Canons - The Holy Spirit

The Canons of the New Church - The Holy Spirit, Chap. VII

In the degree that any one knows and acknowledges
the Divine Truth which proceeds from the Lord,
in the same degree he knows and acknowledges God;
and in the degree that any one does this Divine Truth,
in the same degree is he in the Lord and the Lord in him.

Canons - equilibrium

The Canons of the New Church - Redemption - Chap. V, 1-3

1. Every person is in the equilibrium which is between heaven and hell,
and thence in the freedom of looking and turning himself either to heaven or to hell.

2. Every man after death comes first into this equilibrium,
and thus into a similar state of life to that in which he was in the world.

3. They who in the world looked and turned themselves to heaven or to hell,
in like manner look and turn themselves after death.

Canons - exinanition?? glorification??

The Canons of the New Church - God the Redeemer Jesus Christ -
Chap. VI, 1-7

1. The Lord had two states; one which was called a state of exinanition, the other glorification.

2. The state of exinanition was also a state of humiliation before the Father;
and the state of glorification was a state of unition with the Father.

3. The Lord, when He was in a state of exinanition, or humiliation,
prayed to the Father as though absent or remote;
and when He was in a state of glorification, or unition,
He spoke with Himself, when with the Father;
altogether as with man there are states of the soul and body,
before and after regeneration.

4. The Lord when He was in Divine Truth separately,
was in a state of exinanition,
since that could be attacked by the hells, or by the devils there,
and be reproached by men;
wherefore the Lord, when He was in that separately,
could be tempted and suffer.

5. But on the other hand,
the Lord, when He was in Divine Good conjointly,
could not be tempted and suffer by devils in hell,
nor by men in the world,
since that could not be approached, still less invaded.

6. The Lord, when in the world, was alternately in these two states.

7. The Lord could not otherwise have become Justice and redemption.

Canons - the Holy Spirit & the Power of the Most High

The Canons of the New Church -
God the Redeemer Jesus Christ - Chap. IV, 5-8

The "Holy Spirit," which came Upon Mary, signifies the Divine Truth;
and the "Power of the Most High," which overshadowed her,
signifies the Divine Good from which that exists.

5. "The Most High," in the Word, is predicated of the Divine good;
wherefore the "power of the Most High' signifies power proceeding from the Divine good.
6. Therefore these two thing, "the Holy Spirit coming upon her,"
and "the power of the Most High overshadowing her," signify both,
namely, Divine Truth and Divine Good,
- this forming the soul, and that the body, - and communication.
7. Consequently, that these two in the Lord recently born were distinct,
as are soul and body, but were afterwards united.
8. In like manner as is done in man, who is born and afterwards is regenerated.

Canons - God, Section VI - "In the beginning..."

The Canons of the New Church - God, Section VI

In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and God was the Word.
All things were made by Him -
and the world was made by Him. (John 1:1,3,10)

By "God" is there meant the Divine Good of Love;
and by the Word, which also was God, the Divine Truth of Wisdom.

Canons - Order

The Canons of the New Church - God, Section VIII -
a notation at end of the section:

All things proceed according to order. God is order.

Invitation 44 & 45 - correspondences in the Word

Invitation to the New Church 44 & 45

44 - ...when a person is in the natural sense, the angels are in the spiritual sense.

45 - The correspondences by which the Word as to each and all of its parts has been written, possess such power and strength, that it may be called the power and strength of the Divine Omnipotence; for through these correspondences, the natural acts conjointly with the spiritual, and the spiritual with the natural; thus the all of heaven with the all of the world. Thence it is that the two sacraments are correspondences of spiritual and natural things; thence is there strength and power.

Invitation 2 & 5 - our regeneration & the coming of the Lord

Invitation to the New Church 2 & 5

2 - During a person's regeneration, the light of heaven is instilled into natural light, and at the same time the heat of heaven; these two constitute, as it were, the new soul, through which a person is formed by the Lord. This light and heat are instilled through the higher mind, which is called the spiritual mind. By virtue of this instilling, or insertion, a person becomes a new creature, and becomes more enlightened and more intelligent in matters of the church, and consequently in the reading of the Word. This also is the new understanding and the new will. Afterwards the person is led by the Lord through the above light and through the above heat, and from natural becomes spiritual.

5 - ... without the Lord's Advent, no person could have been regenerated, and hence saved; and this is what is meant by "the Lamb taking away the sins of the world."

Marriage 99, 104, 105 - angels loving infants

Marriage (De Conjugio)

99 - Those who love infants, and educate them in heaven...live the most sweet and happy life.

104 - The inmost heaven through which the Lord insinuates conjugial love, consists of those there who are in greater peace than others. Peace in the heavens is comparatively like spring in the world, which delights and vivifies all things; it is celestial delight itself in its essence. The angels who are there are the wisest of all, and from innocence appear to the others like infants; they love infants even more than their fathers and mothers have loved them. They also preside over those who are with young.

105 - Those who have loved infants most tenderly, as such mothers...are there in the most sweet and tranquil life, and in celestial joy more than others.

Marriage 58 - to command in marriage

Marriage (De Conjugio) 58

Concerning the love of commanding in marriages,
that it takes away all love truly conjugial,
since conjugial love is such that the one wills to think and will as the other,
and thus mutually and reciprocally, so neither one commands,
but the Lord; thence is the delight of conjugial love.

Marriage 31 - conjugial love

Marriage (De Conjugio) 31

No one can be in conjugial love unless he be spiritual
by combat against the evils and their falsities,
and unless he acknowledges the Lord and His Divine.

Charity 212 - the church & religion

Charity 212
Where there is no truths of faith, the Church does not exist;
and where there is no good of life, religion does not exist.
The Church and religion make one, like truth and good. And because truth is of faith and good is of charity, they make one as faith and charity do; and, in order that it may be still more clearly understood, they make one as do the understanding and the will. It is well known that it is possible for a man to understand well and all the while not will well, and to understand truths and thence give utterance to them, and yet not from willing them, do them. But when he wills as he understands, and does as he says, then the will and the understanding with him make one. It is similar in the case of the Church and religion. The Church is a Church from its doctrine; and religion is religion from a life in accordance with doctrine. And the doctrine ought to be composed of truths, and the life ought to be made up of goods.

