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Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings

This list of Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings was originally compiled by W. C. Henderson in 1960 but has since been updated.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #421

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421. And to him was given the key to the bottomless pit. This symbolizes their hell opened.

A key symbolizes the power to open, and also to close (nos. 62, 174, 840). And a bottomless pit symbolizes hell, where those people reside who have affirmed in themselves justification and salvation by faith alone, all of whom come from the Protestant Reformed Church. Here, however, they are people who appear in their own eyes and so in the eyes of many others to be educated and erudite - even though in the sight of angels in heaven they appear to be bereft of intellect as regards matters having to do with heaven and the church, since people who affirm such a faith, even so far as to affirm its inner tenets, close the higher constituents of their intellect, and this at last to such an extent that they can no longer see any spiritual truth in any light. The reason is that an affirmation of falsity constitutes a denial of the truth. Consequently, whenever they hear some spiritual truth, namely, a truth of the Word serviceable for doctrine and life for people of the church, they keep their mind in the falsities they have affirmed; and then they either shroud the truth they have heard in falsities or reject it as nothing but words, or they yawn at it and turn away, and this the more conceited they are owing to their erudition. For conceit glues the falsities together until they at last stick together, like solidified sea foam. The Word is therefore hidden from them, like a book sealed with seven seals.

[2] I will describe, furthermore, their character, and the character of their hell, because it has been given me to see it and speak with the inhabitants there, and also to see the locusts that issued from it:

That pit, which is like the mouth of a furnace, appears in the southern zone, and the abyss beneath it extends a great distance toward the east. The inhabitants in it have light, but if light from heaven is let in, the hell becomes dark. Consequently the pit is closed above.

Seen there are huts with arched roofs, built seemingly of brick, which are divided into several small rooms, and each room has in it a table, with sheets of paper lying on it, along with some books. At each table sits someone who in the world affirmed justification and salvation by faith alone, making charity a merely natural moral act, and deeds of charity simply those of civil life by which people are able to achieve rewards in the world; but if people should do those deeds for the sake of salvation, they condemn those deeds, and some of them do so severely, because the deeds have in them human reason and human will.

All the people in this abyss were educated and erudite in the world. And among them are some metaphysicians and scholastics who are held in higher esteem than the rest there. I recognized several when it was granted me to speak with them.

[3] Their fate, however, is this: When they are first admitted there, they sit in the first small rooms; but as they argue for faith to the exclusion of works of charity, they leave their former seats and go into little rooms nearer the east, and this repeatedly until they reach the end, where those people reside who use the Word to defend those tenets. And because they cannot help but falsify the Word then, their huts vanish, and they see themselves in a desert; and at that point they undergo such experiences as described in no. 153 above.

There is also another abyss beneath that abyss, where the residents are people who have similarly argued for justification and salvation by faith alone, but who within themselves, in their spirit, have denied God, and at heart have laughed at the sanctities of the church. They do nothing but argue there, tearing their garments, climbing up on the tables, stamping their feet and battling each other with invectives. And because no one is permitted to do physical harm there, they threaten vocally and shake their fists.

The environment there is unclean and squalid. But this a subject for another time.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #486

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486. Predestination is the offspring of the faith of the church at the present time, because it is the product of a belief in man's utter impotence and lack of choice in spiritual matters. It results from that belief and also from man's, so to speak, lifeless conversion, that he is like a block of wood, and that he has therefore no way of telling whether the block is brought to life by grace or not. For it is said that one is chosen purely as an act of God's grace without any activity on one's part, whether derived from one's natural powers or one's reason. Being chosen takes place where and when God wills, that is, at His good pleasure. The deeds which follow faith as its evidences are to the eyes of one who reflects like the deeds of the flesh; and the spirit which brings them about does not display their origin, but makes them the subject of grace or good pleasure, just as faith is.

[2] These considerations make it plain that the dogma of the present-day church concerning predestination has emerged from this source, like a shoot from a seed. I can assert that it stemmed from that belief as an almost inevitable consequence; an event which first happened with the Predestinarians, starting with Gottschalk 1 , then with Calvin and his followers, and was finally established firmly by the Synod of Dort 2 . Afterwards it was imported by the Supralapsarians and Infralapsarians into their church as an ensign of religion, or rather like the head of the Gorgon or Medusa engraved on the shield of Pallas.

[3] But what more hurtful idea could be thought up, or what more cruel belief could anyone hold about God, than that some of the human race are predestined to damnation? It would be cruel to believe that the Lord, who is love itself and mercy itself, could wish a large number of people to be born destined for hell, or that hundreds of millions are born lost souls, that is, born devils and satans; and that the Lord did not of His Divine wisdom, which is infinite, and does not take care that those who live a good life and acknowledge God are not cast into the fire and everlasting torment. In fact, the Lord is the creator and saviour of all; He alone guides all and wishes no one's death. Could therefore anything more horrifying be believed or thought than that a group of nations and peoples under His control and gaze should be predestined to be handed over as prey to the devil, to fill his maw? Yet this is the offspring of the faith of the present-day church. The faith of the new church recoils from this as a monstrosity.

Footnotes:

1. A German theologian of the 9th century.

2. A conference held at Dordrecht in 1618-19 which condemned the belief of the Arminians, and upheld Calvin's doctrine of predestination.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.

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