The Derivation and Function of Scientific Revelations Volume 4 Theistic Psychology: The Scientific Knowledge of God Extracted From the Correspondential Sense of Sacred Scripture by Dr. Leon James, Professor of Psychology, University of Hawaii

Dr. Leon James
Professor of Psychology
University of Hawaii
Published on the Web in 2004
Last Update: 2007

The Derivation and Function
of Scientific Revelations

Note: For a more detailed justification for extracting the correspondential sense of the Writings of Swedenborg, please consult my online book at: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/v2ch1-nonduality.html

At age 57 Swedenborg suddenly found himself a dual citizen – conscious in both worlds simultaneously. This means that he was conscious in both the natural mind and the spiritual mind. Our consciousness in the natural mind allows us to see others here on earth who are also conscious in their natural mind. Similarly, Swedenborg’s new consciousness in his spiritual mind allowed him to see others in the spiritual world.

Theistic psychology resolves the issue of how Swedenborg was able to “travel” through the spiritual world by collecting many details about it that are mentioned in various places in the Writings Sacred Scripture and putting them together in an explanatory framework.

Spiritual travel or displacement is nothing else than a series of changes in mental states. In his spiritual mind, Swedenborg was able to “travel” to the spiritual sphere of planets located in distant galaxies by undergoing a series of mental changes that sometimes took several of his earth days (in the natural mind). The same procedure had to be experienced by the spirits who were “traveling” with him.

Swedenborg describes his visits to the three heavens and what he saw there. In order to see the people in each heaven, Swedenborg’s mental states in the spiritual mind, had to be changed to match the mental states of the societies he was visiting, who were in their spiritual mind. He described the location of the heavens relative to each other, their cities and lands, and the layout of the territory in the world of spirits and in the hells located beneath it. This kind of information about the spiritual world may be called spiritual geography.

But it was revealed to humanity two thousand years ago that the “Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21 in the New Testament Sacred Scripture). This revelation may be one of the most astonishing facts in scientific history. For seventeen centuries the meaning of it remained clouded and not understood. Perhaps it was a figure of speech. Perhaps it was a mystery. In the Writings of Swedenborg the mystery was solved. The spiritual world is nothing else than the mental world.

Every human being is born with a physical body on some earth and a mental body, or mind, in the world of spirits. The physical body and the mind grow up together through experiences of life. The physical body is temporary and disintegrates at some point, leaving the mind in the world of spirits free from earthly input and conditions. The human mind is a spiritual organ constructed out of the eternal substances from the Spiritual Sun. Similarly, the physical body is a physical organ constructed out of the temporary materials from the natural sun that is around every earth.

The anatomy of the physical body was well known to Swedenborg from his studies of the sciences of his day in 18th century Europe. The anatomy of the mind was totally unknown to anyone because scientists had no access to observation of the mind. The conscious natural mind has some knowledge of itself because it is constructed of organic layers in discrete degrees, and the higher degree can observe and monitor the lower degree. The highest portion of the natural mind is called the natural-rational degree of thinking and willing, and this is exhibited by what we read in the Letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture.

But it is impossible for the natural mind to observe even a single thing about the operations a discrete degree higher than itself, namely, the spiritual mind. Whatever operations take place in this layer of our mind remain unconscious or inaccessible to the conscious – as long as our mind in the world of spirits is still connected to the physical body on earth. The operations in the spiritual mind originate from Divine Speech exteriorizing across the layers of the mental world. There is a continuous built in organic striving from the unconscious spiritual mind to coordinate by correspondence the operations in the conscious natural mind. The natural mind (“the servant”) is to reform itself and become aligned to the spiritual mind – which occurs progressively during our regeneration on earth.

The consciousness level or, mentality of people’s willing and thinking, is produced by Divine Speech through the progression of correspondences – celestial-rational, spiritual-rational, spiritual-natural or interior natural, natural-rational, natural-sensuous, and natural-corporeal. Divine Speech, or Divine Truth, issues from the Spiritual Sun in the form of spiritual heat and light. These distinct but united uncreate and infinite substances, propagate through the mental world of humanity, that is, through the mind of every human being. This propagation is in successive and simultaneous order so that it continuously permeates every human mind from birth to endless immortality.

Divine Speech enters our celestial mind in the first or highest of the successive degree, which is a above our spiritual mind. This portion of the human organic mind is called the “third heaven” and its mentality level of willing and thinking is produced by the celestial-rational correspondences in Sacred Scripture.

We actually possess in our mind four versions of the Writings Sacred Scripture. The first is in our external natural mind in the form of natural-rational correspondences called the “Letter of the Writings.” This is in the external natural mind which is operating in the world spirits. The second version of the Writings is in our interior-natural mind in the form of spiritual-natural correspondences of the Writings. This is in our first heaven. The third version is in our spiritual mind in the form of spiritual-rational correspondences. This is in our second heaven. The fourth is in our celestial mind in the form of celestial-rational correspondences This is in our third heaven.

There is therefore a perfect overlap between the geography of the spiritual world and the anatomy of the mind. In effect we can write this formula:

All the heavens and all the hells are in every human mind. No other place or plane of existence has been created for heaven and hell except the mental world. Every human being is born with the three heavens and the three hells, separated by the world of spirits. There is only one eternal and infinite Spiritual Sun, and it is located in the mind of every human being.

Everyone can see the Spiritual Sun, the heavens and the hells, the societies and lands and lakes and mountains – but only by elevating our consciousness from the natural mind to the spiritual mind. This cannot be done as long as we are connected to the physical body. Hence during our life on earth we cannot see the Spiritual Sun that is in the upper portions of our mind. Neither can we see the societies of heaven and hell that live in the spiritual world.

All this amounts to the astonishing equation that spiritual geography = mental anatomy. The human race is not spread out as it appears from the earths in the physical world. All human beings live their lives, doing their willing and thinking, in the same mental expanse created by the proceeding substances from the Spiritual Sun. There is only one spiritual world, only one mental world. Despite the experience of privacy in our mind, we are in fact continuously in the presence of the entire humanity through the vertical community of the mental world. The shape of humanity’s vertical community was seen many times by Swedenborg as the Grand Human (“Grand Man”).

The consequences of these facts are staggering to contemplate. It means that every human being at any time from birth to eternity, has access to every other human being in existence. This is a consequence of the fact that there is only one mental world, one spiritual world, and that a change of mental state brings us in the presence of others who are in a similar or compatible mental state. Swedenborg demonstrated this scientific reality by coming into the presence of people in the spiritual world whose names he knew from literature and talking with them – Aristotle, King David, Mary, Luther, Newton, and numerous others.

At this day it is not possible for anyone to become conscious in their spiritual mind and thus come into the conscious presence of people in the afterlife of immortality. The reason for this is explained below.

