1.  Introduction: Non-theistic and Theistic Psychology

 The study of theistic psychology starts and ends with human mental anatomy.

 Non-theistic psychology has nothing to say about mental anatomy because it equates the mind with the brain. Mental states involving sensations, thoughts and feelings are equated with physical neural or electro-chemical operations in the physical brain. Non-theistic psychology denies that the mind exists. It asserts that only the brain exists. Since non-theistic psychology adopts this materialistic perspective without proving that it is correct, we will call it the negative bias in science (see Section xx).

 In contrast, theistic psychology asserts that there are two separate but interacting worlds, namely, the physical world of time-space-matter, and the mental world of sensations, thoughts and feelings which are operations of the mind that are not in time, not in space, and do not involve physical matter. This separate world outside time-space-matter is in the mental world of eternity, which is also called the spiritual world. In other words, when we are conceived and born we come into existence with two bodies, one physical and the other spiritual. The physical body and spiritual body are tied to each other by functional laws of correspondence, which we will study later. These laws of correspondence are actually cause-effect laws that tie together the two worlds. Nothing can happen in one world that is not tied completely to something happening in the other world.

 Our physical body contains our physical organs that allow us to function in a physical world. Our spiritual body contains our mental organs that allow us to function in the spiritual world of eternity. Dying involves being disconnected from the physical body and awakening a few hours later in our spiritual body. We thus ‘pass on’ from being dual citizens in both worlds, to being a citizen in the spiritual world of eternity. In that world we are immortal, living forever. While we are still dual citizens we are not conscious of our spiritual body and its mental organs. It appears to us that our sensations, thoughts and feelings are in the physical body. But once we reason rationally that sensations, thoughts and feelings cannot exist in a physical plane, we come to the correct conclusion that our sensations, thoughts and feelings must be outside the physical world. Hence it makes sense to think about a spiritual body in which the mental organs are enclosed.

We will study human mental anatomy just as we study human physical anatomy. These anatomical details are revealed in the correspondential sense of Sacred Scripture, which is Divine Speech expressed in a natural language. There are versions of Sacred Scripture in every culture, given by God through prophets of a particular people. It makes sense that God would want to give us scientific facts about the spiritual world of eternity since non-theistic science can discover things only about the physical world of time-space-matter. Even psychology, which is the science of the human mind, knows nothing about how sensations, thoughts and feelings operate in mental organs. This is because non-theistic psychology does not recognize the world of eternity, the spiritual body, God or Divine Speech, and consequently denies that there is a world of eternity and that Sacred Scripture contains scientific revelations on mental anatomy and eternity.

But theistic psychology assumes just the opposite and goes on from there. Once you assume that God exists, it makes sense that God wants to communicate with the mind of humanity on earth. Once you realize that science is not capable of telling us anything about mental anatomy, spiritual body, and eternity, it is easy to see that these scientific details about the other world have to be revealed by God. There is no conscious one on one communication possible between people in eternity and people still connected to their physical body. Consequently, Divine Speech expressed in natural languages is the only external way that God can communicate these facts to science.

The positive bias in theistic psychology, and the arguments I mention above, would hardly be convincing to most people as scientific proof of the existence of God, dual citizenship, and the afterlife of eternity. Theistic psychology does not provide proof of the positive bias in science, any more than non-theistic psychology provides proof of the negative bias in science. So we are not required to prove the existence of God or eternity. However we do need empirical evidence that shows that God and eternity do exist -- even if this empirical evidence cannot be experimented with or replicated in the same way as things in non-theistic psychology.

No such evidence existed until the Swedenborg Reports, which are closely studied in theistic psychology. Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772) was a respected and well known scientist, engineer, inventor, and political figure in Sweden. At age 57 God appeared to him and told him that he had been prepared since his childhood to develop a mind capable of being conscious in both the natural mind and the spiritual mind. The spiritual body we have at birth contains two major portions, a spiritual mind and a natural mind. The spiritual mind is unconscious until death when we are resuscitated. The natural mind is the portion by which we operate consciously in daily life. After dying and resuscitation, our natural mind becomes unconscious, and we continue our immortal life in our spiritual mind.

Swedenborg is the only known scientist in history who became conscious in both minds simultaneously.

The Swedenborg Reports (also called The Writings of Swedenborg) make up about 30 volumes of notes he made about what he saw in the spiritual world of eternity. Since his passing on in 1772 Swedenborg’s Writings have been studied by thousands of enthusiastic scholars who have also written various collateral books. Much of this literature is cited in the References in Volume 18 of Theistic Psychology. I found the Swedenborg Reports in 1981 in Hamilton Library on the University of Hawaii Manoa campus. I have researched and studied these reports ever since. Theistic psychology represents the way that I try to summarize the facts contained in those reports.

Swedenborg was able to interview thousands of people who were going through the dying process, which takes about 30 hours, and at the end of which the individual awakens in the spiritual mind. That’s the moment he talked to them, and then he also followed them around to see how their new life of immortality progressed.

The most valuable data that he presents, in my view, is the connection between our habits and traits by which we lived while connected to the physical body, and the quality of our life in eternity.

This seems obvious to me. What can be more important than to know than whether we can prepare of our life in eternity? What kind of life is there for us in that mental state? Is it happy and joyful, or is it painful and disturbing? No amount of pleasure and contentment we have here for a few decades is worth anything to me if after that I have to endure an eternity of suffering! If I accept that there is an afterlife of eternity, I most definitely want to know the details of it and what I need to do to make sure my life in eternity will be a mental state of heaven rather than a mental state of hell.

Swedenborg gives detailed descriptions of what we need to know. But we need to approach this study as scientists, and we need to understand these details rationally and empirically, as a scientist. Theistic psychology is a systematic exposition of the facts of eternity and God as they are available in Sacred Scripture. The Swedenborg Reports give us the detailed methods of analysis that we can apply to Sacred Scripture in order to extract from it all the scientific facts about God and the mental world of eternity in the spiritual world.

You might think that the mental world of eternity, or the spiritual world of the afterlife, is something strange and unknown to you while you’re here and still ‘stuck on earth.’ But the opposite is the case! The mental world of eternity is something you have been intimately familiar with since your birth, much more familiar than the outside world around you. This may be surprising to you, but it becomes obvious as soon as you realize what it is from personal experience.

You know of course the expression “mental world” as referring to the mind, to our sensations (S), thoughts (C), and feelings (A). But most people do not know that these are actual operations in the spiritual body which contains the organs of our mind. You are in the mental world since your birth. You know yourself as “me” and you are aware of what you are thinking and feeling. Your personality or “self,” which makes you into a unique individual, is nothing else than the cumulative collection of all your sensations (S), thoughts (C), and feelings (A). The growth and development of your “self” depends on the continuity of your sensations (S), thoughts (C), and feelings (A). If these operations are not physical, and hence not in the brain, where are they?

