Son should have everlasting life. John 6:40.

He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; he, however, who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him. John 3:36.

God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:15, 16.

Furthermore:

You are to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And you are to love the neighbour as yourself. The law and the prophets depend upon these two commandments. Matt. 22:37-40.

These are a minute selection from the Word and like a few pints of water drawn from the sea.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 484

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 484

484. Can anyone fail to see the inanity - I would rather not say folly - of the passages quoted in 464 above from the church's book called the Formula of Concord, once he has read them and then a few passages taken at random from the Word? Would he not think to himself: 'Suppose what is taught there were right, that man has no free will in spiritual matters, what would religion, which is doing good, be but a meaningless term? And what would the church be without religion but like the bark around timber, of no use except for burning?' Then he would go on to think, 'If there were no church because there was no religion, what then would heaven and hell be, but stories invented by ministers and prelates of the church to control the common people and secure their own promotion to higher honours?' It is from this there comes that detestable utterance in many mouths: 'Who can do good by himself, and who can acquire faith by himself?' So they give up the effort and live like heathens.

[2] Ah, my friend, shun evil and do good, and believe in the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul, and the Lord will love you, and give you love so that you can act, and faith so that you can believe. Then you will be impelled by love to do good, and by faith, which is trust, to believe. And if you persevere in this, you will be linked with Him and He with you, and this for ever; and this is the essence of salvation and everlasting life. If a person were not to use the strength he has been given to do good, and use his mind to believe in the Lord, what would man be but a wilderness and a desert, and exactly like dried up ground, which does not absorb rain, but makes it bounce off; or like a sandy heath, where sheep can find no pasture. He would also be like a dried up spring; or like the stagnant pool there, when the source is obstructed, or like a dwelling where there is no harvest nor any pool - if he does not flee from such a place at once, and look for a place to live elsewhere, he would die of hunger and thirst.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 485

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 485

485. VI

Without free will in spiritual matters man would have no means of establishing a mutual link with the Lord. The result would be not imputation, but complete predestination, which is a detestable doctrine.

It was fully shown in the chapter on faith that without free will in spiritual matters no one could possibly possess either charity or faith, much less the two linked together. From this it follows that without free will in spiritual matters man would have nothing by which the Lord could link Himself to him; yet without a reciprocal link there could be no reformation or regeneration, and consequently salvation would be impossible. It is an irrefutable consequence that without a reciprocal link of man with the Lord and of the Lord with man there could be no imputation. Many things have followed from the attempt to prove that without free will in spiritual matters there can be no imputation of good and evil. These aberrant doctrines will be discussed in the last part of this book [Chapter 11] dealing with the heresies, paradoxes and contradictions which stem from the present-day belief that the merit and righteousness of the Lord God the Saviour is imputed to man.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 486

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 486

486. Predestination is the offspring of the faith of the church at the present time, because it is the product of a belief in man's utter impotence and lack of choice in spiritual matters. It results from that belief and also from man's, so to speak, lifeless conversion, that he is like a block of wood, and that he has therefore no way of telling whether the block is brought to life by grace or not. For it is said that one is chosen purely as an act of God's grace without any activity on one's part, whether derived from one's natural powers or one's reason. Being chosen takes place where and when God wills, that is, at His good pleasure. The deeds which follow faith as its evidences are to the eyes of one who reflects like the deeds of the flesh; and the spirit which brings them about does not display their origin, but makes them the subject of grace or good pleasure, just as faith is.

[2] These considerations make it plain that the dogma of the present-day church concerning predestination has emerged from this source, like a shoot from a seed. I can assert that it stemmed from that belief as an almost inevitable consequence; an event which first happened with the Predestinarians, starting with Gottschalk*, then with Calvin and his followers, and was finally established firmly by the Synod of Dort**. Afterwards it was imported by the Supralapsarians and Infralapsarians into their church as an ensign of religion, or rather like the head of the Gorgon or Medusa engraved on the shield of Pallas.

[3] But what more hurtful idea could be thought up, or what more cruel belief could anyone hold about God, than that some of the human race are predestined to damnation? It would be cruel to believe that the Lord, who is love itself and mercy itself, could wish a large number of people to be born destined for hell, or that hundreds of millions are born lost souls, that is, born devils and satans; and that the Lord did not of His Divine wisdom, which is infinite, and does not take care that those who live a good life and acknowledge God are not cast into the fire and everlasting torment. In fact, the Lord is the creator and saviour of all; He alone guides all and wishes no one's death. Could therefore anything more horrifying be believed or thought than that a group of nations and peoples under His control and gaze should be predestined to be handed over as prey to the devil, to fill his maw? Yet this is the offspring of the faith of the present-day church. The faith of the new church recoils from this as a monstrosity.

* A German theologian of the 9th century.
** A conference held at Dordrecht in 1618-19 which condemned the belief of the Arminians, and upheld Calvin's doctrine of predestination.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 487

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 487

487. I thought that such a crazy notion could never be decided upon by a Christian, much less expressed in speech and given public utterance, though in fact it was done by so many representatives of the clergy at the Synod of Dort in Holland, where it was cleverly written up and published. So to set aside my doubts some of those who had taken part in the decisions of that Synod were sent for to come to me.

When I saw them standing nearby I said: 'How can anyone who relies upon sound reason come to the conclusion that we are predestined? Surely only cruel ideas about God can flow from this, and criminal ideas about religion? Surely anyone whose support for predestination has engraved it on his heart can only think about everything belonging to the church, and likewise about the Word, as being worthless? Can he think of a God who has predestined so many thousands of people for hell as anything but a tyrant?'

[2] When I said this, they gave me a satanic look and said: 'We were among the chosen representatives at the Synod of Dort. Then, and still more since, we have convinced ourselves of much about God, the Word and religion, which we have not dared to make public. But when we talked and taught about religion, we wove and knitted a web of threads of various colours, and scattered over it feathers borrowed from peacocks' wings.' But since they wanted to do the same on this occasion, angels using the power given them by the Lord shut the externals of their minds and opened the interiors for them, forcing them to speak as these dictated. Then they said: 'Our faith which we formed by a series of arguments one depending on the next was and is still as follows.

[3] (1) There is no such thing as the Word of Jehovah God, but some airy utterance from the mouth of the prophets. We thought so because the Word predestines all for heaven and holds man to blame only if he does not walk in the ways which lead there.

(2) Religion exists because it is needed; but it is like a gust of wind which carries a fragrant smell to charm the masses. Religion therefore must be taught by ministers, small and great, as being drawn from the Word, because this is accepted. We had this idea because where there is predestination, there religion is nothing.

(3) The laws of civil justice constitute a religion; but predestination is not dependent upon living by them, but on nothing but God's good pleasure, just as in the case of a monarch with absolute power, it depends solely on the look on his face.

(4) Everything the church teaches, except the existence of God, is to be dismissed as empty verbiage and rejected as rubbish.

(5) The spiritual matters so much talked about are no more than ethereal vapours beneath the sun, and if they penetrate deeply into anyone, they make him become giddy and stupefied, turning him into a detestable monster in the sight of God.'

(6) When they were asked whether they believed the faith from which they deduced predestination was spiritual, they said that faith depended upon predestination, but when it was given they were like blocks of Wood; as a result they were indeed brought to life, but not spiritually.

sRef Isa@14 @29 S4' [4] After delivering these dreadful statements they wanted to go away, but I said to them: 'Stay a little while and I will read to you from Isaiah.' What I read was this:

Do not rejoice, all of Philistia, that the rod that smites you is broken, for a basilisk has come forth from the root of the snake, whose fruit is a flying serpent. Isa. 14:29.

I explained this by means of the spiritual sense. Philistia means the church separated from charity. The basilisk which came forth from the root of the snake means its teaching about three Gods, and about its belief in imputation being granted to each person individually. Its fruit which is a flying serpent means there is no imputation of good and evil, but instant mercy, whether a person has lived a good or a wicked life.

sRef Isa@59 @5 S5' [5] On hearing this they said: 'This may be; but find us something from that book you call the holy Word about predestination.' I opened the book and came across in the same prophet this passage which fitted:

They laid asp's eggs and wove spider's webs. Anyone who eats one of their eggs dies; and when anyone crushes one, a viper is hatched. Isa. 59:5.

On hearing this they could not bear to listen to the explanation, but some of them who had been sent for (there were five of them) cast themselves into a cave, around which appeared a dark fiery glow, a sign that they were without either faith or charity.

This makes it plain that the decree of the Synod about predestination is not only a crazy heresy, but also a cruel heresy. It must therefore be eradicated from the brain, so that not so much as one jot of it is left.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 488

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 488

488. The unnatural belief that God predestines people to hell can be compared with the unnatural behaviour of fathers in some savage nations, who throw their own unweaned babies and children out into the streets; and with the unnatural behaviour of some enemies, who throw the bodies of those they have killed out in the woods for wild beasts to devour. It can also be compared with the cruelty of a tyrant, who divides the people under his control into groups, and some groups he hands over to executioners, some he throws into deep water at sea, and some into fire. It can also be compared with the ferocity of some wild animals which devour their own young; and with the madness of dogs which fly at their own reflexions seen in a mirror.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 489

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 489

489. VII

But for free will in spiritual matters God would be responsible for evil, and thus there could be no imputation of charity and faith.*

It follows from the belief held at the present time, a belief which was first hatched by the members of the Council in the city of Nicaea, that God is the cause of evil. That was where the heresy was invented and devised which still persists, that there were three Divine Persons from eternity, and each of them was God in Himself. Once this theory was hatched, its followers had no alternative but to approach each Person singly as God. They put together a belief in the imputation of the Lord God the Saviour's merit or righteousness, and to prevent anyone intruding on the merit with the Lord , took away from man all free will in spiritual matters, and attributed to him utter impotence as far as faith is concerned. And because they deduced everything spiritual in the church solely from that faith, they claimed like impotence in regard to everything the church teaches about salvation. This was the source from which sprang a succession of dreadful heresies, based upon that faith and belief in man's impotence in spiritual matters, as well as that most harmful doctrine of predestination discussed in the preceding section. All these beliefs imply that God is the cause of evil, or that God created both good and evil.

