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The Word and Its Senses;
Correspondences; Authority
THE WORD—USUALLY WITH A CAPITAL "W" in
English—covered a considerable range of related meanings for
Swedenborg. His Latin had two words, vox and
verbum, both of which must be rendered by one English
word, "word." He used the Latin vox to designate the
written appearance or spoken sound of a word, distinct from
its meaning, and used verbum for the meaning and,
capitalized, for the Word of the Lord.
Supremely, the Word is truth itself
(absolute truth beyond finite human comprehension, but
intrinsic to the nature of God), divine wisdom and divine
life—by means of which all things come into being out of the
infinite creative energy of divine love. In this sense, the
Word (always with a capital "W") is the source of life in
all living creatures and the origin of all true knowledge
and understanding.
Mediately, the Word is God's revelation
of himself or truth accommodated to finite human
understanding. With a small "w," the word in this sense
usually is a particular truth revealed to someone, as "the
word that Amos saw." Capitalized, it refers to the entire
panorama of revelation: history and creation. Revelation is
history, in the sense that Israel's history reveals
knowledge leading to salvation; creation, in that the
created universe correspondentially reveals the nature of
spiritual reality. Finally, the Word is the fullest
self-revelation of God in the Word-become-flesh (Jesus, the
Christ).
Specifically, the Word is the Bible.
Most specifically, or especially, it is those books of the
Bible that contain a continuous spiritual meaning based
on—and found within—the literal meaning. This specific
designation—the Word within and beyond the literal
sense—includes another range of meanings. Swedenborg saw
multiple levels of revelation in the written Word of the
Lord, levels that most often are called the "senses" of the
Word.
Without counting lines of text to be
certain, it is at least probable that Swedenborg wrote more
about the Word and its senses than he wrote about any other
topic. In different contexts, the number of senses in the
Word, their designations, and their relationship to one
another varies within a considerable range. To cite just a
few examples:
In
Secrets of Heaven
4750, he describes two
senses of the Word, namely, good and its opposite. In
Secrets of Heaven
5247, he describes two
senses: internal and external. In
Sacred Scripture 4, he again speaks of two, one
spiritual and one natural. In
Sacred Scripture 5, the two are spiritual and
literal. In
Secrets of Heaven 4606, there are three,
internal, external, and supreme; in
True Christianity 91, the three are natural, spiritual,
and celestial. In
Revelation Unveiled
(Apocalypse
Revealed in older translations) 1066, there are four, and
Secrets of Heaven 8443 refers to six degrees
of "Truth Divine," each of which can be considered a
separate "sense."
This scattered sampling is not at all
intended to be complete; nor, on the other hand, is it
intended to be intimidating. Rather, it is intended to
suggest the dynamic nature of Swedenborg's teaching about
the Word and its senses and to show that in different
contexts, from different perspectives, for different
purposes, with different emphases, he points out different
polarities. Usually, he speaks of two: one is the natural,
literal, or external sense; and the other is the internal,
spiritual, or heavenly sense. When he speaks of three
senses, the third is the supreme or heavenly sense. Notice
that "heavenly" is listed among the possibilities for two
different senses. That never happens in the same context.
When three senses are discussed, or where two levels of
internal sense are described, heavenly means a higher sense
than the spiritual.
In many respects, and in many instances
where they appear, these various names for the different
senses can be taken fairly simply as synonyms for two or
three levels of meaning. Such levels are found within, based
on, and reach beyond the plain meaning of the words as you
read them on a page of the Bible. "Interior" and "exterior"
senses are referred to occasionally, and are intermediate,
comparative terms, usually paired with "internal" or
"external" which are absolutes. Sometimes, much more precise
gradations appear ("internal-historical,"
"spiritual-natural," etc.) but usually they are explained in
their contexts. In all cases, look for the point that is
being made, and the terminology will not be overwhelming.