Charity 208 - the 'first of charity'

Charity 208
...the "first" of charity is to look to the Lord and shun evils as sins, which is done by repentance.
...before the Lord can inflow with good, evil must be removed; for influx before that is dangerous, as the good is turned into evil and increases it. The first thing, therefore, is to remove evil, and afterwards to inflow with good, and bring it into operation by means of the man Anyone attempting to do good from the Lord, before evil has been removed by repentance, or without shunning evils as sins, is attempting what is impossible....
Who is loving a person, when he wants to kill him, or hates him? Who is loving the neighbor, when he commits whoredom with someone else's wife? Who is loving the neighbor, when he defrauds him? Who is loving the neighbor, when he slanders him? Who is loving the neighbor, when he covets what belongs to him? Those evils, therefore, must first be removed; and in the measure that they are being removed, the that extent the neighbor is being loved.

Charity 202 - the Lord brings forth good

Charity 202
The Lord can bring forth good through any man, and He can turn the evil that an evil man brings forth into good. He can rouse an evil man to do good from selfish and worldly consideration; but in that case the Lord does not inflow into the evil of the man himself, but round about it into the surrounding things in him, thus into his external, by means of which the man wants to appear like a good man. That good, therefore, is good so far as the surface goes, but intrinsically is evil. With hypocrites, it is like gilded dung, so that scarcely anyone thinks it to be other than pure gold; nevertheless, if it is brought near to a sensitive nostril, the smell of the dung in it is perceived.

Charity 172 - service

Charity 172
... for everyone,
in whatever position of responsibility he is,
is obliged to serve;
even a king ought to serve the Lord.
And in so far as anyone serves faithfully,
he is loved and led by the Lord.
And in the measure that anyone looks to the Lord
and shuns evils as sins,
he serves freely and not under compulsion.

Charity 167 - hidden things of charity

Charity 167
No one can know the hidden things of charity in himself,
because he does not see them:
but the Lord sees them.

Charity 102 - Life is God & inflows into a person

Charity 102
... because Life is God,
the Divine cannot be appropriated to a person, who is finite and created,
but it can inflow into, and be adjoined to, a receptacle;
just as the eye is not light in itself, but can receive light,
and as the ear is not hearing in itself, but is the receptacle for it.

Charity 52 & 54 - genuine charity

Charity 52 & 54
He who loves a neighbor from genuine charity finds out what sort of person he is, and does good to him with discrimination, in accordance with the quality of his good.

Genuine charity itself is prudent and wise. The other charity is spurious, because it is of the will or of good only, and not at the same time of the understanding, or of truth.

Charity 2 - looking to the Lord

Charity 2
In so far as anyone does not look to the Lord
and shun evils because they are sins, he remains in them.

All evils are innately delightful, because man is born into the love of self, and that love delights in all the things that are of his proprium, that is, the things that he wills and thinks. Unless these inbred delights are subdued, everyone remains in them until death; and they are not subdued unless they are regarded as sweet poisons that kill, or as flowers beautiful in appearance but inwardly toxic, that is, unless the delights of the evils are regarded as being fatal, and this until they become undelightful.

AE - AC Holy Spirit - the union of Body & Soul

AE - The Athanasian Creed - The Holy Spirit

Through temptations man becomes spiritual and is conjoined to heaven. But the Lord through temptations conjoined His Human to the Divine itself which was in Him, and so He became God as to the Human.

He was united to His Divine by successive steps...and He was united through temptations and victories. Full unition was accomplished by the passion of the cross.

There is one God; and this is acknowledged in all the world.
The soul induces likeness in the body, and the body is but the external form of its own soul.
The Divine itself, and the Divine love, was His soul; it could not be otherwise than the Body should be like it.

AE - AC 201 - the Lord & the hells

AE - Athanasian Creed 201
That the Lord is God who alone is to be worshiped, is manifest from this, --that the hells are filled with the most bitter hatred against the Lord; not so against the Father, who also some hells call the Creator of the universe, from the habit of speaking that was formed in the world, and this without hatred; but all the hells are against the Lord; they are not willing, neither are they able, to name Him, and to all of them it is most delightful to torment those who adore the Lord, and this enjoyment of theirs is extreme.

AE - AC 121 - the Divine

AE - The Athanasian Creed 121

The Divine cannot be in any other body than its own;
thus it must be Divine.

AE - AC 92 - His Coming

AE - The Athanasian Creed 92

If the Lord had not now executed the Last Judgment (and this is His Coming),
No one in the church could have been saved any longer;
for all are in falsities, and all the Word has been falsified....
It is because of this that the Lord has now revealed the spiritual sense
as truth of doctrine;
as was done also in His Coming when He assumed the Human.

For those who want more of an explanation,
this is explained more fully in no. 112, which is in Comments.

AE - AC 46 - the Divine body and soul

AE - The Athanasian Creed - 46

The soul of the Lord was the Divine itself...
consequently, it is plain that His soul was His own Divine itself.
And whereas the body is not the man without the soul,
(indeed, whatever belongs to the body, even to its least particle,
lives from the soul,)
consequently such as the soul is, such is the body;
and the body is formed to the likeness of the soul....
And so they (Christians) make three parts in the Lord,
when yet there are two, the Divine and the Human;
and these two are one only Person;
and as soul and body make one man,
so the Divine and the Human is one Christ....

AE - AC 7 - the Divine Human was Divine order

AE - Athanasian Creed 7
...the Divine clothed itself with the Human,
according to Divine order,
from firsts to lasts:
and therefore in the Divine Human was Divine order:
consequently, that thus it fills all things,
or is omnipresent everywhere.

AE - The Angelic Idea - the Divine proceeding

AE - The Angelic Idea

The Divine proceeding that is nearest to the Lord appears before the angels as a sun; this appears to their sight fiery and flaming; this is so because the Divine proceeding is the Divine love and the Divine wisdom, and these so appear at a distance. (The angels add that the Divine proceeding is what the ancients represented by golden or shining and pure circles about the head of God, which modern painters still retain from the ancient idea.)

AE - DW XII (1) - what is spiritual

AE - Divine Wisdom XII (1)
What is spiritual can derive its essence from no other source
than the Divine love and the Divine wisdom,
for to love and to be wise is spiritual....

AE - DW XI - W&F 1 - a candle

AE - Divine Wisdom XI - Wisdom & Faith 1

...charity must give being to faith,
and faith must so teach;
moreover, charity must enlighten and faith must see;
consequently, if charity and faith are separated,
man has neither the one nor the other;
as when you take away a candle
you take away the light also, and there is thick darkness.

