1 DE HEMELSCHE LEER
A MONTHLY MAGAZINE
DEVOTED TO THE DOCTRINE OF GENUINE TRUTH
OUT OF THE LATIN WORD
ORGAN OF NOVA DOMINI ECCLESIA QUAE EST NOVA HIEROSOLYMA-THE LORD'S NEW CHURCH WHICH IS NOVA HIEROSOLYMA
EXTRACTS FROM THE ISSUES SEPTEMBER 1936 TO JULY 1938 (ENGLISH TRANSLATION AND ENGLISH ORIGINALS)
SIXTH FASCICLE
s-GRAVENHAGE SWEDENRORG GENOO'ISCHAP NASSAOPLEIN 2i
1939
LEADING THESES PROPOUNDED IN “DE HEMELSCHE LEER”
MEMORABILIA 1312
“If they accept truths as these or principles, then innumerable truths are detected, and all things confirm.”
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EXTRACT FROM THE ISSUE FOR NOVEMBER 1934
AN ADDRESS
BY H. D. G. GROENEVELD DELIVERED AT THE SOCIAL SUPPER, OCTOBER 28TH 1934, ON THE OCCASION OF THE DEDICATION OF THE NEW CHURCH·BUILDING.
The use the Church will perform in its new dwelling is determined by and therefore is entirely dependent on the use that the Lord performs in its interior dwelling. If there is no interior dwelling which is the Lord's alone, then the use which the Church performs in its exterior dwelling is of no significance, however its work in this world might appear as use. The essential would be lacking in its new dwelling and all its exterior would be appearance only. Since the exterior, without the essential which is the Lord's, carries seduction in it, the Church would not be able to .resist the charm of that exterior and would soon be brought to accept the appearance itself as the essence. No longer Heaven, but the world would be put up as the end of life, as a result of which .charity and faith would be directed to the things of the world. The Church would draw the world to itself, and the more it accepted its exterior as essential, the greater would be its power of attraction. Indeed the Church would thereby considerably increase in growth, but it would have had the gates of the Heavens closed and would have opened the gates of hell.
It is however of the Lord's Divine Providence that the Church has been led to a new dwelling, although the end as yet is scarcely visible and down there it is surrounded by countless dark clouds. The interior dwelling for it is present already.
This interior dwelling came into existence the moment the interior things descended into the natural, which have been given to the Church, belonged to the good of life of the Church. These interior things in the natural penetrated
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to the not-conjoined human things which, with the interior things that previously were present, could still maintain their life. Since the new interior things cannot be conjoined with these human things, there arose not only a resistance but also a revolt against these interior things, which resulted in a suffering of these things. Fiercer and fiercer grew the revolt, until finally the human things led the new interior things to crucifixion. By this the human things which previously still had life, were deprived of life. It therefore was not a coincidence, but in correspondence with the state of the Church that the last Lesson from the New Testament in the old dwelling was the chapter of the Lord's Crucifixion.
In the love for the living truth in the human things, to which love alone all help in tbe agony was directed, the new human things from the Divine Human of the Lord, with which human things the new interior things are conjoined, could now come to life. It is the good of life of these new human things which is now the interior dwelling. In this dwelling the man of the Church is in real peace, and he lies down to rest under the protection of the only Lord. It is in this dwelling that the conjunction takes place of the most exterior things with the most interior, and of the most interior things with the most exterior. This conjunction is described in the 28th chapter of Genesis, verses 10-13, where we read: "And Jacob went out from Beer-sheba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the Angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, Jehovah stood above it, and said, I am Jehovah, the God of Abraham tby father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to tbee will I give it, and to thy seed". It is this dwelling alone that is the entrance to Heaven, and it is out of this alone that the Word can be approached. It is the holy place, it is the house of God, as appears from the continuation of the 28th chapter, verses 16-17: "And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely Jehovah is in this place, and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful
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is this place. This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven".
No man of the Church can read the 'Word holily but out of the interior dwelling. In this dwelling he comes into the light of truth, for it is the dwelling of the Lord, and there alone is the light, because the Lord Himself is the light. It is only out of the good of life from the interior things descended into the natural, that we can enter the interior dwelling. Out of the good of life of this world there is no entrance to this dwelling, for in this apparent good the evil and the false of the love of self are hidden. This good desires admittance on the strength of faith, while the essential love to the Lord and to the neighbour is lacking. It is this good that is represented by the five foolish virgins, of whom we read the following in the 25th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, verses 10-12: "And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut. Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said, Verily I say unto you, I know you not".
Let us therefore go to the interior dwelling that we may there meet each other. Then the glory will appear in this new dwelling, which we have entered to-day, for the only Lord will be in it.
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EXTRACT FROM THE ISSUE FOR MARCH 1935
TO LIVE A LIFE FOLLOWING THE DOCTRINE
BY ANTON ZELLING.
"When therefore ye shall see the abomination of desolation, signifies the devastation of the Church .... Which was told of by Daniel the prophet, signifies ... everything prophetic concerning the Lord's Advent and concerning the state of the Church. _ .. Standing in the holy place, signifies devastation as to all things which are of -good and truth; the holy place is the state of love and faith .... LET HIM THAT READETH UNDERSTAND, signifies that these things are to be well observed by those who are in the Church, especially by those who are in love and faith".
A.C.3652.
The Latin for "following" [according to] is secundum, from sequor: something which immediately follows, as 2 follows from 1 (hence the meaning of secundus: the next following, the second), as the effect from a cause; all effect is according to or following the cause. The Latin word for "following" [according to] also signifies: to willingly follow, along with the stream, well disposed to, prosperous, happy; the Greek word for "following" further signifies: altogether, fully, near, to, at, in.
This secundum also lies involved in: "Hoc est primum et magnum Mandatum; secundum simile est illi" ("This is the first and great Commandment; the second is like unto it"), Matth. XXII: 38, 39. To live a life following the Doctrine is the second which is like unto the Doctrine. It is said to live, not, to do, to act, to conduct one's self, nor anything else. Now to live is to love and to hold holy what is of Life and to be filled with that Life more and more. "To love God and the neighbour is of life because the all of life is of love", A.C. 9383. Thus in "living a life following the Doctrine" the two Commandments are fulfilled: "To love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy
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soul, and with all thy mind", and "To love thy neighbour as thyself". The neighbour is the Lord in the neighbour, the Doctrine of the neighbour. The first commandment refers to the Lord, the second to the angelic Heaven in the blessed consociation of all with each and of each with all. So too the Doctrine refers to the Lord, and "to live a life following the Doctrine" to the angelic Heaven on earth or the Church.