But, my friend, do not place your trust in any Council, but in the Word of the Lord, which is superior to Councils. Is there anything the Roman Catholic councils have not hatched, anything the Council of Dort did not hatch, where that dreadful viper, predestination, was brought to light?

[2] It might be thought that giving man free will in spiritual matters was a mediate cause of evil, and consequently, that if he had not been given such free will, man could not have sinned. But, my friend, pause here for a moment and consider whether any man, if he was to be a man, could have been created without free will in spiritual matters; if that were taken from him, he would cease to be a man and be merely a statue. What is free will but the ability to will and do, to think and speak to all appearance as if from oneself? Since man was given this ability so that he could live as a man, two trees were placed in the Garden of Eden, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This means that he could use the freedom given him to eat the fruit of the tree of life or the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

* The last four words are added from the Table of Contents.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 490

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 490

490. It is plain from the first chapter of Genesis that everything created by God was good. It says there that 'God saw that it was good' (verses 10, 12, 18, 21, 25), and at the end 'God saw everything that He made, and behold, it was very good' (verse 31). It is also plain from man's primeval state in paradise. Evil, however, arose from man, as is plain from Adam's second* state, that is, after the fall, by his being expelled from paradise. It is clear from these facts that if free will in spiritual matters had not been given to man, God Himself, and not man, would have been the cause of evil; in this case God would have created both good and evil, and it is wicked even to think that God created evil too. The reason why God did not create evil, since He bestowed on man free will in spiritual matters, and never puts any evil into his mind, is that He is good itself, and in good God is omnipresent, continually urging and demanding to be received. Even if He is not received, still He does not go away. For if He did, man would instantly die, or rather dissolve into non-existence, since man gets his life, and the continued existence of all he consists of, from God.

[2] Evil was not created by God but introduced by man, because man turns the good which continually flows in from God into evil, by turning away from God and turning towards himself. When this happens, the pleasure given by good remains, but it now becomes the pleasure given by evil; for without an apparently similar pleasure being left man would cease to live, since it is pleasure which makes up the vital principle of his love. These two pleasures are still diametrically opposed, though a person is unaware of this so long as he lives in the world. After death, however, he will know this and indeed feel it plainly, for then the pleasure given by the love of good is turned into heavenly blessedness, but the pleasure given by the love of evil into the torments of hell. These arguments prove that everyone is predestined to heaven, and no one to hell; but it is the person who commits himself to hell by misusing his free will in spiritual matters. As a result he embraces the ideas wafted from hell, since, as was said above, everyone is held mid-way between heaven and hell, so that he can be in equilibrium between good and evil, and consequently have free will in spiritual matters.

* Reading secundo for secundum.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 491

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 491

491. Comparisons can be drawn to illustrate the propositions that God bestowed freedom, not only on every human being, but also on every animal, and indeed an analogous faculty even on inanimate objects, giving each the power to receive it according to its nature; and that God intends good to all, but this is turned into evil by the objects upon which it acts. The atmosphere enables everyone to breathe, and likewise every animal and wild beast, every bird, the owl as much as the dove; it also enables birds to fly. Yet the atmosphere is not to blame for the opportunity given to creatures of contrary nature and character. The ocean affords in itself a home and provides food for every fish; but it is not to blame for one fish swallowing another, or for the crocodile turning its food into poison to kill people. The sun provides light and heat for all, but the objects it acts upon, the various plants on earth, receive them in different ways; a good tree or shrub does so in one way, a thorn or briar in another, and a harmless plant in a different way from a poisonous one.

sRef Matt@5 @45 S2' [2] Rain from the upper levels of the atmosphere falls to the ground everywhere, and the ground supplies water from this source to every tree, plant and grass, each of which uses the water to serve its own needs. This is what is meant by the faculty analogous to free will: the plants freely suck up the water through their openings, pores and passages, which in warm weather stand open, and the earth merely provides moisture and elements, which the plants take up in a manner reminiscent of thirst and hunger. It is much the same with people. The Lord flows in to provide every person with spiritual heat, which is in essence the good of love, and with spiritual light, which is in essence the truth of wisdom. But the way the person receives these depends upon which way he turns, whether to God or to himself. That is why the Lord says where He teaches us about love towards the neighbour:

So that you may be sons of the Father, who makes the sun rise on the wicked and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Matt. 5:45.

And in another passage He speaks of Him desiring the salvation of all.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 492

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 492

492. I shall add to this the following account of an experience.

I have on several occasions heard sayings about the good of charity coming down from heaven, passing through the world of spirits, and penetrating right to the depths of hell. As these sayings descended, they were turned into ideas obviously contrary to the good of charity, and finally into ones full of hatred directed against the neighbour. This was an indication that everything coming from the Lord is good, but is turned into evil by the spirits in hell. The same happened with some truths of faith, which in their descent turned into falsities which were the opposite of the truths. It is the receiving form which turns what impinges on it into what agrees with itself.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 493

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 493

493. VIII

Anything spiritual to do with the church which enters freely and is freely accepted lasts, anything that does not, does not last.

The reason why anything freely accepted by a person lasts with him is that freedom has to do with his will; and if so, it also has to do with his love. It has been shown elsewhere [397] that the will is a receiver for love. Anyone can understand that all freedom has to do with love, and also with the will, when people say, 'I want this because I love it', and conversely, 'I love this, so I want it.'

But man's will is twofold; there is an interior and an exterior, or a will belonging to the internal man and one belonging to the external man. A person can therefore be a sycophant, and act and talk in one way in front of the world and in another with his close friends. In front of the world he uses the will of his external man to act and talk, with his close friends that of his internal man. By the will of the internal man is meant where his dominant love is. These brief remarks are enough to establish that the interior will is the real man, since that is where the being and essence of his life resides. The understanding is the form it takes to enable the will to make its love visible. Everything a person loves and wants as a result of his love for it is a free choice; for whatever arises from the love of the interior will is the pleasure of his life. And because the love of the interior will is the being of his life, it is also his self (proprium). This is why what is freely accepted by this will lasts, because it attaches itself to the self. The converse is that if anything is not freely introduced, it is not accepted; but more will be said on this in what follows.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 494

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 494

sRef John@6 @51 S0' 494. It needs to be appreciated that the spiritual ideas of the Word and the church, which a person is impelled by love to absorb and which his understanding supports, last in a person in a way which social and political ideas do not. This is because spiritual ideas rise to the highest level of the mind and take on a form there. The reason is that this is where the Lord enters bringing a person various kinds of Divine truth and good, so that this is a kind of temple for Him to live in. Social and political ideas, being worldly, occupy the lower levels of the mind; some of them there serve as chapels outside the main temple, others, as fore-courts leading to the entrance. Another reason why the church's spiritual ideas reside in the highest levels of the mind is that they are peculiar to the soul, seeking its everlasting life; and the soul is at the highest level, feeding upon nothing but spiritual kinds of food. That is why the Lord calls Himself bread, when He says:

I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live for ever. John 6:51.

This region is also the seat of a person's love, and this is what makes him blessed after death; there too is the chief residence of his free will in spiritual matters, and from this source comes all the freedom a person has in natural matters. This being its source, it is in communication with all acts of free will in natural matters, and by their means the love that is dominant at the highest level attracts everything which is of use to it. This communication is like that between the force of a spring and the waters that flow from it, or between the reproductive principle of a seed and every part of a tree, especially its fruits, because in them it renews itself. If, however, anyone denies the existence of free will in spiritual matters, and takes it away from them, he makes for himself another spring and opens up a channel to that, changing spiritual freedom into purely natural freedom, and eventually into the freedom of hell. This sort of freedom too resembles the reproductive principle of a seed; it passes freely through the trunk and branches to reach the fruits, which are so teeming with it that they are rotten inside.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 495

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 495

sRef Ex@35 @29 S0' sRef Ps@54 @6 S0' sRef John@8 @36 S0' sRef Ps@47 @9 S0' sRef Ex@35 @5 S0' sRef Ex@35 @21 S0' sRef John@8 @35 S0' sRef John@8 @31 S0' sRef John@8 @32 S0' sRef John@8 @33 S0' sRef John@8 @34 S0' 495. Any freedom coming from the Lord is real freedom; but any that comes from hell and makes itself at home with a person is slavery. Still spiritual freedom must inevitably seem like slavery to anyone who enjoys the freedom of hell, since they are opposites. Yet all who enjoy spiritual freedom not only know but feel that the freedom of hell is slavery. The angels therefore shun it like the stench of a corpse, though those in hell sniff it as if it were a perfume. It is well known from the Lord's Word that worship freely given is true worship, and what is offered willingly is pleasing to the Lord. That is why we read in the Psalms of David:

I will make a free will offering to God. Ps. 54:6.

and in another place:

The willing ones of the peoples are gathered together, the people of the God of Abraham. Ps. 47:9.

For this reason the Children of Israel had free-will sacrifices. Their chief mode of sacred worship consisted of sacrifices. Because free-will offerings are pleasing to God they were instructed that every man who was impelled by his heart or moved by his own volition should bring a choice offering to Jehovah for the making of the Tabernacle (Exod. 35:5, 21, 29).

