be revealed; it is meant by "the white horse" on which He who sat was
called the Word of God and was Lord of lords and King of kings (on this
see the little work _The White Horse)._ That by the Holy Jerusalem a new
church is meant which was to be established then by the Lord may be seen
in _Doctrine of the New Jerusalem about the Lord_ (nn. 62-65).
[5] It is clear, then, that the spiritual sense of the Word was to be
revealed for a new church which should acknowledge and worship the Lord
alone, hold His Word sacred, love divine truths and reject faith
separated from charity. More about this sense of the Word may be seen in
_Doctrine of the New Jerusalem about Sacred Scripture_ (nn. 5-26 and
following numbers); what the spiritual sense of the Word is (nn. 5-26);
that a spiritual sense exists in all of the Word in general and in detail
(nn. 9-17); that by virtue of the spiritual sense the Word is divinely
inspired and holy in every expression (nn. 18, 19); that until now the
spiritual sense has been unknown, and why it was not revealed before (nn.
20-25); and that henceforth that sense will be open only to one who is
in genuine truths from the Lord (n. 26).
[6] It may be evident from these propositions that it is by the Lord's
divine providence that the spiritual sense has lain concealed from the
world until the present day and been kept meanwhile in heaven with the
angels, who draw their wisdom from it. This sense was known and treasured
among ancient peoples who lived before Moses, but when their descendants
converted the correspondences, of which their Word and hence their
religion solely consisted, into various idolatries, and the Egyptians
converted them into magic, by the Lord's divine providence this sense was
closed up, first with the Israelites and then with Christians for the
reasons given above, and is now opened for the first time for the Lord's
new church.
265. _Doubt may arise against divine providence in that it has been
unknown hitherto that to shun evils as sins is the Christian religion
itself._ That this is the Christian religion itself was shown in
_Doctrine of Life for the New Jerusalem,_ from beginning to end; and as
faith separated from charity is the one obstacle to its being received,
that also was treated of. We say that it has not been known that to shun
evils as sins is the Christian religion itself, for it is unknown to
nearly everyone; yet everyone does know it, as may be seen above
(n. 258). Nearly all are ignorant of it because faith separate has
obliterated knowledge of it. For this faith declares that it alone saves
and not any good work, that is, any good of charity; also that men are no
longer under the yoke of the law, but are free. Those who have frequently
heard such teaching no longer give thought to any evil of life or any
good of life. Everyone, moreover, is inclined by nature to embrace such
teaching, and once he has done so he no longer thinks about the state of
his life. This is why it is not known that shunning evils as sins is the
Christian religion itself.
[2] That this is unknown was disclosed to me in the spiritual world. I
have asked more than a thousand newcomers from the world whether they
knew that to shun evils as sins is religion itself. They said that they
did not and that it was a new idea which they had not heard before, but
had heard that they cannot of themselves do good and that they are not
under the yoke of the law. When I inquired whether they knew that a man
must examine himself, see his sins, repent and begin a new life and that
otherwise sins are not remitted, and if sins are not remitted, men are
not saved; and when I reminded them that this was read out in a deep
voice to them each time they observed the Holy Supper, they replied that
they paid no attention to that but only to this, that they have remission
of sins by the sacrament of the Supper and that faith effects the rest
without their knowing it.
[3] I asked again, Why have you taught your children the Decalog? Was it
not that they might know what evils are sins to be shunned? Was it only
that they might know and believe, but do nothing? Why is it said that
this is new? To this they could only reply that they know and yet do not
know, and that they never think of the sixth* commandment when they
commit adultery, or about the seventh when they steal or defraud
secretly, and so on, and still less that such acts are contrary to divine
law, thus contrary to God.
* Swedenborg follows the numbering of the Commandments customary with
Lutherans, as with Roman Catholics.
[4] When I recalled to them many things from the teachings of the
churches and from the Word confirming the fact that to avoid and be
averse to evils as sins is the Christian religion's very self and that
one who does so has faith, they fell silent. They were convinced of it,
however, when they saw that all were examined as to their life and judged
according to their deeds, and no one was judged according to faith apart
from life, for everyone has faith according to his life.