AE - DW - Love & Charity, Wisdom & Faith

AE - Divine Wisdom XI

LOVE AND CHARITY
1. The love of uses is charity.
2. The Lord is the source (a quo), and the neighbor is the object (ad quem).
3. Love to the Lord exists in charity, because in use.
4. Use is to perform one's office, and to do one's work
rightly, faithfully, sincerely, and justly.
5. There are general uses which are also uses of charity.
6. Uses become uses of charity only with one who fights against evils,
which are from hell;
7. Since these are contrary to love to the Lord,
and contrary to charity towards the neighbor.
8. Uses that have one's own good for their first and last end
are not uses of charity.

WISDOM AND FAITH
1. Faith is nothing else than truth.
2. Truth becomes truth when it is perceived and loved,
and it is called faith when it is known and thought.
3. The truths of faith look on one hand to the Lord,
on the other to the neighbor.
4. In brief, how the Lord is to be approached
that conjunction may be effected,
and how afterwards the Lord performs uses through man.
5. Both of these are taught by truths, spiritual, moral, and civil.
6. Faith is to know and think them; charity is to will and do them.
7. Therefore when the Divine love of the Lord exists with man in charity,
which to to will and do truths,
the Divine wisdom of the Lord exists with man in faith,
which is to know and think truths.
8. The conjunction of charity and faith is reciprocal.

AE - DW X - What is the Divine Wisdom?

AE - Divine Wisdom X [2]
The Divine wisdom is what is called the Divine providence,
and what is called also Divine order,
and Divine truths are called the laws of the Divine providence,
which have been treated of as above;
they are also called the laws of Divine order.
These laws on the one side have regard to the Lord,
and on the other to man,
and on both sides to conjunction.
The Divine love has for its object to lead and to bring man to itself;
and the Divine wisdom has for its object to teach man the way in which he must go that he may come into conjunction with the Lord. This way the Lord teaches in the Word, and particularly in the Decalogue; and on this account the two tables of the Decalogue were written by the finger of the Lord Himself, one of which has regard to the Lord and the other to man, and both to conjunction.

AE - DW - the spirit of a man

AE - Divine Wisdom - VII 92) [4]
The spirit of a man is not a substance that is separate from his viscera, organs, and members, but it cleaves to them in close conjunction; for the spiritual goes along with every fiber of these from outermosts to innermosts; and thus with every fiber and filament of the heart and lungs; consequently, when the bond between man's body and spirit is loosed, the spirit is in a form like that in which the man was before; there is only a separation of spiritual substance from material. For this reason the spirit has a heart and lungs the same as the man in the world, and also speech; and there can be no sense or motions or speech without heart and lungs. Spirits also have atmospheres, but spiritual. How greatly, then, are those deceived who assign to the soul a special seat somewhere in the brain or in the heart, for the soul of man, which is to live after death, is his spirit.

AE - DW III [3] - the co-operation between love & wisdom

AE - Divine Wisdom III [3]

... love in a state of peace and tranquility co-operates with wisdom,
and wisdom with love, and produces and forms...

AE - DW II - an image & likeness of the Lord

AE - Divine Wisdom - II
As there are two things in the Lord,
love and wisdom,
and these two proceed from Him,
and as man was created to be a likeness and an image of the Lord,
a likeness trough love,
and an image through wisdom,
so two receptacles were created with man,
one for love and the other for wisdom;
the receptacle of live is what is called the will,
and the receptacle of wisdom is what is called the understanding.

AE - DL XVII - acquiring the spiritual affection of use

AE - Divine Love - XVII
Every person has eternal life according to his affection of use, for the reason that affection is the person himself; consequently, such as the affection is, such is the person.

[5] The spiritual affection of use is both internal and external, and it is external or natural to the same extent that it is spiritual; for what is spiritual flows into what is natural, and arranges it in correspondence, thus into an image of itself.

Spiritual affection is acquired by shunning evils because they are sins; which is done by means of combat against them. The evils that a person must shun are all set forth written in the Decalogue. So far as person fights against them because they are sins, he becomes a spiritual affection, and thus he performs uses from spiritual life....

In this way one's spiritual mind is opened, through which the Lord enters into his natural mind and arranges it for performing spiritual uses which appear like natural uses. To these and no others is it granted by the Lord to love Him above all things and the neighbor as oneself.

If a person, by means of combat against evils as sins, has acquired anything spiritual in the world, be it ever so small, he is saved, and afterwards his uses grow like a grain of mustard seed into a tree.

AE - DL XIII - love to the Lord & the neighbor

AE Divine Love XIII

To love the Lord means to do uses from Him and for His sake.
To love the neighbor means to do uses to the church, to one's country, to human society, and to the fellow-citizen.
To be in the Lord means to be a use.
And to be a man means to perform uses to the neighbor from the Lord for the Lord's sake.

AE - DL XI - There are degrees of affections and uses.

AE - Divine Love XI

There are continuous degrees and discrete degrees. Both of these are in every form in the spiritual world and in the natural world. All are acquainted with continuous degrees; few however, have any knowledge of discrete degrees....
Continuous degrees, which all know about, are like the degrees from light to shade, from heat to cold, from rarity to density....
[2] But discrete degrees are wholly different. These do not advance in one plane to the sides around, but from highest to lowest; and for this reason they are called descending degrees.

AE - DL VIII - creation & use

AE - DL VIII

...from creation nothing is found on the earth that is not for use.

AE - DL IV - form of love

AE - The Divine Love IV

...form of love is a form of use;
for the subjects of love are uses,
because love wills to do goods,
and goods are nothing else than uses;
and since the Divine love infinitely transcends,
its form is a form of use in its whole complex.

AE 1226 - a life of use

AE 1226 [6]
A life from a love of uses is a life of love
of the public good and of love to the neighbor,
and also a life of love to the Lord,
for the Lord performs uses to man through man,
consequently a life of the love of uses is the spiritual Divine life,
and everyone who loves a good use and does it from a love for it,
is loved by the Lord,
and is received with joy by the angels of heaven.

AE 1223 - "For the fine linen is ... "

AE 1223
For the fine linen is the just deeds of the saints,
signifies that by means of truths from the Word
those who believe in the Lord have goods of life.

This is evident from the signification of "fine linen",
as being truths from the Word;
also from the signification of "saints",
as being those who are in truths from good from the Lord.

