Why Faith is Important

THOSE WHO DO NOT ADMIT OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE KNOWLEDGES OF FAITH ARE KEPT SECURE FROM EVIL SPIRITS. [Certain] spirits complained that they could no longer be present, because as long as anyone remained [firm] in the knowledges of faith, he was not allowed to admit objections. They said therefore that they had no means of leading them, affirming also that it was through this medium that they seduced them; that by the force of a single objection all confirming truths, however numerous, were rendered of no effect; for man is so borne on by his cupidities, which produce phantasies, that they willingly admit objections, of which a single one then becomes stronger with them than a thousand confirmations. Wherefore that a man be true, or in true faith, he ought to be in the opposite state, so that one truth may prevail over a thousand or ten thousand objections; thus evil spirits will flee, for they cannot live in such a sphere. - Emanuel Swedenborg, Spiritual Experiences, 3164

Now this was the faith of these of whom I have spoken; they are young, and their minds are firm, and they do put their trust in God continually. - Alma 57:27

Be wise in the days of your probation; strip yourselves of all uncleanness; ask not, that ye may consume it on your lusts, but ask with a firmness unshaken, that ye will yield to no temptation, but that ye will serve the true and living God. - Mormon 9:28

 It is evident from the foregoing that, through work in a higher world, the soul must withdraw from the body some of its activity ordinarily bestowed upon it with such care. It leaves the body to a certain extent self-dependent, and the body needs a substitute for what the soul had formerly done for it. If it does not obtain such a substitute, it comes in danger of mischief from hurtful forces, for one must in this regard be clear that man is continually subject to the influences of his surroundings. Actually he lives only through the influences of these surroundings. Among these, the kingdoms of visible nature first of all come under consideration. Man himself belongs to this visible nature. If there were no mineral, plant and animal kingdoms, nor other human beings around him, he could not live. If an individual could be imagined as cut off from the earth and lifted up into surrounding space, he would have to perish instantly as a physical being, just as the hand would wither if cut off from the body. Just as the illusion would be formidable if a human hand were to believe that it could exist without the body, so powerful would be the deception of a man who maintained that he could exist as a physical being without the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, and without other men. — But besides the above-named kingdoms there are three others that generally escape the notice of man. These are the three elemental kingdoms. They stand, in a sense, below the mineral kingdom. There are beings who do not condense into the mineral condition, but who are none the less present and exert their influence upon man. (Further information concerning these elemental kingdoms will be found in my Cosmic Memory, and also in the remarks about them in my Theosophy.) Man is thus exposed to influences from kingdoms of nature that in a sense must be called invisible. Now, when the soul works upon the body, a considerable part of its activity consists in regulating the influences of the elemental kingdoms in such a way that they are beneficial to man. — The instant the soul withdraws part of its activity from the body, injurious powers from the elemental kingdoms may get hold of it. Herein lies a danger of higher development. Therefore care must be taken that, as soon as the soul is withdrawn from the body, the latter is in itself accessible only to good influences from the elemental world. If this be disregarded, the ordinary man deteriorates, to a certain extent, physically and also morally, in spite of having gained access to higher worlds. While the soul dwells in the higher regions, pernicious forces insinuate themselves into the dense physical body and the etheric body. This is the reason why certain bad qualities, which before the higher development had been held in check by the regulating power of the soul, may now come to the fore for want of caution. Men formerly of good moral nature may, under such circumstances, when they enter higher worlds, reveal all kinds of low inclinations, increased selfishness, untruthfulness, vindictiveness, wrath, and so forth. — No one alarmed by this fact need be deterred from rising to the higher worlds, but care must be taken to prevent the occurrence of such things. The lower nature of man must be fortified and made inaccessible to dangerous elemental influences. This can be brought about by the conscious cultivation of certain virtues. These virtues are set forth in the writings on spiritual development. Here is the reason why they must be carefully sought after. They are the following.First of all, the human being must, in a fully conscious manner, in all things, continually be intent upon the lasting, distinguish the imperishable from the transitory and turns his attention toward it. In all things and beings he can suppose or discern something that remains after the transitory appearance has faded away. If I see a plant, I can first observe it as it presents itself to the senses. No one should neglect to do this, for no one who has not first made himself thoroughly familiar with the perishable aspect will detect the eternal in things. Those who are continually afraid that to fix their attention on the spiritually imperishable will cause them to lose the freshness and naturalness of life do not really know what is being dealt with. But when I look at a plant in this way, it can become clear to me that there. is in it a lasting living impulse that will reappear in a new plant when the present plant has long since crumbled to dust. Such an orientation toward things must be adopted in the whole temper of life. — Then the heart must be fixed upon all that is valuable and genuine, which one must learn to esteem more highly than the fleeting and insignificant. In all feelings and actions, the value of any single thing must be held