You must have a rational and sufficiently scientific explanation of what the answer is. You cannot get an objective answer except from theistic psychology, or from Sacred Scripture, upon which theistic psychology is based. But remember: not on the literal sense of Sacred Scripture, but on its extracted correspondential sense (see Section xx). It is not possible to take the literal meaning of most of Sacred Scripture and obtain scientific facts from it.

For instance, some people have advanced then idea that the creation story in the Book of Genesis, of the Old Testament Sacred Scripture, is the basis for a theistic science account of how the physical world was created by God. But they do not realize that the scientific facts of that creation story lie not at all in the literal sense – which is an allegory of creation, but in the hidden correspondential sense that can be extracted only if one knows about correspondences (see Section xx).

When you apply the methodology of correspondences to that portion of the Sacred Scripture text, you immediately begin to see that what God is talking about there is not the creation of the physical universe, but the creation of the spiritual mind in every person born on a planet. The creation story, when analyzed by correspondences, reveals many scientific details about the anatomy of the mental world, and how we climb up and down its layers, as we develop our angelic capacities, in preparation for a joyful and conjugial life in the heaven of eternity in our mind. When our mind operates in such a way that we are forever joyful, in love to our spouse, surrounded by peace, comfort, and art, among like minded interesting friends, then we are in the heavenly layer of the mental world. Our mind gives us access to go anywhere across the layers of the mental world. Some of these involve only heavenly operations, but other layers involve only hellish operations – fear, horror, savagery, degrading lusts, madness, hating God, children, and heaven.

Every human being is capable with the spiritual body to roam around in any of these layers and zones of the mental world of eternity.

Swedenborg proves it to us by doing it for 27 years while still here and writing about it as one of science’s most amazing experiment.

Swedenborg roamed around with his spiritual body, being then conscious in his spiritual mind. He says that the process is somewhat similar to what the old prophets of Sacred Scripture experienced when they had visions and angelic or Divine dictations. You do not right now see your spiritual body or the spiritual body of those who are around your spiritual body. So we see nothing that belongs to the spiritual world. We are in the mental world of eternity, yes, but our conscious awareness is restricted to the natural mind. This is the “me” of every day, my sensations, thoughts, and feelings. All these mental operations of our daily life are located in the natural mind, which comprises the lowest layers of the mental world. We cannot roam around the layers where our spiritual mind can roam around. So our conscious awareness is limited to the natural mind until the moment of resuscitation.

Once you are resuscitated, as Swedenborg describes it from charted and precise empirical observations, you are conscious in your spiritual mind, and therefore you suddenly begin to see the other spiritual bodies and the people to whom they belong. A whole new world is now open to you in which nothing can stop you from doing what you want or going where you want. This is because the laws of the mental world are different from what we are used to here. But just think about your dreams, during which you are roaming around in the mental world of eternity with your spiritual body. What causes the details of your scenery or events in the dream? Most people know from Freud’s psychology that it is your desires and intentions (A) that create the visual details (S) of the dream through your knowledges and memories (C). In other words, your dreams are sensations (S), thoughts (C), and feelings (A) operating in the layers of your spiritual mind.

Once you realize this you can see why you do what you want in the mental world of eternity, just as in your dreams, except that now you are not asleep and it is your very real actuality of existence. You quickly discover the new rules of reality. Everything you see around you in the environment are appearances created by your feelings, emotions, and intentions, as well those of the people you are with. When you are in “bright” mood, everything around is cheerful and friendly, with beautiful gardens, flowers, birds, waterfalls, fruit trees (operations in the heavenly layers of the mind). But when you are in a “dark” mood, everything around appears gloomy, ugly, depressing, scary, with caverns, forests, and deserts populated by poisonous and vicious animals (operations in the hellish layers the mind). 

In our natural mind connected to this world, we alternate between happy joyful moments and moments of anxiety, suffering, and lack of hope. People have tried to control these mental states using various techniques of physical discipline, mental practice, or dietary and drugs. Basically every generation is searching for this control, without having found it. In your spiritual mind, after resuscitation, the compelling power of your loves and intentions exert an absolute power and are irresistible.

Operations in the affective organ (A) of the spiritual mind are super powerful and effective in creating our environment in the mental world of eternity. Are you hungry for X? Blink. There it is on the table, just reach for it. Are you curious to see your friend Y? Blink. There you are in front of him or her. Do you flash on the cute pet you had when on earth in the natural mind with your physical body? Blink. There is your beloved little pet next to you, and you can touch him, hold him, talk to him, as always, and see his reactions. Are you mad at somebody that confronts you? Blink. That person disappears from your view. Do you want a new piece of art work in your royal grand palace with gardens? Blink. The sculpture or painting is there in front of you, more beautiful and moving that you could expect. Etc. Etc.

On the other hand if the operations in your affective organ (A) are hellish, selfish, injurious, hateful, domineering, delusional – then you can imagine the scary and deranged environment around you, and even worse, the savage and vicious people around you, who try to hunt you down, rob you, enslave you, or just plain pull you apart limb by limb. These are all mental torutres. The person feels like the body is being pulled apart into sections. But once this is felt and done, the person is back as before, only to experience the same nightmare or delusion over and over again. Swedenborg witnessed the maniacal furor of the people who operate in the hellish layers of the affective mind. If you are taken there by your negative emotions and lusts, or by various character weaknesses that you refused to pay attention to in your life prior to resuscitation, then indeed you are in deep trouble!

Swedenborg records many details about the hellish operations of the spiritual mind, and I won’t go into detail for they are horrifying. But of course you can check it out in the Swedenborg Reports (see Reading List in Volume 18 for free access online to all of Swedenborg’s books). Many of the details are collected in one book called Heaven and its Wonders and Hell From Things Heard and Seen (1758). Here is the Table of Contents for the online version: www.swedenborgdigitallibrary.org/contets/HH.html

 So again I ask: What could be more important to us now in this life than to know the details of the afterlife in the mental world of eternity, and how we can determine whether we’re going to experience an eternal hell or an eternal conjugial heaven?

This is what theistic psychology can teach you. Of course, if you are reading this in the negative bias mode of materialism, a warning about hell might sound superstitious or delusional. But for now, assume the positive bias mode of reading this, so that you can examine the logic of heaven and hell as connected to our mental habits and ruling love. You will see that hell is a physiological or medical issue about the spiritual body in eternity. It is like this with your temporary physical body. If you neglect taking proper care of it you will reap the inevitable medical consequences down the line, sooner or later.

