The White Horse Described in Revelation 19, Followed by Material on the Word and Its Spiritual or Inner Meaning Drawn from Secrets of Heaven

Table Of Contents

Concerning the White Horse in the Apocalypse Chapter 19, 1-5

The Word and Its Spiritual or Inner Meaning from Secrets of Heaven, 6

The Word is understood only by people who are enlightened. 7

The Word is understood only by means of a body of teaching drawn from the Word. 8

There is a spiritual meaning in the Word that is known as “the inner meaning.” 9

The inner meaning of the Word is primarily for angels, but it is also for us. 10

There are countless treasures hidden in the inner or spiritual meaning of the Word. 11

The Word was composed using correspondences and therefore representations. 12

The literal meaning or outer form of the Word. 13

The Lord is the Word 14

People who are hostile to the Word. 15

The books that are books of the Word. 16

More on the Word. 17

7. The Word is understood only by people who are enlightened. Our rational capacity cannot grasp things that are divine; it cannot even grasp things that are spiritual unless it is enlightened by the Lord: 2196, 2203, 2209, 2654. This means that only enlightened people can understand the Word: 10323. The Lord makes it possible for people who are enlightened to understand what is true and to sort out things that seem contradictory: 9382, 10659. Understood on a literal level, the Word is not consistent and often seems self-contradictory (9025); therefore people who are not enlightened can interpret it and constrain it to support all kinds of opinions and heresies and to favor all kinds of worldly and bodily ¹ loves (4783, 10330, 10400). We gain enlightenment from the Word if we read it out of a love for what is true and good, but not if we read it out of a love for fame, profit, or prestige, and therefore out of a love for ourselves: 9382, 10548, 10549, 10550. We are enlightened if we are committed to living good lives and therefore are affected by what is true: 8694. We are enlightened if our inner self has been opened—that is, if our inner self is capable of being raised into heaven’s light: 10400, 10402, 10691, 10694. Enlightenment is an actual opening of the deeper reaches of our minds as well as a raising of them into heaven’s light: 10330. If we regard the Word as holy, then without our knowing it something holy flows in from within us—that is, through our inner self from the Lord: 6789. We are enlightened and see truths in the Word if we are being led by the Lord, but not if we are leading ourselves: 10638. We are being led by the Lord when we love what is true because it is true; that is, when we love to live by divine truths: 10578, 10645, 10829. The Word is brought to life for us depending on the amount of life there is in our love and faith: 1776. The products of a self-oriented intelligence ² have no life in them, because nothing good comes from our self-centeredness: 8941, 8944. We cannot be enlightened if we have thoroughly convinced ourselves of false teachings: 10640.

[2] It is our understanding that is enlightened: 6608, 9300. Our understanding is what receives truth: 6222, 6608, 10659. For every teaching of the church, how well we understand it depends on the nature of the concepts we have of it in our intellect and in our thinking: 3310, 3825. As long as we are living in this world, our concepts are earthly because we are thinking on an earthly level. However, there are spiritual concepts hidden within them if we are passionately interested in the truth for its own sake, and these concepts become ours after death: 3310, 5510, 6201, 10236, 10240, 10551. If we cannot conceive of something in our intellect and in our thinking, we cannot comprehend it, either: 3825. Our concepts of matters of faith are disclosed in the other life, and angels ³ there see what our concepts are like; we are then united with others in keeping with our concepts, provided that they are rooted in love and affection: 1869, 3310, 5510, 6200, 6201, 8885. This means that the Word is understood only by rational people, since without some concept of a subject and some rational insight, “believing” is only keeping in our memory some statement that we do not comprehend or love. This is not believing: 2533. It is the literal meaning of the Word that is enlightened for us: 3436, 9824, 9905, 10548.

Fotnoter:

9025. 'And a man strikes his companion with a stone or a fist' means the weakening of one [particular truth] by some factual truth or by some general truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'striking' as injuring, dealt with in 7136, 7146, 9007, at this point weakening since it refers to truths contained in factual knowledge; from the meaning of 'a stone' as truth, dealt with in 643, 1298, 3720, 3769, 3771, 3773, 3789, 3798, 6426, 8941 - truth on the lowest level of order, that is, within the natural, which is factual truth, 8609; and from the meaning of 'a fist' as general truth. For 'the hand' means the power that truth possesses, 3091, 4931, 7188, 7189, and therefore 'the fist' means full power from general truth. The expression 'general truth' describes what has been received and prevails in all parts. Consequently the words 'striking with a fist' mean with full force and power - in the spiritual sense exerted through truths that spring from good, and in the contrary sense through falsities that arise from evil. Those words are used in the latter sense in Isaiah,

Behold, you fast for quarrel and contention, to strike with the fist of wickedness. Isaiah 58:4.

'Striking with the fist of wickedness' stands for doing so with full force exerted through falsities arising from evil.

[2] What it is to weaken some truth that the Church possesses by means of factual truth or general truth must be explained. The expression 'factual truths' is used to mean truths derived from the literal sense of the Word. General truths derived from there are those which have been accepted by ordinary people and as a result occur in everyday conversation. Such truths are very many, and prevail with much force. But the literal sense of the Word is for simple people, for those who are being introduced into more internal truths of faith and for those who do not understand internal ones. For that sense accords with what a person ruled by the senses sees, that is, it accords with that level of understanding. This explains why statements that are dissimilar, seemingly contradicting one another, appear many times there. In one place, for example, it may say that the Lord leads into temptation, in another that He does not; in one that the Lord repents, in another that He does not; in one that in His actions the Lord is moved by anger and wrath, in another by pure forbearance and mercy; in one that souls are presented for judgement immediately after death, in another at the time of the last judgement; and so on. Because such statements are derived from the literal sense of the Word they are called factual truths; and they are different from the truths of faith that compose the teachings of the Church. For the truths of faith arise out of the literal statements through explanation of them; for when they are explained a member of the Church is taught that such statements occur in the Word on account of people's level of understanding and in accordance with the appearance. So it is also that in very many instances the teachings of the Church depart from the literal sense of the Word. It should be realized that the genuine teachings of the Church are what the expression 'internal sense' describes at this point; for the internal sense contains truths such as angels in heaven possess.

[3] Among the priests and the members of the Church there are those who teach and learn the Church's truths from the literal sense of the Word, and there are those who teach and learn them from teachings drawn from the Word, called the Church's doctrine of faith. The perception of the second group is very different indeed from that of the first; yet ordinary people cannot tell them apart because both groups speak from the Word in almost the same way. However those who teach and learn solely the literal sense of the Word without guidance from the teachings of the Church grasp no more than matters that concern the natural or external man, whereas those guided by genuine teachings drawn from the Word understand in addition the matters that concern the spiritual or internal man. The reason for this is that the Word in the external or literal sense is natural, but in the internal sense it is spiritual. In the Word the first is called 'the cloud', but the second 'the glory in the cloud', 5922, 6343 (end), 6752, 8106, 8781.

[4] From all this one may now see what is meant by contention among them regarding truths, and by a weakening of one [particular truth] by some factual truth or some general truth. A factual or a general truth is a truth derived from the literal sense of the Word, as has been stated; and since they are dissimilar and seemingly contradictory, sometimes they cannot do other than weaken the spiritual truths that constitute the teachings of the Church. They are weakened when doubt enters a person's thinking because places in the Word say the opposite of one other. This state regarding the truths of faith as they exist with a person is the subject here in the internal sense.