Heaven Revealed/Chapter 20

by Benjamin Fiske Barrett

XX.

GARMENTS IN HEAVEN.

ANOTHER question which people are inclined to ask about heaven, is: Are the angels clad in garments? If so, are they all clothed alike? And if not alike, upon what does the diversity depend? What determines the character and quality of their garments? The following are Swedenborg's answers to these questions:

"Since angels are men, and live together in society like men on earth, therefore they have garments. . . . Their garments correspond to their intelligence. Therefore all in heaven appear clothed according to their intelligence; and because some excel others in intelligence, therefore they have more excellent garments. The most intelligent have garments that glitter as from flame, and some have garments that shine as from light. The less intelligent have bright and white garments without splendor; and the still less intelligent have garments of different colors.

"Since the garments of the angels correspond to their intelligence, therefore they correspond also to truth, for all intelligence is from divine truth. Therefore whether we say that angels are clothed according to intelligence or according to divine truth, it is the same thing. The garments of some glitter as from flame; and those of others shine as from light, because flame corresponds to good, and light to truth derived from good. The garments of some are bright and white without splendor, and those of others are of diverse colors, because the divine good and truth are less refulgent, and also variously received, with the less intelligent.

"That the garments of the angels do not merely appear as garments, but that they really are garments, is manifest from these considerations: that they not only see them, but also feel them; that they have many garments; that they take them off and put them on; that they lay aside those which are not in use, and when they come into use again they resume them. That they are clothed with a variety of garments I have witnessed a thousand times. I inquired whence they obtained them, and they told me from the Lord; that they received them as gifts, and that they are sometimes clothed without knowing how. They also said that their garments are changed according to the changes of their state; that in the first and second states they are bright and shining, and in the third and fourth states rather more dim; and that this also is from correspondence, because their changes of state are changes as to intelligence and wisdom.

"Since every one in the spiritual world is clothed according to his intelligence, thus according to the truths from which his intelligence is derived, therefore those in the hells, being without truths, appear only in torn, squalid and miserable garments, each one according to his insanity. Nor can they wear any others."—H. H. n. 177-'81.

Here, again, we are told that it is because angels are men, and live together in society like men on earth, that they are clad in garments—the same reason, observe, which was assigned for their dwelling in houses. The argument, brief as it is, when duly considered is seen to be one of immense force. It will bear expansion—requires it, indeed, that its full force may be seen and felt. In its expanded form it may be stated thus:

Man is endowed by his Creator with a certain constitution, physical and moral; and this constitution has its laws. His physical or material organization perishes, but the moral or spiritual, which is the real, never dies. And the laws of his immortal part remain forever the same. And belonging to this part of our nature, even when regenerate, are certain implanted instincts, wants and tendencies. And these must remain so long as man's spiritual constitution remains, or so long as he continues to be man. And while they remain, they impel him in certain directions, and necessitate a certain environment. For example, he is gifted with a social nature which impels him to seek the society of his fellows. And as this tendency belongs to our immortal part, it must exist in the Hereafter, and will therefore necessitate the existence of societies in the spiritual world.

Another of the laws or God-implanted tendencies of our moral nature, is that of spiritual affinity, which impels each one to seek the society of kindred spirits. This law or tendency can never cease until we cease to be human. Its active force in the Hereafter, therefore, necessitates the arrangement of angels and spirits into innumerable societies.

Another of the implanted instincts of our immortal nature, and which will therefore endure so long as the soul endures, is the love of home. And this love necessitates the existence of that visible symbol of home, the house, as the only means of fully satisfying this want of the soul. Hence, we are told, the angels have houses and live in them because they are men, with the wants, affections and tendencies of men, alive and active in them. And for the same reason, also, angels are clad in garments,—because they are men.

Remarks similar to those made respecting houses in heaven, are applicable also to the disclosure about garments there. For these have a moral or spiritual as surely as they have a physical use, even here on earth. They are required for the satisfaction of the soul, no less than for the protection and comfort of the body. Our spiritual nature demands them for the gratification of its God-given wants. And if it calls for them here, it will call for them in the world beyond. If garments on earth were worn merely for the body's comfort and safety, why are they not laid aside when the weather is such that the body does not need them? True, this, or something approaching it, is done in some parts of our world. But what parts? Not where man's higher nature is most developed, and the angel-life in him is most conspicuous, but where this nature is most shriveled and debased—where the angel is most hidden beneath the bestial life, and man approaches nearest to the condition of the brutes.

As some evidence of the moral signification and use of dress among men, see how various are the garments of different people even in the same climate, country, city or village—various in color, form and material. This variety results from the variety of mental states—from a diversity of tastes which is its underlying and efficient cause; and it proves that garments are chosen to gratify an implanted want of the soul not less than an immanent need of the body.

