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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

 

Coronis (An Appendix to True Christian Religion) #37

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37. "On a time, when I was meditating on conjugial love, the desire seized my mind of knowing what that love had been like with those who lived in the Golden Age, and what, afterwards, in the succeeding ones which are called the Silver, Copper and Iron ages. And, as I knew that all who lived well in those ages are in the heavens, I prayed to the Lord that it might be permitted me to speak with them and be instructed.

"And, lo! an angel stood by me, and said, 'I am sent by the Lord to be your guide and companion; and I will lead and accompany you, first, to those who lived in the first era, or Age, which is called the Golden.' (The Golden Age is the same as the age of the Most Ancient Church, which is meant by the head of fine gold, on the statue seen by Nebuchadnezzar in a dream - Dan. 2:32- of which we have spoken before.) The angel said, 'The way to them is laborious; it lies through a dense wood, which no one can traverse unless a guide be given him by the Lord.'

[2] "I was in the spirit, and prepared myself for the journey, and we turned our faces to the east; and as we proceeded, I saw a mountain, whose summit towered beyond the region of the clouds. We crossed a great desert, and reached a wood crowded with all kinds of trees, and dark by reason of the dense growth thereof, of which the angel told me beforehand. But that wood was intersected by numerous narrow paths. The angel said that these were so many windings of error, and that unless the eyes were opened by the Lord, and the olive-trees girt about with vine tendrils seen, and the steps led from olive-tree to olive-tree, the traveller would stray into Tartarus. This wood is of such a nature, to the end that the approach may be guarded; for no other race but the primeval one dwells on that mountain.

[3] "After we entered the wood, our eyes were opened, and we saw here and there the olive-trees entwined with vines, from which hung bunches of grapes of a dark-blue colour, and the olive-trees were arranged in perpetual windings; wherefore, we walked round and round as they came into view; and at length we saw a grove of lofty cedars, and some eagles on their branches. When he saw these, the angel said, 'Now we are on the mountain, not far from its summit.'

And we went on; and lo! behind the grove was a circular plain, where were feeding male and female lambs, which were forms representative of the state of innocence and peace of the inhabitants of the mountain.

"We crossed this plain, and lo! there were seen thousands and thousands of tents to the front, and at the sides in every direction, as far as the sight could reach. And the angel said, 'Now we are in the camp where dwell the armies of the Lord Jehovih, for so they call themselves and their habitations. These most ancient people, while they were in the world, dwelt in tents; for which reason they also dwell in them now.' But I said, 'Let us bend our way to the south, where the wiser of them dwell, that we may meet some one with whom we may enter into conversation.'

[4] "On the way, I saw at a distance three boys and three girls sitting at the door of their tent; but as we drew near, both the boys and the girls were seen as men and women of medium height. And the angel said, 'All the inhabitants of this mountain appear at a distance as young children, because they are in the state of innocence, and early childhood is the appearance of innocence.'

"On seeing us, the three men (viri) ran towards us, and said, 'Whence are you, and how have you come hither? your faces are not of the faces belonging to this mountain.'

"But the angel replied, and told the means by which we obtained access through the wood, and the reason of our coming.

"On hearing this, one of the three men invited and conducted us into his tent. The man was clad in a coat of a purple colour, and a tunic of white wool; and his wife was dressed in a crimson robe, and had, underneath, a vest of fine embroidered linen.

[5] "But inasmuch as the desire of knowing about the marriages of the most ancient people was in my mind, I looked at the husband and the wife by turns, and observed as it were a unity of their souls in their faces; and I said, 'You two are one.

"And the man answered, 'We are one; her life is in me and mine in her. We are two bodies, but one soul. There is between us a union like that of the two tents in the breast, which are called the heart and the lungs; she is the substance of my heart, and I am her lungs; but as by heart we here mean love, and by lungs wisdom-we understand the latter by the former on account of correspondence-she is the love of my wisdom, and I am the wisdom of her love. Hence, as you said, there is the appearance of the unity of our souls in our faces. Hence, it is as impossible to us, here, to look in lust upon the wife of a companion, as it is to look at the light of our heaven from the shade of Tartarus.'

"And the angel said to me, 'You hear now the speech of these angels, that it is the speech of wisdom, because they speak from causes.'

[6] "After this conversation, I saw a great light on a hill among the tents, and I asked, 'Whence is that light?'

"He said, 'From the sanctuary of our tabernacle of worship.'

"I enquired whether it was allowed to approach; and he said that it was. Then I drew near, and saw the tabernacle exactly according to the description without and within, of the Tabernacle which was set up for the Sons of Israel in the wilderness, the form of which was shown to Moses on Mount Sinai (Exod. 25:40; 26:30). I asked, further, 'What is there within, in its sanctuary, whence so great a light proceeds?'

"And he answered, 'There is a tablet, on which is written, "THE COVENANT BETWEEN THE LORD JEHOVIH AND HEAVEN."' He said no more.

"Then, also, I questioned them about the LORD JEHOVIH, whom they worship; and I said, 'Is He not God the Father, the Creator of the universe?'