Theistic psychology from the Writings Sacred Scripture brings to the world a new perspective on what it means to be close to God or to seek closeness with God. The period prior to the publication of the Writings Sacred Scripture (1747-1771), is known in the General Church as the age of the First Coming, while the Writings Sacred Scripture constitute a new era known in the New Church as the Second Coming. These two periods are contrasted in theistic psychology regarding the meaning and process of closeness to God.

The era of the “First Coming,” which extends from the first century A.D. to the eighteenth, is known in theistic psychology as the sensuous consciousness approach to God. The Old Testament phase of sensuous consciousness was concrete while the New Testament phase of sensuous consciousness was abstract in the form of Christian theology, all of which is based on a sensuous consciousness of the visible “Son of God,” through whom the invisible “God the Father” can be known.

Then begins the new era of the rational consciousness of God as the Divine Human, made possible by the rational revelations of the Writings Sacred Scripture. This changeover regarding humanity’s relationship to God is a new evolutionary creation of the human mind. Today the sensuous consciousness approach to God is still the dominant mode of effort people exert in their longing for closer “union with God.” But it is vital that people begin to acquire the new mode of approaching God that has now been created in the era that began with the Writings Sacred Scripture.

God can always be approached by anyone regardless of knowledge, education, or formal religious association. God is already present in every individual’s mind, managing the endless details of every person’s biography from birth to eternity. Through this management role and presence, God leads and provides for every individual what is needed for heavenly consciousness and eternal life. And yet this relationship is incomplete and not fully effective until the individual consciously reciprocates God’s loving management care with feelings of gratitude and longing for ever higher understanding of God’s Truth and Love.

God’s longing and love for every individual is to have us achieve higher and higher rational consciousness of Him as the Divine Human in whom infinite things are distinguishably one. This is the way God presents Himself in the literal sentences of the Writings Sacred Scripture. We are given there the scientific details of how the Divine Human accomplished this last major evolutionary development of humankind. It included the remaking of the upper portion of the human mind called the “Old Heavens,” which were accessed by people through their sensuous consciousness of God.

The “New Heavens” that were now created in people’s minds (at the end of the 18th century), were no longer accessible by sensuous consciousness, hence the need for the Writings Sacred Scripture on earth to enlighten people to see their way to the new heavens in their mind. God uses the Writings Sacred Scripture as the method for bringing rational consciousness of Him to people’s conscious awareness. This is what God is longing for.

Today in the civilization of cross-cultural diversity, Western culture is permeated through and through with Eastern nonduality which is based on the idea of nonduality between the Divine and the human (see Note 4). The nonduality of new age philosophies was recently reviewed by Rev. Erik E. Sandstrom in a General Church publication (see Note 5). Every single idea, concept, principle, and image in nonduality promotes and preaches the sensuous consciousness of God as a process of union with the Divine called “oneness.” At this level of human consciousness we are being described as no longer human, but Divine, God Itself, of one substance, immensity, and timelessness, without emotion, love, or wisdom such as it is know to human beings. It is a portrayed as a great mystery impossible to convey in words because it is “above thinking with words.”

Sensuous consciousness of God opposes rational consciousness of God. They are in a mortal battle by which one must eliminate the other, like it was commanded to the children of Israel entering the Holy Land that they should exterminate and extirpate every single inhabitant, by which was represented mental states of nonduality. In the nonduality tradition, practitioners and students are given mental exercises to practice allowing them to withdraw from all sensory stimulation coming in from the outside through the physical body. They must also try to eliminate all thinking and consciousness of meaning. And if these exercises are done faithfully for some period of time, the student is promised a new higher type of consciousness which is not human but Divine.

And yet the actual truth and scientific fact is that there is no access to the spiritual mind which is the portion that receives the inner sensory consciousness of the Spiritual Sun. Swedenborg was a unique case because he was able to be conscious in his spiritual mind before he underwent resuscitation in the world of spirits. He therefore had a sensuous consciousness of the spiritual world as well as the natural world. He was able to confirm by years of daily experience in his spiritual mind, that the new heavens in the human mind are heavens produced by the rational consciousness of God.

Our rational consciousness of God begins with dualism and Sacred Scripture. The correspondences of Divine Speech in Sacred Scripture create the new rational genes of consciousness, out of which our heavens are constructed. The only access to our heavens in eternity is by means of a rational understanding of higher order correspondences in Sacred Scripture – corporeal, sensuous, natural-rational, spiritual-natural, spiritual-rational, celestial-rational. This is a gradual progression of rational consciousness up the ladder of correspondences of Divine Speech.

Theistic psychology provides the scientific reasoning process for proving that rational consciousness of God is the only road to a happy eternity.

Seeking sensuous consciousness of God today leads to a delusional relationship with oneself. It is not unusual for a Christian today to declare that God spoke to him or her in answer to some question or request. But we know from the Writings that God speaks to people only through Sacred Scripture, that is by enlightenment. Divine Speech with God in a dialog form in the natural mind is not possible (“He said to me...I said to Him...”). Today in the age of rational consciousness, God enlightens our conscious natural mind through the unconscious spiritual mind, the two acting in correspondence – never by direct speech or living voice, as He did in the days of the Old and New Testaments.

Every semester I ask my students to explain why God doesn’t appear at the United Nations, or some other world stage, and make a declaration of Himself in the media, and then return to heaven. Such a Divine intervention would constitute the sensuous consciousness of God, materialistic proof of His existence and direct communication with Him. Such physical demonstration of Himself would not turn the world to theism. Science would not be changed. Religion would remain the same mystery as before. Those who did not believe, and then believed because of the sensuous consciousness of God, would then eventually not believe.

The only consciousness of God that can remain in the mind and grow to eternity, is rational consciousness of God.

In our modern age, correspondences of Divine Speech in Sacred Scripture are the only mechanism that has been created for elevating rational consciousness of God and making it grow.

Divine Speech is the same as Divine Truth and this is the same as spiritual light streaming out of the Spiritual Sun and entering the mind of every human being throughout its discrete layers. Sacred Scripture (“the Word”) is the only source of genuine or Divine correspondences. God enlightens us through the doctrine of truth that we extract from the Writings Sacred Scripture. This enlightenment is rational speech or communication with God.

We experience communication with God not as a dialog but as new insight or understanding that we perceive as spiritual correspondence. The experience of comprehending spiritual correspondences gives us the rational feeling of God’s immediate co-Presence in our willing and thinking. In the new age for the modern mind this rational consciousness of God is the way to heaven, and nothing else can be.