[5] Christendom in large part has not known this because by a law of
divine providence everyone is left to act in freedom according to reason
(on this, above, nn. 71-91 and nn. 101-128); and by another law no one is
taught directly from heaven but by means of the Word and by doctrine and
preaching from it; there are besides all the laws on permission which are
also laws of divine providence. On these see above, n. 258.
274.* _A doubt may be raised against divine providence in that it has not
been known before that a man lives as a human being after death and that
this has not been disclosed before._ It has been unknown because with
those who do not shun evils as sins the belief lies hidden that man does
not live after death. It is of no moment therefore to them whether one
says that man lives after death or will rise again on the day of the last
judgment. If belief in resurrection happens to visit one, he tells
himself, "I shall fare no worse than others; if I go to hell I shall have
the company of many and also if I pass to heaven." Yet all in whom there
is any religion have an implanted recognition that they will live as
human beings after death. Only those infatuated with their own
intelligence think that they survive as souls but not as human beings.
* So numbered in the Latin original.
It may be seen from the following that anyone in whom is any religion has
an implanted recognition that he lives after death as a human being:
1. Who thinks otherwise when he is dying?
2. What eulogizer, mourning the dead, does not exalt them to heaven and
place them among the angels conversing with them and sharing their joy?
Some men are deified.
3. Who among the common people does not believe that when he dies, if he
has lived well he will enter a heavenly paradise, be arrayed in white,
and enjoy eternal life?
4. What priest does not speak so to the dying? And when he speaks so he
believes it, provided he does not think of the last judgment at the time.
5. Who does not believe that his little ones are in heaven and that after
death he will see his wife, whom he has loved? Who thinks that they are
spectres, still less souls or minds hovering in the universe?
6. Who contradicts when something is said about the lot or state of those
who have passed from time into eternal life? I have told many what the
state or lot of various persons is and have never heard anyone protest
that their lot is not yet determined but will be at the time of the
judgment.
7. When one sees angels in paintings or statuary does he not recognize
them as such? Who thinks then that they are bodiless spirits or airy
entities or clouds, as do some of the erudite?
8. Papists believe that their saints are human beings in heaven and
others elsewhere are; so do Mohammedans of their dead; more than others
Africans do, and many other peoples do. Why then do not Reformed
Christians believe it, who know it from the Word?
9. Moreover, as a result of the recognition implanted in everyone, some
men aspire to the immortality of renown. The recognition is given that
turn in them and makes heroes and brave men of them in war.
10. Inquiry was made in the spiritual world whether this knowledge is
implanted in all men; it was found that it is in a spiritual idea
attached to their internal thought, not in a natural idea attached to
their external thought.
It is plain from all this that doubt should not be thrown on the Lord's
divine providence on the supposition that only now has it been disclosed
that the human being continues such after death. It is only the sensuous
in man that wants to see and touch what is to be credited. One who does
not raise his thinking above it is in the dark of night about the state
of his own life.
XIV. EVILS ARE TOLERATED IN VIEW OF THE END, WHICH IS SALVATION
275. If man were born into the love for which he was created, he would
not be in evil, in fact would not know what evil is. For one who has not
been in evil and is not in it, cannot know what it is; told that this or
that is evil, he would not believe it. This is the state of innocence in
which Adam and his wife Eve were; that state was signified by the
nakedness of which they were not ashamed; the knowledge of evil
subsequent to the fall is meant by eating of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil. The love for which the human being was created is love to
the neighbor, to wish him as well as one does oneself and even better. He
is in the enjoyment of this love when he serves his neighbor quite as
parents do their children. This is truly human love, for in it is what is
spiritual, distinguishing it from the natural love of brute animals. Were
man born into this love, he would not be born into the darkness of
ignorance as everyone is now, but into some light of the knowledge and
hence of the intelligence soon to be his. To be sure, he would creep on
all fours at first but come erect on his feet by an implanted striving.
However much he might resemble a quadruped, he would not face down to the
ground but forward to heaven and come erect so that he could look up.
276. When love of the neighbor was turned into self-love, however, and
this love increased, human love was turned into animal love, and man,
from being man, became a beast, with the difference that he could think
about what he sensed physically, could rationally discriminate among
things, be taught, and become a civil and moral person and finally a
spiritual being. For, as was said, man possesses what is spiritual and is
distinguished by it from the brute animal. By it he can know what civil
evil and good are, also what moral evil and good are, and if he so wills,
what spiritual evil and good are also. When love for the neighbor was
turned into self-love, however, man could no longer be born into the
light of knowledge and intelligence but was born into the darkness of
ignorance, being born on the lowest level of life, called
corporeal-sensuous. From this he could be led into the interiors of the
natural mind by instruction, the spiritual always attending on this. Why
one is born on the lowest level of life known as corporeal-sensuous,
therefore into the darkness of ignorance, will be seen in what follows.
[2] Anyone can see that love of the neighbor and self-love are opposites.
Neighborly love wishes well to all from itself, but self-love wishes
everyone to wish it well; neighborly love wants to serve everyone, but
self-love wants all to serve it; love of the neighbor regards everyone as
brother and friend, while love of self regards everyone as its servant,
and if one does not serve it, as its enemy; in short, it regards only
itself and others scarcely as human beings, esteeming them at heart less
than one's horses and dogs. Thinking so meanly of others, it thinks
nothing of doing evil to them; hence come hatred and vengeance, adultery
and whoredom, theft and fraud, lying and defamation, violence and
cruelty, and similar evils. Such are the evils in which man is by birth.
That they are tolerated in view of the end, which is salvation, is to be
shown in this order:
i. Everyone is in evil and must be led away from it to be reformed.
ii. Evils cannot be removed unless they appear.
iii. So far as they are removed they are remitted.
iv. The toleration of evil is therefore for the sake of the end in view,
namely, salvation.
277. (i) _Everyone is in evil and must be led away from it to be
reformed._ The church knows that there is hereditary evil in man and that
as a result he is in the lust of many evils. Thence it is that he cannot
do good of himself, for evil does only such good as has evil in it; the
evil inwardly in it is that one does good for one's own sake and thus
only for the sake of appearances. It is known that hereditary evil comes
from one's parents. It is said to come from Adam and his wife, but this
is an error; for everyone is born into hereditary evil from his parent,
and the parent from his parent, and so on; thus it is transmitted from
one to another, is augmented and becomes an accumulation, and is passed
to one's progeny. There is therefore nothing sound in man but all is
evil. Who feels that it is evil to love himself above others? Who, then,
knows that this is an evil, though it is the head of evils?
[2] Inheritance from parents, grandparents and great-grandparents is
plain from much which is known in the world, from the fact, for instance,
that households, families and even nations are distinguishable by the
face; the face is also a type of the mind which in turn accords with the
affections of one's love. Sometimes, too, the features of a grandfather
recur in a grandson or a great-grandson. From the face alone I know
whether a person is a Jew or not; likewise of what stock certain persons
are; others no doubt know also. If the affections which spring from love
are thus derived from parents and transmitted by them, evils are, for
these spring from affections. But it shall be told how the resemblance
comes about.
[3] Everyone's soul comes from his father and is only clothed with the
body by one's mother. That the soul is from the father follows not only
from what has been said above, but from many other indications, too; also
from this, that the child of a black man or Moor by a white or European
woman is black, and vice versa; and especially in that the soul is in the
seed, for impregnation is by the seed, and the seed is what is clothed
with a body by the mother. The seed is the primal form of the love in
which the father is--the form of his ruling love with its nearest
derivatives or the inmost affections of that love.