If you neglect taking proper care of your spiritual body in this life, you will reap the inevitable medical consequences in the afterlife, beginning at resuscitation, and these will be going on forever. So much is at stake here! Perhaps so much that some people react with a defense mechanism of either rejecting the whole idea for various justified reasons they come up with. Or else, they decide they will deal with it later in life when they are ready. But some people take this spiritual medical idea of hell rationally and scientifically. Theistic psychology gives them the opportunity to examine the scientific and medical explanation of hell. It is scientific because it is based on a reputable scientist's empirical and observational reports over a span of 27 years of daily interaction with people in both this world in time and in the world of the afterlife in eternity.

These empirical observations can be examined to see if they fit into a coherent rational and useful explanation of the human mind in broader terms then materialistic psychology can allow.

The positive bias says that the Swedenborg Reports may be valid and scientific.

The negative bias says that the Swedenborg Reports cannot be valid and scientific.

Summary statement for you to discuss, memorize, and rationally think through as you study theistic psychology:

The Writings of Swedenborg, viewed in the positive bias mode, contain these six facts and observations confirmed by Swedenborg:

(1) We are born with a temporary physical body in time and an immortal spiritual body in eternity.

(2) Our sensations, thoughts, and feelings that make up the mind or conscious self, are not 'emergent epiphenomena' in the physical body. They are actual and real organs in the spiritual body constructed out of spiritual substances from the Spiritual Sun in the world of eternity.

(3) God creates and manages the spiritual body from birth to eternity. This includes regeneration, which is the process of preparing the spiritual body for a life of conjugial happiness and rationality in eternity.

(4) We must cooperate consciously in regeneration by facing our weaknesses and traits that are contrary to a life of happiness and rationality in eternity. To do this successfully we must acquire spiritual truths about the spiritual mind and eternity. The source of these spiritual truths is Sacred Scripture, which God gives at different times to various cultures and civilizations.

(5) To acquire these spiritual truths from Sacred Scripture we must apply the reasoning of correspondences to its literal sense. This process of correspondential analysis or extraction yields the knowledge of spiritual truths. Theistic psychology is such knowledge extracted from the correspondential sense of several Sacred Scriptures.

(6) These spiritual truths must be applied to our daily thoughts, feelings, and intentions, using a rational reasoning process to fight the temptation of thinking and enjoying whatever we want or can justify. We can then compel ourselves to abandon all thoughts, intentions, and enjoyments that are unhealthy to our happiness and rationality in eternity. Unless we negate in this regeneration process, our spiritual body will not be healthy in the afterlife of eternity, and will sink into mental insanity and delusion.

 In their literal sense, the various cultural and historical versions of Sacred Scripture present God in very different ways, but when you extract the correspondential sense from the literal, we get the same version of mental anatomy. The Old Testament Sacred Scripture presents God as a kind of old fashioned potentate in the heavens who has His favorite “chosen people” on earth, cares about the purity of their racial blood line, and promises them that they will rule the world. He also gets very angry when they don’t follow the commandments He gave them, so angry that He cries out for vengeance and threatens to punish them, and their children, and their grandchildren.

In the literal meaning of the New Testament Sacred Scripture, God is portrayed as a God Man who has only compassion for all human beings regardless of their race or culture, or even planet. He forgives everyone their lawlessness and promises all human beings a heavenly eternity if they believe in Him and continue to do so no matter what.

In the literal meaning of the Writings Sacred Scripture, God is identified as the Divine Human who incarnated as a man on earth and took on a country’s citizenship, leading a normal life in the physical body that He took for Himself through birth. But in His spiritual body He was battling the sensations, thoughts, and feelings in the natural layers of the mental world. Using His Divine power from His soul, He rearranged that entire layer of the mental world of eternity. It is explained that God could not accomplish this from the Spiritual Sun, which is above all the layers of the mental world. He therefore had to make Himself acquire a human physical body on earth, and a human spiritual body in the mental world. He was then able to do what He could not do from the Spiritual Sun, namely, reorder and rearrange the entire layer of the interior-natural mind where the inherited tendencies kept people holding on to their inherited hellish traits.

This is what God wanted to remedy. He wanted people in their natural mind on earth, and on other planets, to have freedom of choice regarding which character habits of thoughts and feelings they wanted to hang on to, and which they wanted to get rid of for the sake of their afterlife in eternity. People had lost that freedom because their inherited tendency towards hellish enjoyments was so strong and compelling. God therefore made an appearance in history and science by providing for Himself through birth, a physical body and a spiritual body. Through this spiritual body obtained by birth from a virgin woman on earth, God Man was able to access the human mental layers through His own natural mind, which He did not possess before. And there He faced the disorder of the inherited hellish sensations, thoughts, and feelings. Through His Divine power from His soul He was then able to recreate these mental layers in a different and new order.

Since then all human beings born on earth have had access to the new dynamic of their own natural mind. Everyone is now in balance between the inherited hellish traits and the heavenly traits that we acquire through instruction, Sacred Scripture, and conscience. Every person is now capable of knowing what is heavenly and what is hellish in their character traits. Through His Divine Human spiritual body and His Natural Mind, God can now be present in every one’s natural mind as the Divine Psychologist leading the individual up the layers of the mind into the heavenly layers.

Further, every individual is given the power by the Divine Psychologist not only to know which of their traits are heavenly or hellish, but also to face them in combat with spiritual truths. This takes several stages of battling, difficult at first as we compel ourselves not to do what is hellish even if we still enjoy it.  But later we feel good about avoiding those traits, and at last, we hold them in aversion, viewing our former character as gross and animalistic. In this way the Divine Psychologist gradually reorders our natural mind until it is in the heavenly order of our spiritual mind. When the minds are so coordinated, we achieve our highest potential and success on earth, and then conjugial heaven in eternity.

Over the course of centuries people have put forth various ideas about what is heaven and hell. These ideas were taken either from the literal meaning of their Sacred Scripture, or they concocted various imaginative descriptions of heaven and hell. But in the literal meaning of the Writings Sacred Scripture we are given Swedenborg’s empirical observations of heaven and hell in the afterlife of eternity. It is proven that heaven cannot be a reward for good deeds, and hell cannot be a punishment for bad deeds.

Instead, heaven and hell are not places like prison houses, but mental states. We can all recognize that heaven and hell refer to our mental states. People say “I am in heaven.” when their thoughts are very positive and their feelings peaceful and joyful. People say “I am in a hell.” when their feelings are awful and overwhelming, and their thoughts are disturbed and confused. This shows that people know that heaven and hell are mental states. Swedenborg observed that when people undergo resuscitation and continue life in their spiritual body and mind, they are driven and pulled irresistibly by their loves, feelings, desires, intentions, motives – all operations in the affective organ (A). 

