Heaven and its Wonders and HellSwedenborg, Emanuel
Religion
Heaven and its Wonders and Hell
Swedenborg, Emanuel
Future life -- Christianity -- Early work to 1800; Heaven -- Christianity; Hell -- Christianity
{Footnote 1} The celestial angels know innumerable things, and
are immeasurably wiser than the spiritual angels (n. 2718). The
celestial angels do not think and talk from faith, as the
spiritual angels do, for they have from the Lord a perception
of all things that constitute faith (n. 202, 597, 607, 784,
1121, 1384, 1442, 1898, 1919, 7680, 7877, 8780, 9277, 10336).
In regard to the truths of faith they say only "Yea, yea, or
Nay, nay," while the spiritual angels reason about whether a
thing is true (n. 2715, 3246, 4448, 9166, 10786, where the
Lord's words, "Let your discourse be Yea, yea, Nay nay" (Matt.
5:37), are explained).
271. Such are the angels of the third heaven because they are in love
to the Lord, and that love opens the interiors of the mind to the
third degree, and is a receptacle of all things of wisdom. It must be
understood also that the angels of the inmost heaven are still being
continually perfected in wisdom, and this differently from the angels
of the outmost heaven. The angels of the inmost heaven do not store
up Divine truths in the memory and thus make out of them a kind of
science; but as soon as they hear them they perceive them and apply
them to the life. For this reason Divine truths are as permanent with
them as if they were inscribed on them, for what is committed in such
a way to the life is contained in it. But it is not so with the
angels of the outmost heaven. These first store up Divine truths in
the memory and stow them away with their knowledge, and draw them out
therefrom to perfect their understanding by them, and will them and
apply them to the life, but with no interior perception whether they
are truths; and in consequence they are in comparative obscurity. It
is a notable fact that the angels of the third heaven are perfected
in wisdom by hearing and not by seeing. What they hear from
preachings does not enter into their memory, but enters directly into
their perception and will, and comes to be a matter of life; but what
they see with their eyes enters into their memory, and they reason
and talk about it; which shows that with them the way of hearing is
the way of wisdom. This, too, is from correspondence, for the ear
corresponds to obedience, and obedience belongs to the life; while
the eye corresponds to intelligence, and intelligence is a matter of
doctrine.{1} The state of these angels is described in different
parts of the Word, as in Jeremiah:
I will put My law in their mind, and write it on their
heart. They shall teach no more everyone his friend and
everyone his brother, saying, Know ye Jehovah; for they
shall all know Me, from the least of them even unto the
greatest of them (31:33, 34).
And in Matthew,
Let your speech be Yea, yea, Nay, nay; what is more than
these is from evil (5:37).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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