Scientific discovery of Spiritual Laws given in Rational
Scientific Revelations
|
|
Series: |
151
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER read:
"The Divine, proceeding, which is called .the Holy Spirit, is in the proper
sense the Holy Word, and there the Divine troth", CANONS, The Holy Spirit,
Universalia VI. And of the Son of Man we read: "That to him who speaks a
word against the Son of Man it is forgiven, is because it is forgiven him who
denies that this or that is the Divine troth oat of the Word in the Church, if
only he believes, that the Divine truths are in the Word and oat of the Word.
The Son of Man is the Divine truth out of the Word in the Church; and this
cannot be seen by all", CANONS, The Holy Spirit, 5 :9. We read in the Word
that it is characteristic of the natural or external Church, to identify the
letter of the Word with the Doctrine of the Church, A.C. 9025, 9424, 104(X),
10584, and many other places. There is no realization in this state of the law
that the Word cannot be transferred from outside of man to within man except
from the Holy Spirit; nor of the law that good and truth do not exist unless in
a subject which is man; nor of the law that all influx is according to
reception. That the signification of the Son of Man as the Word refers to a
different series from that of the Son of man as the faith of the Church, is not
seen. The first series refers to the Glorification of the Lord, the second to
the regeneration of the Church. The
Bishop adds: "But the New Doctrine, while it claims to be not the Word, yet
it insists that it is the 'faith of the church', and the one only true doctrine,
which, when it is truly seen to be such, then also its seeming limits must be
removed, and this for the reason that since that 'Doctrine' is to continue
throughout unending ages, it 'must be seen to be Infinite, and so a state of the
Divine Human' ". We are not aware of .any place in DE HEMELSCHE LEER where
it is insisted that our Doctrine is the "faith of the church"; this is
altogether contrary to our thought; but since the Bishop does not indicate a
place,
152 proceeds
out of the Divine Human of the Lord", A.E. 151. "All wisdom and
intelligence which Angels and men have, is not theirs but the Lord's with them;
this is also known in the Church, for it is known that all good which is of
love, and all truth which is of faith, is from God, and nothing from man",
A.E. 152. In n. 9954 of the ARCANA COELESTIA it speaks of "the interior
things which are of faith and love from the Lord and to Him, thus which are
Divine", and in n. 34 of the APOCALYPSE EXPLAINED we read: "Every
truth which is a truth is Divine", From these and innumerable similar
passages it follows that all genuine faith and all genuine truths of faith are
the Lord's and thus Divine. This also follows from the fact that all genuine
truths are drawn out of the Word and belong to the Word. "All the Divine
things which are called the spiritual things of the Church, are out of the
Word", D.P. 230. That the genuine things from the Lord received by man, in
themselves are infinite, is also plainly taught: "The proprial things of
the Lord are all infinite and eternal, thus without time, consequently without
limit and without end; those things which thence are as it were the proprial
things of man, are likewise infinite and eternal; but nothing of them is of man,
but they are of the only Lord with him", D.P. 219. That these infinite as
it were proprial things of man involve the reception is literally taught:
"Man is in the eternal and the infinite not only by influx thence, but also
by reception", A.C. 5114.
The Bishop adds: "We submit that states are predicated, not of the
Infinite, but only of that which is founded in and on limits". It is indeed
true that states are not predicated of the Divine Human as it is in itself or in
its Esse. This is taught for instance in n. 3998 of the ARCANA COELESTIA:
"With the Lord there are no states, but everything there is eternal and
infinite", cf. n. 6983. But on the other hand there are many places which
speak of Divine states with regard to the things in the Heavens and in the
Church which are from the Existere of the Divine Human, 153
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER also
of the Lord, but only when He was in the world, and there took on the Divine
Esse; but since He has become the Divine Esse, Existere can no longer be
predicated of Him, except as a certain Proceeding from Him. What proceeds from
Him, is what appears as Existere in Him, but it is not in Him, but it is from
Him, and makes that men, spirits, and Angels, exist, that is, live. Existere
with man, spirit, and Angel,
is to
live; and his
living is eternal
felicity". From this it plainly appears that the essential existere of man
does not lie in his being a finite creature, of which, of course, it can never
be said that it is Divine, but in his living, that is, in his eternal felicity,
which is of the Lord alone, and of which it therefore must be said that it is
Divine, for it is from the Existere of the Divine Human, and it is of the
Heavens which are the Body of Christ, cf. T.C.R. .608. That the Divine is
predicated of the states of man can be confirmed from the following quotations:
"Those who are in the love to the Lord and in innocence .thence are above
others in peace because in the Lord; their state is called Divine
celestial", A.C. 8665. And in n. 9952 it speaks of "a state of the
Divine Good in the spiritual Kingdom", and of "a state of the Divine
Truth in the spiritual Kingdom". In general we read: "State is said of
love, of life, of wisdom . . . in general of good and truth", D.L.W. 7.
