Spiritual Experiences (Buss) n. 1625

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1625. CONCERNING THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE ANGELS. In regard to the knowledge of the angels of the interior heaven, a single example may suffice, taken from their knowledge of the structures and forms of the [human] body; for while any one, no matter what, of the viscera of the body is under consideration, they are enabled to know not only its whole structure and operation, but also all the experience which anatomy is able to detect in the smallest particulars, as whether it be true or genuine. Not only so, but they know in an instant whether what is stated respecting each of the viscera be correct, besides many interior things which no one of the human race can know, as I have sometimes found by experience. They are acquainted, too, with the correspondence which these things bear to things spiritual. Indeed, their knowledge is such that if men were aware of it they would be astounded, although matters of this kind had never been their study in the life of the body. It flows, as it were, spontaneously from the fact that by reason of an intelligence bestowed by the Lord, they know how everything is with the Grand Man in general and in particular, and the knowledge seems to be innate in them. But such knowledge they could never possess were it not that the whole heaven represents the whole man, with all his several parts, and unless the Lord were the life of that man, and thus life itself and unless also the universal heaven were organic. - 1748, March 22. They are thus in first principles, and from first principles, or things interior, and more interior, could comprehend the things which are without or below.


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