When we read the Writings Sacred Scripture we are happy at first to contact the natural-rational meanings and explanations of the literal meaning. We are excited by the insights this provides on so many religious and theological issues that have puzzled people of every generation. We can do this only to the extent that we can identify ourselves with the Christian religion in a Western cultural context. Readers from other religions are put off by Swedenborg’s apparent anti-Semitism and seemingly dogmatic condemnation of sacred figures in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

From this pan-human perspective, the Letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture is written in a style similar to the Old and New Testament Sacred Scripture, namely, male dominant and antagonistic to outside cultures and religions. Yet there are critical differences conceptually because the Writings justify everything rationally, while the Old and New Testaments remain dogmatic and mystical. The Writings Sacred Scripture are therefore ultimately more accepting and universal as a “rational faith” in sharp contrast to the earlier “blind faith” or “mystical faith.”

Nevertheless the Letter of the Writings cannot be exported to other religions and cultures unless they are willing to amalgamate and exchange the old for the new. Yet we know that the Divine Psychologist never changes an individual’s childhood religious beliefs and concepts. Instead, He bends them appropriately so that they can conform to the truths of the Writings Sacred Scripture. These are the truths that form the person’s eternal heavens and must be acceptable and loved.

It is for this reason that the Writings Sacred Scripture had to be written in natural-rational correspondences that would allow people to extract pan-human knowledge that was beyond culture and religion.

When the method of correspondences with enlightenment is applied to the literal sentences of the Writings Sacred Scripture, the religious, historical, and cultural references “vanish” (AC 1405; 3776). In its stead, there appears the jewel of universal meanings conveyed by higher-order correspondences that are hidden within the Letter – first interior-natural (or spiritual-natural), then spiritual-rational, and at last celestial-rational (see Section xx).

Consider that the letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture had to be written in a style that makes the establishment of the New Church religion possible, this being its literal mission. Had the Writings been written in a style that deals with interior-natural extractions – like theistic psychology – it could not have served for establishing the New Church religion.

The Writings had to be written in correspondences for at least these three reasons:

(1) All Sacred Scripture is nothing but Divine Speech exteriorizing at discrete degrees of the human mind. Divine Speech falls into correspondences appropriate at each level. The literal meaning of Sacred Scripture is for establishing religion and worship.

(2) A universal pan-human theistic psychology had to be delivered to humanity for the regeneration of all people regardless of culture and religion. This could not be delivered in a literal meaning because it would have interfered with reason (1). To make this extraction possible, the method of correspondences with enlightenment was described and prescribed in the Writings.

(3) The Letter of the Writings is to endure for all time on earth, changeless, sacred, the basis and containant of Divine Truth that forms the human mind and ties earth to heaven. Therefore there had to be no limit to the amount and depth of knowledge extractable from the Letter, so that the numberless generations to come, would have a source of new spiritual knowledge for their regeneration. Only by correspondences could such an infinite source be delivered to humanity.

These are at least three reasons why the Writings Sacred Scripture had to be written in natural-rational correspondences of Divine Speech. The future will surely bring more insight on this question. For now, we can see that the Writings Sacred Scripture are the final component of the historical “Threefold Word,” and all Sacred Scripture is written in correspondences. In the following passages “the Word” refers to all Sacred Scripture. Quoting:

the Word was written wholly by correspondences, each thing and all things in it being correspondent. (HH 114)

the Word has been written wholly by correspondences, and consequently is of such a nature as to conjoin heaven with man. For heaven is in the internal sense of the Word (AC 10687)

that the Word is written throughout wholly by correspondences may be seen in THE DOCTRINE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM CONCERNING THE SACRED SCRIPTURE (n. 5-26); that the doctrine of the Church is to be drawn from the sense of the Letter of the Word and confirmed by it (n. 50-61 of the same work); that heresies may be derived from the sense of the Letter of the Word, but that it is harmful to confirm them (n. 91-97); that the Church is from the Word, and its quality is according to its understanding of the Word (n. 76-79). (DP 256)

It has been said above that the spiritual world, which is heaven, is conjoined with the natural world by means of correspondences; therefore by means of correspondences communication with heaven is granted to man. For the angels of heaven do not think from natural things, as man does; but when man has acquired a knowledge of correspondences he is able, in respect to the thoughts of his mind, to be associated with the angels, and thus in respect to his spiritual or internal man to be conjoined with them. That there might be such a conjunction of heaven with man the Word was written wholly by correspondences, each thing and all things in it being correspondent. If man, therefore, had a knowledge of correspondences he would understand the correspondential sense of the Word, and from that it would be given him to know arcana of which he sees nothing in the sense of the letter. For there is a literal sense and there is a correspondential sense in the Word, the literal sense made up of such things as are in the world, and the correspondential sense of such things as are in heaven (HH 114)

These and other passages make it clear that all Sacred Scripture is written in correspondences, otherwise the text would not be Divine. In the following passage “the Word” refers to the Old Testament Sacred Scripture, the New testament Sacred Scripture, and the Writings Sacred Scripture – the three making one complete series of revelation, given for the elevation of consciousness of the human race.

the Word is Divine by virtue of the correspondential sense, and not so without it (AC 10227)

Each Sacred Scripture is written in natural correspondences at discrete levels to each other within the natural mind. The Old Testament Sacred Scripture is written in natural-corporeal correspondences. The New Testament Sacred Scripture is written in natural-sensual correspondences. The Writings Sacred Scripture is written in natural-rational correspondences. The progression – corporeal, sensuous, rational – represents three discrete levels of operation within the external natural mind. These three mentality levels of human consciousness indicate the growth of civilizations (“Churches”). The Writings Sacred Scripture are called “the crown of revelations” because the natural-rational level is the top of the natural mind. No further or new revelations can be given.

From now on all new knowledge and understanding in the human race will be sourced from the extraction process alone. This is an endless source because Sacred Scripture contains endless rational series enclosed within its literal by means of correspondences – spiritual-natural (first heaven), spiritual-rational (second heaven), and celestial-rational (third heaven). All three levels of correspondences are within the Letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture.

Correspondences of Divine Speech are the formative causes of human consciousness at each of its discrete levels – celestial, spiritual, natural. The natural mind of humanity had to be regenerated by progressive steps of psychobiological evolution. The regeneration of the natural mind is performed by means of correspondences at each discrete sub-level of the natural mind – corporeal, sensuous, rational. The steps of individual regeneration recapitulate the steps of historical civilizations (or “Churches”).

The lowest portion of the natural mind is called the natural-corporeal mentality of willing and thinking. This mentality level is regenerated through natural-corporeal correspondences of Sacred Scripture. The middle level of our natural mind’s functioning is regenerated by natural-sensuous correspondences. The upper level of our natural mind’s functioning is regenerated by natural-rational correspondences.

