[AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTORY NOTE]

The HEAVENLY ARCANA - the matters in Sacred Scripture or the Word of the Lord that have been disclosed - stand in explanatory sections entitled THE INTERNAL SENSE OF THE WORD. As for the nature of that sense, see what has been presented on the subject from experience in 1767-1777, 1869-1879, and in addition in the main body of the work, in 1-5, 64-66, 167, 605, 920, 937, 1143, 1224, 1404, 1405, 1408, 1409, 1502 end, 1540, 1659, 1756, 1783, 1807.

The MARVELS -- things seen in the world of spirits and in the angelic heaven - have been placed in sections before and after each chapter. In this first volume the sections are:

1. Man's awakening from the dead and his entry into eternal life, 168-181.

2. The entry into eternal life of one who has been so awakened, 182-189.

3. Man's entry into eternal life - continued, 314-319.

4. The nature of the life of a soul or spirit at that time, 320-327.

5. Some examples of what certain spirits had thought during their lifetime about the soul or spirit, 443-448.

6. Heaven and heavenly joy, 449-459.

7. Heaven and heavenly joy - continued, 537-546.

8. Heaven and heavenly joy - continued, 547-553.

9. The communities that constitute heaven, 684-691.

10. Hell, 692-700.

11. The hells of people who have gone through life hating, desiring revenge, and being cruel, 814-823.

12. The hells of people who have gone through life committing adultery and acts of unrestrained lust; also the hells of deceivers and witches, 824-871.

13. The hells of the avaricious; then the filthy Jerusalem and the robbers in the desert. Also the utterly foul hells of people who have lived wholly engrossed in the pursuit of pleasures, 938-946.

14. Other hells that are different from those mentioned already, 947-970.

15. Vastations, 1106-1113.

[NCBSP editor's note: The table of contents for Volume 2 of this translation may be found in section 1114.]

320. CHAPTER 4

THE NATURE OF THE LIFE OF A SOUL OR SPIRIT

As regards, in general, the life of souls, that is, of people who have recently died and become spirits, much experience has made it clear to me that when a person enters the next life he is not aware of being in that life. He imagines that he is still in the world, indeed that he is still within his physical body, insomuch that when he is told he is a spirit he is absolutely dumbfounded. He is dumbfounded because, for one thing, he is still in every way a man as regards sensations, desires, and thoughts, and for another, he did not during his lifetime believe in the existence of the spirit, or as is the case with some, that the spirit could possibly be such as his experience now proves.

1. THE BOOK OF GENESIS

The Word of the Old Testament contains heavenly arcana, with every single detail focusing on the Lord, His heaven, the Church, faith, and what belongs to faith; but no human being grasps this from the letter. Judging it by the letter or sense of the letter, nobody views it as anything more than a record, in the main, of external features of the Jewish Church. Yet at every point there are internal features that are nowhere evident in the external, apart from the very few which the Lord revealed and explained to the Apostles, such as that sacrifices mean the Lord; that the land of Canaan and Jerusalem mean heaven, which is therefore called Canaan and the heavenly Jerusalem; and that Paradise is similar in meaning.