Here we are in the 21st century. We know that the universe is an enormous place. We're just bursting with scientific knowledge. But how are we doing with the even-bigger ideas? Our human societies seem to be erasing them, or ignoring them - maybe we think we're too busy for them.

Here on the New Christian Bible Study site, we'll buck the trend. We want to explore the big ideas that give us a framework for living better lives. Here's a start on a list of big ideas from a New Christian perspective. For each idea, there is a footnote that lists some references in Swedenborg's theological works:

1. God exists. Just one God, who created and sustains the entire universe in all its dimensions, spiritual and physical. ¹

2. God's essence is love itself. It's the force that drives everything. ²

3. God's essence comes into being, that is, it exists, in and through creation. ³

4. There are levels, or degrees, of creation - ranging from spiritual ones that we can't detect with our physical senses or sensors, to the level of the physical universe where most of our awareness is when we're alive here. ⁴

5. The created universe emanates from God, and it's sustained by God, but in an important way it is separate from God. He wants it to be separate, so that freedom can exist. ⁵

6. God operates from love through wisdom - willing good things, and understanding how to bring them about. ⁶

7. The physical level of creation exists to provide human beings with an opportunity to choose in freedom, with rationality, whether or not to acknowledge and cooperate with God. ⁷

8. God provides all people everywhere, regardless of their religion, the freedom to choose to live a life of love to God and to the neighbor. ⁸

9. God loves everyone. He knows that true happiness only comes when we're unselfish; when we're truly motivated by a love of the Lord which is grounded out in a love of the neighbor. He seeks to lead everyone, but will not force us to follow against our will. ⁹

10. God doesn't judge us. He tells us what's good, and what's evil, and flows into our minds to lead us towards good. However, we're free to reject his leading, and instead opt to love ourselves most. Day by day, we create habits of generosity or of selfishness, and live out a life in accordance with those habits. Those habits become the real "us", our ruling love. ¹⁰

11. Our physical bodies die eventually, but the spiritual part of our minds keeps going. It's been operating on a spiritual plane already, but our awareness shifts - so that we become fully aware of spiritual reality. ¹¹

Poznámky pod čarou:

311. Heaven and Hell Come from the Human Race

People in the Christian world are totally unaware that heaven and hell come from the human race. They actually believe that angels were created in the beginning and constitute heaven, and that the devil or Satan was an angel of light who became rebellious and was cast out together with his faction, and that this gave rise to hell.

Angels are utterly amazed that there can be this kind of belief in the Christian world, and even more so that people know absolutely nothing about heaven, even though this is a primary doctrine of the church. Knowing that this kind of ignorance is prevalent, they are profoundly delighted that it has now pleased the Lord to reveal to us so much about heaven - and about hell as well - and so as much as possible to dispel the darkness that is rising daily because this church is drawing to a close.

[2] So they want me to testify on their behalf that in all heaven there is not a single angel who was created as such in the beginning, nor is there in all hell a devil who was created as an angel of light and cast out. Rather, all the people in heaven and in hell are from the human race - in heaven the ones who have lived in heavenly love and faith, and in hell the ones who have lived in hellish love and faith. Hell as a whole is what is called the devil and Satan. The hell at the back, where the people called evil demons live, is the devil, and the hell that is in front, where the people live who are called evil spirits, is Satan. ¹ We will describe later what each hell is like.

[3] They insisted that the reason the Christian world has adopted this kind of belief about people in heaven and people in hell is that they have taken a few passages of the Word, understanding them only in their literal meaning, with no enlightenment or instruction based on genuine doctrine from the Word. Yet the literal meaning of the Word, without the light of genuine doctrine, leads the mind astray in all directions, giving rise to ignorance, heresy, and error. ²

Poznámky pod čarou:

179. There are degrees of love and wisdom, and therefore degrees of heat and light, and so, too, degrees of atmospheres. Unless one is aware of the existence of degrees, and of what they are and their nature, the following observations cannot be comprehended, since there are degrees in every created thing, thus in every form. Therefore in this third part of Divine Love and Wisdom we must take up degrees.

That there are degrees of love and wisdom can be plainly seen from the love and wisdom of the angels of the three heavens. Angels of the third heaven excel angels of the second heaven in their love and wisdom, and these in turn excel angels of the lowest heaven, and this to such an extent that they cannot dwell together. The degrees of their love and wisdom distinguish them and separate them.

So it is that angels of the lower heavens cannot ascend to angels of the higher heavens, and if it is granted them to ascend, they do not then see those higher angels, nor anything of their surroundings. The reason they do not see them is that the love and wisdom of those higher angels is in a higher degree, which transcends their perception. For every angel is an embodiment of his love and wisdom, and love together with wisdom is in its form the human being, because God, who is love itself and wisdom itself, is a human God.

[2] I have been granted several times to see angels of the lowest heaven ascend to angels of the third heaven, and when they had worked their way up there, I heard them complain that they did not see anyone, even though they were surrounded by those higher angels. They were afterward then informed that the higher angels were invisible to them because they were incapable of perceiving those angels' love and wisdom, and that it is an angel's love and wisdom that cause him to be seen as a person.