DP 136 - More on Being Compelled

DP 136 [3, 4 8, 9]

. . . the internal self so refuses
to be compelled by the external that it turns away:
The reason is that the internal self
wishes to be in freedom and loves freedom,
for freedom is bound up with a person's love or life . . ..
Consequently,
when that freedom feels itself to be compelled,
it withdraws into itself, so to speak,
and turns away,
and regards the compulsion as its enemy.
Indeed, the love
which constitutes the person's life is provoked,
and causes the person to think
that he is then not his own person,
consequently that he has no life of his own.

A person's internal self is of such a character
owing to the law of the Lord's Divine providence
that a person act in freedom
in accordance with his reason.

The fact that the internal self can compel the external
is because the internal self is, so to speak, the master,
and the external self its servant.

. . . a person can be reformed,
not by faith only,
but by a love of the will which forms for itself its faith.

The internal level of thought  . . .
cannot be coerced by any fear.
Yet it can be compelled by love and by a fear of losing it.
Fear of God in its true sense is just that.
To be compelled by love
and by a fear of losing it
is to compel oneself.
. . . [And] is not contrary to one's freedom and rationality.

~ Bethel ~

Then God said to Jacob,
"Go up to Bethel and settle there,
and build an altar there to God,
who appeared to you
when you fleeing from your brother Esau."

After Jacob returned from Paddan Aram,
God appeared to him again and blessed him.
God said to him,
"Your name is Jacob,
but you will no longer be called Jacob;
your name will be Israel."
So He named him Israel.

And God said to him,
"I am God Almighty;
be fruitful and increase in number.
A nation and a community of nations
will come from you,
and kings will come from your body.
The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac
I also give to you,
and I will give this land
to your descendants after you."
Then God went up from him at that place
where He had talked with him.

Jacob set up a stone pillar
at the place where God had talked with him,
and he poured out a drink offering on it;
he also poured oil on it.
Jacob called the place
where God had talked with him Bethel.

(Genesis 35:1, 9-14)

DP 126 - True "Being Born Again; DP 129 - Compulsion; DP 132 - The Lord and Internal Worship

DP 126

When instead of a hellish life's love
a heavenly life's love has been implanted by the Lord,
then instead of lusts for evil and falsity,
affections for goodness and truth are implanted,
and instead of the delights of lusts for evil and falsity,
the delights of affections for good,
and instead of the evils of hellish love,
the goods of heavenly love.
Instead of cunning, then, prudence is implanted,
and instead of malicious thoughts, thoughts of wisdom.
Thus the person is born again and becomes a new person.

DP 129 [1,3]

It Is a Law of Divine Providence
That a Person Not Be Compelled by External Means
to Think and Will, Thus to Believe and Love,
Matters Having to Do with Religion;
but That a Person Bring Himself to Do So
and at Times Compel Himself.

(1) No one is reformed by miracles and signs,
because they compel.
(2) No one is reformed by visions
or by communications with the dead,
because they compel.
(3) No one is reformed by threats and punishments,
because they compel.
(4) No one is reformed
in states devoid of rationality and freedom.
(5) It is not contrary to rationality and freedom
to compel oneself.
(6) The outer self must be reformed by the inner self,
and not the reverse.

DP 132 [3]

. . . one who does not acknowledge the Lord
is incapable of receiving any internal quality of worship.

~ Pillars and Piles ~

Laban answered Jacob,
"The women are my daughters,
the children are my children,
and the flocks are my flocks.
All you see is mine.
Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine,
or about the children they have borne?
Come now, let's make a covenant, you and I,
and let it serve as a witness between us."

So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar.
He said to his relatives,
"Gather some stones."
So they took stones and piled them in a heap,
and they ate there by the heap.
Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha,
and Jacob called it Galeed.

Laban said,
"This heap is a witness between you and me today."
That it why it was called Galeed.
It was also called Mizpah, because he said,
"May the Lord keep watch between you and me
when we are away from each other.
If you mistreat my daughter
or if you take wives besides my daughter,
even though no one is with us,
remember that God is a witness between you and me."

So Jacob took an oath
in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac.
He offered a sacrifice there in the hill country
and invited his relatives to a meal.
After they had eaten,
they spent the night there.

Early the next morning
Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters
and blessed them.
then he left and returned home.