Those who find themselves in joyful surroundings and peaceful feelings are operating in consciousness in the spiritual mind where the heavenly operations occur. But those who find themselves in sorrowful surroundings and hostile feelings are operating in consciousness in the spiritual mind where the hellish operations occur. No one is rewarded by God, and no one is punished. Everyone freely chooses the layers of the mental world where they want to spend their eternal life.

You can see from the above discussions that we must prepare ourselves for life in the spiritual mind of eternity, to make sure that we are propelled to choose the heavenly layers instead of the hellish layers of our mental world. The knowledge of mental anatomy and its application to our daily thoughts and feelings, becomes a very useful charting tool that allows us to manage our personality traits through cooperating knowingly and voluntarily with the Divine Psychologist. 

You can watch some brief video clips about Swedenborg's life and mission, and also about correspondences:

http://www.newcenturytv.com/swedenborg/

 

2.  Mental Anatomy: The Chart of 12 Layers

The mental world of eternity, also called the spiritual world of the afterlife, is arranged in layers, also called “discrete degrees” or levels. Each layer provides its own level of sensory (S), cognitive (C), and affective (A) operations.  

The Mental World of Eternity Viewed in Successive Order

 Note: The chart  above is based on the careful work done by N.C. Burnham (1887). His color charts of mental anatomy are based exclusively on the Writings Sacred Scripture, and he quotes many relevant Numbers to confirm each layer of the diagram. The 2001 Internet edition by Ian Thompson is available here:   http://www.theisticscience.org/books/burnham/index.htm

2.1  The Mental World of Eternity Viewed in Simultaneous Order

You can see that the highest layer in successive order is the inmost layer in simultaneous order. The inmost of every human being is the Spiritual Sun, and the outermost is the physical body.

Note that layers are grouped in four sequences of three:

layers 1, 2, 3  pertain to God

layers 4, 5, 6  pertain to our spiritual mind in eternity (unconscious until resuscitation)

layers 7, 8, 9  pertain to our natural mind in eternity (unconscious after death)

layers 10, 11, 12  pertain to three bodily containers of the layers above

You need to print out the two charts above so that you have them in front of you and refer to them as you read through the three Parts of these Lecture Notes.

Unless you do this it will be impossible for you to follow rationally much of the discussion that follows.

Having the two charts available to you as a printout will also allow you to practice memorizing the layers by carrying it around with you and looking at it for a few times every day. It always helps when you try to explain the chart to your friends, especially if you can reproduce the chart from memory.

Ultimately you want to be able to reproduce the whole chart  from memory. Then you will be able to think and reflect and reason with it as you would use a road map in unknown territory through which you decided to pass through. Be sure to look at the chart whenever any of the layers are mentioned in a sentence (e.g., 7C or 9A, etc.). If you do this persistently, you will soon be able to visualize each layer. As you read the Lecture Notes you will be able to cumulate the information presented by organizing everything into its proper layer.

Then you can think of these layers in your mind as you perform your daily activities. If you do this you will be enlightened, being able to be a dual citizen, a new state that provides incalculable benefits to you and those who are affected by what you do. 

2.2.  Relationships Between Layers

 Notice the sub-layers of the natural and spiritual mind. Layers 7, 8, and 9 combined make up the natural mind, and is also called the “external mind” when it is contrasted with the spiritual mind (layers 4, 5, and 6 combined), which is then called the “internal mind.” In other words, when we contrast the natural vs. the spiritual layers of the mind, we call the natural mind our “external mind” and we call the spiritual mind our “internal mind.” This is because the mental world of eternity is internal to the physical world of the body, which is external. The internal is said to be “within” the external, and “within” is the same as “above.” Thus, what is internal or within is also higher or superior in quality of operation.

In the mental world of eternity the top three layers (1, 2, 3) belong to God.  The bottom three layers (10, 11, 12) are mere coverings and support for all the rest. The middle six layers constitute our mind, also called our “spirit.” Since mind is called spirit, the mental world of the mind is also called the spiritual world of eternity. Our mind and its organs (layers 4 through 9) are located outside time in eternity. Our physical body and limbus are located in time and place.

Layers 7,8,9 constitute our natural mind, while 4,5,6 constitute our spiritual mind. Our natural mind is built up by sensory input from the physical body (layer 12). Hence layers 9 and 8 contain ideas and experiences based on the physical body and world. Layer 7 however is capable of containing spiritual content from Sacred Scripture, from conscience, from enlightenment and insight.

At layer 8C we think and reason on the basis of content from the physical world, but at layer 7C we think and reason on the basis of content from the mental world of eternity.  This distinction is the very basis for our regeneration and consequent attainment of a heavenly conjugial life in eternity.

Layer 7 is called the “interior” sub-layer of the natural mind, and layer 8 is called the “exterior” sub-layer of the natural mind. There is a world of difference between what is exterior and what is interior. For example, think of some physical examples. You wouldn't pay for the chicken you ordered if they give you cleaned up chicken bones. Nor would you pay for TV that has no inner components and is just an empty box. No one can survive on banana peels and coconut shells that have been cleaned of all their interiors. So you can see from this that the exterior is necessary for a protective covering, and that the interior is actually giving you what you want or need. Our exterior mind (layer 8) is what we know ourselves as, the "me" or the "I" or the "self." This self-concept is based on materialistic content from the sensory organs.

 

We do not know, or believe, that we have an upper layer, a more interior layer, in which we can become conscious of a different "me," a self that is far more important to me since it forms the basis of my immortal life in eternity. The exterior layer 8 thinking and reasoning can be rearranged or corrected with reformation (see Section xx). After reformation, which can take a few weeks or a few months, or longer, we become consciously aware of the existence of the interior layer in our natural mind (7). We recognize for instance, that our familiar voice of conscience and moral reasoning about right and wrong, resides in this interior layer, not in the exterior layer. This is an important mental discovery. Look for it. Examine rationally what it is you are feeling when you just know that something is right or wrong.

You will gradually come to realize what is involved in the mental state of "I just know this is wrong (or is right)." It is not something global or undifferentiated. For instance, you definitely know that it is wrong to have the habit of deceiving people. If you think about it rationally, within the positive bias, you will see that there must be a connection between  your conscience and heaven, or the layers that are above your natural mind. These are the layers of your heavenly life in eternity and they influence your natural mind in a way to make it possible for you to attain there after resuscitation. So your conscience operations in layer 7C are connected by correspondence to the unconscious operations of layer 6C in your mind. This is what makes possible the "voice of conscience" since the "voice" speaks in natural words the spiritual operations in layer 6.