Correspondences “conjoin us to heaven.” This means that we are to extract the spiritual information from the correspondences, and it is this interior understanding that conjoins us to heaven, not the literal meaning itself. The literal meaning is necessary but not sufficient (“the Word without doctrine cannot be understood” SS 50 and “it is not the Word, but the understanding of it, which constitutes the Church” (SS 76). The phrase “understanding of

” refers to the activity of extracting spiritual meanings from its literal meaning by applying the method of correspondences with enlightenment. The spiritual understanding we have of the Writings Sacred Scripture is theistic psychology. This spiritual understanding is not available in any other way but through the method of correspondences with enlightenment (see Section xx).

One reason that the Writings Sacred Scripture had to be written and presented to the world in natural-rational correspondences is that spiritual-rational meanings cannot be comprehended by any level of the external natural mind. They can be comprehended only through the interior-natural mind, which becomes operational only after regeneration has begun in adult life.

This is why the Writings Sacred Scripture give us a prescribed method for extracting spiritual meanings – the method of correspondences with enlightenment. The phrase “with enlightenment” refers to the fact that spiritual meanings cannot be written down or comprehended by the external natural mind which is formed wholly by incoming information of the world through the physical body. This is true of all Sacred Scripture as well, which comes to our natural mind through the physical senses of reading and hearing in a natural language.

The natural-rational correspondences of the Writings Sacred Scripture, which are read by the external natural mind, must therefore include all the social, historical, and religious information that is of relevance and interest to the unregenerate mind. This covers everyone, even those raised in the New Church, at least until the age of young adulthood when reformation and regeneration can begin (AC 1661).

But once reformation and regeneration begin in adulthood, our reading of natural-rational correspondences in the Writings Sacred Scripture can be “enlightened” by the Divine Psychologist. Quoting:

If man, therefore, had a knowledge of correspondences he would understand the correspondential sense of the Word, and from that it would be given him to know arcana of which he sees nothing in the sense of the letter (HH 114).

We can understand the “correspondential sense” of the Writings Sacred Scripture with “a knowledge of correspondences.” The “arcana” that we are given to know through enlightenment (or “illustration”) consists of the extracted knowledge which are understood spiritually, but only to the extent of our enlightenment. And we know that this is proportional to progress in our regeneration.

All extracted information from the Letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture – whether doctrine of the Church or theistic psychology -- must be confirmed by the Letter. Quoting:

the doctrine of the Church is to be drawn from the sense of the Letter of the Word and confirmed by it (DP 256).

This phrase “and confirmed by the Letter” reappears in numerous places in the Writings (with variation in wording), no doubt as an indication of its utmost importance. This methodological necessity saves us from “harmful heresies,” which refers to stumbling blocks to our regeneration. Quoting:

Moreover it was confirmed that in the sense of the letter all things which teach the way to salvation, thus to life and faith, stand forth clearly, also that every doctrine of the church is to be drawn from the sense of the letter of the Word and confirmed thereby, and not by the pure correspondential sense; for conjunction with heaven, and through heaven with the Lord, is not given by this sense alone, but by the sense of the letter; and the Divine influx of the Lord through the Word is from firsts through ultimates. (DeVerbo 5)

From this passage we can know that “all things” needed for “the way to salvation,” that is, for our regeneration. “stand forth clearly” in the literal meaning of the Writings Sacred Scripture. Second, “every doctrine of the church is to be drawn from the sense of the letter of the Word and confirmed thereby, and not by the pure correspondential sense.” We cannot rely for doctrine on theistic psychology nor on any other extracted information or knowledge. Doctrine is to be “drawn” only from the Letter of the Writings Sacred Scripture. Only the Letter is in correspondences of Divine Speech, and only it contains infinite spiritual knowledge to be extracted.

It is said that the literal sense of the Writings Sacred Scripture is not for doctrine, but for “drawing out” doctrine, which is the correspondential sense. It is this correspondential sense, along with the literal, that we must have for regeneration. The literal sense itself is not enough and neither is the correspondential sense. For regeneration we need to have a conscious understanding of both the literal sense and the correspondential sense. In other words, we need to understand the spiritual topics of the Letter spiritually, and not merely naturally.

But note well: once the spiritual doctrine has been drawn out from the literal meaning of the Writings Sacred Scripture, it must be confirmed by the literal meaning of the Writings Sacred Scripture. This clearly proves that the literal meaning of the Writings can be used to confirm spiritual truths even though they do not appear there, but are hidden within.

Summarizing the three steps of the method of correspondences with enlightenment:

Step (1) requires educational literacy and personal study. We are in this unregenerate state until adulthood with the onset of reformation and regeneration.

Step (2) requires the method of correspondences with enlightenment. Knowledge of the method is from Step (1). When we apply this knowledge to our daily willing and thinking, we are enlightened so that we can perceive spiritual meanings within the literal.

Step (3) requires that we look at new passages, not used in Step (2), and that we read them with enlightenment.

If we are enlightened in Step (2) and we extract the spiritual information, but then, we are not enlightened in Step (3), the confirmation process cannot be completed. Only if we read the new passages with enlightenment is it possible to see that the spiritual meaning in Step (2) is confirmed. It is not logical to expect Step (3) as a natural meaning, to be able to confirm Step (2) as a spiritual meaning since the natural cannot confirm the spiritual, but only the spiritual within the natural can do that. Only the spiritual can confirm the spiritual. And the spiritual requires enlightenment by definition.

When we evaluate a proposal in theistic psychology we do not rely on information about the author of the proposal. We know the general rule that the method of correspondences with enlightenment yields results proportional to the degree of our cooperation with the Divine Psychologist in our regeneration. Nevertheless we cannot know the state or degree of regeneration of any individual at any particular time, so the evaluation process of the proposal is not to be based on what we suppose is the author’s level of regeneration. Rather, each proposal should be examined on its own merit by a diversity of people who have a love and a knowledge of the Writings. Most importantly, independent others must be able to confirm the new proposal from the Letter. Until then the proposal does not have an objective community status. It is not yet alive.

At any particular time there may be a variety of proposals in theistic psychology that have been authored regarding extractive research, such as my proposals in this work (see selections below). The status of each proposal is to be verified and confirmed by others before one can legitimately consider it to be part of the body of knowledge of theistic psychology. The enterprise of theistic psychology is a cumulative long-term generational development. There is no theoretical limit to its growth because the amount of knowledge that can be extracted from the Writings Sacred Scripture is endless.

It is obvious that prior to being enlightened we only have a natural understanding of the extracted knowledge of theistic psychology. This is the case with my students studying theistic psychology for a required course credit. It is not expected that their grade be dependent on their character reformation, regeneration, and enlightenment. Their course work is based on a natural understanding of the spiritual topics of theistic psychology. Anyone studying theistic psychology will experience a progression of steps of enlightenment and will be able to perceive and comprehend the topics in progressively higher-order correspondences – interior-natural as an image of spiritual-natural, spiritual-rational, and celestial-rational.

