1. THE FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND THE NEW CHURCH

A statement of faith, set out in both universal and particular terms, is placed at the beginning to serve as a preface to the book which follows, to be like a doorway leading into a church, and a summary presenting in a short compass what follows at more length. It is called the faith of the new heaven and the new church, because heaven, where the angels are, and the church among men form a single unit, just as the internal and external sides of the personality make up a single individual. This is why a member of the church who possesses the good of love which arises from the truths of faith, and possesses the truths of faith which arise from the good of love, is, so far as the interiors of his mind are concerned, an angel of heaven. Therefore too after dying he comes into heaven, and there enjoys happiness depending upon how far the good and truth are linked. It should be known that in the new heaven, which is at the present time being established by the Lord, this statement of faith serves as its preface, doorway and summary.

257. An example from nature may serve to illustrate this idea, that many things in the literal sense of the Word are appearances of truth, in which genuine truths are hidden; and that it is not injurious to think and to speak in simple terms according to the appearances of truth, but that it is injurious to confirm them, since this destroys the Divine truth hidden within them. This example is offered because what is natural provides a clearer illustration and proof than what is spiritual.

It appears to the eye that the sun travels round the earth every day and also once every year. Thus we talk of the sun rising and setting; causing morning, noon, evening and night, as well as the seasons, spring, summer, autumn and winter, and thus days and years. Yet the sun stands unmoved, for it is a sea of fire, and it is the earth which rotates every day and travels around its orbit every year. A person, who in simplicity or ignorance thinks that the sun travels round the earth, does not destroy the natural truth, which is that the earth rotates on its axis and every year travels around the ecliptic. But if a person convinces himself of the sun's apparent motion by the reasonings of the natural mind, and more so if he does so from the Word, because it speaks of the sun rising and setting, he weakens the truth and destroys it; and afterwards he is hardly able to see it, even though he is given a visual demonstration that the whole starry sky rotates similarly every day and every year in appearance, although not a single star changes its fixed position relative to another. The movement of the sun is an apparent truth; its not moving is a genuine truth. Yet everyone speaks according to the apparent truth, saying that the sun rises and sets. This is allowed, because it could not be otherwise. But to think like this from conviction blunts and dulls the rational understanding.

221. (v) LIKEWISE, THE EXTERNAL FEATURES OF THE TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM.

This was because the Temple, exactly like the Tabernacle, represented heaven and the church; but the Temple represented the heaven of the spiritual angels, the Tabernacle that of the celestial angels. Spiritual angels are those who possess wisdom from the Word, celestial angels are those who possess love from the Word. The Lord Himself teaches us in John that the Temple at Jerusalem means in the highest sense the Lord's Divine Human:

Break up this Temple, and in three days I will raise it again. He was speaking about the temple of His body, John 2:19, 21.

When the Lord is meant, so too is the Word, for He is the Word. Now since the interior parts of the Temple represented the interiors of heaven and the church, and so those of the Word, therefore its external parts also represented and stood for the exteriors of heaven and the church, and so those of the Word, that is, its literal sense. We read of the exterior of the Temple that it was built of whole, undressed stones, and inside of cedar-wood; all its walls were carved inside with cherubim, palms and open flowers, and the floor was overlaid with gold (1 Kings 6:7, 29-30). All these things too stand for the externals of the Word, which are the holy things in its literal sense.