Angelic Wisdom Concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom | Page 3

spiritual light. For this reason something shall first
be said about spiritual idea, and thought therefrom. Spiritual idea
derives nothing from space, but it derives its all from state. State is
predicated of love, of life, of wisdom, of affections, of joys therefrom;
in general, of good and of truth. An idea of these things which is truly
spiritual has nothing in common with space; it is higher and looks
down upon the ideas of space which are under it as heaven looks down
upon the earth. But since angels and spirits see with eyes, just as men in
the world do, and since objects cannot be seen except in space,
therefore in the spiritual world where angels and spirits are, there
appear to be spaces like the spaces on earth; yet they are not spaces, but
appearances; since they are not fixed and constant, as spaces are on
earth; for they can be lengthened or shortened; they can be changed or
varied. Thus because they cannot be determined in that world by
measure, they cannot be comprehended there by any natural idea, but
only by a spiritual idea. The spiritual idea of distances of space is the
same as of distances of good or distances of truth, which are affinities
and likenesses according to states of goodness and truth.
8. From this it may be seen that man is unable, by a merely natural idea,
to comprehend that the Divine is everywhere, and yet not in space; but
that angels and spirits comprehend this clearly; consequently that a man
also may, provided he admits into his thought something of spiritual
light; and this for the reason that it is not his body that thinks, but his
spirit, thus not his natural, but his spiritual.
9. But many fail to comprehend this because of their love of the natural,
which makes them unwilling to raise the thoughts of their
understanding above the natural into spiritual light; and those who are
unwilling to do this can think only from space, even concerning God;
and to think according to space concerning God is to think concerning
the expanse of nature. This has to be premised, because without a
knowledge and some perception that the Divine is not in space, nothing
can be understood about the Divine Life, which is Love and Wisdom,
of which subjects this volume treats; and hence little, if anything, about

Divine Providence, Omnipresence, Omniscience, Omnipotence,
Infinity and Eternity, which will be treated of in succession.
10. It has been said that in the spiritual world, just as in the natural
world, there appear to be spaces, consequently also distances, but that
these are appearances according to spiritual affinities which are of love
and wisdom, or of good and truth. From this it is that the Lord,
although everywhere in the heavens with angels, nevertheless appears
high above them as a sun. Furthermore, since reception of love and
wisdom causes affinity with the Lord, those heavens in which the
angels are, from reception, in closer affinity with Him, appear nearer to
Him than those in which the affinity is more remote. From this it is also
that the heavens, of which there are three, are distinct from each other,
likewise the societies of each heaven; and further, that the hells under
them are remote according to their rejection of love and wisdom. The
same is true of men, in whom and with whom the Lord is present
throughout the whole earth; and this solely for the reason that the Lord
is not in space.
11. GOD IS VERY MAN.
In all the heavens there is no other idea of God than that He is a Man.
This is because heaven as a whole and in part is in form like a man, and
because it is the Divine which is with the angels that constitutes heaven
and inasmuch as thought proceeds according to the form of heaven, it is
impossible for the angels to think of God in any other way. From this it
is that all those in the world who are conjoined with heaven think of
God in the same way when they think interiorly in themselves, that is,
in their spirit. From this fact that God is a Man, all angels and all spirits,
in their complete form, are men. This results from the form of heaven,
which is like itself in its greatest and in its least parts. That heaven as a
whole and in part is in form like a man may be seen in the work on
Heaven and Hell (n. 59-87); and that thoughts proceed according to the
form of heaven (n. 203, 204). It is known from Genesis (1:26, 27), that
men were created after the image and likeness of God. God