Because the Writings Sacred Scripture had to be written in natural-rational correspondences, it was necessary for the Writings to prescribe the precise method by which spiritual-natural and spiritual-rational correspondences could be extracted from its Letter.

Once the extracted information – either doctrine of the Church or theistic psychology -- is written down and read by others, its spiritual meaning is understood only naturally until readers apply it to their willing and thinking in daily activities, by which and during which they may be enlightened by the Divine Psychologist. It is only in that state of enlightenment that any spiritual subjects can be comprehended spiritually.

This process of enlightenment applies only to appropriately extracted knowledge from the Writings Sacred Scripture. One cannot be enlightened by extracting knowledge from natural science books, theistic psychology books, doctrinal classes, or the writings and lectures of others. All these social occasions during which we are exposed to spiritual topics, will be understood naturally. None of these human-made sentences in a natural language are made up of correspondences. Only through the correspondences in Sacred Scripture can we be enlightened.

There are two stages in our understanding of enlightenment – personal and particular. At first we think that enlightenment is a personal characteristic one achieves, like obtaining a specialized degree or performing something in the top category. By this way of thinking, enlightenment is a sudden and permanent change in one’s status or ability. We then can discuss opinions we have about this or that person, to establish who is enlightened and who is not. Or else, who is enlightened to X degree, and who to XX degree.

This type of thinking does not allow the appropriate evaluation of extractive research in theistic psychology. It merely leads to disagreement about whether a cited passage does or does not confirm the extracted spiritual information.

The second phase of understanding the process of enlightenment is to see it in scientific, mechanistic, and particular mode. It is not the person who is enlightened but the understanding of the person in the particular area or issue that is being proposed as new spiritual information. Enlightenment is a local phenomenon – it applies narrowly to a focus issue in our mind at the time. We may go through Step (2) successfully under enlightenment for a few minutes or days. Then we want to confirm the new spiritual insight, but it no longer seems spiritual, only plainly natural. And when we look at the confirming passages we gathered under enlightenment, now we can no longer see the spiritual in it. The confirmation process fails.

The first idea of enlightenment, being personal, is also subjective. People can opine about “so-and-so’s spiritual insight,” perhaps pitting one against the other. But in the more mature idea of enlightenment, spiritual insight is not part of the person but part of truth, hence of good, hence part of the Divine Human alone. All spiritual insight is spiritual light which is from the Spiritual Sun, which is the Divine Human. Hence in no way is enlightenment part of the person, but is the Divine Psychologist with the person. Spiritual light enters the human mind and is received by the cognitive organ (“the understanding”), while the heat that is within that light, enters the affective organ (“the will”).

When these two are “married” in our willing and thinking in one or another daily activity, then we are in a state of enlightenment regarding that activity at that time. In that state we can extract spiritual meaning from Sacred Scripture. Note that this takes place through the Sacred Scripture in our memory-knowledge. We do not need to power up NewSearch or to reach for the Arcana Volume. Such physical activity takes us into another focus in our train of thinking, perhaps away from the spiritual understanding of the moment. But our memory-knowledge of the Letter of the Writings allows us to see the spiritual within the natural when we are in the state of enlightenment.

This process of gradual and progressive phases of enlightenment is described regarding the Divine Child in the Genesis stories of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, as analyzed and extracted in the Writings Sacred Scripture.

Enlightenment is a process that is continuous and progressive (DLW 256), though it appears to be in discrete layers as our virtual heavens in the interior-natural organ. We may be able to confirm spiritual-natural meanings (first heaven), but not yet spiritual-rational meanings (second heaven), and even less celestial-rational meanings (third heaven).

Given these methodological issues there needs to be an organized body of knowledge that collects new proposals for spiritual insights and allows them to be gradually incorporated into the body of knowledge by systematic confirmations achieved by various people in the collective effort. This organized and cumulative body of knowledge is theistic psychology, of which this work is an instance.

There is a third and final phase of understanding the organic mechanism of enlightenment. This begins when our enlightenment regarding an issue becomes permanent, or semi-permanent in our understanding. It becomes part of how we think about that issue. It is permanently part of our rational consciousness of Divine Speech. This experience gives a new perspective we could not comprehend before in a genuine way. We are at last becoming spiritual in our willing and thinking regarding that issue.

Now there are many issues to be dealt with in every person’s regeneration. We keep extending our permanent state of enlightenment to diverse areas of concern in our willing and thinking – marriage, parenting, professional work, hobbies, driving the car, personal development. To the extent that this is taking place in our daily life, to that extent we have become spiritual persons. We can read any part of Sacred Scripture and receive insight regarding its spiritual meaning.

Theistic psychology studies the issue of why spiritual meanings cannot be written down in natural expressions. Swedenborg conducted experiments with spirits who were alternately exposed to natural expressions and to spiritual meanings and it was very clear that they could not have any spiritual meanings while their mind was held in natural expressions (TCR 280).

In the following episode, the spirits who were with Swedenborg’s spiritual mind while he was writing down in his natural mind, sentences describing his spiritual experiences. Quoting:

They said because they now speak with me, that those things which I have written are so rude and gross that they suppose nothing which is internalizing can be understood from those words or the mere sense of the words. I also perceived by a spiritual idea that it was so, that my expressions were very rude, wherefore it was given me to reply that my words are only vessels in which purer, better, and internalizing things can be infused. (SD 2185)

The spirits were indignant because the natural expressions Swedenborg wrote in contained no spiritual ideas in their literal meaning. The spirits had no use for natural ideas. But Swedenborg explained to them that his natural sentences were “only vessels” that contained spiritual meanings (“internalizing things”) that do not appear in the natural expressions.

The internal sense of the Word contains arcana of heaven, which relate to the Lord and His kingdom in the heavens and on earth (n. 1-4, 937). Those arcana do not appear in the sense of the letter (n. 937, 1502, 2161). (WH 11)

Why do spiritual meanings (“arcana”) not appear in the sense of the letter of Sacred Scripture? Why are they hidden? Why aren’t they placed right there in the literal meaning?

The answer is that they are placed there – in the “naked truth” or “plain meaning” sentences -- but they are not seen. As soon as spiritual meanings are laid down into the natural sentence, what remains there is only a vessel of the spiritual meaning. The vessel becomes transparent only when we are enlightened by the Divine Psychologist in that moment regarding our focus of attention. It’s as if we had a peculiar language aphasia, alternating between days that we speak one language with days when we speak another language, thinking each time that we only know that one language. If we are then spoken to by someone in the other language, we do not understand its meaning.

The act of writing or speaking a spiritual meaning from enlightenment automatically covers it up or wraps it into a natural expression of the spiritual meaning. So it is in theistic psychology, where there are three distinct levels of understanding its concepts (see Volume 3).