Only that lives which lives a life following the Doctrine. All living or loving outside of the Doctrine is not life or love; it remains natural, unreformed, and allows of no regeneration. There are those who accept the Doctrine and reject the life. Of them it is said: "They are present, although separated. They are like friends who talk with one another, but have no love for one another; and they are like two persons, one of whom speaks to the other as a friend, and yet hates him as an enemy", D.P. 91. It is acknowledging the Lord with the mere cognition and meanwhile remaining outside the Divine Human and hating it as an enemy.
Man is in the spirit when he is alone, but in the body when' he is in company. Therefore in the world it is not so visible who rejects life and who lives a life following the Doctrine. From Matthew XXV, verse 34 to the end, it even appears that they who have lived a life following the Doctrine, the followers, and they who have rejected the life, the rejecters, are equally ignorant of whether or not having done anything "unto one of the least of these My brethren"; yea, elsewhere it appears that the followers have not known of it, and that the rejecters did not know but that they had prophesied in the name of the Lord, and in His Name had cast out devils, and in His Name had done many wonderful works, Matth. VII: 22. "To live a life following the Doctrine" and "to reject life", taken as effects, thus appear exteriorly before and in the world as indistinguishable, no less so than the delight of conjugial love and that of scortatory love, and no less so than the preaching from the spiritual sense and the preaching from the natural sense.
“Man's understanding can be raised above his proper love into some light of wisdom in the love of which the man is not, and he can thereby see and be taught how he must live that he may come also into that love, and thus may enjoy
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the blessedness into the eternal", D.L.W. 395. Now this life he can either follow or reject; the Doctrine to appearances remains the same; and everything the Doctrine teaches concerning life the rejecter can know as well as, if not better than the follower. Seen from a worldly point of view the rejecters are even not so bad and in many things even exemplary. For they who do not reject the Doctrine, but the life, do not therefore reject everything which the Doctrine teaches concerning life. They can even fit it in in an exemplary way, "put it into practice", to such an extent that their fittings in, in public, leave the applications in secret of the followers far in the shade. There is a difference as of an abyss between fitting the truths of the Doctrine into the life, and applying life to the Doctrine, just as the former life is in no way the latter life. Fitting in is always of something to something entirely different and which remains entirely different; applying, however, is always of something to something that is distinctly one with it and which becomes more and more the same. Explicare, to unfold, to unpleat, supposes applicate, to fold to, to apply, in order that understanding and will may keep pace with each other, in order that Doctrine may become life, and life Doctrine - a one, full of doctrine and life. When fitting in, man is not in the love of the wisdom which he fancies he has; when applying, man is in the love of his wisdom. The fitting in is forced compulsion of an indoctrinated proprium, the applying is the freedom of an angelic proprium; the fitting in is made, tyrannical, fanatical; the applying is born, gentle, mild; the fitting in is into heterogeneous things, the applying to homogeneous things. The fitting in of things to life leaves dead, the applying of life makes living and new. Fitting in knows zeal, emulation, rivalry; applying knows quiet steady diligence. The fitting in is with the whole head above out of a certain light of wisdom while the body below remains outside the love of that wisdom; the applying is with the whole heart, the whole soul, and the whole understanding; in short, the fitting in is from the love of self and the world, the applying is out of the two commandments fulfilled. To acknowledge, the Lord and to reject the life is to acknowledge the Son of Man and to withhold from Him the place where to lay His head, thus in no way to
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acknowledge Him. To “live a life following the Doctrine" on the other hand is to allow the Lord to make a dwelling with man. To reject life is to retain and carry on one's own life "under the appearance of much praying", that is, under respectable fittings in, in which merit makes itself great. For they can glory in and appeal to "many wonderful works done". In "CONCERNING THE SACRED SCRIPTURE FROM EXPERIENCE" there occur two reasonings: I. "l know various correspondences, I can know the true doctrine of the Divine Word, the spiritual sense will teach me it". II. "I know the Doctrine of Divine ·truth; now I can see the spiritual sense, if only I know the correspondences; but nevertheless this must be in enlightenment from the Lord, because the spiritual sense is the Divine Truth itself in its light", n. 21. Clearly the false first reasoning is that of the rejecter ever ready to fit in. What the follower with reverence calls the "Doctrine of Divine Truth", the rejecter calls “various correspondences", handled as burglars' implements. He means to say: "I can fit those in, I can push in with them, and force my way". Note how the tone and the affection in the words of both reasonings differ entirely as to the life. "l know various correspondences" has as its affection "by now I surely possess sufficient means". On the other hand, in "I know the Doctrine of Divine truth" there is an entirely different tone. "I know", there does not mean "I possess". And "if only I know the correspondences" is full of a life following the Doctrine. This latter knowing is an entirely different knowing from the "I know" of the first reasoning. That first knowing, the rejecter's knowing, is, as has been said, a possession, a piece of mere memory-knowledge; the latter knowing "if only I know" is of a life entirely following the Doctrine, in the realization that there is no living science of correspondences without a life in agreement with the Doctrine of the Divine truth. Is it not somewhere expressly said that there is perception when the external things correspond to the internal things? Now the follower makes the knowing of correspondences subject to his perception, but the rejecter makes no such fuss - "1 know various correspondences". How false, how full of denial of life that sounds. And how full of awe and reverence, vibrating with love and veneration, how living sounds, on the
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other hand: “If only I know, but nevertheless this must be in enlightenment from the Lord". There is the appearance there, that one could be engaged in the first reasoning, but that he is warned that such reasoning is false: "This cannot be done, but let him say within himself ... ", whereupon follows meditation II. But there is no question there of one person, but of two, of I., the separated, II., the conjoined. The rejecter will never accept meditation II, because that can only be accepted in a life following the Doctrine; and the follower will never fall into the falsity of meditation I., for thereby he would lose the Life in his life. Meditation I. is not only a fault of thinking, but especially a fault of life, and an irreparable one. To appearance an imaginary fault of thinking is there brought forward, in order the better to show, from the opposite, what is the right thinking. But a separation is here made between the goats and the sheep, between those on the left hand and those on the right hand; and in the affection of the words we clearly see with whom the Lord inflows out of the good of love and of charity, and with whom He does not. The nature of the false things of faults of thinking can be seen only with and by a life following the Doctrine.
