287. We can also tell that love and wisdom are human by looking at heaven's angels, who are people in full beauty to the extent that they are caught up in love, and therefore in wisdom, from the Lord. The same conclusion follows from what it says in the Word about Adam's being created in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26), because he was created in the form of love and wisdom.

All earthly individuals are born in the human form as to their physical bodies. This is because our spirit, which is also called our soul, is a person; and it is a person because it is receptive of love and wisdom from the Lord. To the extent that our spirit or soul actually accepts love and wisdom, we become human after the death of these material bodies that we are carrying around. To the extent that we do not accept love and wisdom we become grotesque creatures, retaining some trace of humanity because of our ability to accept them.

39. In people love and wisdom appear as two separate attributes; but in themselves they are still in a distinct combination one, since the wisdom in a person accords with his love, and the love in him accords with his wisdom. Wisdom that is not united with its love appears as though it were wisdom, and yet it is not. And love that is not united with its wisdom appears as though it were the love proper to wisdom, even though it is not. For each must take its essence and its life from the other in a reciprocal exchange.

Love and wisdom in a person appear as two separate attributes for the reason that the faculty of understanding in him can be raised into the light of heaven, but not the faculty of loving except to the extent that the person does as he understands. Consequently, any measure of apparent wisdom that is not united with the love proper to wisdom sinks back to the love with which it is united, which may be a love of something other than wisdom, even a love of insanity. For a person may know from wisdom that he ought to do this or that, and still not do it, because he does not love it. However, to the extent that he does do from love what wisdom teaches, to the same extent he is an image of God.