Spiritual Life and the Word of God by Emanuel Swedenborg
page 70 of 136 (51%)
page 70 of 136 (51%)
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because he then enters into the marriage of good and truth; and in good
there is the conatus [instinct] to love truth continually, and in truth there is the conatus [instinct] to love good continually; and then the wife is good in form and the husband is truth in form. From that conatus [instinct] man puts off all the austerity, sadness, and dryness of old age, and puts on the liveliness, gladness, and freshness of youth, from which the conatus [instinct] becomes living and a joy. I have been told from heaven that such then have the life of love, which cannot otherwise be described than as the life of joy itself. That the man who lives in true marriage love in the world comes after death into the heavenly marriage, which is the marriage of good and truth springing from the marriage of the Lord with the church, is clearly evident from this, that from the marriages in the heavens, although the married pair have consociations there like those on the earth, children are not born, but instead of children goods and truths, and thus wisdom, as has been said above. And this is why births, nativities, and generations mean in the Word, in its spiritual sense, spiritual births, nativities, and generations, and sons and daughters mean the truths and goods of the church, and other like things are meant by daughters-in-law, mothers-in-law, and fathers-in-law. This also makes clear that marriages on the earth correspond to marriages in the heavens; and that after death man comes into the correspondence, that is, comes from natural bodily marriage into spiritual heavenly marriage, which is heaven itself and the joy of heaven. (A.E., n. 1000.) From marriage love angels have all their beauty; thus each angel has beauty in the measure of that love. For all angels are forms of their affections, for the reason that it is not permitted in heaven to counterfeit with the face things that do not belong to one's affection; |
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