The same truth is further evinced by the well-known fact that the soul of the same individual instinctively craves different garments when in different states. Today you wear one that satisfies the demands of both body and soul. To-morrow some specially sad or joyous event occurs, and the soul requires a different garment—more sombre or more gay according to the nature of the event, and thus corresponding more truly with your mental state. Every one perceives how inappropriate a ball-room dress would be at a funeral,—so inappropriate, indeed, that our best feelings would be disturbed if not shocked by such unfitness. And why? Clearly because there are certain wants of the soul as well as of the body which garments are required to satisfy. And a brilliant dress on a solemn occasion fails to meet this requirement. Why do little children prefer garments of bright and gay colors? Not because these make their bodies more comfortable, but because they better correspond with, and satisfy the requirements of, their gay and gladsome spirits. For a similar reason old age usually prefers garments of grave and sombre colors; for such colors are in close correspondence with the sober thoughts of age, and therefore more satisfying to the soul's requirements.

Why is it, again, that children are so fond of new garments, and love to change their garments so often? While aged people are content to wear the same dress for years, and care little or nothing for change of style or color? The difference in their mental states furnishes the all-sufficient answer. The states of little children—their thoughts and feelings—change quickly and often; while those of the aged are comparatively fixed and stationary.

It is plain to be seen, therefore, that there is a meaning to garments as worn here on earth. They signify and reveal something of the wearer's mental state—which they could not do if they had not a spiritual as well as a natural use to subserve; if they did not meet a want of the soul as well as of the body. The universal human heart has ever had a perception of this truth; for in all ages men have recognized the propriety of different kinds of garments, corresponding to and indicative of different kinds and degrees of intelligence, and different stations and occupations in life. Thus the queen's or emperor's robe, the judge's gown, the bishop's surplice, the soldier's coat, the sailor's jacket, and the cobbler's apron, are cach appropriate to the wearer's function. And if the positions and occupations of men in this world were always according to their intelligence and capabilities, then their garments, being according to each one's use or function, would correspond with and indicate the kind and degree of their natural intelligence,—as in the spiritual world each one's garments correspond with his spiritual intelligence.

To sum up the rational argument for the truth of Swedenborg's disclosure on this subject:

We have ample warrant for affirming that garments, even in this world, subserve a spiritual as well as a natural use; that they are required not less to satisfy the wants and appetencies of the soul, than the immanent needs of the body. And as the soul is immortal, and retains all its wants and appetencies when released from the incumbrance of gross matter, it will desire garments in the spiritual world. And since all lawful desires (and the angels have no others) will be gratified in heaven, therefore its denizens must be clad in garments. And because of that great and universal law which determines the aspect of all outward things in the spiritual world, their garments must correspond to their states of intelligence, and change with the changes of their states as Swedenborg has many times declared.

Let us now look at the Scripture testimony. The Bible makes frequent mention of angels, and always speaks of them as being clothed. Their garments, or the color and aspect of them, are often spoken of. Thus it is said of the angel that rolled the stone away from the door of the sepulchre, that "his countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow." And when the weeping Mary looked into the sepulchre, the record says she saw "two angels in white, sitting, the one at the head and the other at the feet where the body of Jesus had lain." And Luke speaks of these two angels as "two men in shining garments." (xxiv. 4.) And in the Revelation the four and twenty elders are spoken of as "clothed in white raiment." They, also, that stood before the throne and the Lamb, were "clothed in white robes." And "white robes were given to every one of them" that were under the altar. Again it is said that the armies which the seer beheld "in heaven" following Him who was "called Faithful and True," and "on whose head were many crowns," were "clothed in fine linen clean and white." And of him "that overcometh" it is said, "the same shall be clothed in white raiment." (Chs, iii., vi., vii., xiii., xiv., xix.)

The testimony of the Bible, therefore, is ample and conclusive on this subject, and in complete accord with that of reason and the disclosures of the illumined Swede.

Then see how intimately these disclosures are connected with the deeper or heavenly meaning of the Scripture, and what light they throw upon many portions of it. For everything that appears in heaven, is in correspondence with something belonging to angelic minds, and is the visible image thereof. And garments, we are told, correspond to spiritual intelligence, and therefore represent the truths or thoughts that clothe the affections of the wearers.

"Both angels and spirits appear clothed in garments, and every one according to his truth. They who are in genuine divine truths appear clothed in white shining garments; and others in others. Some spirits do not know whence garments come to them, but they are put on while they are ignorant of it. And their garments vary according to the changes of their state as to truths. In a word, their intellectual is what is exhibited and represented by garments; for the intellectual of every one is formed by truths, and becomes of such a quality as are truths from which it is formed. The intellectual appertaining to the angels of heaven is in their internal, hence they have white shining garments; the shining is from the divine good, and the whiteness is from the light of heaven, which is the divine truth. But the garments of those who are in things external without an internal principle, are dirty and tattered, like those of beggars in the streets and of robbers in forests."—A. C. n. 10,536; also n. 5248.

