Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence Part 1

Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence.

by Emanuel Swedenborg.

PREFACE

THE Book

The reader will find in this book a firm a.s.surance of G.o.d's care of mankind as a whole and of each human being. The a.s.surance is rested in G.o.d's infinite love and wisdom, the love pure mercy, the wisdom giving love its ways and means. It is further grounded in an interpretation of the universe as a spiritual-natural world, an interpretation fully set forth in the earlier book, _Divine Love and Wisdom_, on which the present work draws heavily. As there is a world of the spirit, no view of providence can be adequate which does not take that world into account.

For in that world must be channels for the outreach of G.o.d's care to the human spirit. There also any eternal goal--such as a heaven from the human race--must exist. A view of providence limited to the horizons of the pa.s.sing existence can hardly resemble the care which the eternal G.o.d takes of men and women who, besides possessing perishable bodies, are themselves creatures of the spirit and immortal. The full t.i.tle of the book, _Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence_, implies that its author, in an other-world experience, had at hand the knowledge which men and women in heaven have of G.o.d's care. Who should know the divine guidance if not the men and women in heaven who have obviously enjoyed it? "The laws of divine providence, hitherto hidden with angels in their wisdom, are to be revealed now" (n. 70).

As it is presented in this book, providence seeks to engage man in its purposes, and to enlist all his faculties, his freedom and reason, his will and understanding, his prudence and enterprise. It acts first of all on his volitions and thinking, to align them with itself. That it falls directly on history, its events and our circ.u.mstances, is a superficial view. It is man's inner life which first feels the omnipresent divine influence and must do so. If we cannot be lifted to our best selves and if our aims and outlook cannot be modified for the better, how shall the world be bettered which we affect to handle? Paramount in G.o.d's presence with all men, if only in their possibilities, is His providential care.

This care, to which man's inner life is open, is alert every moment, not occasional. It is gentle and not tyrannical, constantly respecting man's freedom and reason, otherwise losing him as a human being. It has set this and other laws for itself which it pursues undeviatingly. The larger part of the book is an exposition of these laws in the conviction that by them the nature of providence is best seen. Is it not to be expected in a universe which has its laws, and in which impersonal forces are governed by laws, that the Creator of all should pursue laws in His concern with the lives of conscious beings? To fit a world of laws must not the divine care have its laws, too? Adjustment of thought about divine providence to scientific thought is not the overriding necessity, for scientific thought must keep adjusting to laws which it discerns in the physical world. In consonance, religious thought seeks to learn the lawful order in the guidance of the human spirit.

Do not each and all things in tree or shrub proceed constantly and wonderfully from purpose to purpose according to the laws of their order of things? Why should not the supreme purpose, a heaven from the human race, proceed in similar fas.h.i.+on? Can there be anything in its progress which does not proceed with all constancy according to the laws of divine providence? (n 332)

Respecting the laws of providence, it is to be noted that there are more laws than those, five in number, which are stated at the heads of as many chapters in the book. Further laws are embodied in other chapters. At n. 249(2) we are told that further laws were presented in nn. 191-213, 214-220, and 221-233. In fact, at n. 243. there is a reference to laws which follow in even later chapters. In nn. 191-213 the law, partly stated in the heading over the chapter, comes to full sight particularly at n. 210(2), namely, that providence, in engaging human response, shall align human prudence with itself, so that providence becomes one's prudence (n. 311e). In nn. 214-220 the law is that providence employ the temporal goals of distinction and wealth towards its eternal goals, and perpetuate standing and wealth in a higher form, for a man will then have sought them not for themselves and handled them for the use they can be.

To keep a person from premature spiritual experience, nn. 221-233, is obviously a law of providence, guarding against relapse and consequent profanation of what had become sacred to him.