So much for vocabulary. What's it all
about? The assignment for this chapter includes
True Christianity 194, which begins: "What the spiritual
sense is." Read it and see if you find out. All I see there
is what the spiritual sense is not. I do not think
Swedenborg is trying to confuse you there. He's being
careful that you are not misled. But the danger remains.
For instance, it is easy to mistakenly
assume that the spiritual sense is a kind of "other
language." That assumption implies that, just as Swedenborg
is translated from Latin into English, French, or whatever,
the literal sense can be translated again into the spiritual
sense. Sorry, but what you get then is the correspondential
sense. The spiritual sense, most simply put, is what the
spiritual angels understand when you are reading the Word.
Now, maybe your anima can get an understanding of the
spiritual sense from the spiritual angels it associates
with, or maybe you've regenerated to the point where you
understand it that way directly. But even if you understand
or, more accurately in most cases, feel the spiritual
sense, you can't quite put it into words. Our words are a
natural language and can convey only a natural sense, or a
natural understanding of the spiritual sense. Even when
Swedenborg unveils the spiritual—and especially the
heavenly—sense, it still is reduced to natural terms. That's
why Swedenborg often explains that what it really, finally
means is unintelligible. The spiritual sense of the Word is
more nearly something you experience while reading the Word
than something you can put into words.
The closest you can come to putting it
into words, of course, is through correspondences.
Correspondences also are an excellent aid in turning your
mind in the direction that makes the experience of the
spiritual sense most easily attained. Correspondences are
not just a principle of Bible interpretation. Long before he
began to use the principle of correspondence to deepen his
understanding of the Word, Swedenborg had recognized it as a
fundamental principle in the created order of things. We'll
get back to that in Chapters 12 and 13, but it's important
to remember that correspondence is the link between physical
and natural reality, and the Bible—written from the
perspective of Truth itself—uses the structure of creation
to convey eternal truths while talking about rivers and
mountains, sun and moon, rocks and trees.
Everything that was created corresponds
to something else that was created. Bedrock in the earth
corresponds to the spiritual reality of fundamental faith.
The Lord, appearing in the heavens as a spiritual sun,
corresponds to the physical sun in our sky; he radiates love
and wisdom as our sun radiates heat and light.
Correspondence is a true relationship inherent in creation.
Everything that corresponds also
represents, although not all representatives are
correspondences. A smile on your face is a representative of
your inner feelings—a false one if you smile as you greet
your enemy, and a true one (a correspondence) if you are
smiling at someone you are happy to see. All
representatives, both true and false, also signify
something. However, some significatives do not really
represent. Occasionally Swedenborg interchanges these terms
as synonyms; but at critical points, where he is careful
with terms, this is the relationship between these three.
Rather inconspicuously in
Secrets of Heaven
4, Swedenborg states a primary purpose for writing the
work, namely, to demonstrate convincingly that there is an
internal sense in the Holy Word. Looking back, thirty
volumes and over two hundred years later, it seems like such
a little thing. However, when he wrote that he would
"sufficiently establish" the existence of an internal sense
in
Sacred Scripture, he was promising something that no
one had ever imagined (his idea of an internal sense,
connected to the literal by correspondences, was radically
different from the old allegorical system). Why should
anyone believe such a claim?
To begin, he uses an inductive proof:
chapter by chapter, verse by verse, word by word, he shows
that consistent application of a consistent method reveals a
self-consistent, coherent, deeply significant internal
sense. But why should this be accepted as divine revelation,
rather than a clever scheme of interpretation?
For authority at this level, he turns
to another kind of consistency: each theological point of
the internal sense is shown to be consistent with the
literal sense of Scripture at many points. Later, he would
call this consistency the primary authority for theological
confirmation (True Christianity
229).
He uses other substantiations for
different purposes, but his deepest, most fundamental
authority for claiming to present a divine revelation is
revelation itself—a revelation that comes to all who lead
lives of true charity. In a way that is not obvious but not
completely hidden either, the Lord leads people to want to
believe what is true (Secrets of Heaven
8694).