Spiritual operations or thinking and reasoning (layers 6, 5, 4), are based entirely on the information we acquire from the correspondences in Sacred Scripture. Exterior-natural operations (layer 8) are based entirely on sensuous information from the corporeal mind (layer 9) that is closest to the physical body (layer 12). For instance, at the corporeal-natural level of understanding the meaning of Sacred Scripture (layers 9), we read "blood of the sacrifice" and we think of gruesome physical things. If we read "blood" with a sensual understanding of Sacred Scripture, we abstract it into a symbol of God's forgiveness of our sins, which have been transferred to the sacrificial animal.

But if we read it through the rational level of understanding Sacred Scripture (layer 7), we see that "blood" discussed in Sacred Scripture is an exterior representative of something interior or spiritual in layer 6 or above. Once we realize this, or discover it, we begin to read Sacred Scripture from this layer (7C), so that reformation of the lower layers can take place through the spiritual truths. Your conscious awareness in layer 7C is being constantly enlightened while you study Sacred Scripture from this interior layer. This applies to the study of theistic psychology since it is the knowledge extracted from Sacred Scripture through the methodology of correspondences.

Layer 9 is the lowest or most external portion of the natural mind, and is closest to the physical body (layer 12), hence it is most like the physical body.

Layer 4 is called the “inmost” or highest layer of the spiritual mind, layer 5 the “middle” layer of the spiritual mind, and layer 6 the "exterior" or lowest portion of the spiritual mind. This is the closest to the natural mind. Layers that are next to each other are more like each other than layers further away. They play an important transition function since what is intermediate contains something that pertains to the other two layers.

Layer 7 (interior-natural) corresponds to layer 4 (interior-spiritual). Layer 8 (exterior-natural) corresponds to layer 5 (exterior-spiritual). Layer 9 (natural corporeal) corresponds to layer 6 (spiritual-natural). Layers that correspond to each other, influence each other more.

There is also a correspondence between layers

4A, 5A, 6A

4C, 5C, 6C

4S, 5S, 6S

Our afterlife of immortality is consciously experienced in layers 6, 5, and 4. We enter one of these layers permanently at our “second death,” which occurs shortly after resuscitation.

Layers 12 and 11 constitute the physical body in the physical

 Layers 10, 9, 8, 7 constitute the “world of spirits” where we are resuscitated. Layers 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 constitute the “spiritual world,” which is the mental world of the afterlife in eternity.

Layers 3 through 9 are inherited from the biological father; layers 10 and 11 from the mother.

Each layer of the mind contains three receptor organs: affective (A), cognitive (C), and sensorimotor (S). The affective organ is called “celestial” because it is a receptor of spiritual heat or good, which come out of layer 1 in infinite variety and quality. The cognitive organ is called “spiritual” because it is a receptor of spiritual light or truth, which come out of layer 1 in infinite variety and quality. The sensorimotor organ is called “natural” because it is a receptor of the combination of the affective (A) and cognitive (C) organs, expressing that joint operation in the external plane of that layer (S). The external plane of each layer (S) produces the sensuous appearances of the environment.

For instance, our conscious layer 7 contains a celestial feature in its affective organ (layer 7A); a spiritual feature in its cognitive organ (layer 7C); and a natural feature in its sensorimotor organ (layer 7S). The affective organ of our natural mind (what we intend and love every day) is therefore called a “celestial-natural” operation. Similarly, the cognitive organ of our natural mind (what we think and understand) is therefore called a “spiritual-natural” operation. And similarly, the sensorimotor organ of our natural mind (what we sensate and can move) is therefore called a “natural-corporeal” operation.

Again: when we are spiritual angels in the second heaven our mind operates at layers 5A, 5B, and 5C. The things we intend and love are spiritual-celestial operations (5A). The things we think and understand are spiritual-spiritual operations (5C). The things we sensate and move are spiritual-natural operations (5S).

Again, at layers 7C and 8C we can have “natural understanding,” i.e., understanding of “natural- rational truths.” We can also have at layer 7C (but not at layer 8C) “spiritual understanding,” i.e., understanding of “spiritual-rational truths” and “celestial-rational truths.”

It is also the case that the affective operations at all layers are relatively a celestial operation because it involves the reception of good or spiritual heat (love), and this is always celestial (layers 4A, 5A, 6A, 7A, 8A, 9A). The cognitive operations in all layers are a spiritual operation because it involves the reception of truth or spiritual light (wisdom), and this is always spiritual (layers 4C, 5C, 6C, 7C, 8C, 9C). The sensorimotor operations in all layers are a natural operation because it involves the expression of the affective and cognitive jointly in the lowest sub-layer, which is always natural (layers 4S, 5S, 6S, 7S, 8S, 9S).

Here are some further examples with which you can practice reading, understanding, and memorizing the anatomy chart:

4A = love or good (spiritual heat) in the celestial (upper) layer of the spiritual mind (celestial love or good)

5A = love or good (spiritual heat) in the spiritual (middle) layer of the spiritual mind (spiritual love or good)

6A = love or good (spiritual heat) in the natural (lower) layer of the spiritual mind (spiritual-natural love or good)

7A = love or good (spiritual heat) in the celestial (upper) layer of the natural mind (natural love or good)

 

4C = truth (or rationality) in the celestial (upper) layer of the spiritual mind (celestial-rational truth)

6C = truth (or rationality) in the natural (lower) layer of the spiritual mind (spiritual-natural truth)

7C = truth (or rationality) in the rational (upper) layer of the natural mind (natural-rational truth)

 

5S = outward appearances in the spiritual (middle) layer of the spiritual mind (spiritual appearances)

6S = outward appearances in the natural (lower) layer of the spiritual mind (spiritual-natural appearances)

8S = outward appearances in the natural (middle) layer of the natural mind (natural appearances)

9S = outward appearances in the natural (lower) layer of the natural mind (corporeal appearances)

Etc. You can practice with the rest of the sub-layers in the chart.

The immortal spiritual body with which we are born, contains our mind, that is, our mental organs, which are called the affective organ (A), the cognitive organ (C), and the sensorimotor organ (S). These three mental organs are in the spiritual-mental body in the same way that the physical body contains the circulatory system, the respiratory system, and the nervous-skeletal system.

The circulatory system in the physical body corresponds to the affective organ in the spiritual body, whose operations give us the subjective experience of feeling and willing. Feelings in the spiritual body correspond to the circulatory system in the physical body, because feelings nourish the life of experience. Feeling and willing give us

• an affective consummatory life such as needs, wants, desires, satisfactions, pleasures, interests, attractions, etc. (as well as their opposites),
  and

• an affective conative life such as intentions, motives, purposes, endeavors, resolve, compassion, love, etc. (as well as their opposites)

The respiratory system corresponds to the cognitive organ whose operations give us the subjective life of thinking, reasoning, and intelligence. Thoughts in the spiritual body, that is, the operations of the cognitive organ, correspond to the respiratory system in the physical body, because thoughts guide our feelings and clarifies them, just as oxygen cleans and purifies the blood. Thoughts give us

• a cognitive appraising life through memory, imagination, words, meaning, concepts, topics, knowledge, logic, common sense, conversation, etc.
  and

• a cognitive planning life through rational reasoning, inventiveness, predictions, hypotheses, fantasies, schedules, blueprints, management policies, etc.

