A Man of the Field:
Forming The
Volume 1: Reformation
The
Struggle Against Nonduality
Volume 2: Enlightenment
The
Spiritual Sense of the Writings
Volume 3: Regeneration
Spiritual
Disciplines For Daily Life
Volume 4: Uses
The New
Church Mind In Old Age
By Leon
James
October
2002
(draft 17a)
Author
information appears at the end. This document is in the process of being
revised. Please note the draft version marked on top. To print this document,
see Printing Note at the end.
A ìfieldî means doctrine (AC 368)
A "man" signifies faith and
truth (AC 427; 4823)
Volume 1
Reformation
The
Struggle Against Nonduality
Chapter 1
Table of Contents
Access to other Chapters
and Volumes here:
1.
The Writings Are A Divine Scientific Revelation
2.
The Writings Are The Lordís Second Coming
3.
Heaven Is Created From Rational Love
4. A
Divine Revelation That Surpasses All Others
5.
Swedenborgís Scientific Experiments In The Spiritual World
6.
Swedenborgís Dual CitizenshipóNatural And Spiritual
7.
This Book Is About Regeneration
REFORMATION:Ý THE INWARD STRUGGLE AGAINST NONDUALITY
The New Church Mind is to
be Formed by the Writings Exclusively
3.
Spiritual Truths Understood Naturally and Spiritually
4.
The Great Battle Of Nonduality Vs. Duality
5.
Enlightenment From The Lord
7. At
The Threshold Out Of Hell Into Heaven
8.
Cooperation in our Regeneration
9.
The Lordís Relationship to All Religions
10.
The Writings As The Exclusive Source For Spiritual Truths
11.
Separating Nonduality and Duality in the Mind
12.
Reformation by Means of the Writings
13.
Old and New Testament From Perspective Of The Writings
14.
The Writings Are The Last Revelation
15.
The Writings Are For The Rational Mind
17.
The Birth Of The Interior-Natural
18.
Reformation And Regeneration Begin In Early Adulthood
19.
Nonduality Fills The Culture Around Us
20.
Two Methods For Fighting Nonduality In The Mind
Absolute Opposition Between
Duality and Nonduality
1.
Religious Membership Not Required For Salvation
2.
Revelation Is Necessary For Spiritual Truths
3.
The New Rational Consciousness of God
4.
Nonduality is from Self-intelligence
5.
Nonduality In The Mind Opposes Regeneration
2. Incompatibility with the
Writings
4. Duality is the only
reality
1.
The New Age Of The Second Coming
5. The natural and
spiritual mind
1.
Nonduality Is In The Unregenerate Natural Mind
2.
The Spiritual Begins With The Rational
3.
The Spiritual In The New Testament
6. Why nonduality can be
attractive
Titles for the Abbreviated
Citations in the Book
Full Text Free Online Access to All Swedenborgís
Writings:
Access to other Chapters and
Volumes here:
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/nonduality.html
Every
spiritual truth in the Writings
is a Divine Commandment
Preface to Volume 1
|
ìThe
manifestation of the Lord, and intromission into the spiritual world, surpass
all miracles. This has not been granted to anyone since the creation, as it
has been to me.î Emanuel Swedenborg (INV 52) |
This book
presents the perspective on reality given in the Writings of Emanuel
Swedenborg (1688-1772).
It is intended
for all those, regardless of religious or intellectual background, who want to
form a new mind in themselves that is based
exclusively on the Writings. The bookís purpose is to assist them in undergoing
reformation and regeneration in preparation for a conjugial life in heaven.
1. The Writings Are A Divine Scientific Revelation
In todayís
intellectual climate revelations from God, His Name, the Bible, heaven and
hell, Church Doctrine, and the like are automatically considered religious
issues. When I started reading the Writings I was well into my career as a
psychology professor, writer, and scientist. I knew that the two-dozen books of
the Writings that I was studying were categorized as religious books, since I
found them in our university library in the section on Bible Commentaries. But
the books were written by Emanuel Swedenborg, a Swedish scientist of repute in
his days, and known to many influential intellectuals in
Swedenborg
was a fully rational thinker with a passion and commitment for explanations of
phenomena that span the entire chain of their existence from ultimates to
firsts. And since it is irrational to think that firsts can be from nothing or
from chaos, rationality requires that the first of all phenomena be a rational
Human God.
Swedenborgís
science was therefore inclusive and centered on a Human God who runs the
universe in a rational way that is discoverable by intellectual investigation.
Swedenborg
relied on the revelations of the Bible for the scientific facts about the
spiritual world. Since he had no direct access to the spiritual world (until
age 57), he extracted the facts from the Bible using both its literal meaning
and spiritual meaning. The Bible reveals many scientific facts about the
spiritual world in relation to the natural world, as for instance:
q
that there is a God who forms and
runs the universe
q
that God is Human
q
that Godís personality is motivated
by Divine Love
q
that God runs the universe by means
of rational laws
q
that there is a spiritual world and
life after death
q
that we are immortal
q
that in the afterlife we live in
either heaven or hell
q
that the spiritual world is within
the mind, thus that the mind is in the spiritual world
q
that spirit and mind are the same
q
that those who make it to heaven are
then angels
q
that those who make it to hell are
then devils
q
that heaven and hell are within us
q
that our character is what
determines whether we are to live in heaven or hell within us
q
that we inherit a degenerate
character that must be regenerated
q
that regeneration consists in
following conscience, not doing evil to the neighbor, loving to do good
q
that our mind or spirit is in
unconscious communication with those who are already in the spiritual world
q
that God manages the smallest
details of our willing and thinking so as to facilitate regeneration
q
that God manages the details of
every event or outcome at the macro and micro levels, including fortuitous
events, accidents, the laws of chance, randomness, regularity
q
and many others
The above
list of scientific facts about the universe is based only on the literal meaning of the Bible.
Swedenborg
also extracted many scientific facts from the spiritual meaning of Bible verses, as for example:
q
that the Bible is the Word and
therefore it is Divine Truth
q
that parts of the Bible are written as
accurate history, while other parts are spiritual visions
q
that spiritual visions are universal
phenomena brought about by correspondences
q
that correspondences are revealed by
God to the human race
q
that correspondences are Divine
Truths accommodated to human intelligence
q
that correspondences are ordered in
discrete degrees or levels in a hierarch of truths from external to inmost
q
that regeneration of oneís character
is achieved by the applying the power of correspondences to oneís daily willing
and thinking
q
that the universe is managed by a
hierarchical order of correspondences that are represented in the spiritual
meaning of the Bible
q
that individual regeneration and
biography recapitulates history and evolution
q
that the Bible reveals the
intellectual history of the human race within the spiritual meaning of the details
regarding names, places, numbers, and descriptions
q
that we live in heaven as angel
couples
q
that in the afterlife we have
spirit-bodies allowing us to live in society, marriage, and an active creative
life