CHAPTER 7 ASSIGNMENTS
Read the following passages from
Swedenborg. For further reading in other published versions,
see the passages listed just below:
Secrets of Heaven
1-5, 64, 68, 2987-3001, 6597, 8694, 10321-10325
Revelation Unveiled (Apocalypse
Revealed in older translations) near the end of the
Preface and Chapter 1
Heaven and Hell 87-115
True Christianity CHAPTER 4.
PASSAGES FROM SWEDENBORG:
The Word and Its Senses; Correspondences; Authority
SH 1
The Word in the Old Testament contains
heavenly secrets. Each and every part of it has to do with
the Lord, his heaven, his church, faith, and everything
related to faith. No mortal being can get this from the
letter—the literal meaning of the Bible—where no one sees
anything but details which relate in a general way to Jewish
religion. However, the fact is that everywhere in the Old
Testament there is an inner meaning that cannot be detected
on the surface—except for a few things. Some of these are
things that the Lord revealed and explained to the Apostles.
He revealed, for example that the Jewish sacrifices
symbolize the Lord, that the land of Canaan and Jerusalem
symbolize heaven—which is why they are called heavenly
Canaan and heavenly Jerusalem—and that Paradise has a
similar meaning.
SH 2
The former Christian world remains
ignorant that the entire Old Testament—every part of it,
even the smallest part of every letter—involves and
symbolizes spiritual and heavenly realities. That explains
why people care so little about the Old Testament. However,
there is one concept that enables them to understand: [they
realize that] the Word is the Lord's and comes from him, so
it could not exist without containing the kinds of things
that relate to heaven, the church, and faith. Without those
things, it could not be called "The Word of the Lord," nor
could it be said that there is anything alive in it. After
all, where could its life come from unless something in it
was alive? How could the Word have life in it unless every
single thing in it relates to the Lord, who truly is life
itself? Whatever does not regard him at some deeper level is
not living. Any expression in the Word that does not involve
the Lord, or refer to him in its own way, is not divine.
SH 3
Without this kind of life, the Word is
dead as far as its literal meaning is concerned. Indeed, the
Word is like a human being who has an external nature and an
internal one, as is known in the Christian world. Our
outside, separated from our inside, is our body, so it is
dead. Our inside, however, is what lives and allows our
outside to live. Our human inside is our soul. In the same
way, the Word—if seen only as its literal meaning—is like a
body without a soul.
SH 4
When our mind is occupied by the
literal meaning alone, it can never show us what is
contained within the letter. For example, consider the first
chapter of Genesis. Its literal meaning alone reveals
nothing but things concerning the world's creation, the
Garden of Eden (called Paradise), and Adam, the first human
ever created. Who would say anything else?
However, it will be sufficiently
established in what follows that it does indeed contain
hidden treasures that have never been revealed before. The
internal sense of the first chapter of Genesis concerns our
new creation (that is to say, our regeneration) in general,
and the very earliest church [our oldest style of religious
life] in particular. This happens in such a way that not
even the smallest syllable of the smallest word fails to
represent, symbolize, and incorporate this meaning.
SH 5
No mortal being is able to know this
without the Lord's making it possible. Therefore, I've been
allowed to reveal in this preface that in his divine mercy
the Lord has allowed me to mingle with spirits and angels,
to hear them talking, and to speak to them in return.
Several years of this, without break or interruption, has
enabled me to see and hear astonishing things in the other
life, things which have never before come into anyone's
knowledge or imagination.
I have been taught in the other life
about different kinds of spirits and the situation of souls
after death; about hell and the regrettable situation of the
faithless; about heaven and the most happy situation of the
faithful; and, most importantly, what the faith that is
acknowledged in the universal heaven teaches. By the Lord's
divine mercy, all of this will be expanded in what follows.
