6110. [numbered by Tr.] Various points regarding marriage and adultery

1.) How the female is born innocence, and how the male.

How the female develops an affection for what is good, and the male an understanding of what is true.

How the female develops affection for what is true, which happens when she desires to marry, and how the male develops understanding of what is true, which happens likewise when he wants to love the female sex.

How this then grows with them both to the point that it becomes marriage, and how understanding of what is true then subordinates itself to affection for what is true, and they are united.

2.) What the feminine and what the masculine are inwardly.

The feminine inwardly is to love her husband tenderly, but they do not want their husband to know this, consequently he is dominant; and the husbands who do not have this authority become impotent. The wives of angels said that I should not reveal this, but I said that I will reveal it because they think that this is their weakness, but it is the goodness itself of truth and the truth of good.

3.) How two partners become a single form of love through marriage love.

The form of their bodies results from the union of their minds.

About the forms of human beings depending on the affections [they have for things] and consequently the understanding, that is to say, on what comes from (the [things] of) their love and consequently from their wisdom.

This is the image and likeness of God, Gen. [1:26].

Potency increases to the point that it becomes perpetual.

4.) There are many reasons why the man wants his woman to show reluctance:

with certain men there is pleasure in being forceful; with some it is the result of adultery; with some it arouses sexual potency;

it stems from various causes, chiefly of a mental nature.

in the end they become like cats that tear at another cat, stand still, stare at each other, howl miserably, and secretly desire [to mate].

The women are furious that this is disclosed. They declare, as if from inward will, that they do not wish [to make love].

The reason is because potency vanishes if they do otherwise.

5.) The mental conclusion alone that adultery is not a sin makes a person an adulterer.

From the things about this in the Doctrine of Life ¹ .

Every conclusion in the mind produces an effort in body, which is the act itself.

I asked about cats, why they have such a nature. They said that in the female cat, first it is the pleasure of fighting that is aroused, and that the male cat observes this, and when it comes to an end they copulate.

6.) I told the adulterers that in heaven one always has the ability to make love, and they said that so that they could get into heaven if they had known this in the world, they never would have lived promiscuously.

But I said that in heaven it is not allowable to love anyone except one's partner, while in hell you can commit whoredom with anyone at all. I asked, "Do you want to be in hell or heaven?" and I could not wring an answer out of them.

7.) If a man focuses his love on his wife by fleeing adultery as a sin, then his love and its sexual ability grow daily; but if he takes [the pleasure] from this love and wastes it on whoredom, marriage love becomes like chaff and dies.

8.) Speaking of a woman, one said that is impossible to keep on making love to one's wife, because it becomes ordinary. But angels said he was mistaken. Instead, when there is true marriage love, what is ordinary is a [garden] bed in which delights take form from what is inward, like roses in a [garden] bed, and every rose becomes a [new] bed in which inward delights are formed and varied, and this goes on to eternity.

9.) Something like fury seizes hellish spirits when they feel the aura of marriage love؉ know from much experience.

10.) Married partners, that is to say, marriage love, is the image and likeness itself of God. Adultery destroys it.

11.) Hell is infuriated when [those there] perceive the aura of marriage love, [this was an] experience as it were from heaven.

12.) Adultery is in the whole body as an effort when it is regarded as acceptable.

13.) Every person is a particular affection given form. If it is charity, this form is angelic. What [forms] do their affections then take? They are sheep or doves.

14.) Marriage is like the marriage of the will and understanding, or rather of affection and thought, in all things down to the very least details, because it is a marriage of good and truth.

Let the conjunction, or rather marriage, of these be compared with the marriage of sound and speech, in which this clearly can be seen:

- as for example, that speech is the form of sound, so the husband can be described as the form of his wife,

- that they are one flesh,

- that the husband must cleave to his wife,

- that the wife is the soul and life of the husband,

- or rather that she is the heart of the husband,

- but that neither knows other than that she is his, or he is hers, and that they belong to each other reciprocally and mutually,

15.) that with women nerves are softer, that the veins are somewhat wider, that with men the arteries are stronger, that [with women] the thighs are wider, because the thighs stand for marriage love. These things may be seen in "Secrets of Heaven".

