2. The Lord is God of Heaven

First and foremost, we need to know who the God of heaven is, since everything else depends on this. Throughout the whole of heaven, no one is acknowledged as God of heaven except the Lord. Angels say what he himself taught, namely that he is one with the Father, that the Father is in him and he in the Father, that anyone who sees him sees the Father, and that everything holy emanates from him (John 10:30, 38; 14:9-11, 16; 16:13-15). I have often talked with angels about this, and their consistent testimony has been that in heaven they cannot divide the Divine into three because they both know and perceive that the Divine is one and that this "one" is in the Lord. They have also told me that when people arrive from earth with the idea of three divine beings they cannot be admitted to heaven. This is because their thinking vacillates between one opinion and the other, and in heaven they are not allowed to think "three" and say "one." ¹

In heaven people actually speak directly from their thought, so that we have there a kind of thoughtful speech or audible thought. This means that if people have divided the Divine into three in the world and held a separate image of each one without gathering and focusing these three into one, they cannot be accepted. In heaven, there is a communication of all thoughts, so if people arrive who think "three" and say "one," they are recognized immediately for what they are and are sent away.

Still, it needs to be realized that in the other life any people who have not put "good" in one compartment and "true" in another - who have not separated faith from love - accept the heavenly concept of the Lord as God of the universe once they have been taught. It is different, though, with people who have separated their faith from their lives, that is, who have not lived by the guiding principles of true faith.

Footnotes:

1408. The events described here and in what follows took place in history as they are recorded, yet the historical events as described are representative, and every word carries a spiritual meaning. This is so in all of the historical parts of the Word, not only in the Books of Moses but also in those of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings, all of which books contain nothing else than historical narratives. But although they are historical narratives in the sense of the letter, in the internal sense there are arcana of heaven lying hidden there. These arcana cannot possibly be seen as long as the mind keeps its eye fixed on the historical details, nor are they disclosed until the mind removes itself from the sense of the letter. The Word of the Lord is like a body that has a living soul within it. The things that belong to the soul are not apparent as long as the mind is fixed on those of the body, so much so that it scarcely believes it possesses a soul, even less that it will be alive after death. But as soon as the mind departs from bodily things, those belonging to the soul and to life show themselves; and in this lies the reason not only why bodily things must die before a person can be born anew or be regenerated, but also why the body must die so that he can enter heaven and behold heavenly things.

[2] The same applies to the Word of the Lord Its bodily parts are the things that constitute the sense of the letter, and when the mind is fixed on these the internal things are not seen at all. But once the bodily parts so to speak have died, the internal for the first time are brought to view. All the same, the things constituting the sense of the letter are like the things present with man in his body, namely the facts belonging to the memory which come in through the senses and which are general vessels containing interior or internal things. From this one may recognize that the vessels are one thing and the essential elements within the vessels another. The vessels are natural, and the essential elements within the vessels are spiritual and celestial. In the same way the historical narratives of the Word, as with each individual expression in the Word, are general, natural, indeed material vessels that have spiritual and celestial things within them. These things never come into sight except through the internal sense.

[3] This may become clear to anyone simply from the fact that many matters in the Word have been stated according to appearances, indeed according to the illusions of the senses, such as that the Lord is angry, punishes, curses, slays, and many other such statements, when in fact the internal sense contains the reverse, namely that the Lord is never angry or punishes, still less curses or slays. All the same, no harm at all is done to people who in simplicity of heart believe the Word as they find it in the letter so long as they are leading charitable lives, the reason being that the Word teaches nothing other than this - that everyone ought to live in charity with his neighbour and to love the Lord above all things. People doing this are in possession of the internal things, and thus with them the illusions acquired from the sense of the letter are easily dispersed.

418. The previous verse deals with celestial things, which are the attributes of love, the present verse with spiritual things, which are the attributes of faith. These spiritual things are portrayed as 'the harp and organ'. That stringed instruments, such as harps and others like them, meant the spiritual things of faith is clear from many points of view. In the worship of the representative Church instruments like these, and the singing likewise, had no other representation. This was why there were so many singers and musicians, the main reason for such representation being that all heavenly joy produces gladness of heart, which was expressed by means of singing, and subsequently by means of stringed instruments that strove to match the singing and uplifted it. Every affection of the heart also has this capacity to produce singing and therefore the things which go with singing. Affection of the heart is something celestial, singing issuing from it something spiritual.

[2] That singing and the like means that which is spiritual has also become clear to me from angelic choirs, of which there are two kinds, celestial and spiritual. From the vibrant quality of their singing, to which the sound of stringed instruments may be likened, spiritual choirs are readily distinguished from celestial choirs. This will in the Lord's Divine mercy be described later on. What is more, the most ancient people related that which was celestial to the province of the heart, and that which was spiritual to the province of the lungs. In so doing they related that which was spiritual to whatever involved the lungs, such as singing voices and other similar things, and so to the voices or sounds of such instruments. The reason for their so relating them was not only that the heart and lungs represent a kind of marriage, like that of love and faith, but also that celestial angels belong to the province of the heart whereas spiritual angels belong to that of the lungs. It can also be recognized that such considerations are meant here from the fact that this is the Word of the Lord, which would contain no life at all if its message were merely that Jubal was the father of those who play on harp and organ. Nor would any use be served in anyone's knowing it.