That all love which is love, all life which is life, all wisdom which is wisdom,
all good which is good, and all truth which is truth, are of the Holy Spirit,
and thus Divine, may be known in the Church. See for instance A.E. 24 where we
read: "Every truth which is a truth is Divine". These passages prove
beyond the possibility of a doubt that the Divine is predicated of states of
Angels and 154 are
God", A.E. 1096. Clearly the "Divine things" here spoken of are
the result of a Divine Nexus with the finite; for it is not possible to speak of
the absolute Divine in itself
We consider that a failure to understand the true purport of the saying
of JOB XV: 15: "The Heavens are not pure in His sight", has prevented
many from seeing the truth of this more interior and therefore more essential
teaching: "God is the all of Heaven, so much so that whether you say Heaven
or God, it is the same", A.E. 1096; and: "In Heaven everything is
Divine", MEMORABILIA 5811. That with the "not pure" there is not
meant anything whatever within the celestial marriage of good and truth which is
Heaven, thus not anything of the celestial proprium, but the fact that the old
proprium is 155
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER as
it is true that the Divine is never conjoined with man, but only adjoined to
man, so it is true that the non-pure things are never conjoined with man but
only adjoined and subjoined to man. That of man to which the Divine is adjoined
is the finite substances of which man consists; that of man to which the
non-pure things are adjoined is his celestial proprium, which is given him to
feel as if it
156 THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS
mediate
interstice that they make is on the one side out of evil not of falsity and out
of falsity not of evil, and on the other side out of good not of truth and out
of truth not of good, which two can indeed come in contact with each other but
nevertheless not conjoin themselves". Since regeneration even with the
Angels goes on to eternity, there is with them a continuous birth of goods which
at first are not of truth and of truths which are not of good, which goods and
truths can enter into the celestial marriage, that is, into Heaven proper, only
in the measure regeneration with regard to them is accomplished. For this
We also believe that still another misunderstanding has kept many from
seeing that the Heavens proper are pure, and that in the Heavens everything is
Divine. We refer to the understanding of such a number as 694 of THE TRUE
CHRISTIAN RELIGION: "Every Angel as every man thinks truth and does good as
from himself, and this, according to the state of the Angel, is mixed and not
pure". The purpose of this teaching evidently is to show that Good itself
and Truth itself are only in the Lord, such as He is in Himself. Even the
highest Angels are not in Truth itself but in 157
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
nevertheless
good and truth with Angels are Divine, is taught in the following quotation:
"But these things are not so in the Lord, for all in Him is Divine Good,
but not Divine Truth. ... But Divine Truth is Divine Good appearing in Heaven
before the Angels and on earth before men, and although it is an appearing,
still it is Divine Truth". A.C. 3712. Compared with Good itself and Truth
itself, as they are in the Lord in Himself, good and truth with Angels and men
are mixed and not pure, for "the Divine itself of the Lord is far above His
Divine in Heaven", H.H. 118, c.f.A.C. 7270, 8760; and the Divine,
proceeding, cannot exist apart from an adjunction to the finite; but compared
with evil and falsity, they are not mixed and they are pure. The most convincing
example of Divine truths which are "mixed and not pure" is that of the
truths of the letter of the Word. For the letter is accommodated to the natural
understanding of man, and it is therefore written according to appearances
"according to the state of man"; but nevertheless the truths of the
letter 158 ceeding
through the degrees of creation is less and less purely Divine, being adjoined
to a finite more and more finited. Therefore we read: "The Divine itself of
the Lord is far above His Divine in Heaven", H.H. 118. The Divine,
proceeding, is the most pure in the spiritual Sun, which is
"the proximate
Divine, proceeding", ANGELIC IDEA
CONCERNING CREATION; and yet this Divine is not the purely Divine which is in
the Lord Himself. It is less pure in the radiant belts around the spiritual Sun,
cf. A.C. 7270, than in the spiritual Sun itself; it is less pure in the
succeeding auras than in the radiant belts; it is less pure in the Heaven of the
Human Internals, cf. A.C. 1999, than in those auras; it is less pure in the
Heavens of the Angels than in the Heaven of the Human Internals; it is less pure
in the lower Heavens than in the higher Heavens; and it is less pure with men in
the world than it is in the Heavens; and yet throughout it is Divine, for
throughout it is the Lord's Divine Love and Wisdom, proceeding. What it actually
is in the Heaven of the Human Internals and above, no Angel or man can ever
know, but in the Heavens and with men it is "the good of love and the truth
of faith", H.H. 7. "The all of faith and love is from Him, and what is
from Him is also He Himself, for it is His Divine, proceeding, which is called
the Spirit of truth and the Holy Spirit", A.E. 84. From this it may also be
seen that if it were true what our opponents hold, namely, that the truths of
genuine Doctrine born in. the mind cannot be Divine because man is a finite
recipient of life, this would do away with the Divinity of the truths of the
Word itself. For although the Word is Divinely given and dictated, nevertheless
the truths of the Word are never the purely Divine Truth, but, being
accommodated to the understanding of Angels and men, they are always adjoined to
the finite; they are never purely Divine, but in this sense they are mixed and
not pure.
The Bishop further on, in the same paragraph, adds: "Clearly there
is here a confusion of thought. That which is seen as immortal should not be
seen to be Infinite. Human souls are immortal". The subject is not the
human soul merely seen as a finite and created recipient of life, of which, of
course, it has never been said that it is infinite.
The subject is the genuine
Doctrine of the- 159
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER Church,
which is the presence of the Holy Spirit in the human mind. Here it may plainly
be seen how the issue has entirely been lost sight of in bringing in the
teaching that the finite never is Divine, which in itself is a verity, but which
in connection with our problem is irrelevant. For the problem is concerned with
the truths of faith, which are of the Divine, proceeding, and the Divine
proceeds through the finite, cf. D.P. 219: "The infinite cannot proceed
from the finite; . . . and yet the infinite can proceed from the finite, yet not
from the finite but from the infinite through it". Instead of facing the
real problem, namely, that the Third Testament contains the three discrete
degrees of the rational and therefore the Doctrine of the natural Church, the
Doctrine of the spiritual Church, and the Doctrine of the celestial Church, all
to be drawn out of that Word by man as from himself and nevertheless all Divine,
the Rev. Hugo LJ. Odhner in his address, 160 corpuscular
compound of finite substances, although, it is true that it cannot be conceived
of apart from adjunction to the finite; for the essential celestial proprium
consists of the genuine affections and thoughts of good and truth
The Bishop continues: "The New Doctrine quotes, for its sustainment,
the teaching of the Writings that it is not the Word, but the understanding of
the Word, that makes the church. We agree that the understanding is the
instrumental cause of the church being what it is at any given time". If
man's own understanding ever were the instrumental cause of the Church, there
could never be a genuine Church; for man's own understanding as to spiritual
things is utterly blind. Therefore we read: "Man believes that he has a
will of good, but he is entirely mistaken; if he does good, it is not out of his
will, but out of a new will, which is the Lord's, thus it is out of the Lord;
hence also if he thinks and speaks truth, it is out of a new under- 161
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
standing,
which is thence, and thus also out of the Lord; for the regenerated is an
altogether new man formed from the Lord, and therefore he is also said to be
created anew", A.C. 928.
The Bishop adds: "But it is also true that the Word is ever making
and remaking the understanding of man". It is true that the progress of
Doctrine in one sense can be seen as a continuous purification. But this refers
to the fact that no new truth can ever be acquired without wrestling with the
evils and falsities which are opposed to it. But once a genuine truth has been
acquired, it will always remain a genuine Divine truth. It indeed contains
infinite particulars and singulars which are capable of a continued opening to
eternity. But that it thus contains infinite
unopened particulars
and singulars,
does not make it not Divine;
just as a seed or a germ of a living organism is not less orderly than the
developed organism itself, and just as a bud on a plant is not less orderly than
the full-grown plant itself.
The Bishop adds: "Herein there is a notable difference in the point
of view. The real question is, What is the source of the doctrine of the church?
Is it truth out of good with the regenerate, or is the Word of God the immediate
source"? Genuine truth out of good is of course not a source of Doctrine,
but genuine truth out of good is Doctrine;
for Doctrine
is spiritual
out of celestial origin. The Doctrine of th6 Church has two sources,
both equally essential. The mediate source is the letter of the Word, for the
Doctrine must be drawn out of the letter; 162 but
the immediate source is the Spirit of the Word, which .is the Holy
Spirit; for
without the
Holy Spirit
it is
impossible to draw genuine Doctrine out of the Word. "The Divine,
proceeding, which is called the Holy Spirit, is in the proper sense the Holy
Word, and there the Divine truth", CANONS, The Holy Spirit, Universalia,
VI.
If the Bishop had said that we hold that genuine truth out of good which
has been acquired on the basis of the letter of the Word, is the Doctrine, that
would indeed have been in agreement with the position which we actually hold;
but the idea that truth out of good is the source of the Doctrine, is contrary
to our position; for we have
The Bishop adds: "Doctrine is knowledge from the Word, — knowledge
taken from that Word which is external to, or outside of, the mind of man".
The teaching of the Word is that Doctrine is spiritual out of celestial origin,
while knowledge taken from the Word which is external, or outside of, the mind
of man, is mere science. Knowledge taken up from without is not even cognition,
and much less is it Doctrine. "All the scientific with man is
natural, because
it is in
his natural
man, even
the scientific concerning spiritual and celestial things", A.C.
4967. "The scientifics into which the things of faith and charity can be
applied are very many, such as all the scientifics of the Church, ... all the
scientifics which are true, about correspondences, about representatives, about
significatives, about influx, about order, about intelligence 163
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER and
wisdom, about affections, yea all truths of interior and exterior nature,
both visible and invisible, because these correspond to spiritual
truths", A.C. 5213. "By scientific truth is meant every scientific by
which spiritual truth is confirmed, and it has life out of spiritual good. For,
through scientifics, man can be wise or be insane. He is wise through
scientifics when by them he confirms the truths and goods of the Church, which
are spiritual truths and goods, and
he is insane through scientifics
when by them he weakens and
refutes the truths and goods of the Church. ... All intelligence and
wisdom are out of truths which are out of Heaven", A.E. 507. That man in
his thought may be insane through the scientifics taken from the Third Testament
can be seen from the fact that there are those who quote from it to confirm that
it is not the Word. "Scientifics are the first things which must be
learned; for they are those things out of which truths must be concluded, and in
which truths then must be terminated. Afterwards progress is made to more
interior things", A.C. 5901. "The more interiorly the thought goes,
the more it removes itself from the scientifics. . . - From this it can be
manifest that the scientifics are of service to man to form.the understanding,
but that when the understanding is formed, they then form an ultimate plane, in
which man does no longer think, but above it", A.C. 5874. "Scientifics
and doctrinal things are distinct from each other in this, that out of
scientifics are doctrinal
things", A.C.
3052. "Doctrinal things
are conclusions from scientifics, for there flows in through the rational as it
were a dictate that this is true and this not true", A.C. 3057. From this
it becomes plainly evident that Doctrine involves conclusion and the influx
through a genuine rational, and cannot possibly be simply knowledge from
without. That this conclusion must be from the Holy Spirit is also plain, for it
is the rational which concludes, and
man's own
rational in spiritual things
is utterly blind. For we read: "He who believes that man has a rational and
an understanding before his natural is purified from evils, is mistaken; for the
understanding is to see the truths of the Church out of the light of Heaven, and
the light of Heaven does not inflow with another one", A.E. 941. The
genuine rational
164 from
the Holy Spirit exists in three discrete degrees; the genuine natural rational
from which is the natural Doctrine, the spiritual rational from which is the
spiritual Doctrine, and the celestial rational from which is the celestial
Doctrine. "Out of scientifics afterwards may be learned and comprehended
truths still more interior, which are called doctrinal things", A.C. 3309.
"That they have their doctrinal things out of the Word does not make them
to be Divine truths; for out of the sense of the letter of the Word any
doctrinal whatever may be hatched, . . . but not
The Bishop adds: "That which descends from the soul of man never
becomes light in the mind until it falls into such knowledge". Nowhere in
DE HEMELSCHE LEER has it been said
that truth comes to man by a mere influx from the soul. But the truths of
interior Doctrine do not
165 A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
arise
by influx from the soul merely into knowledge taken up from the Word from
without. The bases for interior Doctrine arc the opened truths of the Word in
the interior The
Bishop adds: "Hence the imperative need of the Word external to the human
mind, — a Word Divinely formed, and authoritative, and, as such, the source of
all knowledge of those Divine things which carry the power of molding and
remolding the understanding of man" pp.
272—273. Nowhere in DE
HEMELSCHE LEER has it been said that the Word external to the human mind is not
an imperative need. On the contrary this is our fundamental thought, and it has
been shown that the Third Testament primarily, and not the Old and the New
Testaments, is that Word for the New Church. All the Doctrine of the New Church
is out of that Word alone. But it has been shown at the same time, that this
Word with the man of the Church is not the Word, but it remains without him,
except in the measure as it is received from the Holy Spirit. No
authority whatever
166 any
Church flows forth not only all its worship but also all the dogmatic of it;
thus it may be said that such as is its faith such is its doctrine. ... The
faith of the Church respecting God is like the soul of the body, and the
doctrinal things are like its members; and, moreover, the faith in God is as a
queen, and the dogmatic things are like the officers of her court; and as these
all hang upon the mouth of the queen, so the dogmatic things upon the utterance
of faith. Solely out of that faith can it be seen how the Word is understood in
the Church of it. For the faith in applies to itself and draws to itself, as if
by cords, whatever things it can. If the faith is false it plays the harlot with
every truth therein, and perverts and falsifies it,
and makes man
in spiritual
things insane;
but if the faith is true,
then the whole Word favors, and the God of the Word, who is the Lord God the
Savior, infuses light, and breathes upon it with His Divine assent, and makes
man to be wise". Does it here not appear in full light that it is not
possible to say that the Writings of Swedenborg are the faith of the New Church,
if it is not at the game time realized that this must be from the Holy Spirit?
The Bishop continues: "We know, indeed, that the state of the church
is according to the state and quality of the understanding of the Word. We know
also that this understanding is of vital importance", p. 273. The teaching
"that it is not the Word which makes the Church but the understanding of
the Word", S.S. 76-79, as a literal statement of the Word, is indeed known
in the Church, but if this teaching 167
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER from
Him is also He Himself, for it is His Divine, proceeding, which is called the
Spirit of truth and the Holy Spirit. And because the Lord is in it, and it is He
Himself, therefore it is said that they shall remain in the Lord, by which is
understood in faith and love in Him from Him", A.E. 84-. Is it not evident
in view of such explicit teaching that the inflowing Divine even after reception
and appropriation is still Divine? Plainly "the all of love and of
faith" involves reception; there is no
The essential problem here involved is the problem of the Divine Nexus or
the Divine Mediation whereby the conjunction of man with the infinite God is
possible, and that of the Divine, proceeding, in which the conjunction has
become 168 actual,
since "the Divine, proceeding from the Lord, is the good of love and the
truth of faith", H.H. 7. The Divine, proceeding, being the good of love and
the truth of faith. is appropriated to man by reception. That the Nexus is
Divine is a verity well known in the Church. The same is true of the Divine,
proceeding, however far it may proceed; for it proceeds by many degrees of
accommodation, but always remains Divine. But that also the reception is Divine,
since it also is of the Divine, proceeding, is not so well known in the Church,
although it is plainly evident from reason and from the literal teaching of the
Word. The Divine, proceeding, in all its degrees, involves a conjunction and an
adjunction; for in the Divine, proceeding, Divine Good is always conjoined with
Divine Truth, and to speak of the Divine, proceeding, apart from adjunction to
the finite, is not possible; for the Divine proceeds through the finite:
"The infinite cannot proceed from the finite; ... and yet the infinite can
proceed from the finite, yet not from the finite but from the infinite through
it", D.P. 219. In the Divine, proceeding, both a conjunction of good and
truth and an adjunction to the finite are always involved. Good and truth, such
as they proceed from the Lord, are conjoined; but such as they are at first
received by man, they are not conjoined. They are, however, conjoined again by
regeneration, and as they are conjoined they are again of the Divine,
proceeding. "Conjoined they proceed from God, and conjoined they are in
Heaven, and therefore they must be conjoined in the Church", T.C.R. 398. In
the measure in which there is conjunction of good and truth in the mind, man is
conjoined with God, for by that conjunction he is taken up in the Divine,
proceeding. But in the measure man is in truth not yet of good, and also as far
as he is seen as a finite and created receptacle, the Divine is only adjoined to
man. The reception of the Divine, proceeding, however, is never according to
adjunction, but according to conjunction, as we read: "Reception_ is
according to
conjunction", A.E. 118.
But all
conjunction is of love, and it is of the Divine, proceeding, as 169
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER reception
is Divine. This is confirmed by the following quotations: "Reception and
the reciprocal in man are from the Lord", LIFE 102. "Reception must be from man, although not thus from
man that it is from man, but as if from him", A.E. 644. Reception,
therefore, plainly is Divine.
The problem seems to have been obscured with many by
170 THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS Love
and Wisdom together with this adjoined finite is called the Divine, proceeding,
can here plainly be seen. For the spiritual Sun is called "the Divine Love
and Divine Wisdom proceeding", D.L.W. 86, and yet it is said that the
things which constitute that Sun "are deprived of life in itself", n.
294. This is even more strikingly demonstrated in no. 7270 of the ARCANA:
"The Truth which proceeds immediately from the Lord, being out of the
infinite Divine itself, cannot possibly be received by any living substance
which is finite, thus not by any Angel; and therefore the Lord created
successive things by which as media the Divine truth that proceeds immediately
can be communicated. But the first successive out of this is too full of the
Divine than that it could as yet be received by any living substance which is
finite, thus by any Angel; and therefore the Lord created still
another successive through which the
Divine Truth immediately proceeding might be receptible in part; this successive
is the Truth Divine which is in Heaven. The first two are above the Heavens, and
are as it were radiant belts of flame which encompass the Sun, which is the
Lord". The Truth Divine is here even called a successive which has been
created. On the other hand, of the spiritual Sun, it is here said that it is the
Lord. That the proceeding of the Divine through the successive auras involves
just as many degrees of reception, may be plain. That the term receptacle is
predicated of what evidently is of the Divine, proceeding, can be seen from the
following quotations: "That the Divine of the Lord in Heaven is love, is
because love is the receptacle of all things of Heaven, which are peace,
intelligence, wisdom, and felicity", H.H. 18. "Innocence is the
receptacle of the truth of faith and of the good of love", H.H. 330.
"The only receptacle of good is truth", H.H. 371. That all love, all
innocence, all truth, are of the Divine, proceeding, is known. But that all
these things do not exist without a subject which is man, is also known, from
which it follows that there must be involved an adjunction to the finite. This
is the reason why they are called a receptacle, and yet they are Divine, for
they are of the Divine, proceeding.
But the problem in the mind of many seems to have been 171
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER in
the subject of the limbus. The limbus is not man, just
172 as
a certain
Proceeding from
Him. What
proceeds from Him, is what
appears as Existere in Him; but it is not in Him, but it is from Him, and makes
that men, spirits, and Angels exist, that is, live. Existere with man, spirit,
and Angel, is to live, and his living is eternal felicity", A.C. 3938. It
was the Rev. Albert Bjorck who
first pointed to this foundation passage. Here the Esse and the Existere
of man, thus the whole of man, are clearly described. Life itself is the Esse of
the Divine Human, but the reception of life, which is the esse of man is the
Existere of the Divine Human. This follows plainly from the teaching of this
passage; for it is said that "the esse of man is the receiving of the
eternal that proceeds from the Lord", but that Esse is only in the Lord,
and that it is the reception of life of which
Existere is predicated. This
Existere is therefore the Existere of the Divine Human. And further on it is
actually said that apart from this, Existere cannot be predicated of the Divine
Human, since this has become the Divine Esse or Jehovah. That the words "It
is the reception of life of which Existere is predicated" refer to the
Existere of the Divine Human and not to the existere of man, can also be seen
from the fact that the existere of man at the end of the quotation is said to be
living, that is, eternal felicity. This existere of man is from the Existere of
the Divine Human which is the esse of man or the reception of life; for the
existere of 173
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER Divine
Human, it also is of the Lord alone and only as it were of man. This is the
reason why all things of love and faith, which are the living of man, or his
eternal felicity, are said to be from the Lord alone, and the Lord's alone, yea,
the Lord Himself. Apart from the esse of man, that is, apart from the Heavens
and the Internal of the Church — for the internal man is Heaven — the Divine
Human has no Existere, that is, it does not exist. The Divine Human IS in the
Divine Itself, for it is Jehovah; but the Divine Human EXISTS in the esse of man
and since the esse of man is the Existere of the Divine Human, it cannot but be
Divine; and this is not difficult to understand, for it is the internal man
which is of the Lord alone, and it is not a receptacle of life but the reception
of life;
it is
the Existere of
the Divine
Human; and it is of the Divine, proceeding, and indeed through spiritual
substances which are active
and not through natural substances which are passive. But the existere of 174
THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS the
saying in the Gospel by JOHN I : 3.
Moreover it is plainly taught that the all of love and faith is of the Lord
alone, yea, that "it is He Himself", A.E. 84, and that it therefore is
Divine. Although the Divine, proceeding, is "successively diminished by
infinite circumvolutions, until, tempered and accommodated, it reaches
the Angels", DIVINE LOVE III, because "the Divine Love, such as it is
in the Lord, cannot be received by any Angel, for
it would
consume them",
ibidem, nevertheless it remains Divine; it has become as it were finite, but it
still is infinite. "The proprial things of the Lord are all infinite and
eternal, ... those things which thence are as the proprial things of man, are
likewise infinite and eternal; but nothing of them is of man, but they are of
the only Lord with him", D.P. 219. From this it now may be seen in full
light that all that is truly human in man, both
There is the Divine in itself and there is the Divine, proceeding.
There are
several degrees
of the Divine, proceeding,
above the Heavens, and there is the Divine, proceeding, in the Heavens.
Therefore we read: "The
Divine itself of the Lord is far above His Divine in Heaven", H.H. 118. The
Divine of the Lord in Heaven and in the Church is called the celestial and the
'spiritual. The celestial and the spiritual things of Heaven and of the Church
are Divine. This can be confirmed by innumerable quotations out of the Word; the
following few must here suffice: "All the Divine things which are called
the spiritual things of the Church, are out of the Word", D.P. 230.
"The Divine with those who have faith in Him, is love and charity", A.
2023. "The Divine things which are called the spiritual things of the
Church", T.C.R. 480.. "The Divine things which are the truths and
goods of the Church", T.C.R. 400". "No one in the Heavens has any
power except the only Lord; therefore the Angels are powers, or are powerful, in
the measure they accept from the Lord; and they accept in the measure in which
they 175
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
are
in Divine good united to Divine truth; for this is the Lord in Heaven. From this
it is clear that the Lord alone is powerful, and never anyone in Heaven except
from the Lord. The cause is that the Divine of the Lord is the all in all things
there", A.E. 43. "The Divine which makes the highest Heaven is called
the Divine celestial; but the Divine which makes the middle Heaven is called the
Divine spiritual; and the Divine which makes the ultimate Heaven is called the
Divine natural out of the spiritual and the celestial", A.E. 69. "This
Divine is called the angelic while it is in the Angels", D.L.W.
114. "The Lord is nothing but Divine Good; what proceeds out of His
Divine Good, and inflows into Heaven, in His Celestial kingdom is called the
Divine Celestial, and in His spiritual kingdom the Divine spiritual; it is thus
said Divine spiritual and Divine celestial respective to
the receptions", A.C.
6417. And specifically:
"The spiritual is called the Divine, proceeding, and it is the Divine Truth
in Heaven", A.E. 189. From these quotations it is clear that the spiritual
and celestial things of Heaven and of the Church are Divine. When during one of
the discussions I spoke about these Divine things, which man by regeneration
begins to see within himself as if they were his own, the Rev. Dr. Alfred Acton
said: "What you have described is usually called the celestial and the
spiritual. What advantage do you propose to yourself by calling it Divine
instead of celestial and spiritual?", p. 252. If the Word itself says that
the celestial and spiritual things of man are Divine, the great importance of
realizing this is self-evident. Indeed no one can deny that the celestial and
the spiritual is of the Divine, proceeding.
If it is admitted that the genuine
things which man has from the Lord are celestial and spiritual things, then the
whole position which we defend is admitted. For the essence of it is that
genuine Doctrine with man is spiritual out of celestial origin. But it is just
this very thing which is denied by our opponents. They admit no other Divine
Doctrine with man except knowledge from without. Doctrine arrived at on the
basis of the letter by conclusion of the genuine natural rational, or the
spiritual rational, or the celestial rational, however confirmed by the letter,
they call interpretative or derived doctrine, and they call it human doctrine
which is not 176 Divine.
To draw Doctrine out of the Word to them never
The spiritual and celestial things which are of the Divine, proceeding,
and which make man to be a man, cannot come into existence except by
regeneration. The essential of regeneration is that good and truth with man be
united, as we read: "To regenerate man is to unite good and truth with him,
or love and wisdom, as they are united in the Divine that proceeds from the
Lord", D.P. 58. This union of good and truth with man depends on the mutual
conjunction of the internal and the external man so that they make one. There
are innumerable places in the Word in which this conjunction and this oneness
are described; for instance: "This signifies those of the Church with whom
the internal and the external, or the spiritual and the natural man, make
one", A.E. 150; arid: "As the Lord glorified His Human, so He
regenerates man; that is, 177
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER altogether
foreign to the problem here involved. Although
In his address on The Proprium, pp. 216—231, the Rev. Theodore Pitcairm
arrayed an overwhelming wealth of passages from the -Word which confirm these
truths. In the discussion, pp. 231—232, the Rev. Dr. Alfred Acton said:
"Now it is true that the Lord adjoins Himself only to that which is His Own
in man. It is also true that the proprium of man is evil. The same was true of
the first 178 THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS
which
is the Existere of the Divine Human of the Lord. It may also be seen that the
essential man is looked for in his being a finite receptacle of life, while the
teaching of the Word is that the essential man is the reception of life, the
esse of it, which is the Existere of the Divine Human, being the internal man,
and the existere of it, which is from the Existere of the Divine Human, being
the external man, that is, man's living, or his eternal felicity,
cf. A.C.
3938. It may
also be seen
that the proprium of man is
seen in his being a finite receptacle, while in reality it again is reception;
with the regenerate, with whom it is called the celestial proprium, which is of
the Lord alone, it is the genuine reception as o/ one's self of the inflowing
Divine, which reception is man's living, that is, his eternal felicity; with the
evil, with whom it is called the
infernal or man's own proprium, it is
the reception from one's self of the influx from hell, which reception is
the evil man's living, that is, his eternal infelicity. To what that concept
must lead may here also be seen in that it is said that the proprium of even the
first man was evil, which means nothing less than that 179
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
of
man, without which man would not be man", ANGELIC IDEA CONCERNING CREATION.
In looking for the origin of evil to the fact that man is not life but a
receptacle of life, instead of looking for the origin of evil to man's free
choice, evil could never be imputed to man, but would have to be imputed to the
order of creation. But quite apart from this, it may be seen from the teaching
of revelation that the element of reception can never be found in the passive
natural substances of the mind, but that the first element of human reception is
in the Heaven of the Human Internals, the second element of human reception in
the internal man, which both are of the Divine, proceeding, and the latter
specifically is the Existere of the Divine Human of the Lord, and that the third
element of human reception is the as of one's self reception in the external
man, which reception is only as it were of man, but in reality also of the
Divine, proceeding. If the element of reception in itself would involve the
tendency to fall away, then the existence of a Heaven of the Human Internals, to
which belong the souls even of the devils in hell, would not be possible.
Moreover from the fact that Dr. Acton says: "It is true that the Lord
adjoins Himself only to that which is His Own in man", it is clear that the
essential purport of the teaching on the celestial proprium has escaped his
attention. For according to the teaching of the Word, just the opposite of what
he says is true. The Lord adjoins Himself to man, but He conjoins Himself, yea,
he unites, A.E. 1138, Himself only with that which is His Own in man. That to
which the Lord adjoins Himself, however, is not the evil proprium of man, but
those finite, spiritual substances which constitute man as a form recipient of
life, and, in a more interior relation, truth with man which is not yet of good;
but that with which the Lord conjoins Himself, which is His Own in man, is man's
celestial proprium. From the revealed teaching concerning the esse and the
existere of man, as it is
given in
the quoted n.
3938 of
the ARCANA COELESTIA, it thus becomes evident that the failure to
understand the reality of the celestial proprium, which is of the Lord alone and
by which "the union of the Lord with man and of man with the Lord",
A.E. 1138, is effected, is due to the fact that one looks for the essential
180 THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS
man
in his being a receptacle of life, while both his esse and his existere are a
reception of life, and to the fact that one looks for the element of reception
in the passive and therefore dead natural substances of the limbus, while the
essential element of reception is revealed to be the esse of
From all these things it follows that the Divine things of Heaven and of
the Church necessarily involve reception and appropriation, which are possible
only in a new will and a new understanding, which are of the Lord alone. If,
therefore, it is said that the understanding is of vital importance, we cannot
agree, if by this understanding man's own understanding is meant. The only thing
vital with regard to this understanding is that it should be entirely removed,
and that man should receive a new understanding which is only as it were his,
but in reality of the Divine, proceeding, of the Lord. Of the new understanding
of man we read: "Man believes that he has a will of good, but he is
entirely mistaken; if he does good, it is not out of his will, but out of a new
will, which is the Lord's, thus it is out of the Lord; hence also if he thinks
and speaks truth, it is out of a new understanding, which is thence, and thus
also out of the Lord; for the regenerated is
an altogether
new man
formed from the
Lord, and therefore he is
also said to be created anew", A.C. 928. Here it is plainly taught that if
man thinks and speaks truth it is out of a new understanding which is out of a
•new will which is the Lord's. "He who believes that man has a rational
and an understanding before his natural is purified from evils, is mistaken; for
the understanding is to see the truths of the Church out of the light of Heaven,
and the light of Heaven does not inflow with another 181
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
one",
A.E. 941. "And {/" you are willing to believe it, man also by this is
made new; not only in that a new will is given him, and a new understanding, but
also a new body for his spirit; the prior ones are indeed not abolished, but
they are removed so that they do not appear; and new ones are created in the
regenerated as in a womb, by love and wisdom, which are the Lord", D.W. IV.
"All men, however many there are, have no other seed than something filthy
and infernal, in which and out of which is their proprium;
182 quotations
it may now be clear that the understanding of the regenerate man is indeed the
Lord's with man. This is the plain and literal teaching of the Word. This
expression is thus not "foreign to the Writings, and meaningless", as
Dr. Acton expressed himself, p. 258; and also the remark the Bishop made with
regard to it, p. 187, we believe must be due to a misunderstanding. It is a
literal quotation from the Latin Word. It is, of course, not the infinite Wisdom
itself of the Lord; everyone may see that that is not meant.
The Bishop adds: "We know that the true process of understanding is
to read the Word from the Word, or to read the Writings from their own
teaching". There is no other way to read the Word from the Word than to
read the the letter of the Word from the spirit of the Word, and this is the
same as to read the Word in the light of Doctrine out of the Word, for "the
Word in the letter cannot be apprehended except by Doctrine out of the Word,
made by one who is enlightened", A.C. 10324. To read the Word simply from
the letter of the Word cannot possibly bring a true process of understanding.
"The Word in the letter without illustration is not understood, and
illustration is either spiritual or natural; spiritual illustration is given
only with those who are spiritual, which are those who are in the good of love
and charity and thence in truths; but mere natural illustration with those who
are natural", A.E. 176.
The Bishop adds: "And we rely upon the Writings just because we know
that they did not proceed from truth out of good with man, but from the Lord
alone, through the Divinely prepared, Divinely guarded, and Divinely inspired
mind of Swedenborg". The Doctrine of the Church does not proceed from truth
out of good, but it is truth out of good. "The Doctrine is out of spiritual
good", A.C. 5997. It is true that man may rely upon the Word alone. Nothing
whatever has been said contrary to this truth in DE HEMELSCHE LEER. But-it is
also true that Doctrine may not be identified with knowledge from the Word. It
is true that the Writings of Swedenborg are from the Lord alone, but genuine
Doctrine is also from the Lord alone. The fact that the genuine Doctrine out of
the Word existing in the Church is truth out of good with man, is not contrary
to the fact that it also is from the Lord alone; what 183
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER would
regeneration be if the regenerate mind, in making' Doctrine,
were not
also Divinely
prepared, Divinely guarded,
and Divinely inspired? This, therefore, is not the difference between the giving
of the Word from the Lord and the making of Doctrine from the Lord out of the
given Word. In the measure as Doctrine is not truth out of good with man, the
Word remains outside of man, and with the 184 new
position unless one is willing to enter without prejudice into the real meaning
of the new concepts which have been advanced.
The Bishop adds: "Also we know that the Writings thus given are
accommodated to the understanding, and even the natural understanding of
men". This is the very reason why in their letter they contain the three
degrees of the rational together, and why the letter must he opened if man is to
The Bishop continues: "All New Churchmen pray that The
Bishop adds: "But as to whether the interior degrees of their minds are
opened by regeneration they know not, as long as this life lasts. And this of
mercy, because of the dangers which arise. . . . Hence the warning in the
Writings, that an opening of the interior degrees of the mind is not perceived
or sensed by man until after his departure out of the world (D.P. 32). This
gives us 185
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
interior
degrees of the mind. In every general state of the Church there are natural men,
spiritual men, and celestial
186 THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS
"There
are three degrees of wisdom with man. . . . The ascent of love according to the
degrees is not perceived by man except obscurely, but the ascent of wisdom
clearly with those who know and see what wisdom is", D.P. 34; and:
"Men do not see the spiritual light except by the perception of
truth", D.L.W. 181; and: "This second rational
The Bishop continues: "We realize, indeed, the vital importance of
the states of mind in which the Word is read, and the importance of those
interpretations of the Word through which the Word is seen. But in this relation
of the mind of man to the Word of God, the mind does not so transcend that it
can lay down an everlasting doctrine before unknown", pp. 273—274. We
must repeat here that nothing is of vital importance in the Church except that
which is from the Divine Human of the Lord. Nothing but falsities and fallacies
can be seen in the Word through interpretations originating in man's own mind.
There is nothing transcendent in man's own mind; the Holy Spirit alone can show
to man the interior degrees of rational truth 187
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
contained
in the letter of the Third Testament, and even the genuine sense of the merely
natural degree.
