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

Footnotes:

459. To these points I will add these memorable occurrences.

The first memorable occurrence. From far away I saw five halls. They were surrounded with different kinds of light. The first hall was surrounded with a fiery light, the second with a yellow light, the third with a bright white light, the fourth with a light halfway between daylight and twilight. The fifth hall was scarcely visible, because it was standing in the shadow of evening.

On the roads I saw some people on horseback, some in carriages, some walking, and some running and hurrying. The people in a hurry were headed for the first hall, the one surrounded in fiery light. Upon my seeing all this, a longing to go there and hear what they were discussing took hold of me and urged me in that direction. I quickly got ready and joined the people hurrying to the first hall. I went in with them.

Just picture the huge crowd inside. Some of them were heading to the right and some to the left to sit on seats arranged along the walls. Near the front I saw a low platform. The man who was the chairperson for the event was standing on it with a staff in his hand, a hat on his head, and a coat that was dyed the color of the hall's fiery light.

[2] After people had gathered, he lifted up his voice and said, "Friends, today we are discussing what goodwill is. As each of you may know, goodwill is spiritual in essence and earthly in practice. "

Immediately someone in the first row on the left side (the row where people with a reputation for being wise were seated) stood up and began to speak.

He said, "My opinion is this. Goodwill is morality inspired by faith. "

He supported his opinion in the following way: "Surely everyone knows that goodwill follows faith the way a female attendant follows her lady. Everyone knows that people who have faith are so spontaneously living the law, and therefore a life of goodwill, that they don't realize that the law and a life of goodwill are what they are living. If they realized this and then did it and were thinking they would be saved as a result, they would pollute the sacred faith with their selfishness and cripple its effectiveness. "

He said, "Doesn't this follow our dogma?" and looked at the people sitting at the sides, some of whom were clergy. They nodded.

[3] "But is spontaneous goodwill," he continued, "anything other than the morality into which everyone is initiated from early childhood? This morality is intrinsically earthly, but it becomes spiritual when faith is the inspiration for it. Who else but God can tell from people's moral life whether they have faith or not - given that everyone lives morally? God alone, who infuses faith into us and seals it there, is able to recognize and tell the difference. Therefore I submit that goodwill is morality inspired by faith. Morality that comes from our faith is intrinsically effective for our salvation. Every other type of morality does not bring us salvation, because we practice it in order to earn merit. Therefore people who mix goodwill and faith all find themselves without lamp oil - - that is, people who connect goodwill and faith inwardly rather than attaching them together outwardly. Mixing and connecting goodwill and faith would be like a servant standing by the back seat of a carriage in order to get in beside a church leader. It would be like bringing a doorkeeper into the dining room to sit at the table next to a powerful, influential person. "

[4] Then someone from the first row on the right stood up and said, "My opinion is that goodwill is religious devotion combined with compassion. I support this opinion as follows: Nothing can appease God more than religious devotion from a humble heart. Religious devotion constantly asks God to give us faith and goodwill. The Lord says, 'Ask and it will be given to you' (Matthew 7:7). Therefore what we are given has both faith and goodwill in it.

"I say that goodwill is religious devotion combined with compassion, because all true religious devotion feels compassion. Religious devotion moves our heart to the point of groaning; and what is that groaning but compassion? The feeling does indeed pass after we are done praying, but it nevertheless returns when we pray again. And when it returns there is a religious quality to it, showing that we have goodwill.

"ow, anything that advances our salvation our priests attribute solely to faith and not to goodwill. What is left for us then except to ask for both faith and goodwill with religious devotion and fervent prayer?

"When I read the Word, all I could see was that faith and goodwill are the two means of being saved; but when I consulted the ministers in the church, I heard that faith is the only means and goodwill is nothing. Then I saw myself as being at sea on a ship that was being tossed between two rocky outcroppings. Since I was afraid that the ship would be smashed, I climbed off into a rowboat and set forth. My rowboat is religious devotion - which, by the way, avails in every difficulty. "

[5] After that person, someone from the second row on the right stood up and said, "My opinion is that goodwill is doing good to everyone, whether honest or dishonest. I support this opinion as follows: Goodwill is goodness of heart. A good heart has good intentions toward all, both the honest and the dishonest. The Lord said that we are to do good even to our enemies. So if you withhold your goodwill from someone, doesn't that part of your goodwill become no goodwill? Aren't you then like a person hopping along on one leg because the other leg has been amputated? A dishonest person is just as much of a person as an honest one is. From the perspective of goodwill, people are people. If someone is dishonest, what difference does that make to me?

