Category — Merely human

In the first place, I would like to say why I first proposed to speak on the subject of the human of the Lord which He glorified, then withdrew the proposal, but finally agreed to speak on this subject.

The reason was that the order of the Church is to have a paper sent out formally so that those attending the meetings have a chance to consider the subject, and so that the subject does not come as something new but as something reflected upon.

I did not write a paper for the following reasons: My ideas were just forming in my mind and had not yet taken a many definite form, and there were many obscurities in my mind. I therefore did not wish to put them down in written form until the subject was more clear in my mind.

I have been working for the last nine months, concentrating on the subject, but have not come to a conclusion on many things and, therefore, I did not know how much more study, or how much more time it would take before I felt like writing; and, as I’m getting to an age where one does not know how long one is going to live, or how long one’s mental faculties will be fully alert, I thought I might say a few words on the subject.

I did express some of my ideas in a letter, which you have read. I have a great many ideas, but what I will say tonight will be s relatively a few thoughts on the subject.

Another reason I withdrew was that we will gain little from the subject if there is a spirit of debate and argumentation. If there is not a spirit of charity, we may say things that later we will regret. In DE HEMELSCHE LEER it speaks of coming together in an interior dwelling, where we can meet.

That interior dwelling s a dwelling in the presence of the Lord. If we get into a debate or argument He is not present. This is a thing I feared. I did not fear it only on account of others, but I myself have felt drawn into that sort of debating and arguing atmosphere, so that when I returned home from the meeting, I have felt distressed at what I had said, and I don’t doubt that others have felt the same way.

I have, therefore, requested that, as the subject is new and requires meditation, that we omit discussion… It would be better if we left the consideration of the subject to a later meeting when, possibly I might be able to write something on the subject. My ideas are based on many passages of the Third Testament that I have considered, but which I can not directly quote, nor can I give you the numbers that my ideas are based on; so I am just presenting thoughts for you to consider…

In considering something that is new, it is important to try to enter into the thinking and feeling of the one who presents it. There is always a danger that from one’s former thoughts, one expresses ideas according to the habit of one’s thinking instead of first trying to enter fully into what is being presented. In a letter of Mr. Groeneveld’s to Bishop DeCharms, he complains that Bishop DeCharms did not enter into the field of his thinking, but was arguing from his own previous ideas.

The first thing in coming to wisdom is to realize that what we know compared to what we do not know, is like a drop of water compared to the ocean. And this is certainly true in relation to the doctrine concerning the Lord. What we know is very, very little. If we have studied the ARCANA COELESTIA many times, especially those chapters which treat of the Lord and His Glorification, we are apt to think that we know far more than we really know.

It says in DE HEMELSCHE LEER that when any one comes from one discreet plane of thinking to another, that the statements in THE CORONIS to the TRUE CHRISTIAN RELIGION apply.

In the CORONIS there are three of four lists of statements concerning a lack of cognitions, namely twenty some statements, of which it is said there is no cognitions: no cognition of God, no cognition of the Lord, no cognition of the Trinity, no cognition of faith, no cognition of charity, no cognition of regeneration, etc.

And it says that whenever one comes into an essentially new state, one is totally ignorant of all these subjects. This does not mean, of course, that one does not know the things he had learnt before, but that he does not have any cognition in relation to the state into which he is to come.

When I was in the General Church, before I came to know DE HEMELSCHE LEER, I had read the whole of the Third Testament seven or eight times. I thought I had a pretty good knowledge of the Third Testament; but when I came to know DE HEMELSCHE LEER, I realized what I knew was only generals of the letter and that I had no knowledge of anything internal at all..

If you enter into a new subject, you realize that what you know of it is scarcely anything. Yet that little you do know – that drop, is all important; it is the very center of the life. Although it is as a drop compared to the ocean, these trues are still all-important. The Word contains infinite trues; few of those trues are expressed in direct statement, what has been called “taking up by direct cognizance. ” The interior trues are only within when the Lord orders them out of an influx of good so that we see them in a genuine relation.

For example, if we are studying chapters of the ARCANA which treat of the glorification of the Lord, we may find a passage that suddenly throws a new light on the whole subject; a number from the ARCANA COELESTIA, or maybe some other book in the Third Testament, with which, at first, one had not connected it at all with what one is studying. So it comes in a surprising way that we come to a certain light. This is enough for an introduction.

Read the full paper on the Human of the Lord which He glorified by T.Pitcairn