The nervous-skeletal system corresponds to the sensorimotor organ whose operations give us the subjective life of sensing the environment outside the body and of acting upon that environment through motor determinations.  Sensations and motor determinations in the spiritual body correspond to the nervous system in the physical body, because sensations give us the life of experiencing the world outside of us and motor determinations give us the ability to make our bodies move and interact with the environment. Sensations and motor determinations give us

• a sensory noticing life such as seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, pleasure, pain, heat, cold, etc.
  and

• a motor execution life such as moving, pushing, pulling, dancing, chewing, verbalizing, writing, drawing, etc.

Here is then a summary of the exact correspondence between mental anatomy and physical anatomy (try to memorize this after you studied the details given above):

• an affective consummatory life in the spiritual body (= circulatory veins in the physical body)

• an affective optimizing life in the spiritual body (= circulatory arteries in the physical body)
   

• a cognitive appraising life in the spiritual body (= respiratory inhaling in the physical body)

• a cognitive planning life in the spiritual body (= respiratory exhaling in the physical body)
   

• a sensory noticing life in the spiritual body (= nervous afferent input in the physical body)

• a motor execution life in the spiritual body (= nervous efferent output in the physical body)

The affective life of feelings cohere together as a cumulative whole called the affective self.

The cognitive life of thoughts cohere together as a cumulative whole called the cognitive self.

The sensorimotor life of sensations and motor determinations cohere together as a cumulative whole called the sensorimotor self.

Every person can therefore be studied, described, and understood as a threefold self.

 A somewhat different but related method of expressing the relationships among the layers and sub-layers in the mind has been proposed by Dr. Ian Thompson – see here:
http://www.theisticscience.org/principles/degrees.html

The two methods are discussed in detail in Volume 9: The Genes of Consciousness in Spiritual Development, mentioned above.

Dr. Ian Thompson, in a recent email to me, suggested another way of representing the relations through what he calls an "enhanced ennead" matrix:

 In the ennead of layers 4-12 of Leon's, I already have a specific structure
 in mind:
 
 4 7 10
 5 8 11
 6 9 12
 
 See Figure 8 in http://www.theisticscience.org/principles/degrees.html 
 
 The 1, 2, 3 of the layers chart are an earlier triad that I had not considered yet.
 Note that they are not part of God!! They are the first created degrees,
 before angelic/human consciousness [celestial-rational] begins for individual people.
 
 And this triad is reflected both in the 3 rows and the 3 columns of the
 enhanced ennead:
 
        1     2     3
 --------------------
 1   |  4    7    10
 2   |  5    8    11
 3   |  6    9    12
 
 Each row and each column of this 'enhanced ennead' therefore reflects
 similarities: [1 4 7 10],  [2 5 8 11],  [3 6 9 12], and also [1 4 5 6], etc.
 
 The [1 4 7 10] sequence will automatically generate a square pattern when you
 put everything in a circle, as will [2 5 8 11] and [3 6 9 12].
 You can try out the 3 columns beginning [1 4 5 6] and see what they look like.

Please note that these various personality tendencies have not been researched in theistic psychology, and I am presenting them here only to illustrate the fact that mental anatomy and spiritual geography have been combined in the tradition of astrology since antiquity (see Section 6.12.) . We need to distinguish between mental anatomy and mental biology (see Part 2 of the Lecture Notes). In the enneagram circle quoted above there is the arrangement or structure of the mental anatomy (layers 1 to 12) which correspond to the zodiac structure of 12, which is based on the ancient science of correspondences originating in the ancient Sacred Scriptures (see Section xx). But the application of the zodiac layers of mental anatomy is done by various people who are trying to apply knowledge of mental anatomy to a counseling technique not unlike the counseling techniques in non-theistic psychology that you are familiar with from textbooks and popular culture. Consider for instance the above quote from the enneagram site:

"The inclusion of each type in its Triad is not arbitrary. Each type results from a particular relationship with a cluster of issues that characterize that Triad [e.g., 1, 4, 7 or 3, 6, 9]. Most simply, these issues revolve around a powerful, largely unconscious emotional response to the loss of contact with the core of the self."

No doubt the book on this subject at the site explains the psychological basis for the theory that each personality type represents an "emotional response to the loss of contact with the core of the self."  This would be a theory that needs to shown to be accurate. It is different with theistic psychology because we cannot provide our own theory as an explanation for mental phenomena. The theory must be extracted through the strict application of correspondences to the text of Sacred Scripture (see Section xx). The same point applies to how astrology may be applied today as a counseling technique. The zodiac structure of mental anatomy and spiritual geography may be accurate because they are derived from the ancient knowledge of correspondences extracted from the literal of Sacred Scripture. Example of the style of ancient Sacred Scripture is illustrated in a few places in the Old Testament Sacred Scripture that Swedenborg identifies by correspondential analysis (see Section xx).

These include the first eleven Chapters of the Book of Genesis, which forms the beginning of the Jewish and Christian Bibles (see Section xx). Other examples include certain brief portions that Moses copied from the Ancient Sacred Scripture, copies of which were still available in the Middle East at the beginning of the second millennium B.C. Subsequently, according to Swedenborg's studies, remnants of the knowledge of correspondences found their way into Egyptian hieroglyphics (see Section xx). In Section 10.10.1 where I show my research on how to extract spiritual correspondences from the literal sentences and expressions still used today by millions of Americans, and also the sentences of Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, which are ancient sacred texts also written in the language of correspondences known throughout the ancient world prior to 2000 B.C.

Of great empirical interest to is the fact that Swedenborg, in his "travels" to the heavenly layers in the spiritual mind (6, 5, 4), has interviewed people who had lived on this earth in pre-antiquity times relative to our calendar and, when they were allowed to consult their normally quiescent natural mind (layers 7C, 8C),  they were able to report to Swedenborg that they had had the knowledge of correspondences from their Sacred Scripture, which they were able to read in spiritual-rational (layer 5C) and celestial-rational (layer 4C) correspondences, as that science was well-known to them. Subsequently the knowledge of correspondences was lost until Swedenborg was able to revive it in the 18th century through his empirical observations in the spiritual mind of eternity.