(Genesis 31:43-22)

DP 121 - What Purifies Evils; DP 123 - The Continual Endeavor of Divine Providence; DP 124 - Two Secrets on the Nature of Divine Providence

DP 121

Many people think that simply believing
what the church teaches purifies a person of his evils.
Others believe that doing good is what purifies;
others, that it is knowing, speaking and teaching
such matters as have to do with the church;
others, that it is reading the Word and books of piety;
others, that it is going often to church, hearing sermons,
and especially partaking of the Holy Supper;
others, that it is renouncing the world
and pursuing a life of piety;
others, that it is confessing oneself guilty of all sins;
and so on.

None of these, however, purifies a person at all
unless he examines himself,
sees his sins, acknowledges them,
condemns himself on account of them,
and repents by desisting from them.
Moreover, all of this he must do as though of himself,
and yet with an acknowledgment at heart
that he does so from the Lord.

DP 123 [3]

. . . it is the continual endeavor
of the Lord's Divine providence
to conjoin a person with Himself
and Himself with the person,
and so make him to be an image of Himself.

DP 124

To this I will add two secrets of angelic wisdom,
from which one can see the nature of Divine providence.
One, that the Lord never
acts upon any one constituent in a person individually
without acting at the same time on all his constituents.
Two, that the Lord acts 
from inmost elements and from outmost elements 
simultaneously.

~ Jacob Leaves Laban ~

Jacob heard that Laban's sons were saying,
"Jacob has taken everything our father owned
and has gained all this wealth
from what belonged to our father."
And Jacob noticed that Laban's attitude toward him
was not what it had been.

Then the Lord said to Jacob,
"Go back to the land of your fathers 
and to your relatives,
and I will be with you.

So Jacob sent word to Rachel and Leah
to come out to the fields where his flocks were.

. . . Then Jacob put his children and his wives on camels,
and he drove all his livestock ahead of him,
along with all the goods
he had accumulated in Paddan Aram,
to go to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan.

When Laban had gone to shear his sheep,
Rachel stole her father's household gods.
Moreover, Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean
by not telling him he was running away.
So he fled with all he had,
and crossing the River,
he headed for the hill country of Gilead.

(Genesis 31:1-4, 17-21)

DP 100 - Good and Evil Can Not Be In the Same Vessel; DP 107 - Trees and Spiders

DP 100

Everyone can see from reason alone that the Lord,
who is good itself and truth itself,
cannot enter into a person
unless the evils and falsities in him are put away.
For evil is opposed to good, and falsity to truth,
and two opposites can never be commingled.
Rather, when one approaches the other,
a combat ensues,
which lasts until one gives way to the other,
and the one that gives way,
goes away,
and the other takes its place.

In such an opposition are heaven and hell,
or the Lord and the devil.
Can anyone reasonably suppose
that the Lord can enter where the devil reigns?
Or that heaven and hell can exist together?
Who does not see
from the rationality granted to every sane person
that for the Lord to enter,
the devil must be cast out?
Or that for heaven to enter,
hell must be removed?

DP 107

Heavenly love with its affections
for good and truth and consequent perceptions,
together with the delights of those affections
and their consequent thoughts,
may be likened to a tree
adorned with branches, leaves and fruits.
The life's love is the tree itself.
The branches with their leaves
are affections for good and truth
with their accompanying perceptions;
and the fruits are the delights of the affections
with their accompanying thoughts.

In contrast,
hellish love with its affections for evil and falsity,
which are lusts,
together with the delights of those lusts
and their accompanying thoughts,
may be likened to a spider and its surrounding web.
The love itself is the spider.
Its lusts for evil and falsity
with their interior cunning and guile
are the threads of the web
immediately surrounding the spider's abode,
and the delights of those lusts
with their crafty schemes
are the threads further out,
where flies flitting about
are caught, wrapped up, and devoured.

~ Jacob Lays His Head on a Stone ~

Jacob left Beersheba and set out for Haran.
When he reached a certain place,
he stopped for the night because the sun had set.
Taking one of the stones there,
he put it under his head and lay down to sleep.
He had a dream in which he saw
a stairway resting on the earth,
with its top reaching to heaven,
and the angels of God
were ascending and descending on it.
There above it stood the Lord,
and He said:
"I am the Lord,
the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac.
I will give you and your descendants
the land on which you are lying.
Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth,
and you will spread out to the west and to the east,
to the north and to the south.
All peoples on earth will be blessed
through you and your offspring.
I am with you
and will watch over you wherever you go,
and I will bring you back to this land.
I will not leave you
until I have done what I have promised."