But I discovered that the spiritual insight can be recovered from the literal expressions we gave it during enlightenment. But to do so, one must re-read in a state of enlightenment. Then we can reconstruct or recapture the original spiritual meaning. This is very useful for systematic progress in research and study. For the past twenty years I have followed this unwavering rule:

Writing this work could not have been done without my faithful and compulsive adherence to this cardinal rule of research in theistic psychology. It takes involvement with recording devices (pencil, pen, tape recorder, computer, etc.) and storing devices (book margins, post-it notes, index cards, note pads, word processing files, indexes, concordances, etc.). It also takes determination to get up while you fall asleep, because you must put to record (into a “vessel”) what you have just been given from heaven.

Enlightenment is not a mystical experience. Nor is it difficult to understand precisely what it is. From the perspective of theistic psychology enlightenment is a psychobiological process of the human mind corresponding to the biological process by which sunlight and its heat are received by plants and use it to fabricate their nutrition. Spiritual light in which there is spiritual heat proceeds from the Spiritual Sun into the mental world of humanity where it enters the mind of every existing human being simultaneously and proceeds outward and downward by successive degrees of correspondence. The cognitive (light) and affective (heat) organs of the mind are constructed and animated by this universal “influx,” and we use it for willing and thinking in daily activities.

The operation of enlightenment in the cognitive organ is also called “revelation”: Quoting: By "revelation" is meant enlightenment when the Word is read, and perception then” (AC 8694). When we read the Writings Sacred Scripture (“the Word”) we can comprehend the revelations in a spiritual way when we are enlightened while reading and reflecting. It is not necessary that we read the printed sentences on the page or screen. It is equally effective if we think the sentences or phrases and reflect upon their universal meaning.

In this reflection upon the universal meaning, we are to be motivated to apply the truth to self. To be motivated to apply the truth to one’s willing and thinking is to search for the universal meaning. This universal meaning applies to every individual regardless of background, culture, and religion. Hence we call this universal meaning theistic psychology. This process of extracting the scientific meaning from the Writings Sacred Scripture is the process of practicing the method of correspondences with enlightenment.

Enlightenment is the comprehension of scientific meaning within the literal meaning. It is to perceive how the sentence applies to self and to all other human beings. This is what makes it into a science – universal and objective applicability. Enlightenment, or the perception of spiritual meaning, is not received when our motivation for reading and reflecting upon the Writings is other than application to one’s own willing and thinking. Our interest must be no other than the desire to reform our inherited character by facing spiritual combat in temptations. The truths we extract that apply to our willing and thinking are to be formed into a doctrine of justification by which we can fend off doubts and relapses. This is the ultimate purpose of enlightenment.

Enlightenment is not something superfluous or special, reserved for certain types of scholarship and piety. Enlightenment is the psychobiological process by which every person’s affective and cognitive organs are regenerated and prepared for life in heaven. Without enlightenment no one can be prepared for heaven. Either we are enlightened in this world, or failing that, in the afterlife. No one enters heaven without being enlightened while reading the Writings Sacred Scripture. Everyone who is resuscitated in the world of spirits is given instruction in the Writings Sacred Scripture since they alone contain the rational heavens of our immortality. Those who have lived a life of conscience and use are happy and willing receivers of the truths of the Writings. Others are unwilling.

The extracted knowledge of theistic psychology may be studied by anyone for any purpose, but everything in it will be understood naturally, and nothing in it will be understood spiritually – unless one is enlightened by the Divine Psychologist while it is being read or applied. It is not possible to perceive spiritual meanings without being ‘online’ as it were, connected to “mediate influx” in a deliberate and conscious way. This ‘online’ feature applies to enlightenment since it is the organic operation of spiritual light in the cognitive organ of thinking and reasoning. As long as we are plugged in the correct way, enlightenment flows and operates in our conscious mind. The organic venue for the process is the interior-natural organ (see Section xx)..

When the Writings discuss some particular historical ethnic group or religion, we are to search for the scientific meaning behind the discussion, just as Swedenborg performed for us with the Old and New Testament portion of Sacred Scripture. The Writings teach that all Sacred Scripture is written in correspondences and that we are to extract spiritual doctrine from them. The Writings Sacred Scripture are written in natural-rational correspondences, which is a discrete degree above the New Testament Sacred Scripture. The angelic spirits in the first heaven of the mind read the Writings Sacred Scripture as we do, but it is clear that they know nothing about any of the historical names, nations, periods, and places mentioned in the Writings. Instead of these things, they see the interior-natural correspondences. Our interior-natural organ can give us enlightenment to see these spiritual-natural correspondences of the Letter of the Writings, not exactly as they do, but in an image that is so close that we can speak with them and think with them.

The scientific meaning of “Abraham” is a celestial mental state in every person’s mind regardless of religion or planet. Similarly with “Jerusalem,” which refers to the spiritual-rational correspondences out of which is constructed the second heaven of every human mind. By this method of correspondences the reader makes the historical names “vanish,” and likewise, with all references to natural things (AC 1405; 3776). When we read the Writings Sacred Scripture we think and reason in our external natural understanding by means of the natural-rational correspondences of the literal meaning. But the angels who are with us, only perceive the interior-natural, the spiritual-rational, and celestial-rational correspondences that are within the literal meaning we are reading.

When the Word is being read by man, angels neither know nor perceive what eighty-six is, nor are they concerned about what age Abram was when Hagar bore him Ishmael. Rather, when such a number is read, the real things embodied in that number instantly present themselves to them, as when all other expressions are read, these present themselves as the things which they have been shown to mean in the internal sense. (AC 1963)

when the Word is being read by man the angels may thereby be in their happiness of wisdom (AC 5398)

this sense is for the angels who are with man while the Word is being read, consequently that there is from this source an influx of holiness, and a perception of it, with those who are in the life of faith and charity (AC 8971)

They said that these persons are mentioned with honour in the Word for the reason that in the internal sense the Lord is meant by them-by "Abraham", "Isaac", and "Jacob", the Lord in respect of the Divine and the Divine Human; by "David" the Lord in respect of the Divine Royalty; and by the "Apostles" the Lord in respect of Divine Truths; also that when the Word is read by man the angels have no perception whatever of these men, for their names do not enter heaven (HH 526)

When we read passages in the Writings Sacred Scripture that discuss Abraham or King David or one of the Apostles, these names repeatedly appear within the literal meaning of the Writings. What is the scientific or universal meaning of these names? They each refer to human mental states and their dynamic activity in regeneration and spiritual growth. This applies to all people regardless of background, religion, or planet, though no doubt with realistic differences. When we read one of the many superb Memorable Relations throughout the Writings, what do the angels who are with us get out of it? Especially when our children read them in the innocence of ignorance? The angels have no idea of number or age. What then do they think of when numbers and ages are mentioned in the Memorable Relations? Neither do they know of directions like north or south. Neither do they know of the European nations and cities, as those which are mentioned in many places throughout the Writings, nor the names of the bishops of the Church, and so on.

It is clear that the Writings Sacred Scripture exists at discrete levels and that the Letter is different at each level. The method of correspondences starts at the natural-rational level of the literal meaning, collecting facts and organizing them into an orderly doctrine that we use as a tool in daily spiritual combat with our temptations brought to us by the Divine Psychologist for this very purpose. This doctrine may be called abstracted, to distinguish it from the later doctrine that is extracted.

Abstracted doctrine does not use the method of correspondences, and hence does not depend on enlightenment. We all start with principles of life and religious doctrines that are abstracted, paraphrased, contrasted, and reflected on. They are the foundation of our moral-rational life, and hence of civilization and society. Further on down the road of maturity we begin to go beyond abstraction. We leave the discrete degree of the literal and its rational abstractions in our mind, by making the literal meaning “vanish” from central focus, and as a result, we begin to think with angels (AC 1405; 3776).

But as he grows into a young adult, if he develops his power of reason, he employs what is in his interior natural to work out the reasons for things, which are truths of a yet higher nature. These are extracted so to speak from what is present in the interior natural. (...) This is the manner in which a person rises with his understanding from the world up to heaven. (AC 5497)

The phrase “to rise with the understanding from the world up to heaven” refers to enlightenment through Sacred Scripture. Our thoughts suddenly begin to operate by means of spiritual-natural correspondences of the Writings Sacred Scripture. We are with the angelic spirits that inhabit the first heaven in our mind. And by progressive enlightenment in our interior-natural organ we climb up Jacob’s ladder of discrete correspondences in our mind, “as though” we actually were in the presence of the angels who dwell in our spiritual mind.

We receive this light of heaven when we read the Writings as Divine Speech rendered in the correspondences of Sacred Scripture. To read the Writings as Divine Speech in correspondences is to read them with enlightenment. The abstract doctrine of the literal meaning is suddenly seen infused with heavenly light so that its interiors are perceived as truth from the Divine Human. This interior perception in enlightenment cannot possibly be at the same discrete level of meaning as the literal. The literal Sacred Scripture and the abstracted doctrine of the literal, now become spiritually empowered with a comprehension that is a discrete degree above them.

We learn and memorize and apply abstracted doctrine for decades before we begin reformation and regeneration. Abstracted doctrine is necessary for making us ready for reformation, and we could not become ready without it. But the Writings tell us that the time must come in adulthood when we choose to begin our reformation and regeneration. Now we must enter a discrete degree within the abstracted doctrines that we have collected in our mind until then. We do this under the supervision of the Divine Psychologist who provides the spiritual light or enlightenment.

The Divine Psychologist is commanding us, through the literal meaning of the Writing Sacred Scripture, that we must begin practicing the method of correspondences with enlightenment. This involves the deliberate intention and systematic application procedures called extractive research, that is, spiritual meaning that is “drawn out” by means of correspondences and illustration.

[3] But what is the nature of the revelation with those who are in good and from this in the affection of truth, cannot be described. It is not manifest, neither is it altogether hidden; but it is a certain consent and favoring from within that a thing is true, and a non-favoring if it is not true. When there is a favoring, the mind is at rest and is serene, and in this state there is the acknowledgment which is of faith. The cause of its being so is from the influx of heaven from the Lord; for through heaven from the Lord there is light, that surrounds and enlightens the intellect, which is the eye of the internal sight. The things which are then seen in that light are truths, for this very light is the Divine truth which proceeds from the Lord. That this Divine truth is light in heaven, has been frequently shown. (AC 8694)

This passage describes in natural expression a spiritual phenomenon that we experience mentally when extracting theistic psychology knowledge for ourselves. The extracted information is called “revelation” because it cannot be perceived as true except by enlightenment. The spiritual meaning which is the content of revelation or enlightenment, “cannot be described” with natural expressions because “it is not manifest.” But “neither is it altogether hidden.”

What does this mean? Something that cannot be described in language that refers to natural objects and conditions, which are “not manifest” in natural perception? The closest specific description given for it is that “it is a certain consent and favoring from within that a thing is true, and a non-favoring if it is not true.” If we were to become conscious in our third heaven, we would be nearly omniscient, because whatever we were curious about would instantly be present in our thoughts as an answer in Divine Truth, which is omniscient.

The procedures for extracting scientific facts from the Writings Sacred Scripture are surely endless in number when we consider that the Writings Sacred Scripture mark themselves as the last portion of the overall Sacred Scripture that took thousands of years to deliver to humanity. It calls itself “the Crown of Revelations” because “it will endure forever.” Quoting:

LII. This New Church, truly Christian, which at this day is being established by the Lord, will endure to eternity, as is proved from the Word of both Testaments; also it was foreseen from the creation of the world; and it will be the crown of the four preceding churches, because it will have true faith and true charity. (CORO 0)

We need to extract the correspondential sense of the above passage to see how it applies to theistic psychology:

We now know that heaven and earth must stay connected in creation so that there will never be an end to earths in the natural world. An endless series of civilizations and generations will be using the Writings Sacred Scripture for extracting the information they will need to regenerate. Every generation must extract its own information because each generation is unique in relation to all the others, and their regeneration will depend on new truths that prior generations have not seen.

This is why it is rational to think that the number of methods by which spiritual information can be extracted from the Writings, is endless. But here are three methods of extraction that it was given me to discover. Perhaps others have also made these and similar discoveries in their study of the Writings. They are serviceable to our generation for extracting certain types of spiritual facts that are suitable to a civilization whose genes of consciousness is formed by natural-rational correspondences. I use the expression genes of consciousness to refer to the basic semantic units that define our mentality levels. See Section xx.

The substitution technique involves parallelisms in the Writings that are explicitly stated in the Letter. It may also be called the method of applying the Letter to the Letter. The Letter of the Writings must define the substitution for it to be permissible. Some substitutions are near to each other, as they are mentioned closely to each other in the text, while other substitutions are more distant from each other, so that several steps of parallelisms must be reconstructed and demonstrated.

I illustrate near substitutions in the following table which is based on a search for equivalence statements in the text, as for instance "it is the same whether you say that...", besides others like it that could also be searched.

