247. Of the Ancient Churches.

The first and Most Ancient Church on this earth, which is described in the first chapters of Genesis, was a celestial church, and the chief of all the rest (n. 607, 895, 920, 1121-1124, 2896, 4493, 8891, 9942, 10545). Of the quality of those in heaven who belonged to it (n. 1114-1125). They are in the highest degree of light (n. 1116-1117). There were various churches after the flood, called in one word, the Ancient Church, concerning which (n. 1125-1127, 1327, 10355). Through how many kingdoms of Asia the Ancient Church was extended (n. 1238, 2385). The quality of the men of the Ancient Church (n. 609, 895). The Ancient Church was a representative church, and its representatives were collected into one by certain men of the Most Ancient Church (n. 519, 521, 2896). The Ancient Church had a Word, but it was lost (n. 2897). The quality of the Ancient Church when it began to decline (n. 1128). The difference between the Most Ancient and the Ancient Churches (n. 597, 607, 640-641, 765, 784, 895, 4493). The Most Ancient Church and the Ancient were also in the land of Canaan, and hence came the representatives of the places therein (n. 3686, 4447, 4454). Of the church that began from Eber, which was called the Hebrew Church (n. 1238, 1241, 1343, 4516-4517). The difference between the Ancient and the Hebrew Churches (n. 1343, 4874). Eber instituted sacrifices which were wholly unknown in the Ancient Churches (n. 1343). The Ancient Churches agreed with the Christian Church as to internals, but not as to externals (n. 3478, 4489, 4772, 4904, 10149). In the Most Ancient Church there was immediate revelation; in the Ancient Church, revelation by correspondences; in the Jewish Church, by a living voice; and in the Christian Church, by the Word (n. 10355). The Lord was the God of the Most Ancient Church, and was called Jehovah (n. 1343, 6846). The Lord is heaven, and He is the church (n. 4766, 10125, 10151, 10157). The Divine of the Lord makes heaven, see the work on Heaven and Hell (n. 7-12 and (Heaven and Hell 78-86) 78-86); and thus also the church, since what constitutes heaven with man, constitutes also the church, as was shown in the doctrine above.

4807. CHAPTER 38

In the preliminary section of the previous chapter, in 4661-4664, an explanation was begun of what, in Matthew 25:31-end, the Lord said about judgement on the good and the evil, who are there called the sheep and the goats. What the internal sense of those words is has not yet been explained, but comes up for explanation now in the preliminary sections of this and a couple of chapters ¹ following it. From these explanations it will be clear that by a last judgement in this parable He did not mean a last phase of the world, when - for the first time - the dead will rise again and will be gathered before the Lord and will be judged, but that He meant the last phase of a person passing over from the world to the next life, this point being his time of judgement. This is the judgement He meant. But none of this is seen from the sense of the letter, only from the internal sense. The reason the Lord spoke in the way He did is that He spoke using representatives and meaningful signs, as He has done everywhere else in the Old Testament Word and in the New. For to speak using representatives and meaningful signs is to speak simultaneously to the world and to heaven, that is, both to men and to angels. This kind of speech, being universal, is Divine and therefore proper to the Word. Consequently, those who are in the world and are interested only in worldly matters grasp nothing else from the words spoken by the Lord regarding a last judgement than the idea that everyone's resurrection will take place at one and the same point in time, when the Lord will sit on a throne of glory and address those gathered together there in the words used in the parable. But those who are interested in heavenly matters know that each person rises again at the point in time when he dies, and that the Lord's words in the parable carry the teaching that everyone will be judged according to what his life is, thus that everyone brings his judgement with him because he brings his life with him.

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3751. The preliminary section of the previous chapter explained what the Lord has foretold about the final period of the Church in Matthew 24:15-18. In the preliminary section of the present chapter, in which the same section-by-section method of presentation is adopted, the explanation is given of the words that follow in verses 19-22 of that chapter in Matthew, which are these,

But woe to those who are with child or giving suck in those days! Pray that your flight may not take place in winter or on a sabbath. For then there will be great affliction, unlike any from the beginning of the world until now, or any in the future. And unless those days were cut short, no flesh would be saved; but for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short.