What the Writings Testify
What the Writings Testify
CHAPTER 12
The Revelation of the Doctrines of the New Church constitutes the Second
Advent of the Lord
"The Coming of the Lord is not His coming to destroy the visible heaven and the
habitable earth ..."
- True Christian Religion 768
"Since His ascension into heaven [the Lord] is in the glorified Human; and in this
He cannot appear to any man unless He first open the eyes of his spirit .... It is a vain
thing to believe that the Lord is to appear in the clouds of heaven in Person. but He is
to appear in the Word, which is from Him, thus is Himself."
- True Christian Religion 777
The coming of the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven (Matt. 16:27, 24:30, 26:64, Mark
14:61, 62, Luke 21:27, 22:69) means that when He comes to judgment He will appear in the
sense of the letter of the Word. And because He now has come, He has therefore appeared in
the Word through this that He has revealed that there is a spiritual sense in every single
thing of the sense of the letter of the Word, and that in it He alone is treated of, and
that He alone is the God of heaven and earth. These are the things meant by His advent in
the clouds of heaven".
- Apocalypse Revealed 642
"This Second Advent of the Lord is effected by means of a man before whom He has
manifested Himself in Person and whom He has filled with His Spirit, to teach the
doctrines of the New Church through the Word from Him.
" ...It follows that He is to do it by means of a man, who is able not only to
receive the doctrines of this Church with his understanding, but also to publish them by
the press. That the Lord has manifested Himself before me His servant and sent me on this
office, and that, after this, He opened the sight of my spirit and thus let me into the
spiritual world and gave me to see the heavens and the hells, and also to speak with
angels and spirits, and this now for many years, I testify in truth; and also that from
the first day of that call, I have not received any thing which pertains to the doctrines
of that Church from any angel, but from the Lord alone while I read the Word."
- True Christian Religion 779
"'And they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory,' signifies that then the Word shall be revealed as to its internal sense, in which the Lord
is. The 'Son of Man' is the truth Divine which is therein."
- Arcana Coelestia 4060:7
"The Advent of the Lord is the revelation of truth Divine at the end of the church
"
- Arcana Coelestia 9807.4
It has now pleased the Lord to reveal many arcana of heaven, especially the internal or
spiritual sense of the Word, which hitherto has been entirely unknown; and therewith He
has taught the genuine truths of doctrine; which revelation is meant by the Advent of the
Lord in Matthew xxiv."
- Apocalypse Explained 641:3
"That a new ecclesiastical history should be written, because now is the Advent of
the Lord, predicted in Matthew, chap. xxiv...
"That when the Brief Exposition was published, the angelic heaven ... appeared of a
deep scarlet color with the most beautiful flowers ...
"That there was inscribed on the books, 'The Advent of the Lord' (Adventus Domini)-on
all in the spiritual world; by command I likewise inscribed the same on two copies in
Holland".
- Ecclesiastical History 1, 7, 8
Note: One of these two copies-of the Summaria Expositio-has been found and is on
display in the Royal British Museum. The inscription on the fly leaf reads: "Hic
Liber est Adventus Domini, scriptum ex mandato" (This Book is the Advent of the Lord,
written by command). Four references are added in Swedenborg's hand: "2513, 4535,
6895, 8427, p. 19 .
"'I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse' (Rev. xix.11) signifies the
spiritual sense of the Word revealed by the Lord, and thereby the interior understanding
of the Word disclosed, which is the advent of the Lord ... That this is the advent of the
Lord, is because by that sense it manifestly appears that the Lord is the Word, that the
Word treats of Him alone, that He is the God of heaven and earth, and that the New Church
exists from Him alone.... The spiritual sense of the Word is at this day
revealed...."
- Apocalypse Revealed 820
"The Coming of the Lord in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory, signifies His
presence in the Word, and revelation.... Hence it is manifest that by these words of
the Lord is meant that at the end of the church, when love and thence faith would be no
more, the Lord would open the Word as to its internal sense, and would reveal the arcana
of heaven. The arcana revealed in the following pages are concerning heaven and hell and
at the same time concerning the life of man after death ... That at this day there exists
such an immediate revelation, is because this is what is meant by the Advent of the
Lord."
- Heaven and Hell 1
"The doctrine of the church is that this is the Advent of the Lord and that thence
it is that arcana have been opened by the Lord respecting heaven and hell, man's life
after death, the Word, the last judgment- which have all been written out in Latin and
sent to all the archbishops and bishops of the kingdom [of Great Britain] and to the
nobility. And still not a word has been heard, a sign that they do not interiorly care for
the things of heaven and the church, and that it is now the very end of the church and
indeed that the church no longer exists ..."
- Concerning the Athanasian Creed 2
" ...Without the advent of the Lord into the world, no one could have been saved.
It is similar at this day: wherefore unless the Lord came again into the world in Divine
truth which is the Word, not any one can be saved."
- True Christian Religion 3
"'The consummation of the age' ...is the last time of the church; and the [second]
advent of the Lord then is the revelation of Himself, and of Divine truth from Him, in the
Word through the internal sense; elsewhere than in the Word the Lord does not reveal
Himself, nor there otherwise than through the internal sense."
- Apocalypse Explained 36
"That a revelation has been made by the Lord concerning heaven and hell,
concerning the last judgment (which has been accomplished), and concerning the spiritual
sense of the Word. Thus the way to salvation has been revealed, and the state of man after
death; and this fully and plainly, so that anyone who understands the Latin language can
know ..."
- De Domino, Preface
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