"Goodwill is like the warmth of the sun. It gives life to animals both wild and tame. It treats wolves and sheep alike. It makes trees grow whether they are harmful or beneficial. It treats thorn bushes the same as grapevines. "

At that point the speaker picked up a grape and said, "Goodwill is like this grape. Split it and what's inside will fall out. " He split the grape and its contents fell out.

[6] After that statement someone from the second row on the left stood up and said, "My opinion is that goodwill is doing all you can for your relatives and friends. I support this opinion as follows: Surely everyone knows that goodwill begins from ourselves. We are each neighbor to ourselves. Our goodwill then moves outward from ourselves to the people closest to us - first our brothers and sisters, and then our other family members and relatives. Goodwill's progression has built-in limits then. People who are more remote than this are foreign to us. Deep inside ourselves, we don't recognize foreigners. They are alien to our inner selves. Siblings and blood relatives, however, are connected to us by nature. Friends are connected to us by familiarity, which is a second nature; therefore these too become our neighbor. Goodwill connects us to people on the inside and then on the outside. People who are not connected to us on the inside should be called only acquaintances of ours.

"All birds recognize their family members. They use sound rather than plumage to tell. At close range they also tell by the living aura emanating from the bodies of their family members. In birds this innate love and sense of connection is called an instinct. But we have the same thing. In relation to our loved ones this is truly an instinct of human nature.

"Does anything make for compatibility except blood? The human mind or spirit senses a blood relationship as if it could smell it. In this compatibility, and the harmonious feeling it generates, lies the essence of goodwill. On the other hand, incompatibility that causes antipathy is like having no blood relationship and therefore no goodwill.

"And because familiarity is a second nature and it too produces compatibility, it follows that goodwill is also doing good to our friends.

"If we have been at sea and then we dock at some port and hear that we have arrived in a foreign land whose language and customs we do not know, we feel out of tune with ourselves and have no enjoyable feeling of love for the local people. But if we hear that it is our own country, with a language and customs we know, we feel in tune with ourselves and have an enjoyable feeling of love, which is also the enjoyable feeling of goodwill. "

[7] Then someone from the third row on the right stood up and said in a loud voice, "My opinion is that goodwill is giving donations to the poor and helping the needy. This is definitely goodwill, because the divine Word teaches that it is. What the Word declares allows for no contradiction.

"It is a pointless display to make donations to the rich and wealthy. There is no goodwill in it; instead the purpose is to be paid back. In it no genuine feeling of love for our neighbor is possible; it is an illegitimate feeling that may work on earth but does not work in heaven. Therefore poverty and need are to be the focus of our donations, because then the idea of a personal payback does not arise.

"In the city where I live, I know who the honorable and the dishonorable people are. I have observed that all the honorable people, when they notice a poor person in the street, stop and make a donation. All the dishonorable people, on the other hand, when they see a poor person off to the side, keep walking as if they were blind to the poor person and deaf to his or her voice. Everyone knows that the honorable have goodwill but the dishonorable do not.

"Someone who gives to the poor and helps the needy is like a shepherd who leads starving, thirsty sheep to something they can eat and drink. Someone who gives only to the rich and well-off is like someone who entertains the elite and presses food and wine on those who have had far too much already. "

[8] After that, someone from the third row on the left stood up and said, "In my opinion, goodwill is building hospices, hospitals, orphanages, and hostels, and maintaining them with donations. I support my opinion as follows: These forms of benefit and aid are public. They are leagues beyond private giving. In this case, goodwill becomes richer and more packed with an abundance of good things, and the reward we hope for on the basis of promises in the Word becomes enlarged - as we prepare and sow the field, so we reap. Isn't this a way of giving to the poor and helping the needy on a large scale? Who would not want glory from the world as a result, and also praises in the humble voices of the grateful people we have helped? Doesn't this lift our heart to its peak, and with it our feeling called goodwill?

