It has been said that the Divine truth goes forth from the Lord, and
that the Word is from that, and that through the Word angels and men
have wisdom. But so long as it is unknown how Divine truth goes forth
from the Lord, this may be said but it cannot be understood. Divine
truth, which is the same as Divine wisdom, goes forth from the Lord as
light and heat do from the sun. The Lord is Divine love itself, and
love appears in the heavens from correspondence as fire, and the Lord's
Divine love as a sun, glowing and resplendent like the sun of the world.
From that sun, which is high above the heavens where the angels are, and
which is Divine love, heat and light go forth; the heat therefrom is
Divine good, and the light therefrom is Divine truth. The heat is
Divine good, because all heat of life going forth from love is felt as
good, for it is spiritual heat; and the light is Divine truth because
all light going forth from love is felt as truth, for it is spiritual
light; consequently it is from that light that the understanding sees
truths, and it is from that heat that the will is sensible of goods; and
this is why in the Word love is meant by heavenly fire and wisdom by
heavenly light.
It is the same with a man and with an angel. Every angel and man is his
own love, and a sphere flowing out from his love encompasses every man
and angel. That sphere consists of the good of his love and of the
truth of his love, for love gives forth both, as fire gives forth both
heat and light; from the will of a man or angel it gives forth good, and
from his understanding it gives forth truth. This sphere, when the man
or angel is good, has an extension into the heavens in every direction
according to the character and amount of the love, and into the hells in
every direction when the man or angel is evil. But the sphere of the
love of a man or an angel has a finite extension into a few societies
only of heaven or hell, while the sphere of the Lord's love, being
Divine, has an infinite extension, and creates the heavens themselves.
(A.E., n. 1076.)
The Word of the Lord is wonderful in this respect, that in every
particular of it there is a reciprocal union of good and truth, which
testifies that the Word is the Divine that goes forth from the Lord,
which is Divine good and Divine truth reciprocally united; and also
testifies that in the Word there is a marriage of the Lord with heaven
and the church, which also is reciprocal. There is a marriage of good
and truth, also of truth and good, in every particular of the Word, in
order that it may be a source of wisdom to angels and of intelligence to
men, for from good alone no wisdom or intelligence is born, neither from
truth alone, but from their marriage when the love is reciprocal. This
reciprocal love the Lord sets forth in John:
"He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood abideth in Me and I in
him" (vi. 56).
In the same,
"In that day ye shall know, that . . . ye are in Me and I in you. He
that hath My commandments and doeth them, he it is that loveth Me; . . .
and I will love him" (xiv. 20, 21).
The reciprocality is that such are in the Lord and the Lord is in them,
also that whoever loves the Lord, the Lord also will love him. "To have
His commandments" is to be in truths, and "to do them" is to be in good.
Reciprocality is also described by the Lord in His union with the
Father, in these words,
"Philip, . . . How sayest thou, Show us the Father? Believest thou not
that I am in the Father and the Father in Me? . . . Believe Me, that I
am in the Father and the Father in Me" (John xiv. 9-11).
From this reciprocal union of the Divine and the Human in the Lord the
reciprocal union of Divine good and Divine truth goes forth; and this
goes forth from the Lord's Divine love; and the same is true of the
Lord's reciprocal union with heaven and the church, and in general the
reciprocal union of good and truth in an angel of heaven and in a man of
the church. And as good is of charity and truth is of faith, and as
charity and faith make the church, it follows that the church is in a
man when there is a reciprocal union of charity and faith in him.
Again, as good is of the will and truth is of the understanding, and as
the will and understanding make man, it follows that a man is a man
according to the union of the will and all things belonging to it with
the understanding and all things belonging to it, and this reciprocally.
This union is what is called marriage, which from creation is in every
particular of heaven and in every particular of the world; and from this
is the production and the generation of all things. That in every
particular of the Word there is such a marriage that good loves truth
and truth loves good, thus mutually and in turn, is disclosed in the
spiritual sense of the Word; and it is from this marriage that good and
truth are one and not two, and are one when good is of truth and truth
is of good. (A.E., n. 1077).
The Word in the sense of the letter appears very simple, and yet there
is stored up in it the wisdom of the three heavens, for each least
particular of it contains interior and more interior senses; an interior
sense such as exists in the first heaven, a still more interior sense
such as exists in the second heaven, and an inmost sense such as exists
in the third heaven. These senses are in the sense of the letter, one
within the other, and are evolved therefrom one after the other, each
from its own heaven, when the Word is read by a man who is led by the
Lord. These interior senses differ in a degree of light and wisdom
according to the heavens, and yet they make one by influx, and thus by
correspondences. How they thus make one shall be told in what follows.
All this makes clear how the Word was inspired by the Divine, and that
it was written from an inspiration to which nothing else in the world
can in anywise be compared. The mysteries of wisdom of the three
heavens contained in it are the mystical things of which many have
spoken. (A.E., n. 1079.)