When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought,
"Surely the Lord is in the place,
and I was not aware of it."
He was afraid and said,
"How awesome is this place!
This is none other than the house of God;
this is the gate of heaven."

Early the next morning Jacob
took the stone he had placed under his head
and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it.
He called that place Bethel,
though the city used to be called Luz.

Then Jacob made a vow, saying,
"If God will be with me
and will watch over me on this journey I am taking
and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear
so that I return safely to my father's house,
then the Lord will be my God
and this stone that I have set up as a pillar
will be God's house,
and of all that you give me
I will give you a tenth."

(Genesis 28:10-22)

DP 96 - Freedom and Rationality Are Human

DP 96 [2, 5]

. . . a person would not have will or understanding,
and so would not be human:
That is because a person has will
solely for the reason
that he is able to will freely as though of himself,
and his ability to will freely as though of himself
is due to the faculty continually given to him by the Lord
called freedom.
So, too, a person has understanding
solely for the reason that he is able to understand
as though of himself
whether something accords with reason or not,
and his ability to understand
whether something accords with reason or not
is due to the second faculty
continually given to him by the Lord
called rationality.

The Lord resides in every person in these faculties
because of an influx of the Lord's will --
His will being 
to be received by the person,
to have His abode in him,
and to impart to him the felicities of eternal life.
These are objects of the Lord's will
because they are the objects of His Divine love.

It is this, the Lord's will,
which creates in a person the appearance 
that what he thinks, speaks, wills and does 
is his own.

 

~ Rebekah Gets Isaac to Send Jacob to Paddan Aram ~

Then Rebekah said to Isaac,
"I'm disgusted with living because of these Hittite women.
If Jacob takes a wife from among the women of this land,
from Hittite women like these,
my life will not be worth living."

So Isaac called for Jacob and blessed him
and commanded him:
"Do not marry a Canaanite woman.
Go at once to Paddan Aram,
to the house of your mother's father Bethuel.
Take a wife for yourself there,
from among the daughters of Laban,
your mother's brother.
May God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful
and increase your numbers
until you become a community of peoples.
May He give you and your descendants
the blessing given to Abraham,
so that you make take possession of the land
where you now live as an alien,
the land God gave to Abraham."
Then Isaac sent Jacob on his way,
and he went to Paddan Aram,
to Laban the son of Bethuel the Aramean,
the brother of Rebekah,
who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.

(Genesis 27:46; 28:1-5)

DP 89 - Acting in Freedom; DP 92 - Conjunction With the Lord; DP 93 - And Again . . .

DP  89

Now because all willing springs from love,
and all understanding from wisdom,
it follows that the ability to will
springs from Divine love
and the ability to understand
from Divine wisdom,
thus both from the Lord,
who is Divine love itself and Divine wisdom itself.
It follows from this
that to act in freedom in accordance with one's reason
has no other origin.

DP 92

The conjunction of the Lord with a person
and the reciprocal conjunction of a person with the Lord
are effected by means of these two faculties.
Conjunction with the Lord and regeneration are one,
for to the extent someone is conjoined with the Lord,
to the same extent he is regenerate.
Consequently everything that we said above
about regeneration can be said of conjunction.
And what we say here about conjunction
can be said of regeneration.

DP 93

To look to God in one's life
is nothing else
than to refrain from evils as sins.

~ Jacob and Esau Are Born ~

This is the account of Abraham's son Isaac.

Abraham became the father of Isaac,
and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah
daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan Aram
and sister of Laban the Aramean.

Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife,
because she was barren.
The Lord answered his prayer,
and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.
The babies jostled each other within her,
and she said, "Why is this happening to me?"
So she went to inquire of the Lord.

The Lord said to her,

"Two nations are in your womb,
and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other,
and the older will serve the younger."

When the time came for her to give birth,
there were twin boys in her womb.
The first to come out was red,
and his whole body was like a hairy garment;
so they named him Esau.
After this, his brother came out,
with his hand grasping Esau's heel;
so he was named Jacob.
Isaac was sixty years old
when Rebekah gave birth to them.

(Genesis 25:19-26)

DP 81 - When We Think Evils Are Allowed

DP 81

The evils that a person believes allowable,
even if he does not do them,
also become attached to him,
for making them allowable in the thought
springs from the will,
the two being in accord.
Consequently, when a person believes
some evil allowable,
he dissolves any internal bond against it,
and is kept from doing it only by external bonds,
which are fears.
Moreover, because the person's spirit
inclines to that evil,
therefore if the external bonds are removed
he does it as allowable.
And meanwhile he continually does it in his spirit.