"Rich people who ride instead of walking through the streets have no opportunity to turn their eyes toward the people sitting against the walls at the curbs and to hand them coins. Instead they make donations to places like these, which help many at once. Lesser people, however, who walk the streets and don't have these kinds of resources, do something else. "

[9] Upon hearing this, someone from the same row suddenly drowned out this person's voice with an even louder tone and said, "Nevertheless, rich people shouldn't value the generosity and excellence of their goodwill more than a pittance that one poor person gives another, because we know that all who perform any action do so according to their role in society. A monarch does something worthy of a monarch, a commander something worthy of a commander, an officer something worthy of an officer, and an attendant something worthy of an attendant. Goodwill is not essentially measured by the excellence of one's role or of the gift itself, but by the fullness of feeling that led to it. Therefore a manual laborer who gives a single coin can be making a donation with more abundant goodwill than a ranking official who gives or wills an extensive collection of valuables. This fits the following statement: 'Jesus saw rich people placing their donations in the treasury. He also saw a poor widow throwing in two mites. He said, "Truly I tell you, this poor widow threw in more than all the others"' (Luke 21:1-3). "

[10] Then someone from the fourth row to the left stood up and said, "My opinion is that goodwill is providing church buildings with an endowment and benefiting its ministers. I support this opinion as follows: People who do this have something holy in mind and act on that holiness. They make their donations holy as well. Goodwill demands this because it is intrinsically holy. All the worship that takes place in church buildings is holy, for the Lord says, 'Where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there in the midst of them' [Matthew 18:20]. As his servants, the priests minister for him. Therefore I conclude that donations to priests and to church buildings count for more than donations to other people and other things. Furthermore, part of the work of the ministry is blessing, which means that the donations are sanctified.

"Afterward nothing makes the mind more elated and cheerful than seeing one's donations in the form of as many sanctuaries. "

[11] Then someone from the fourth row to the right stood up and said this: "My opinion is that goodwill is the ancient Christian family feeling. I support my opinion as follows: Every church that worships the true God begins with goodwill. So did the early Christian church. Because goodwill unifies people's minds and makes one mind out of many, early Christians called each other family, but family in Jesus Christ their God. Since they were surrounded at that point by barbarous nations that they feared, they made a communal life with what they had, which brought them a great and like-minded happiness. They met together every day and talked about the Lord God their Savior Jesus Christ, and over lunch and dinner they talked about goodwill. This led to a family feeling among them.

"After those times, however, schisms began to occur, and then came the unspeakable Arian heresy, which robbed many of the idea that the Lord's human manifestation was divine. That caused goodwill to break down and the family feeling to fade away.

"The truth is that all who worship the Lord in truth and do what he commands are family (Matthew 23:8)family in spirit. Since nowadays people don't recognize what others are like in spirit, there is no reason for them to refer to themselves as a family.

"A family feeling based on faith alone is not real; still less real is a family feeling based on faith in another god besides the Lord God the Savior. The goodwill that causes a family feeling is not part of that faith. Therefore I have concluded that the ancient Christian family feeling was goodwill. It was, but it is no more. Nevertheless, I predict that it is going to return. "

When this last point was made, a fiery light appeared from outside the east window and tinged the speakers cheeks - something the gathering was astounded to see.

[12] Lastly, someone from the fifth row on the left stood up and asked permission to add something to the last speaker's remarks. The group gave permission. The statement was this: "My opinion is that goodwill is forgiving anyone's wrongs. I base my opinion on the usual conversation among people as they approach the Holy Supper. At that moment some people say to their friends, 'Forgive the wrongs I have done,' figuring that this will satisfy goodwill's requirements. But I have thought to myself that this is only the semblance of goodwill, not a real form of its essence. Some who say this are themselves unforgiving people, and some put no effort into the pursuit of goodwill. People like this are not the people mentioned in the prayer the Lord himself taught us: 'Father, forgive us our wrongs, just as we forgive people who wrong us. '

"Wrongs are like wounds. Unless they are opened up and cleansed, pus gathers in them and infects neighboring tissues, creeping outward like a serpent and corrupting the blood on all sides. It is the same with wrongs against our neighbor. If they are not removed by repentance and by living as the Lord commands, they remain and become more deeply entrenched.

