237. And knowest not that thou are wretched, signifies that they do not know that their falsities have no coherence with truths. This is evident from the signification of "wretchedness," as meaning the breaking up of truth by means of falsities, and also no coherence; this shows what is meant by "the wretched." They are so because their doctrine is founded on two false principles, which are faith alone and justification by faith; consequently falsities flow in from these in constant succession, and the truths which they adduce from the sense of the letter of the Word to confirm these are weakened and falsified, and truths when falsified are in themselves falsities. This is described in many passages in the Word, and is meant by the "vanities" that the prophets see, and the "lies" that they speak. It is described also by the "breaches" in the walls and houses so that they fall; likewise by "idols" and "graven images" that the artificer makes and connects by chains that they may cohere; for "idols" and "graven images" signify the falsities of doctrine; the like is signified by "breaches of the walls" and "of the houses," and by "the prophets who see vanities and speak lies;" for "prophets" mean doctrines, "vanities" such things as are of no account, and "lies" falsities. But as these things are mentioned in many passages in the Word they cannot be cited here on account of their abundance; they will therefore be omitted, and a few only quoted here in which "wretchedness" and "wall" are mentioned, that it may be known that these signify the weakening of truth by falsities, and thus no coherence.

[2] In Isaiah:

Thy wisdom and thy knowledge it hath misled thee, when thou hast said in thine heart, I, and none like me besides. Therefore shall wretchedness fall upon thee, and devastation shall come upon thee (Isaiah 47:10-11).

Here also those are described who believe that they know all things and that they are more intelligent than all others, when yet they know and understand nothing of truth; and that therefore the understanding of truth is taken away from them. Their belief that they are more intelligent than all others is meant by "Thy wisdom and thy knowledge it hath misled thee, when thou hast said in thine heart, I, and none like me besides;" and the loss of all understanding of truth is meant by "wretchedness shall fall upon thee, devastation shall come upon thee."

[3] In Ezekiel:

Wretchedness shall come upon wretchedness; therefore they shall seek a vision from the prophets; but the law hath perished from the priest, and counsel from the elders. The king shall mourn, and the prince shall be clothed with astonishment (Ezekiel 7:26-27).

Here the vastation of the church is treated of, which takes place when there is no truth that is not falsified. Falsity from falsity is meant by "wretchedness upon wretchedness;" "a vision from the prophet" is doctrine, here the doctrine of falsity; "the law hath perished from the priest" means that the Word is not understood, for "law" signifies the Word, and the "priest" one who teaches; "counsel hath perished from the elders" means that right has perished from the intelligent, "counsel" signifying right, and "elders" the intelligent; "the king shall mourn, and the prince shall be clothed with astonishment," means that there is no longer any truth, "king" signifying truth, and "prince" truths that are primarily of service.

[4] In David:

Right is not in their mouth, wretchedness is in their inward part (Psalms 5:9);

where "wretchedness" likewise stands for falsities not cohering with any truth. So too in Jeremiah:

Lament, and wander among the walls; for their king is gone into exile, and his priests and his princes together (Jeremiah 49:3).

"Wandering among the walls" is among truths destroyed by falsities; "the king gone into exile" signifies truth; and "his priests and princes together" signify the goods and truths of life and doctrine (See above).

[5] In Ezekiel:

When they build a wall [maceriem], behold they daub it with untempered mortar. Say to them which daub it with untempered mortar, that the wall [paries] shall fall. Is it not said unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it? (Ezekiel 13:10-12).

"The wall which they daub with untempered mortar" signifies falsity assumed as a principle, and by application of the Word from the sense of the letter made to appear as truth; "daubing" is application and seeming confirmation thereby; "untempered mortar" is what has been falsified; and because the truth of the Word is thus destroyed, and the truths used to confirm become truths falsified, which in themselves are falsities, and these with the false principle perish together, it is said, "Behold, the wall shall fall. Is it not said unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it?"

[6] In Hosea:

Behold, I obstruct thy way with thorns, and I will encompass wall with wall, that she shall not find thy ¹ paths (Hosea 2:6).

"To obstruct the way with thorns" is to obstruct all thoughts by falsities of evil, that truths be not seen; falsities of evil are "thorns;" "to encompass wall with wall" is to heap falsities upon falsities; "that she shall not find thy paths" means that nothing of truth can be seen; this comes to pass because truths and falsities of evil cannot be together, as heaven cannot be with hell; for truths are from heaven, and falsities of evil are from hell; therefore when falsities from evil reign communication with heaven is taken away, and when that is taken away truths cannot be seen, and if presented by others they are rejected. For this reason, those who are in false principles, as those who are in the principles of faith alone and justification by faith, cannot be in any truths (as may be seen above, n. 235, 236).