Not the followers, but the rejecters will now ask: "But what then is life, to reject life and to live a life following the Doctrine"? at the same time standing ready with the best of definitions. To begin with, to live a life following the Doctrine is so much, so everything, that one of middling understanding but who had lived following the commandments, after death was seen elevated among the highest Angels as one of them in wisdom. Now anyone may deem that to live a life following the commandments or the Doctrine is comparatively not so difficult, and possible for almost everyone, and particularly so for the rejecters. Merely a matter of continuous clipping, of steady fitting in. But in "living a life following the Doctrine" infinite arcana are hidden, so infinite that like those of regeneration they might be termed inexhaustible into the eternal. How gross in this respect our ideas are would appear from the vain effort to wish to compare our self·examination before the Holy Supper with the examination the Angels institute with the newcomers - both examinations as to the "life followed". We very soon consider the slightest fitting
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in a full application, and if that were not so, how brokenly, how beaten down would we approach to the Holy Supper, with what deepest humiliation would we partake, how immeasurably overwhelmed would we come away. How many worthily accept the Grace? How few the Mercy in deepest humiliation! By the self-examination before the Holy Supper it may in some measure be perceived what "a life following the Doctrine" should be. The Doctrine or the understanding of the Word is called a candle. A candle has three things: the flame, the wick, and the wax. In the flame it burns, by the wick it burns, from the wax it burns. Not one of these three things can be lacking, each of these three things of the Doctrinal Candle, spiritual from celestial origin, is from the Lord; the flame, the plaited threads of the wick, and the bees' wax. They who reject the life take away from the wick the wax from which the flame lives and is fed, and surround the now stolen wick with the tallow of their proprium. The effect to outward appearance is the same, the flame is of about the same heat, the brightness about as strong; but the one is wax-light, clear, pure, steady, the other tallow-light, smoky, greasy, flickering. But this only for him who sees from within. The rejecter from without, from the proprium, brings forward ever more fuel; the follower knows the light is fed from within, and that the Lord provides. His sole care full of love and life is that his slender burning wax-candle remain unspoiled before and from the Lord, pure from heterogeneous materials, untouched by draughts that make it flicker and drip. In the follower the Lord provides Himself with wax, but the rejecter provides himself with any desirable tallow from his proprium. The wax-light shines on other things than does the tallow-gleam. Other things enter in by the waxlight than by the tallow-light. The rejecter agrees with the' follower that the Lord is the Same with all, and that it is the receptions that differ. But in this word "reception" a deep arcanum is hidden. The Latin word for "reception" is receptio, which is really a regrasping, retaking. If we hold to this distinction and now read in CONCERNING THE SACRED SRIPTURE FROM EXPERIENCE, n. 8: "The Lord flows in with the Angel and with the man of the Church out of the good of love and of charity; the Angel and the man of the Church RECIPIT (that is, regrasps, retakes) the
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Lord, who is in the good of love and of charity, in the truths of Doctrine and of faith with himself out of the Word; thence there is the conjunction which is called the celestial marriage". Now the practically worn out words receive and reception take on an awful sense. A sense that touches life, every one's life and every kind of life. For the rejecters as well as the followers can alike be in the truths of the Doctrine and of faith out of the Word; let us assume so for a moment. But consider: the Lord inflows with the Angel and with the man of the Church out of the good of love and of charity. He who receives the Lord, does not accept Him, but recipit, that is, regrasps Him. Him who was there already, and thus had already been accepted, for He who, or that which, inflowed was there already before the receptio. Where, therefore, the re-ceptio is, there is life, and it is life. In art statements of masters are known which prove they already had a perception of this truth of life, a confession that they had not made, not sought the things, but had found them in themselves, that is re-ceptus, retaken or regrasped. What they created, they acknowledged to have been there, before it was there. 'With them there is no question of mere coincidences. The simple follower believes this simply; the rejecter agrees to an acceptance, a taking on, a taking over, but the fundamental meaning of re-ceptio must frighten him off, for it is in conflict with his free concept of the free choice. If the Lord inflows, and man recipit, it then appears that the inflowing of the Lord is the all of all things, for
the in flowing is the Lord's;
the good of love and of charity is the Lord's;
the truths of Doctrine and of faith with him out of the Word are the Lord's;
the recipere is the Lord's;
and the conjunction is the Lord's.
To be in that is to "live a life following the Doctrine"; this IS the life which the rejecters reject. In this it is that the followers are soft as wax, and the rejecters a lump of tallow. In this it is that the followers never take up (receive) any more and anything else, than what is truly a recipere. We are taught that a perceptio, a perception, is there where the external things correspond to the internal and communicate. The follower does not live except out of
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His perceptions, which are also receptions. To live a life following the Doctrine for him is to keep the perceptions pure by having the external things, all of them, none excepted, continually ordered from the Lord, following the internal. His care for this constitutes his life, his life following the Doctrine. It will appear to the rejecter that this win cost quite some sacrifices quite some "mortifications" as the roman-catholics say. But this again is argued from the proprium, from an entirely different life that knows only of fittings in. And now for the first time the true signification of applying appears: it is the Lord's Life, regrasped, which applies itself to the Doctrine, the same to the same from the same origin. To follow here is to wave *, the will from the Lord waves together with the understanding from the Lord, the man is in the love of the wisdom, in the blessedness of conjunction "which is called the celestial marriage". If we had known that man of middling understanding, but who lived a life following the Commandments, and also a super-ingenious rejecter, would we have seen the great distinction? In what may have consisted the life of that middling man? In a quiet, hidden application, in having been faithful over little but this with' a faithfulness, a confidence, so simple, pure, and great, that his life beside that of the rejecter would have appeared as simple, saturnine fearsome, self-contained, monotonous, cold, aud dull. For, in general, said with the lips, the "shunning of sins as sins against the Lord", is easily done; but if the kingdom of God is thought of as inside the man, and the Lord is not viewed as being ,above the proprium in worldly aspect, but in the things that lie within waiting there for the recipere, then not-sinning becomes a well nigh superhuman lifetask, crowned only in the rarest instances. Then faithfulness is interrelated with being married **, and is full of infinite conjugial fear. None of those things possible with the rejecter are possible with the follower. They can speak together, but as two of
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* To follow in Dutch is volgen, and to wave is golven; this cannot be rendered in English. (ED.)
** The Dutch word for being married, "getrouwd zijn", is from the same root as the word for faithfulness, ''trouw''; the full meaning of this sentence therefore. cannot be rendered in English. (ED.)
