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The Second Class of Interiors in which the Lord is Acknowledged
Heavenly states of life are grounded in the loves of heaven and hence form the basis for an acknowledgement of the Lord. This acknowledgement is not something of the lips alone but is expressed from the very life and so constitutes genuine worship of the Lord. Good is the focus in these states where one lives according to one’s conscience. When the “Divine Being” or the Lord, as the Word, is placed at the centre, it brings with it an ever-deepening affection for Divine truths. This affection is not just a love of learning about spiritual things, it includes this of course, but it is so much more, having a primary focus on their practice and use.
All that have lived a good life in the world and have acted from conscience, who are such as have acknowledged the Divine and have loved Divine truths, especially such as have applied those truths to life, seem to themselves, when let into the state of their interiors, like one aroused from sleep into full wakefulness, or like one passing from darkness into light. They then think from the light of heaven, thus from an interior wisdom, and they act from good, thus from an interior affection. Heaven flows into their thoughts and affections with an interior blessedness and delight that they had previously had no knowledge of; for they have communication with the angels of heaven.
They then acknowledge the Lord and worship Him from their very life, for being in the state of their interiors they are in their proper life (as has been said just above, 505); and as freedom pertains to interior affection they then acknowledge and worship the Lord from freedom. Thus, too, they withdraw from external sanctity and come into that internal sanctity in which worship itself truly consists. Such is the state of those that have lived a Christian life in accordance with the commandments in the Word (HH 506-1).
Metanoia or Repentance: Living from the Word as the Lord
The heavenly sense of self is the heavenly proprium that arises through the integration of the Word into our life. This integration is how a genuine spiritual conscience is formed. When we start to turn to the Word seeking truths, with the intent to live our life from them, then a change starts to occur in our mind. That change initiates subtle shifts in the state of our affections and belief structures. This process of transformation that manifests in the spiritual world of our minds, is mirrored in the process described in the awakening series in Heaven and Hell that newly arrived spirits undergo. To work with the Word means that we start to think from the Word, or to put it another way, we start to think from the Lord as the Word; from the goods and truths that are the Word. This is the practice of repentance, which is a translation of the Greek word “metanoia”. This word means to be given a “new mind” or to “think in a new way” which is the product of a transformative change of heart.
Everyone must come to see their state of the life as it really is. To awaken spiritually means to awaken to the reality of our situation; to awaken to what we are apart from the Lord, as well as to who the Lord is and to the new sense of self that He provides for all through the Word, when this is believed and lived. To apply truths from the Word to our interior life is what it means to acknowledge the Lord as the source of our life. This is what it means to worship in spirit and in truth (Jn 4:23) and it is this kind of worship that transforms the mind and heart as the following makes clear.
They then acknowledge the Lord and worship Him from their very life, for being in the state of their interiors they are in their proper life (as has been said just above, 505); and as freedom pertains to interior affection they then acknowledge and worship the Lord from freedom (HH 506-1).
Preparation and Movement into the Third State of Awakening
So, we come to see that there is a sense of self that lives from the hellish proprium that doesn’t acknowledge the Lord as the source of all that is good and true. Then there is also a sense of self in which He is acknowledged and worshiped. The awakening more deeply into these two selves parallels the separations we see described in the spiritual world between evils sprits and good spirits.
In this second state the separation of evil spirits from good spirits takes place. For in the first state they are together, since while a spirit is in his exteriors he is as he was in the world, thus the evil with the good and the good with the evil; but it is otherwise when he has been brought into his interiors and left to his own nature or will (HH 511).
The ability to see evil states and to respond appropriately to shun them, enables the process of separation in which the sense of self is extracted from what is evil and false and implanted into what is good and true. When effort is made ‘as of self” to see and acknowledge the evil and false states that are made conscious, the Lord is then able to gather them together and separate them from the sense of self that is spiritual and focused on the Lord. Essentially, it is the removal of the hellish proprium to the periphery in the mind and the implanting and emerging of a new heavenly sense of self or heavenly proprium, that is now the focus in the center.
The separation of evil spirits from good spirits is effected by various means; in general by their being taken about to those societies with which in their first state they had communication by means of their good thoughts and affections, thus to those societies that they had induced to believe by outward appearances that they were not evil. Usually they are led about through a wide circle, and everywhere what they really are is made manifest to good spirits.
At the sight of them the good spirits turn away; and at the same time the evil spirits who are being led about turn their faces away from the good towards that quarter where their infernal society is, into which they are about to come (HH 511).
In the work that comes with living a spiritual life, these evil spirits or states serve a use in allowing us to see the contrast of what is good, and of the Lord, and what belongs to the hellish proprium. It is only then that we, as of self, have the ability to shun evils as sins against the Lord. We see this paralleled in the description of the uses that evil spirits serve:
Another of their uses is their collecting together evil spirits like themselves and separating them from the good; and another, that the truths and goods that the evil had outwardly professed and feigned are taken away from them, and they are brought into the evils of their life and the falsities of their evil, and are thus prepared for hell (HH 508-6).
Evil spirits are not interested in being instructed in the things of heaven which is what the next phase in the awakening process entails. This is because their essential nature is love of self and the world and they are consequently led by their loves, away to their eternal community in the hells. This separation is mirrored in all states of evil and falsity that are acknowledged through awakening to spiritual life. When what belongs to the hellish proprium is seen for what it is, this very acknowledgement initiates the separation of those things that are not of the Lord, so that they are cast aside into the hells from which they arose.
… and after death he continues to be such as the nature is that he has acquired by his life in the world; and with the evil this nature can no longer be amended and changed by means of the thought or by the understanding of truth (HH 508-7).
Exhortation is no longer of any avail, neither is instruction or fear of the law and of the loss of reputation, since everyone then acts from his nature; and that nature can be restrained and broken only by punishments (HH 509).
So, the spirits (or states of the hellish proprium), whose interiors are of a hellish quality, find a home in hell (or are cast to the periphery of our mind). The good spirits (or states of the Lord), that are of a heavenly quality, move onto the third state of instruction in preparation for their assimilation into a heavenly community (or state of use).
The instruction provided is directly related to the uses to which the form of mind is specifically suited.
The third state of man after death, that is, of his spirit, is a state of instruction. This state is for those who come into heaven and become angels. It is not for those who come into hell, because such are incapable of being taught, and therefore their second state is also their third, ending in this, that they are wholly turned to their own love, thus to that infernal society which is in a like love (512 HH).