SH 64
[What you have seen in this first
chapter]...is the Word's inner meaning, the truest life in
it, which in no way appears in the literal meaning. But the
number of treasures hidden within the Word is so large that
many volumes would be insufficient to unfold all of them.
Only a minimum sample has been given here, examples that can
confirm that regeneration is being discussed, and that it
progresses from our outside to our inside.
This is how angels understand the Word.
They know nothing at all about what is literal or the most
obvious meaning of even a single word—much less the names of
different countries, cities, rivers, and the people whose
names appear throughout the historical and prophetic books.
They visualize only the things that those words and names
symbolize. For example, Adam in Paradise brings the very
earliest church to their minds—and not even that church
itself, but its faith in the Lord. The image of Noah
suggests to them the remnant of that church among its
successors until Abram's time. Abraham never suggests to
them the living man, but rather makes them think of a saving
faith of the kind he represented, and so on. In this way,
they see spiritual and heavenly realities in the Word, with
no connection to the words or names.
SH 68
It is not hidden from me that many
people will say that no one is able to converse with spirits
and angels while still living in a body, and that many will
call it a fantasy. Others will say that I have related such
stories to gain people's trust, and others will say other
things. But I don't care: I have seen, I have heard, I
have felt.
SH 2987
Few people have any idea of what
representations and correspondences are. No one can know
what they are without knowing that there is a spiritual
world and that it is distinct from the natural world.
Correspondences exist between spiritual things and natural
things, and appearances of spiritual things within natural
things are representations. Correspondences are so called
because they correspond; as representations are so named
because they represent.
SH 2988
You can get some idea of
representations and correspondences if you consider the
mind's properties—specifically, thought and intention—which
normally shine from the face so that they are plainly
visible in facial expressions. Feelings, especially, display
their inner qualities in the eyes. When aspects of the face
act in concert with aspects of the mind, they are said to
correspond, and to exist as correspondences; while the
actual facial expressions represent [the mind's thoughts,
intentions, and feelings], and exist as representations.
Similarly, bodily gestures, and all the movements that
muscles cause in our bodies, are well known to be
expressions of what a person is thinking and intending. The
physical gestures and movements represent what is going on
in the mind, and are called representations. When those
physical things agree with the mental ones, they correspond.
SH 2989
Reflections of this kind do not take
shape in our mind exactly as they appear on our face: it is
our feelings that display themselves there. Neither do
actions exist in the mind exactly as they present themselves
through bodily movements. Rather, it is thoughts that are
presented in this way. What occurs in our minds is
spiritual, while what happens in our bodies is physical.
That is to say, when aspects of our internal self take shape
in our external self, what is visible on our outside is
representative of what is inside, and those outer
appearances that agree with the inner reality are
correspondent.
SH 2990
It is well known (or certainly could
be), that there is a spiritual world and a material world.
Broadly speaking, the spiritual world is where spirits and
angels are, and the material world is where human beings
are. In detail, there is a spiritual world and a natural
world within each individual person, our internal nature
being our spiritual world and our external being our
material world. In most cases, any thoughts, intentions, or
feelings that flow from our spiritual world to our natural
world are representations and, to the extent that the inward
and outward agree with one another, they are
correspondences.
SH 2991
You can know that material things
represent spiritual things and that they correspond to them
from this: no material thing can possibly exist without a
cause prior to itself, and its cause is something spiritual.
. . . All material things represent spiritual things to
which they correspond, in the same way that spiritual things
represent heavenly things from which they exist.
SH 2992
Much experience has enabled me to know
that in the natural world—in all three of its kingdoms—there
is nothing of any kind that does not represent something in
the spiritual world or does not have something [spiritual]
to which it corresponds....
SH 2996
Everything in the human body has a
correspondence with something in heaven. This is the most
deeply hidden secret in this world, but nothing is better
known in the other life. There is not even the smallest
particle in the human body that does not have something
spiritual and heavenly (that is, some heavenly community)
corresponding to it.