before the eyes in the context of the whole. — Thirdly, six qualities should be developed: control of the thought world, control of actions, endurance, impartiality, trust in the surrounding world, and inner equilibrium. Control of the thought world can be attained if one takes the trouble to combat that wandering will-o'-the-wisping of the thoughts and feelings that in ordinary human beings are constantly rising and falling. In everyday life man is not the master of his thoughts; he is driven by them. Naturally, it cannot be otherwise, for life drives man and as a practical person he must yield to this. In ordinary life there is no alternative. But if a higher world is to be approached, at least brief periods must be set aside in which one makes oneself ruler of one's thought and feeling world. Therein, in complete inner freedom one puts a thought in the center of one's soul, where otherwise ideas obtrude themselves upon one from without. Then one tries to keep away all intruding thoughts and feeling and to link with the first thought only what one wills to admit as suitable. Such an exercise works beneficially upon the soul and through it also upon the body. It brings the latter into such a harmonious condition that it withdraws itself from injurious influences despite the fact that the soul is not directly acting upon it. — Control of actions consists of a similar regulation of these through inner freedom. A good beginning is made when one sets oneself to do regularly something that it would not have occurred to us to do in ordinary life. For in the latter, man is indeed driven to his actions from without. But the smallest action undertaken on one's innermost initiative accomplishes more in the direction indicated than all the pressures of outer life. — Endurance consists in holding oneself at a distance from every whim that can be designated as a shift from “exulting to the highest heaven to grieving even unto death.” Man is driven to and fro among all kinds of moods. Pleasure makes him glad; pain depresses him. This has its justification. But he who seeks the path to higher knowledge must be able to mitigate joy and also grief. He must become stable. He must with moderation surrender to pleasurable impressions and also painful experiences; he must move with dignity through both. He must never be unmanned nor disconcerted. This does not produce lack of feeling, but it brings man to the steady center within the ebbing and flowing tide of life around him. He has himself always in hand.
Another important quality is the “yea saying” sense. This can be developed in one who in all things has an eye for the good, beautiful, and purposeful aspects of life, and not, primarily, for the blameworthy, ugly and contradictory. In Persian poetry there is a beautiful legend about Christ, which illustrates the meaning of this quality. A dead dog is lying on the road. Among the passersby is Christ. All the others turn away from the ugly sight; only Christ pauses and speaks admiringly of the animal's beautiful teeth. It is possible to look at things in this way, and he who earnestly seeks for it may find in all things, even the most repulsive, something worthy of acknowledgment. The fruitfulness in things is not in what is lacking in them, but in what they have. — Further, it is important to develop the quality of “impartiality.” Every human being has gone through his own experiences and has formed from them a fixed set of opinions according to which he directs his life. Just as conformity to experience is of course necessary, on the one hand, it is also important that he who would pass through spiritual development to higher knowledge should always keep an eye open for everything new and unfamiliar that confronts him. He will be as cautious as possible with judgments such as, “That is impossible,” “That cannot be.” Whatever opinion he may have formed from previous experiences, he will be ready at any moment, when he encounters something new, to admit a new opinion. All love of one's own opinion must vanish. — When the five above mentioned qualities have been acquired, a sixth then presents itself as a matter of course: Inner balance, the harmony of the spiritual forces. The human being must find within himself a spiritual center of gravity that gives him firmness and security in the face of all that would pull him hither and thither in life. The sharing in all surrounding life must not be shunned, and everything must be allowed to work upon one. Not flight from all the distracting activities of life is the correct course, but rather, the full devoted yielding to life, along with the sure, firm guarding of inner balance and harmony.
Lastly, the “will to freedom,” must come within the seeker's consideration. Whoever finds within himself the support and basis of all that he accomplishes already has this attribute. It is so hard to achieve because of the balance necessary between the opening of the senses to everything great and good and the simultaneous rejection of every compulsion. It is so easy to say that influence from without is incompatible with freedom. The essential thing is that the two should be reconciled within the soul. When someone tells me something and I accept it under the compulsion of his authority, I am not free. But I am no less unfree if I shut myself off from the good that I might receive in this way. For then worse elements in my own soul act as a compulsion upon me. Freedom means not only that I am free from the compulsion of an outside authority, but above all that I am not subservient to any prejudices, opinions, sensations and feelings of my own. The right way is not blind subjection to what is received, but to leave ourselves open to suggestion, receiving it impartially, so that we may freely acknowledge it. An outside authority should exert no more influence than to make one say, “I make myself free just by following the good in it — that is to say, by making it my own.” An authority based upon occult wisdom will not at all exert influence otherwise than in this way. It gives whatever it has to give, not in order itself to gain power over the recipient, but solely that through the gift the recipient may become richer and freer. - Rudolf Steiner, The Knowledge of Higher Worlds