And the Lord says:

If you remain faithful to my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will recognise the truth, and the truth makes you free. If therefore the Son makes you free, you will be truly free. But anyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. John 8:31-36.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 496

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 496

496. The reason why what is freely accepted lasts is that a person's will takes it to itself and makes it its own; and because it enters into his love, and this love acknowledges it as its own and uses it to develop its form. This can be illustrated by comparisons, but because these are drawn from events in nature, heat takes the place of love. It is well known that the effect of heat, depending on its degree, is to open passages in all plants; and that as they are opened up, so the plant returns inwardly to the form dictated by its nature, spontaneously taking in its food, retaining what suits it, and so growing. It is much the same with an animal; everything its desire for food, its appetite, leads it to choose and eat is added to its body and so lasts. The reason why what is suitable is constantly added to the body is that all the body's constituent parts are continually being renewed. This is a known fact, though few are aware of it.

[2] With animals too heat opens up every part of their bodies and gives free play to their natural love. As a result in spring and summertime they develop or return to their instinctive desire to produce and bring up offspring. They do so in the greatest freedom, because it is the effect of the dominant love implanted in them from creation, in order to maintain the universe in the state in which it was created.

[3] The reason why the freedom of loving can be illustrated by the freedom induced by heat is that love produces heat; this is obvious from its effects, as when a person is fired, grows heated and bursts into flame as his love develops into enthusiasm or into a blaze of anger. This and no other is the source of people's blood heat or vital heat and that of animals in general. This correspondence is the reason why parts of the body are made suitable through heat to receive freely what love seeks.

[4] All the inward parts of the human body are in this sort of equilibrium and so freedom. In such freedom the heart pumps its blood equally up and down, the mesentery its chyle, the liver produces blood, the kidneys secrete, the glands filter, and so on. If anything should happen to the equilibrium, the organ would become sick and suffer from paralysis or ataxia. In this case equilibrium and freedom are one. There is no substance throughout the created universe that does not tend towards equilibrium to maintain its freedom.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 497

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 497

497. IX

A person's will and understanding enjoy this free will; but wrong doing in both the spiritual and natural worlds is curbed by laws, since otherwise society in either world would cease to exist.

Simply by observing one's own thought process it is possible to know that everyone enjoys free will in spiritual matters. Is there anyone who is not free to think about God, the Trinity, charity and the neighbour, faith and how it works, the Word and everything to be learned from it, and after studying theology about its details? Everyone can think, or rather form a conclusion, teach and write either in favour of these things or against them. If a person were deprived for one instant of this freedom, would not his thinking come to a halt, his tongue fall silent, and his hand be paralysed? So, my friend, you can if you like, simply by observing your own thought process, reject and abominate that absurd and damaging heresy, which at the present time has throughout Christendom cast a pall of lethargy over heaven's teaching about charity and faith, leading to salvation and everlasting life.

[2] The reasons why this free will is located in a person's will and understanding are as follows:

(1) Those two faculties must first be taught and reformed, and by their means the two faculties of the external man which enable him to speak and act.

(2) Those two faculties of the internal man constitute his spirit, which lives on after death, and is subject only to Divine law; and it is the leading principle of this that a person should have the law in mind, keep it, and obey it of his own accord, yet by the Lord's guidance.

[3] (3) Man as far as his spirit is concerned is midway between heaven and hell, and so between good and evil, so as to be in equilibrium. This is the source of his free will in spiritual matters; on this equilibrium see 475ff above, But so long as he lives in the world, he is as far as his spirit is concerned in equilibrium between heaven and the world. A person is then almost completely unaware that to the extent that he retreats from heaven and approaches the world, he also approaches hell. He is unaware of this and yet is not unaware, in order that in this respect too he should enjoy freedom and be reformed.

[4] (4) These two faculties, the will and the understanding, are designed to receive the Lord; the will receives love and charity, the understanding wisdom and faith. The Lord performs each of these acts while giving the person full freedom, so that their linking should be mutual and reciprocal, and the means to salvation.

(5) Any judgment to which a person is submitted after death is in accordance with the way he has used his free will in spiritual matters.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 498

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 498

498. The conclusion from this is that true freedom of will in spiritual matters resides in a person's soul in full perfection. From there it flows, like a gush of water into a spring, into both parts of his mind, the will and the understanding, and through these into the bodily senses, and into speech and action. Life in a person exists in three degrees: in the soul, the mind and the body with its senses. Everything in a higher degree excels in perfection what is in a lower degree. It is this freedom a person enjoys by means of which, in which and together with which the Lord makes His presence felt by a person, unceasingly pressing to be received. But He never deflects or does away with his freedom, since, as I said before, nothing which a person does without freedom in spiritual matters lasts. It can therefore be said that it is this freedom which permits the Lord to reside in a person's soul.

sRef Gen@3 @18 S2' [2] It is too obvious to require explanation, that wrongdoing is in both the spiritual and natural worlds curbed by laws, since no society anywhere could otherwise be stable. Yet illustrations are needed to show that without those external constraints not only would society come to an end, but the whole human race would perish too. Man is prey to two loves, that of dominating others and that of possessing everyone's wealth. These loves, if given free rein, race away without limit. The hereditary evils a person acquires by birth come chiefly from those two loves. Adam's crime was simply wishing to become like God, an evil ambition the serpent put into his mind, as we are told. So when he was cursed, he was told that the earth should bring forth thorns and thistles for him (Gen. 3:5, 18), meaning all evil and falsity derived from it. All held in thrall by those loves regard themselves alone as the one person in whom and for whom all others exist. They are without pity, fear of God, or love for the neighbour, so that they are unmerciful, savage and cruel, their greed and longing to rob and steal are worthy of hell, and they are cunning and deceitful in carrying out such crimes. Not even the animals of the earth have such innate wickedness, for the only desire which makes them kill and eat other animals is to fill their bellies and to protect themselves. A wicked man, therefore, looked at from the point of view of those loves is more savage, more fierce and worse than any animal.

[3] It becomes clear in riotous crowds, where the restraints of the law are ineffective, that this is what people are like inwardly, as also in cases of massacre and looting, when the signal is given to wreak one's fury on the defeated or besieged; hardly anyone holds his hand until the drum is heard signalling it to cease. These examples show that if there were no fear of legal penalties to deter people, not only society but the whole human race would be destroyed. The only way to be rid of all these evils is to use one's free will in spiritual matters correctly, that is, to focus the mind on thoughts of the conditions of life after death.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 499

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 499

499. But this needs further illustration. If all created things, animate as well as inanimate, did not have a kind of free will, no creation would have been possible. For if animals did not have free will in natural matters, they could not select food suitable for their nourishment, they could not reproduce or look after their offspring, so there would be no animals. If the fish of the sea and the shellfish of its floor did not have such freedom, there would be no fish or shellfish. Likewise, if every insect did not have it, there would be no silkworm to produce silk, no bee to produce honey and wax, no butterfly to sport with its mate in the air, feed on the nectar of flowers, and represent man's blessed state in the aura of heaven, when like caterpillar he has shed his outer skin.

sRef Matt@13 @32 S2' sRef Matt@13 @31 S2' [2] If there were not something analogous to free will in the soil of the ground, the seed put into it, and all parts of the tree growing from it, as well as in its fruits, and repeated in the new seeds, there could be no plants. If every metal and every stone, precious as well as common, did not have something analogous to free will, neither metal nor stone could exist, not even a grain of sand. For even this freely absorbs the ether, breathing out its own effluvium, ridding itself of what is exhausted and renewing itself with new material. This is the source of the magnetic field around a magnet, the iron sphere of influence around a piece of iron, copper around copper, silver around silver, gold around gold, stone around stone, nitrous around nitre, sulphurous around sulphur, and of various kinds around every particle of dust in the ground. This influence impregnates the inmost part of every seed and makes it fertile and grow. For failing such an effluvium from every grain of dust in the earth, there would be no commencement of germination and so no means of perpetuating itself. How else could the earth penetrate with dust and water the inmost centre of a seed sown, except by means of its exhalations; as for instance a mustard seed,

Which is smaller than all other seeds, but when it has grown is larger than plants and becomes a great tree. Matt. 13:31, 32; Mark 4:30-32.

[3] When then everything created has been endowed with its own kind of freedom, each according to its nature, why should man be denied the free will appropriate to his nature, which is that he should be spiritual? That is why man has been given free will in spiritual matters from the womb to extreme old age in the world, and thereafter for ever.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 500

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 500

500. X

If people did not have free will in spiritual matters, everyone throughout the world could in the course of a single day have been brought to believe in the Lord. But this would be impossible, because what a person does not accept of his own free will does not last.

The idea that God without giving people free will in spiritual matters could bring everyone throughout the world in the course of a single day to believe in Himself, is a consequence of failing to understand God's omnipotence. Those who misunderstand God's omnipotence may think either that there is no such thing as order, or that God can act just as much against order as in accordance with it. Yet in fact without order no creation would have been possible.

