When Jesus died on the cross, there was an earthquake. Rocks were split. The centurion and his soldiers who had carried out the crucifixion orders were afraid.

In the heart of the temple, in the "holy of holies", in the very heart of Jerusalem, the sacred veil tore, from top to bottom.

The veil, "rent in twain"...

The veils in the tabernacle and later in the temple were important. They're described in great detail in Exodus and in 1 Kings. In Arcana Coelestia 2576, it says that, "Rational truths are a kind of veil or clothing to spiritual truths.... The veil represented the nearest and inmost appearances of rational good and truth....

And now, as Jesus dies on the cross, the veil tears. What does this mean?

Here's how Swedenborg describes the symbolism of this:

"...that once all appearances had been dispelled, the Lord entered into the Divine Itself, and at the same time He opened a means of access to the Divine Itself through His Human that had been made Divine." (Arcana Coelestia 2576)

Think about four watershed spiritual events:

1) The creation of the physical universe. (Current best guess: 13.8 billion years ago). Genesis 1:1-10

2) The beginning of life. (On earth, between 3.5 and 4.5 billion years ago.) Genesis 1:11-25

3) The beginning of spiritually conscious human beings. (Reasonable guess: 100,000 years ago). Genesis 1:26-31

4) The incarnation and resurrection of the Lord God Jesus Christ (2000 years ago).

God's love and wisdom have been flowing into the universe for a long time. Where you might expect entropy, instead we see a universe that seems to favor life and intelligence. Think what a fulfilling moment it must have been when God could tell that human minds were now responding to Him, after all that outpouring.

But the free response-ability has tragedy baked in, because we can also choose not to respond, and to go the opposite way.

As we humans grew more "sophisticated", God used new channels to reach us, notably prophets and spiritual leaders, and later the written word. And in those channels, from the earliest times, there are already prophecies that the Lord would one day come into the world in human form.

Why did He need to do that? He must have foreseen that people would need to have that human level of connection, in order for enough good and truth to exist for us to make the decisions that open us to salvation.

Let's go back to Swedenborg's description:

"... once all appearances had been dispelled the Lord entered into the Divine Itself..."

Throughout the Lord's life on earth, there was the appearance that he was a man, like us. He had a human body. He could be tired and hungry. He could be tempted (though unlike us, he always won). In his spiritual life, there were times when he felt keenly the appearance of his human separate from his Divine essence. At other times, that appearance thinned, and he felt his divinity more powerfully. As he grew up, and was baptized, and began his ministry, he must have been growing more and more fully aware of what was going on inside him -- the glorification of the human part of him. With the death of his body on the cross, the bodily human-ness was no longer in the way. That appearance was dispelled. A new connection was fully forged between the Divine and the human.

And then, there's the second part of Swedenborg's statement:

"at the same time He opened a means of access to the Divine Itself through His Human that had been made Divine."

The veil was torn. The old religion, which had placed ritual above real good, and where God was invisible, separated from human knowledge by a veil -- was torn. New light could reach people, through the new teachings of the Lord. We could respond to a God who, in His Divine Human, we now could understand and approach and love more deeply.

10416. 'And rose up to play' means the resulting desire of their interiors to celebrate, and concord. This is clear from the meaning of 'playing' as the desire of a person's interiors to celebrate, for play is the outcome of that desire, being a bodily activity brought about by gladness of mind; and all desire for celebration and all gladness of mind come from the delights belonging to the loves that govern a person. The reason why concord as well is meant is that every desire to celebrate has concord residing inwardly within it; for if any disagreement or disapproval enters in, that desire perishes. The desire to celebrate resides inwardly in a person's feeling of freedom, and all feeling of freedom comes as a result of love, when nothing exists to frustrate it.

[2] Since outward things are used in the Word to describe inward ones, times of play and dancing are used to describe those of joy and gladness present in a person inwardly, as in the following places: In Jeremiah,

The city will be built upon its mound. Then there will come out of these thanksgiving (confessio) and the voice of those who are playing ¹ . Jeremiah 30:18-19.

In the same prophet,

Again I will build you, that you may be built, O virgin of Israel! Again you will adorn your timbrels ² , and will go forth in the dance of those who are playing ¹ . Their life ³ will become like a watered garden, and they will not sorrow any more. And the virgin will rejoice in the dance, and the young men and the old together. I will turn their mourning into joy. Jeremiah 31:4, 12-13.

In Zechariah,

The streets of the city will be full of boys and girls playing in its streets. Zechariah 8:5.

In David,

Praise the name of Jehovah with timbrel and dance. Psalms 149:3; 150:4.

In the same author,

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing. Psalms 30:11.

In Jeremiah,

The joy of our heart has ceased, our dance has been turned into mourning. Lamentations 5:15.

[3] Since times of play and dancing were the signs of feelings of joy and gladness inwardly present and springing from love, Miriam and the women went out, with timbrels after the Egyptians had been drowned in the Sea Suph and started dancing, Exodus 15:20. For the same reason, when the ark was being brought up from the house of Obed-Edom to the city of David, David leapt and danced before Jehovah, 2 Samuel 6:12, 16.

[4] The fact that inner things are presented and described in the Word by means of outward ones is clear from the following words in David,

You have made the sea, great and wide on both hands ⁴ - there the ships sail, the Leviathan whom You have formed to play in it. Psalms 104:25-26.

Anyone without knowledge of the fact that the spiritual sense exists within each detail of the Word knows nothing else here than that 'the sea' and 'ships' are used to mean sea and ships, 'the Leviathan' to mean the monsters there, and 'playing' to mean their swimming around together there. Such things however are not what constitute the Word, every jot of which is Divine; but when the spiritual matters meant by those things are understood instead, it becomes Divine. In the internal sense 'the sea' is a gathering together of factual knowledge of truths, thus it is that which constitutes what is external with a person and in the Church; 'ships' are cognitions or knowledge and matters of doctrine drawn from the Word; 'the Leviathan' is factual knowledge in general; and 'playing' is the delight derived from those things.

'The sea' is a gathering together of factual truths, see 28, 2850, 8184, 9340.

'Ships' are cognitions and matters of doctrine drawn from the Word, 1977, 6385.

'The Leviathan' is factual knowledge in general, 7293.

Thus 'playing' is the delight and the desire to celebrate derived from those things, which occurs when known facts add strength to spiritual matters and accord with them.

Footnotes: