Saturday, June 23, 2007

AC 2831 - being caught in a thicket

AC 2831
Behind, caught in a thicket. (Genesis 22:13)
That this signifies entangled in natural knowledge,
is evident from the signification of being "caught,"
as here being entangled;
and from the signification of a "thicket" or "tangle,"
as being memory-knowledge....

[10] The reason why in the word memory-knowledges are called "thickets," is that they are comparatively of such a character, especially when the cupidities of the love of self and of the world, and the principles of falsity, seek for them. Celestial and spiritual love is that which disposes into order the knowledges which are of the exterior memory; and the love of self and of the world is that which perverts the order, and disturbs all things in it. These things the person does not take notice of, because he places order in perverted order, good in evil, and truth in falsity. On this account these things are in entanglement; and also on this, that the things of the exterior memory, where these knowledges are, compared with those in the interior memory, where rational things are, are as in a thicket, or as in a dark forest. How shady, opaque, and dark it is there in comparison, a man cannot know so long as he is living in the body; for he then supposes that all wisdom and intelligence are from this source; but he will know in the other life, when he comes into the things of his interior memory.

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