The New Church; What, How, Why/Chapter2
II
HOW
IN ancient times, when the Lord desired to make His will known He chose an angel, filled him with His spirit and presence, and sent him on the Divine errand. Such a one is called in the Word "the angel of the Lord." When by angels He could no longer well effect His purpose, He chose a prophet, and gave him what He should say, do, and write. When He desired to come on earth in the flesh at the first advent, He chose a woman to provide Him a body of flesh in which He might dwell and reveal His nature. In more recent times, when He desired to break the seals of His Word, He chose a man through whose mind and hand He might make known His new revelation, Emanuel Swedenborg was chosen for this purpose.
Let us not think this exceptional. For also when the Lord desired to establish the Israelitish Church, He chose Moses and instructed him, that he might teach and lead the people. Again, when He desired to establish the Apostolic Church, He chose the Apostles, instructed them and sent them out to teach and preach. When He desired any book of the Word to be written, He chose a man to write it. It is perfectly in accord with His known way that He should choose a man to pen the new revelation of truth for His last Church.
Swedenborg lived from 1688 to 1772. About 1745 his spiritual sight was opened, as were the eyes of Elisha's servant when he was given to see the mountain round about Elisha full of horses and chariots; and as John's were, when, in the Isle of Patmos, he saw the heavenly things of Revelation. But Swedenborg's vision was open longer and more fully. Though living in the body in this world, he at the same time for about twenty-seven years lived in the spiritual world, and conversed with spirits and angels there as one of their number. In this way he became acquainted with the order, laws, and life of the spiritual world as we are with this world. This was a mode of instruction and preparation for the work that he was chosen to do. What Swedenborg wrote in pursuance of this preparation constitutes the new revelation of truth from the Lord out of heaven, and is commonly called the Writings of the New Church. They are not from himself, nor any man, spirit, or angel, but from the Lord alone through the instrumentality of Swedenborg's mind and hand, which fact their character fully attests.
1. The Law of Correspondence
The Word is written according to the law of relation between things natural and things spiritual. This relation is the Law of Correspondence. According to it spiritual things flow into, communicate with, and sustain natural things. It is the very law according to which creation itself took place and is now sustained.
This law being applied to the Word shows that the Word is written in pursuance of it, and is thereby so composed that all things of heaven and God are in the Word.
To expound this law adequately would require more space than we can here give. Possibly the briefest way to present an idea of it is by a general statement of its fundamental principles and a few illustrations by the application of them to the Word.
First, there are two great divisions of the created universe, the natural world and the spiritual world. The natural world and its laws and particular forms are exactly like the spiritual world and its laws and particular forms, only with this difference, that the natural world is material while the spiritual world is spiritual.
Let us illustrate in particular. In nature there is a sun that sends out heat and light. All nature is sustained by the sun. In the spiritual world there is a sun also. From it comes heat and light, and all life in the spiritual world is sustained by it. But in the spiritual world the Lord is the sun. The heat that flows from it is love; its light is truths So it is written, "The city has no need of the sun nor of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God did lighten it and the Lamb is the light thereof." The sun in nature is material and its heat and light are material, but in the spiritual world the sun is spiritual because God is a spirit, and the heat and light are spiritual because love and truth are spiritual.
Again, we have conceived of the natural world with its sun shining upon it as the very picture of the spiritual world with the Lord shining upon it with love and wisdom. Now think of the natural universe as the external clothing of the spiritual world and sustained by it part for part, and the basis of the law of correspondence will be laid. For the natural world and its particular forms are but material clothing of corresponding spiritual forms or forces from which they exist.
To illustrate, man has a material body in the natural world sustained by heat and light from the sun. Within the material body part for part is the soul, made of spiritual substances and perpetually bathed by the heat and light of the spiritual world, which are love and wisdom from the Lord. Yet while his body is in nature sustained by heat and light from the sun, and his soul is in the spiritual world likewise under its sun, the spiritual body is within the material body giving life and power to it and every part. In fact, the natural universe is an outbirth of the spiritual world, and is sustained by it just as the body is formed and sustained by the soul within.