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whom one hates the other. It is clear that the rejecter conceives of the evil things as sins against God in an entirely different way from the follower. For him who rejects the life following the Doctrine there is really nothing to be shunned. A life outside the life following the Doctrine is a life of the proprium, and the proprium fears only the loss of name and profit. The sins against the Lord which, in the evil things, the follower shuns, are insults committed against the life following the Doctrine, for he clearly perceives that this "life following the Doctrine" is his no more than is the Lord's influx into it. This life is one of following the Life which is the Lord, as the Doctrine of the Church is following the infinite Divine Doctrine. The follower feels even into the body that the life following the Doctrine is unassailable, and for him the "thou shalt not ... " is given an entirely new sense: in the life following the Doctrine he will not sin, for that life is as particularly protected by Providence as is the embryo in the womb over which we read that a particular Providence watches. He carries a life in him which in appearance is his, which in appearance he must protect against evil things, but which is the Lord's and is led from the Lord, well disposed, prosperous, happy, because it is yielding willingly, altogether, and fully, as the secondary significations of following indicate. "Against God" for him is against the influx of the Lord from the good of love and of charity, which influx the rejecter inverts and thus never regrasps, never applies, for he has nothing to apply, having rejected the life following the Doctrine. What is rejecting the life other than going direct to the Father out of the proprium? There sinning "against God" loses its sense, for the proprium cannot do otherwise. For the rejecter the Commandments stand in the imperative, for the follower in a blessed negative future tense. They promise him the state of the saints.
The rejecter takes up what he may, where he may, the follower recipit what is .the Lord's with him. With the rejecter everything is dead and old, with' the follower everything is living and new. In apparently the same things the one finds death, the other life. How dead all words and ideas become for those who reject life, and how living and new for those who live a life following the Doctrine, perhaps nowhere so clearly appears as in the
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taking up and the fitting in of the expression "to read the Word holily, to have it holy" with the rejecters, and in the regrasping and the application thereof with the followers. "To read the Word holily" - let us be honest for most people has become a commonplace, something so familiar that their lips readily pronounce it as a matter of course without their giving it any particular thought. The rejecters will indignantly deny this, but the followers will he sadly silent at that indignation with a feeling of shame akin to compassion. For, what else is it that is generally understood by to read holily and to have holy ("to have holy", sanctum habere, for the first time indeed enters into our language, as a lost and now regrasped word), than an external attitude, an amalgamation of what is roman catholic solemn, protestant stiff, jewish traditional? Meanwhile holy is most closely related to "living a life following the Doctrine". The Latin words sanctus and sacer just as secundum come from sequor, and their sanscrit root sak means to follow, to honour. To read holily therefore means to read while following, to read with a life following the Doctrine, which must be something entirely different from the "holy" reading with a rejected life. Our Dutch heilig (holy) again is connected with heel (whole) [old English hdlig and hdl], thus with the Greek secondary meanings of "following": altogether and fully. For the rejecters the holy is only on the outside, for the followers entirely from within. Is it not overwhelming that in the word sanetlls, holy, the following and the honouring lie enclosed, a following with the life that for the first time truly is an hononring? Now for the rejecter "to read holily" is a worn down type, for the follower an inexhaustible word that begins to live in him more and more, within the radius of which light ever more real human things enter his life. The holy reading by the rejecter projects nightbirds only on the wall.
For the rejecter everything is of importance, except that life over which the follower watches. Not to live a life following the Doctrine is the same as saying to the Lord: "We have Abraham for a father", for it means having things of doctrine and faith, but admitting no flowing in of the Lord and not being willing for any recipere. Recipere tbe Lord is to allow the Lord to give Eternal Life to the
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Truths of Doctrine and of faith with man out of the Word, and to make a dwelling therein. Just as the Lord cannot dwell with man except in what is His, just so man from himself cannot take up anything but the human. Now rejecting life is nothing else than taking the reception naturally and effecting a fitting in, not knowing that the receiving is a receptio, and that also the application is altogether and fully the Lord's. And, curiously enough, of rejection the same may be said from the opposite, as of regrasping. For if the receiving, re-cipere, thus seen, is a willing regrasping of that which man already has in him from the Lord, of that which from the Lord already is in man, over against that, rejecting, re-jicere, thus seen, is an unwilling throwing back of that which man should have in him from the Lord, of that which from the Lord should be in man. This makes clear that it is the follower who has and to whom will be given, and that it is the rejecter who has not and from whom will be taken that what he fancied he possessed. Clear also that the rejecter not only does not live a life following the Doctrine, but also persecutes and pursues it.
By "living a life following the Doctrine" the larger and smaller society will have to change completely. This has already been pointed out in speaking of "the interior dwelling"*. For the interior dwelling is only there where a life is lived following the Doctrine; there only is an essential meeting, from place to place, and not only a presence in aspect. For the sake and on behalf of that interior dwelling the exterior dwelling should be so cleansed and ordered that it already fully answers the natural idea that most people must have of the interior dwelling - the exterior dwelling also being interiorly seen, that is, not as a domicile but as civil decency and good manners, newly inspired out of the life following the Doctrine; for that life must reform everything, literally everything, even to ultimates and lowest things, into the smallest diversions, which thus also ... become purely the Lord's. For if Providence watches over the smallest moment of life, the smallest moment of life should be receptible, regraspable. This the rejector will be most fierce in opposing: "mine at
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least the diversions.” No, these too will have at some time to participate in the celestial blessedness, fully taken up into, regrasped in a' life following the Doctrine. One day the state of the Church spontaneously applied will livingly mirror itself in the state of society and in the least, the very least things thereof. Then society will be a Mau in the spirit, living alone and safely in that spirit of life that can truly be called "sphere", truly "sociable"; for there are two kinds of sociableness: this, and any other. For a time we must content ourselves with a multitude of artificial fittings in, but we must not regard them as signs of progress, as signs of "life". The true life of the Church is in the application from within, in the life of everyone following the Doctrine, of all together and of each one, in the life from the Lord. The Church as Man and man as Church is the receptacle in which the Lord is in what is His, receptus, regrasped. That regrasping is the conjunction, the reconjunction the Religion, the True living Christian Religion.
