⁄
that preceded this significant declaration -- numbers 1 to 148-1/3 – were
apparently discarded by Swedenborg. Translators bringing the work into
publication have sought to reconstruct their general content from the index
that Swedenborg prepared for this work.
Now let us turn to what might be termed internal evidence. Along with
a myriad other subjects, what do we find in the text of the work itself that
testifies to its character and the manner of its transmission? In regard to this
important question I have identified upwards of 20 passages that in one way or
another appear to be relevant: 1635, 1647, 2270, 2739, 2894, 2955, 4034, 1140,
1145½, 1181, 1389, 1464, 1466, 1498, 1637, 2185, 2476, 2749, 3963.
Perhaps two of the leading passages recorded by Swedenborg that speak
most directly to character and mode of transmission of what was being written
from the Lord through him are numbers 1647 and 4034. It is important to
note that these two telling passages, along with the others just listed, were all
recorded in the text of The Spiritual Diary/Spiritual Experiences prior to the
time that Swedenborg began, from the Lord, to write the manuscript of the
Arcana Coelestia at the close of November and in the beginning of December
of 1748.
“That The Things Which I Learned From Representations, Visions, And
Discourses With Spirits And Angels Were From The Lord Alone.”
Spiritual Diary1647: “Whenever there was any representation, vision
and discourse, I was kept interiorly and intimately in reflection upon it, as to
what thence was useful and good, thus what I might learn therefrom; which
reflection was not thus attended to by those who presented the representations
and visions, and who spoke; yea, sometimes they were indignant when they
perceived that I was reflecting. Thus I have been instructed; consequently by
no spirit, nor by any angel, but by the Lord alone from Whom is all truth and
good; yea, when they wished to instruct me concerning various things, there
was scarcely anything but what was false: wherefore I was prohibited from
believing anything that they spoke; nor was I permitted to infer any such thing
as was proper to them [or akin to their proprium]. Besides, when they wished
to persuade me, I perceived an interior or intimate persuasion that the
thing was so and so, and not as they wished; which also they wondered at; the
perception was manifest; but cannot easily be described to the apprehension of
men.” (1748, March 22) [Emphasis mine] (Compare this passage with what the
Lord has declared in True Christian Religion 779; Apocalypse Revealed Preface;
De Verbo 29; Invitation Preface VIII; Coronis 18, 20)
Spiritual Diary/Spiritual Experiences 4034: “It was now observed, as
previously remarked above, that evil spirits were constrained to utter the
things that were to be noted (and recorded) by me, although ignorant of the
reason of the constraint; on which account even those mucus-spirits became
469