"People who merely pray to God to remove their sins but don't do any repentance are like people who live in some city and are infected with a contagious disease. They go to the mayor and say, Master, cure us. Surely the mayor is going to tell them, 'Why do you ask me to cure you? Go to a doctor, find out what medicine to take, get some from the apothecary, and take it. Then you'll be cured. ' If people beg for their sins to be forgiven without doing any actual repentance, the Lord will tell them, 'Open the Word and read what I said in Isaiah: "Woe to a sinful nation, heavy with injustice. As a result, when you stretch out your hands I hide my eyes from you. Even if you increase your praying, I do not hear it. Wash yourselves. Remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes. Stop doing evil. Learn to do good, and then your sins will be removed and forgiven (Isaiah 1:4, 15-18).'"

[13] After these speeches I raised my hand and asked whether I could offer an opinion even though I was a stranger. The chairperson put it to the group. After they agreed I said, "My opinion is that goodwill is to act in all our work, and in every role we have, with judgment based on a love for justice - but only if that love comes solely from the Lord God the Savior. All the definitions I heard from the people in the seats to the right and the left are well-known examples of goodwill. Nevertheless, as the chair of this gathering said at the outset, goodwill is originally spiritual. It is earthly only by derivation. When earthly goodwill is inwardly spiritual, to the angels it looks as clear as a diamond. When earthly goodwill is not inwardly spiritual, however, and is therefore merely earthly, to the angels it looks opalescent, like the eye of a cooked fish.

[14] "It is not up to me to say whether the well-known examples of goodwill that you have just presented one after the other are actions motivated by spiritual goodwill or not. There is one thing I can do, however. These examples of goodwill should contain something spiritual. I can state what that spiritual something must be like if they are to be earthly forms of spiritual goodwill.

"Those actions are spiritual if they are done with judgment based on a love for justice. That is, as we practice goodwill we check to see whether we are acting on the basis of justice. We use our judgment to tell.

"It is possible for us to do harm through our good deeds. It is also possible for us to do good through apparently evil deeds. For example, we do harm through a good deed if we give a needy robber money to buy a sword, even if the robber while begging doesn't say that that is what the money is for; or if we bail the robber out of prison and point the way to the forest, saying to ourselves, 'It is not my fault if the robber steals. I have helped another human being. '

"For another example, if we feed some lazy person and protect him or her from being forced to labor for work, and we say, 'Stay in a room at my house. Lie in bed. Why wear yourself out?' we are encouraging laziness. Likewise if we give dishonest friends and relatives of ours jobs in high places from which they can practice all kinds of malice. Surely anyone can see that these acts of goodwill are not done with any love for justice or with any judgment.

[15] "On the other hand, we can also do good through actions that look bad. Take for example a judge who lets a criminal go because the criminal is crying and pouring out devout words, praying for the judge to grant a pardon because the criminal is the judge's neighbor. The judge would be performing an act of goodwill by imposing the penalty established in the law, because this would stop the criminal from doing any further harm and being a threat to the community; and the community takes precedence as a form of the neighbor. It would also prevent the scandal that might arise if the judge decided to let the criminal go.

"Surely everyone knows that servants benefit if their masters punish them for doing something evil, and children benefit as well when their parents punish them for the same reason.

"Something similar is also good for the people in hell, all of whom love doing evil. It is good for them to be kept locked in prisons and to be punished when they do something evil. The Lord allows this for the sake of their correction. This happens because the Lord is perfect justice and does what he does with perfect judgment.

[16] "From these points you can clearly see why I made the statement I did: we act with spiritual goodwill when we base our actions on a love for justice, and use our judgment.

"The love has to come solely from the Lord God the Savior, because all goodness related to goodwill comes from the Lord. He says, 'Those who live in me and I in them bear much fruit, because without me you cannot do anything' (John 15:5); and that he has all power in heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18). All love for justice and use of judgment comes from the God of heaven alone, who is justice itself, and who is the source of all our ability to judge (Jeremiah 23:5; 33:15).

[17] "In conclusion, let's review all the definitions of goodwill from the chairs to the left and right - that it is morality combined with faith; religious devotion combined with compassion; doing good to everyone whether honest or dishonest; doing all you can for your relatives and friends; giving donations to the poor and helping the needy; building hospitals and maintaining them with donations; providing church buildings with an endowment and benefiting their ministers; the ancient Christian family feeling; and forgiving anyone's wrongs. These are all outstanding examples of goodwill as long as they are done with a love for justice and with judgment. Otherwise they are not goodwill: they are only streams that have been cut off from a river or branches that have been pulled off a tree, since real goodwill is believing in the Lord and behaving justly and uprightly in all our work and in every role we have. People who receive a love for justice from the Lord and who practice justice with judgment are goodwill in its image and likeness. "

[18] After I said that there was silence, like the silence of people who see something in their inner self and acknowledge the truth of it to some extent, but do not see it yet in their outer self. I noticed this in their faces.