"And they replied, 'He is; but, by the Lord Jehovih we understand Jehovah in His Human; for we are not able to look upon Jehovah in His inmost Divinity, except through His Human': and then they explained what they understood, and also what at this day they understand, by the

Seed of the woman trampling the serpent's head (Gen. 3:15);

namely, that the Lord Jehovih would come into the world, and redeem and save all who believed on Him, and who would believe thereafter.

"When we had finished this conversation, the man ran to his tent, and returned with a pomegranate in which was a vast number of golden seeds, which he presented to me, and I brought away: this was a token that we had been with those who lived in the Golden Age." [See the little work on CONJUGIAL LOVE , n. 75.] - For an account of the heavens of the remaining Churches which succeeded the Most Ancient, in their order, see in the same little work on CONJUGIAL LOVE (n. 76-82).

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #78

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78. The third experience.

The next day an angel came to me from another community in heaven and said, 'We have heard in our community that because of your thoughts about the creation of the universe you were sent for to a community near ours; and there you gave a lecture on creation, which they applauded and have since taken great pleasure in. Now I am going to show you how animals and plants of every kind were produced by God.'

So he took me into a broad, green plain and said, 'Look around you.' I did so and saw birds of the most beautiful colours, some in flight, some sitting on trees and some on the level plucking petals from roses. Among the birds there were also doves and swans. When these had vanished from my sight, I saw not far away flocks of sheep with their lambs, of goats both male and female, and around these flocks I saw herds of cattle with their calves, as well as of camels and mules. In a wood I saw stags 1 with lofty antlers, as well as unicorns.

When I had seen these, the angel said, 'Turn to face east.' There I saw a garden full of fruit trees, oranges, citrons, olives, vines, figs, pomegranates and bushes that produce edible berries.

Then he said, 'Now look to the south.' There I saw crops of various kinds of grain, wheat, millet, barley and beans. Around them were flowerbeds full of roses of beautifully variegated colours. To the north there were woods full of chestnuts, palms, limes, planes and other leafy trees.

[2] When I had seen these, the angel said, 'All the things you have seen are correspondences of the affections of the love on the part of the angels in the neighbourhood;' and he 2 told me to which affections each corresponded. 'Moreover,' he went on, 'not only those but all the other sights that present themselves to our eyes are correspondences; for instance, houses, the furniture in them, tables and food, clothes, even gold and silver coins, the diamonds and other precious stones which wives and girls in the heavens wear for their adornment. From all these things we can tell what each person is like in respect of love and wisdom. The contents of our houses, which serve a purpose, remain there constantly; but in the case of those who wander from one community to another, such things change depending upon the company the people are in.

[3] 'These things have been shown to you so that you can see creation on the scale of the universe reflected in these particular models. For God is love itself and wisdom itself, and His love contains infinite affections, and His wisdom infinite perceptions; all the things to be seen upon earth are correspondences of these affections and perceptions. This is the origin of birds and animals, trees and shrubs, crops and grain, plants and grasses. For God has no extension, but is everywhere in space; so He fills the universe from first to last. Because He is omnipresent, there are such correspondences of the affections of His love and wisdom throughout the natural world. But in our world, which is called the spiritual world, similar correspondences present themselves to those who receive affections and perceptions from God. The difference is that in our world such things are created by God in an instant in accordance with the affections of the angels. But in your world, although their creation is in principle similar, provision has been made for them to be constantly renewed from generation to generation, so that creation is continuous.

[4] 'The reason why in our world creation is instantaneous, but in your world continued a generation at a time, is that the atmospheres and soils of our world are spiritual, while those of your world are natural. Natural objects have been created to serve as clothing for spiritual ones, just as layers of skin clothe the bodies of men and animals, bark and bast clothe the trunks and branches of trees, the pia mater and dura mater and other membranes clothe the brain, sheathes the nerves, the neurilemata their fibres, and so on. That is why everything in your world remains constant, and is regularly repeated year by year.'

'Report,' he added, 'what you have seen and heard to the inhabitants of your world, seeing that up to now they have been in total ignorance of the spiritual world, and without knowing about it no one can know, nor even guess, that in our world creation is continuous, and was similar in your world too when God created the universe.'

After this our talk turned to various subjects, and at length to hell, where none of the sort of things that exist in heaven are to be seen, but only their opposites, since the affections of the love of its inhabitants, which are longings for evil, are the opposite of the affections of love on the part of the angels in heaven. In company with those in hell, and in general in their deserts, there are to be seen birds of the night, such as bats, tawny and horned owls, as well as wolves, leopards, tigers, rats and mice; also poisonous snakes of every kind, dragons and crocodiles. Where there is a grassy stretch, there is an undergrowth of brambles, nettles, thorns and thistles, and some poisonous plants, which come up and disappear by turns. Then there are to be seen only heaps of stones and marshes full of croaking frogs. All of these things too are correspondences, but as was said before, correspondences of the affections of their love, which are longings for evil. Yet such things are not created there by God, nor were they in the natural world, where similar things come into existence. For all things that God created and creates were and are good. But such things arose on earth together with hell, which was composed of human beings who, by turning away from God, became after death devils and satans. But because these frightful subjects began to distress our ears, we turned our thoughts away from them and recalled instead what we had seen in the heavens.

Footnotes:

1. The Latin has 'hinds'.

2. The Latin has 'they'.

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

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