Spiritual Life and the Word of God by Emanuel Swedenborg
page 113 of 136 (83%)
page 113 of 136 (83%)
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explained, as far as possible, to the comprehension. It can be said of
every regenerate man that he is his own truth and his own good, since the thought which belongs to his understanding is from truths, and the affection which belongs to his will is from goods. Whether you say, therefore, that a man is his own understanding and his own will, or that a man is his own truth and his own good, it amounts to the same thing. The body is mere obedience; for it speaks that which man thinks from the understanding, and does that which he wills from affection. Thus these things and the body mutually correspond and make one, like an effect and its effecting cause; and these taken together constitute the human. As it can be said of the regenerate man that he is his own truth and his own good, so it can be said of the Lord as Man, that He is truth itself or Divine truth, and good itself or Divine good. All this makes evident the truth that the Lord in relation to His Human in the world was Divine truth, that is the Word; and that everything that He then said was Divine truth, which is the Word; and that since the time when he went to the Father, that is, became one with the Father, the Divine truth going forth from Him is the Spirit of truth, which goes out and goes forth from Him, and at the same time from the Father in Him. (A.E., n. 1071.) III. The Lord's Words Spirit and Life That the Word is holy and Divine from inmosts to outermosts is not evident to the man who leads himself, but is evident to the man whom the Lord leads. For the man who leads himself sees only the external of the Word, and forms his opinion of it from its style; but the man whom the Lord leads forms his opinion of the external of the Word from the holiness that is in it. |
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