The paradox of divine foreknowledge and human freedom, regularly discussed in studies of providence, receives an explanation which becomes more and more enlightening in the course of the book. The paradox, probably nowhere else discussed, of man's thinking and willing to all appearance all by himself, and of the fact that volition and thought come to him from beyond him, receives a similar, c.u.mulative answer. The tension between the divine will and human self-will is a subject that pervades the book; to that subject the profoundest insights into the hidden activity of providence and into human nature are brought. On the question, "Is providence only general or also detailed?" the emphatic answer is that it cannot be general unless it takes note of the least things. On miracle and on chance conclusions unusual in religious thought meet the reader. The inequalities, injustices and tragedies in life which raise doubts of the divine care are faced in a long chapter after the concept of providence has been spread before the reader. What would be the point in considering them before what providence is has been considered? Against what manner of providence are the arguments valid? A chapter such as this, on doubts of providence and on the mentality which cherishes them, becomes a monograph on the subject, as the chapter on premature spiritual experience, with the risk of relapse and profanation, becomes a monograph on kinds of profanation.

Coming by revelation and by a lengthy other-world experience on Swedenborg's part (in which he learned of the incorrectness of some of his own beliefs, nn. 279(2), 290) the book, like others of his, nevertheless has for an outstanding feature a steady address to the reason. The profoundest truths of the spiritual life, among them the nature of G.o.d and the laws and ways of providence, are not beyond grasp by the reason. Sound reason Swedenborg credits with lofty insights.

_Divine Providence_ is a book to be studied, and not merely read, and studied slowly. By its own way of proceeding, it extends an invitation to read, not straight through, but something like a chapter at a time. In a new chapter Swedenborg will recall for the reader what was said in the preceding chapter, as though the reader had mean-while laid the book down. The revelator proceeds at a measured pace, carries along the whole body of his thought, and places each new point in this larger context, where it receives its precise significance and its full force. It is an acc.u.mulation of thought and not a repet.i.tion of statements merely that one meets. "What has been written earlier cannot be as closely connected with what is written later as it will be if the same things are recalled and placed with both in view" (n. 193 (1)).

THE TRANSLATION

This volume has been translated afresh from the Latin; it is not a revision of any earlier edition. Greater readableness has been striven for. In the past, it is generally recognized, Latin sentence structure and word order were clung to unnecessarily. "The defects in previous translations of Swedenborg have arisen mainly from too close an adherence to cognate words and to the Latin order of words and phrases." So wrote the Rev. John C. Ager in 1899 in his translator's note in the Library Edition of _Divine Providence_. Why, indeed, should English not be allowed its own sentence structure and word order? In addition, in this translation, long sentences, readily followed in an inflected language like Latin, have been broken up into short ones. English also uses fewer particles of logical relation than are at home in Latin. There is more paragraphing, aiding the eye, which both British and American translators have been doing for some years. Latin has neither a definite article nor an indefinite article, and a translator into English must decide when to use either or neither. The definite article, the present translator thinks, has been overused, perhaps in a dogmatic tendency to be as precise as can be. When, for instance, one is admitted into "truths of faith" he is certainly not admitted into "the truths of faith," as though he could comprehend them all. The very t.i.tle of the book changes the impression which it makes as the definite article is inserted or omitted in it. "The divine providence" seems to single out a theological concept; "divine providence" seems more likely to lead the thought to G.o.d's actual care.

Swedenborg has his carefully chosen terms, of course, like "proprium,"

which are best kept, although in the present translation that term is sometimes rendered by an explanatory word and one which, in the particular context, is an equivalent. The verb "appropriate" presents a difficulty, but has been kept, partly because of the noun "proprium." One could translate rather wordily "make"--something good or evil--"one's own."

The English word now means "take exclusive possession of," which one can hardly do of good or evil. a.s.similation is the thought and the act, and with that in mind the verb "appropriate" and the noun "appropriation" can be retained. The unusual locution "affection of truth" or "of good,"

which Mr. Ager abandoned, translating "for truth" and "for good," has been returned to. Much is implied in that phrase which is not to be found in the other wording, namely, that we are affected by truth and by good, and that there is an influx of these into the human spirit. Similarly meaningful is another unusual way of speaking in English, of a person's being "in" faith or "in" charity, where we say that he has faith or exercises charity. The thought is that faith and charity, truth and goodness beckon to us, to be welcomed and entered into.