The primary end of order is that man should be an image of God; consequently he should become more and more perfect in love and wisdom, and thus more and more an image of God. God is continually working to produce this result in man; but without free will in spiritual matters, which enables a person to turn towards God and link himself in turn with Him, it would be labour in vain, since it would be impossible. For it is order from which and according to which the whole world with every single thing in it was created. Because all creation derives from order and is in accordance with order, God is called order itself. It is therefore the same thing whether you speak of acting contrary to Divine order or acting contrary to God. In fact, God Himself cannot act contrary to His Divine order, if this is really acting contrary to Himself. He therefore guides every person in accordance with Himself as order, and those who have strayed and fallen away He guides to it, and those who resist towards it.

sRef Luke@16 @31 S2' [2] If man could have been created without free will in spiritual matters, what would then have been easier for almighty God than to bring everyone throughout the world to believe in the Lord? Surely He could have implanted this faith in everyone, both directly and indirectly? Directly, through His absolute power and its irresistible working, which never ceases aiming at man's salvation; or indirectly, through causing him to feel the pangs of conscience, through convulsions of the body producing unconsciousness, and serious threats of death, if he fails to accept. In addition, by opening up hell and displaying devils with terrifying torches in their hands, or by summoning up from hell the dead whom they had known in the form of terrible spectres. The reply to these suggestions is given in Abraham's words to the rich man in hell:

If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead. Luke 16:31.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 501

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 501

501. The question is asked today why miracles do not happen as they once did; for people think that if they took place, everyone would acknowledge them in his heart. The reason why miracles do not take place at the present time as they did formerly is that they compel and take away free will in spiritual matters, turning a person from a spiritual man into a natural one. Everyone in the Christian world since the Lord's coming has been able to become spiritual; and the only way to be made spiritual is by Him through the Word, and the ability to undergo this would be destroyed, if he were brought to believe by means of miracles. As I said before, they compel and take away his free will in spiritual matters; and everything in such matters done under compulsion lodges in the natural man, shutting off the spiritual man as if with a door. It is the spiritual who is the real internal man, and this deprives him of all power to see any truth in light. After this, therefore, his reasoning about spiritual matters comes solely from the natural man, who sees everything which is truly spiritual back to front.

[2] The reason, however, why before the Lord's coming miracles took place was that at that time the people in the church were natural men, to whom spiritual matters to do with the internal church could not be disclosed. For if they had been, they would have profaned them, All their worship, therefore, was confined to ritual acts, which represented and symbolised the internal matters of the church; and these people could only be induced to carry out the rituals properly by means of miracles. Because these representative acts had a spiritual internal, not even miracles could at times induce them to carry them out, as is plain from the Children of Israel in the desert, who, despite seeing so many miracles in Egypt and then the greatest one on Mount Sinai, still after Moses had been absent for a month danced around the golden calf, crying out that it had brought them out of Egypt. They behaved in much the same way in the land of Canaan despite seeing the outstanding miracles performed by Elijah and Elisha and in due course the truly Divine miracles performed by the Lord.

aRef Matt@12 @45 S3' aRef Luke@11 @26 S3' [3] The main reason why miracles do not happen at the present time is that the church has taken away all free will from people. It has done so by decreeing that man can make no contribution to the reception of faith, nor to his conversion or his salvation as a whole (see above, 464). Anyone who believes this becomes more and more natural; and the natural man, as I said before, looks at everything spiritual back to front, so that in thought he opposes it. The higher region of the human mind, the chief seat of free will in spiritual matters, would then be shut off. Spiritual ideas, which would have received a sort of confirmation by the miracles, would occupy the lower or purely natural region of the mind, while false ideas about faith, conversion and salvation stayed on top. This would make satans live above and angels below, like vultures living over hens. Then a little while later the satans would burst the bolts and rush furiously on the spiritual ideas occupying the lower position, not only denying them, but cursing and profaning them. So the person's last state would be much worse than his former one,

TCR (Chadwick) n. 502

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 502

502. Anyone, who through false ideas about the spiritual matters of the church has become natural, cannot help thinking of God's omnipotence as being above order, and so of God's omnipotence as having no order. This is why he falls into crazy ideas like these. Why did the Lord come into the world and why did He redeem it like this, when God by His omnipotence could have achieved the same result from heaven as He did upon earth? Why by His redemptive act did He not save the whole human race with no exceptions, and why was the devil afterwards able in the case of a person to overpower the Redeemer? Why is there a hell? Could not God by His omnipotence have wiped it out, and could He not do so now? Or could He not bring everyone out of hell and make them angels in heaven? Why is there a Last Judgment? Could He not move all the goats on the left to the right and make them sheep? Why did He cast down the angels of the dragon and the dragon himself from heaven, and not change them into Michael's angels? Why does He not give both parties faith, imputing to them the righteousness of the Son, and so forgive their sins, justifying and sanctifying them? Why does He not give the animals of the earth, the birds of the air and the fish of the sea the power of speech, together with intelligence, and bring them along with human beings into heaven? Why did He not make, or why does He not still make, the whole earth into a Paradise, where there should be no tree of the knowledge of good and evil, no serpent, and where all the hills were running with fine wines, producing gold and silver, both in nuggets, so that all there might live amid rejoicing and song, in a constant round of festivities and pleasures, like images of God? Would not such things befit an omnipotent God? And much more of the same sort.

But, my friend, this is all nonsense. God's omnipotence is not devoid of order. God Himself is order; and because all things were created from God, they were created from order, in order and with a view to order. The order which man was made to partake in is that his blessing or his cursing should be dependent upon his free will in spiritual matters. For, as I said before, without free will man could not have been created, nor could even animals, birds and fish. But animals enjoy only natural free will; man enjoys natural and spiritual free will as well.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 503

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 503

503. At this point I shall add some accounts of experiences. The first experience.

I heard that a meeting had been called to discuss man's free will in spiritual matters - this was in the spiritual world. There were present from every quarter learned men, who had thought about the subject in the world in which they had previously lived, and many of them had been at councils and synods, both before and after that of Nicaea. They gathered in a sort of circular temple, like the one at Rome known as the Pantheon, which was formerly dedicated to the worship of all the gods, but subsequently consecrated by the papacy to the cult of all the holy martyrs. Around the walls of the temple were what looked like altars; but each had chairs drawn up to it, on which those who had gathered sat, and rested their elbows on the altars as if they were so many tables. No one had been appointed to preside over their meeting, but one by one, as the fancy took them, they broke ranks and coming into the centre gave vent to and made known their opinion. To my surprise, all the members of this assembly were full of arguments in favour of man's complete lack of power in spiritual matters, and they ridiculed the idea of free will in this respect.

[2] When they were assembled one man suddenly rushed into the centre and cried out in a loud voice: 'Man has no free will in spiritual matters, any more than Lot's wife had after she was turned into a pillar of salt. For most certainly, if man had any more freedom, he would of his own accord claim as his own the faith of our church. This is that God the Father in complete freedom and at His good pleasure confers that faith as a free gift on whomever He wishes, whenever He wishes. God would never have this good pleasure nor make this free gift, if by some sort of freedom or good pleasure man could also claim it for himself. For if this happened, our faith, a star which shines before our eyes night and day, would be scattered into the air like a shooting star.'

He was followed by another man who jumped up from his seat and said: 'Man has no more free will in spiritual matters than an animal, or rather, than a dog, because, if he had, he would do good of his own accord, whereas all good comes from God, and man cannot get anything for himself but what is given to him from heaven.'

[3] He was followed by another who leaped up from his seat and spoke from the centre. He said that man has no more free will in spiritual matters, or even in discerning these, than an owl has in daylight, or rather, than a chick has while it is still hidden in the egg. 'In such matters he is as blind as a mole; for if he was a veritable Lynceus* to discern what has to do with faith, salvation and everlasting life, he would believe that he could regenerate and save himself, and would actually attempt it, thus profaning his thoughts and deeds with seeking more and more merit.'

Yet another ran out into the centre and delivered this utterance, that anyone of the opinion that he can will or understand anything in spiritual matters since the fall of Adam is raving and becoming deranged, since he would then believe himself to be a tin god or supernatural being, possessing in his own right some portion of God's power.

[4] He was followed by a man who came panting into the centre, carrying under his arm a book, called the Formula of Concord; the Evangelicals at the present time swear by what he called its orthodoxy. He opened it and read out the following passage:

Man with regard to good is utterly corrupt and dead, so that there has remained and subsists in man's nature since the fall before regeneration not so much as a spark of spiritual strength, to enable him to be prepared for God's grace or to seize it when it is offered; or to be capable of receiving that grace of his own accord by his own efforts; or in spiritual matters to understand, believe, endorse, think, will, begin, complete, act, work, co-operate or apply or adapt himself to grace, or to make any contribution, to the extent of a half or even the smallest part, to his conversion. In spiritual matters relating to the salvation of the soul man is like the pillar of salt which was Lot's wife, resembling a block of wood or stone devoid of life, without the use of the eyes, the mouth or any senses. However he has the power of movement and the control of his external members, so as to attend public gatherings and hear the Word and the Gospel. (pp. 656, 658, 661-663, 671-673 in my edition.)

After this all expressed their agreement, crying out together: 'This is true orthodoxy.'

[5] I was standing close by and listening intently to all this, and since in my spirit I was incensed I asked in a loud voice: 'If you make man in spiritual matters a pillar of salt, an animal, blind and mad, what then becomes of your theology? Is not everything in theology a spiritual matter?'

After a period of silence they replied to this: 'The whole of our theology contains nothing spiritual apprehensible by reason. Our faith is the only item in it which is spiritual. But we have carefully shut up our faith to prevent anyone looking into it, and have taken precautions to ensure that no gleam of spirituality escapes from it so as to become visible to the understanding. Moreover man does not by any choice of his own contribute a whit to it. We have also removed charity from any spiritual idea, making it purely a moral matter, and we have treated the Ten Commandments likewise. Neither do we teach that there is anything spiritual about justification, the forgiveness of sins, regeneration and salvation by this means. We say that faith brings these about, but how we have no idea. In place of repentance we have adopted contrition, but to prevent it being thought to be spiritual we have removed it from all contact with faith. Neither have we adopted any but purely natural ideas about redemption. These are, that God the Father placed the human race under sentence of damnation, His Son took that sentence upon Himself, and allowed Himself to be hung upon the cross, thus compelling His Father to have mercy; and we have many more such ideas, in which you will not be able to detect anything spiritual, but only what is completely natural.'

[6] But, so incensed had I already become, I went on to say: 'If man had no free will in spiritual matters, what would he be but a beast? Surely this is what gives him his superiority over mere beasts? What would the church be without it, but the blackened face of a wall-eyed fuller? What would the Word be without it, but a blank book? Is there anything the Word says and commands more often than that man is to love God and to love the neighbour, and he is to believe that his salvation and life depend upon how he loves and believes? Is there anyone who is unable to understand and do what is laid down in the Word and in the Ten Commandments? How could God have prescribed and commanded man to do such things, if He had not given him the capability to do them?

