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
282. Because innocence With the angels of heaven is the very being
[esse] of good, it is evident that the Divine good that goes forth
from the Lord is innocence itself, for it is that good that flows
into angels, and affects their inmosts, and arranges and fits them
for receiving all the good of heaven. It is the same with children,
whose interiors are not only formed by means of innocence flowing
through them from the Lord, but also are continually being fitted and
arranged for receiving the good of heavenly love, since the good of
innocence acts from the inmost; for that good, as has been said, is
the being [esse] of all good. From all this it can be seen that all
innocence is from the Lord. For this reason the Lord is called in the
Word a "lamb," a lamb signifying innocence.{1} Because innocence is
the inmost in all the good of heaven, it so affects minds that when
it is felt by any one-as when an angel of the inmost heaven
approaches-he seems to himself to be no longer his own master and is
moved and as it were carried away by such a delight that no delight
of the world seems to be anything in comparison with it. This I say
from having perceived it.
{Footnote 1} In the Word a "lamb" signifies innocence and its
good. (n. 3994, 10132).
283. Everyone who is in the good of innocence is affected by
innocence, and is affected to the extent that he is in that good; but
those who are not in the good of innocence are not affected by
innocence. For this reason all who are in hell are wholly
antagonistic to innocence; they do not know what it is; their
antagonism is such that so far as any one is innocent they burn to do
him mischief; therefore they cannot bear to see little children; and
as soon as they see them they are inflamed with a cruel desire to do
them harm. From this it is clear that what is man's own, and
therefore the love of self, is antagonistic to innocence; for all who
are in hell are in what is their own, and therefore in the love of
self.{1}
{Footnote 1} What is man's own is loving self more than God,
and the world more than heaven, and making one's neighbor of no
account as compared with oneself; thus it is the love of self
and of the world (n. 694, 731, 4317, 5660). The evil are wholly
antagonistic to innocence, even to the extent that they cannot
endure its presence (n. 2126).
284. XXXII. THE STATE OF PEACE IN HEAVEN.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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