Suddenly, however, I was taken out of their sight because I went back out of the spirit into my physical body. Because our earthly self wears a physical body, it is not visible to any spiritual person, meaning a spirit or an angel, and neither are they visible to it.

459. I will add here the following accounts of experiences, of which this is the first.

I saw at a distance five schools, which were bathed in light of different colours, the first in flame-coloured light, the second in yellow, the third in brilliant white, the fourth in light mid-way between that of midday and that of evening, the fifth hardly visible at all, since it was as if placed in the shades of evening. On the roads I saw some people riding horses, some in carriages, and some on foot. Some of them were running or hurrying, and these were bound for the first school, the one surrounded by flame-coloured light. On seeing them I was seized and driven by a desire to go there and listen to the discussion. So I quickly prepared myself and joined the group which was hurrying to the first school, and I went in together with them. There was a large gathering to be seen there, some moving to the right and some to the left, to sit down on the benches round the walls. In front I saw a low platform, on which stood the person who had the duty of presiding; he had a staff in his hand, a hat on his head, and clothing tinged with the flame-coloured light of the school.

[2] When they were assembled, he raised his voice and said, 'Brethren, to-day's subject for discussion is: "What is charity?" Anyone of you may know that charity in its essence is spiritual, and in its exercise natural.'

At once someone on the first bench to the left, where those who had a reputation for wisdom were seated, got up and began to speak as follows. 'My opinion is that charity is morality with faith breathed into it.' He supported his opinion like this. 'Is there anyone who does not know that charity follows faith, as an attendant does her mistress? And that a person, if he has faith, carries out the law, and so charity, so spontaneously that he is unaware that it is the law and charity which he lives by. For if he did know and so acted, thinking at the same time of obtaining salvation on this account, he would sully his holy faith with his self (proprium) and thus maim its efficacy. Surely this is in accordance with the dogma of people in our country?' Here he looked at those sitting beside him, who included some clergy, and they nodded assent.

[3] 'Yet what is spontaneous charity but morality, something we are all taught from childhood? This is therefore essentially natural, but it becomes spiritual when faith is breathed into it. Can anyone tell by looking at the morality of their lives whether people have faith or not? Everyone lives a moral life, but only God, who puts in and seals faith, knows and can tell the difference. I hold therefore that charity is morality with faith breathed in, and this morality coming from faith is in its inmost productive of salvation; all other is not productive of salvation, because it aims at merit. So it is a waste of effort to mix charity and faith together, at least if they are linked from within and not attached from without. Mixing and linking them would be like putting the footman who stands at the back into the carriage with the bishop, or like bringing the door-keeper into the dining-room to sit at table with the lord.'

[4] Next someone on the first bench to the right got up and said: 'My opinion is that charity is piety with pity breathed into it, and I support this view by the consideration that nothing else but piety coming from humility of heart could propitiate God. Piety prays continually that God may grant faith and charity; and the Lord says:

Ask and it shall be granted you, Matthew 7:7.

And since it is granted, both faith and charity are contained in it. I say that charity is piety with pity breathed into it, because all devout piety is pitying. Piety moves a person's heart to groan, and what is this but pitying? Admittedly this goes once the prayer is said, but it returns when the prayer is repeated, and when it returns piety is in it and so piety is in charity. Our priests ascribe everything conducive to salvation to faith, and nothing to charity; what then remains except piety pityingly praying for both? When I read the Word, I could not help seeing that faith and charity were the two means to salvation; but when I consulted the ministers of the church, I was told that faith was the sole means, and charity was no use. Then it seemed to me as if I was at sea in a ship being tossed about between two reefs; so fearing shipwreck, I climbed into the lifeboat and sailed away. My lifeboat is piety; and what is more, piety is useful for all purposes.'