AE 1215 - fallacy is seeing appearance and not essence

AE 1215 [4]
...for a fallacy is an inversion of order;
it is the judgment of the eye,
not of the mind;
it is a conclusion from the appearance of a thing,
not from its essence.

...it is an eternal truth that influx is spiritual and not physical,
that is, influx is from the soul, which is spiritual,
into the body, which is natural,
or from the spiritual world into the natural world;
also that as the Divine from itself
and through that which proceeds from itself
created all things,
so it sustains all things...

AE 1210 - "To praise God"

AE 1210
"To praise God" signifies confession and worship,
because the Lord has no wish to be praised and glorified
from any love of Himself,
but only from His love for man,
for man must needs praise and glorify the Lord,
that is, give praise and glory to Him,
when he acknowledges in heart that there is nothing of good in himself,
and that he can do nothing of himself,
and on the other hand, that all good is from the Lord,
and that the Lord can do all things.
When man is in this acknowledgment,
he puts aside what is his own,
which belongs to the love of self,
and opens all things of his mind,
and thus gives room for the Divine to flow in with good and with power.
This is why it is necessary for man to be in humiliation before the Lord,
and why humiliation can be from no other source
than self-acknowledgment and acknowledgment of the Lord,
according to which reception is effected.

AE 1206 - "falling down before God"

AE 1206
... by creation there are gestures corresponding to every affection, and a man falls into them spontaneously when he comes into the affection, provided he has not learned to counterfeit affections that are foreign to him; while one who has learned so to do takes on gestures from himself by which he depicts affections of the heart, although they do not belong at all to his heart. Such can fall down before God, but it is a purely counterfeit act. This has been said to make known that "falling down before God" means to act from inmost affection, which is called humiliation of heart; this precedes worship, which is an act of the lips.

AE 1199 - For true and just are His judgments

AE 1199
For true and just are his judgments,
signifies that the laws of the Divine providence,
and all the works of the Lord,
are of the Divine wisdom and the Divine love.

AE 1198 - Salvation, glory, honor, power

AE 1198
Salvation and glory and honor and power unto the Lord our God
signifies eternal life is from the Lord
through the Divine truth and the Divine good from His Divine omnipotence.
This is evident from the signification of salvation, as being eternal life;
also from the signification of "glory and honor,"
as being the Lord's Divine truth and Divine good;
also from the signification of "power,"
as being, in reference to the Lord, omnipotence;
and as the Lord is called in the Word "Jehovah" and "Lord"
from the Divine good,
and "God" from the Divine truth,
and Divine good and truth are signified by "glory and honor,"
so it is said, "the Lord our God".
In the sense of the letter, "salvation, glory, honor, and power," are mentioned separately, but in the spiritual sense they are joined into one meaning, which is, that eternal life is from the Lord through the Divine truth and the Divine good from the Divine omnipotence. The same is true of many other passages of the Word. Sometimes mere names of countries and cities are enumerated, that appear disconnected in the sense of the letter, but in the spiritual sense they combine into one continuous sense.

AE 1194 - being useful

AE 1194 [2]
Man was created to perform uses, and this is to love the neighbor, so all who come into heaven, however many there are, must do uses. All the delight and blessedness of these is according to uses and the love of uses. Heavenly joy is from no other source. He who believe that such joy is possible in idleness is much deceived.

AE 1190 & AE 1193 - uses

AE 1190 [2]
To love wisdom is to love uses that are true uses,
and to love knowledge is to love the cognitions of good and truth
for the sake of such uses.
When uses are loved more than self and the world,
and the cognitions of good and truth are loved for the sake of uses,
uses have the first place and eminence and wealth the second place....

AE 1193 [2]
To love uses is nothing else than to love the neighbor,
for use in the spiritual sense is the neighbor.
This can be seen from the fact that everyone loves another
not because of his face and body,
but from his will and understanding....
And as a person is loved or not loved for these reasons,
it follows that the neighbor is that from which every one is a person,
and that is his spiritual.


cognitions - thoughts or beliefs

AE 1184 - going astray

AE 1185 [2]
...by the Divine providence man is led only to such things as do not lead astray and as are serviceable to eternal life; for all things of the Divine providence with man look to what is eternal, since the life which is God, from which man is man, is eternal.... I have seen the eminent and the rich in the heavens and I have seen them in the hells; therefore, as has been said, when eminence and riches to not lead astray, they are from God, but when they do, they are from hell.

AE 1175 - the Lord leads a person by their affections

AE 1175 [4]
Why a person is led by the Lord by means of affections and not by means of thoughts shall now be told. When a person is led by the Lord by means of affections, he can be led according to all the laws of His Divine providence, but not if he should be led by means of thoughts. Affections do not become evident to man, but thoughts do; also affections produce thoughts, but thoughts do not produce affections; there is an appearance that they do, but it is a fallacy. And when affections produce thoughts, they produce all things of a person, because these constitute his life. Moreover, this is known in the world. If you hold a person in his affection, you hold him bound, and lead him wherever you please, and a single reason is then stronger than a thousand. But if you do not hold a person in his affection, reasons are of no avail, for his affection, when not in harmony with them (reasons), and either perverts them or rejects them or extinguishes them. It would be similar if the Lord should lead a person by means of thoughts immediately, and not by means of affections. Again, when a person is led by the Lord by means of affections, it seems to the person as if he thought freely as if of himself, and spoke freely and acted freely as if of himself. And this is why the Lord does not teach a person immediately, but mediately by means of the Word, and by means of conversations and intercourse with others; for from these things man thinks free as if of himself.

AE 1174 - as of self

AE 1174 [2]
... it is according to a law of the Divine providence that man shall go whithersoever his affection wills....
And yet the Lord leads him as if by the hand, permitting and withholding as far as man is willing to follow in freedom....

[3]
This the Lord does without the man's knowing it, because if man knew it he would disturb the continuity of that process by leading himself. It is enough for man to learn truths from the Word, and by means of truths to know what good is, and from truths and goods what evils and falsities are, in order that he may be affected by truths and goods, and not be affected by falsities and evils.

AE 1166 - Divine omnipotence, Divine omniscience, Divine providence

AE 1166 [2]
The Lord alone resists the evils with man by Himself and not through any angels of heaven, because to resist evils with man is a work o f Divine omnipotence, Divine omniscience, and Divine providence.