From this we may readily understand the spiritual signification of the garments of Jerusalem, and her comely ornaments; and may see what is meant by the "wedding garment," without which there can be no admission into the heavenly kingdom; and why we are commanded to keep our garments clean, or to guard against their defilement. Thus, in Isaiah we read: "Put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem " (lii. 1). By Jerusalem is meant the Lord's church, viewed individually or collectively. And what are her garments but the truths of wisdom from the Word of God? These are the appropriate clothing of whatever there is of God's love in human hearts. They are, therefore, the beautiful garments of Jerusalem. And when Jerusalem (the individual or collective church) is brought into perfect marriage union with the Lord, and becomes his own, this is the Divine testimony respecting her ornaments and apparel:

"I clothed thee also with broidered work and shod thee with badger's skins; and I girded thee about with fine linen, and covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and put bracelets upon thine hands and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy forehead, and ear-rings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen and silk and broidered work . . . And. . . thy beauty was perfect through my comeliness which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord God." (Ezek. xvi. 10-14.)

All moral or spiritual beauty is the Lord's own comeliness; for it is his own life in the soul of man. He stamps his comeliness on all who become spiritually conjoined to Him through obedience of life, and this it is that makes their souls beautiful. He clothes and adorns their minds with the precious and various truths of his wisdom. These are the beautiful garments and precious jewels wherewith He ever decks Jerusalem his Bride. And in the other world where all the inner qualities of the soul manifest themselves to the outward sense, those who have received the beautiful and precious life of the Lord, appear clad in garments of corresponding beauty.

And when the interiors of the soul are completely laid open—as is the case with all shortly after they enter the other world—or, what is the same, when the Lord comes in with his revealing light and life, it then becomes manifest whether that soul is and has been inwardly a worshiper of self and the world, or of the Lord in his Divine Humanity. If the former, he can have no permanent abode in the kingdom of light, but only in the "outer darkness," however fair and beautiful may have been his outward life and character; but if the latter, he is inwardly wedded to the Lord by love, and his thoughts thence proceeding are thoughts of corresponding truth and loveliness. His mind is clothed with celestial intelligence; he has on "the wedding garment." And from this we may understand the meaning of the parable of the marriage of the king's son (Matt. xxii.), and why it is said that "when the king came in," and "saw there a man not having on a wedding garment," he gave commandment that he be taken away, and "cast into the outer darkness." All divine laws are self-executing. And the soul that has not become internally married to the Lord by a life of obedience to his precepts, is, by its own organic conditions, without the wedding garment, and therefore outside of the Kingdom—unclothed with celestial intelligence—in "the outer darkness."

And so we might extend our illustrations through many pages, showing again the intimate connection between Swedenborg's revealings of the spiritual sense of Scripture, and his disclosures concerning the spiritual world. And we find a similar agreement throughout his writings. Can a coincidence so striking and so often repeated, be the result of mere accident? If so, such a marvelous kind of accident never occurred before or since his time. And if it were an ingenious contrivance of the author, then he (the man of exceptional honesty, simplicity, and child-likeness of character) must be credited with such a degree of ingenuity and cunning as the world never before witnessed—yea, such as the human imagination was never capable of conceiving. Only things that are divinely true, parts of the grand and universal order of God, ever fit into each other in a manner so complete and perfect.

Then look at the practical considerations with which this disclosure, like all the others about heaven, is fraught. The garments of the angels, like their habitations and their whole environment, are indissolubly bound to themselves as effects to their producing cause. The quality and appearance of their dress are in perfect correspondence with their states of life, and change with those states. Their understandings are stored with the beautiful and precious truths of heavenly wisdom. These clothe and adorn their minds, and create for themselves, by the unerring law of correspondence, garments of corresponding worth and beauty visible to the outward eye.

And here, let it be borne in mind (for it is the practical lesson to be learned from this disclosure), we are daily weaving and working for ourselves the garments we shall wear in the great Hereafter. And we can wear no others than those we make, as it were, with our own fingers. If we are sedulously imbibing heavenly intelligence, seeking to have our minds clothed and adorned with the truths of wisdom from the Divine Word, as only those are who are careful to live or do the truths they learn, then we are weaving for our souls garments of heavenly texture and brilliancy. But if we are regardless of the Divine precepts, if we fail to clothe our minds with the truths of wisdom, as do those who neglect to apply these truths to life, then we shall have no garments, or none but filthy and ragged ones, in the Hereafter, to cover the shame of our nakedness. Therefore, saith the Lord: "Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame."