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Doctrine of the Wife for Husbands:
A Spiritual Practice for Achieving Unity

Part 4

Last update: July 19, 2001

Go to the other parts:   Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4

Note:  You may want to consult a more recent version of this essay:

www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/wife.html

CONTENTS

Part 4
Doctrinal Propositions
On the meaning of UNITION--CONJUNCTION--MARRIAGE--RELIGION--Concepts necessary to explain the Doctrine of the Wife
Spiritual Physiology of Marriage
The Spiritual Psychobiology of Marriage
Marriage as Psychiatry
Why a Male Priesthood?

Please email Leon James

Doctrinal Propositions

  1. That in celestial man and woman the Divine Truth is received in the form of the celestial Divine, which form is received in our within which is our affection for the genuine good and true.
  2. That the aim of all our efforts in the celestial state is solely to bring to our conscious awareness the arcana laid down in our idea of the Divine Human.
  3. That our idea of the Divine Human in born in the Divine Good of our remains, which idea contains infinite arcana to be laid out by the Lord gradually in our conscious awareness; this idea is represented by the expression "The Writings of Swedenborg as the Third Testament."
  4. That our idea of the Divine Human is being laid out as Spiritual and Celestial Doctrines which bear names such as "The Doctrine of Faith", "The Doctrine of Life", "The Doctrine of De Hemelsche Leer", "The Doctrine of the Wife", and so on; these Doctrines are represented by the expression "The Third Testament."
  5. That the First Five chapters of the Arcana Coelestia signify the celestial degree of the Doctrine of the Wife; that the Fifth Chapter of the Gospel of John signifies the spiritual degree of the Doctrine of the Wife; and that the Twenty-first Chapter of Genesis signifies the natural degree of the Doctrine of the Wife.
  6. That the Four Gospels, in their order, signifies the orderly steps we undergo in our understanding and perception of the Doctrine of the Wife.
  7. That the study explication, and teaching of "The Third Testament", are required daily activities and the scientifics or products thus accumulated constitute useful documents for the development of the Doctrine of the Church and Theistic Science.

"And Jehovah visited Sarah, as He had said; and Jehovah did unto Sarah as He had spoken…. And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne unto Abraham, mocking. And she said unto Abraham, Cast out this handmaid and her son; for the son of this handmaid shall not inherit with my son with Isaac. And the word was evil exceedingly in the eyes of Abraham, on account of his son. And God said unto Abraham, let it not be evil in thine eyes because of the boy, and because of thine handmaid; all that Sarah with unto thee, hearken unto her voice, for in Isaac shall thy seed be called."
Genesis 21:1, 9 – 12
See also: 
Arcana Coelestia 2615 – 2667 and De Hemelsche Leer 5:32 – 33

The wife’s superiority (i.e. priority) lies in her deeper vision of the husband’s celestial temptations. This deeper vision gives her infallible judgment over matters involving her husband’s celestial temptations. The Doctrine of the Wife makes visible that the domain of the wife’s superiority is in the husband’s celestial temptations. As well, it makes visible that she is not in a superior position regarding matters involving spiritual and natural temptations.

Unless it is known what kind of temptation one is in--celestial, spiritual, or natural – one world not know when the wife’s has infallible judgment. Every regenerating husband has areas of celestial temptations and these become increasingly visible as he overcomes natural and spiritual temptations apart from the wife.

The content of celestial temptations in general deals with natural things from the rational, i.e., PSYCHO-POLITICS OF USES IN EVERYDAY LIFE. In this battle the first rational (Ishmael) is favored by the husband’s natural inclinations and opposes ("mocks") the second rational (Isaac) conceived within the wife’s affections and judgment (Sarah) and to be received by the husband (Abraham). When the husband overcomes as of self his inmost resistance to his wife’s vision/perception of truth (judgment) [=Abraham hearkens unto Sarah’s voice] then, and only then, can he form DOCTRINE (Jacob bowing to Esau as Lord).

To a spiritual man there is great delight in the Doctrine of the Church he forms along with other men of the Church. His delight in Doctrine is greater than his delight in his wife. Adam was more delighted in his proprium (Eve) than in the Lord’s leading (celestial Adam). It is of the Lord’s Mercy to will that the spiritual man discover the presence of this Doctrine within his wife so that his wife may be as delightful as the Doctrine to him, yeah, more delightful. Thus he becomes celestial, for to the husband of the celestial Church, the wife is the greatest delight of all. At last, she becomes for him the sole genuine doorway to the Lord Himself. As he thus takes on more and more splendiferous aspects, she radiates more and more with an even deeper light of wisdom.

Women in the Priesthood? see here:  http://www.newchurchissues.org/wip/MF/mfndx.htm
  1. The Revolt of Woman Rev. W. L. Gladish
  2. The Essential Feminine Rev. Dandridge Pendleton
  3. The Purpose of Woman Rev. Ormond Odhner
  4. The Uses of Men and Women Rev. Harold Cranch
  5. Serving the Church Rev. Kurt H. Asplundh
  6. The ?Women?s Lib? Movement Rev. Frederick L. Schnarr
  7. Women on Boards Rev. Alfred Acton
  8. A Comparison of Attitudes towards Woman Kathleen M. Nicolier
  9. Single Women and the Church Rev. Kurt H. Asplundh
  10. "Women’s Work" Rev. Kurt P. Nemitz Men as Husbands and Fathers
  11. Rev. Willard L.D. Heinrichs Male and Female Created He Them Rev. Kurt H. Asplundh
  12. The Male and Female Minds Rev. Erik Sandström, Sr.
  13. Women and Uses Rev. Kenneth J. Alden Some Thoughts on Masculinity Rt. Rev. Peter M. Buss
  14. Link to "What the Bible Says about Sexual Equality" Rev. John Odhner
  15. The New Church - A True Liberator of Modern Women or Is the New Church Relevant to Modern Life? Marianne Sharpe
  16. The Involvement of Women in the Uses of the Organized Church Zoe Gyllenhaal Simons
  17. Masculine and Feminine George H. Woodard Feminine Wisdom [Comments] Rev. Erik Sandström, Sr. [Comments: Linda Simonetti Odhner, Rev. Erik Sandström, Sr.]
  18. Growing Beyond the Natural Masculine and Feminine Approaches [Comments] Rev. Eric Carswell [Comments: Anne Fitzpatrick, Margaret Shepp Hyatt, Rev. Eric Carswell]
  19. The Masculine Principle Rev. Alain Nicolier
  20. The Perfect Complement of Woman and Man Rt. Rev. Peter M. Buss
  21. The Difference between the Sexes from Divine Revelation and from Experience Sarah Headsten
  22. "A Name of Glory and Honor" Rev. Robert S. Jungé

Go to the other parts:   Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4

On the meaning of UNITION--CONJUNCTION--MARRIAGE--RELIGION--Concepts necessary to explain the Doctrine of the Wife

  1. Eve is our won proprium, our natural self or self-conscious existence, the essential of which is the feeling of as-of self, i.e. "it is I who thinks, it is I who feels, it is I who decides, it is I who wishes, etc." Prior to the state of Eve, human beings lived in an earthly paradise, directly led by angels and spirits, of whom they were consciously aware. However, at one stage people began to experience the desire to be led by their own self so as to be able to plan their future and explore in unknown areas, and less by inner instinct. The making of Eve is that delight we have when this desire for independence is satisfied by the Lord. A certain spiritual darkness is necessary for this; human beings would no longer possess infallible judgment by instinct – as animals do also. But a new danger is now present: the Snake.
  2. The darkening of the spiritual world to human beings on earth (called the Fall), brought on both natural freedom and spiritual slavery. This was not a necessary outcome. The spiritual decline occurred only when people began to doubt the Word of God as preserved is Sacred Scriptures given to every culture, society, and tribe in the form of religious traditions or church. With the decline of the church came false beliefs, which led to a lack of wisdom in practical life. Social life then became "a problem" and required historical characteristics such as wars, famine, sickness, competition, injustice, deceit, conflict, discord, unhappiness, and hate.

    However a means of salvation was provided in advance by the Lord: regeneration through temptations. All men and women who want to compel their natural self to a life in obedience to their religion, gradually receive a new conscious rational perception of spiritual realities.

  3. Regeneration is effected through temptations. As temptations are overcome in spiritual battles of conscience vs. desire, we begin to construct a new conscious self, one composed of rational elements only. Rational elements are within and above natural elements (by Creation). Rational ideas are abstracted from space-time concepts; or, space-time concepts are external elements within which there is a controlling agency called the spiritual. Our innate rational cognitions are capable of conjoining to the spiritual elements so that we can feel them as part of our self from within. This felling from within constitutes a new experience, a new inner sense, a new birth, a regeneration of an old sense that human beings possessed prior to the Fall. The formation of this new rational self which can sense eternal trues as a self-conscious ability is called the formation of the Church within us. For further explanations on the sensuous vs. rational consciousness, see this article.
"A wife unites herself with her husband's intelligence, and so with him. If therefore a man loves himself for his intelligence, he withdraws this from his wife into himself, which causes division, not union" (CL 331).

    Spiritual Physiology of Marriage

    Step 1) the wife’s external mind, which is outer love, conjoins and appropriates the husband’s external mind, which is wisdom.

    Step 2) the husband’s internal mind, which is inner love, conjoins and appropriates the wife’s internal mind, which is inner wisdom.

External Mind = Memories of people, places, events, things, honors, reputation, books.
Internal Mind = Memories of loves, likes, affections, preferences, needs, wants.

 

  CONJUGIAL LOVE External Internal

Love

Desire to conjoin, share, and be first to each other. to raise a family and make each other happy to be one angel in heaven

Wisdom

Seeing what is true vs. fiction in society, work place, art, science, religion in relationships and character

ADAM and EVE=MAN and WOMAN= HUSBAND and WIFE

 

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THE DOCTRINE OF THE WIFE CHART

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Note: The wife’s superiority (i.e. priority) lies in her deeper vision of the husband’s celestial temptations. This deeper vision gives her infallible judgment over matters involving her husband’s celestial temptations. The Doctrine of the Wife makes visible that the domain of the wife’s superiority is in the husband’s celestial temptations. As well, it makes visible that she is not in a superior portion regarding matters involving spiritual and national temptations. Unless it is known what kind of temptation one is in celestial, spiritual, or natural – one world not know when the wife’s has infallible judgment. Every regenerating husband has areas of celestial temptations and these become increasing by visible as he overcomes natural and spiritual temptations apart from the wife. The content of celestial temptations in general deals with natural things from the rational, i.e., PSYCHO-POLITICS OF USES IN EVERYDAY LIFE. In this battle the first rational (Ishmael) is favored by the husband’s natural inclinations and opposes ("mocks") the second rational (Isaac) conceived within the wife’s affections and judgment (Sarah) and to received by the husband (Abraham). When the husband overcomes as of self his inmost resistance to his wife’s vision/perception of truth (judgment) [Abraham hearkens unto Sarah’s voice] then, and only then, can he form DOCTRINE (Jacob bowing to E? or Lord).

To a spiritual man there is great delight in the Doctrine of the Church he forms along with other men of the Church. His delight in Doctrine is greater than his delight in his wife. Adam was more delighted in his proprium (Eve). Than in the Lord’s leading celestial Adam). It is of the Lord’s Mercy to will that the spiritual man discover the presence of this Doctrine within his wife so that his wife may be as delightful as the Doctrine to him, yeah, more delightful. Thus he becomes celestial, for to the husband of the celestial Church, the wife is the greatest delight of all. At last, she becomes for him the sole genuine doorway to the Lord Himself. As he thus takes on more and more splendiferous aspects, she radiates more and more with an even deeper light of wisdom.

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The Psychobiology of Gender

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Female man * Male man

Wife * Husband

1 couple unit

Psychology Key: Woman = motivated or affective (will) (love)

Man = cognitive (understanding) (wisdom)

N.B. Affections rule Cognitions form within

*A wife is to be ruled by her husband because cognitions separated (emptied) rule the natural (external). A husband is to obey his wife because cognitions refilled (conjoined) achieve the couple state (for superior).