Latin sometimes has a number of words for an idea or an ent.i.ty, and the English has not, but when English has the richer vocabulary, why not avail oneself of the variety possible? The Latin word "finis," for example, used in so many connections, can be rendered by one word in one connection and by another in another connection. The "goal" or the "object" of providence is plainer than the "end" of providence. The "close" of life is common speech. "Meritorious" has been kept in our translations, for in a restricted field of traditional theology it does mean that virtue, for example, _earns_ a reward. To most readers the word will be misleading, for they will understand it in its usual meaning, that some act is well-deserving. The former is Swedenborg's meaning, which is that an act is done to earn merit, or is considered to have earned merit. We translate variously according to context to make that meaning clear (nn. 321(11), 326(8), 90).

As it is what Swedenborg has written that is to be translated, the Scripture pa.s.sages which he quotes are translated without an effort to follow the Authorized Version, which he did not know. This is also done when he refers to the book which stands last in our Bibles; the name he knew it by, the Apocalypse, is retained.

THE SUBJECT INDEX

The rewording in this translation would have necessitated revision of the index long used in editions of _Divine Providence_, which goes back to an index in French done by M. Le Boys des Guays. The opportunity was seized to compile a subject instead of a word index. It is based on an a.n.a.lysis of the contents of the book, and can serve as a reading guide. It does not usually quote the text, but sends the reader to it. Definitions of a number of terms are embodied in it.

The appearance that man thinks, wills, speaks and acts all of his own doing is the subject of much of the book, and this the index shows. The "life's love" deserves to be a separate entry, for little of a psychological nature in the book becomes more prominent than the love which forms in the way one actually lives, and which embodies one's actual belief and thought. Single words which have been scattered entries in the index long used--usually Scripture words of which the correspondential meaning is given--are a.s.sembled alphabetically under the entry "Correspondences."

A signal feature of Swedenborg's thought is the unities he perceives. Of love and wisdom he says that they can only be perceived as one (4(5)). So good and truth do not exist apart, nor charity and faith, nor affection and thought. These and other pairs of terms are therefore entered in the index; after references on the two together, references follow on each term alone.

The index, it is hoped, will do more than introduce the reader to statements made in the book, but will carry him into its stream of thought.

WM. F. WUNSCH

Angelic Wisdom about DIVINE PROVIDENCE

DIVINE PROVIDENCE

I. DIVINE PROVIDENCE IS GOVERNMENT BY THE LORD'S DIVINE LOVE AND WISDOM

1. To understand what divine providence is--namely, government by the Lord's divine love and wisdom--one needs to know what was said and shown earlier about divine love and wisdom in the treatise about them: "In the Lord divine love is of divine wisdom, and divine wisdom of divine love"

(nn. 34-39); "Divine love and wisdom cannot but be in, and be manifested in, all else, created by them" (nn. 47-51); "All things in the universe were created by them" (nn. 52, 53, 151-156); "All are recipients of that love and wisdom" (nn. 55-60); "The Lord appears before the angels as a sun, the heat proceeding from it being love, and the light wisdom" (nn.

83-88, 89-92, 93-98, 296-301); "Divine love and wisdom, proceeding from the Lord, make one" (nn. 99-102); "The Lord from eternity, who is Jehovah, created the universe and everything in it from Himself, and not from nothing" (nn. 282-284, 290-295). This is to be found in the treatise ent.i.tled _Angelic Wisdom about Divine Love and Wisdom._

2. Putting with these propositions the description of creation in that treatise, one may indeed see that what is called divine providence is government by the Lord's divine love and wisdom. In that treatise, however, creation was the subject, and not the preservation of the state of things after creation--yet this is the Lord's government. We now treat of this, therefore, and in the present chapter, of the preservation of the union of divine love and wisdom or of divine good and truth in what was created, which will be done in the following order:

i. The universe, with each and all things in it, was created from divine love by divine wisdom.

ii Divine love and wisdom proceed as one from the Lord.

iii. This one is in some image in every created thing.

iv. It is of the divine providence that every created thing, as a whole and in part, should be such a one, and if it is not, should become such a one.

v. Good of love is good only so far as it is united to truth of wisdom, and truth of wisdom truth only so far as it is united to good of love.

vi. Good of love not united to truth of wisdom is not good in itself but seeming good, and truth of wisdom not united to good of love is not truth in itself but seeming truth.

vii. The Lord does not suffer anything to be divided; therefore it must be either in good and at the same time in truth, or in evil and at the same time in falsity.

viii. That which is in good and at the same time in truth is something; that which is in evil and at the same time in falsity is not anything.

ix. The Lord's divine providence causes evil and the attendant falsity to serve for equilibrium, contrast, and purification, and so for the conjunction of good and truth in others.

