That the Word is holy and Divine from inmosts to outermosts is not
evident to the man who leads himself, but is evident to the man whom the
Lord leads. For the man who leads himself sees only the external of the
Word, and forms his opinion of it from its style; but the man whom the
Lord leads forms his opinion of the external of the Word from the
holiness that is in it.
The Word is like a garden, that may be called a heavenly paradise, in
which are delicacies and charms of every kind, delicacies from the
fruits, and charms from the flowers; and in the middle of it trees of
life, and near them fountains of living water, and round about trees of
the forest, and near them rivers. The man who leads himself forms his
opinion of that paradise, which is the Word, from its circumference,
where the trees of the forest are; but the man whom the Lord leads forms
his opinion of it from the middle of it, where the trees of life are.
The man whom the Lord leads is actually in the middle of it, and looks
to the Lord; but the man who leads himself actually sits down at the
circumference, and looks away from it to the world.
Again, the Word is like fruit within which there is a nutritious pulp,
and in the middle of it seed vessels, in which inmostly is a living germ
that germinates in good soil. Again, the Word is also like a most
beautiful infant, about which, except the face, there are wrappings upon
wrappings; the infant itself is in the inmost heaven, the wrappings are
in the lower heavens, and the general covering of the wrappings is on
the earth. As the Word is such it is holy and Divine from inmosts to
outermosts. (A.E., n. 1072.)
The Word is such because in its origin it is the Divine itself that goes
forth from the Lord, and is called Divine truth; and when this descended
to men in the world it passed through the heavens in their order
according to their degrees, which are three; and in each heaven it was
recorded in accommodation to the wisdom and intelligence of the angels
there. Finally it was brought down from the Lord through the heavens to
men, and there it was recorded and made known in adaptation to man's
understanding and apprehension. This, therefore, is the sense of its
letter, and in this lies Divine truth such as it is in the three
heavens, stored up in distinct order.
From this it is clear that the entire wisdom of the angels in the three
heavens has been imparted by the Lord to our Word, and in its inmost
there is the wisdom of the angels of the third heaven, which is
incomprehensible and ineffable to man, because full of mysteries and
treasures of Divine verities. These lie stored up in each particular
and in all the particulars of our Word. And as Divine truth is the Lord
in the heavens, so the Lord Himself is present, and may be said to dwell
in all the particulars and each particular of His Word, as He does in
His heavens; and in the same way as He has said of the ark of the
covenant, in which were deposited only the Ten Commandments written on
the two tables, the first-fruits of the Word, for He said that He would
speak there with Moses and Aaron, that He would be present there, that
He would dwell there, and that it was His holy of holies, and His
dwelling place as in heaven. (A.E., n., 1073.)
As the Divine truth, in passing from the Lord Himself through the three
heavens down to men in the world, is recorded and becomes the Word in
each heaven, so the Word is a bond of union of the heavens with each
other, and a bond of union of the heavens with the church in the world.
For the Word is the same everywhere, differing only in perfection of
glory and wisdom according to the degrees in which the heavens are;
consequently the holy Divine from the Lord flows in through the heavens
into the man in the world who acknowledges the Lord's Divine and the
holiness of the Word whenever he reads the Word; and so far as such a
man loves wisdom he can be instructed and can imbibe wisdom from the
Word as from the Lord Himself, or from heaven itself, and can thus be
nourished with the food with which the angels themselves are nourished,
and in which there is life; according to these words of the Lord:
"The words that I speak unto you are spirit and are life" (John vi. 63).
"The water that I will give you shall become . . . a fountain of water
springing up unto eternal life" (John iv. 14). "Man doth not live by
bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God"
(Matt. iv. 4). "Work . . . for the meat that abideth unto eternal life,
which the Son of man shall give unto you" (John vi. 27).