16.) Unless there is the thought of what is eternal, that is to say, of an eternal union, she is not a wife but a concubine, and the result of thought of what is not eternal is that marriage love perishes.

17.) The bond must be a back-and-forth one, or forward and backward, the bond back-and-forth is the wife's affection in the husband's understanding, and the husband's understanding in the wife, if it is not there, it is not marriage love, and under these circumstances it does not become eternal.

If angelic spirits in the world of spirits speak about these two things, [marriage love and eternity], the hells are stirred up, and those who are linked with the hells become as it were insane.

18.) The wife in heaven is spiritual heat, and the husband spiritual light.

19.) A beautiful heavenly and spiritual woman is beauty itself, that is to say, a form of beauty and goodness.

As regards all the works in the universe created by the Lord, clearly there is nothing more beautiful than a virgin.

20.) How the life of the husband enters a wife through [her] hips, and by love.

How truth then becomes good, that is to say, how [the husband's] understanding becomes the wife's will, and at last how the husband's understanding becomes a form of the wife's affection.

Thus how it must be understood that the wife was formed from the rib of Adam, and that Adam said, she is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh, and they became one flesh, and the man must cleave to his wife [Gen. 2:23-24].

21.) The pleasure of rape. The hell [of those who rape] is like a cadaver, why --

The pleasure of defloration, the nature of whoredom.

The pleasure of having a variety [of partners], the nature of that pleasure: they become like nasal mucus.

The pleasure of committing adultery with someone else's wife, its nature and kind.

The pleasure of a married man's whoring, its nature.

The pleasure of having a mistress before marriage, its nature. It is permitted, in what circumstances and with whom.

22.) Marriage love is innocence itself, from [the description of] Adam.

—It is chastity itself, - from its origin, and from its correspondence, from its childlike playfulness

; it is purity itself.

There is a representation of it in caterpillars, when they become butterflies.

23.) The reasons for divorce:

1.) illicit sexual behavior,

2.) desertion,

3.) disease, etc.

Why it is not allowable to take a woman who has been divorced, in other words, clearly left [by her husband].

24.) The beauty of a wife and virgin comes from chaste marriage love.

Wisdom comes from the man.

25.) There is no lust in marriage love, because that is not chaste.

This is keenly felt by those who have marriage love.

Therefore there is nothing unclean in it; it is pure.

It may appear as if it is impure, but yet it is not.

The reason is that within the love of marriage lies heaven, down to its lowest aspects, and within the love of adultery lies hell; both appear alike, but yet they are not. They are not felt except by marriage love.

26.) The apparently similar delights, it was said by the ancients, were symbolized by Cerberus, ² who stands at the entrance and guards lest the delight of heavenly love descends into hell.

27.) Marriage love looks unceasingly to two being one, that is to say, one flesh.

If the love in marriage does not look to this, it is the love of adultery.

They can become more a one to eternity.

28.) A male child is truth from good in the natural person.

This truth is born from the spiritual good of a person in the natural person, and from the marriage of good and truth in the spiritual person, thus daughters and sons in the natural person are goods and truths, as may be seen in Apocalypse Revealed 543 ³ .

Things about the firstborn may also be seen.

[29] 29) The nature of the love of the innermost friendship between them: the innermost [bond] of friendship never ceases, and it makes the pleasure of their conversation heavenly.

The distinction between this love and the love of conjunction.

The nature of the difference.

This difference is unknown to adulterers. They immediately believe that the wife wants conjunction when she says she loves her husband.

30.) I have been told from heaven that most ancient people, who were of the heavenly nature, made marriage love the chief of all their loves, calling it the very delight of their life; and also that love for children is directly derived from it.

31.) The nature of the love for children, which [the Greeks call] storge, in the case of those who are evil. It is that they see themselves in them, because the soul of father is in them.

This love joins partners, but how and with what difference.