So also just as the body is sustained from the soul, just as the natural world is sustained from the spiritual world, the spiritual world is sustained by the Lord.
Now, that law of relation which exists between the soul and the body, between the spiritual world and the natural world, between the Lord and the spiritual world; that law of relation which exists between the Creator and all created things, by means of which life and power flow into created forms from the One Fountain of life, is the Law of Correspondence. 2. Application of the Law to the Word
The law is best understood in its application. In a theme so vast, only a few brief and most limited illustrations can be give here. First we will observe its application in particular instances, and then in a more general way.
The natural body must have bread and water from the earth to sustain it. The spirit must have bread and water from the spiritual world to sustain it. The "bread which cometh down from God out of heaven and giveth life unto the world," is love, from which alone we can have real life in our spirits. The water which the Lord gives that becomes "a well of water springing up into everlasting life," is truth from the Lord, which not only quenches the thirst for knowledge, but also like water washes from defiling evils and makes the heart pure. We are momentarily dependent for true thoughts and good affections upon truth and love—the water and bread of the spirit—from the Lord. The spiritual body lives from the spiritual world spiritually, just as the natural body lives from the natural world naturally. In short, nature with its particular forms and laws is a parable of the spiritual world of corresponding forms and laws from which the former derives existence.
In forming the Word, the Lord, who alone knew this relation because He created things and sustains them, followed this law. That is, He uses man's names of natural things for His names of spiritual things, pursuant to the law of correspondence.
Bread sustains the body. Goodness from the Lord does the same for the soul. So the Lord uses our name of bodily food for His name of spiritual food. He calls His goodness bread. "This is the bread that cometh down from God out of heaven."
Water quenches thirst. It is the great cleansing element. Truth quenches mental thirst, and is the cleansing element of the soul, for only by knowledge can we control disease or shun evils. Truth may be in the form of a great science, vast like a sea. It may be the truth current in our civil institutions or in our daily lives, when it is like rivers. It may come from a deep affection for truth itself, and be like a perennial spring. It may come as if out of the atmosphere, like the dew, and refresh us in our daily toil. In fact, truth may take as many forms as water does upon the earth. So the Lord uses man's names of water in its various forms as His names of corresponding forms of truth. So He says, "My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass." "There is a river whose streams thereof shall make glad the city of God."
There is no good thing that does not have its opposite, for evil is but perverted good. The same word that is used to denote a good or true thing is used also as the name of the opposite evil. The Lord said, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees," by which He meant not their bread, but their false doctrines.
Again, it is written, "The floods have come in unto my soul," "but the Lord is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea."
Here we notice that the floods mean the false doctrine of worldliness.
Love is called fire, because love warms the heart. But the heart may be heated in rage, which heat is called hell fire. The context clearly shows whether a virtue is meant or that virtue perverted, which is its opposite. So throughout the Word as to every jot and tittle.
Now let us observe the law of correspondence in its application to a continuous portion of Scripture.
Genesis is not intended to describe the creation of the material heaven and earth. The earth herself is a book having her history written upon the pages of her strata more fully than pen can tell. Man can search out for himself the history of the earth's formation. God makes revelation of such things as man can not find out for himself by searching. Though the letter of the Word contains the words of man in the form of allegory, parable, history, song, prophecy, and fact, it is from beginning to end a Divine parable reflecting through its letter spiritual things.
"In the beginning" is the commencement of man's regeneration, for the Word treats of spiritual things.
"God created the heavens and the earth" tells us of the two natures in every one, a heavenly nature in correspondence with heaven, and an earthly nature in correspondence with the world. "The earth was without form and void" is descriptive of the lower nature of man before regeneration. The creation of light is the spirit of God first wakening man to the consciousness of heavenly things, which light is spiritual. The first day is the first step in regeneration, the first awakening to the knowledge of the existence of heavenly things.
He divides "the waters under the firmament from the waters above the firmament" when man distinguishes between what is of the world and what is of heaven. This is the second day or second step in the creation of a spiritual man.