Remember that correspondences are the laws of reality by which God created the universe and maintains it in order. God created all things through Divine Speech ("the Word of God"), which in theistic psychology refers to the substance of spiritual light emanating from the Spiritual Sun (layer 1). This is also why Sacred Scripture descends as correspondences of Divine Speech through the layers of the mental world. Those who are conscious in their celestial-rational mind (third heaven, layer 4) are the first to receive Divine Speech in their Sacred Scripture, which Swedenborg saw in their cities. From that layer Divine Speech descends to the next layer (5, second heaven) and Swedenborg confirmed that the Sacred Scripture they have in their cities is the same as the one in the celestial layer above, but only as correspondences at that layer, which are spiritual-rational correspondences of Sacred Scripture. The layers chart above specifies for each layer what correspondences of Sacred Scripture operate there.

Remember that it is the same Divine Speech in all Sacred Scripture that actually creates the consciousness of people operating at that layer -- and yet the literal of it is totally different in different layers because correspondences across layers correspond indeed, but the literal content does not show it -- unless you know correspondences. This is why we can analyze the variety of Sacred Scripture we can find across the globe, with its diversity of culture and languages, and yet get the same knowledge of theistic psychology from each. If you look at the simultaneous view of the layers chart you can see this easily:

If you take the Sacred Scripture of any culture and language today, you will be looking at the literal meaning of the physical book or computer file. This is at layer 12, like the physical body and all physical objects in the natural world (layer 12). Whichever Sacred Scripture you select, it will contain the structure above. "Simultaneous" order contrasts with "sequential" order depicted in the chart layers. God's creation and management of the universe is through sequential order, called "from Firsts to lasts" (layers 1 to 12 downward), but once the last or "ultimate" layer (12) is reached in sequential order, the entire series of 12 layers now exist as the infrastructure of the created layer or object. Every Sacred Scripture has this simultaneous order within itself, though you can only see the bottom layer (layers 9C and 8C) when your mind focuses on the literal meaning of it. This literal meaning is cultural, historical, and ethnic-religious, and therefore the various versions of Sacred Scripture are not compatible in their literal meaning.

But as soon as you leave the literal layer by applying the laws of correspondences to it, as we do in theistic psychology, our consciousness, meaning, or content starts rising across the layers, all the way to the topmost layer of consciousness and content -- celestial-rational correspondences of Sacred Scripture. This level of sensing, thinking, and feeling is awesome to contemplate as it provides us with quasi-omniscience and unbelievable power, as Swedenborg describes the capabilities of the people in eternity who are in that layer (see Section xx). However, prior to reformation and regeneration, we are able to rise in consciousness only to the natural-rational correspondences of Sacred Scripture (layer 7C). After reformation, we can rise still higher, in proportion to our willingness to face more and more interior spiritual combat.

As we regenerate, the Divine Psychologist creates situations that faces us with more and more interior traits that we have inherited, most of which remain hidden or sub-conscious, until they are brought into our awareness by the Divine Psychologist. We are only able to face those hellish traits for which we have acquired spiritual correspondences from Sacred Scripture. If we are willing to cooperate with the Divine Psychologist by daily self-witnessing or mental monitoring, as described below, we can go as high as we want in consciousness and spiritual power or effectiveness.

You will notice from these various systematic representations that the mental structure that God created is completely systematic, having the same number and type of sub-layers at each layer, the whole making a rational series like that of the DNA structure of physical cells, which is the shape of a helix, which is a three-dimensional spiral structure. Mental anatomy conforms to the enneadic structure or three by three matrices of nine boxes or zones (see Section  4.4.7.1 The Basic Ennead Chart For Spiritual Geography and Mental Anatomy. Note that the numbering system may have to be adjusted slightly to reconcile the various diagrams.) If you think about common objects around you, like your computer or your shoes or your lunch, you can have an "x-ray" vision into its infrastructure, which is the simultaneous order depicted above.

Amazingly, every physical object (layer 12) has its outward layer of matter, but within it lies the mental world of humanity through the layers of correspondences created and maintained by spiritual light and heat streaming from layer 1. God creates everything through the mental anatomy of human minds! Our mental organs and layers are higher and more advanced forms of creation since they are discrete degrees within the physical world, and they are created from spiritual substances that are more alive and powerful than physical matter, which is only temporary, relatively inert, and weak. When we die and are resuscitated, we leave this outward layer and go inward, starting our life in layer 6. You can also see form this that the physical universe must remain forever since all else in eternity is within it, or dependent on it for its ultimate base (limbus, layer 11). Furthermore, the physical world is necessary for the evolution of the mental world to eternity, since this perfection depends on more and more individuals joining the afterlife, and all individuals must be born as dual citizens, with a temporary existence in layers 12 to 7.

You can understand this from mental anatomy and its developmental stages. We are born simultaneously with the temporary physical body (layer 12), which includes the permanent limbus covering (layers 11), and the permanent spiritual body (layers 10 through 4). But just like the natural layers of the mind (9, 8, 7) must be developed through growth and experience, the spiritual layers of the mind (6, 5, 4) must also be opened or developed from their potential to their actual. And this growth of the spiritual mind depends on the growth of the natural mind.

This is then another reason why the physical universe is forever since people could not enter eternity without first developing their natural mind through the physical body. It is impossible for human beings to be created directly into the spiritual body at layers 6 and above (the three heavens).

Note that mental anatomy charts are at the same time spiritual geography charts. When Swedenborg explored the mental world of eternity through his spiritual mind having become conscious at age 57, he made the discovery that the countless number of cities in which each society lives in, are arranged in the shape of the human body, physical and spiritual. This was useful to him when he was recording the details of what he was able to see. He would localize the cities relative to each other by saying that it was in the region of the Right Eye, or in the region of The Heart, or the Left Hemisphere of the Brain, or, the region of the Reproductive Organs, both male and female, and so on.

Swedenborg then observed that the quality of the mental states of the people living in each portion of the body organs corresponded to the physiological properties of these organs in the physical body. Here is an episode that occurred in the region of the gall bladder, which is an organ that stores the bile, a chemically caustic agent for purging certain impurities from the digested food. Quoting from the Writings Sacred Scripture:

AC 5187. A certain spirit once came to me, asking whether I knew a place where he could stay. I thought he was an upright spirit, and when I told him that he could perhaps stay where I was, harrier spirits who belonged to this province came along and harried him piteously. This grieved me, and I sought in vain to stop them. At this point I became aware of the fact that I was in the province of the gall bladder. The harrying spirits were some of those who despised uprightness and godliness. I was allowed to witness one kind of harrying there, which consisted in compelling a spirit to speak faster than he could think. This they accomplished by severing his own speech from his thought and then compelling him to speak what they were speaking, a painful experience. By means of this form of harrying the slow are introduced into thinking and speaking more quickly. (AC 5187)

 

In other words, the mental states of those who inhabit the gall bladder region in mental eternity involve treating certain others harshly as a way of purifying them from malfunction. This treatment is painful. Contrast this with the people who inhabit the region of the face and chest. Quoting from the Writings Sacred Scripture:

AC 1773. Spirits who had found delight and joy in the Word of the Lord during their life in the body, have in the other life a kind of joyous heavenly warmth which it has also been permitted me to feel. The warmth of those who had some measure of this delight was communicated to me. It was like a vernal heat, beginning in the region of the lips, and diffusing itself about the cheeks, and thence as far as the ears, ascending also to the eyes, and descending toward the middle region of the breast.