[7] Tell any peasant, someone whose mind is not bogged down in fallacies about theology, that in what concerns faith and charity and the salvation they bring he can no more understand and will than a block of wood or a stone, not even being able to devote himself to or fit himself for them, surely he will roar with laughter and say: "How crazy can you get? What need have I then of a priest and his sermons? How is a church then any better than a stable? How then is worshipping any better than ploughing? What madness it is to talk like that, piling folly on folly. Does anyone deny that all good is from God? Surely man is permitted to do good of himself by God's guidance? And it is much the same with believing."'

On hearing this they all cried: 'We gave an orthodox view based on orthodox principles, you have given a peasant's view based on peasants' principles.' Then suddenly a thunderbolt fell from the sky, and they rushed out in droves for fear it would burn them up, and they all went away, each to his own home.

* In Greek mythology a man famous for his acute vision.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 504

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 504

504. The second experience.

I was once, while in the world of spirits, given the inward spiritual sight enjoyed by the angels of the higher heaven; and I saw two spirits not far from me, though some distance apart. I could tell that one of them loved good and truth, which linked him with heaven, and the other loved evil and falsity, which linked him with hell. I approached and called them to me, and from the sound of their voices and their replies I gathered that they were each equally able to perceive truths, and acknowledge them when perceived, to use their understanding to think about them, and to direct their intellectual processes as they pleased, and the motions of their will as they liked; in other words each enjoyed similar free will on the rational level. Moreover I noticed that as a result of that free will there appeared in their minds a glow which extended from the first vision, that of perception, to the last, that of the eye.

[2] But when the one who loved evil and falsity was left alone to think, I observed something like smoke rising from hell and putting out the glow above the level of the memory, so that he was in thick darkness as of midnight. This smoke caught fire and burned like a flame lighting up the region of his mind below the level of memory; this caused him to think of extraordinary falsities arising from the evils of self-love. When the other, however, the one who loved good and truth, was left alone, I saw a gentle flame flowing down on him from heaven, which lit up the region of his mind above the level of memory, and the region below this as well right down to the level of the eye. The light from this flame shone brighter and brighter as his love for good led him to perceive and think of truth. These sights showed me plainly that everyone, wicked as well as good, enjoys spiritual free will, but that hell sometimes blots it out in the case of the wicked, and heaven enhances it and makes it burn brighter in the case of the good.

[3] After this I talked with each of them, first with the one who loved evil and falsity. I had asked something about his experiences, but he was incensed when I mentioned free will. 'What madness it is,' he said, 'to believe that man has free will in spiritual matters! Can any human being help himself to faith and do good of himself? Does not the priesthood at the present time teach what the Word says, that no one can acquire anything unless it is given him from heaven? The Lord Christ said to His disciples, 'Without me you can do nothing.' To this I would add, that no one can move his foot or his hand to do any good action, nor move his tongue to utter any truth derived from good. The church therefore under the guidance of its wise men came to the conclusion that man is unable to will, understand or think about anything spiritual, not even to fit himself to willing, understanding or thinking about it, any more than a statue, a block of wood or a stone; and that therefore God, who alone has the freest and unlimited power, at His good pleasure breathes faith into man, and this, without any action or power on our part, by the working of the Holy Spirit produces all the effects which the uneducated attribute to man.'

aRef Gen@3 @0 S4' [4] Then I talked with the other spirit, the one who loved good and truth, and when I had asked something about his experiences, I mentioned free will. 'What madness it is,' he said, 'to deny that man has free will in spiritual matters! Is there anyone who is unable to will and do good, and to think about and speak truth of himself, which he draws from the Word, and so from the Lord who is the Word? For He said: "Bring forth good fruit" and "Believe in the light", as well as "Love one another" and "Love God"; or again "He who hears and keeps my commandments loves me, and I will love him"; not to mention thousands of similar things throughout the Word. So what use then would the Word be, if man could will and think nothing, and so do and speak nothing that is prescribed in it? If man did not have that ability, what would religion and the church be but a shipwreck lying at the bottom of the sea, with the ship-master standing on top of the mast, shouting. 'There's nothing I can do,' while he watches the rest of the crew hoist sail in the life-boats and sail away. Was not Adam given freedom to eat from the tree of life and also from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? And because in his freedom he ate from the latter tree, smoke from the serpent, that is, from hell, entered his mind, and on account of that he was expelled from paradise and cursed. Yet even still he did not lose his free will, for we read that the route to the tree of life was guarded by a cherub, because if that had not been done, he could still have wished to eat from it.'

[5] When he said this, the other spirit who loved evil and falsity said: 'I reject what I have just heard, and keep in my mind what I suggested myself. Surely everyone knows that it is only God who is alive and so is active, and man is of himself dead, and so is purely passive? How could someone like this, who in himself is dead and purely passive, take to himself what is alive and active?'

My reply to this was: 'Man is an instrument for life; and God alone is life. God pours His life into the instrument and all its parts, just as the sun pours its heat into a tree and all its parts. God allows man to feel that life in himself as if it were his own; and God wants man to feel this so that man may, as it were of himself, live in accordance with the laws of order, which are as many as there are commandments in the Word; and so that he may put himself into a suitable state of mind to receive the love of God. Still God continually keeps His finger on the pointer of the balance, and controls it, without, however, violating free will by compulsion.

[6] 'A tree is unable to receive anything that the sun's heat supplies through its root, unless every single fibre in it is warmed and heated. Nor can elements rise up through the root, unless every single fibre passes on the heat it has received and thus contributes to the transport. Man behaves in like fashion with the vital heat he receives from God, but in distinction from a tree he feels the heat as his own, though it is not his. To the extent that he believes it is his and not God's, he receives vital light though not the heat of love from God, but the heat of love from hell. Since this is gross, it obstructs and closes the finer ramifications of the instrument, just as impure blood does the capillary vessels of the body. In this way a person turns himself from being spiritual into a purely natural man.

[7] 'Man's free will is derived from his feeling the life in him as his own, and God's leaving him to feel like this so that linking may take place. This linking is impossible unless it is reciprocal, and it becomes so when a person freely acts as if of himself. If God had not left man to do this, man would not be man, nor could he have everlasting life. For it is the reciprocal link with God which makes man a man rather than an animal, and allows him after death to live for ever. This is the result of free will in spiritual matters.'

[8] On hearing this the wicked spirit took himself off to a distance, and I then saw a flying serpent, of the sort called prester*, on a certain tree, offering someone fruit from it. In the spirit I approached the place, and saw there in place of the serpent a monstrous man, whose face was so covered in beard that only his nose stuck out; and instead of the tree there was a lighted fire-brand, near which he stood. The smoke had previously penetrated his mind, and after that he rejected the idea of free will in spiritual matters. Suddenly similar smoke came out of the fire-brand and surrounded both it and the man. Since they were thus lost to view, I went away. But the other spirit, who loved good and truth and insisted that man has free will in spiritual matters, accompanied me home.

* Or 'fiery serpent'.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 505

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 505

505. The third experience.*

I once heard a noise as of two mill-stones grinding together. I approached the sound, and it ceased. I saw a narrow doorway leading downwards and at an angle towards a building with a vaulted roof; it had a number of rooms each divided into small cells. In each of the cells sat two people collecting passages from the Word in support of justification by faith alone; one collected the passages and the other wrote them out, and they took turns to do this.

I went up to one cell which was near the entrance and asked: 'What are you collecting and writing out?'

'Passages,' they said, 'about the act of justification or faith in action, the faith which is the real one, and justifies, quickens and saves. It is the leading doctrine of the church in our part of Christendom.'

'Tell me,' I said to him then, 'some sign of that act, when that faith is introduced into a person's heart and soul.'

'The sign of that act,' he answered, 'is at the moment when a person smitten with grief at the thought of being damned, and being in a state of contrition, thinks about Christ taking away the damnation imposed by the law, confidently grasps this merit of His, and keeping this in his thoughts approaches God the Father and prays.'

[2] 'The act does so take place,' I said, 'and there is this moment. But how am I to understand,' I asked, 'what is said about this act, that nothing on man's part assents to it, any more than he would assent if he were a block of wood or a stone? Man, as it is said, with regard to that act can begin nothing, will or understand or think nothing, perform no act or contribute to any joint act, or fit or adjust himself. Tell me how this squares with your assertion that the act arises at the time when a person thinks about the enforcement of the law, about the taking away of his damnation by Christ, about the confidence with which he seizes Christ's merit, and with these thoughts in mind approaches God the Father and prays. Surely all of these are acts done by the person?'

'Yes,' he said, 'but they are not done by him actively, but passively.'

[3] 'How,' I answered, 'can anyone think, have confidence and pray passively? If you take away his activity and co-operation, do you not also take away his capacity to receive, and so everything is lost together with the act itself? What then does your act become but something purely imaginary, what is called a point of argument? I hope that you do not follow certain people in believing that such an act only takes place with those who are predestined, and know nothing of the faith being poured into them. They could just as well play at dice to determine whether faith was poured into them or not. Therefore, my friend, you should believe that man as regards faith and charity acts of himself under the Lord's guidance, and without this act on his part this act of faith of yours, which you called the leading doctrine of the church in Christendom, is no more than Lot's wife turned into a pillar of salt, which rings as pure salt when struck with a scribe's quill or with his fingernail (Luke 17:32). I have said this because you are making yourselves with regard to this act like such statues.'

When I said this, he took hold of the lamp-stand to hurl it with all the force in his hand in my face. But the lamp suddenly went out and he threw it in his companion's face, while I went away amused.