~ Abraham Sends for a Wife for Isaac ~

Abraham was now old and well advanced in years,
and the Lord had blessed him in every way.
He said to the chief servant in his household,
the one in charge of all that he had,
"Put your hand under my thigh.
I want you to swear by the Lord,
the God of heaven and the God of earth,
that you will not get a wife for my son
from the daughters of the Canaanites,
among whom I am living,
but will go to my country and my own relatives
and get a wife for my son Isaac."

The servant asked him,
"What if the woman is unwilling
to come back with me to this land?
Shall I then take your son back
to the country you came from?"

Make sure that you do not take my son back there,"
Abraham said.
"The Lord, the God of heaven,
who brought me out of
my father's household and my native land
and who spoke to me
and promised me on oath, saying,
'To your offspring I will give this land' --
he will send his angel before you
so that you can get a wife for my son from there.
If the woman is unwilling to come back with you,
then you will be released from this oath of mine.
Only do not take my son back there."

(Genesis 24:1-8)

DP 67 - The Continual Goal of Divine Providence

DP 67

. . . it is the continual object of Divine providence
that a person become a heaven in form
and so an image of the Lord,
and this is achieved through
an affection for goodness and truth,
that he become an embodiment of that affection.

. . . This end is achieved, however,
with those whom the Lord is able to lead to heaven.
And because the Lord foresees it,
He also continually provides
for a person's becoming such as to allow it.
For everyone who allows himself to be led to heaven
is thus prepared for his place in heaven.

~ Isaac Is Born ~

Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as He had said,
and the Lord did for Sarah what He had promised.
Sarah became pregnant
and bore a son to Abraham in his old age,
at the very time God had promised him.
Abraham gave the name Isaac
to the son Sarah bore him.
When his son Isaac was eight days old,
Abraham circumcised him,
as God commanded him.
Abraham was a hundred years old
when his son Isaac was born to him.

(Genesis 21:1-5)

DP 46 - Because God Is

DP 46 [3]

. . . every created thing,
and above all the human being
and the love and wisdom in him,
have real existence,
and do not exist only in idea.
For unless God were infinite,
there would be nothing finite.
So, too, unless the infinite were omni- or all- ,
there would be nothing real.
And unless God created all things from Himself,
there would be nothing at all.

In a word: We are because God is.

~ When Abram Was Ninety-nine ~

When Abram was ninety-nine years old,
the Lord appeared to him and said,
"I am the God Almighty;
walk before Me and be blameless.
I will confirm My covenant between Me and you
and you will greatly increase your numbers."

Abram fell face down,
and God said to him,
"As for Me, this is My covenant with you:
You will be the father of many nations.
no longer will you be called Abram;
your name will be Abraham,
for I have made you a father of many nations.

. . . God also said to Abraham,
"As for Sarai your wife,
you are no longer to call her Sarai;
her name will be Sarah.
I will bless her
and will surely give you a son by her.
I will bless her
so that she will be the mother of nations;
kings of peoples will come from her."

When He had finished speaking with Abraham,
God went up from him.

(Genesis 17:1-5, 15-16, 22)

DP 35 - Wisdom

DP 35

Let no one suppose, however, that
someone has wisdom if he knows many things,
if he perceives them in some degree of light,
and if he can discuss them intelligently,
unless that wisdom is conjoined with love.
For it is love through its affections
that produces wisdom.
If wisdom is not conjoined with love,
it is like an atmospheric phenomenon in the sky
that vanishes, or like a falling star.
On the other hand,
wisdom conjoined with love
is like the enduring light of the sun,
or like a stationary star.

A person has a love of wisdom to the extent
that he shuns the devil's crew,
which are the lusts of evil and falsity. 

 

~ Abram Sets Out An Offering to the Lord ~

As the sun was setting,
Abram fell into a deep sleep,
and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.
then the Lord said to him,
"Know for certain that your descendants
will be strangers in a county not their own,
and they will be enslaved and mistreated
four hundred years.
But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves,
and afterward
they will come out with great possessions.
You, however, will go to your fathers in peace
and be buried at a good old age.
In the fourth generation
your descendants will come back here,
for the sin of the Amorites
has not yet reached its full measure."

(Genesis 15:12-16)