 

[2] The warmth of those who had been still more affected by delight in the Word of the Lord, and by the interior things of it which the Lord Himself had taught, was also communicated to me; beginning at the breast it ascended thence toward the chin, and descended toward the loins. The warmth of those who had been even more delighted and affected, was still more interiorly joyous and vernal, extending indeed from the loins upward toward the breast, and thence through the left arm to the hands. I was instructed by the angels that this is really the case, and that the approach of those spirits brings such warmth, although they themselves do not feel them, because they are in them, just as infants, children, and youths are not commonly sensible of their own warmth which they have in greater measure than adults and old people, because they are in it. 

[3] I was also made sensible of the warmth of some, who had indeed been delighted with the Word, but had not been solicitous about the understanding of it; their warmth was felt in the right arm only. As regards the warmth: evil spirits also can by their artifices produce a warmth which counterfeits delight, and can communicate it to others; but it is only an external warmth, without an origin from internals. Such warmth is that which putrefies and converts food into excrement, like the heat of adulterers, and that of those who have been immersed in filthy pleasures. (AC 1773)

 In other words, people whose spiritual mind was opened through spiritual truths from Sacred Scripture, are in joyous mental states that are communicated or transferred to those present, like Swedenborg, and who can then experience in the spiritual body the sensations that correspond to their joyous feelings and thoughts.

 Next consider what is said about the people (“spirits” in eternity) who live in the region of the abdomen or stomach. Quoting from the Writings Sacred Scripture:

SE 1240. There are spirits who constitute these provinces and who appear almost directly above the middle of the head, at a medium distance. It is their nature to stir up and slip into a person qualms of conscience, so to speak, in any matters where some doubt occurs regarding something they think ought to be done, and thus would be a sin [to leave undone].

            They do this in very many instances, and thereby burden the conscience in matters which should not burden them. There are a lot like this in the world, called the "conscientious," but what true conscience is, they do not very well know, for everything that comes along they make a matter of conscience.

            For example, if someone travels to foreign countries and spends his money on very expensive articles, then they would burden his conscience with this single objection, that by doing this he deprives his country of his wealth, which ought, however, to remain within it. They do the same in numerous other cases. And once such a scruple has been raised as a premise, supporting arguments to weigh down upon this false conscience are never lacking.

            True conscience, opposed to this reasoning, says that if he did not spend the money, the conscience would really be burdened, as all would admit if they knew [the facts]; likewise, if the conscientious doubt is raised about someone spending money for the most useful purposes, yet in doing so depriving the heirs of it, to [whose interests], seen from a legal standpoint, the person must be dedicated. And there are countless similar cases.

            People who were of this nature during their life, in the other life make up that province [abdomen]. When they are present, they constantly weigh down the conscience with qualms of this kind, even to the point of causing grief. And because they only take into consideration the factors that support their objections, they regard causes of the greatest usefulness, which ought to outweigh them, as nothing. (SE 1240)

 In other words, people who inhabit the stomach region of the mental world have feelings and thoughts that correspond to anxiety, which we experience in that region, as everyone knows. The Divine Psychologist manages all the interactions we have with spirits through our unconscious spiritual mind. This management has a purpose and a goal. When the Divine Psychologist decides that we need to have our guilt feelings aroused through conscience, He brings our spiritual mind into contact or communication with the spiritual mind of those spirits in the abdominal region. Their presence with our unconscious spiritual mind (layer 6) evokes a corresponding reaction in our conscious natural mind (layer 7). The anxiety we feel is caused by their action, as explained in the quote above.

 Next consider what Swedenborg observed about the people who live in the region of the mouth and lips, and their role in the resuscitation process of people at death. Quoting from Worcester’s book available at:  http://www.theisticscience.org/books/worcester/lips.html - LIPS

I add some comments in square brackets [ ] and in italics to clarify the topic.

New things, necessary to the growth and happiness of the heavens, are as food supplied from the earths. Like food the newcomers from the earth must be received by the heavens, examined, sorted, instructed, and trained to heavenly states, as by a kind of digestion, before they can be assimilated; and this is the function of the world of spirits [ = where we are resuscitated and awaken in our spiritual mind].

                                                     

“The life of man,” Swedenborg says, “when he dies, and enters into the other life, is like food, which is received softly by the lips, and afterwards is passed through the mouth, faucets, and esophagus into the stomach; and this according to the nature derived from his works [ = our intentions and motives] during the life of the body. Most are treated gently at first, for they are kept in the company of angels and good spirits; which is represented in food that it is first softly touched by the tongue.

[Quoting from the Writings Sacred Scripture:]

“The food which is soft, in which is sweetness, [essential] oil, and spirit, is immediately received by the veins, and borne into the circulation; but food which is hard, in which is bitterness and foulness, and little nutritiveness, is more hardly treated, and is cast down through the œsophagus into the stomach, where it is corrected by various methods and tortures. What is still harder, more foul, and worthless, is thrust into the intestines, and at length into the rectum, where first is hell, and is cast out, and becomes excrement.

“Resembling this is the life of man after death. First man is kept in externals; and because he had lived a moral and civil life in externals, he is with angels and good spirits. But afterwards externals are taken away from him, and then it appears what he was within as to thoughts and affections, and at length as to ends; according to these his life remains.

 “As long as they are in this state, in which they are like food in the stomach, they are not in the Greatest Man, but are being introduced; but when they are representatively in the blood, then they are in the Greatest Man.” (AC 5175, AC 5176)

The angels [ = people who live in the heavenly regions of the mental world], then, who softly receive man [ = people still connected to the physical body on earth] at his entrance into the spiritual world [ = when dying], who cooperate with the Lord in drawing him out of the world and introducing him into the spiritual world, are in the province of the lips. Perhaps we see some effect of their presence even before the moment of death, in those whose feelings and thoughts are strongly drawn towards the other world as the time of death comes near; and especially in those for whom open vision of spiritual things, more or less distinct, produces an anticipation of the peaceful gladness which we commonly see represented in the face after the natural life ceases.

Swedenborg says that celestial angels, who belong to the kingdom of the heart, come to the person at the time of death, and take charge of his affections and thoughts; and that at their approach an aromatic odor is perceived, and then all spirits leave the person exclusively to their care. (HH 449)