At face value, the Ten Commandments can seem intense and unforgiving. But Emanuel Swedenborg’s understanding of the internal sense of the Bible—spiritual meanings that lie beneath the literal words—can give us a new perspective on these familiar rules.

In this episode of their Swedenborg and Life web series, hosts Curtis Childs and Jonathan Rose study the inner meaning of the first commandment.

(References: Apocalypse Revealed 950; Arcana Coelestia 8864, 8865, 8868, 8869, 8875, 8878, 8879, 8880, 8881)

Like "say," the word "speak" refers to thoughts and feelings moving from our more internal spiritual levels to our more external ones -- and ultimately from the Lord, who is in a sense the most internal spiritual level of all. This is generally called "influx" and "perception" in the Writings, meaning they are thoughts and feelings that flow in in a complete way from the Lord, rather than being things we have to think about and figure out. On a number of occasions "speak" and "say" are used together; in these cases "speak" refers more to intellectual instruction in matters of thought and "say" refers more to feelings and affections that flow in directly.