It is a work of Divine omnipotence, because to resist one evil is to resit many, and even to resist the hells. For every evil is joined with innumerable other evils, and they cling together like the hells with each other; for as evils make one so do the hells, and as the hells make one so do evils, and no one but the Lord is able to resit the hells so united.

It is a work of Divine omniscience, because the Lord alone knows what man is and what his evils are, and what their connection is with other evils, thus in what order they must be removed that man may be inwardly or radically cured.

It is a work of Divine providence, that nothing may be done contrary to the laws of order, and that what is done may promote man's eternal good; for Divine omnipotence, Divine omniscience, and Divine providence have respect in every least particular to what is eternal.

[3]
All this makes clear that no angel is able to resist the evils with man, but the Lord only. The Lord carries on this work in man both immediately from Himself, and mediately through heaven, and yet in such a way that no angel knows anything about it.

AE 1160 - the profanation of what is holy

AE 1160 [3]
Moreover, the Lord by His Divine providence guards with the greatest care against this kind of profanation; and lest this exist, He separates the holy things with man from those that are not holy, and stores up the holy things in the interiors of his mind, and raises them up to Himself; while the things not holy He stores up in the exteriors, and turns them to the world. Thus holy things can be separated from the unholy, and thus man can be saved. But this cannot be done when goods and evils are mixed together.

AE 1159 - a law of order relating to reformation which is a law of providence

AE 1159 [5]
... man is not let into the truths of faith and the goods of love except so far as he can be withheld from evils and held in goods even to the end of life, and that it is better for a man to be permanently evil than that he be good and afterwards evil, for thus he becomes profane. It is for this reason that the Lord, who provides all things and foresees all things, hides the operations of His providence....

AE 1153 - the operation of the Divine Providence

AE 1153 [6]
Man does not perceive the operation of the Divine providence within himself, because that would take away his freedom, and thus his ability to think as if of himself, and with it every delight of life; thus man would be like an automaton, in which there is no reciprocal, and consequently no conjunction; also he would be a slave and not free. The Divine providence moves so secretly that scarcely a trace of it is seen, although it acts upon the most minute things of man's thought and will, which regard his eternal state....

[7]
If a man should learn anything of these arcana, he could not be withheld from leading himself; and in this he would be continually led from heaven into hell, while the Lord's leading is continually from hell towards heaven. For from himself man constantly acts against order, while the Lord acts constantly according to order; for man, from the nature derived from his parents, is in the love of self and the love of the world, and consequently perceives from a feeling of delight everything belonging to those loves as good; nevertheless, those loves as ends must be removed; and this is done by the Lord in infinite ways, that appear like a labyrinth even before the angels of the third heaven.

[8]
All this makes clear that man would find no help at all in knowing anything about this from sense or perception, but it would do him harm instead, and would destroy him forever. It is sufficient for man to know truths, and by means of truths to know what is good and what is evil, and to acknowledge the Lord and His Divine auspices in every least thing. Then so far as he knows truths, and by means of them what is good and evil, and does what is good as if from himself, so far the Lord leads him from love into wisdom, conjoining love to wisdom and wisdom to love, and making them to be one, because they are one in Himself.

AE 1145 - "wood" and "stone"

AE 1145 [2]
"Wood" signifies good, because it is from a tree from which are fruits; also because wood can be burned and be useful in keeping the body warm, and in building houses and marking various articles of convenience and use; also because an oil, which signifies the good of love, may be expressed from wood; it also contains in it that which gives heat.

"Stone" on the hand signifies here (Rev. 18:12) the truth of the natural man, because it is cold and cannot be burned.

AE 1144 - love of the neighbor, love of uses

AE 1144
Love towards the neighbor in the spiritual sense is the love of uses;
and when uses are for the sake of self,
it is not a love of uses but a love of self.

AE 1139 - the union of the Lord with a person

AE 1139 [2]
... the light of life and the heat of life move and fill their recipient in the exact measure of the quality of his acknowledgment that they are not his but are the Lord's, and the quality of acknowledgment is in exact accord with the quality of love in doing the commandments, which are uses.

AE 1129 - the universe

AE 1129 [5]
... the created universe is full of God.

AE 1127 - life from the Lord

AE 1127
Life from the Lord is love and wisdom;
consequently,
such as the reception of love and wisdom from the Lord is
such is the person.

AE 1115 - spirit & body

AE 1115 [4]
A man is in the idea of his spirit when he thinks abstractly,
and in the idea of his body when he does not think abstractly.

AE 1112 - civil truth is truth from law, civil equity is the good

AE 1112
"The just" is truth from good because civil justice is nothing else than civil truth, which is of the law, and civil equity is the good that is also of the law, since as the law wills justice so it wills equity; for as all truth must be from good so all justice must be from equity; and as all truth must be of good so all justice must be of equity, and conversely. The two cannot be separated, for if they are separated equity is no longer equity, nor is so-called justice justice; as good and truth cannot be separated, of if they are separated, good is not good, nor is truth truth.

AE 1104 - the Lord as Man who is God

AE 1104 [3]
In a word, those who separate the Divine from His Human, and do not think that the Divine is in His Human as the soul is in the body, and that the two are one Person, may fall into strange ideas about the Lord, even into an idea like that of a man separated from his soul. Take heed, therefore, not to think of the Lord as a man like yourself, but think of the Lord as Man who is God.

AE 1100 - the truths of the Word can be understood

AE 1100 [24]
If what is not understood must be believed,
a man might be taught like a parrot to speak and to remember....
But be it known that all the truths of the Word,
which are the truths of heaven and of the church,
can be seen by the understanding,
in heaven spiritually,
in the world rationally;
for a truly human understanding is the sight itself of these truths,
for it is separated from what is material
and when separated
it sees truths as clearly as the eye sees objects;
it sees truths as it loves them,
for as it loves them it is enlightened.
The angels have wisdom in consequence of seeing truths....

AE 1096 - thought of God

AE 1096 [4]
As thought about God is what primarily opens heaven,
so thought against God is what primarily closes heaven.

AE 1092, 1094 - our thoughts

AE 1092 [3]
... all the thoughts of a person pour themselves forth into the spiritual world in every direction, much the same as rays of light from a flame. As the spiritual world consists of heaven and hell, and as heaven as well as hell consists of innumerable societies, the thoughts of a person must needs pour themselves forth into societies; spiritual thoughts, which relate to the Lord, to love and faith in Him, and to the truths and goods of heaven and the church, into heavenly societies; but merely natural thoughts, which relate to self and the world and the love of these, and not at the same time to God, into infernal societies.