This, "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together and let the dry land appear," is when man collects knowledge of heavenly things, his character being yet unproductive as dry land. In this state he sees his needs, and commences to think and act religiously. The things that then first come into his character, such as thoughts of right, good actions, and repentance, are the grass, the herbs, and the tree yielding fruits of repentance. This is the third state in regenerating.
On the fourth day the sun, moon, and stars were created. The sun is God's love that then is felt in power. The moon is faith derived from that love as the moon derives its light from the sun. The stars are heavenly truths. The fourth state of regeneration is when love, faith, and heavenly truths are set in the firmament of the mind to shed their heat and light down upon the earth of man's nature.
Then when these luminaries are set in the heaven of man's nature to rule in his day states and night states, truths become vivified and he delights in them. Such truths are typified by the fishes of the sea and the fowls of the air, and by all that the waters brought forth. This is the fifth state of regeneration.
The sixth day the beasts were created. These highest forms of animal life typify the affections or living things in man. The sixth state of regeneration is when the affections are of faith and animated with love from the Lord.
Then when man has gained dominion over the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air, the fishes of the sea and every creeping thing, which are words for corresponding mental things, or natural affections and thoughts, it is the seventh day or holy sabbath of the spirit. The seventh day man had been created in the image and likeness of God, for by passing successively through these stages, he is regenerated and becomes thereby an image and likeness of God.
This is but the barest outline of what the first chapter of Genesis teaches with all detail and fullness. By the language there used, because nature is a parable of man, and "the invisible things from the foundation of the world are clearly seen by the things that are made," the story opens up with unfathomable depth and divine beauty. This is true not only of Genesis, but throughout the Word, and appears when we see how the Lord clothes spiritual ideas in the words and language of mankind.
Take these same words and apply them to another part of the Word, and they will be observed to be used with the same meaning and in a similar way.
Note the much discussed passage taken from the book of Jasher belonging to a lost Word, "Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou moon in the valley of Ajalon." This was not a violation of natural law, the disarrangement of the universe for a small body of fighting men, but it is a parable of great spiritual facts as surely as is the story of the Prodigal Son.
The battle Joshua was fighting stands for one that we fight in temptation. The sun and the moon standing still, is the continuance of love and faith in our struggle in spiritual night and battle that the victory of redemption may be won.
Again, we read in Acts, that on the day of Pentecost was the fulfillment of the prophecy of Joel," the sun should be turned to darkness and the moon into blood before that great and notable day of the Lord." This did not mean the literal obliteration of the sun and moon, but the destruction of love and faith, which did occur.
Apply the same law of interpretation to Revelation where the same words occur, "A woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars." We have no difficulty in interpreting man's picture of the state of the church or of the world. He pictures it as a woman half clad, clinging to a cross, looking up in agony to a heaven of black, lightning-riven clouds, with a few rays of light breaking through, and at her feet is the storm-beaten, threatening sea. We know that in this picture the woman clinging to the cross and gazing upward is temptation. The clouds are our obscurity, the little light is our hope, the threatening sea is the world of sin. The picture is man's own representation of the Church as it is. Can we not likewise read the Lord's picture of the Church or state of faith that is to be?
Throw this p1cture upon the blue sky as the back ground, "A woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars," and you will have the Lord's representation of an enlightened faith and Church. The woman is the Lamb's bride, the Church, the mother by whom under God we are born again.
The woman clothed with the sun, is the Church clothed with the love of God as its habit. The moon under her feet is the Church established upon truth derived from love. The crown of twelve stars is the Church possessed of all spiritual truths as the regal principle. Continuing, the man child to be born is the Church pregnant with manly principles of life, or in other words, because God is a man, the man child is a complete system of divine, human doctrine. The dragon standing before the woman to destroy the child, is the world of sin. The flood of waters is false reasonings from the dragon, which is they who wage war against them "which keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ." That the woman is to be nourished in the wilderness, tells us that the Church, by which is meant heavenly love and faith in human ministration, will be strengthened in its obscurity and dearth until it shall grow strong and increase, preparatory to bringing mankind into a wise, loving, and holy life.