The Bishop in the next paragraph continues: "The Lord's message is
to be seen in His Word alone. There only may the true Holy Spirit be
found". DE HEMELSCHE LEER contains no single statement contrary to this
truth. But the basis for the Holy Spirit in the human mind is in the discrete
degrees of the genuine rational, which are opened by regeneration.
The Bishop in the next paragraph continues: "The position of the
General Church is as it ever has been, — that the Writings, as the Word, are
the true and everlasting Doctrine of the New Church, and that no Doctrine
modified by the understanding of man should be imposed as of binding authority,
or of credal force". The Writings, "as the Word", without
Doctrine made by man are not understood; if they are not 'understood, they are
not the Doctrine of the Church. All Doctrine taken up in the mind is according
to the understanding of the mind. The position of DE HEMELSCHE LEER is exactly
expressed in the following quotation: "The Doctrine of the Church unless
collected and confirmed out of the sense of the letter of the Word, has no
power; . . . but the Doctrine out of the sense of the letter, and together with
it", ON THE SACRED SCRIPTURE FROM EXPERIENCE XXVIII. It is plainly evident
from this passage that the sense of the letter of the Word should not be
identified with the Doctrine of the Church. Our position is that the Doctrine
drawn out of the letter and together with it has power; the opposite position is
that the letter itself is that Doctrine, and that the letter alone has power.
That the Word given to the Church must be distinguished from the Doctrine of the
Church drawn out of that Word, may be seen also in the following passage:
"It shall be briefly told how the case is with the support of the Word by
Doctrine out of the Word. He who does not know the arcana of Heaven cannot
believe otherwise than that the Word is supported without Doctrine thence. For
he supposes that the Word in the letter or the literal sense of the Word is the
Doctrine itself. . . . But the Doctrine must be collected out of the Word, and
while it is being collected the man must be in enlightenment from the Lord. . .
. These are they who are enlightened in the Word
188 when
they read it, and they see the truth, and thence make Doctrine for themselves.
... The Lord inflows through Heaven into their understanding; . . . and the Lord
then at the same time inflows with faith, by means of the cooperation of the new
will. . . . From these things it can now be plain how the Doctrine of truth and
good is given to man from the Lord. That this Doctrine supports the Word in
respect to its literal or external sense, is plain to everyone who
reflects", A.C. 9424. Is it not clear from this passage that the Doctrine
made by man which is thus to support the letter of the Latin Word, must
necessarily be the Doctrine of genuine truth from the Holy Spirit. And is it not
clear that any "interpretative" or "derived" doctrine from
man's
The Bishop adds: "No such doctrine should, therefore, be advanced
for the acceptance of the church with the claim that it is of Divine origin,
Essence, and Authority, 189
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
on
its own recognizance", but that it must refer "exclusively to the
literal sense of the Word itself ", First Fascicle,
The Bishop adds: "No such doctrine should be delivered to the church
with the requisition that it be accepted as proceeding from the Holy
Spirit". It is a Divine truth of the Word that all genuine Doctrine in the
Church is from the Holy Spirit; but never may the Doctrine "be delivered to
the church with the requisition that it be accepted as proceeding from the Holy
Spirit". Never has this been done by us, and DE HEMELSCHE LEER contains no
single statement from which it could be concluded that we ever advocated such a
disorderly thing.
The Bishop adds: "No such doctrine should be insisted upon on the
ground that it 'proceeds from truth out of good with man'." Doctrine does
not proceed from truth out of good with man. Such a statement as is here given
in quotation-marks does not agree with our position. Doctrine is truth out of
good, to quote: "Doctrine is out of spiritual good", A.C. 5997. This
is simply a matter of fact, revealed in the Word; but on the other hand Doctrine
should not be insisted upon 'on this ground. Never has this been done by us.
The Bishop adds: "Every Doctrine will be received which is seen to
be of and from the Word, unqualified by
The Bishop on the next page (275) continues: "By the doctrine of the
church the advocates of the New Doctrine 190 of
the Third Testament contains the three discrete degrees of Doctrine, the natural
Doctrine, the spiritual Doctrine, and the celestial Doctrine. The natural man
with his natural understanding in that Word sees a natural Doctrine; the
spiritual man with his spiritual understanding in that Word sees a spiritual
Doctrine; and the celestial man with his celestial understanding in that Word
sees a celestial Doctrine. These are abstract teachings of truth derived from
the Word itself. Since the understanding of the Word is the internal sense, A.C.
2762, and the internal
The Bishop adds: "But simply note that every understanding of the
Word undergoes continual change, and is therefore not only mutable, but is
sometimes unreliable". The genuine understanding of the Word, which is
signified by the White Horse, A.C. 2761, and which is the Doctrine of faith, A.C.
2762, is from the Lord alone and thus Divine; it is indeed capable of a
continued opening to
The Bishop adds: "In the present state, the members of the General
Church will do well to hold to the belief that the Writings are the Word,
indeed; but the need is to see that they are the Doctrine of the Church".
We believe indeed that the ACADEMY and
the GENERAL CHURCH owe their
existence to a celestial perception of the
truth that the Writings are the Word;
but how seriously this truth
is endangered at the present time, may be seen from the fact that there are
already those who deny that the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg refer to
themselves in their teaching concerning the letter of the 191
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
Word.
It was indeed according to order that when that celestial perception first was
given, they could not yet
The Bishop continues: "Every Word ever given to man was designed to
be the doctrine of the church. . . . And each successive Word has been
increasingly doctrinal in form"; and further on the Bishop uses the
expression "the Word of Doctrine". The idea evidently is that in the
case of the Writings of Swedenborg, these being doctrinal in form more than the
previous Testaments, there is so much the more The
Bishop adds: "Unless we see the Writings as doctrine, and as the Doctrine
of the Church, we shall come under some other doctrine and some other
dominion". The Word of the Third Testament apart from Doctrine made by man,
as from himself but from the Holy Spirit, is not understood. If the
understanding is not a new under-
192 standing
which is of the Lord alone, A.C. 928, man remains under the dominion of his
proprium, and the Church comes under the dominion of men. Only if the
understanding of the Latin Word is from the Holy Spirit, then the Church will be
under the rule 'and government of the Lord.
The Bishop adds: "Certainly, as we receive the Word of Doctrine, our
understanding will, in accord with its quality, form doctrine thence, even the
doctrine which will 193
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
by
man — the necessity of which is here admitted by the Bishop — is not
accepted by oar opponents, cf. NEW CHURCH LIFE, p. 199; it is held that this
teaching applies only to the Glorification of the Lord, The fact that man can
for himself make genuine Doctrine out of the Word, which he needs as a guiding
light to read the Word, is called a God-given gift to man, without any
explanation of the laws of the human mind and of regeneration which must be
involved. Can this necessity and responsibility to form Doctrine be laid upon an
understanding the main characteristic of which is its unreliability, yea more,
an understanding of which we know from revelation that with regard to spiritual
things it is utterly blind? In reality, however, all the laws of the relation
between man and God, in the Word are clearly described; and in the present case
specifically the laws of order according to which the genuine natural rational,
the spiritual rational, and the celestial rational with man come into existence,
namely, in the 12th, 20th and 26th chapters of
GENESIS. The teaching
of these chapters, we believe, gives
a clear explanation of that God given gift to man.
