Divine Love and Wisdom and Wisdom

299 Pages·2009·0.99 MB·English

by  Emanuel Swedenborg

Angelic Wisdom concerning
Divine Love
and
Wisdom
EMANUEL SWEDENBORG
Translated from the Original Latin by
John C. Ager
STANDARD EDITION
SWEDENBORG FOUNDATION
West Chester, Pennsylvania
© 2009 Swedenborg Foundation
This version was compiled from electronic files of the
Standard Edition of the Works of Emanuel Swedenborg as
further edited by William Ross Woofenden. Pagination of
this PDF document does not match that of the
corresponding printed volumes, and any page references
within this text may not be accurate. However, most if not
all of the numerical references herein are not to page
numbers but to Swedenborg’s section numbers, which are
not affected by changes in pagination. If this work appears
both separately and as part of a larger volume file, its
pagination follows that of the larger volume in both cases.
This version has not been proofed against the original, and
occasional errors in conversion may remain. To purchase the
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Swedenborg’s works, or the available volumes of the latest
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Contents
Editor’s Preface
1. [The Creator]
Love is the life of man
God alone, consequently the Lord, is Love itself, because he is life
itself, and angels and men are recipients of life
The Divine is not in space
God is very man
In God-Man esse and existere are one distinguishably
In God-Man infinite things are one distinguishably
There is one God-Man, from whom all things come
The Divine essence itself is love and wisdom
Divine love is of Divine wisdom, and Divine wisdom is of Divine
love
Divine love and Divine wisdom are substance and are form
Divine love and Divine wisdom are substance and form in itself,
thus the very and the only
Divine love and Divine wisdom must necessarily have being and
have form in others created by itself
All things in the universe are creationed from the Divine love and
the Divine wisdom of God-man
All things in the created universe are recipients of the Divine love
and the Divine wisdom of God-Man
All created things have relation in a kind of image to man
The uses of all created things ascend by degrees from last things to
man, and through man to God the creator, from whom they
are
The Divine, apart from space, fills all spaces of the universe
The Divine is in all time, apart from time
The Divine in things greatest and least is the same
2. [The Means of Creation]
Divine love and Divine wisdom appear in the spiritual world as a
sun
Out of the sun that takes form from the Divine love and the Divine
wisdom, heat and light go forth
The sun of the spiritual world is not God, but is a proceeding from
the Divine love and Divine wisdom of God-Man; so also are
the heat and light from that sun (n. 93).
Spiritual heat and light, in proceeding from the Lord as a sun,
make one, just as his Divine love and Divine wisdom make one
The sun of the spiritual world appears at a middle altitude, far off
from the angels, like the sun of the natural world from men
The distance between the sun and the angels in the spiritual world
is an appearance according to reception by them of Divine love
and Divine wisdom
Angels are in the Lord, and the Lord in them; and because angels
are recipients, the Lord alone is heaven
In the spiritual world the east is where the Lord appears as a sun,
and from that the other quarters are determined
The quarters in the spiritual world are not from the Lord as a sun,
but from the angels according to reception
Angels turn their faces constantly to the Lord as a sun, and thus
have the south to the right, the north to the left, and the west
behind them
All interior things of the angels, both of mind and body, are turned
to the Lord as a sun
Every spirit, whatever his quality, turns in like manner to his ruling
love
Divine love and Divine wisdom, proceeding from the Lord as a sun
and producing heat and light in heaven, are the proceeding
Divine, which is the holy spirit
The Lord created the universe and all things of it by means of the
sun which is the first proceeding of Divine love and Divine
wisdom
The sun of the natural world is pure fire, consequently dead; nature
also is dead, because it derives its origin from that sun
Without a double sun, one living and the other dead, no creation is
possible
The end of creation has form in outmosts, which end is that all
things may return to the creator and that there may be
conjunction
3. [The Structure of Creation]
In the spiritual world there are atmospheres, waters, and lands, just
as in the natural world; only the former are spiritual, while the
latter are natural
There are degrees of love and wisdom, consequently degrees of heat
and light, also degrees of atmosphere
Degrees are of a two-fold kind, degrees of height and degrees of
breadth
Degrees of height are homogeneous, and one is from the other in
succession, like end, cause, and effect
The first degree is the all in every thing of the subsequent degrees
All perfections increase and ascend along with degrees and
according to them
In successive order the first degree makes the highest, and the third
the lowest; but in simultaneous order the first degree makes the
innermost, and the third the outermost
The outmost degree is the complex, container, and base of the prior
degrees
The degrees of height are in fullness and in power in their outmost
degree
There are degrees of both kinds in the greatest and in the and least
of all created things