32.) A female becomes a female after death, and a male becomes a male, and the love remains mutual and reciprocal, wherefore this [marriage] cannot otherwise than continue in existence.

33.) Before the engagement there is sometimes an exploration by the angels as to whether the love is reciprocal, otherwise this is known from the [partners] themselves, and this is from the Lord.

There are festivities when there are marriages in heaven, but with a difference in the different societies.

34.) Control is exercised in marriage either by the husband or by the wife.

What the submissiveness is that results from excessive righteousness.

What excessive simplicity is with him or her.

What the conviction or belief is that whoredom is not a sin.

35.) About infernal marriage, in the case of those who have a love of exercising control and are atheists.

On the part of the man there is a murderous hatred.

But still he is clearly the servant or slave of the wife so that he does not dare mutter against her will.

But [this happens] at the time when she obtains control through various things.

The reason is that the man's faculty of understanding is subject [to the wife].

36.) They have no inward manliness or honesty; consequently they are not [truly] human.

An adulterer is unjust, unfaithful, insincere, unkind, a vow breaker, liar, immodest.

He has no inward righteousness or inward faithfulness, no inward sincerity, inward truth, inward shame, and so no inward sense of honesty and inward manliness.

What he is like inwardly, and what he is like outwardly; this then is what kind of a person he is.

37.) It is the truth from good through which the Church has its being, and good is from the Lord; and because the Lord flows in through good into truth, it follows from this that angels, and people with whom the Church is, receive good from the Lord in truths, consequently there is a marriage of good and truth in an angel and a person.

38.) If a person concludes that adultery is not a sin, he or she is an adulterer, because the conclusion comes from the will and at the same time from the understanding, in which there is also intention,

thus from the inward will, which is endeavor. It reigns in the whole person — the nature of the endeavor.

39.) A conjunction of good and of truth takes place because the Lord looks on a person in the forehead, and the person looks on the Lord through the eyes. The forehead is the will's love, that is to say, good [intent], and the eyes are the understanding, and so truth.

From this it is said that a person is a recipient of love and wisdom, or of good in truth.

All angels turn the face to the Lord.

The ruling love turns all things to itself, and they follow it.

40.) A person's spirit co-operates in acts of intercourse because what belongs to the spirit is sown at the point of the act's origin.

Nonetheless the person's spirit flows into what is earthly.

In the innermost of the person's spirit there is a conjunction of good and truth, that is to say, of pleasure that simulates good and a sense of rightness that simulates truth.

Therefore when angels and spirits are joined together — which happens in a similar way, they do not conceive or bring forth other things than those of love and wisdom, because without what is earthly there is no reproduction.

41.) All evil lusts stem from adultery, because it is their essential form.

An adulterer, convinced that it is allowable and that he may commit it, cannot acknowledge God in his heart, nor can he be conjoined with the Lord and consequently not with heaven because his delight is entirely opposed to spiritual delight.

Finally he becomes in the highest degree sensual, carnal, and material, and he thinks and speaks from what the eye can see and the ear can hear, which is merely stored away in the memory.

42.) Affection is the all of thought, just as sound is the all of speech, which can be known from the fact that a person's nature is the nature of his or her affection.

From this one principle can be known what thought is in its essence and life

and what chaste thought is, and unchaste thought, and what its origin is.

43.) What is contained in sound, there are yearning desires, what comes from sound.

A person in the world has little awareness of what is in sounds, but the angels have a thorough awareness.

44.) Love for one's partner that does not come from intercourse, as is the case with others, but intercourse comes from love for one's partner, so that the love for one's partner does [not] depend on the fire of that member, but the other way around.

Love for one's partner is full of delights beyond inter course, and is the sweetness of married life together.

Between that love apart from intercourse and intercourse itself lies a decision — just as between what a person thinks from their will, which is an intention, and the action or words, between these comes a decision, which is like the opening of the mind to action, as it were an opening of the door.

45.) Why is not permissible to contract marriage between certain blood relatives; what harm it does, from Lev. [18:1-18].

46.) Then, what dissolves a marriage, the reasons; fornications, why it is not allowable to marry a divorced woman.

