Canons of the New Church #3

Durch Emanuel Swedenborg
  
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3. SUMMARIES treating of GOD

I. THERE IS ONE GOD.

II. THAT ONE GOD IS BEING (Esse) ITSELF, WHICH IS JEHOVAH.

III. THAT GOD HIMSELF IS FROM ETERNITY, AND THEREFORE IS ETERNITY ITSELF.

IV. GOD, BECAUSE HE IS BEING (Esse) ITSELF, AND IS FROM ETERNITY, IS THE CREATOR OF THE UNIVERSE.

V. THAT ONE ONLY GOD IS LOVE ITSELF AND WISDOM ITSELF, THUS LIFE ITSELF.

VI. HE CREATED THE UNIVERSE FROM DIVINE LOVE, BY MEANS OF DIVINE WISDOM, OR WHAT IS THE SAME THING, FROM DIVINE GOOD, BY MEANS OF DIVINE TRUTH.

VII. WITH HIM THE CREATION OF THE UNIVERSE HAD AS AN END AN ANGELIC HEAVEN FROM THE HUMAN RACE.

VIII. AND IN CONSEQUENCE, WITH MEN AND ANGELS, THE COMMUNICATION AND CONJUNCTION OF HIS LOVE AND WISDOM, AND THEREBY THEIR BLESSEDNESS AND HAPPINESS TO ETERNITY.

IX. THAT END WAS IN GOD THE CREATOR FROM ETERNITY, AND IS IN HIM TO ETERNITY, HENCE THERE IS THE PRESERVATION OF THE CREATED UNIVERSE BY HIM.

X. By MEANS OF HIS DIVINE PROCEEDING GOD HAS OMNIPOTENCE, OMNIPRESENCE AND OMNISCIENCE. Apocalypse Revealed 31. 1

Fußnoten:

1. Marginal Notes:

"The Essence and Existence of God; the immensity and eternity of God; or chiefly such ....

Theological things occupy the highest region of the human mind; they are innumerable.

In the midst of them is God.

There is an influx from Him, like that from a sun, into every single thing round about underneath.

Therefore a mode of speaking, so that a knowledge of Him penetrates and fills them all.

Conjunction with Him makes a man an image of Him.

Conjunction is effected by means of love and wisdom."

The above propositions were copied by Johansen immediately after X above and numbered consecutively 11 to 17. Worcester says, "The first of them seems to be imperfect and is not found in the Skara MS." Nordenskjold regarded them as belonging to Chapter II and following no. 7 there.

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.