Relationships Gender Differences

Why a man doesn’t want to commit himself to a relationship?

Control, Cowardice or (Fake Independence) – wants to retain control over woman avoiding changing his character which a woman pressures him to do once the man the commits.

Selfishness and lack of caring, Self-Destructive – doesn’t want to give up selfish activities and habits (investing) wants to destroy himself by first destroying the woman and his relationship. – Doesn’t want to give up other woman or men friends. – Doesn’t want to share his money.

Why a woman wants and strives for a relationship with commitment?

Conjunction (unity) – wants to evolve into a joint human (couple hood is completion of self)

Unselfish or Altruistic – desires to change herself so as to fit perfectly with her man.

Caring and Nurturing – cares about him so wants to be close and intimate so as to know how to take care of his needs.

Belonging – needs overt signs of belonging for reassurance and safety.

Romance – wants to feel special and exclusive.

Jealousy: reaction to threat

      1. Outside threat to check relationships (breaking up)
      2. Inner threat to one’s self-esteem (ego threat)

Different reasons for males and females: ("I’m unworthy to be loved") ("I’m inferior in compassion") ("I’m not capable in compassion") ("I’m replaceable")

c) Control, desire for (I own you; you belong to me; no one can have you; you’re just my property)

Jealousy: Zeal to Protect

    1. Desire to protect relationships
    2. Fighting against loose ends in commitment
    3. Opposing general love of the sex (wonder, lust vs. love of one of check sex)
    4. Communication (Talk)

    5. Men use silence to control woman (if he doesn’t talk about it, she can’t have he5r way and her demands can be ignored)
    6. Women use talk} to reach consensus, to request help and attention, to play and share (intimacy) (safety), to release stress, to overcome doubts and feelings of unworthiness
    7. Men use talk} to intimidate and impose his will, to invalidate and criticize, to confuse (pool the wool over her eyes), to reduce and woo, to focus on task and avoid relating

DISCLAIMER

[Does not pertain to extreme cases, e.g. fatal attraction, abuse, mental, illness or deliberately calculating types]

Marriage is external

He/She is the one

Accommodating him/her (people are unique, unique relationships, culture and self)

Finding out what he/she cares about moment – by – moment

Solving his/her problems

Saving him/her form problems, not giving him/her problems

Obey him/her

Make it safe to tell the truth, no repercussions

Make up for transgressions – remedy

Tell the truth, no deception, ever

Respond carefully to distress symptoms

    1. Let him/her say painful things without reproach
    2. Be reassuring
    3. Don’t assume you are being criticized or attached
    4. Try to help him/her balance by remaining calm and helpful and attentive
    5. Be attentive all the time, no time out, especially when fighting/arguing

      It may feel strange to respond the way he/she needs to be responded to … it evolves into your own way … face his/her reality without denial

      Avoid whose right/wrong style of conversation

      Develop exploratory style of talk to go deeper without hurting, defending, accusing

      Why men must give in to their women:

      It’s a man’s world

      Men automatically assume a position of superiority

      Men take their rights automatically

      Men developed the social, economic and judicial systems

      Men are by definition biased toward male views

      It’s the little things that show the male predominance

    6. Women carrying burdens
    7. Men talking to men and ignoring women
    8. Men’s violence in temper, word, act
    9. Men’s silence on a topic
    10. Men looking a woman up and down
    11. Men’s refusal to go along with
    12. Men hate weakness (no crying)

Men need women’s sweetness but don’t allow themselves to have it by distancing form the women

Men cannot have love without obeying their women as they expect their women to obey them

Men cannot be happy and evolve without love

Children do not provide the kind of love men need to be happy and fulfilled

Men need love to fell adequate, to be healed of injuries, to become their true selves

The Revolt of Woman

by Rev. W.L. Gladish

(...)

