1594. It follows from this that they separated, a man from his brother, means that those things separate. It was said above at verse 8 what a man who is a brother is, namely, unity [§1578]. So separating themselves, a man from his brother, is division.

People do not know what divides the outer self from the inner, and the reasons are many. One is that they do not realize (or if they have heard, do not believe) that any inner self exists. Another is that they do not realize (or if they have heard, do not believe) that self-love and its desires are what divide; so do materialism and its desires, although not as much as self-love.

[2] The reason they do not realize (and if they have heard, do not believe) that any inner self exists is that they live enmeshed in their body and senses, which can never glimpse anything deeper. Inner qualities can see what is more superficial, but superficial qualities can never see what is deeper. Take sight as an example. Our inner eye can see what our outer eye sees, but our outer eye could never see what our inner eye does. Again, true understanding and rationality can perceive the existence and nature of bare facts, but the reverse is not true.

Another reason is that they do not believe in a spirit that separates from the body when people die. They barely believe in any inner life at all, which they call the soul. When people who focus on their senses and body think about the separation of the spirit from the body, it strikes them as impossible, because they locate life in the body. They confirm themselves in this view by the argument that brute animals too are alive and yet do not live on after death, and by many other arguments as well. They adopt all these attitudes because they live enmeshed in their body and senses, and this kind of life, regarded in itself, is almost exactly the same as the life of brute animals. The only difference is that people are capable of thinking and of reasoning about subjects that come up; and yet they do not then reflect on this advantage they have over animals.

[3] But this is not the main factor dividing the outer self from the inner, because most people succumb to such disbelief — the best-educated more than the simple.

The chief divisive factor is self-love; materialism too, but not so much as self-love. The reason people are unaware of this is that they live lives devoid of neighborly love, and when they do, they are incapable of seeing that a life of self-love and self-centered cravings is as contrary to heavenly love as it is. In addition, self-love and its cravings then harbor a burning flame that yields pleasure, which touches their life so powerfully that they can scarcely believe it does not constitute eternal happiness itself. As a result, many of them also consider eternal happiness to consist in becoming influential after the life of the body ends, and being waited on by others, even by angels. This despite the fact that they have no interest themselves in serving anyone, unless for the ulterior, selfish motive of having others serve them. They say at the time that they want to serve only the Lord, but this is a lie, because people motivated by self-love want even the Lord to serve them, and the less it happens, the further they withdraw. In their heart, then, they carry the desire to become the Lord themselves and to rule the whole universe. Since most — or rather all — people are like this, you can imagine what kind of reign that would be! Would it not be the government of hell, where each person loves herself or himself more than any other? Such is the inherent character of self-love. All this evidence reveals the nature of self-love. So does the fact that self-love conceals within itself hatred against anyone who does not submit to us as a slave, and that because it conceals hatred, it also conceals vengefulness, cruelty, deceit, and many other unspeakable evils.

[4] Mutual love, however — which is the only heavenly love — consists in not merely saying but admitting and believing that we ourselves are extremely unworthy; that we are vile, disgusting creatures whom the Lord in his infinite mercy is always withdrawing and withholding from hell, although we are always attempting and even begging to throw ourselves headlong into it. The reason we need to admit and believe this is that it is true. We are asked to admit and believe it not because the Lord or any angel wants us to surrender; the aim is to prevent us from puffing up with pride despite the fact that we are like this. It would be like hearing dung claim to be pure gold, or a fly in an outhouse claim to be a bird of paradise. So the more we admit and believe that we are what we are, the more we back away from self-love and self-centered desires and shudder at ourselves. The more we do this, the more we receive heavenly love from the Lord — that is, mutual love, which is the desire to serve everyone. These are the people meant by the least who become the greatest in the Lord's kingdom (Matthew 20:26-27, 28; Luke 9:46, 47, 48).

[5] This evidence shows what the chief means of dividing the outer self from the inner is: self-love. It also shows that the chief means of uniting the outer self to the inner is mutual love, which is absolutely impossible to acquire until self-love withdraws. The two are, after all, diametrically opposed.

Our inner self is simply mutual love. Our actual spirit, or soul, is our intermediate self, which lives on after death. It is organic, ¹ since it is linked to our body while we live in the world. This intermediate self, this soul or spirit of ours, is not our inner self, but the inner self is present within it when mutual love is present. ² The qualities of the inner self are the Lord's, so that our inner self can be said to be the Lord. But as long as angels, or human beings, live a life of mutual love, the Lord gives them a heavenly sense of autonomy, so that for all they can tell they are doing good on their own. As a consequence, the inner self is attributed to them as if it was theirs. However, those who love one another admit and believe that no goodness or truth is theirs but that all of it is the Lord's. The ability to love another as themselves (and more especially to love another more than themselves, if they resemble angels) is a gift from the Lord, as they also admit and believe. This gift and its blessings retreat from their grasp the more they retreat from acknowledging that it is the Lord's.

Footnotes: