A question from a friend: "Could you please explain how to understand the following statement?:

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do His commandments.” (Psalm 111:10, and, similarly, Proverbs 9:10.)

It's a good question: How can FEAR be a beginning of wisdom? Especially if the object of fear is a God of love?

This theme of fearing the Lord Jehovah runs strongly through the Old Testament, the revelation given to the Hebrews who lived before He came to earth as Jesus Christ. Here's one example to start with:

"Let all the earth fear Jehovah: let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast." (Psalms 33:8-9)

Jehovah is Creator. The Old Testament often describes Him as a powerful and demanding God. He commands that people learn to obey Him. He rewards the obedient and punishes those who disobey and turn away from Him. He sometimes changes His mind, and at times Moses and others apparently argued with Him, persuading Him to reach different conclusions. (2 Samuel 24:16) He can even “laugh at” the wicked. (Psalms 37:13) David once lamented that God “cast us off and humiliated us;” and that He sleeps while evil is done. (Psalms 44:9,23)

The spiritual meaning of these Old Testament passages, explained in the Heavenly Doctrines given through Swedenborg, shows that in fact God punishes no one. The pain and penalty of bad consequences come from the evil that drives human beings from within. God allows punishment to restore order, and He brings good from its evil – acting always from the infinite love that is His essence. But the "natural man" – including the low earthly mind within us all – sees God as wrathful, arbitrary and vengeful. In reality, God is loving, and it is the natural man who is wrathful against God, feeling He is angry at us.

Still, a number of Old Testament passages urge us to fear God in some sense. Psalm 34 describes clearly the kind of person who truly “fears” the Lord. These passages are written especially for the natural man in all of us, and for children – to help us understand how in our low natural minds we should listen seriously to the Lord God our Creator, and obey Him, especially His Ten Commandments.

At first this may feel like the fear of God as Lawgiver because He may punish us – and so a young person, or an angry sinner, is addressed bluntly: the way to wisdom is to begin by fearing God who created us and set before us a life of order and goodness. If we learn to obey our Maker, we will grow and learn about God’s love, and the fear we felt at first changes its character, and our love for God can grow.

WHAT IS THE SPIRITUAL SENSE OF FEARING GOD?

The New Testament and the Heavenly Doctrines call us to a higher understanding of God, and of fearing God, including the concept of holy fear. Here is one summary:

To fear the Lord’s name means, symbolically, to love, because everyone who loves another is afraid of injuring the one he loves. There is no genuine love without that fear. Accordingly, someone who loves the Lord is afraid of doing evil, because evils go counter to the Lord, as they go counter to His Divine laws in the Word…. To fear God means, symbolically, to love things having to do with God, by doing them, and refusing to do things which go counter to Him.” (Apocalypse Revealed 527)

One short summary of the spiritual sense says simply that fearing the Lord as “the beginning of wisdom" means that it is wisdom to worship the Lord. (Prophets and Psalms 361).

More explanation about fearing God comes in a discussion about “the small and the great” who “fear” the Lord’s name (Revelation 11:18). After death all people, Christian or not, spiritually small and great, “are saved who fear God and live in mutual love, in uprightness of heart and in sincerity from a religious principle, for all such, by an intuitive faith in God and by a life of charity, are associated together as to their souls with angels of heaven, and are thus conjoined to the Lord and saved.” (Apocalypse Explained 696:1)

Scriptural passages urging us “to fear Jehovah” also say that we should “keep and do” His words and commandments – because we worship God by means of truths and goods both. “Fearing” relates to a person’s understanding, and goodness in life relates to the will within us. Divine truth can bring a scary fear, in that it condemns the evil to hell. But Divine good does not condemn, since so far as a person receives and acts out of authentic goodness, that good takes away condemnation. “So far as a person is in the good of love there is fear of God;… also dread and terror disappear and become holy fear attended with reverence, so far as a person is in the good of love and in truths….” (Apocalypse Explained 696:6) Similarly, awe and reverence in worship vary with everyone according to our state of life.

Fear is not absent in love of God and the neighbor:

Spiritual fear is a holy fear that abides within every spiritual love, variously according to the quality and quantity of the love. In such a fear is the spiritual person, and he knows that the Lord does not do evil to anyone…, but does good to all, and desires to raise up everyone … into heaven to Himself. This is why the fear of the spiritual person is a holy fear, lest by evil life and false doctrine a person should turn away and so do harm to that Divine love in himself. (Apocalypse Explained 696:23)

Many passages in Swedenborg’s Writings discuss “holy fear” further – our fear of harming God and people whom we love.

SO, SHOULD I BE AFRAID OF GOD?

In actual living, when we love someone, we like to think of good things to do for him or her. But maybe the very first essential – the beginning of wisdom – is to avoid anything that would hurt a person or somehow be overbearing. An early enthusiastic love can be too powerful if we don’t think through the possible effects of our words or actions. A very strong religious convert can make promises beyond what his inner being can sustain until he has taken actual new steps in his living. In that way “fear” is, in time, a first or primary for our love for anyone, including love of God.

On the other hand, there is a contrary fear of God that in itself does not begin wisdom. “Fear of God in evil people is not love, but a fear of hell.” (Apocalypse Revealed 527) This natural fear is “a fearfulness, dread and terror of dangers and punishments, and thus of hell.…” (Apocalypse Explained 696:23) – far distant from a fear that is attached to love for God.

Old Testament descriptions portraying God as angry, changeable, and arbitrary speak to this low spiritual mentality, and should not be taken as the truth about God – though they do picture how many people envision God. And they do show us a key reality – that God the Creator does exist, and this universe, and my life, are more than just my personal possessions to play with, enjoy, and build up my own self-image. And if I am a creation and live His way, perhaps He can make me happy in this His world.

The realities of this God and His creation can be known truly only through a higher spiritual kind of fear flowing from love – yet a low natural fear may come first in time. When a person examines himself rationally and discovers “some evil, and says to himself, ‘This is a sin,’ and abstains from it through fear of eternal punishment … then for the first time the person from a pagan, becomes a Christian.” (True Christian Religion 525)

Jacob once awoke afraid after a strong dream about God, and he said, “Surely Jehovah is in this place; and I knew it not…. How dreadful is this place! This is none other but the house of God…., and this is the gate of heaven.” (Genesis 28:16-18) After a little time to reflect, he vowed: “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then shall Jehovah be my God….” (Genesis 28:20-21) We know not if this fearful and rather selfish vow made Jacob a wise follower of Jehovah, but later chapters do show Jacob as obedient to God.

I personally believe the literal meaning of “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom”. Obedience and faith often do begin with a low-level, natural-minded fear.

And that fear does contain a felt sense that there IS a Creator God (“I AM”) who wants humans to act according to His created systems. In this way fear is, in time, the beginning of wisdom.

Even though rooted at first in self-love, fear of God can be part of God’s “Let there be light” that begins our spiritual rebirth, and goes with our first vision “that there is something higher” than self. (See Arcana Coelestia 20: that “a person begins to know the good and the true are something higher.”) If you are in a state of fearful darkness, and think that “there is something higher,” something good and true above your control, you may be starting to let your Creator’s light show you the way.

Of course, a low-level scary fear needs to mature and grow into a spiritual fear. If we repent and shun evils, we open our door to the Lord, and allow Him to lead us through spiritual reform and rebirth (regeneration). He leads us towards holy fear, from a good love that is far different from “the darkness upon the faces of the deep” (our mental state before regeneration; Genesis 1:2)

Yes, even starting from a natural dread of hell, if you ACT from that fear by stopping some foul thing you do, you are beginning towards wisdom, by believing the fear is real – because God is real, and an unhappy afterlife is real. And, you point yourself on a path in God’s direction. This beginning in time may feel uncertain, cloudy, even silly – yet come from a feeling that an imperative from your Maker is real and makes sense. And if you act from that belief, then the belief begins to be a reality within you – a tiny beginning of wisdom. If you repeat and continue in it, the Lord leads you into a holier fear which flows from love. The key here might be if you’re willing to do God’s teachings even at times when you’re NOT feeling fear of Him or of hell. Perhaps this is the moment that wisdom actually begins.

People who live in the stream of God’s providence are “carried along constantly toward happier things, whatever appearance the means may present.” (Arcana Coelestia 8478:4) They trust in God with a spiritual fear of acting against His love, or bringing harm to others, because they wish to serve other people in God’s creation, and to receive within themselves something that comes from God.

“Thou wilt show me the path of life. In Thy presence is fullness of joy; at Thy right hand are pleasures for evermore.” (Psalm 16:11)

8478. 'Let no one leave any of it until the morning' means that they must not be anxious to acquire it of themselves. This is clear from the fact that the manna was given every morning and that worms bred in what was left over, meaning that the Lord provides people's requirements every day and that for this reason they ought not to be anxious to acquire them of themselves. The same thing is meant by daily bread in the Lord's Prayer and also by the Lord's words in Matthew,

Do not be anxious for your soul, what you are going to eat or what you are going to drink, nor for your body, what you are going to put on. Why be anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they do not toil, nor do they spin. Do not therefore be anxious, so that you say, What shall we eat? or What shall we drink? or What shall we wear? For all these things the gentiles seek. Does not your heavenly Father know that you have need of all these things? Seek first the kingdom of God ¹ and its righteousness, then all these things will be added to you. Do not therefore be anxious about the morrow; for the morrow will take care of the things that belong to it. Matthew 6:25-end.

Similar words occur in Luke 12:11-12, 22-31.

[2] The present verse and the one that follows refer in the internal sense to concern for the morrow, a concern which was not only forbidden but also condemned. The forbiddance of it is meant by their being told not to leave any of the manna till the morning, and the condemnation of it is meant by worms breeding in any they did leave and its becoming putrid. Anyone who does not view the matter from anywhere beyond the sense of the letter may think that all concern for the morrow is to be avoided, which being so, people should then await their requirements every day from heaven. But a person who views it from a position deeper than the literal meaning, that is, who views it from the internal sense, may recognize what concern for the morrow is used to mean - not concern to obtain food and clothing for oneself, and also resources for the future; for it is not contrary to order to make provision for oneself and one's dependents. But people are concerned about the morrow when they are not content with their lot, do not trust in God but in themselves, and have solely worldly and earthly things in view, not heavenly ones. These people are ruled completely by anxiety over the future, and by the desire to possess all things and exercise control over all other people. That desire is kindled and grows greater and greater, till at length it is beyond all measure. They grieve if they do not realize the objects of their desires, and they are distressed at the loss of them. Nor can they find consolation, for in times of loss they are angry with the Divine. They reject Him together with all belief, and curse themselves. This is what those concerned for the morrow are like.

[3] Those who trust in the Divine are altogether different. Though concerned about the morrow, yet are they unconcerned, in that they are not anxious, let alone worried, when they give thought to the morrow. They remain even-tempered whether or not they realize desires, and they do not grieve over loss; they are content with their lot. If they become wealthy they do not become infatuated with wealth; if they are promoted to important positions they do not consider themselves worthier than others. If they become poor they are not made miserable either; if lowly in status they do not feel downcast. They know that for those who trust in the Divine all things are moving towards an everlasting state of happiness, and that no matter what happens at any time to them, it contributes to that state.

[4] It should be recognized that Divine providence is overall, that is, it is present within the smallest details of all, and that people in the stream of providence are being carried along constantly towards happier things, whatever appearance the means may present. Those in the stream of providence are people who trust in the Divine and ascribe everything to Him. But those not in the stream of providence are people who trust in themselves alone and attribute everything to themselves; theirs is a contrary outlook, for they take providence away from the Divine and claim it as their own. It should be recognized also that to the extent that anyone is in the stream of providence he is in a state of peace; and to the extent that anyone is in a state of peace by virtue of the good of faith, he is in Divine providence. These alone know and believe that the Lord's Divine providence resides within every single thing, indeed within the smallest details of all, as has also been shown in 1919 (end), 4329, 5122 (end), 5894 (end), 6058, 6481-6486, 6490, 7004, 7007, as well as that Divine providence has what is eternal in view, 6491.

[5] Those with the contrary outlook are scarcely willing to allow any mention of providence. Instead they put every single thing down to prudence; and what they do not put down to prudence they put down to fortune or to chance. Some put it down to fate, which they do not ascribe to the Divine but to natural forces. They call those people simple who do not attribute all things to themselves or to natural forces. From all this one may again see what those people are like who are concerned for the morrow, and what those are like who are not concerned for the morrow.

Bilješke: