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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

 

True Christian Religion #112

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112. The third experience.

I once woke up around dawn and went out into the garden in front of my house. I watched the sun rising in its splendour, and around it I saw a halo, first of all narrow and later projecting further, shining as if made of gold, and under its lower edge a cloud coming up, which glittered with the sun's fire like a ruby. This then led me to think about how the earliest people had legends which described the Dawn as having wings made of silver feathers and carrying gold in her mouth.

While my mind was taking pleasure in these thoughts, I passed into the spirit, and heard some people talking to one another. 'I wish,' they were saying, 'we could talk with that original thinker who has thrown the apple of Strife among the leaders of the church; many laymen have run after it, picked it up and held it before our eyes.' They meant by that apple my little book entitled: A BRIEF EXPOSITION OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE NEW CHURCH. 'It is a new doctrine never before thought up, designed to divide the church,' they said. I heard one of them cry out: 'Divisive indeed, it is heretical!' But some of the bystanders answered: 'Be quiet, hold your tongue; it is not heretical. It quotes a large number of sayings from the Word which those who live with us - we mean laymen - pay attention to and support.'

[2] On hearing this, since I was in the spirit, I went up to them and said: Here I am. What is the trouble?'

At once one of them, a German as I learned later, a native of Saxony, said in an authoritative tone of voice: 'How have you the nerve to upset the mode of worship established for so many centuries throughout the Christian world, namely, the invocation of God the Father as the Creator of the universe, and of His Son as Mediator, and of the Holy Spirit as Worker? You are banishing the first and the last God from our Trinity of Persons, although the Lord Himself says: "When you pray, pray like this: Our Father, who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come." Is this not an instruction to us to invoke God the Father?'

This speech produced silence, and all his supporters took up their stand like the brave fighters on warships when the enemy fleet comes into view, ready to shout: 'Now let us fight, victory is surely ours.'

[3] So I began my speech by saying: 'You all know that God came down from heaven and became man, because we read: "The Word was with God and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh." You know all of you,' and here I looked hard at the Evangelical party, to which the spokesman who had addressed me belonged, 'that in Christ who was born of the Virgin Mary God is man, and man is God.' There was an uproar from the assembly at this, so I said: 'Do you not know this? It is in accordance with the doctrine of your sect called the Formula of Concord; it states this and adds many proofs in support of it.'

Then the spokesman turned to the assembly and asked whether they knew this. They replied: 'We paid too little attention to what that book says about the Person of Christ; but we worked hard at the section on justification by faith alone. Still, if that is what it says, we are content.' Then one who could remember it said: 'Yes, it does say that; and it adds further that Christ's human nature was raised to Divine majesty and all its attributes, and also that Christ is seated in Divine majesty at the right hand of His Father.'

[4] When they heard this, they fell silent. So having got them to agree to this, I said: 'If this is so, is not the Father then the Son, and the Son also the Father?' But since this again offended their ears, I went on: 'Listen to the Lord's actual words, and if you paid no heed to them before, do so now. He said: "The Father and I are one; the Father is in me and I in the Father; Father, all things of mine are yours, and all of yours are mine; He who sees me sees the Father." How can you understand these sayings, except as meaning that the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father, and that they are one like soul and body in man, so they are one Person? You will find that this is part of your faith too, if you believe the Athanasian Creed, which says something very much like this. But take from what I have quoted just this one utterance of the Lord: "Father, all things of mine are yours, and all of yours are mine." What does this mean, if not that the Father's Divine belongs to the Son's Human, and the Son's Human to the Father's Divine? Consequently in Christ God is man and man is God, and thus they make one as soul and body make one.

[5] Everyone can say the same things about his soul and body. Each person can say: all things of yours are mine, and all of mine are yours; you are in me and I in you; he who sees me sees you, we are one in person and have one life. The reason is that the soul pervades the whole and every part of the person, for the life of the soul is the life of the body, and is possessed by them in common. It is plain from this that the Father's Divine is the Son's soul, and the Son's Human is the Father's body. Where can a son's soul come from, if not from his father, and where can his body come from, if not from his mother? When we say the Father's Divine we mean the Father Himself, since He and His Divine are the same; this is also one and indivisible. The truth of this is established by the words with which the angel Gabriel addressed Mary: "The power of the Most High will overshadow you, and the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the holy thing that shall be born of you shall be called the Son of God." Shortly before He is called "the Son of the Most High," and elsewhere "the only-begotten Son." You, however, who call Him only the Son of Mary, destroy the idea of His divinity; but the only ones who do this are some of the learned clergy and well-educated laymen, who, when they lift their thoughts above the level of the bodily senses, have in view the enhancement of their reputations. This not only casts a shadow, but actually puts out the light, through which the glory of God comes in.