[4] These affections are enveloped in everyone with the honesties of
moral life and with the goodnesses partly of civil and partly of
spiritual life, which are the external of life even with the evil. An
infant is born into this external life and is therefore lovable, but
coming to boyhood and adolescence he passes from that external to the
inner life and at length to his father's ruling love. If this has been
evil and not been moderated and bent by various means by his teachers, it
becomes his ruling love as it was his father's. Still the evil is not
eradicated, but put aside; of this in what follows. Plainly, then,
everyone is in evil.
277 r. It is plain without explanation that man must be led away from
evil in order to be reformed. For one who is in evil in the world is in
evil after he has left the world. Not removed in the world, evil cannot
be removed afterwards. Where a tree falls, it lies. So, too, when a man
dies his life remains such as it has been. Everyone is judged according
to his deeds, not that these are recounted, but he returns to them and
acts as before. Death is a continuation of life with the difference that
man cannot then be reformed. For reformation is effected in full, that
is, in what is inmost and outmost, and what is outmost is reformed
suitably to what is inmost only while man is in the world. It cannot be
reformed afterwards because as it is carried along by the man after death
it falls quiescent and conforms to his inner life, that is, they act as
one.
278. (ii) _Evils cannot be removed unless they appear._ This does not
mean that man must do evils in order for them to appear, but that he must
examine himself, his thoughts as well as his deeds, and see what he would
do if he did not fear the laws and disrepute--see especially what evils he
deems allowable in his spirit and does not regard as sins, for these he
still does. To enable him to examine himself, man has been given
understanding, and an understanding separate from his will, in order that
he may know, comprehend and acknowledge what is good and what is evil,
likewise see the character of his will or what it loves and desires. To
see this his understanding has been given higher and lower or interior
and exterior thought, so as to see from the higher or interior what his
will prompts in the lower or exterior thinking: he sees this quite as he
does his face in a mirror. When he does and knows what is sin, he is
able, on imploring the Lord's help, not to will it but to shun it, then
to act contrary to it, if not freely, then by overcoming it through
fighting it, and finally to become averse to it and abominate it. Then
first does he perceive and also sense that evil is evil and good is good.
This, now, is self-examination--to see one's evils, acknowledge them,
confess them and thereupon desist from them.
[2] But as few know that this is the Christian religion itself, and these
alone have charity and faith and are led by the Lord and do good from
Him, something will be said of those who fail to examine themselves but
still think that they possess religion. They are 1. Those who confess
themselves guilty of all sins but do not search out any one sin in
themselves. 2. Those who neglect the search on religious principle.
3. Those who in absorption with the mundane give no thought to sins and
hence do not know them. 4. Those who favor them and therefore cannot know
them. 5. With all these, sins do not appear and therefore cannot be
removed. 6. Finally, the reason, so far unknown, will be made plain why
evils cannot be removed apart from their being searched out, appearing,
being acknowledged, confessed and resisted.
278 r. But these points will be considered one by one, for they are
fundamentals of the Christian religion on man's part.
First, _of those who confess themselves guilty of all sins, but do not
search out any one sin in themselves._ They say, "I am a sinner. I was
born in sin. From head to foot there is nothing sound in me. I am nothing
but evil. Good God, be gracious to me, pardon, cleanse and save me. Make
me to walk in purity and in a right path"; and more of the kind. And yet
the man does not examine himself and hence does not know any evil, and no
one can shun what he is ignorant of, still less fight against it. After
his confessions he also thinks that he is clean and washed, when
nevertheless he is unclean and unwashed from the head to the sole of the
foot. For the confession of all sins is the lulling of them all to sleep
and finally blindness to them. It is like a generality devoid of anything
specific, which amounts to nothing.