[7] But let examples illustrate this. Those who have adopted faith alone and justification by faith as a principle of religion, when they read the Word and see that the Lord says that man shall be recompensed according to his deeds and works, and that he who has done good, shall come into heaven, and he who has done evils into hell, call the good things that they do fruits of faith, not knowing or not wanting to know, that the good things called fruits are all from charity, and none of them from faith separate, which is called faith alone; every good also is of charity, and truth is of the faith therefrom. From this it is clear that they pervert the Word; and they do this because they cannot otherwise apply truth to their principle, believing still that the two may thus cohere; but the result is that truth perishes and becomes falsity, and not only falsity but also evil.

[8] From this falsities evidently follow in constant succession, for they teach that the good works that man does are meritorious, not being willing to see that as faith with its truths are from the Lord, and thus not meritorious, so are charity with its goods. They teach also that as soon as a man receives faith he is reconciled to God the Father through the Son, and that the evils thenceforth done, as well as those done before, are not imputed; for they say that all are saved however they have lived, if only they receive faith, even though it be in the hours before death. But these, and many other things which are deductions from the falsity of the principle, do not cohere with the truths from the Word, but destroy them, and truths destroyed are falsities, even such falsities as emit a bad odor. From these a grievous smell is perceived in the other life, which is such that it cannot be endured by any good spirit; it is like the stench of purulent matter from the lungs. Many other examples might be adduced; there is an abundance of them; for whatever is deduced from a false principle becomes thereby a falsity, since in the deduction the principle only is regarded to which it clings because from this it flows and to this it is applied.

[9] What the religion of faith alone and of justification by faith is can be inferred from the simple fact that all who have confirmed these tenets in themselves by doctrine and life, send out from themselves in the other life a sphere of abominable adultery like that of a mother or stepmother with a son; this abominable adultery corresponds to such, and is also perceived from them wherever they go; from that sphere I have a thousand times recognized their presence. Such a sphere flows out from them because they adulterate the goods of charity and of the Word, and adulteries correspond to adulterations of good, while whoredoms correspond to the falsifications of truth (See Arcana Coelestia 2466, 2729, 3399, 4865, 6348, 8904, 10648).

[10] There is a like meaning in:

Reuben's lying with Bilhah, of whom his father begat Dan and Naphtali (Genesis 35:22);

And therefore he was also accursed (Genesis 49:4);

And because he defiled his father's couch the primogeniture was taken away from him and given to Joseph (1 Chronicles 5:1). For by "Reuben" in the Word faith is meant here faith alone (See Arcana Coelestia 3325, 3861, 3866, 3870, 4601, 4605, 4731, 4734, 4761, 6342, 6350); and by "Joseph," the good of faith (See 3969, 3971, 4669, 6417).

[11] That such things are to take place at the end of the church is predicted in Daniel, where the statue that Nebuchadnezzar saw in a dream is described in these words:

Whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of man; but they shall not cleave one to the other, even as iron doth not mingle with clay (Daniel 2:43).

By "iron" truth without good is meant; by "miry clay" the falsity that is from self-intelligence; by "the seed of man" the Word of the Lord (Matthew 13:24, 37). That these do not cohere is meant by "they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron doth not mingle with clay."

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1072. 'He was drunk' means that he consequently sank into errors. This is clear from the meaning of 'a drunken man' in the Word. Those people are called drunk who do not believe anything except that of which they have a mental grasp, and who for that reason probe into mysteries of faith. And because they probe into them by means of knowledge, either factual or philosophical, acquired through the senses, man being what he is inevitably sinks as a consequence into errors. Man's thought is altogether earthly, bodily, and material because it is born of things that are earthly, bodily, and material which cling to it all the time and which the ideas comprising his thought are based on and encompassed by. Consequently to think and reason about Divine matters from such things is to run into errors and perversities, and from that position it is as impossible to acquire faith as it is 'for a camel to go through the eye of a needle'. The error and insanity that result are in the Word called 'drunkenness'. What is more, souls or spirits in the next life who reason about and against the truths of faith become like drunken men and behave as these do. These people will in the Lord's Divine mercy be described later on.