[6] 'But let us go back to the Lord's Prayer, which says: "Our Father, who art in the heavens, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come." Those of you who are present here understand by these words the Father in His Divine alone; but I understand Him in His Human, and this too is the Father's name. For the Lord said: "Father, glorify your name," that is, your Human. When this happens, the kingdom of God comes. The instruction to use this prayer has been given us for the present time, that is, so that God the Father may be approached through His Human. The Lord also said: "No one comes to the Father except through Me," and the prophet said: "A child is born for us, a Son is given to us, whose name is God, Hero, the everlasting Father;" and elsewhere: "You, Jehovah, are our Father, your name is our Redeemer from of old." There are thousands of other passages where the Lord our Saviour is called Jehovah. This is the true explanation of those words in the Lord's Prayer.'

[7] On finishing this speech I looked at them and noticed that their faces had changed in accordance with the change in their mental state. Some of them supported me and were watching me; some did not, and they turned their faces away. Then I saw on the right a pearly-coloured cloud, and on the left a murky cloud, from both of which rain was falling. The rain from the dark cloud was like a shower in late autumn, that from the other like dew in early springtime. Then suddenly I passed from the spirit into the body, and so returned from the spiritual world into the natural one.

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

True Christian Religion #385

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385. I shall here add accounts of some experiences, of which this is the first.

An angel once said to me: 'You want to see clearly what faith and charity are, and so what faith is when separated from charity, and what it is when joined to charity; I will give you a visual demonstration.'

'Please do,' I replied.

'Instead of faith and charity,' he said, 'think of light and heat, and you will see clearly. Faith in its essence is truth belonging to wisdom, and charity in its essence is affection belonging to love. In heaven truth belonging to wisdom is light, and affection belonging to love is heat. The light and heat the angels enjoy are essentially this and nothing else. From this you can see clearly what faith separated from charity is like, and what faith joined to charity is like. Faith separated from charity is like light in wintertime, and faith joined to charity is like light in springtime. Light in wintertime, being light without heat but combined with cold, completely strips the trees of their leaves, kills off the grass, makes the ground hard and freezes water. But light in springtime, being light combined with heat, makes the trees grow, putting forth first leaves, then flowers, and finally fruits; it opens up and softens the ground, to bring forth grass, plants, flowers and shrubs, and it also melts the ice so that water flows from springs.

[2] 'It is exactly the same with faith and charity: faith separated from charity makes everything die off, and faith combined with charity makes everything come to life. This coming to life, as well as that dying off, can be seen actually happening in our world, the spiritual one, because here faith is light and charity is heat. For where faith is combined with charity, there are parkland gardens, flower-gardens and shrubberies, the more beautiful, the more closely they are combined. But where faith is separated from charity, not so much as grass grows; and any patch of greenery is produced by thorns and briars.'

Not far off were standing some clergymen, whom the angel called believers in men's justification and sanctification by faith alone, as well as mystery-mongers. We told them the same and demonstrated it to them so that they could see that it was so. When we asked whether it was not so, they turned their backs and said, 'We did not hear.' But we shouted at them and said, 'So listen to it again.' However, then they put both hands over their ears and cried: 'We do not want to hear.'

[3] After hearing this I spoke with the angel about faith on its own and said that I had been allowed to know by personal experience that that sort of faith is like the light of wintertime. I told him how for some years past spirits who had different kinds of faith had passed by me; and whenever those who had separated faith from charity came near, such a chill attacked my feet, and then by degrees my loins and finally my chest, that I hardly knew otherwise than that all the vitality in my body was going to be extinguished. This would actually have happened, if the Lord had not driven those spirits away and freed me.

It seemed to me surprising that those spirits did not in themselves feel any chill, as they admitted. So I compared them to fish under ice, for they too do not feel any chill, since their life and thus their nature is essentially so cold. I perceived then that this chill spread from the deceptive light of their faith, much like that which rises after sunset from marshy and sulphurous ground in midwinter. Travellers in all parts see this deceptive, cold light.

They can be compared with the icebergs which are torn from their places in arctic lands and are carried hither and thither on the ocean. Of these I have heard it said, that on their approach the crews of ships all shiver with cold. Groups of spirits whose faith is separated from charity can therefore be likened to these icebergs, and if you like you can so call them.

It is well known from the Word that faith without charity is dead; but I will say why it dies. It dies of cold, and this kills off faith like a bird in a severe winter. First of all its sight goes, and at the same time its ability to fly; finally its breathing stops, and it falls headlong off the branch into a snowy grave.

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

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