* This passage is repeated with slight modifications from AR 484.4-6.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 506

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 506

sRef Gala@2 @16 S0' sRef Gala@2 @15 S0' 506. The fourth experience.*

I saw in the spiritual world two flocks, one of goats, the other of sheep. I wondered who they were, since I knew that when animals are seen in the spiritual world, they are not animals, but correspondences of the affections and from these the thoughts of those who are there. So I went nearer, and as I approached, the likenesses of animals disappeared, and I saw human beings in their place. It became clear that those who made up the flock of goats were those who had convinced themselves of the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and those who made up the flock of sheep were those who believed that charity and faith are one, just as good and truth are one.

sRef 2Cor@5 @10 S2' sRef Rom@2 @6 S2' sRef Rom@2 @13 S2' sRef Rom@3 @28 S2' [2] Then I spoke with those who had appeared like goats and said: 'Why have you met together?' Most were clergy who had prided themselves on their reputation for learning, because they knew the secrets of justification by faith alone.

They said that they had met together to hold a council, because they had heard that Paul's statement that man is justified by faith without the deeds prescribed by the law (Rom. 3:28) had not been properly understood. For by faith there Paul did not mean the faith of the present-day church, in three Divine persons from eternity, but faith in the Lord God, the Saviour Jesus Christ. By the deeds prescribed by the law he did not mean the deeds prescribed by the law of the Ten Commandments, but those prescribed for the Jews by the law of Moses. Thus from those few words people had come to two monstrously false conclusions by incorrect interpretation: that faith meant the faith of the present-day church, and the deeds meant those prescribed by the Ten Commandments. 'Paul did not mean these,' they said, 'but those prescribed by the law of Moses which were intended for the Jews; and this is clearly established from his saying to Peter, whom he criticised for following Jewish practices, although he knew that no one is justified by the deeds prescribed by the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ (Gal. 2:14-16).' The faith of Jesus Christ is faith in Him and from Him, see above 338. Because by the deeds prescribed by the law Paul understood the deeds prescribed by the law of Moses, he made a distinction between the law of faith and the law of deeds, and between Jews and gentiles, or between circumcision and lack of circumcision. Circumcision means the Jews, as everywhere else. And he ends with these words:

Are we then abolishing the law by faith? By no means, we are reinforcing the law. Rom. 3:27-31.

(He says all this in a single passage.) He also says in the preceding chapter:

It is not those who hear the law who will be justified by God, but those who keep it. Rom. 2:13.

He says elsewhere that God will repay each according to his deeds (Rom. 2:6), and:

We must all be put on show before the tribunal of Christ, so that each may be rewarded for his bodily acts, whether good or ill. 2 Cor. 5:10.

There are many more passages showing that Paul rejected faith without good deeds, just as much as James did (James 2:17-26).

[3] Further evidence that Paul meant the deeds prescribed by the law of Moses for the Jews can be drawn from the fact that all the statutes for the Jews are called in the writings of Moses the law, and so these are the deeds prescribed by the law; e.g.:

This is the law of the grain offering. Lev. 6:14, 18ff.

This is the law of the burnt-offering, the grain-offering, the sin-sacrifice, the guilt-sacrifice and the consecration. Lev. 7:37,

This is the law of beast and bird. Lev. 11:46ff.

This is the law for one who bears a child, a son or a daughter. Lev. 12:7.

This is the law for a leprous disease. Lev. 13:59; 14:2, 32, 54, 57

This is the law of the person with a discharge. Lev. 15:32.

This is the law in cases of jealousy. Num. 5:29, 30.

This is the law for the Nazirite. Num. 6:13, 21.

This is the law of cleansing. Num. 19:14.

This is the law concerning the red cow. Num. 19:2.

The law for the king. Deut. 17:15-19.

In fact, the whole book of Moses is called 'the Book of the Law' (Deut. 31:9, 11, 12, 26; also Luke 2:22; 24:44; John 1:45; 7:22, 23; 8:5). They went on to say that they had seen in the writings of Paul that the Law of the Ten Commandments was to be observed in living and to be fulfilled by charity (Rom. 13:8-11). He also says that there are three things, faith, hope and charity, and that the greatest of these is charity (1 Cor. 13:13). So it is clear he did not put faith first. They said that these subjects were what they had been summoned to debate.

[4] However, not to disturb them, I went away; and then again they looked at a distance like goats, sometimes lying down and sometimes standing. But they turned their backs on the flock of sheep. When they were debating, they seemed to be lying down, but standing up when they reached a conclusion. But I kept my gaze fixed on their horns, and was surprised to notice that at one time the horns on their foreheads appeared to point forwards and upwards, at another time curving away towards their backs and eventually pointing completely the other way. Then they suddenly turned to face the flock of sheep, but they still looked like goats. So I went up to them again and asked: 'What are you doing now?' They replied that they had reached the conclusion that faith alone produces the good deeds of charity, as a tree produces fruit.

Then a clap of thunder was heard, and a flash of lightning was seen coming from above. Following this an angel appeared, standing between the two flocks, who shouted to the flock of sheep: 'Do not listen to them. They have not abandoned their former faith, which is that faith alone brings justification and salvation, and the practice of charity plays no part. Neither is faith a tree; it is man who is the tree. Repent and look to the Lord, and you will have faith; before doing that, the faith you have is not a faith with any life in it.'

Then the goats whose horns were curved backwards wanted to join the sheep. But the angel who stood between them divided the sheep into two flocks. He told those on the left: 'Go and join the goats; but I warn you, the wolf will come and seize them, and you with them.'

[5] After the two flocks of sheep had been separated, and those on the left had heard the angel's threatening words, they looked at one another and said: 'Let us talk with our former companions.' Then the left-hand flock spoke to the right-hand one and said: 'Why have you abandoned our shepherds**? Are not faith and charity one, as a tree and its fruit are one? The tree extends through its branches into the fruit; if you break a piece off a branch which forms the connection between the tree and its fruit, the fruit will be lost, won't it, and together with the fruit all the seed which might grow into a new tree? Ask our priests if that isn't so.'

So they asked the priests, and they looked around at the rest, who were winking at them to get them to say that they had made a good point. After this they replied: 'You have made a good point, but as regards the extension of faith into good deeds, like that of a tree into its fruit, we know many secrets, but this is not the occasion to divulge them. The chain or thread which links faith and charity has many knots on it, and only we, the priests, are able to undo them.'

[6] Then one of the priests, who belonged to the right-hand flock of sheep, got up and said: 'Their answer to you was Yes, but to their own party No, for they do not think as they speak.' 'How then do they think?' the others asked; 'Don't they think as they teach?'

'No,' he replied, 'they think that every good of charity, what is called a good deed, which a person does for the sake of salvation and everlasting life, is not in the least good, because by doing the deed himself the person wants to save himself, claiming for himself the righteousness and merit of the one Saviour. They think that this is true of every good deed in which a person is aware of his volition. They hold therefore that there is no link at all between faith and charity, not even that faith is retained and preserved by good deeds.'

[7] But those who belonged to the left-hand flock said: 'You are telling lies to accuse them. Don't they preach charity and its deeds, what they call the deeds of faith, openly in our hearing?'

'You do not understand their sermons,' he replied; only a clergyman who is present can grasp and understand them. What they have in mind is merely moral charity, and its social and political good deeds.

They call these the good deeds of faith, but they are certainly not. For an atheist can do them just as well and in the same guise. They say therefore with one voice that no one is saved by any deeds, but by faith alone. Let us take a comparison to illustrate this. They say that an apple-tree produces apples, but that if a person does good for the sake of salvation, just as the tree by a continuous extension of itself produces apples, then the apples are rotten inside and full of maggots. They say too that a vine produces grapes, but if a person were to do spiritual good deeds as a vine makes grapes, he would make bitter grapes.'

[8] Then they asked: 'What for them are the good deeds of charity, those that are the fruits of faith?'

He replied that perhaps they lurk out of sight somewhere near faith, but are not attached to it. 'They are,' he said, 'like a person's shadow, which follows behind him when he is looking towards the sun, and which he cannot see unless he turns around. Or rather I might say that they are like horses' tails, which in many places are docked nowadays, because people say: "What use are they? They serve no purpose, and if they remain attached to the horse, they easily get dirty."'

On hearing this someone in the left-hand flock of sheep became indignant and said: 'There certainly must be some link, else how could they be called the deeds of faith? Possibly the good deeds of charity are introduced by God into what a person does of his own will by some influence; let us say, by some affection, some afflatus, inspiration, urging and excitation of the will, some silent perception in thought, leading to exhortation, contrition and so to conscience, and thus leading to compulsion, obedience to the Ten Commandments and the Word, either like a child or like a wise man, or by some other means resembling these. How else could they call them the fruits of faith?'

To this the priest replied that they could not. 'And,' he said, 'if they do say that something like this happens, they still stuff their sermons full of words which prove that it is not from faith. There are still others who teach that such things occur but only as signs of faith, not as bonds linking it with charity. There are some, however, who have devised a theory of linking by means of the Word.'

Then they said, 'Isn't this how a link is made?' But he answered, 'That is not what they think, but they imagine it happens just by listening to the Word. For they claim that man's whole rational and voluntary faculty is in matters to do with faith impure and merit-seeking, since in spiritual matters a person cannot understand or will anything, work or co-operate, any more than a stick.'

[9] However one, on hearing that man was believed to be like this in all matters to do with faith and salvation, said: 'I heard someone saying: "I have planted a vineyard. Now I shall drink wine until I am drunk." But another man asked: "Surely you will drink wine out of your goblet by the use of your right hand?" "No," he said, "I shall drink out of an invisible goblet by means of an invisible hand." "Then," said the other man, "you certainly won't get drunk."'