SH 2997
Our internal or spiritual self, which
is our spirit and is called our soul, has a correspondence
with our natural or external self....
SH 2998
People are unaware of the existence of
this correspondence and do not believe they have any
connection with the spiritual world; yet we are totally
entwined with that world, and without that connection we
could not continue to exist for a single moment. No single
part of us could continue to exist. Our entire continued
existence depends on that connection.
SH 6597
[In the preceding volumes] we have
looked at the internal sense of things in the Book of
Genesis. That book consists entirely of historical
narratives (apart from Chapters 48 and 49, in which
prophetic statements also are found). It may be hard to see
that the internal sense really is what has been laid out
here, because history does draw the mind toward the literal
sense and lead it away from the internal sense (especially
because the internal sense is so different from the literal
one, dealing as it does with spiritual and heavenly things,
while the literal is concerned with worldly and earthly
matters).
The internal sense is the way I have
explained it. You can see this from the details of my
explanation and, most importantly, from the fact that it has
been told to me again and again from heaven.
SH 8694
"Revelation" means vivid representation
when the Word is read (and reception of what is presented).
People who are involved with doing good things and who
desire what is true are taught by the Word through
revelation. On the other hand, those who are not doing what
is good for other people cannot be taught from the Word.
They can only be hardened in whatever they have been taught
from early childhood, whether those things are true or
false. Revelation comes to those who live good lives but not
to those who are involved with what is evil, because the
entire Word (and every detail of it) concerns the Lord and
his reign. The angels present with us perceive this level of
meaning from it. It is their perception which is
communicated to us when we are into doing what is good, when
we are reading the Word and when we are desiring what is
true because that is what we love. The illustration and our
reception of it come through the angels who are with us.
Those who are involved with what is
good, and consequently what is true, have their intellectual
faculties opened to heaven, and their soul—that is, their
internal nature—is in community with angels. Everything is
different for those who are not involved with what is good
and so do not have a desire for what is true springing from
that good. Heaven is closed to them.
It is hard to describe what revelation is like for those who
are accustomed to doing good and who consequently love what
is true. It is not something obvious, but neither is it
completely hidden. It is like a kind of inner inclination to
prefer a thing that is true or to avoid it if it is not
true. When the inclination is to prefer, the mind relaxes
and becomes serene, capable of the kind of knowing that
comes from faith.
SH 10321
The Word, being revelation from the
Divine, is divine in each and every part; for what is divine
cannot be otherwise.
SH 10322
The Word contains an internal sense for
the angels, which is a spiritual sense; and an external
sense for us, which is natural. This is how heaven is
conjoined with the human race through the Word.
SH 10323
The authentic sense of the Word can be
grasped only by those who are enlightened, and only they are
enlightened who love the Lord and have faith in him; their
inward aspects are elevated by the Lord into the light of
heaven.
SH 10324
The Word in the letter cannot be
grasped without teachings drawn from the Word by one who is
enlightened, for its literal sense has been written so that
even simple people who need teachings from the Word to guide
them as a lamp can understand.
SH 10325
The books of the Word are all those
which have an internal sense. Those which do not have it are
not the Word. Books of the Word in the Old Testament are the
five books of Moses, the books of Joshua, Judges, both books
of Samuel and of Kings, the Psalms of David, the books of
the Prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel,
Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum,
Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachai; and in
the New Testament the four Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke,
John—and Revelation.
TC 193
The Word is spiritual in its inmost
aspect because it has descended from the Lord Jehovah and
has passed through the heaven of angels. In this descent,
the divine nature itself—which is beyond expression and
perception—has been successively adapted to permit first
angels, and finally human beings, to grasp it. Therefore,
there is a spiritual sense. This spiritual sense is inside
the natural sense like the soul in a person, or like the
intellect's thought within speech, and like the will's
affection within action....