What becomes of man's boasted superiority if he has in himself nothing of conjugial love or even of the love of the sex, if his reception of that most universal sphere which preserves creation depends wholly upon the female sex? May not this superiority of woman be set over against the ability of his rational to climb into a light in which women are not? "Conjugial love depends on the wife's love; and such is the husband's love in reciprocation; and the wife's love does not depend on the husband's love .... It is the reverse with those who are not in conjugial love" (De Conj. 34).

These passages clearly teach the superiority of woman over man, of the wife over the husband.

Conjugial love is hers, not his. Consider what this involves. The conjugial sphere is the most universal sphere proceeding from the Lord. It is the sphere which preserves the created universe. It is the sphere not only of marriage, but also of religion. Conjugial love is the source whence flow all human loves, spiritual as well as natural. Man must receive through woman not only conjugial love but also love to the Lord, mutual love, love of offspring, love of the neighbor; thus all that makes the sweetness, beauty and joy of life is given by the Lord to woman and through her is transferred to man so far as he, by return of her affection, is conjoined with her. Is it any wonder that woman represents the church?

The truth of the matter is that the equality of man and woman results from their inequality.

In his province-that of judgment and rational light man is supreme. His understanding climbs into a light in which woman is not. For the sake of marriage the Lord gives to him that light which is to guide them both.

In her province-that of affection-woman is supreme. Her will receives the warmth of heaven. For the sake of marriage the Lord pours immediately into her soul that conjunctive sphere which is for her husband as well as herself, which, having united them, turns them to the Lord and then conjoins them with their fellows.

Therefore each is superior to the other; and each is also inferior to the other. From the heights in which her will dwells, gently glowing with the warmth of heaven, woman stoops to man in his poverty and offers him of her abundance. And if he receives it and loves her, she lifts him up to the delectable mountains.

On the other hand, man also dwells upon the heights as to his understanding. For the Lord separates his understanding from his will and lifts it up to the peaks where it catches the eternal splendor of the Sun of Heaven. And from that Light he beckons the woman to leave caring for bodily and earthly things and dwell with him in that splendor.

The reason we think that the Writings teach the inferiority of woman is that the understanding is the only province of human life of which we have any conception. We come of a faith-alone generation to which the will and its affections were unknown. We ourselves still abide in the rind and husk and think of science as wisdom. If man can think more deeply than woman, what is there left for her to do? Thought is the all of life. She can indeed prepare her husband's meals and nurse the babies. But a servant can do these things. Woman can show her equality with man only by invading his field, beating him at his own game, becoming a more astute statesman and a better general of fighting armies. Such is the thought of today.

(...)

The regenerating man recognizes his wife his equal because she is in all things that he himself lacks so far his superior. He must acknowledge that superiority, and on bended knee supplicate her to unite her grace, beauty and sweetness to his uncouth austerity. And this not only in the days of courtship before marriage but his humility before her grows with the years, and his wonder that she should hearken to his plea. To him she becomes the embodiment of all his heart's desire, unattainable without her. Nor does this at all involve placing his own burden of rational judgment upon her slender shoulders. Here he is superior.

And as the understanding sees both for itself and for its will, so the husband with a clearer sight looks out the untrod path for both.

(...)

So is it with man and woman. She, being a form of affection while he is a form of understanding, is, as it were, both above and below him. She inspires him yet is guided by him. From her unregenerate affections she looks up to his superior light. Yet has she from within all things that form his rational. But with her they are only feelings, impulses. She sees them as truths only when they have been formulated and spoken by him. Her leadership is from within, hidden, unrecognized even by herself unless her husband has wit enough to see it and show it to her. His leadership is open and manifest to all, and to the unthinking seems the only leadership. Thus each leads and each follows.

Each has a soul that reaches up to direct contact with God. Neither is the internal of which the other is the external. Understanding from the Lord flows into the male, but for love he must turn himself to woman. Love from the Lord flows directly into the female, but for light she must turn to the man. The man does not represent the Lord and the woman the church but both together represent the church (see CL 21), and in heaven are not called two but one angel (HH 367).

(...)