What is the importance and the use of a consideration such as this on life following the Doctrine? Rather might one ask: what is the danger and the disadvantage? For in all things that touch the life, whether direct or indirect, very ugly things come to light, the uglier the more the love of self and of the world within them have been sugar-coated. For, of course, we all of us have nothing of the rejecter and everything of the follower. We all live a life following the Doctrine, be it in a greater or smaller measure (as if there were a greater or smaller measure in living a life "following the Doctrine"). And thereby we vulgarize the word "life following the Doctrine" to a familiar term, to a commonplace, as the words "to read holily" or “interior dwelling"; thereby we henceforth take the word into our mouths easily and untouched, while we ought to enter into this worn full of silent awe, as something a thousand times greater than we. Whoever in the least begins to realize the meaning of "a life following the Doctrine", of "reading holily", overwhelmed and breathless, asks of himself: "Who then can be saved?" Upon which follows the Lord's answer: "With man this is not possible, but with God alone". But we generally do not let it get
19 SO FAR, WE CONTENT
so far, we content ourselves with passing off every thought concerning a "life following the Doctrine" as being nothing new, as something which from the beginning was over well known to the members of the New Church and which we can therefore hastily pass over. Instead of a living acquisition, the word becomes just one more lifeless, hardened idea, and, however paradoxical it may sound, an accepted rejected something, the characteristic of all vulgarization; for vulgarizing is nothing else than depriving something of its living contents and making it common, thus rejecting the contents and not accepting the form otherwise than deformed according to the proprium. Doing thus, the evil and false in ourselves, the rejecter in us, can make itself master of such words' as reading holily, living a life' following the Doctrine, the interior dwelling, and fit them in according to and for the sake of the form. There lie the danger and the disadvantage of all misunderstood progress of Doctrine the immediate vulgarization, the forerunner of all profanation and soon equally horrible. The danger and the disadvantage of form-alone, of ever more forms-alone. The damnable faith-alone consists of nothing but that. The importance and the use, however, of every consideration of a life following the Doctrine are so preponderant for every well understood progress of Doctrine, that it finally learns to overlook the inevitable danger and disadvantage, remembering the words: "Let the dead bury the dead". The importance of every such testimony is: To ever more clearly understand that every progress of Doctrine is' altogether and fully dependent on a life following the Doctrine. The "se is every self-examination enlightened by Doctrine and consequent repentance .. !for, as in a certain light of wisdom we see that the Lord is in the Doctrine of genuine truth, yea, that the Lord is that Doctrine,' even so we learn with fear, in the measure in which from the Lord we turn ourselves to the love of that· wisdom, to realize that the Lord is in the life following the Doctrine, yea that the Lord is that life. Our tender care then becomes serving that life in everything and not letting it go short of anything. And we get so far as to be able to see that Doctrine in the life following the Doctrine is in its fulness, in its holiness, in its power. "To the Angels more than to any others the appearance is given
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as if they lived out of themselves with ineffable felicity", A.C. "1735. The greater the innocence, the greater the appearance. (The rejecter would sooner expect that the more wisdom a man possesses, the fewer appearances he is in). That appearance in other words is called the celestial Proprium. Now to live a life following the Doctrine is to be in an unassailable innocence from the Lord, with the blessedness of the appearance of living as if from one's self increasing into the infinite. In short, "living a life following the Doctrine" is being gifted with the celestial Proprium. For where else will this celestial Proprium dwell than in what is the Lord's with man and Angel, in the Church and in Heaven? Where else than in the life following the Word? And so the Celestial Doctrine is not conceivable without this second like unto it: the celestial life - "perfect, even as your Father, who is in the Heavens, is perfect", Matth. V : 48.
21 DE HEMELSCHE LEER
EXTRACT FROM THE ISSUE FOR APRIL 1935
TO LIVE A LIFE FOLLOWING THE DOCTRINE
BY ANTON ZELLING.
"When therefore ye shall see the abomination of desolation, signifies the devastation of the Church .... Which was told of by Daniel the prophet, signifies ... everything prophetic concerning the Lord's Advent and concerning the state of the Church .... Standing in the holy place, signifies devastation as to all things which are of good and truth; the holy place is the state of love and faith .... LET HIM THAT READETH UNDERSTAND, signifies that these things are to be well observed by those who are in the Church, especially by those who are in love and faith".
A.C.3652.
In another way:
There are two things: The life of the Doctrine, and the life following the Doctrine. In "the life of the Doctrine", the Lord is the Doctrine; in "the life following the Doctrine", the Doctrine is the Neighbour. In essence the same, but with a distinctive accent. Just as in Dutch there are two words for "wheel", rad" and “wiel", meaning the same, but with a distinction. In the word "rod" the stress is on the spokes - whence "molenrad" (mill-wheel); in the word "wiel" the stress is on the encompassing rim whence "vliegwiel" (fly-wheel). In the life of the Doctrine the thought might be of a wheel of rays out of a golden sun-axis, in life following the Doctrine, of the will regarded as the circumference of the wheel. The life of the Doctrine goes forth, the life following the Doctrine returns. Only in the unity of both is the VERA CHRISTIANA RELIGIO, the Coming in the Second Coming, fulfilled. For the "Second Advent" - Adventus Secundus - might also be understood as "Following [according to] the Coming": there is no taking up, no receptio, of the Lord's Second Coming except following the taking up, the receptio, of each Coming
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of the Lord. A taking up, a receptio, in will and understanding, with the life, with the inmost of that life; the proprium. What is the proprium? A question in which lies the Lord's question: "Peter, lovest thou Me?" and, like that sad question, to be thrice repeated: What is the proprium?