A little later the same man said: 'Please listen to me. I tell you, drink the wine which comes from understanding the Word. Don't you know that the Lord is the Word? Is not the Word from the Lord? Is He not thus in it? If therefore you do good from the Word, are you not doing it from the Lord, in accordance with His words and His will? If you then look to the Lord, He will also guide and teach you, and you will do it of yourselves from the Lord. Can anyone who does something at a king's behest, in accordance with his words and his instructions, say: "I am doing this in accordance with my own words or instructions, and of my own will."'

[10] After this he turned to the clergy and said: 'You ministers of God, do not lead the flock astray.' On hearing this the majority of the left-hand flock went away and joined the right-hand flock.

Then some of the clergy began saying: 'We have heard things we never heard before. But we are shepherds, and we shall not abandon the sheep.' So they went away with them, saying: 'This man has uttered a true saying. How can anyone say "I do this of myself" when he does it in accordance with the Word, so at the Lord's behest, in accordance with His words and His will? Can anyone who does something at a king's behest, in accordance with his words and his will, say: "I am doing this of myself"? We now see it was by Divine providence that the link between faith and good deeds, which is recognised by the members of the church, was not discovered. It could not be, because it could not exist; for there was no faith in the Lord, who is the Word, and so there was not either any faith coming from the Word.'

But the rest of the priests, who belonged to the flock of goats, went off waving their hats and shouting: 'Faith alone, faith alone, long live faith alone.'

* This passage is repeated with modifications from AR 417.
** The Latin word means both shepherd and pastor.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 507

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 507

507. The fifth experience.*

I was talking with angels and we came at last to the subject of the lust for evil which every person acquires by birth. 'In the world where I live,' said one of them, 'those who are possessed by lust appear to us angels as fools, but to themselves they seem extremely wise. On this account, in order to drag them out of their folly, they are by turns allowed to lapse into it and are then brought to a rational frame of mind, which in their case is confined to externals. When they are in this state they see, acknowledge and confess that they are crazy. But they still long to exchange their rational state for their crazed one, and they plunge into it as being freedom and pleasure in place of compulsion and unpleasantness. So it is lust that inwardly delights them, not intelligence.

[2] 'There are three universal loves of which every person is from creation compounded: the love of the neighbour, which is also the love of performing services, and this is a spiritual love; the love of the world, which is also the love of possessing wealth, and this is a material love; and self-love, which is also the love of dominating others, and this is a bodily love. A person is truly human when the love of the neighbour, or the love of performing services, makes up the head, and the love of the world, or of possessing wealth, makes up the chest and belly, and self-love, or the love of dominating, makes up the feet and the soles of the feet. But if the love of the world makes up the head, a person is only human in the way a hunchback is. And if self-love makes up the head, he is not like a person standing on his feet, but like one standing on the palms of his hands with his head down and his haunches in the air.

[3] 'When the love of performing services makes up the head, and the other two loves duly make up the trunk and feet, the person appears in heaven to have the face of an angel with a lovely rainbow around his head. But if the love of the world or wealth makes up the head, seen from heaven he seems to have a pale face like a corpse with a yellow ring around his head. And if self-love or the love of dominating others makes up the head, seen from heaven he seems to have a face dark with fiery gleams with a white ring around his head.'

This led me to ask: 'What do the rings around the head represent?' Intelligence;' they replied, 'the white ring around the head of a person with a dark face with fiery gleams represents his intelligence being limited to externals or around him, and his craziness being in his internals or inside him. Also a person of this sort is wise when engaged in the body, but crazy when in the spirit. No one is wise in spirit except by the Lord's doing; this happens when he is born again and created anew by the Lord.'

[4] After this the ground on the left opened and I saw rising through the opening a devil with a dark face with fiery gleams and a white ring around his head. 'Who are you?' I asked. 'I am Lucifer,' he said, 'the son of the dawn. I was cast down for making myself like the Most High, as described in Isaiah, chapter 14.' He was not actually Lucifer, but he thought he was. 'Since you have been cast down,' I said, 'how can you rise again from hell?' 'There,' he said, 'I am a devil, but here an angel of light; don't you see I have a white ring round my head? And you will see, if you wish, that among moral people I am moral, among rational people rational, among spiritual people even spiritual. I was even able to preach.'

'What did you preach about?' I asked. 'Against cheats,' he said, 'against adulterers and all the hellish loves. In fact it was then I called myself the devil Lucifer and invoked curses against myself as such, so that I was praised to the skies. That was how I got the name of the son of the dawn. To my own surprise, when I was in the pulpit I could think of nothing but speaking correctly and properly. But the reason was revealed to me, that I was in externals and these were then separated from my internals. Yet despite having this revealed to me, I was still unable to change, because I regarded myself as superior to the Most High, and was proud enough to oppose Him.'

[5] 'How,' I asked then, 'could you have spoken like that when you are yourself a cheat and an adulterer?' 'I am different,' he replied, 'when I am in externals or the body, from what I am when in internals or the spirit. In the body I am an angel, but in the spirit a devil. For while I am in the body I am in the power of the understanding, but in the spirit I am in the power of the will, and the understanding carries me upwards, while the will carries me down. When I am in the power of the understanding there is a white ring surrounding my head; but when the understanding becomes completely subservient to the will and is its creature, which is our ultimate fate, the ring turns black and fades away. When this happens I can no longer climb up into this light,,

Suddenly, however, catching sight of the angels with me, his face became inflamed and his voice became harsh, and he turned 'black, including the ring around his head. Then he fell back into hell through the opening by which he had risen. The by-standers drew the conclusion from what they had seen and heard that it is the will and not the understanding which determines a person's character, since the will has no difficulty in bringing the understanding over to its side and making it subservient.

[6] Then I asked the angels where the devils got their rationality from. 'It is,' they said, 'from the glory of self-love, for self-love is surrounded by glory, since this is the brilliance of its fire, and glory raises the understanding almost into the light of heaven. Everyone's understanding is capable of being raised in proportion to his knowledge; but the will can only be raised by living in accordance with the truths taught by the church and by reason. That is why even atheists, who out of self-love boast of their reputation, and so pride themselves on their intelligence, enjoy a higher degree of rationality than many others. But this happens when they are deep in intellectual thought, not when they are letting their wills express their love. It is love in the will which takes possession of the internal man, but thought in the understanding which takes possession of the external man.' The angel went on to tell us the reason why man is a compound of three loves, that of service, that of the world, and self-love. It is so that he may be guided in his thoughts by God, yet think entirely as if of himself. He told us that the highest levels of the human mind are turned upwards to God, the middle levels outwards to the world, the lowest downwards to the body. It is because these are turned downwards that a person thinks as if entirely of his own accord, when in fact his thoughts are controlled by God.

* This section is repeated with modifications from CL 269.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 508

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 508

508. The sixth experience.

One day a magnificent church building appeared to me; it was square in plan with a roof like a crown, with arches above and a raised parapet running around. Its walls were all windows made of crystal, its door of a pearly substance. Inside on the south side towards the west there was a platform, on which the open Word lay at the right surrounded by a blaze of light, so bright as to spread round and light up the whole platform. In the middle of the church was a shrine with a curtain in front of it; but this was now raised and there stood a golden cherub with a sword which he brandished in all directions in his hand.

aRef Gen@3 @24 S2' aRef Gen@3 @23 S2' [2] When I caught sight of all this, as I meditated, the meaning of each of the details came flooding into my mind. The church meant the new church; the door of a pearly substance, entry into it; the windows of crystal the truths which enlighten it; the platform the priesthood and their preaching; the Word on it, open and lighting up the top of the platform, the revelation of its internal, or spiritual, sense; the shrine in the middle of the church the link of that church with the heaven of angels; the golden cherub there the Word in its literal sense; the sword brandished in his hand meant that this sense can be twisted in different ways, so long as it is made to refer to some truth. The lifting of the curtain in front of the cherub meant that now the Word was laid open.

[3] Later, when I got closer, I saw there was an inscription over the door: NOW IT IS PERMITTED. This meant that now it is permitted to enter with the understanding into the mysteries of faith. Seeing this inscription led me to think that it is extremely dangerous to enter with the understanding into the dogmas of faith which have been put together out of one's own intelligence and the falsities it produces, and even more so to seek to support them by quoting the Word. This has the effect of shutting off the understanding at the top and little by little also at the bottom, to such an extent that theology is not only disliked but actually wiped out, like the writing on a paper being destroyed by book-worms, or the wool of a piece of cloth by grubs. His understanding then concerns itself only with political affairs which affect his life in the country where he lives, and with civil affairs relating to his official duties, and with domestic affairs of his household; and in all of these he constantly embraces nature, being led by the enticement of its pleasures to love it, as an idolater does the golden image in his lap.

[4] Now since the dogmas of present-day Christian churches are put together not from the Word, but from people's own intelligence and the false ideas that come from that, and also by means of some ideas supported from the Word, for this reason the Lord's Divine providence has seen to it that among Roman Catholics the Word has been taken away from laymen, while among Protestants it remains open, though shut off by their frequent saying that the understanding must be kept in obedience to their faith.

[5] But in the new church the opposite happens; here it is permitted with the understanding to approach and penetrate all its secrets, and also to support them from the Word. The reason is that its doctrines are a series of truths revealed by the Lord through the Word; and proving them by rational argument causes the understanding to be opened up above more and more. This lifts it into the light enjoyed by the angels of heaven; and that light is in essence truth, and it makes the acknowledgment of the Lord as the God of heaven and earth shine out in all its glory. This is what the inscription 'NOW IT IS PERMITTED' over the door means; and the removal of the curtain of the shrine in front of the cherub has the same meaning. It is a rule in the new church that falsities shut off the understanding, and truths open it up.