47.) The Popes exalt celibacy and virginity over matrimony, but for the purpose of having monks and virgins in the monasteries.

But the opposite [should be exalted].

48.) A detailed description must be given of the state of marriage love prior to the state in which it comes to fulfillment.

The earlier state ought in all respects to precede marriage, and love [ought to develop] from that, without thought of the state following.

Then, marriage is happy and lasting, but so far as it partakes of the latter state alone, so far is

it lacking.

I heard certain ones saying that they knew nothing at all about the latter state nor thought about it when they desired a wife and saw her.

Such is the state of virgins and girls.

Such a state is chaste.

49.) The delights of the prior state are limitless, [observed] from experience.

They come nearer and nearer to the latter state, but still do not enter it. It appears as if they open it, but yet they do not.

Between the prior the latter state there is something that may be termed a decision almost like that between thinking and willing.

The latter state contains in itself all of the prior state and all of its delights, and its delights too are limitless.

The prior state is a state of a marriage friendship which surpasses all friendship.

50.) Those with whom the prior state [of marriage friendship] exists separate from the latter, and those with whom there are both.

Those with whom it does not exist.

51.) What general power it has with those who are in the prior state, together and apart, and what general [power] it has with those who are only in the latter state.

52.) Virgins who have been steeped in a piety almost to the point of a kind of melancholy become sad wives and cannot be among the happy in heaven, [I know] from experience. As a consequence those who have lived in convents [cannot].

53.) The nature of the body of the wife and the nature of the body of the husband compared to the bodies of those in the first state, that is to say, the state before the desire for the marriage.

Compared to adulterers and adulteresses.

Compared to the bodies of young people, of adults, of elderly people.

Of what nature the same are as to their minds, that is to say, their spirits.

54.) The pleasures and pleasantnesses of a mere touch of the hands, [or] of the lips, whenever they are thinking from love about such things from the Word as can be applied [to their relationship], from objects, from various agreeable pleasures.

They have exquisite sensations of the individual and general [states].

These arise from the delights of affection and thought and the conjunction of them, and the more exquisite the sensation, the more inward the conjunction.

There is pleasure of this kind in the conjunction of what is feminine and what is masculine because there is pleasure like this [from the conjunction] of goodness and truth.

There are yet more pleasures from the conjunction of the outer senses such as sight, hearing, smell, especially of breathing, in which countless things lie hidden, they lie hidden especially in the tone of voice itself.

55.) Various fears on account of the wife, as for example:

1.) that she be faulted with infertility,

2.) that she be [faulted with] insanity and or stupidity out of disdain,

3.) that she be a cause of disturbance,

4.) because of arguments,

5.) because of various reasons having to do with himself, and for various reasons having to do with his wife, such as that she may have a purse to manage as in Holland, that she may fare well in the home, so that she may eat and drink well, so that [she may be cared for] when she is sick; this appears as if he loves his wife, but it is not fear for the wife, but fear on account of the wife.

The fear belonging to marriage love, however, is fear that the wife be harmed by anything disgracefully evil. In short, he fears to do evil to it, because he loves her. This fear is the fear for the wife, and not fear on account of the wife.

56.) Various forms of disdain for a wife. ⁴

Various enmities and hatreds for a wife, for various reasons. ⁵

Various forms of antipathy for a wife. ⁶

57.) Appendix — It may be confirmed that Light becomes darkness and darkness becomes light from the fact that if man had eyes like an owl [it would become so to him].

It may be confirmed that the confirmation of falsity corresponds to that light.

58.) The confirmation that adultery is lawful may be compared to the confirmation that light is darkness and darkness light.

59.) Marriage in the Divine sense is the marriage of love and wisdom in God, which together make one, because love belongs to wisdom and wisdom belongs to love.

From this love comes the [marriage] of the Lord and the Church, which love is reciprocal according to the words of the Lord [John 14:20-21].

The marriage of good and truth comes from this, how; marriage is reciprocal, but it arises from good; and

there is an image and likeness of this marriage in the marriage of the two who are joined together by genuine marriage love.