AE 1094 [2]
Here let it be said that a person lets himself more and more into the societies of heaven successively according to the increase of wisdom, and into more and more interior societies successively according to the increase of the love of good; also that so far as heaven is opened to him hell is closed. But it is man who opens hell to himself, while it is the Lord who opens heaven to man.

AE 1088 - "cherubim" guard & protect

AE 1088 [5]
The "cherubim" mean in the Word a guard and protection that the holy things of heaven not be violated, and that the Lord be approached only through love; consequently these signify the sense of the letter of the Word, because that is what guards and protects.

AE 1085 - our Word, Its holiness, and the angels

AE 1085 [2]
As the angels of the three heavens receive their wisdom from the Lord through the Word with them, and as their Words make one with our Word by correspondences, it also follows that the sense of the letter of our Word is the basis, support, and foundation of the wisdom of the angels of heaven. For the heavens rest upon the human race as a house rests upon its foundation; so the wisdom of the angels of heaven rests in like manner upon the knowledge, intelligence, and wisdom of men from the sense of the letter of the Word, for as been said above, communication and conjunction with the heavens are effected through the sense of the letter of the Word. So it is, that of the Lord's Divine Providence it has come to pass, that the Word as to the sense of the letter from its first revelation has not been mutilated, not even as to an expression and letter in the original text, for every expression is a support, and in some measure the letters. From all this it is clear what a profanation it is to falsify the truths and adulterate the goods of the Word, and how infernal it is to deny or weaken its holiness. As soon as that is done, for that man of the church heaven is closed. The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which cannot be forgiven, is the blasphemy of the Word by those who deny its holiness.

AE 1083 - "Thou shalt not steal"

AE 1083 [4]
When... "Thou shalt not steal" is read, by "stealing" a man understands stealing, defrauding, and taking away under any pretense his neighbor's goods. But an angel of the spiritual kingdom by "stealing" understands depriving another of his truths and goods by means of falsities and evils, while an angel of the celestial kingdom by "not to steal" understands not to attribute to himself the things that are the Lord's as the good of life and the truth of faith; for thereby good becomes not good, and truth not truth, because they are from men.

AE 1077 - a source of wisdom & intelligence

AE 1077 [2]
The Word of the Lord is wonderful in this,
that in every particular of it
there is a reciprocal union of good and truth
which testifies that the Word is the Divine proceeding from the Lord
which is the Divine good and the Divine truth reciprocally united . . ..
There is a marriage of good and truth, also of truth and good,
in every particular of the Word,
in order that it may be a source of wisdom
to angels and of intelligence to mankind . . .

AE 1072 - the Word is like a garden

AE 1072 [2]
That the Word is holy and Divine from inmosts to outermosts
is not evident to the man who leads himself,
but is evident to the man whom the Lord leads.
For the man who leads himself sees only the external of the Word,
and judges from its style;
but the man whom the Lord leads
judges of the external of the Word from the holiness that is in it.
The Word is like a garden,
that may be called a heavenly paradise,
in which are dainties and delightful things of every kind,
dainties from the fruits,
and delightful things from the flowers;
and in the middle of it trees of life,
and near them fountains of living water,
and round about trees of the forest,
and near them rivers.
The man who leads himself judges of that paradise,
which is the Word,
from its circumference, where the trees of the forest are;
but the man whom the Lord leads judges of it from the middle of it,
where the trees of life are.
The man whom the Lord leads is actually in the middle of it,
and looks to the Lord;
but the man who leads himself actually sits down at the circumference,
and looks away from it to the world.

AE 1066 - the Word

AE 1006 [3]
The Word is Divine truth itself,
which gives wisdom to angels and enlightens men.
... as the Word is the Divine truth, it is also the Lord....

The rest of this number gives a beautiful explanation of the senses of the Word, and then gives a detailed look at the sense of the letter of the Word. You can find it if you click on the word "comments" under this passage.

AE 1064 - the fifth kind of profanation

AE 1064 [3]
This kind is not like the others that have been treated of, for it consists in jesting from the Word and about the Word. For those who make jokes from the Word do not regard it as holy, and those who joke about it hold it in no esteem. And yet the Word is the very Divine truth of the Lord with men, and the Lord is present in the Word, and heaven also; for every particular of the Word communicates with heaven, and through heaven with the Lord; therefore to jest from the Word and about the Word is to bespatter the holy things of heaven with the dust of the earth.

AE 1061 - the Word serves heaven

AE 1061
... the Word in the letter must be natural,
in every particular of which the spiritual sense must be stored up;
otherwise the Word would not serve the heavens as a basis;
nor would it serve the church as the means for its conjunction with heaven.

AE 1050 - the light of heaven

AE 1050 [2]
A person has two minds, the natural and the spiritual. The natural mind is opened to him by the knowledges and cognitions of truth and good, and the spiritual mind is opened by a life according to these; and this is effected in those who know, acknowledge, and believe the truths of the Word and live according to them.... When the spiritual mind has been opened, the light of heaven, which is Divine truth, flows through it into the natural mind, and there arranges truths in corresponding order.


[cognitions - thinking, remembering, learning, using language)

AE 1043 - equilibrium

AE 1043 [3]
All angels, spirits, and men are kept by the Lord in equilibrium between good and evil, and thus between truth and falsity, in order that they may be in freedom; and thus may be led from evil to good and from falsity to truth easily and as if by themselves, although in fact they are led by the Lord.

AE 1038 - beasts

AE 1038 [2]
The divine Word can be signified by a "beast," because many of the holy things of the church are signified in the Word by "beasts".... Moreover, all beasts that were sacrificed, as oxen, bullocks, goats, she-goats, kids, rams, sheep, and lambs, signified the holy things of the church.... And this is why men because of charity are called "sheep," and even the Lord Himself because of the Divine innocence is called a "Lamb," and because of Divine power is called a "Lion."

AE 1032 - heaven or hell?

AE 1032 [2]
Man is either led from heaven or he is led from hell;
he cannot be led by both at the same time;
and he is led from heaven when he is led by the Lord,
and from hell when he is led by self.

... when man thinks in that elevated state
he thinks truth from the Lord
and does good from Him.