The Latin word proprium is - But let it first be settled once and for all, that it is the Doctrine which should shed its light upon the etymology, and not vice-versa, which would be an example of the imaginary physical influx. For, the Word dwells in the word in, its own, spiritual out of a celestial origin. "Once a flower was opened before the Angels as to its interiors, which arc called spiritual, and when they saw they said that there was within as it were a whole paradise, consisting of indescribable things", SACR. SCRIPT. FROM Exp. 19. That flower is every word opened out of the Word, letter by letter as a botanical wonder of sense in form; as a form a natural thing, as a natural thing an effect out of spiritual things, and the spiritual things the effects out of the celestial things. Thus seen, etymology too, becomes an ancilla Doctrinae, a handmaid of the Doctrine, confirming what the word itself says: the etymos logos, that is, the true, genuine, thus original word, in short, the interior sense of the word: "as it. were a whole paradise consisting of indescribable things". Now the Latin word proprium is in all probability contracted from pro-privo, that is, "for one's own" or "as one's own"; while privus is connected with our “vrij" (free); in which word "vrij" there are etymologically involved the ideas of will desire, dear, loved (whence the Dutch words "vriend" and "vrijen" for "friend" and "to woo"), to favour, to make beautiful, analogous to the Latin for free, liber. of which the sanscrit-root lub-dhas means "desirous" (whence libido, voluptuousness), In the Dutch word "heteigene" (the proprium, literally "the own") two intergrown ideas can be indicated, that of to possess and that of to owe (still clearly traceable in the English: to own and to owe), Surrounded by the clear and warm light of the Doctrine we now see the word proprium, "the own" I spring open like a flower-bud: that which man possesses for or as his own, free according to his will, wish, and desire; but which nevertheless he owes and remains owing to the Lord. That
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Pro in pro-prium, for or as, signifies the appearance as if it were man's, just as in the word own the appearance of the self-possession constitutes the external of that word, and the essence of the indebtedness the internal. Etymologically, that is, taken as to the true sense of the word, the proprium means: That which in appearance is man's, but in essence the Lord's. We now in this etymology enlightened by the Doctrine clearly see TWO propriums designating themselves, which may be called the "indebted proprium" and the Hpossessive proprium"; the one being of Heaven, the other of hell. Wherever in the Word Heaven and hell are mentioned, Heaven refers to the proprium in man indebted to the Lord, and hell to man's possessive proprium; Heaven to the innocence in him, hell to his guilt; for to acknowledge indebtedness is from the Innocence of the Lord to appropriate to one's self, to be in the innocence of Heaven; but the denying of the indebtedness is the disowning in the proprium of the Innocence of the Lord, and therefore to be in guilt, in the guilt and indebtedness of hell.
From the letter of the Word we have learned to see with a rational that man's proprium "from birth is nothing but evil and false", but to see with a rational is by no means yet to perceive with the voluntary. The Lord's Coming had for its end the subjugation of the hells and the ordering of the Heavens. Without these two Works of Divine Mercy the Second Coming wonld not be conceivable, for the Second Coming is following the Coming. With reference to man the Corning of the Lord is a subjugation of the possessive proprium and an ordering of the indebted proprium. For as long as the possessive proprium from its hells rises up against the indebted proprium in its Heavens, this latter is under constraint and out of its order. In the six days or periods of the story of creation, the states of man's regeneration following one another, have been described, and the second state, the status secundus is "when a distinction is being made between the things which are of the Lord, and those which are proper to man", A. C. 8, which state is followed by the repentance of the third state. The things that are the Lord's in the Word are called remains. reliquiae in the Latin, literally:
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things left back, things which remain behind. Undoubtedly, man's own things make his possessive proprium; the Lord's things, left behind in him as reliquiae the proprium indebted to the Lord: and in the ARCANA COELESTlA, n. 13, we read that in the regeneration out of this indebted own, the greater part, at this day, come only to the first state; "some only to the second; some to the third, fourth, fifth; seldom to the sixth; and scarcely anyone to the seventh",
What then is, be it asked once more, the proprium?
What do Peter's tears signify at the thrice repeated question: Lovest thou Me?
In a sense we might even speak of three propriums: ,
I. the proprium in itself, which is purely the Lord's, and which in man
II. either shines forth as the indebted, or
III. hides away behind the possessive.
This would make clear that the Lord does not break or extinguish our evil and false things, but bends them. For, just 'as the evil and false is a perverted good and true, the possessive is the indebted of the same proprium perverted. Reformation and regeneration have no other meaning than turning the Lord's proprium in man from the possessive to the indebted, which is such an enormous work that we read that at this day scarcely anyone reaches the seventh state, and further that the work of regeneration even in the highest Heavens is not completed into eternity. This at the same time gives an image of the most direful temptations the Lord went through in the complete glorification of His Human, and we read in D.L.W. n. 221:
"That the Lord came into the world, and took upon Himself (sus-ceperit, not receperit!) the Human, in order to put Himself into the power of subjugating the hells. and of reducing (red-igendi) all things to order both in the Heavens and in the lands. This Human He put on over His former Human. The Human which He put on in the world, was as the Human of a man in the world, yet both Divine, and thence infinitely transcending the finite humans of Angels and men". His former Human is the Human Divine Proprium of the Father Himself, the Human of man is the indebted Divine Human Proprium of the Son; and the possessive human proprium is the maternal from
25
mary which the Lord put off entirely. Thus seen, the Lord's Glorification is the conjunction of the Lord's Propriums, of which the regeneration of the proprium in man is an image.
It is following the progress of the Doctrine that this question of life arises, for if the Doctrine is not immediately followed by a life following the Doctrine, the life of the Doctrine remains spiritual, outside the body of the Church, it draws back, and its after-effects are cerebral only. It is a compelling necessity out of the Doctrine to see those two propriums in order that the infernal one may be subjugated and that which is the Lord's be put in order and become celestial -- from the Lord. No Second Coming but following this Coming.
Man's proprium is entirely evil and false, Inversely it might be said, that the evil and the false is man's proprium, for therein it is as in its subject. That shunning evils means shunning the possessive proprium, taken merely doctrinally, in a purely abstract way, is quite clear; but between the possessive proprium and the indebt<ld proprium, if no Coming of the Lord is admitted, without subjugation on the one side and a putting in order on the other, in a word, without separation, a mixing up is possible of good and evil, true and false; first a rendering vague of the borders, then a vulgarization, and finally· a profanation. For what is the Lord's and what is man's, what is inherent in the indebted proprium and what is inherent in the possessive proprium, are continually opposed the one to the other, and if we do not continually allow the Lord to wrestle in our temptations and to conquer, if we do not immediately obey His command: Follow Me, and have this followed by the second command: Let the dead bury the dead, Matth. VIII: 22, the possessive proprium has the mastery over the indebted proprium: the tears of Peter.
The evil and false of the possessive proprium is the perverted good and true of the indebted proprium, and because in that perversion are contained its will, wish, desire, favouring, and beautifying, the possessive proprium makes its evil and false appear as good and true to such an extent that it lets its evil and false pass among the good and true of the indebted proprium as if they were alike, as false prophets coming in sheep's clothing, but inwardly
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they are ravening wolves, Matth. VII : 15. So it happens that we in ourselves, alone and in society, and in others in the church and the world, find so many things that are good, lovable, precious, hearty, warm, spontaneous, delightful, noble, great, true, pretty, beautiful, agreeable, spirited, fine and what not, and nevertheless they are such only as to the appearance of the possessive proprium. Does not the passage in RATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY, XXXI refer to this: "[It appears] that insanity is wisdom, fallacy truth, the becoming and the unbecoming honesty, vice virtue; license free choice, pleasures and the allurements of the senses the highest felicity and the highest good. That art appears more ingenious than nature; that philosophers are possessed of a better common sense than the plebeians; that they are wise who talk more elegantly and are skilled in languages and mingle their sharper wittiness, or they who keep silent or bring forth half the sense of what is to be understood; that we are to esteem those who are esteemed by others whom we believe to be possessed of judgment; infinite other things occur in the disquisition of the true and the false, the good and the evil, the beautiful and the becoming. The discriminations themselves, which do not appear before the senses, we believe to be naught so long as they are concealed, although they are infinite, and the figure rather gross and unequal. So in other things". We put in italics: "in the disquisition", -perceiving that what is meant is an examination guided from the Lord, starting from love for the truth for the sake of truth; for the appearances there mentioned are just those of which the possessive proprium certainly never tolerates any examination, Of only a falsified one.