3. (i) _The universe, with each and all things in it, was created from divine love by divine wisdom._ In the work _Divine Love and Wisdom_ we showed that the Lord from eternity, who is Jehovah, is in essence divine love and wisdom, and that He created the universe and all things in it from Himself. It follows that the universe, with each and all things in it, was created from divine love by means of divine wisdom. We also showed in that treatise that love can do nothing without wisdom, and wisdom nothing without love. For love apart from wisdom, or the will apart from understanding, cannot think anything, indeed cannot see, feel or say anything, so cannot do anything. Likewise, wisdom apart from love, or understanding apart from will, cannot think, see, feel, or speak, therefore cannot do, anything. For if love is removed from wisdom or understanding, there is no willing and thus no doing. If this is true of man, for him to do anything, it was much more true of G.o.d--who is love itself and wisdom itself--when He created and made the world and all that it contains.

[2] That the universe, with each and all things in it, was created from divine love by divine wisdom may also be established from objects to be seen in the world. Take a particular object, examine it with some wisdom, and you will be convinced. Take the seed, fruit, flower or leaf of a tree, muster your wisdom, examine the object with a strong microscope, and you will see marvels. Even more wonderful are the more interior things which you do not see. Note the unfolding order in the growth of a tree from seed to new seed; reflect on the continuous effort in all stages after self-propagation--the end to which it moves is seed in which its reproductive power arises anew. If then you will think spiritually, as you can if you will, will you not see wisdom in all this? Furthermore, if you can think spiritually enough, you will see that this energy does not come from the seed, nor from the sun of the world, which is only fire, but is in the seed from G.o.d the Creator whose wisdom is infinite, and is from Him not only at the moment of creation but ever after, too.

For maintenance is perpetual creation, as continuance is perpetual coming to be. Else it is quite as work ceases when you withdraw will from action, or as utterance fails when you remove thought from speech, or as motion ceases when you remove impetus; in a word, as an effect perishes when you remove the cause.

[3] Every created thing is endowed with energy, indeed, but this does nothing of itself but from Him who implanted it. Examine any other earthly object, like a silkworm, bee or other small creature. View it first naturally, then rationally, and at length spiritually, and if you can think deeply, you will be astounded at all you see. Let wisdom speak in you, and you will exclaim in astonishment, "Who does not see the divine in such things? They are all of divine wisdom." Still more will you exclaim, if you note the uses of all created things, how they mount in regular order even to the human being, and from man to the Creator whence they are, and that the connection, and if you will acknowledge it, the preservation also of them all, depend on the conjunction of the Creator with man. That divine love created all things, but nothing apart from the divine wisdom, will be seen in what follows.

4. (ii) _Divine love and wisdom proceed as one from the Lord._ This, too, is plain from what was shown in the work _Divine Love and Wisdom,_ especially in the propositions: "Esse and existere are distinguishably one in the Lord" (nn. 14-17); "Infinite things are distinguishably one in Him" (nn. 17-22); "Divine love is of divine wisdom, and divine wisdom of divine love" (nn. 34-39); "Love not married to wisdom cannot effect anything" (nn. 401-403); "Love does nothing except in union with wisdom"

(nn. 409, 410); "Spiritual heat and light, proceeding from the Lord as a sun, make one as divine love and wisdom make one in Him" (nn. 99-102).

The truth of the present proposition is plain from these propositions, demonstrated in that treatise. But as it is not known how two distinct things can act as one, I wish now to show that there is no "one" apart from form, and that the form itself makes it a unit; then, that a form makes a "one" the more perfectly as the elements entering into it are distinctly different and yet united.

[2] _There is no "one" apart from form, and the form itself makes it a unit._ Everyone who brings his mind to bear on the matter can see clearly that there is no "one" apart from form, and if a thing exists at all, it is a form. For what exists at all derives from form what is known as its character and its predicates, its changes of state, also its relevance, and so on. A thing without form has no way of affecting us, and what has no power of affecting, has no reality. It is form which enables to all this. And as all things have a form, then if the form is perfect, all things in it regard each other mutually, as link does link in a chain. It follows that it is form which makes a thing a unit and thus an ent.i.ty of which character, state, affection or anything else can be predicated; each is predicated of it according to the perfection of the form.