The Bishop adds: "This necessity brings with it the gravest of
responsibilities, for in the formation of derived doctrine the mind of man may
take a right or a wrong turning". It has been one of the main subjects of
DE HEMELSCHE LEER to bring this responsibility into full light. And what is the
right turning and what the wrong turning has been described in the light of the
teaching of the Word in great detail. The wrong turning in the Word is described
as to the three discrete degrees of truth in the thrice repeated story of a man
being in the danger of taking a woman who is the wife of another. The right
turning is described in his conquering in that temptation. —
All Doctrine with man is derived Doctrine. Underived Doctrine with man cannot
possibly exist. Underived Doctrine exists in the Lord alone. The Doctrine of the
Church can never be otherwise than derived.
The Bishop adds: "The mind may turn and return to the revealed Word,
in faithfulness, or it may turn in and upon itself, and there, in an endless
cycle, become entangled with the vision of its own states; so much so as to
mistake those states for the universe of truth". If by the turning 194 and
returning of the mind to the revealed Word nothing else is meant but direct
cognizance of the letter or knowledge taken-from the Word which is outside of
the mind of man, then the Doctrine of the Church has not yet come into
existence, for knowledge is not Doctrine but mere science. For we read:
"Scientifics and doctrinal things are distinct from each other in this,
that out of scientifics are doctrinal things", A.C. 3052. It is indeed true
that everything which is involved in the Doctrine is plainly stated in the Word.
But although it is plainly stated, none but the genuine natural rational can see
there the natural Doctrine of the Church; none but the spiritual rational can
see there the spiritual Doctrine of the Church; and none but the celestial
rational can see there the celestial Doctrine of the Church. That a truth is
plainly stated and that nevertheless 195
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
general
are signified the inferior or exterior things, for these are of service to the
higher or interior things. Thence by -a servant is signified the natural, for
this is of service to the spiritual; consequently the scientific truth which is
of the literal sense of the Word; for this is of service to the spiritual truth
which is of the internal sense; the truth of the internal sense of the Word is
the same with the genuine truth of the Doctrine of faith of the Church",
A.C. 9034. It becomes plainly evident from this passage that knowledge from
without is not the Doctrine; it is the
The Bishop continues: "The health of the mind is de-
196 pendent
upon its outlook, — its outward look to the Word of God as Doctrine, from
whence it derives its knowledge of Divine things". All coming into
existence of truth with
The Bishop adds: "Life inflows from within, and meets this
knowledge, and then, and not till then, does the light break". DE HEMELSCHE
LEER does not contain one statement contrary to the law that an influx from
within alone can never bring truth to man. But in a mind where the influx from
within meets nothing but knowledge from without, interior Doctrine cannot come
into existence. The
The Bishop adds: "This light of the mind can not be independent of
the outer Word of Doctrine". All scientifics of truth must come out of the
letter of the Word alone. For the Word is the one and only source of all truth.
But the thinking of the mind in making Doctrine, though it is not independent of
the letter, nevertheless is far above the scientifics out of the letter. This
may be confirmed by the following quotations: "The more interiorly the
thought 197
A REPLY BY THE REVEREND ERNST PFEIFFER
Lord.
That there is interior and exterior thinking, may be seen in n. 5127,
5141", A.C. 6007. And: "The more exterior is the apperception,
the more obscure it is;
for exterior things are generals respectively, for innumerable interior
things in the exterior appear as one", A.C. 5141. Is it not plain that
every scientific of the Latin Word so contains innumerable interior things? And:
"They who are in enlightenment are in the light of Heaven as to their
internal man; for it is the light of Heaven which enlightens man in the truths
and goods of faith. They who are so enlightened grasp the Word as to its
interior things; for which reason they make Doctrine for themselves out of the
Word, to which they apply the sense of the letter", A.C. 9382.
The remaining paragraphs of the Bishop's address as far as I can see do
not contain any further points which have not yet been answered in this reply.
We can only hope and pray the Lord that from the foregoing it has now become
clear that our position, our motive, and our end, have been misunderstood, and
that the charges made against us are unfounded. We solemnly declare our loyalty
to the Word
We firmly believe in all sincerity with the full conviction of truth that
the essential principles of the new position are confirmed on every page of the
Third Testament. Our loyalty — and the Bishop will be the first to admit
that----- above all must be to the Word of the Lord.
199
CONTENTS Leading Theses propounded in DE HEMELSCHE LEER ................ 2 The Understanding of the Word, by Rev. Ernst Pfeiffer ............... 3 Series and Degrees in the Latin Word, by Rev. Theodore Pitcairn ............ 22 To the Editor of BE HEMELSCHE LEER, by Rev. Prof. Dr. Alfred Acton ......38 From the Transactions of the Swedenborg Gezelschap. From the Minutes of the Meeting of May 7th~. 1932. Discussion of the Address by Bishop George de Charms, The Interior Understanding of the Writings, NEW CHURCH LIFE, November 1931. Rev. Ernst Pfeiffer ......... 39 Prof. Dr. Charles H. van 0s...... 53 Rev. Theodore Pitcairn ........ 60 N. J. Vellenga ........... 67 J. P. Verstraate ........... 71 H. D. G. Groeneveld ......... 76 That the Lord Alone is Heaven, by Rev. Theodore Pitcairn................. 81 Plain Statements of Doctrine, by Rev. Albert Bjorck ................ 87 The Lord's Own with Man, by Rev. Theodore Pitcairn. ...............103 Matthew XXIII : 37—39, by H. D. G. Groeneveld 109 Jacob and Rachel, by Rev. Theodore Pitcairn . . 116 The
Annual Council Meetings 1933. THE BISHOP'S ADDRESS. A Reply by Rev. Ernst
Pfeiffer . .
. 123
200
DE HEMELSCHE LEER
May be obtained through: Academy Book Boom, Bryn Athyn, Pa. U.S.A. Mr.
Horace Howard, 30, Drury Road, Colchester, England. J. H. Ridgway, Esq., 2,
Old Well Court, Durban, South Africa.
and through the Publishers: THE SWEDENBORG GENOOTSCHAP 229, LAAN VAN
MEERDERVOORT
The Hague, Holland
Price $0.50 or 2s.
The four previous Fascicles are still available
|
|