In the Lord the three degrees of height are infinite and uncreate,
but in man the three degrees are finite and created
These three degrees of height are in every man from birth and can
be opened successively; and as they are opened, man is in the
Lord and the Lord in man
Spiritual light flows in with man through three degrees, but not
spiritual heat, except so far as man flees from evils as sins and
looks to the Lord
Unless the higher degree, which is the spiritual, is opened in man,
he becomes natural and sensual
The natural degree of the human mind regarded in itself is
continuous, but by correspondence with the two higher degrees
it appears when it is elevated as if it were discrete
The natural mind, since it is the covering and container of the
higher degrees of the human mind, is reactive; and if the higher
degrees are not opened it acts against them, but if they are
opened it acts with them
The origin of evil is from the abuse of the capacities proper to man
that are called rationality and freedom
Evils and falsities are in complete opposition to goods and truths,
because evils and falsities are diabolical and infernal, while
goods and truths are divine and heavenly (n. 271).
All things of the three degrees of the natural mind are included in
the deeds that are done by the acts of the body
4. [The Method of Creation]
The Lord from eternity, who is Jehovah, created the universe and
all things thereof from Himself, and not from nothing
The Lord from eternity, that is, Jehovah, could not have created
the universe and all things thereof unless he were a man
The Lord from eternity, that is, Jehovah, brought forth from
Himself the sun of the spiritual world, and from that created
the universe and all things thereof
There are in the Lord three things that are the Lord: the Divine of
love, the Divine of wisdom, and the Divine of use; and these
three are presented in appearance outside of the sun of the
spiritual world, the Divine of love by heat, the Divine of
wisdom by light, and the Divine of use by the atmosphere
which is their container
The atmospheres, of which there are three both in the spiritual and
in the natural world, in their outmosts close into substances
and matters such as are in lands
In the substances and matters of which lands are formed there is
nothing of the Divine in itself, but still they are from the
Divine in itself
All uses, which are ends of creation, are in forms, which forms they
take from substances and matters such as are in lands
All things of the created universe, viewed in reference to uses,
represent man in an image; and this testifies that God is man
All things created by the Lord are uses; they are uses in the order,
degree, and respect in which they have relation to man, and
through man to the Lord, from whom [they are]
Evil uses were not created by the Lord, but originated together with
hell
The visible things in the created universe bear witness that nature
has produced and does produce nothing, but that the Divine
out of itself, and through the spiritual world, has produced and
does produce all things
5. [The Goal of Creation]
Two receptacles and abodes for himself, called will and
understanding, have been created and formed by the Lord in
man; the will for his Divine love, and the understanding for his
Divine wisdom
Will and understanding, which are the receptacles of love and
wisdom, are in the brains, in the whole and in every part of
them, and therefrom in the body, in the whole and in every
part of it
There is a correspondence of the will with the heart, and of the
understanding with the lungs
From the correspondence of the heart with the will and of the lungs
with the understanding, everything may be known that can be
known about the will and understanding, or about love and
wisdom, therefore about the soul of man
What man’s beginning is from conception
Index of Scripture Passages
Index
DIVINE LOVE AND WISDOM 1
Editor’s Preface
Divine Love and Wisdom is a philosophical work that was first
published in Latin in 1763. It states in a concise and ordered way
the philosophy of creation that underlies all of Swedenborg’s
theological writings. This philosophy of creation can first be
unquestionably identified in two works he published in 1734, his
Principia and his Infinite and Final Cause of Creation, which are
both based on the premise that this is a created universe.
Swedenborg held consistently to this belief from at least this time
through the rest of his life.
In chapter 3, n. 188, the author states that “it is the object of this
little work to uncover causes, that effects may be seen from them,
and thus the darkness may be dispelled in which the man of the
church is in respect to God and the Lord, and in respect to Divine
things in general which are called spiritual things.”
Divine Love and Wisdom was first translated into English in 1788
by Nathaniel Tucker and printed in Manchester, England. There is
a copy of this edition in the library of the British Museum with
manuscript notes by William Blake. The present version was
translated by John Ager and first published by the Swedenborg
Foundation in 1885. This work has also been printed in several
other languages, including Danish, French, German, Icelandic,
Italian, Russian and Swedish.
Although this book is Swedenborg’s most orderly presentation of
a philosophic concept, its five chapters are untitled. Descriptive
titles have been supplied by this editor and added in brackets on
the first page of each chapter, and they also have been placed in the
running heads.