[5] He was followed by someone from the second bench on the right, who said: 'My opinion is that charity is doing good both to the upright and to the criminal. I support this view like this. What is charity but goodness of heart? A good heart wishes well to all, upright as well as criminal. The Lord said too that we should do kindnesses to our enemies. If therefore you take your charity away from anyone, does not charity then become to that extent non-existent, and thus you become like a man who has lost one leg and walks by hopping on the other? The criminal is just as much a human being as the upright man; charity looks on everyone as human, so if he is a criminal, what has that to do with me? Charity behaves like the heat of the sun, which gives life to both harmful as well as harmless animals, to wolves as much as to sheep. And it makes bad trees grow just as much as good ones, and thorns as much as vines.' On saying this he took in his hand a fresh grape, and said: 'Charity behaves like this grape; cut it open and all that is in it is lost.' Then he cut it open, and its contents were lost.

[6] After this speech someone else got up from the second bench on the left and said: 'My opinion is that charity means looking after one's relatives and friends in every way, and this is how I support it. Is there anyone who does not know that charity begins with oneself? Everyone is one's own neighbour. Charity therefore advances from itself through degrees of nearness, first to brothers and sisters, from them to nearer and more distant relatives, and so the advance of charity is limited by itself. Those outside the group are strangers, and strangers are not inwardly acknowledged, so they are estranged from the internal man. But blood-relations and other relatives are naturally linked to one; and habit, which is second nature, does the same for friends, so that they become the neighbour. Charity joins another person to oneself from within, and so from without. Those who are not joined from within should merely be termed companions.

'Surely all birds recognise their kindred, not by their plumage, but by their call; and when they are close, by the vital sphere spreading from their bodies. This affection for their kin which brings them together is called instinct in the case of birds, but the same affection in the case of human beings, when directed towards one's family and people, is the instinct of truly human nature. What is it that makes us kin but blood? This is what a person's mind, which is also his spirit, feels and, so to speak, scents. The essence of charity consists in this kindred feeling and the sympathy it induces. On the other hand, however, absence of kinship, which also gives rise to antipathy, is as it were the absence of blood and so of charity. Because habit is second nature, and this too makes a sort of kinship, it follows that charity includes doing good to friends. Does not anyone who has been at sea and puts in to a port and is told that it is a foreign country, where he does not recognise the languages and customs of its inhabitants, find himself as it were out of place and feel no pleasure in love towards them? But if he is told that it is his native land, and recognises the languages and customs of the inhabitants, he feels as it were at home, and then he feels pleasure from love, a pleasure which is also that of charity.'

[7] Next someone on the third bench to the right got up, and speaking in a loud voice said: 'My opinion is that charity is giving alms to the poor and helping the needy. There is no doubt that this is charity, because this is what the Divine Word teaches, and its dictates admit no rebuttal. Giving to the rich and those with ample resources is nothing but boastful vanity, devoid of charity but motivated by imagining a reward. In this there can be no real affection of love towards the neighbour, but only a spurious affection which is acceptable on earth, but not in the heavens. It is need and want therefore which call for assistance, since here the idea of reward is excluded. In the city where I live, where I know who are upright and who are wicked, I have observed that on seeing a poor man in the street all the upright stop and give him alms; but the wicked, catching sight of the poor man to one side, go past as if blind to the sight of him, and as if deaf to his voice. Does not everyone know that the upright have charity and the wicked do not? A person who gives to the poor and helps the needy is like a shepherd who leads his hungry and thirsty sheep to pasture and to water; but a person who only gives to the rich and affluent is like a person who worships tin gods, and presses food and drink on those who are suffering from overindulgence.'

[8] Next someone got up from the third bench on the left and said: 'My opinion is that charity is building hospices, hospitals, orphanages and hostels, and supporting them with donations. I support this view by the fact that such acts of kindness and assistance are public, and surpass by miles private acts. Charity as a result becomes richer and more full of goodness, because the good deeds are numerous, and the reward to be hoped for according to the promises contained in the Word becomes larger. For as anyone prepares the ground and sows, so shall he reap. Is not this giving to the poor and helping the needy on a larger scale? Is there anyone who does not by this aim at approval by the world, and at the same time hope for praise and humble, grateful thanks expressed by those who are so supported? Does not this lift up the heart, together with the affection which is called charity, right to its peak? Rich people who do not walk in the streets, but ride, cannot notice the beggars sitting by the walls on either side, and hand out small coins to them; but they make contributions to enterprises which are of advantage to many people at once. Lesser folk, however, who walk in the streets and do not possess such resources, do the other thing.'