But let us give a striking example of a subjugated possessive proprium and of a well-ordered indebted proprium.
In the so-called JOURNAL OF DREAMS, n. 76, 77, Emanuel Swedenborg wrote: "I heard a person at the table asking his neighbour the question whether anyone who had an abundance of money could be melancholic. I smiled in my mind and would have answered, if it had been proper for me to do so in that company, or if the question had been addressed to me, that a person who possesses everything in abundance, is not only subject to melancholy, but is r exposed 1 to a still higher kind, that of the mind and
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the soul, or of the spirit which operates therein, and I wondered that he had proposed such a question. I can testify to this so much the more, as by the grace of God there has been bestowed upon me in abundance everything that I require in respect to temporal things; I am able to live richly on my income alone, and can carry out what J have in mind, and still have a surplus of the revenue, and thus I can testify that the sorrow or melancholy which comes from the want of the necessaries of life, is of a lesser degree and merely of the body, and is not equal to the other kind. The power of the Spirit prevails in the latter, but I do not know whether it is so also in the first kind, for it seems that it may be severe on bodily grounds; still, I will not enter further into this matter".
Leaving for a moment out of consideration the subject of this meditation, we would wish to draw attention to Swedenborg's attitude, expressed in the words; "I smiled in my mind and would have answered, if it had been proper for me to do so in that society, or if the question had been addressed to me". Externally taken, a courteous attitude which every "perfect gentleman" would likewise have observed; one does not speak when one has not been introduced. Interiorly taken, hawever, it is the attitude of life of a humbled indebted proprium and of a subjugated possessive proprium. For how many of us would not have eagerly taken the opportunity quickly found at a table d'hote to hold a striking speech, even if for a quarter of an hour only, for the sake of reading from the eyes of all "O HOW JUST, O HOW LEARNED, O HOW WISE", T.C.R. 332, 333, 334. It would have seemed to us as if we had spoken from a good and true impulse, and had spoken the right word, and still and still this would have been an appearance out of the possessive proprium, proud of our own pedantry and the demonstration thereof. And our feeling of self would have felt flattered with the satisfaction of having done a good work, to have stood for the truth, to have sown a little seed, and what not more. Here we have a striking example of how the possessive proprium may pose as good and true, with the truths from the indebted proprium and, not being subjugated, push forward, presumptuously occupying the place of the indebted proprium which has been put out of its order, and not be conscious of how evil and false it is! This now
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is one of the many forms in which the possessive proprium acts as disturber, as rejecter, as fitter-in, loving the uppermost rooms, the chief seats, the greetings, altogether as in the description of Matthew ch. XXIII. And now, as a contrast, notice the attitude printed above in italics, at the same time bearing in mind the so highly characteristic subject: whether possession makes melancholy! What an indebted proprium applied to life speaks therefrom, and what a subjugated possessive proprium; and yet, he who reads this Journal of Dreams sees what combats had to be humbly wrestled through from the Lord and to be suffered, to keep this possessive proprium subjugated, in order that in this life there might be the life following the Doctrine.
The proprium, whatever it is, is the Lord's, but it is given to man, Angel, and devil as his: pro privato, for or as private property. Now the delight that constitutes the inmost of this appearance, in the indebted proprium is an inexpressibly blessed feeling of gratitude; and, in the possessive proprium an excessive avidity and love of dominion. Whether possession makes melancholy, it was asked. Is this melancholy not involved in the sadness spoken of in Matthew XIX: 22: "When the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions". In the testimony which Swedenborg gave in the above quoted meditation we also see all of the great material possessions he enjoyed, expressly booked as a debit-item;.and because he lived entirely out of the indebted proprium he was silent at that table, because it was no society. We think also of that memorable meeting in T.C.R. n. 503: "No president was appointed ... but each one, as the desire seized him, rushed forth into the midst, and ... made public his opinion". (How characteristic too that every one there was seated at his own small altar. And their speaking testified to a thinking close to the speech). This keeping silent now was from the indebted proprium, for the possessive proprium cannot keep quiet, it must be active, of itself it must be able to shoot to the centre and to cry out, whether there is a society or not. Do we see the difference between the chaste and scrupulous indebted proprium and the unchaste and unscrupulous possessive proprium? Do we also see therefrom how much the rejecter in us transfers from the indebted to the possessive, not perceiving that thereby he transfers the living
29
contents as forms-alone, as mere cognitions, mere cultures.
This concrete example is weighty with conclusions for us to draw. With a lip-confession of an evil and false proprium we too easily shirk a life following the Doctrine. In our life in the Church, alone and in company, we should let the possessive proprium be subjugated and the indebted proprium be ordered from the Lord, more and more, through all the seven states, not for our own sake but for the sake of the Lord. We should be near to one another in the indebted proprium, and remain at a distance in the possessive proprium. The rejecter in us, on the contrary, wishes us to be near to one another in the possessive proprium and at a distance in the indebted proprium. Thus our societies are still full of good and true, dear and cordial, warm and generous, spontaneous and enthusiastic appearances, which interiorly are nothing but evil and false, and meanwhile the Lord over and again asks of the things in our indebted proprium: Peter, lovest thou Me?