Do we not now begin to see how the Word is written in God's language clothed in man's words? Do we not see that it is possible for the Word to open up to impenetrable depths and inexpressible glory? Do we not see that it may be so written as to flash forth all truth, not vaguely, but definitely? For the Word is not only a parable in parts, but from beginning to end it is a continued parable setting forth in perfect order all heavenly truths.
Some truths are clearly stated and seen in the letter of the Word. The obscure parts become translucent by the application of the law of correspondence according to which Scripture is written.
We can give here but one more instance of the application of the law to an extensive portion of the Word. This must be very general.
The story of the Israelites in Egyptian bondage, their deliverance, the journey in the wilderness, and final entrance into the Promised Land, though historically true, is none the less a parable. The Lord desired to reveal His relation to mankind, to show the relation of right and wrong to man obedient and disobedient. For this purpose He chose the Israelites and led them upon the great world as a stage for many years that He might dramatize the story of man's redemption.
Because the Egyptians, though skilled in science, were external and worldly, they stand for that bondage to sin in which they were and in which man is born. The long journey to the Holy Land is our experience in life's battle against allurements and evils. The Hivites, Amorites, Hittites, and hostile tribes, stand for the specific evils and falsities in man which respectively dominated them. The wilderness is spiritual barrenness and discouragement, the failure of water and bread, is dearth of truth and love in the mind and heart. The Holy Land where David subdued the enemies of Israel, and Solomon reigned in glory, is our redemption when we have gained the victory over our spiritual enemies and are come into the glory of the promised kingdom of the Lord.
The Gospels tell us of the incarnation of God in Christ, the life of the Lord on earth, His subjugation of the hells, His glorification and unition with the Father. It is all literally true and real. But it is also a parable of grand spiritual facts and laws. For like the Lord every truth that comes to man is begotten of the Father, is conceived in virgin affection, is wrapped in the swaddling clothes of natural ideas, is laid in the manger of the memory, grows and waxes strong in the grace of God to self assertion, is crucified in temptation, is buried in the sepulchre of worldliness before it rises to reign in power and glory over our lives.
So the Word from beginning to end is to be read not as a production of man, but as the Word of God, teaching not historical truths, but spiritual truths, not loosely or by vague, uncertain inference, but with mathematical accuracy and definiteness. For all its teachings, when seen in the light of correspondence, are confirmed by every reason that is and are denied by none.
The letter of the Word then becomes like a translucent stone, reflecting divine truth from the Lord just as a gem does the colors that are in the sun.
3. Things Heard and Seen
In addition to the class of writings that explain the Word, which we have called Exegetical, there are the Supplementary writings. These set forth not only the true philosophy of nature and spirit, the laws of Divine Providence, the doctrine of life, the constitution of the natural universe, but also they present the fundamental facts appertaining to the spiritual world and life there.
We can not in this short space reproduce these things here, for they should be examined in the entirety and completeness of their original presentation.
The spiritual world is no longer a mystery. Having lived consciously in the spiritual world for twenty-seven years, Swedenborg was prepared to tell about that world as would a traveller from a foreign land.
It is often said that we can not know any thing about the spiritual world, because no one has ever returned to tell us about it. The Lord has now made this statement untrue. That we might know about it, He prepared one so that he went to and came back from the spiritual world many times. For, through the providence of the Lord, he was prepared and so constituted that he lived consciously and really in the spiritual world, and could mingle with spirits and angels. From such experience and association, what he reveals as having seen was not seen in vision or dream, but actually as we see and learn the things of this world, and as angels learn the things of the spiritual world. Swedenborg by the direction of Providence wrote down for the Church on earth the things heard and seen. Not only are these rational and interesting, but they throw great light upon the Word. For that holy book is written with full implication of the spiritual world being as Swedenborg has described it. He gives us the three great divisions of that world, Heaven, Hell, and the Intermediate World of Spirits. He shows the relation that these bear to each other, which the Word implies. He discloses their relation to man and to this world, which relation the Word clearly assumes. What is written in this regard is rational, consistent with all we know and in harmony with the Word. In fact the Word is so written that in it is every truth of doctrine, consequently every truth of doctrine stated in the Writings of the Church can be found there. What is written in this regard, to the spiritual minded, proves the Word and the Word proves it.