1. Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence

Divine Providence Is the Form of Government Exercised by the Lord's Divine Love and Wisdom

To understand what divine providence is--that it is the way the Lord's divine love and wisdom govern us--it is important to be aware of the following things, which were presented in my book on the subject.

In the Lord, divine love is a property of divine wisdom and divine wisdom is a property of divine love (Divine Love and Wisdom 34-39).

Divine love and wisdom cannot fail to be and to be manifested in others that it has created (Divine Love and Wisdom 47-51).

Everything in the universe was created by divine love and wisdom (Divine Love and Wisdom 52, 53, 151-156).

Everything in the created universe is a vessel of divine love and wisdom (54-60 [55-60]).

The Lord looks like the sun to angels; its radiating warmth is love and its radiating light is wisdom (Divine Love and Wisdom 83-88, 89-92, 93-98, 296-301).

The divine love and wisdom that emanate from the Lord constitute a single whole (Divine Love and Wisdom 99-102).

The Lord from eternity, who is Jehovah, created the universe and everything in it from himself and not from nothing (Divine Love and Wisdom 282-284, 290-295). These propositions may be found in the work titled Angelic Wisdom about Divine Love and Wisdom.

83. Angelic Wisdom about Divine Love

Part 2

In the spiritual world, divine love and wisdom look like a sun. There are two worlds, one spiritual and one physical; and the spiritual world does not derive anything from the physical one, nor does the physical one derive anything from the spiritual one. They are completely distinct from each other, communicating only by means of correspondence, whose nature has been amply explained elsewhere. The following example may be enlightening. Warmth in the physical world is the equivalent of the good that thoughtfulness does in the spiritual world, and light in the physical world is the equivalent of the truth that faith perceives in the spiritual world. No one can fail to see that warmth and the goodness of being thoughtful, and light and the truth of faith, are completely distinct from each other.

At first glance, they seem as distinct as two quite different things. That is what comes to the fore when we start thinking about what the goodness of being thoughtful has in common with warmth and what the truth of faith has in common with light. Yet spiritual warmth is that very "goodness," and spiritual light is that very "truth."

In spite of the fact that they are so distinct from each other, though, they still make a single whole by means of their correspondence. They are so united that when we read about warmth and light in the Word, the spirits and angels who are with us see thoughtfulness in the place of warmth and faith in the place of light.

I include this example to make it clear that the two worlds, the spiritual one and the physical one, are so distinct from each other that they have nothing in common, and that still they have been created in such a way that they communicate with each other and are actually united through their correspondences.

146. The divine love and wisdom that emanate from the Lord as the sun and constitute heaven's warmth and light is the emanating Divinity that is the Holy Spirit. I explained in Teachings for the New Jerusalem on the Lord that God is one in both person and essence, consisting of a trinity, and that this God is the Lord. I also explained that his trinity is called Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Divinity as source is the Father, Divinity as human is the Son, and Divinity as emanating is the Holy Spirit.

We say "Divinity as emanating," and yet no one knows why we say "emanating." The reason for this ignorance is that people have not known before that the Lord looks like a sun to angels and that from that sun there issues a warmth that is essentially divine love and a light that is essentially divine wisdom. As long as this remains unknown, people cannot help "knowing" that Divinity as emanating is intrinsic Divinity because it says in the Athanasian doctrine of the Trinity that the Father is one Person, the Son another, and the Holy Spirit another. Now that we know that the Lord looks like a sun, though, we can have an appropriate image of the "Divinity as emanating" that is called the Holy Spirit. We can realize that while it is one with the Lord, it emanates from him the way warmth and light emanate from the sun. This is also why angels are in divine warmth and light to the extent that they are caught up in love and wisdom.

Without this recognition that the Lord looks like a sun in the spiritual world and that his Divinity emanates from him in this way, there is no way for anyone to know what "emanating" means--whether it means simply sharing what belongs to the Father and the Son or simply enlightening and teaching. However, it does not come from enlightened reason if we acknowledge the Holy Spirit as intrinsic Divinity, call it "God," and draw boundaries around it when we know as well that God is both one and omnipresent.