What in our lives in the face of the life following the Doctrine we ought to learn, is continually to appoint to its place in the lower earth the possessive proprium, where it could execute mean services for a piece of food, a piece of raiment, and a piece of money; entirely as in the hellish workhouses. It is of the possessive proprium that the Lord says: "For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? Do not even the publicans so?" Matth. V: 46, 47. Our possessive proprium in its way loves cordially and is full of the most affectionate greetings. It is even willingly prepared to embrace the Doctrine and to be taught by it. It is willing to improve its life provided - it only does not, nay not in anything, lose that life. It is with this as with the love of dominion: a great love of dominion cannot but be accompanied by a great shrewdness, and it is part of that shrewdness never to show a trace of its love of dominion; it beautifies it in the shape of an Ideal- the doctrine of all tyrannic world-reformers. To carry through that ideal is nothing but to fit into everything the ambition and love of dominion: the danger of an indoctrinated proprium. What we therefore greatly need is a concrete idea in ourselves of the propriums, what they have been in the Most Ancient Church, in the
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Ancient Church, in the Hebrew, Jewish, primitive Christian, and how they will have to be in the New Church. And just as the Ancient Church had completely elaborated Doctrines of Charity, we shall also be given the indebted possession of similar Doctrines; and, however curious it sounds, amongst them there will be also a Doctrine of Society, treating of the subjugation and the ordering of the respective propriums, to sue an extent that ill the state of any arbitrary society the state of the Church will be mirrored altogether and fully. To this end it is necessary that every society, and in every society every individual, to use a mathematical expression, should find its greatest common measure and its least common multiple, perceiving that all that goes beyond that is from evil. In the multiple is the life of the Doctrine, in the measure the life following the' Doctrine, both organically one. Therein there is no place for the possessive proprium except at the outermost periphery, and even then as it were at rest, that is, put to its "own" mean service. It is not enough with the lips to abhor "the proprium" and meanwhile to leave it its evil and false playground; it were indeed better to extend mercy also to that proprium and to perform for it a good work of charity, as for a stray dog. The possessive proprium is such a stray dog: if it is not subjugated. Once subjugated, it may become a good watch- or draught-dog, entitled to "good treatment" in its kennel; outside, not in the house. The false prophets against which the Lord warns proceed from the possessive proprium and present themselves as the indebted proprium. Our entire life following the Doctrine must guard against this under penalty of losing for ever the life of the Doctrine in us.
Our Church is the Church of the Lord's Second Coming. And promising this Second Coming following His Coming, the Lord sadly asked: When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth? Let us then, more and more each day, as from ourselves, take up the Life of the Doctrine with and in a life following the Doctrine, lest at some time we walk. our head high above in an appearance of doctrine, the frayed hem of our garment dragging through a filthy Jerusalem; which will happen if we leave it to our possessive proprium to freely dispose of the things of Doctrine. And the end of it would be that we, as they of the filthy Jerusalem, disap-
31
pointed everywhere and yet indefatigably, would be seeking for the Messiah, thus together with the Second Coming, also making void the Coming. For the possessive proprium finally chokes up even every general influx.
We read “that man's understanding can· be raised above his proper love into some light of wisdom in the love of which he is not". Well then, if by that light he does not see and is not taught "how he must live if he would come also into that love, and thus enjoy blessedness into the eternal", D.L.W. 395, it is with his possessive proprium alone that he enjoys the things of wisdom, His reward is gone, his reward and his use. He may have his moments of illuminatio (from lumen, glimmer) - in ordinary language it is said "luminous ideas" - but the true illustratio (from lux, light) is never given to him. We are taught that the Doctrine is from those who are in enlightenment; this means: from those who are in the light of wisdom with the love of that wisdom. Further it imperatively means that nothing of Doctrine ever is from those who "are above their proper love' in some light of wisdom". He who is in the love of wisdom, has the life of the Doctrine in the life following the Doctrine, dwelling in an indebted and thus innocent proprium; he perceives arcana, while the other is only solving problems, with a continually consulted rational. All discussions in doctrinal matters that cannot be settled have therefore this cause, either that both parties speak out of "a certain light", or that one is in enlightenment, and the other only in "a certain light"; the former in a life following the Doctrine, the latter outside of it. That it is necessary that there should be also the latter, is a different question; but what here and now is the principal thing is that we may no longer at any price leave the indebted and the possessive proprium for what it is, undistinguished as one dark entangled mass with "nothing but evil and false" .. First of all, we do not leave it for what it is, for the possessive proprium everywhere and always still plays its 'tricks on ns far too freely; and secondly, in that way we never learn to see that the Doctrine most certainly is in-generated in the proprium, but in the indebted proprium. How otherwise could it be understood that the Most Ancients had the Word engraved in their hearts? And one more question: The judgments in the
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Apocalypse on the Angels of the Churches, do they concern the Doctrine or the life following the Doctrine? The answer is clear: who does violence to the life following the Doctrine, does violence to the life of the Doctrine. WHOSO READETH, LET HIM UNDERSTAND.
Taking the Word for the Doctrine of the Church is to enlarge and extend the possessive proprium to a rich man's land; " ... but God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided"? Luke XII : 16-21. But out of the Word to receive (recipere) the Doctrine of the Church as the understanding of the Word is from the Lord to have the indebted proprium made angelic and a celestial proprium.
The life of the Doctrine in the life following the Doctrine - " I the Vine, you the branches" - is the GLORIFICATION heard in Heaven, T.C.R. 625. The six days or periods of the story of creation as the six successive states of man's regeneration have in them no other end than to come to the Glorification of that Seventh Day. Who, in this connection, re-reads the ARCANA COELESTIA, n. 6--13, will find that the advance of Regeneration is no other than that from the from one's self to the as if from one's self, a gradually stronger shining forth of the indebted proprium through the possessive proprium, until the former is made altogether angelic, the latter definitely asleep. Then love reigns.
And so the question what is the life following the Doctrine, is no other than the Lord's question: Peter, lovest thou Me?
33 DE HEMELSCHE LEER
EXTRACT FROM THE ISSUE FOR JULY 1935
THE NINETEENTH OF JUNE 1935
Address by H. D. G. Groeneveld.
We to-day celebrate the day of the Lord's Second Coming and of the establishment of the New Church. Are we indeed imbued with the fact for which we have come together, and does the great miracle live in us that the Lord has come again and is present in the New Church? If all affections and thoughts for that Church are not in the centre of our lives, then the celebration of this day is merely formal, a celebration therefore in which the essential, that is, the love to the Lord, is lacking. In CONJUGIAL LOVE, n. 125, we read: "It is a common saying within the Church that as the Lord is the Head of the Church, so the husband is of the wife; from which it would follow that the husband represents the Lord, and the wife the Church. But the Lord is the Head of the Church, and the man (homo), a man (vir) and a woman, are a Church; and still more a husband and· a wife together"; and in n. 63: "The conjunction of good and truth is the Church". It thus appears from this that we are in the Church only then when both provinces of the mind, that is the intellectual and the voluntary, are conjoined with the