60.) The man is born so that he may be truth and the wife so that she may be good.

He turns himself, concerning which turning.

About the man, his nature at birth, and about the woman, her nature at birth.

You may see what boys' natures are, and see what girls' natures are.

61.) In the beginning genuine marriage love is like a person being reformed and then regenerated: it inverts itself, and when it has been inverted, the love of the man goes forth from the love of the wife, and such as is hers, such is his.

The conjunction of good and truth is similar in its beginning, progression and end.

And this is what is meant by, "a man shall cleave to his wife" [Gen. 2:24].

Then affection of good plays the leading role.

In the earlier state there is also lasciviousness.

— The nature of the later state.

62.) The reason why all want to boast that they are powerful is so that they may be esteemed, and also believed to be strong, etc.

In sveria ⁷ — soldiers.

63.) How the seed is scattered through the body in every direction, is received by the soul which is in the whole body, thus in the fibers and vessels in every direction, and then it gives delight, it gives pleasure to the wife, and fills with delight.

And thus she is formed into the form of her husband; this is bone and flesh from my bone and flesh [Gen. 2:23]; how it produces intelligence in him, and how it produces impregnation.

64.) Making love to a pregnant wife is permissible. There are many reasons why; the arguments against it are produced by the feeble; and during both impotence and adulteries.

65.) Christian spirits cannot bear the spiritual aura of masculinity and femininity.

They cannot bear the spiritual aura of marriage love; the hells then go into a frenzy.

They cannot bear the aura of nakedness between married partners, they then also flee.

They cannot bear anything of the aura of the love from a married partner.

They turn away from the aura of what is ordinary, that is, when it becomes ordinary, or rather, when it becomes freely accessible to have intercourse with one's wife; it makes them nauseous.

66.) Adultery with the wife of another destroys all the delight of life between husband and wife and leads to aversion for the other, and also destroys care, as mother and father, of the children, and at the same time leads to separation.

What pertains to marriage perishes.

An adulterer does not see this unless he thinks about his own wife if some adulterer were to defile her.

67.) Evil spirits are utterly unable to bear the mental image and consequently the spiritual aura of femininity. They cry out just like those who are being tortured and flee away, experience.

But they can bear it when it is disguised by the aura or

mental image of adultery.

68.) The finest touch produces an arousal of the inward things that are seed.

It goes into the innermost elements in the flesh as well as into the liquid components, into the animate spirits, that is, into the spiritual elements themselves. This is the origin of reproduction.

There is also at that time communication of innermost things with outermost ones, thus from first through last things.

69.) The arousal of adulterers is an outward one, stemming from the pleasure of the touch of bodies, especially of the reproductive organs.

It is external, like one who touches in the neck and tickles.

It is called external because there is no feeling in a feather.

But with those who have a love for marriage, the delights of this love, which are the wife's when they are the man's, are communicated, the wife's [delights] flow into the feeling of the husband,

so that the very sensations and delights are mutually and alternately communicated, thus lascivious love is entirely different from marriage love.

70.) Marriage love does not exist other than with human beings, the reasons ---

The nature of the love emulates that with animals —

71.) About the English Lords who lure the beautiful wives of others to themselves with money, and live with them for several months and afterwards send them back.

They do the same [in the other life], and those who have lured the wives of others to themselves are immediately exposed and grievously punished.

72.) They are punished with the punishment of laceration, which is among the most grievous. They said that after the punishments they do not know whether they are disjointed; and they lie in bed for a long time.

And if they do not desist, they are thrown into hell.

Those who desisted in the world because it is a sin desist in the other life, but those who desisted for other reasons, do not desist in the other life.

73.) 29 Apr. 1765. I have seen, separated from societies, English Lords who in the world had enticed the beautiful wives of others and lived with them until they were no longer able. There was a multitude. They were separated and sent down into lower regions where they were examined as to whether they had afterwards ever repented and believed it to be against Divine laws.

74.) About circumcision. It was an act symbolizing that sensual corporeal love, which is self-love, was taken away.