TC 194
The spiritual sense is...the principal
reason why the Word is spiritual for human beings as well as
for angels. It enables the Word to serve as a channel of
communication with the heavens. Being spiritual, the Word
was composed of pure correspondences. Anything composed of
correspondences emerges with its outermost sense resembling
the style used by the Prophets, the Gospels, and Revelation.
Although it seems ordinary, it has divine wisdom and all the
wisdom of the angels stored within it....
TC 200
It is the spiritual sense that makes
the Word divinely inspired and holy in every word.
TC 201
The spiritual sense of the Word has
been unknown until now. Every single thing to be found in
nature corresponds to something spiritual. Every single part
of the human body does, too. But it has been unknown until
now what correspondence is.
In the earliest times, however, it was
very well known. Those who lived in those times regarded a
knowledge of correspondences as the most prized of all kinds
of knowledge, and it was understood so universally that all
their documents and books were written by the use of
correspondences. The hieroglyphic writings of the Egyptians,
as well as the myths of the earliest peoples, were nothing
else. All the ancient churches served to represent spiritual
ideas: their rites and the rules that governed the
establishment of their modes of worship were made up of
nothing but correspondences. The same is true of all details
of the church among the Children of Israel. Their burnt
offerings, sacrifices, sacrificial cakes and libations in
all their particulars had meaning as correspondences. Also,
the Tabernacle and all its contents, as well as all their
festivals...together with their holy vestments...all the
laws and judgments governing their worship and way of life
had meaning as correspondences. Since divine ideas are
presented in the world as correspondences, this and no other
is the way the Word was written. Therefore the Lord spoke in
correspondences, since he spoke from the Divine....
TC 204
In the course of time the
representative rites of the church, which were
correspondences, began to be turned into idolatrous
practices and magical rites. Therefore, the Lord's divine
providence ensured that the knowledge should gradually be
lost and totally wiped out among the Israelite and Jewish
people. Their worship consisted entirely of correspondences,
and therefore was representative of heavenly things, but
they were unaware of what each detail meant....
TC 206
Later, a knowledge of correspondences,
which allows people to grasp the spiritual sense of the
Word, was not revealed because the earliest Christians were
very simple people. It could not be revealed to them because
it could not have been understood and would have been of no
use to them.... After their times, darkness arose to cover
the whole Christian world, first by the spread of a number
of heresies, and soon afterward by the decisions and decrees
of the Council of Nicea about the existence of three divine
persons from eternity and about the Person of Christ being
the son of Mary and not the son of Jehovah God. That is the
course from which gushed forth the current belief in
justification, according to which three Gods are approached
in turn. On this belief depends every single detail of the
church today [ i.e., around 1772], just as all the
parts of the body are dependent upon the head. Because they
used everything in the Word to prove this erroneous belief,
the spiritual sense could not be revealed. If it had been,
they would have used this sense for the same purpose, so
profaning the very holiness of the Word, and thus completely
closing heaven to themselves and banishing the Lord from the
church.
TC 207
A knowledge of correspondences has been
revealed at this time, allowing the spiritual sense to be
grasped. The spiritual sense of the Word consists of divine
truths of the church, and these are now coming into
light....
EXTENDED READINGS FOR CHAPTER SEVEN:
Secrets of Heaven
1-5, 64, 68, 2987-3001, 6597, 8694, 10321-10325
Revelation Unveiled (Apocalypse
Revealed in older translations) near the end of the
Preface and Chapter 1
Heaven and Hell 87-115
True Christianity CHAPTER 4.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR CHAPTER SEVEN:
How would you respond to the person who
asks, "If the spiritual sense is what God meant when God
revealed the Word, why didn't the biblical writers write
that, instead of something else?"
Particular words in the Judeo-Christian
canon have a variety of correspondences, some of which are
directly opposite to others, and this variety occurs because
the words appear in different contexts. How does context
affect correspondences?
Without quoting Swedenborg, how would
you describe the spiritual sense succinctly?
What questions or issues does the
lesson raise for you?
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