[2] Spirits are clearly distinguished from one another as to whether they possess, or do not possess, faith that inheres in charity. Those who possess such faith do not engage in reasoning about the truths of faith. Instead they immediately declare them to be true, and also confirm them, so far as they are able, by means of sensory evidence, factual knowledge, and analytical arguments. But as soon as something obscure comes up which they do not perceive they lay it aside and never allow anything like that to lead them into doubt. They say that the things they are able to grasp are very few and that therefore to think that something is not true because they themselves do not grasp it would be madness. These people are those who are governed by charity. But those who do not possess faith inhering in charity have no other desire than to reason whether a thing is true and to know how it is so. They say that if they cannot know how it is so, they are unable to believe that it is so. From this attitude of mind alone they are instantly recognized as those who have no faith at all, and it is a sign not only that they entertain doubts about everything but also that at heart they are deniers. And even when they are informed as to how something is so they remain unmoved and raise all kinds of objections, and would never give up even if this went on for ever. Those who are thus unmoved pile up errors upon errors. These people, or such as they, are in the Word called 'drunk from wine or strong drink'.

[3] As in Isaiah,

These err through wine, and go astray through strong drink. The priest and the prophet err through strong drink. They are swallowed up by wine, they err from strong drink. They err in vision. All tables are full of vomit. Whom will He teach knowledge, and whom will He cause to understand the report? Those weaned from milk, those torn away from the breasts? Isaiah 28:7-9.

Such people are clearly meant here. In the same prophet,

How do you say to Pharaoh, I am a son of the wise, a son of kings of old? Where are your wise men now? Let them, I pray, tell you. Jehovah has mingled in the midst of her a spirit of perversity, and they have made Egypt err in all her works, as a drunken man errs in his vomit. Isaiah 19:11-12, 14.

'A drunken man' stands for people who wish from facts to probe into spiritual and celestial things. 'Egypt' means facts, which also is why he calls himself 'a son of the wise'. In Jeremiah,

Drink and get drunk, and vomit, and fall, and do not get up again. Jeremiah 25:27. This stands for falsities.

[4] In David,

They reel and stagger like a drunken man, and all their wisdom will be swallowed up. Psalms 107:27.

In Isaiah,

Come, I will get wine, and we will be drunken from strong drink, and tomorrow will be like this day, a great abundance. Isaiah 56:12.

This has reference to things that are contrary to the truths of faith. In Jeremiah,

Every wineskin will be filled with wine, all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with drunkenness. Jeremiah 13:12-13.

'Wine' stands for faith, 'drunkenness' for errors. In Joel,

Awake, you drunkards, and weep; and wail, all you drinkers of wine, over the new wine, for it is cut off from your mouth. For a nation is coming up over My land; it is turning My vine into a desolation. Joel 1:5-7.

This refers to the Church vastated as regards truths of faith. In John,

Babylon caused all nations to drink from the wine of the anger of whoredom. The inhabitants of the earth have got drunk with the wine of whoredom. Revelation 14:8, 10; 16:19; 17:2; 18:3; 19:15.

'The wine of whoredom' stands for adulterated truths of faith, to which 'drunkenness' has reference. Similarly in Jeremiah,

Babel was a golden cup in Jehovah's hand, making all the earth drunken. The nations have drunk of her wine, therefore the nations are mad. Jeremiah 51:7.

[5] Since 'drunkenness' meant inanities surrounding truths of faith, it also became representative; and Aaron was forbidden to be drunk, as the following shows,

Aaron and his sons were not to drink wine and intoxicating drink when they entered the Tent [of Meeting] lest they died, so that they might distinguish between what was holy and what was unholy, what was unclean and what was clean. Leviticus 10:8-10.

People who believe nothing except what they grasp through sensory evidence and factual knowledge are also called in Isaiah 'heroes at drinking',

Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and in their own sight intelligent! Woe to heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink! Isaiah 5:21-22.

They are called 'wise in their own eyes, and in their own sight intelligent' because people who reason against truths of faith imagine that they are wiser than everybody else.

[6] People however who pay no attention to the Word and the truths of faith, and thus who are unwilling to know anything about faith, and so deny its fundamental teachings, are called 'drunk without wine'. In Isaiah,

They were drunk but not with wine, they were staggering, but not with strong drink. For Jehovah has poured out upon you a Spirit of sleep, and has closed your eyes. Isaiah 19:9-10.

That they are such is clear from what comes before and after this description of them in the prophet. People who are 'drunk' in this sense imagine that they are more alert than anybody else, yet they are in a deep sleep. The fact that the Ancient Church when it began was such as is described in this verse, especially those who belonged to the stock of the Most Ancient Church, becomes clear from what has been stated already in 788.