Why it was done with a stone knife. Because truths remove. Why it was abrogated.

For this reason when the sons of Israel entered the land of Canaan, by which is meant the spiritual Church, they were circumcised again.

75.) Most say that when the delight of marriage becomes ordinary, it becomes worthless and as it were vanishes.

It is otherwise with those who have marriage love. With them the ordinary becomes a plane of inward delights, comparatively like a flowerbed, because it is an outward delight.

In the case of those who have lascivious love the inward elements which are lascivious leave, and virility with them, and as a result love becomes a cold from which the plane they have in common as it were dies.

76.) With those who have a lascivious marriage, and with adulterers with whom the woman's love is not shared with the man, the man's characteristic affection then does this.

The man has a characteristic affection that does not make a one with the woman's affection, on which account both withdraw.

77.) It is this affection that is acting, but it is quickly consumed and burned out. It is otherwise when the affection of the woman flows into the man's intellect as happens with angels of heaven. From this they have understanding in their life.

78.) Concerning whoredom in Paul: 1 Cor. 6:15-19, 7:4; read Eph. 5:28-33, where marriage is compared to [the marriage of] Christ and the Church. 1 Thess. 4:3, 4.

79.) Marriages are the seminary of mankind and thus the seminary of heaven.

80.) The marriage of evil and falsity draws its origin from the marriage of good and truth through the inflow of good and truth from heaven, and then through their inversion, about which experiences are to be related.

But what its nature is, that it exists with adulterers.

An evil man feels evil as good and falsity as truth.

Consequently also they are among serpents, basilisks, mice, horned owls, screech-owls, tigers.

81.) All things may be reduced to a marriage.

Therefore good and evil do not exist together, nor do the truth that comes from good and the falsity that comes from evil, falsity that does not come from evil can be turned through imagery to something good.

82.) If it is only beauty that unites, and not goodness, it is adultery, and this not human except in so far as beauty is believed to stem from goodness, which is the very being of beauty.

Also, good appears in the face, [as is known] from earthly knowledge alone.

The nature of horror in genuine marriage love and in the love that is not genuine.

The nature of fear in these two.

[6110] [Lars Benzelstierna] ⁸

[L]B) ⁹ Opwigla Nordencrantz, bewist med bref ur Landtmolen Carl. til hans afnamare, om solt.

— Opwiglas Brita Behm ¹⁰ , tilstadt af henne och erkendt.

— Wistes huru med drab. Stierncrona skulle talat, som ei sa skolat bifalla om at doda mig.

— Nogot tilforene med Reutercrona, hwars sphaera af mig kiendes, som de som wille doda mig, hel starck.

— Ofwertygad med nagra prof at han dehlt i sterbhus, och giordt orett efter wenskap och mutor, utan conscience.

— Med nagra om den mo som han forgior, den han sokt, tagit for sig, tendt upp.

— Forre tiden wille lata kora ned mig pa isen, anstalt.

— Omgadz med dodande tankar, sa lenge han hollit uti, at jag haft 1/2 Starbo.

— Ofwertygad at wille ophissa Brit. Behm at om Axmars dehl begynna process.

— Hatet som han haft wistes med en Vipersoppa, som gafs mig i somnen, derest helt swart war. Sedan med en uiddwass knif wid dess sida.

[1.)] Talat med froken af Falckfors at fora mig pa andra sidan sion at giora af med mig, men forgefwes.

2.) Med Daniel om sadant, men forgefwes.

3.) Med til en annan i Starbo by at hefwa mig i skogen.

4.) Sokt efter mig deri men for folckets syn intet tohlas.

5.) Haft i anslag och wilja at sticka knifwen i brostet,

6.) Kladt sig ut in drangklader sokt efter mig sielf ute.

7.) Taladt med den och hedt den hemma hos sig som blifwit subordinerade at taga lifwet af mig.

8.) Hon lagt spinlar i kott, hwaraf jag gaf op galla.