[2] Second: _Those who omit the search in consequence of their religion._
They are especially those who separate charity from faith. They say to
themselves, "Why should I search out evil or good? Why evil, when it does
not condemn me? Why good, when it does not save me? Faith alone, thought
and uttered with trust and confidence, justifies and purifies from all
sin, and when once I am justified, I am whole in the sight of God. I am
indeed in evil, but God wipes it away the moment it is committed and it
no longer appears"; and much else. But who does not see, if he opens his
eyes, that these are empty words, without reality because nothing of good
is in them? Who cannot think and speak so, with trust and confidence,
too, even when he is thinking of hell and eternal condemnation? Does he
want to know anything further about either truth or good? Of truth he
says, "What is truth except that which confirms this faith?" and of good,
"What is good except what is in me from this faith? And that it may be in
me I will not do it as from myself, for that would be self-righteous and
what is self-righteous is not good." So he neglects all until he does not
know what evil is; what then is he to search out and see in himself? Is
it not his state then that a pent-up fire of lusts of evil consumes the
interiors of his mind and lays them waste even to the entrance? He is on
guard only at the door to keep the fire from appearing. After death the
door is opened and the fire appears for all to see.
[3] Third: _Those absorbed with the mundane give no thought to sins,
hence do not know of any._ These love the world above all things and
welcome no truth that would lead them away from any falsity in their
religion. They tell themselves, "What is this to me? It is not to my way
of thinking." So they reject truth on hearing it and if they listen to it
smother it. They do much the same on hearing sermons; they retain some
sayings but not any of the substance. Dealing in this way with truths
they do not know what good is, for truth and good act as one; and from
good which is not linked with truth one does not recognize evil except as
one calls it good also, which is done by rationalizing from falsities. It
is these who are meant by the seed which fell among thorns, of whom the
Lord said:
Other seeds fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up and choked them
... These are they who hear the Word, but the cares of this world and the
deceitfulness of riches choke the Word so that it become unfruitful (Mt
13:7, 22; Mk 4:7, 18, 19; Lu 8:7, 14).
[4] Fourth: _Those who favor sins and therefore cannot know them._ These
acknowledge God and worship Him with the usual ceremonials and assure
themselves that a given evil, which is a sin, is not a sin. For they
color it with fallacies and appearances and thus hide its enormity. Then
they indulge it and make it their friend and familiar. We say that those
who acknowledge God do this, for others do not regard an evil as a sin,
for one sins against God. But let examples illustrate this. A man makes
an evil not to be a sin when in coveting wealth he makes some kinds of
fraud allowable by reasoning which he devises. So does the man who
confirms himself in plundering those who are not his enemies in a war.
[5] Fifth: _Sins do not appear in these men, therefore cannot be
removed._ All evil which does not come to sight nurses itself; it is like
fire in wood under ashes or like matter in an unopened wound; for all
evil which is repressed increases and does not stop until it destroys
all. Lest evil be repressed, therefore, everyone is allowed to think in
favor of God or against God and in favor of the sanctities of the church
or against them, without being punished for it in the world. Of this the
Lord says in Isaiah:
From the sole of the foot even to the head there is no soundness; wound,
and scar, and fresh bruise; they have not been pressed out, nor bound up,
nor softened with oil.... Wash you, make you clean, remove the evil of
your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good. . . .
Then if your sins have been as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; if
they have been red like crimson, they shall be like wool. . . . But if
you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword (Isa 1:6, 16,
17, 18, 20).
To be devoured by the sword signifies to perish by falsity of evil.
[6] Sixth: _The cause, hidden so far, why evils cannot be removed apart
from their being searched out, appearing, being acknowledged, confessed
and resisted._ In preceding pages we have mentioned the fact that all
heaven is arranged in societies according to affections of good, and all
hell in societies according to the lusts of evil opposite to the
affections of good. Each person as to his spirit is in some society, in a
heavenly one if in an affection of good, but in an infernal one if in
some lust of evil. While living in the world man does not know this and
yet as to his spirit he is in some society; otherwise he cannot live; and
by it he is governed by the Lord. If he is in an infernal society, he
cannot be led out of it by the Lord except according to the laws of
divine providence, among which is this also, that a man shall see that he
is there, want to leave, and make the effort himself to do so. One can do
this while in the world but not after death, for then he remains forever
in the society in which he put himself in the world. It is for this
reason that man is to examine himself, see and avow his sins, do
repentance, and thereupon persevere to the close of life. I might
substantiate this to full belief by much experience, but this is not the
place to document the experience.