1. The Holy Scripture Throughout Has the Lord As Its Subject, and the Lord Embodies the Word

We read in John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of people. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.... And the Word moreover became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as though of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-5, 14)

Again in the same Gospel:

...the light came into the world, but people loved darkness more than light, for their deeds were evil. (John 3:19)

And elsewhere in it:

While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may be children of light.... I have come as a light into the world, that whoever believes in Me should not abide in darkness. (John 12:36, 46)

It is apparent from this that the Lord is, from eternity, God, and that God Himself is the Lord who was born in the world. For we are told that the Word was with God, and that the Word was God. Also that without Him nothing was made that was made. And later we are told that the Word became flesh, and people beheld Him.

[2] Why the Lord is called the Word is little understood in the church. However, He is called the Word because the term “Word” symbolizes Divine truth itself or Divine wisdom itself, and the Lord embodies Divine truth itself or Divine wisdom itself. That, too, is why He is called the light, which is also said to have come into the world.

Because Divine wisdom and Divine love are united, and were united in the Lord from eternity, therefore we are told as well that “In Him was life, and the life was the light of people.” Life means Divine love, and light Divine wisdom.

This is the union meant by the statement that the Word was in the beginning with God and that God was the Word. With God means in God, for wisdom is present in love, and love in wisdom.

So, too, we find elsewhere in John:

...Father, glorify Me with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. (John 17:5)

“With Yourself” means in Yourself. That, too, is why we are told, “And God was the Word.” And elsewhere that the Lord is in the Father, and the Father in Him, and that He and the Father are one.

Now because the Word is the Divine wisdom accompanying Divine love, it follows that it is Jehovah Himself, thus the Lord, by whom all things were made that were made, inasmuch as they were all created out of Divine love by means of Divine wisdom.

9327. 'I will send My terror before you' means the terror felt, on account of truths springing from good, by those immersed in evils arising from falsity. This is clear from the meaning of 'terror' as the terror felt by those immersed in evils that arise from falsity; and from the meaning of 'the children of Israel', before whom the terror would be sent, as those governed by spiritual good, which is truth springing from good, dealt with in 5803, 5806, 5812, 5817, 5819, 5826, 5833, 7957, 8234, 8805. The nations in the land of Canaan who would feel terror on account of the children of Israel mean evils arising from falsity and falsities arising from evil, see 1413, 1437, 1573, 1574, 1607, 1868, 4517, 6306, 8054, 8317. So it is that 'I will send My terror before you' means the terror felt by those immersed in evils arising from falsity, on account of truths springing from good. The implications of all this are that all power in the spiritual world is provided by truths that spring from good, thus by truths that emanate from the Lord.

[2] This is made perfectly clear by the consideration that the Lord arranges into order all things in heaven and all things in hell, as well as all things in the world, by means of truths coming from Him. For Divine Truth emanating from the Lord is the actual means by which all things are brought into being and by which all things are kept in being. This is incomprehensible to those who think on solely a material level, as those people do who attribute the origin and continued existence of all things to natural forces. These people cannot have any other idea about truths than this, that truths do not possess any power because they are solely objects of thought, and thought is not seen by them to be an essential entity, still less something substantial, ¹ even though they know that thought controls the whole body and causes individual parts to move in exact accord with its own disposition. Nor also do they see that in the whole of creation nothing exists which lacks connection with truth that springs from good. Regarding truth, that it holds all power within it and is a supreme essential entity, see 8200. From all this it is evident that angels possess power which they receive from God's truth that emanates from the Lord, and that this is why they are called 'powers'. As regards the nature of truths that spring from good, that is, of truths coming from the Lord, see my experience involving the arm which corresponds to such truth, spoken of in 4932-4935.

[3] Since all power belongs to truth it follows that no power whatever resides in falsity arising from evil, since it is an absence of truth springing from good, and so is an absence of power. Therefore also those in hell, since all there are steeped in falsities arising from evil, have absolutely no power at all. This being so, thousands of them can be rebuffed, thrown down, and dispelled by a single angel, almost exactly as fluff in the air can be by a puff from the mouth. From this one may see the reason for the terror felt by those steeped in falsities arising from evil on account of truths springing from good. This terror is called 'the terror of God' in Genesis 35:5; Job 13:21; and in Ezekiel,

I will put My terror in the land of the living, when he had been made to lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with those slain by the sword, Pharaoh and all his multitude. Ezekiel 32:32.

And in Moses,

If you despise My statutes, and if your soul abhors My judgements, so that you do not do all My commandments, I will inject dismay into their heart, that the sound of a driven leaf may pursue them, and they may flee, like flight from the sword, and they may fall without [anyone] pursuing. Leviticus 26:15, 36.

This describes the terror experienced by those who despise and reject statutes, judgements, and commandments, thus that felt by those who are immersed in evils arising from falsity and in falsities arising from evil. It says that 'the sound of a leaf will pursue them, and they will flee, like flight from the sword'; and the reason why it says this is that 'a leaf' means truth, 885, and 'the sword' truth engaged in conflict against falsity arising from evil, 2799, 6353, 8294. The fact that those people possess absolutely no power at all against truth is meant by 'they will fall without [anyone] pursuing'.

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