[6] After this I saw what looked like a child overhead, holding a paper in his hand. As he approached me, he grew in size until he was a man of average height. He was an angel from the third heaven; all there look at a distance like children. When he reached me, he held the paper out to me. But since it was written in the rounded script customary in that heaven, I gave it back and asked them to expound the meaning of what was written on it in words I could comprehend in my thinking.

'What is written here,' he replied, 'is: FROM NOW ON ENTER INTO THE MYSTERIES OF THE WORD WHICH HAVE SO FAR BEEN HIDDEN: FOR EACH ONE OF ITS TRUTHS IS A MIRROR IN WHICH WE SEE THE LORD.'

TCR (Chadwick) n. 509

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 509

509. CHAPTER NINE

REPENTANCE

The chapters on faith, charity and free will naturally lead on to the subject of repentance, since true faith and genuine charity cannot exist without repentance, and no one can repent without free will. Another reason why repentance must come here is that the next chapter deals with regeneration; and no one can be regenerated until the more serious evils, which render a person loathsome before God, have been removed. What is an unregenerate person but one who is impenitent? And what is an impenitent person but one stricken with a kind of lethargy, knowing nothing about sin and therefore embracing it in his bosom, kissing it every day, as an adulterer does the trollop in his bed. To show what repentance is, and what it does, the chapter needs to be split up into sections.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 510

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 510

510. I

Repentance is the first stage in the development of the church in a person.

The communion known as a church is composed of as many people as have the church in them; and the church enters into a person when he is being regenerated. Everyone is regenerated by abstaining from sinful evils, and shunning them as anyone would on seeing the hordes of hell seeking with torches in their hands to attack him and to throw him upon a pyre. As a person advances into early manhood there are many ways in which he is prepared for the church and brought into it; but it is acts of repentance which really bring this about in him. By acts of repentance are meant all that prevent him from willing and so from doing the evil actions which are sins against God. For until this happens, he stands outside the process of regeneration. If at that time any thought about everlasting salvation occurs to him, he may incline towards it, but very soon he turns his back on it. It does not reach further into him than the ideas he is thinking about, though from these it may emerge as spoken words, possibly also as gestures in keeping with what he says. On the other hand, when it enters the will, it becomes a part of the person, for the will is the real person, because it is where his love resides. Thought lies outside him, unless it comes out of his will. If so, will and thought act as one and together make up the person. The consequence of this is that for repentance to be genuine and effective in a person, it must come from the will, and from thought coming from the will, not from thought alone. In other words, it must be expressed in action, not merely on the lips.

[2] The Word establishes plainly that repentance is the first stage in the development of the church. John the Baptist, who was sent beforehand to prepare people for the church the Lord was to found, preached repentance at the same time as he was baptising. His baptism was therefore called a baptism of repentance, because baptism means spiritual washing, or being cleansed from sins. He did this in the Jordan, because the Jordan meant being brought into the church, since it was the first boundary of the land of Canaan, which was where the church was. The Lord Himself too preached repentance for the forgiveness of sins. By this He taught that repentance is the first stage in the development of the church, and that to the extent that a person repents, his sins are distanced from him; and to the extent they are distanced, they are forgiven. Moreover, the Lord laid upon the twelve Apostles, as well as the seventy He sent out, the duty of preaching repentance. These facts clearly show that repentance is the first stage in the development of the church.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 511

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 511

511. The church cannot exist in any person until his sins have been distanced from him. Any reasonable person can reach this conclusion, and it can be illustrated by the following comparisons. Can anyone put sheep, kids or lambs into fields or woods teeming with all kinds of wild beasts, before driving out the wild beasts? Can anyone work over a piece of ground thick with thorns, briars and nettles to make a garden, until he has uprooted those weeds? Can anyone introduce a form of government based upon justice or set up an independent state in a city occupied by an enemy, until he has driven the enemy out? It is much the same with the evils in a person, which resemble wild beasts, briars and thorns, or enemies. The church can no more co-exist with these than anyone can live together with tigers and leopards in a zoo. No more can anyone sleep in a bed made on a layer of poisonous plants or with the pillows stuffed with them. No more can anyone sleep at night in a church, if beneath its paving stones lie tombs full of corpses. He would surely be at the mercy of ghosts resembling furies.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 512

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 512

512. II

Contrition, which is said at the present time to precede faith and to be followed by the consolation of the Gospel, is not repentance.

The Reformed Christian church has a tradition of a kind of anxiety, grief and dread which they call contrition; in those undergoing regeneration it precedes their acquisition of faith and is followed by the consolation of the Gospel. This contrition, they say, arises in them as a result of fearing the just wrath of God, leading to the everlasting damnation which is inherent in everyone as the result of Adam's sin and the consequent tendency to evils. Without this contrition, faith which imputes the merit and righteousness of the Lord the Saviour is not bestowed. Those who have acquired this faith receive the consolation of the Gospel, which is that they are justified, that is, made new, regenerated and sanctified without any cooperation on their part. They are thus rescued from damnation and given everlasting blessing, which is everlasting life. But there are three questions about contrition to be discussed: whether it is the same as repentance; whether it is of any importance; and whether there is such a thing.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 513

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 513

513. Whether contrition is the same as repentance or not can be decided from the description of repentance in what follows, namely, that it cannot exist unless a person not only in general terms but also in detail knows that he is a sinner. No one can know this unless he examines himself and sees the sins in himself, and for that reason condemns himself. The contrition, however, which is preached about as being necessary in order to acquire faith, has nothing in common with these actions, for it is merely thinking, and so confession, that one is by birth involved in Adam's sin and prone to the evils that gush forth from that source; as a result, one is subject to the wrath of God, and so deservedly damned and doomed to everlasting death. It is plain from this that contrition of this sort is not repentance.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 514

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 514

514. The second question is whether, since that sort of contrition is not repentance, it is of any importance. It is said to contribute to faith, as what precedes does to what follows, but still not to enter into faith and be linked to it by being mixed with it. But what is this following faith but a belief that God the Father imputes the righteousness of His Son, and then declares a person who is unaware of any sin to be righteous, new and holy, thus clothing him in a robe washed and made white by the blood of the Lamb? When he goes out clad in that robe, what are the evils he has committed in his life but like brimstone cast into the depths of the sea? What then is Adam's sin, but like something covered over or removed to a distance or taken away by Christ's imputed merit? When a person by that faith walks in the righteousness and at the same time in the innocence of God the Saviour, what use is contrition to him, except to make him feel sure he is in Abraham's bosom, from where he may look upon those who have not yet been contrite before acquiring faith as the wretched in hell, or as dead? For they say that there is no living faith in those who lack contrition. It can therefore be said that if they have plunged themselves in damnable evils, or if they now do so, they pay no more attention to them or are no more aware of them than piglets lying in the filth of a street's gutters are aware of the foul stench. From this it is plain that when this contrition is not repentance it is nothing.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 515

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 515

515. The third question to be discussed is whether there is such a thing as this contrition without repentance. I have asked many people in the spiritual world who had convinced themselves that faith imputes the merit of Christ, whether they had experienced any contrition, and they replied: 'What use is contrition when we have believed for certain from childhood up that Christ by His passion has taken away all our sins? Contrition does not square with this belief, since contrition means throwing oneself into hell and torturing one's conscience, yet knowing that one is redeemed, and rescued from hell and so unharmed.' They added that the rule of contrition is nothing but a pretence, which has been seized on in place of the repentance so often mentioned and enjoined in the Word. There might perhaps be some emotion in the case of the simple who know very little about the Gospel, when they hear of or think about the torments of hell.

They said too that the consolation of the Gospel, which was impressed upon them from the time they began to grow up, so far banished contrition that in their hearts they laughed at the mention of it. Hell, they said, could no more strike fear into them than the fire of Vesuvius or Etna can into the inhabitants of Warsaw or Vienna; or any more than the basilisks and poisonous snakes of the Arabian desert, or the tigers and lions in the forests of Tartary, can into those who are living safely, tranquilly and quietly in some European city. The wrath of God had no more frightened them and made them contrite than the wrath of the king of Persia can the people of Pennsylvania. These statements and the arguments drawn from their traditional lore convinced me that contrition, unless it is repentance as shortly to be described, is nothing but a mockery born of the imagination.

Another reason why the Reformed churches adopted contrition in place of repentance was to cut themselves off from the Roman Catholics, who insist on repentance and at the same time on charity. So when the Reformed churches had established the doctrine of justification by faith alone, they claimed the reason was that by repentance, just as by charity, something smacking of merit entered into their faith and sullied it.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 516

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 516

516. III

A mere verbal confession that one is a sinner is not repentance.

The teaching of the Reformed who subscribe to the Augsburg Confession about this verbal confession is this:

No one can ever know his sins; therefore they cannot be listed, being also inward and hidden, so that a confession would be false, imprecise, faulty and incomplete. If, however, one confesses oneself to be wholly and utterly sinful, one takes in all sins, omits none and forgets none. Yet the listing of sins, although not required, is for the sake of tender and timid consciences not to be abolished; but this is merely a childish and general form of confession for the more simple and untutored people. (Formula of Concord, pp. 327, 331, 380.)

This confession was adopted by the Reformed in place of real repentance after they had parted from the Roman Catholics, because it is based upon their doctrine that faith is imputed, and alone without charity, and thus also without repentance, it brings about the forgiveness of sins and regenerates a person. It is also based upon the fact that it is an inseparable corollary of that faith that in the process of justification man does not co-operate with the Holy Spirit; and that no one has free will in spiritual matters; and again that the whole process is the result of direct mercy and in no respect indirectly by or through the person himself.

TCR (Chadwick) n. 517

True Christian Religion (Chadwick) n. 517

sRef Mark@7 @6 S0' sRef Matt@23 @25 S0' sRef Matt@23 @26 S0' 517. Among the many reasons why a mere verbal confession that one is a sinner is not re