[9] On hearing this another on the same bench suddenly shouted him down and said: 'Still the rich ought not to rate the munificence and excellence of their charity higher than the pittance one poor man gives another. For we know that everyone acts in a manner appropriate to his station, the king to his, the judge to his, the officer to his, the courtier to his. Charity regarded in essence does not depend upon the rank of the person and thus on the gift he can confer, but on the depth of affection which motivates the charitable act. Thus the footman who gives a small coin may bestow his gift in fuller charity than the lord who gives or bequeaths a fortune. This too is in accordance with this passage:

Jesus watched the rich throwing their offerings into the treasury, and saw too a poor widow throwing in two pennies. He said, Truly I tell you that this poor widow has contributed more than all the others, Luke 21:1-3.'

[10] After these someone got up from the fourth bench to the left, and spoke. 'My opinion,' he said, 'is that charity is endowing places of worship, and doing kindnesses to their ministers. I support this view by the fact that a person who does so has a holy purpose in mind and that is what motivates his acts; in addition he sanctifies his gifts. Charity demands this, because it is essentially holy. Is not all worship in churches holy? For the Lord says:

Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst. [Matthew 18:20.]

Priests who are His servants conduct that worship. I deduce from this, that gifts which are given to priests and to churches are superior to those which are handed out to other people and for other purposes. Moreover, a minister has been given the authority to bless, by which he sanctifies the gifts. And afterwards nothing so much broadens and cheers the mind as seeing one's offerings as so many sanctuaries.'

[11] Then someone got up from the fourth bench to the right and said: 'My opinion is that charity is the Christian brotherhood of old; and I support that view by the fact that every church which worships the true God begins with charity, as did the Christian church of old. So since charity joins minds, and makes one out of many, they called themselves brethren, in Jesus Christ their God. Since they were then surrounded by barbarous nations who made them afraid, they held their property in common. In this they rejoiced together and with one mind, and at their meetings every day talked about the Lord God their Saviour, Jesus Christ; and at their lunches and dinners they discussed charity, and this was the source of their brotherhood. But after their time, when schisms began to arise, culminating in the heinous Arian heresy, which for many people did away with the idea of the divinity of the Lord's Human, charity went out of fashion and the brotherhood fell apart. It is true that all who in truth worship the Lord and keep His commandments are brothers (Matthew 23:8), but brothers in spirit. Since at the present time no one is recognisable for what he is in the spirit, there is no need for them to call one another brothers. A brotherhood based on faith alone, much less on faith in any other God than the Lord God the Saviour, is no brotherhood, because charity, which makes it a brotherhood, is lacking in that faith. So I deduce that charity was the Christian brotherhood of old, but this in time past, not now. Yet I prophesy that it will come again.' When he said this a flame-coloured light showed through an east window, and tinged his cheeks. The gathering was astonished to see this.

[12] Lastly someone got up from the fifth bench on the left and asked permission to add a contribution to what the last speaker had said. When this was granted, he said: 'My opinion is that charity is forgiving everyone his faults. I got this opinion from the way people are accustomed to speak on going to the Holy Supper; for some then say to their friends, "Forgive me any wrong I have done," thinking that by this they have fulfilled all the requirements of charity. But I thought to myself that this is merely a painted picture of charity, and not the real form of its essence. For this saying is uttered as much by those who do not forgive as by those who make no effort to acquire charity; and such people are not included among those mentioned in the prayer which the Lord Himself taught: "Father, forgive us our faults, just as we forgive those who wrong us." For faults are like ulcers, which, if they are not lanced and healed, form a collection of pus; and this infects the adjacent areas, and creeps around like a snake, turning blood everywhere into pus. It is much the same with faults against the neighbour; unless they are removed by repentance and by living in accordance with the Lord's commandments, they linger and become embedded. Those who without repenting only pray to God to forgive them their sins, are like the citizens of a city smitten with plague, who go to the governor and say, "Sir, heal us." The governor will tell them, "What do you mean, heal you? Go to the physician and find out the remedies, buy them from the chemist, use them, and you will be cured." So the Lord will say [to those] who beg for their sins to be forgiven without really repenting, "Open the Word, and read what I said in Isaiah:

Woe to the nation that sins, weighed down with iniquity. When you spread out your hands, I hide my eyes from you; even though you pray time and again, I do not hear. Wash yourselves, put away the wickedness of your deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good. And then your sins will be taken away and forgiven, Isaiah 1:4, 15-18."'