Footnotes:

6148. 'Only the ground of the priests he did not buy' means that the internal obtained for itself from the natural every capacity to receive good, because every such capacity came from itself. This is clear from the representation of 'Joseph', about whom these things are said, as the internal, dealt with already; from the meaning of 'the ground' as the receptacle of truth, dealt with above in 6135-6137, at this point the capacity to receive good, for the capacity of something is its inherent ability to receive, which causes a receptacle to be a receptacle (that capacity comes from good, that is, from the Lord through good, for if the good of love did not flow in from the Lord no one would ever have the capacity to receive truth or good. That inflow of the good of love from the Lord causes everything present inwardly in a person to be of a receptive nature. The truth that the capacity to receive good comes from the natural is meant by the fact that the ground lay in Egypt, since 'Egypt' means the natural in respect of factual knowledge, 6142); from the meaning of 'the priests' as good, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'not buying' as not taking those capacities to itself - not in the way that it made truths and forms of the good of truth, together with their receptacles, its own, which came about through periods of desolation and sustainment - for the reason that those capacities came from itself, from the internal. All these meanings serve to show that 'only the ground of the priests he did not buy' means that the internal obtained for itself from the natural every capacity to receive good, because every such capacity came from itself.

[2] The implications of all this are that a person's capacities to receive truth and good come directly from the Lord; he obtains them without any help at all from himself. A person's capacity to receive goodness and truth is maintained in him unceasingly; and from that capacity he possesses understanding and will. But a person does not receive them if he turns to evil. The capacity to receive does, it is true, remain, but its access to thought and sensitivity is blocked, on account of which his capacity to see what is true and have a sensitive awareness of what is good perishes. And it perishes to the extent that he turns to evil and in faith and life becomes firmly settled in it. The fact that a person contributes nothing whatever to his capacity to receive truth and good is well known from the Church's teaching that nothing at all of the truth of faith and nothing at all of the good of charity comes from man but from the Lord. Yet a person can destroy that capacity residing with him. From all this one may now see how one should understand the idea that the internal obtained for itself from the natural every capacity to receive good, because every such capacity came from itself. The expression 'from the natural' is used because the inflow of good from the Lord is effected by the Lord through the internal into the natural; and once the capacity to receive has been obtained from there, the inflow takes place, for now there is reception, see 5828.

[3] So far as the meaning of 'the priests' as forms of good is concerned, it should be recognized that there are two realities which go forth from the Lord - goodness and truth. Divine Good was represented by priests, and Divine Truth by kings; and this is why 'the priests' means forms of good and 'the kings' truths. Regarding the attribution of Priesthood and Kingship to the Lord, see 1728, 2015 (end), 3670. In the representative Ancient Church those two offices of priest and king existed jointly in one personage, the reason for this being that goodness and truth which go forth from the Lord are united; and they are also joined together in heaven among the angels.

[4] A personage in the Ancient Church in whom the two offices existed joined together was called Melchizedek, a name meaning king of righteousness. This may be seen from the following statement about Melchizedek who came to Abraham, ¹

Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; and he was a priest to God Most High. And he blessed Abraham. Genesis 14:18-19.

His representation of the Lord in both offices is evident from the fact that he was a king and at the same time a priest, and from the fact that he was allowed to bless Abraham and offer him bread and wine, which even at that time were the symbols of the good of love and the truth of faith. His representation of the Lord in both offices is further evident in David,

Jehovah has sworn and will not repent, You are a priest for ever after the manner of Melchizedek. Psalms 110:4.

These words were spoken in reference to the Lord. 'After the manner of Melchizedek' means that He is both King and Priest, that is, in the highest sense that Divine Good and Divine Truth go forth together from Him.

[5] Because a representative Church was going to be established also among the descendants of Jacob, they too were to have a single personage to represent jointly Divine Good and Divine Truth, which go forth from the Lord united. But on account of the wars and the idolatry of that people the two were in fact divided right from the start; those who ruled over the attended to sacred duties were referred to as the priests, who belonged to the seed of Aaron and were the Levites. At a later time the two functions were joined together in a single person, as they were in Eli and Samuel. Yet because the nature of the people was such that the representative Church could not be established among them, only a representative of the Church, on account of the practice of idolatry prevalent among them, the two functions were allowed to be separated. The Lord was then represented in respect of Divine Truth by kings and in respect of Divine Good by priests. The separation took place because the people desired it, not because the Lord took any pleasure in it, as is clear from the Word of Jehovah to Samuel,

Obey the voice of the people in all that they have said to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them; and show them the right of the king. 1 Samuel 8:7-end; 12:19-20.