AE 1029a - Babylon

AE 1029a
"Babylon (or Babel)" means the church consisting of those who by means of the holy things of the church strive to gain dominion over the whole world, and this by dominion over the souls of men, claiming to themselves authority to save whomsoever they will; and these finally seek dominion over heaven and hell and make it their own. And to this end they draw and transfer to themselves all the Lord's authority, as if it had been given them by Him. The church consisting of such is very different in the beginning from what it becomes in process of time. In the beginning they are as it were in zeal for the Lord, for the Word, for love and faith, and especially for the salvation of men. But in that zeal the fire of domineering lies hidden; and in process of time as dominion increases this breaks forth; and so far as it comes into act the holy things of the church become the means, and dominion itself the end; and when dominion becomes the end the holy things of the church are applied to that end, and thus to themselves; and then they not only ascribe the salvation of souls to their own authority, but they also appropriate to themselves all the Lord's Divine power. And when they do this they pervert every good and every truth of the church, and thus profane the holy things of the church. These things are "Babylon."

AE 1027 - we can be in the Lord, and the Lord in us

AE 1027 [3]
... a person does not conjoin himself to the Lord, but that the Lord alone conjoins a person to Himself, and that conjunction is effected by doing...

AE 1027 [4]
... when a person through the last six commandments conjoins himself to the Lord as if of himself, the Lord then conjoins Himself to a person through the first three commandments, which are that man must acknowledge God, must believe in the Lord, and must keep His name holy. This a person does not believe, however much he man think that he does, unless the evils forbidden in the other table, that is, in the last six commandments, he abstains from as sins. These are the things pertaining to the covenant on the part of the Lord and on the part of man, through which there is reciprocal conjunction, which is that a person may be in the Lord and the Lord in a person.

AE 1022 - Thou shalt not covet

AE 1022 [3]
... all lusts are of love, for it is love that covets; and as there are two evils loves to which all lusts have reference, namely, the love of the world and the love of self, it follows that the lust of the ninth commandment has reference to the love of the world, and the lust of this (the tenth) commandment to the love of self, especially to the love of ruling. (... all evils and the falsities therefrom flow from these two loves...)

AE 1014, 1017 - "Thou shalt not kill"

AE 1012 [4]
The more remote sense of this commandment, "Thou shalt not kill," which is called the celestial spiritual sense, is that one shall not take away from man the faith and love of God, and thus his spiritual life. This is murder itself, because from this life man is a man, the life of the body serving this life as the instrumental cause serves its principal cause. Moreover, from this spiritual murder, moral murder is derived; consequently he who is in the one is also in the other; for he who wills to take away a man's spiritual life is in hatred against him if he cannot take it away, for he hates the faith and love with him, and thus the man himself. These three, namely, spiritual murder, which pertains to faith and love, moral murder, which pertains to reputation and honor, and natural murder, which pertains to the body, follow in a series one from the other, like cause and effect.

AE 1017
When a man abstains from hatred and turns away from it and shuns it as diabolical, then love, charity, mercy and clemency flow in through the heaven from the Lord, and then first the works which he does are works of love and charity.... So long as hatred is not put away, so long man is merely natural...nor can he become spiritual before hatred, with its root, which is the love of ruling over all, is removed; for the fire of heaven, which is spiritual love, cannot flow in so long as the fire of hell, which is hatred, stands in the way and shuts it out.

AE 1006 - Happy is he that is awake

AE 1006
Happy is he that is awake, (Rev. 16:15)
signifies the happy state of those who look to the Lord.
This is evident from the signification of "happy,"
as being to be in a happy state;
also from the signification of "being awake,"
as being to acquire for oneself spiritual life;
and this is acquired by man's looking to the Lord,
because the Lord is Life itself,
and from Him alone is life eternal.

AE 1003 - faith alone

AE 1003 [2]
... faith involves that a thing must be believed,
however it may appear to the understanding;
and when the understanding is taken away from faith
enlightenment also is taken away....

AE 997 [4] - Peace

AE 997 [4]
Peace is happiness of heart and soul
arising from the conjunction of the Lord with heaven and the church,
as well as from the conjunction of good and truth,
when all conflict and combat of evil and falsity
with good and truth has ceased....

AE 997 - the influx of Divine Truth

AE 997 [2]
Something shall now be said about the influx into men of Divine truth from the Lord. From the Lord as a sun both heat and light proceed; but the heat is Divine good, and the light is Divine truth. The light, which is Divine truth, flows into and enters into every angel of heaven, and also into every man in the world, and gives internal sight, which is the sight of the understanding. For every man, not as to his body but as to his spirit, has a faculty for receiving that light, that is, for understanding the Divine truth. And that faculty is opened as the man grows up, and cultivates and forms his rational according to order, by the knowledges [scientifica] and by the cognitions [cognitiones] of good and truth. But the heat, which is Divine good, does not flow into an angel or a man as the light, which is Divine truth, does, for the reason that man is born into evils of every kind, and evils obstruct; consequently evils must first be removed before the heat, which is Divine good, can flow in; and evils are removed by looking upon them as sins against God and shunning them, by praying to the Lord for help; and so far as a man thus receives Divine good so far he comes into the light of understanding Divine truth. For the way of Divine truth into a man who is reformed is through the good of the will, and of the life therefrom with him.

AE 995 - the angels of the third heaven

AE 995 [2]
The genuine conjugial is given especially in the third heaven,
because the angels there are in love to the Lord,
they acknowledge Him alone as God,
and they do His commandments.
To them doing the commandments is loving the Lord.
To them the Lord's commandments are the truths in which they receive Him.
There is conjunction of the Lord with them,
and of them with the Lord;
for they are in the Lord because they are in good,
and the Lord is in them because they are in truths.
This is the heavenly marriage, from which true conjugial love descends.

AE 985 - the love of marriage

AE 985 [3]
The love of marriage is so holy and heavenly because
it has its beginning in the inmosts of a person from the Lord Himself,
and it descends according to order to the ultimates of the body,
and thus fills the whole person with heavenly love
and brings him into a form of the Divine love,
which is the form of heaven,
and is an image of the Lord....

AE 979 & 980, 982 - good works & loving the Lord vs. love of self

AE 979 [2]
When a man shuns evils as sins, he daily learns what a good work is, and the affection of doing good grows with him, and the affection of knowing truths for the sake of good; for so far as he knows truths he can perform works more fully and more wisely, and thus his works become more truly good. Cease, therefore, from asking in thyself, "What are the good works that I must do, or what good must I do to receive eternal life?" Only cease from evils as sins and look to the Lord, and the Lord will teach and lead you.

