Preface

THE first two volumes explained [the first] fifteen chapters of Genesis and said what is contained in their inner meaning. Attached to each chapter [in those volumes] was a record of what the Lord in his divine mercy has given me the opportunity to see and hear in the world of spirits and the heaven of angels. Now comes the third volume, which includes similar reports likewise attached to each chapter. The article appended to the present chapter, Genesis 16 [§§1966–1983], concerns visions and dreams (including prophetic dreams) in the Word.

I know few will believe that anyone can see into the other world or report from there on the state of souls after death, because few believe in the resurrection, and even fewer of the well-educated than of the naive. It is true that they say with their lips that they will rise again, because this accords with official theology, but they deny it at heart.

[2] Some even confess openly that they would believe it if someone were to rise from the dead and they were to see, hear, and touch the person. If this happened, though, it would be an isolated experience and would fail to convince those who at heart deny the resurrection. A thousand objections would occur to them and harden them in their negative frame of mind.

Some do claim to believe they will rise again, but on the day of the Last Judgment. The picture they have formed of this is that everything in the visible world will cease to exist on that day; and since they have been awaiting it in vain for so many centuries, they too are dubious. What is meant by the Last Judgment mentioned in the Word, however, will be summarized at the end of the next chapter, Genesis 17, the Lord in his divine mercy willing [§§2117–2133].

[3] These attitudes indicate what kind of people make up the Christian world today. The Sadducees told of in Matthew 22:23 and the verses that follow openly denied the resurrection, but they acted better than people today who deny it at heart but claim they do not (since it is the official teaching, as noted) Their words contradict their beliefs, and their beliefs contradict their words.

To prevent them from growing even more firmly entrenched in this misguided opinion, the Lord in his divine mercy has given me the privilege of experiencing the next world in spirit while bodily present in this world (since a human being is a spirit clothed with a body). There I have spoken with souls recently revived after death, and in fact with almost everyone I knew during physical life who had since died. Every day now for several years I have also talked with spirits and angels and seen astounding sights that it has never occurred to anyone to imagine. No illusion of any kind was involved.

[4] Many people say that if someone comes to them from the other life, they will believe, so we shall see now whether they can be persuaded despite their hard hearts.

This I can assert positively: People who come into the next life from the Christian world are the worst of all. They hate their neighbor, they hate the religion, they deny the Lord (since it is the heart rather than the mouth that does the talking in the other world), not to mention the fact that they are more adulterous than anyone else. Because heaven is starting to move away from people inside the church, then, clearly the last days are at hand, as I have learned for certain.

To learn about the identity and nature of the Word’s inner meaning, see the statements and illustrations in the first two volumes, §§1–5, 64, 65, 66, 167, 605, 920, 937, 1143, 1224, 1404, 1405, 1408, 1409, 1502 at the end, 1540, 1659, 1756, 1767–1777 and 1869–1879 (particularly), 1783, 1807; and in the present volume, §§1886–1889.

1886. Genesis 16

THIS chapter has to do with Hagar and Ishmael, but until now no one has recognized what they represent and symbolize on an inner level. No one could have recognized it, because so far the world (even the scholarly world) has supposed that the stories of the Word are mere narratives, with no deeper implications. They have said that every jot is divinely inspired, but they do not mean much by it. All they mean is that the contents have been revealed [by God] and that some amount of doctrine relevant to their theology can be drawn from it and used by teachers and students. Because the stories have been divinely inspired (the world reasons), they have divine force in people's minds and do them more good than any other history.

Taken at face value, however, the narratives do little to improve us. They have no effect at all on our eternal life, because in the other world historical detail is obliterated from memory. What good would it do us there to know about Hagar the slave, about the fact that Sarai gave her to Abram, about Ishmael, or even about Abram? In order to go to heaven and partake of its joy (that is, of eternal life), our souls need only what belongs to and comes from the Lord. This is what his Word is for, and this is what it contains in its depths.

1502. These remarks now make it clear that Abram's stay in Egypt simply represents and symbolizes the Lord, and specifically the education he received when he was young. The following saying of Hosea's offers further confirmation:

Out of Egypt I called my child. (Hosea 11:1; Matthew 2:15)

Still further confirmation appears in the following words in Moses:

The residence of the children of Israel who resided in Egypt: four hundred thirty years. And it happened at the end of four hundred thirty years — and it happened on that same day — that all the armies of Jehovah left the land of Egypt. (Exodus 12:40-41)

These years were counted not from the time of Jacob's entry into Egypt but from that of Abram's stay there, from which time four hundred thirty years had passed. ¹ So the child out of Egypt referred to in Hosea 11:1 symbolizes the Lord, in an inner sense.

Still further confirmation comes from the fact that in the Word, the sole function of "Egypt" is to symbolize scholarly learning, as shown in §§1164, 1165, 1462.

[2] The presence of these secrets can also be seen from the fact that similar things are said of Abram — that he called his wife his sister — during his stay in Philistia (Genesis 20:1-9). Similar things are said of Isaac as well — that he called his wife his sister — when he too stayed in Philistia (Genesis 26:6-13). These stories, involving almost the same circumstances, would never have been recounted in the Word if the kind of secrets mentioned had not lain hidden in them.

What is more, this is the Lord's Word, which has no life whatsoever in it if it does not contain an inner meaning that focuses on him.

[3] The secrets that lie buried here (and in the stories about Abram and Isaac in Philistia) tell how the Lord's human quality came together with his divine quality. Or, to say the same thing another way, they tell how the Lord became Jehovah down to his human nature as well. They also reveal that the process started when he was young, which is the subject here.

In addition, these verses involve much more hidden information than anyone could ever believe. The amount that can be expressed, however, is so small that it hardly amounts to anything. Besides the deep mysteries concerning the Lord, the chapter also includes secrets about our own education and rebirth as heavenly people, and about our education and rebirth as spiritual people. It deals with those processes as they occur not only in the individual specifically but also in the church generally. Then too it contains secrets about the education of children in heaven. In short, it describes the instruction of everyone who is becoming the Lord's image and likeness. These things show only in the inner meaning, not in the literal meaning, since the historical details overpower and eclipse them.