“it is the same whether you say...”	Permissible substitutes
Divine worship consists of these truths and goods, or that man consists of them, (AC 10298)	Divine worship	man
truth or faith, since everything of faith is truth; also it is the same whether you say good or love, since everything of love is good (HH 232)	good	love
conjunction of understanding and will or conjunction of truth and good. (HH 370)	conjunction of understanding and will	conjunction of truth and good
ruling love or that which he loves above all things. (HH 486)	ruling love	that which he loves above all things
truth or faith (NJHD 35)	truth	faith
"begotten of God" or "proceeding from God;" (TCR 23)	begotten of God	proceeding from God
God is Good itself and Truth itself or He is Love itself and Wisdom itself (CAN 8)	God	Good itself and Truth itself
	God	Love itself and Wisdom itself
Lord's Divine Human, or the Divine Love (AE 146)	Lord's Divine Human	Divine Love
the understanding of truth is described, or those who are in it are described (AE 355)	the understanding of truth	those who are in the understanding of truth
the spiritual and natural mind or the spiritual and natural man. (AE 406)	spiritual and natural mind	spiritual and natural man
falsities from the hells, or the hells (AE 538)	falsities from the hells	the hells
faith or conscience (AC 2325)	faith	conscience
higher and lower ones, or more internal and more external (AC 10051)	higher and lower	more internal and more external

Let’s take a passage that allows several substitutions according to the table above. I have bolded the words in the original, and also in its duplicate paragraph below to indicate the substitutions: Quoting:

The natural mind, by its two capacities called rationality and freedom, is in this state that it is capable of ascending through three degrees, or of descending through three degrees. It ascends by reason of goods and truths, and descends by reason of evils and falsities. And when it ascends, the lower degrees which tend towards hell are closed, but when it descends, the higher degrees which tend towards heaven are closed. The cause for this is that they are in reaction. These three degrees, higher and lower, have neither been opened nor closed in man in earliest infancy, for he is then ignorant of good and truth, and of evil and falsity. (DLW 274)

The natural man, by its two capacities called rationality and freedom, is in this state that it is capable of ascending through three degrees, or of descending through three degrees. [The man] ascends by reason of love and faith, and descends by reason of evils and the hells. And when [the man] ascends, the external degrees which tend towards hell are closed, but when [the man] descends, the internal degrees which tend towards heaven are closed. The cause for this is that they are in reaction. These three degrees, internal and external, have neither been opened nor closed in man in earliest infancy, for he is then ignorant of love and faith, and of evil and the hells.

It this case, it turns out that the original and the substitutions are so close that the two paragraphs hardly seem different in meaning. Nevertheless, the second paragraph is not merely synonymous with the original but reveals new features that are more interior. To see this requires more detailed study and examination. (see Note 8).

Let us take another passage where the substitutions create a more dramatic difference:

The second sentence containing the substitution is a more interior meaning than the original. We knew that the life of faith is the Lord since faith is truth from the Lord, and what is from the Lord is the Lord. Hence, the very essence and life of faith is the Lord alone. But we did not know that the very essence and life of conscience is the Lord alone. This is a new spiritual revelation contained within the first revelation of the Letter. We must now confirm this new more interior perception by finding a passage in the Letter that states that the life of conscience is the Lord. As for example: Quoting:

[2] A person does not feel this struggle to be anywhere but in himself, and he feels it as the pangs of conscience. Yet it is the Lord and the devil (that is, hell) who struggle in man; their struggle is to gain control of the person, to see which is to possess him. The devil, or hell, attacks the person and calls forth the evil in him, while the Lord protects him and calls forth the good in him. (TCR 596)

Genuine conscience is given by the Lord through the knowledges of a true faith (SE 3615)

With angelical spirits there are bonds of conscience, which conscience is from the Lord. (SE 3850)

Judgments are based on what is the Lord's when they accord with truths and spring from conscience. (AC 9160)

When conscience dictates, it is in like manner said in the Word that "Jehovah speaks;" because conscience is formed from things revealed, and from knowledges, and from the Word; and when the Word speaks, or dictates, it is the Lord who speaks; hence nothing is more common, even at the present day, when referring to a matter of conscience, or of faith, than to say, "the Lord says." (AC 371)

You can see from these series of passages that a conscience that is genuine is from the Lord and is the Lord. Quoting: “nothing is more common, even at the present day, when referring to a matter of conscience, or of faith, than to say, "the Lord says."

In summary, we go through three steps in the method of substitution. First, we find parallelisms in the Letter that are explicitly identified in the plain meaning of the sentences. Second, we make the substitutions and reflect on the new formulation. This new meaning is more interior than what could be seen in the original text of the Letter. It has been spiritually enriched by the different series or contexts which are brought together by the substitution. Third, find new passages that explicitly confirm the new meaning.

Note that the new perception after substitution is more interior than the older perception before substitution. Despite this, the new perception is not yet a discrete degree higher than the old perception. It is in the same degree, which is natural-rational at a more interior continuum. Performing this three-step method builds natural-rational vessels that are needed later for influx and enlightenment. This occurs when we apply the new meaning to our hourly willing and thinking all day long. Then, at some point -- unexpected point -- we receive enlightenment. That’s when for the first time we can see the meaning of the new perception in a spiritual degree.

Without having practiced the substitution method regarding some topic, there are not any such cognitive “vessels” that can be enlightened. Of course, it is possible for people to practice the substation technique implicitly, not as a formal research technique, but spontaneously, since our thinking about Sacred Scripture is always in the company of angels who prompt the train of our thoughts in favorable directions for noticing parallelisms and discovering the substitutes.

Passage From the Writings Sacred Scripture	Its Correspondential Sense in Theistic Psychology
New Church, truly Christian	People from all religions who acknowledge that there can be only one God and that He is Divine Human in whose Image He created human beings. Consequently this one God is the God of all human beings.
which at this day is being established by the Lord	Every human being regardless of religion or culture is given access to new human mental states that were not accessible to people before this.
will endure to eternity	These new mental states give access to the rational understanding of spiritual truths.
as is proved from the Word of both Testaments	The new rational powers are accessed through the correspondential sense of all Sacred Scripture.
also it was foreseen from the creation of the world	This evolutionary organic upgrade could not be delivered to the human race before the new civilization of rationality and science. Now, every individual has access to the highest human potential through rationality from Sacred Scripture.
it will be the crown of the four preceding churches	All mental states below these highest powers are to be made to align themselves with them so that our thinking, willing, and doing in daily acts are to be congruent with the quality of these highest mental states.
because it will have true faith and true charity	The highest human potential is attained when the cognitive organ operates by the rationality of the correspondential sense of Sacred Scripture, and the affective organ operates by willing those things which agree with this rationality.

Theistic Psychology: The Scientific Knowledge of God Extracted from the Correspondential Sense of Sacred Scripture

The Derivation and Function of Scientific Revelations

Theistic Psychology:
The Scientific Knowledge of God
Extracted from the Correspondential Sense
of Sacred Scripture

The Derivation and Function
of Scientific Revelations