[13] When the speeches were over, I held up my hand and asked permission, although I was a stranger, to give my opinion. The presiding officer put this to the meeting, and when it was agreed, I spoke as follows: 'My opinion is that charity is acting in every deed and employment from a love of justice combined with judgment; but from love that has no other source than the Lord God the Saviour. All that I have heard from those sitting on the benches on the right and the left are well-known examples of charity. But as the presiding officer of this gathering said in his introductory remarks, charity is in its origin spiritual, but in what is derived from this it is natural. Natural charity, if inwardly it is spiritual, appears to the sight of angels transparent, like a diamond. But if inwardly it is not spiritual, but purely natural, it appears to the sight of angels pearly, like the eye of a boiled fish.

[14] 'It is not for me to say whether the well-known examples of charity, which you have brought forward one after another, are inspired by spiritual charity or not. But I can say what the spirituality in it must be, for them to be natural expressions of spiritual charity. Their spirituality consists in their being done from a love of justice combined with judgment, that is, in a person looking to see, when he does something charitable, whether he acts from justice; and it is judgment which allows him to see this. For a person can do harm by kindnesses, and do good by things that look like doing harm. For example, harm is done by kindnesses if anyone supplies a hard-up highwayman with the money to buy himself a sword, although in asking he will not say this is his intention. Or if anyone helps him break out of prison and shows him the way to the woods, saying to himself, "It is not my fault that he robs travellers; I helped a fellow human being." To take another example: if someone feeds an idler, and takes care he is not compelled to work, saying, "Come into a room in my house and lie in bed; why tire yourself out?" anyone doing this is fostering idleness, Or again, if anyone promotes relations and friends of bad character to high office, in which they can set on foot many kinds of mischief. Can anyone fail to see that charitable deeds of this sort are not motivated by any love of justice combined with judgment?

[15] 'On the other hand, a person may do a kindness by acts which look like wrong-doing; for instance, a judge who acquits a wrong-doer because he weeps, utters pious expressions and begs to have his offence overlooked, on the grounds that he is his neighbour. Yet the judge in fact acts charitably, when he imposes the sentence prescribed by law, for by so doing he prevents him from doing further wrong and harming the community, which is the neighbour in a superior degree; and he sees to it that such a judgment is not a cause of scandal. Is anyone unaware that it is for their own good that servants are chastised by their masters, and children by their parents, for doing wrong? It is much the same with those in hell, all of whom love to do wrong, being kept shut up in prison and punished when they act wickedly, a punishment permitted by the Lord to reform them. This happens because the Lord is justice itself, and does whatever He does as the result of judgment itself.

[16] 'These facts allow us to see clearly why it is that, as I said before, spiritual charity arises from a love of justice combined with judgment, but from love from no other source than the Lord God the Saviour. The reason is that all the good of charity is from the Lord; for He says:

He who remains in me and I in him brings forth much fruit, because without me you can do nothing, John 15:5.

also:

He has all power in heaven and on earth, Matthew 28:18.

All love of justice combined with judgment has no other origin than the God of heaven, who is justice itself, and the source of all human powers of judgment (Jeremiah 23:5; 33:15).

[17] 'This leads to the conclusion that everything said about charity from the seats to right or left - that it is morality with faith breathed into it, piety with pity breathed into it, doing good to the upright and to the wicked, looking after one's relatives and friends in every way, giving to the poor and helping the needy, building hospitals and supporting them with gifts, endowing places of worship and doing kindnesses to their ministers, that it is the Christian brotherhood of old, or forgiving everyone his faults - all of these are splendid examples of charity, when they are done out of a love of justice combined with judgment. Otherwise they are not charity, but only like watercourses cut off from the spring that feeds them, and like branches torn from a tree. True charity consists in believing in the Lord, and acting fairly and righteously in every deed and employment. Anyone therefore who at the Lord's bidding loves justice and executes it with judgment is an image and likeness of charity.'

[18] This speech was greeted with the sort of silence typically kept by those who are led by the internal man to see and acknowledge that something is so, but do not yet do so in their external man; I could observe this from their faces. But I was then suddenly carried up out of their sight, for from being in the spirit I re-entered my material body. A natural person, being clothed in a material body, is invisible to any spiritual person, that is, any spirit or angel, and so are they to him.