[3] Such a unit is every object which meets the eye in the world. Such, too, is everything not seen with the eye, whether in interior nature or in the spiritual world. The human being is such a unit, human society is, likewise the church, and in the Lord's view the whole angelic heaven, too; in short, all creation in general and in every particular. For each and all things to be forms, He who created all things must be form itself, and all things made must be from that form. This, therefore, was also demonstrated in the work _Divine Love and Wisdom,_ as that "Divine love and wisdom are substance and form" (nn. 40-43); "Divine love and wisdom are form itself, thus the one Self and the single independent existence" (nn. 44-46); "Divine love and wisdom are one in the Lord" (nn.

14-17, 18-22), "and proceed as one from Him" (nn. 99-102, and elsewhere).

[4] _A form makes a one the more perfectly as the elements entering into it are distinctly different and yet united._ This hardly falls into a comprehension not elevated, for the appearance is that a form cannot make a one except as its elements are quite alike. I have spoken with angels often on the subject. They said that this is a secret perceived clearly by their wiser men, obscurely by the less wise. They said it is the truth that a form is the more perfect as its const.i.tuents are distinctly different and yet severally united. They established the fact from the societies which in the aggregate const.i.tute the form of heaven, and from the angels of a society, for as these are different and free and love their a.s.sociates from themselves and from their own affection, the form of the society is more perfect. They also ill.u.s.trated the fact from the marriage of good and truth, in that the more distinguishably two these are, the more perfectly do they make a one; similarly, of love and wisdom. The indistinguishable is confusion, they said, whence comes imperfection of form.

[5] In various ways they went on to establish the manner in which perfectly distinct things are united and thus make a one, especially by what is in the human body, in which are innumerable things quite distinct and yet united, held distinct by coverings and united by ligaments. It is so with love, they said, and all its things, and wisdom and all its things, for love and wisdom are not perceived except as one. See further on the subject in _Divine Love and Wisdom_ (nn. 14-22) and in the work _Heaven and h.e.l.l_ (nn. 56 and 489). This has been adduced as part of angelic wisdom.

5. (iii) _This "one" is in some image in every created thing._ It can be seen from what was demonstrated throughout the treatise _Divine Love and Wisdom_ and especially at nn. 47-51, 55-60, 282-284, 290-295, 313-318, 319-326, 349-357, that divine love and wisdom which are one in the Lord and proceed as one from Him, are in some image in each created thing. It was shown that the divine is in every created thing because G.o.d the Creator, who is the Lord from eternity, produced the sun of the spiritual world from Himself, and all things of the universe through that sun. That sun, which is from Him and in which He is, is therefore not only the first but the sole substance from which are all things. As this is the one substance, it is in everything made, but with endless variety in accord with uses.

[2] In the Lord, then, are divine love and wisdom, and in the sun from Him divine fire and radiance, and from the sun spiritual heat and light; and in each instance the two make one. It follows that this oneness is in every created thing. All things in the world are referable, therefore, to good and truth, in fact to the conjunction of them. Or, what is the same, they are referable to love and wisdom and to the union of these; for good is of love and truth of wisdom, love calling all its own, "good," and wisdom calling all its own, "truth." It will be seen in what follows that there is a conjunction of these in each created thing.

6. Many avow that there is a single substance which is also the first, from which are all things, but what that substance is, is not known. The belief is that it is so simple nothing is more so, and that it can be likened to a point without dimensions, and that dimensional forms arose out of an infinite number of such points. But this is a fallacy, springing from an idea of s.p.a.ce. To such an idea there seems to be such a least thing. The truth is that the simpler and purer a thing is, the more replete it is and the more complete. This is why the more interiorly a thing is examined, the more wonderful, perfect, and well formed are the things seen in it, and in the first substance the most wonderful, perfect and fully formed of all. For the first substance is from the spiritual sun, which, as we said, is from the Lord and in which He is. That sun is therefore the sole substance and, not being in s.p.a.ce, is all in all, and is in the greatest and least things of the created universe.