Divine Love and Wisdom #5

Po Emanuel Swedenborg

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5. For this to fall within the scope of the intellect, however, it must altogether be known that because the Lord is love in its very essence, or Divine love, He appears to angels in heaven as the sun, and that from that sun emanate warmth and light, the warmth emanating from it being, in its essence, love, and the light emanating from it being, in its essence, wisdom. Moreover, to the degree that angels are receptive of that spiritual warmth and that spiritual light, to the same degree they are embodiments of love and wisdom - not embodiments of love and wisdom of themselves, but from the Lord.

Not only do that spiritual warmth and that spiritual light flow into and affect angels, but they also flow into and affect people, to the degree that they become receptive. And they become receptive in the measure of their love toward the Lord and love for the neighbor.

[2] That sun itself, or Divine love, cannot by its warmth and light create anyone from itself directly, for such a one would in that case be love in its essence, which is the Lord Himself, but it can create someone out of substances and materials so formed as to be capable of receiving that warmth and light - even as the sun in the world cannot by its warmth and light produce sprouts in the earth directly, but out of materials in the soil in which it can be present by its warmth and light and cause growth.

(On the Lord's Divine love appearing as the sun in the spiritual world, and the emanation from it of spiritual warmth and spiritual light, from which angels have their love and wisdom, see the book Heaven and Hell, nos. Heaven and Hell 116-140.)

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.