AE 981
Love to the Lord means the love or affection of doing His commandments, thus the love of keeping the commandments of the Decalogue. For so far as a man from love or from affection keeps and does these, so far he loves the Lord, and for the reason that these are the Lord with man.

AE 982 [2]
In the world it is scarcely known that all who are in the love of self, according to the delight of that love, are in the delight of injuring others who do not make one with them.

AE 973 - to love the Lord

AE 973 [2]
For when a man shuns and turns away from unlawful gains through fraud and craft he so far wills what is sincere, right, and just, and at length begins to love what is sincere because it is sincere, what is right because it is right, and what is just because it is just. He begins to love these things because they are from the Lord, and the love of the Lord is in them. For to love the Lord is not to love the Person, but to love the things that proceed from the Lord for these are the Lord with man; thus it is to love sincerity itself, right itself, and justice itself. And as these are the Lord, so far as a man loves these, and thus acts from them, so far he acts from the Lord and so far the Lord removes insincerity and injustice as to the very intentions and volitions in which they have their roots, and always with less resistance and struggle, and therefore with less effort than in the first attempts.

AE 969 - Why 8 of the 10 commandments are "You shall not"

AE 969 [2]
Man is an image of the world as to his natural mind, and he is an image of heaven as to his spiritual mind. The natural mind, which is the world, is beneath; and the spiritual mind, which is heaven is above.

[3]
... before the Lord can flow in with heaven out of heaven and form man to the image of heaven, those evils that lie heaped up in the natural mind must needs be removed. Moreover, as the removal of evils must come first before man can be taught and led by the Lord, the reason is evident why in eight commandments of the Decalogue the evil works that must not be done are recounted, but not the goods that must be done. Good does not exist together with evil, nor does it exist before evils have been removed; for until then there is no way possible for heaven to enter man.

AE 966 - the Lord gives

AE 966 [2]
For the Lord gives life from Himself,
and through the church He gives nourishment.

AE 960b - 'the name of God'

AE 960b [10]
As the Lord's "blood," and likewise "wine," signify the Divine truth that proceeds from Him ... it is said therefore "this is My blood;" and as it is by means of the Divine truth that the Lord is conjoined with the church, it is called "that of the new Testament or the new Covenant."

[14]
Since "the name of God" means that which is from God and which is God, and this is called the Divine truth, and with us the Word, this must not be profaned, because it is in itself Divine and most holy; and it is profaned when its holiness is denied, which is done when it is despised, rejected, and treated contemptuously. When this is done heaven is closed and man is left to hell. For the Word is the only medium of conjunction of heaven with the church; therefore when the Word is cast out of the heart that conjunction is dissolved; and because man is then left to hell he no longer acknowledges any truth of the church.

AE 957 - the primary of all ideas

AE 957 [3]
The idea of God is the primary of all ideas; for such as this idea is, such is man's communication with heaven and his conjunction with the Lord, and such is his enlightenment, his affection of truth and good, his perception, intelligence, and wisdom; for these are not from man but from the Lord according to conjunction with Him. The idea of God is the idea of the Lord....

AE 949 - so far as evils are removed as sins

AE 949 [3]
So far as evils are removed as sins,
so far goods flow in,
and so far does man afterwards do good,
not from self, but from the Lord.

AE 943 - heavenly joy is in these affections

AE 943
Man has the affection of truth
when he loves truth and turns away from falsity.
He has the affection of good
when he loves good uses and turns away from evil uses.
He has the affection of bringing forth fruit
when he loves to do goods and to be serviceable.
All heavenly joy is in these affections and from them,
and this joy cannot be described by comparisons,
for it is supereminent and eternal.

AE 934 - the necessary two things

AE 934 [2]
... for works to be done by the Lord, and not by man, two things are necessary: First, the Lord's Divine must be acknowledged, also that He is the God of heaven and earth even as to the Human, and that every good that is good is from Him; and secondly, that man must live according to the commandments of the Decalogue by abstaining from those evils that are there forbidden, that is, from worshiping other gods, from profaning the name of God, from thefts, from adulteries, from murders, from false witness, from coveting the possessions and property of others. These two things are requisite that the works done by man may be good. The reason is that every good comes from the Lord alone, and the Lord cannot enter into man and lead him so long as these evils are not removed as sins; for they are infernal, and in fact are hell with man, and unless hell is removed the Lord cannot enter and open heaven.

AE 927 - great and wonderful

AE 927
Great and wonderful (Revelation 15:1),
signifies from Divine omnipotence and providence.
This is evident from the signification of "great,"
as being in reference to the Lord His Divine omnipotence;
also from the signification of "wonderful,"
as being in reference to the Lord His Divine providence.
For when man looks to what is great in the Lord
he looks to His Divine omnipotence,
and when he looks to what is wonderful in the Lord
he looks to His Divine providence.

AE 923 - enlightenment, perception, stupidy, foolishness

AE 923 [3]
... spiritual good...which is the good of charity from the Lord,
is what alone opens the spiritual mind,
through which the Lord flows in and enlightens;
and without the opening of that mind
no enlightenment is possible,
and thus no understanding of truth.

AE 923 [4]
I will put my hook in thy nose... (Isaiah 37:29)
... which signifies that stupidity and foolishness should possess him;
for the "nose" signifies perception,
and a "hook" signifies taking it away,
or properly, immersing it in the corporeal sensual,
and when this is separated from the rational it is stupid.

AE 918 - What is charity?

AE 918 [2]
What charity is, which is the same as spiritual good, shall be told briefly.
Charity or spiritual good is to do good because it is true;
thus it is to do truth,
and to do truth is to do what the Lord has commanded in His Word.

For spiritual good is from the Lord, but moral good is from man,
consequently unless the good that man does is from the Lord,
that is, through man from the Lord, it is not good...

[10]
The good of charity means justice, sincerity, and uprightness in every work
and in every function from a love of justice, sincerity, and uprightness,
which love is solely from the Lord.

AE 911c - the Lord's gift to man

AE 911c [17]
For it is to be known, that, although the Lord works all things, and man nothing from self, yet He wills that man should work as if from self in all that comes to his perception. For without man's co-operation, as if from self, there can be no reception of truth and good, thus no implantation and regeneration. For to will is the Lord's gift to man....