If this study approaches a correct interpretation of the relation of man and woman, it will be apparent that our sympathy should be with every movement which places her by his side as altogether his equal; that everything which tends to encourage and develop her interior leadership, or inspiration, should be most welcome; but that the church should oppose all that takes the burden of external leadership and rational judgment out of man's hands and places it in hers. For conjugial love is dependent on each being supreme in his own sphere and seeking to be led by the opposite sex in those things which belong to that sex.

-New Church Life, July 1915 (reprinted 1992;102:106-117)

Found it here:  http://www.newchurchissues.org/wip/MF/mf15wg.htm

The Spiritual Psychobiology of Marriage

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The diagram immediately above shows the two phases or stages of marriage. Initially, the man's consciousness of externalizing truth, which is the truth he knows, conjoins itself with the wife's externalizing good. That is the wife's externalizing affections conjoin with the husband's externalizing cognitions. Thus they form an externalizing marriage or bond. It is externalizing because the man's truth and the wife's affections are both in the externalizing or lower degrees of their consciousness. However, if the two partners continue to grow together and conjoin more deeply within, then they enter phase 2 which is an internal union or conjunction. Now their internalizing parts are conjoined or united--the man's internalizing good and the woman's internalizing truth. Now for the first time the man becomes truly a husband and the woman truly a wife.

In the diagram below, the same process is portrayed. The externalizing union in stage 1 is shown to bond the man's externalizing truth to the wife's externalizing good. This is not so much a true union as a partnership since it resides in externalizing (or lower) parts of the consciousness. Husband and wife as partners are adjoined to each other by externalizing natural life and family, but they are not yet conjoined from within by inner or spiritual life. But in stage 2, the husband's internalizing good is conjoined to the wife's internalizing truth. Now the marriage consists of his affections covered over with her truths. This is a true conjunction or union because it resides in the higher or internalizing regions of their consciousness and life. Only when this stage of internal conjunction is achieved can they be regenerated into a heavenly marriage and live together in eternity.

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From Swedenborg's Arcana Coelestia

1468. He said to Sarai his wife. That this signifies that He so thought concerning the truths to which celestial things were adjoined, is evident from the signification of Sarai when she is called a wife. A "wife," in the internal sense of the Word, signifies nothing else than truth conjoined with good; for the conjunction of truth with good is circumstanced precisely as is a marriage. In the Word, when a "husband" is mentioned, the husband signifies good, and the wife signifies truth; but when he is not called the husband, but the "man," then he signifies truth, and the wife signifies good: this is the constant usage in the Word, as before said (n. 915). In the passage before us, as Abram is named, Sarai his wife signifies truth. To say thus to Sarai his wife is, in the internal sense, to think so concerning the truths with which celestial things were conjoined. It is historically true that Abram so said to his wife, when journeying into Egypt; but as before said, all the historicals of the Word are representative, and all the words are significative. No other historicals are recorded in the Word, and in no other order, and no other words are used to express them, than such as in the internal sense may express these arcana.

Couples who do not progress to an internal union of minds or spirits remain separated in their internals, and when they meet again in the other life, they live with one another again for a brief period. They then can become aware of each other's internal character and disposition, and these separate them. Each is then given another partner with whom they can enter into an internal marriage in heaven. But this happens only when both have been regenerated while still in the physical body. If they are unsuitable to each other by internal disposition or genius and separate, the one who is regenerate goes to heaven with the newly given conjugial partner or soul mate, while the other who is not regenerated goes to hell where they enter into an infernal concubinage with a partner. These infernal marriages are purely externalizing and both partners are "devils" who hate each other's guts yet are forced to endure each other in a marriage made in hell.

 

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The Uses of Men and Women

by Rev. Harold Cranch

(...)

The masculine and feminine principles are present in all things, and are analogous to good and truth, and their conjunction into one. Both love and wisdom are present in the male, and in the female. But everything of love and wisdom in the male is masculine, and everything of love and wisdom in the female is feminine in its nature. Thus, there is a masculine love of the Lord, and a feminine love of the Lord, and they are different. (1st. Index to Marriage, Posth. Th. II, page 530, Standard Edition.) There is also masculine wisdom, and feminine wisdom. And since love is the life of man, and wisdom is its love taking form in a regenerating life, we find the masculine and feminine both described in terms of love.

