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Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings

This list of Memorable Occurrences in Swedenborg's Writings was originally compiled by W. C. Henderson in 1960 but has since been updated.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Conjugial Love #444b

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444b. 1 FORNICATION

By fornication we mean the lust of an adolescent youth or young man, experienced before marriage with a fallen woman. However, lust experienced with a woman not fallen, that is, with a virgin or with someone else's wife, is not fornication; but with a virgin it is debauchery, and with someone else's wife, adultery.

How these latter two differ from fornication cannot be seen by any rational person unless he clearly sees love for the opposite sex in its degrees and diversities, placing its chaste forms on one side and its unchaste forms on the other, and dividing each side into classes and types so as to distinguish between them. Otherwise the difference between what is more chaste and what is less chaste, and between what is more unchaste and what is less unchaste, cannot appear in anyone's idea of them; and without these distinctions, every means of comparison is lost, and at the same time any clarity of sight in matters of judgment. The intellect is then enveloped in such darkness that it does not know how to distinguish fornication from adultery, and still less the milder forms of fornication from its more serious ones, likewise the milder forms of adultery from its more serious ones. Thus it mixes evils together, and out of diverse evils makes one sauce, and out of diverse goods, one paste.

Therefore, in order that love for the opposite sex may be known in its distinctions on the side in which it inclines and progresses to licentious love that is altogether opposed to conjugial love, it is expedient that we examine its first step, which is fornication. This we will do according to the following outline:

1. Fornication is the product of a love for the opposite sex.

2. This love arises when the adolescent youth begins to think and act in accordance with his own intellect, and the sound of his voice begins to become manly.

3. Fornication is the mark of a natural person.

4. Fornication is lust, but not the lust of adultery.

5. In some men a love for the opposite sex cannot, without harmful effects, be totally restrained from going out into fornication.

6. Therefore in populous cities brothels are tolerated.

7. A lust to fornicate is light in the measure that it looks to conjugial love and prefers it.

8. A lust to fornicate is serious in the measure that it looks to adultery.

9. A lust to fornicate is more serious as it verges toward a lust for variety and toward a lust to deflower.

10. The atmosphere of a lust to fornicate, as it is in its beginning, is intermediate between the atmosphere of licentious love and the atmosphere of conjugial love, and forms the point of equilibrium.

11. Care must be exercised to prevent conjugial love from being lost as a result of excessive and unrestrained fornications.

12. For the conjugial union of one man with one wife is the precious jewel of human life and the repository of Christian religion.

13. In men who are not yet able for various reasons to enter into marriage, and because of their salaciousness cannot contain their lusts, this conjugial ideal may be preserved if their promiscuous love for the opposite sex becomes restricted to a single courtesan.

14. Resorting to a courtesan is preferable to promiscuous lust, provided that the arrangement is not made with more than one, or with a virgin or untouched woman, or with a married woman, and that it is kept separate from conjugial love.

Explanation of these statements now follows.

Footnotes:

1. [NCBS: Swedenborg repeated section 444 by accident. The third Latin edition numbered it 444i., as an abbreviation for "iterated". Other translators have called it 444r, for repeated. We've opted for 444b., for this online version.]

  
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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.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Conjugial Love #26

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26. Again I swear in truth that these events and words occurred as I have related them, the first ones in the world of spirits, which is midway between heaven and hell, and the subsequent ones in a society of heaven, the society from which came the angel with the trumpet, who acted as guide.

Who in the Christian world would know anything about heaven and the joys and happiness there - knowledge of which is also knowledge of salvation - unless it pleased the Lord to open to someone the sight of his spirit and to show him and teach him?

Corroboration that things like these occur in the spiritual world appears plainly from the things seen and heard by the apostle John, as described in the book of Revelation. For example, he describes having seen the following:

The Son of Man in the midst of the seven lampstands. 1

A tabernacle, temple, ark, and altar in heaven. 2

A book sealed with seven seals. The book opened, and horses going out of it. 3

Four living creatures around a throne. 4

Twelve thousand taken from each tribe. 5

Locusts arising out of the abyss. 6

A dragon and its fight with Michael. 7

A woman giving birth to a male child and fleeing into the wilderness because of the dragon. 8

Two beasts, one rising up out of the sea, the other out of the earth. 9

A woman sitting on a scarlet beast. 10

The dragon cast into a lake of fire and brimstone. 11

A white horse, and a great supper. 12

A new heaven and a new earth, and the holy Jerusalem coming down, described as to its gates, wall, and foundations. 13

Also a river of water of life, and trees of life yielding fruits every month. 14

Besides many other things, all of which were seen by John, and seen when he was in the spirit 15 in the spiritual world and in heaven. In addition, those things which were seen by the apostles after the Lord's resurrection. 16 And which were later seen by Peter (Acts of the Apostles 11). 17 Also which were then seen and heard by Paul. 18

Moreover, there were the things seen by the prophets. For example, Ezekiel saw the following:

Four living creatures, which were cherubs. (Ezekiel 1 and 10)

A new temple and a new earth, and an angel measuring them. (Ezekiel 40-48)

Being carried off to Jerusalem, he saw the abominations there. (Ezekiel 8) And he was also carried off into Chaldea, to those in captivity. (Ezekiel 11) 19

Something similar happened with Zechariah:

He saw a man riding among myrtle trees. (Zechariah 1:8 ff.)

He saw four horns, and then a man with a measuring line in his hand. (Zechariah 1:18 ff., 2:1 ff.)

He saw a lampstand and two olive trees. (Zechariah 4:1 ff.)

He saw a flying scroll, and an ephah. (Zechariah 5:1, 6)

He saw four chariots coming from between two mountains, with horses. (Zechariah 6:1 ff.)

Likewise with Daniel:

He saw four beasts come up from the sea. (Daniel 7:1 ff.)

Also the combats of a ram and a goat. (Daniel 8:1 ff.)

He saw the angel Gabriel, who spoke at length with him. (Daniel 9) 20

Moreover, Elisha's young man saw fiery chariots and horses around Elisha, and he saw them when his eyes were opened. 21

From these and many other passages in the Word, it is evident that the things which exist in the spiritual world have appeared to many, before and after the Lord's Advent. Why should it be surprising for them to appear also now, when the Church is beginning and the New Jerusalem is coming down from the Lord out of heaven

Footnotes:

1. Revelation 1:12-13.

2. E.g., Revelation 6:9, 8:3, 9:13, 11:19, 14:17-18, 15:5-6, 15:8.

3. Revelation 5:1, 6:1-8.

4. Revelation 4:6, et al.

5. Revelation 7:4-8.

6. Revelation 9:2-3.

7. Revelation 12:3-4, 12:7.

8. Revelation 12:1-6.

9. Revelation 13:1 ff., 11 ff.

10. Revelation 17:3 ff.

11. Revelation 20:10.

12. Revelation 19:11, 17-18.

13. Revelation 21:1-2, 12-21.

14. Revelation 22:1-2.

15. Revelation 1:10, 4:2, 17:3, 21:10.

16. See Matthew 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, John 20, 21, Acts 1:4-11.

17. Acts 10:9-16, 11:5-10.

18. See Acts 9:1-19, 22:6-21, 26:12-18.

19. Ezekiel 11:24.

20. Daniel 9:20-27.

21. 2 Kings 6:17.

  
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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.

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