[6] The reason why the two functions were not meant to be separated was that Divine Truth separated from Divine Good condemns all people, whereas Divine Truth united to Divine Good saves them. Judged by Divine Truth a person is condemned to hell, but Divine Good brings him out of there and raises him into heaven. Salvation comes of mercy and so sprigs from Divine Good; but damnation exists when a person rejects mercy and so casts Divine Good away from himself, as a consequence of which he is left to be judged by Truth. As regards 'kings' representing Divine Truth, see 1672, 1728, 2015, 2069, 3009, 3670, 4575, 4581, 4966, 5044, 5068.

[7] 'The priests' represented the Lord in respect of Divine Good, and for that reason good is meant by them. This becomes clear from the internal sense of all that was prescribed regarding the priesthood when Aaron was chosen, and after him the Levites, such as these prescriptions:

The High Priest alone should enter the Holy of holies and minister there. [Leviticus 16.]

Things holy to Jehovah were to be for the priest. Leviticus 23:20; 27:21.

They were not to have any portion or inheritance in the land, but Jehovah would be their portion and inheritance. Numbers 18:20; Deuteronomy 10:9; 18:1.

The Levites were given to Jehovah instead of the firstborn, and they were given by Jehovah to Aaron. Numbers 3:9, 12-13, Numbers 3:40-end; 8:16-19.

The high priest and the Levites were to be in the middle of the camp when they pitched it and when they were journeying. Numbers 1:50-54; 2:17; 3:23-38; 4:1-end.

No one from the seed of Aaron who had a blemish in himself was to approach to offer burnt offerings or sacrifices. Leviticus 21:17-20.

And there are many other prescriptions besides these, such as those in Leviticus 21:9-13, and elsewhere.

[8] In the highest sense all these prescriptions relating to the priests represented the Lord's Divine Good and therefore in the relative sense the good of love and charity. Aaron's vestments however, called 'vestments of holiness', represented Divine Truth from Divine Good. These matters will in the Lord's Divine mercy be dealt with in the explanations of what appears in Exodus.

[9] Since truth is meant by 'kings' and good by 'priests', 'kings and priests' are mentioned together many times in the Word, as in John, Jesus Christ has made us kings and priests to His God and Father. Revelation 1:6; 5:10.

By virtue of the truth of faith we are said to have been made 'kings', and by virtue of the good of charity to have been made 'priests', so that the truth and good residing with those who abide in the Lord have been joined together, in the way they are in heaven, as stated above. This is what is meant by 'being made kings and priests'.

[10] In Jeremiah,

It will happen on that day, that the heart of the king and of the princes will perish, and the priests will be dumbfounded and the prophets left wondering. Jeremiah 4:9.

In the same prophet,

The house of Israel is ashamed, they, their kings, their princes, and their priests, and their prophets. Jeremiah 2:26.

In the same prophet,

The kings of Judah, the princes, the priests, and the prophets, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. Jeremiah 8:1.

In these places 'kings stands for truths, 'princes' for first and foremost truths, 1482, 1089, 5044, 'priests' for forms of good, and 'prophets' for those who teach, 2534.

[11] Quite apart from this it should be recognized that Joseph did not buy the ground of the priests. The fact that this was representative of the consideration that the whole of a person's capacity to receive truth and good comes from the Lord is evident from a similar law in Moses regarding the fields belonging to the Levites,

The field of the country surrounding the cities of the Levites shall not be sold, for it is their eternal possession. Leviticus 25:34.

The meaning here in the internal sense is that no one ought to lay any claim to the good of the Church, which is the good of love and charity, because that good is from the Lord alone.

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