"The inmost in the male is love, and its covering is wisdom . . . the inmost in the female is .that wisdom in the male, and its covering is that derivative love. This love is feminine love, and is given by the Lord to the wife, through the wisdom of the husband, whereas the former love is a masculine love, and is the love of being wise and is given by the Lord to the husband, according to :the reception of wisdom. It is from .this .that the male is the wisdom of love, the female the love of that wisdom. Therefore, from creation, there has been implanted into both the love of conjunction into a one . . ." (CL 32)

and

"The male is born intellectual, the female voluntary . . . the male is born into the affection of knowing, understanding, and being wise; . . . the female . . . into the love of conjoining herself with the affections in the male. And as the interiors form the exteriors into their own likeness, and as .the masculine form is the form of understanding and ;the feminine form the form of its love, therefore, it is that the male is different in face, in tone of voice, and in body from the female . . . they differ also in their gestures and manners. In a word, there is not anything alike, but still there is what is conjunctive in each thing . . . The masculine in the male is masculine in every part of his body, even the smallest, and also in every idea of his .thought, and in every spark of his affection. In like manner, the feminine in the female." (CL 33)

In an ideal marriage, the husband is the understanding of ,truth, and the wife the will of applying that truth (CL 92 ; AE 100). In the male, the understanding predominates. In the female, the will predominates. So we read:

"The masculine is to perceive from the understanding. The feminine is to perceive from love. And the understanding perceives also those things which are about the body, and outside of the world - for the rational and spiritual sight goes thither, whereas love does not go beyond that which it feels. When it does go beyond, it derives it from conjunction . . . with the understanding of the man . . . The wisdom of the wife is not possible with the man nor the wisdom of the man with the wife. Nor is the moral wisdom of man possible with women, insofar as it derives from his rational wisdom." (CL 168)

(...)

In the highest degree of regeneration and spiritual development, husband and wife both represent aspects of wisdom. The man represents the love of acquiring wisdom, in innocence, to learn the Lord's will. The wife then represents that wisdom in life- the will to do from love what wisdom teaches. Her wisdom of life possesses all the knowledges, truths, and rational concepts that his wisdom has evolved. So she is in the practical wisdom of his love, and he is in a continual love for gaining increase in wisdom. As with the most ancients, the will reigns. What the understanding learns is immediately willed, and the loves of the will inspire greater wisdom.

Bishop Alfred Acton expressed this relationship of men and women in a very beautiful way. He said:

"The inmost of the masculine is the love of growing wise. This love alone prompts to the desire of laboring for the acquisition of knowledges and truths, which are ultimately represented by the seed. The inmost of woman is wisdom itself, which is the love of uses, for it is wisdom alone which prompts to the reception and love of truths, that ,they may be forms of use which are ultimately represented by offspring." (NEW CHURCH LIFE, April, 1922, page 148)

So the husband should be in the love of discovering and understanding truths, his wife in the enlightenment and perception of those truths, to apply them to the life of the family, and use them to develop in regeneration. It is from this that woman is inmostly a form of wisdom. It is not wisdom to search into and acquire rational truths. Wisdom is to love truths, .to cherish them, and to return them to ,the Lord as uses. Therefore, as we read in the Heavenly doctrine: "Wisdom is the origin of beauty; in woman, wisdom latent and concealed; in man, wisdom open and manifest." (CL 383)

(...)

Another important use primarily in the hands of women should be mentioned. The standard of morality, particularly in regard to sex, and marriage, in any nation or organization, is maintained by the ladies. . We are told that the moral wisdom of men, which partakes of the rational, and the moral. wisdom of women, unite outwardly as both have something of the will. Women have an innate perception of what is orderly and proper, what is chaste, and modest. However, they also have the innate desire to please and to be pleasing to men. If men fail in their duty, to become wise, to establish rational safeguards for morality, and to use good judgment in regard to it, then women are apt to lower their standards. Yet, if they do, .there is continual increase in immorality and vice. Therefore, in the Writings, we are told that "the wife [and looking at this more generally, womankind] is the faithful guardian of the common good; and as she is the guardian of this, and the husband is wise, so she provides for the prosperity and happiness of the home." (Index to the Missing Work on Marriage, s.v. sex) So wisdom of life, and perception from that wisdom, is given to both men and women. Both are needed for the proper performance of use.

