0. The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Sacred Scripture ¹

By Emanuel Swedenborg, (First published in 1763)

Translator’s Table of Contents:

The Sacred Scripture, or Word, Is Divine Truth Itself. 1

The Word Contains a Spiritual Meaning, One Previously Unknown. 4

1. What the spiritual meaning is. 5
2. The presence of the spiritual meaning in each and every particular of the Word. 9
3. The spiritual meaning is what causes the Word to be Divinely inspired and holy in every word. 18
4. The spiritual sense of the Word has been previously unknown. 20
5. The Word’s spiritual meaning is granted after this only to someone who possesses genuine truths from the Lord. 26

The Word’s Literal Sense Is the Foundation, Containing Vessel and Buttress of Its Spiritual and Celestial Meanings. 27

In the Word’s Literal Sense, Divine Truth Is Present in Its Fullness, in Its Holiness, and in Its Power. 37

Truths in the Word’s literal sense are meant by the foundations of the wall of the New Jerusalem in Revelation 21. 43

Truths and goods in the Word’s literal sense are meant by the Urim and Thummim. 44

Truths in the Word’s literal sense are meant by the precious stones in the Garden of Eden in which the King of Tyre is said in Ezekiel to have been. 45

The Word’s literal sense is symbolized by the curtains and veils of the Tabernacle. 46

The outer constituents of the Temple in Jerusalem represented the outer constituents of the Word, which are those of its literal sense. 47

When the Lord was transfigured, He represented the Word in its glory. 48

The Church’s Doctrine Must Be Drawn from the Word’s Literal Sense and Verified by It. 50

1. The Word is not understood apart from doctrine. 51
2. Doctrine must be drawn from the Word’s literal sense. 53
3. Genuine truth, of which doctrine ought to consist, is apparent in the Word’s literal sense only to people who are enlightened by the Lord. 57

The Word’s Literal Sense Makes Possible a Conjunction with the Lord and Affiliation with Angels. 62

The Word Exists in All of the Heavens, and Is the Source of the Angels’ Wisdom. 70

The Church Is Formed by the Word, and Its Character Is Such as Its Understanding of the Word. 76

Every Single Constituent of the Word Contains a Marriage of the Lord and the Church, and So a Marriage of Goodness and Truth. 80

Heresies May Be Seized On from the Word’s Literal Sense, But It Is Harmful to Affirm Them. 91

The Lord Came into the World to Fulfill Everything in the Word, and to Become as a Consequence Divine Truth, or the Word, Also in Outmost Expressions. 98

Before the Current Word in the World Today, There Was a Word That Has Been Lost. 101

The Word Is the Means by Which Those Have Light Who Are Outside the Church and Do Not Have the Word. 104

Without the Word No One Would Have Any Knowledge of God, of Heaven and Hell, of Life after Death, and Still Less of the Lord. 114

Translator's Notes or Footnotes:

1. The Sacred Scripture, or Word, Is Divine Truth Itself

Everyone says that the Word comes from God, is Divinely inspired, and so is holy. But even so, no one has known before this wherein the Divinity in it lies. For in its letter the Word appears as though written in the ordinary way, in a foreign style, neither as sublime or nor as lucid as writings of the present age seem to be.

As a result, a person who worships nature as God, or in preference to God, and so thinks prompted by self and his own self-interest, and not prompted by heaven in response to the Lord, may easily fall into error regarding the Word, and into scorning it, and when reading it, saying to himself, “What is this? What is that? Is this Divine? Can God, whose wisdom is infinite, speak so? Where is the holiness in it, and what makes it holy, other than some teaching of religion and so conviction?”

62. The New Church Is Meant by the New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation

After the book of Revelation describes what the state of the Christian Church would be at its end, and what it is now, and after those people of that church who are meant by the false prophet, the dragon, the harlot, and beasts have been cast into hell, thus after the Last Judgment had been accomplished, we are told then:

I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away.... Then I, John, saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.... And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. And (He) Himself will be with them and be their God.... He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.” (Revelation 21:1-3, 5)

The new heaven and new earth that John saw, after the first heaven and first earth had passed away, do not mean a new stellar or meteorological heaven visible to human eyes, nor a new earth for people to dwell on. Rather they mean the new existence of a church in the spiritual world, and the new existence of a church in the natural world.

[2] Since the new existence of a church in both worlds, spiritual and natural, was brought about by the Lord when He was in the world, therefore a similar prediction is made in the Prophets, namely that a new heaven and new earth would then come into existence, as said in Isaiah 65:17, 66:22, and elsewhere. And these cannot mean, therefore, a new heaven visible to the eyes, or an earth inhabitable by people.

By the spiritual world we mean the world where angels and spirits dwell, and by the natural world we mean the world where people dwell.

The new existence of a church has been recently brought about in the spiritual world, and the new existence of a church will be brought about in the world, as we have shown several times in the short work The Last Judgment, and as we will show more fully in its Continuation.