(...)

From all these teachings, we can see that the wisdom and qualities of women are needed in the development of the church, and they, together with their husbands, or mankind and womankind together, are the church. But now let us examine the nature of the incorporated body, and its uses to see if they involve both masculine and feminine qualities.

(...)

To summarize: (1) Women are given a special understanding and enlightenment on the applications of doctrine in their sphere of wisdom. This is true in regard to the home, the preservation of morality, and particularly in the education, care, and welfare of children. And as preparation for conjugial love, upon which the hope of the New Church rests, can be made only in a sphere of genuine morality, their perception as to this is needed in our body.

(2) Wisdom, to be complete, must be the wisdom of husband and wife together. Each contributes to make the mutual wisdom of life from which sound judgments can be made, and the church develop more fully. So we are told that angels, separated from their consorts, are in intelligence, but not in wisdom; but with .their consorts, they are also in wisdom. (AE 998) This would also have application to married partners here, and in more general form, to the fact that good men are affected by the perception of good women.

(3) We have also seen that everything of life, everything of use, everything of the church, has both masculine and feminine aspects. Therefore, the perception of masculine and feminine wisdom, should be taken into consideration in regard to every use. This is one of the important ways by which women become the custodians of the common good.

(4) It is evident that the teachings of the Writings regarding forensic (business and legal affairs) and domestic uses, can be widely misunderstood. There are domestic aspects to every use, as there are also forensic and legal needs. So it is said that .the uses of the wife are adjoined to the uses of the husband, and to speak more generally, the uses of womankind are adjoined to the uses of mankind. The decisions for the forward progress of the church need legal provision and protection- a masculine use. This is provided for by the Board of Directors. Implementation of uses is by both sexes, and always involves clothing the more abstract principles with a body of application that it may come into being, and may be returned to the Lord as a use- this is particularly a feminine quality.

(...)

- New Church Life 1974;94:294-301

Found it here:  http://www.newchurchissues.org/wip/MF/mf74hc.htm

Marriage as Psychiatry

(Healing of the soul and mind)

  1. NOT GOOD FOR MAN TO BE ALONE
  2. = Not good for man to love his own wisdom hence himself.

  3. THEREFORE à WIFE FROM HIS RIB WHILE HE’S ASLEEP
  4. = He, as husband, can now love his wife’s love of his wisdom as he appropriates her love of his wisdom though he cannot discern this since she hides it.

  5. Instead he thinks he woos her and that his love in her while in fact her love is in him and she manages to have him believe she is obedient and receptive when yet she is active and volitional.
  6. From this exchange of appropriation the two become one and come into all the potentials not otherwise available ("conjugal love" and its "heavenly felicity").

Correspondences from Genesis


MAN LEAVING FATHER AND MOTHER

= Stop loving his own loves (father = will) and his won wisdom (mother = understanding), born evil inclination.


CLEANING TO THIS WIFE

= Devotion to her = Loving her = Receiving her love of him (his affections and wisdom), which love she has from birth/influx.


MARRIAGE

= Spiritual reunion of man and woman’s interiors = Becoming one flesh or one person or one angel.


End of Part 4

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Note:  You may want to consult a more recent version of this essay:

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Related Articles:

Spiritual Geography--Part 2: Jacob's Ladder and Other Psycho-Dynamic Applications|| Spiritual Geography--Part 1-- Graphic Maps of Consciousness for Regeneration || Dual Citizenship || Spiritual Psychology  || Spiritual Time and Space || De Hemelsche Leer Article || Theistic Science || Religious Psychology || Discrete Degrees: A Top Down Presentation (Ian Thompson)

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