On Breathing and Thought

Then, proceeding further, you may begin to study in the human being something that is really much more difficult to observe, although it is generally thought to be easy — that is, to gain an understanding of how the human being takes breath, how he sets his rhythmic system in movement, and how the breath leads over into the blood circulation. This tremendously living play, which penetrates the whole body, is far more complicated than it is thought to be. The human being takes in the breath, the breath transforms itself into blood circulation, but on the other side the breath again passes over into the head and is related in a definite way to the whole activity of the brain. Thinking is simply a refined, delicate breathing. The blood circulation, again, passes over into the impulses of the movements of the limbs. - Rudolf Steiner, Karmic Relationships 

But it must not be forgotten that man has a twofold respiration, one of the spirit and another of the body; and that the respiration of the spirit depends on the fibers from the brains, and the respiration of the body on the blood-vessels from the heart, and from the vena cava and aorta. It is evident, moreover, that thought produces respiration; it is evident, also, that affection, which is of love, produces thought, for thought without affection is precisely like respiration without a heart, a thing impossible. From this it is clear that affection, which is of love, conjoins itself to thought, which is of the understanding (as was said above), in like manner as the heart does in the lungs - Emanuel Swedenborg, Divine Love and Wisdom 412

On the Third Eye

The influx of the Lord Himself into man is into his forehead, and from that into the whole face, because the forehead of man corresponds to love, and the face corresponds to all his interiors. The influx of spiritual angels into man is into his head every where, from the forehead and temples to the whole part that contains the cerebrum, because that region of the head corresponds to intelligence; but the influx of celestial angels is into that part of the head that contains the cerebellum, and is called the occiput, from the ears all around even to the neck, for that region corresponds to wisdom. All the speech of angels with man enters by these ways into his thought; and by this means I have perceived what angels they were that spoke with me. - Emanuel Swedenborg, Heaven and Hell 251

 There was a time when the etheric head protruded way beyond the physical body. Even in Atlantean times, the forehead was a point where the etheric head stood far out beyond the physical head, as is still the case today with the horses and other animals. With horses the etheric head today still protrudes beyond the physical. In modern man this point in the etheric head has been brought under protection of the physical head and this gives him the capacity to develop those parts of the physical brain which enable him to call himself “I.” This organ, which enables man to call himself “I,” is connected with a definite process which took place during the Atlantean development of the earth. The occult teacher now instructs his pupil thus: direct your thoughts and concentrate them on this point! Then he gives him a mantra. In this way, a certain force in this part of the head is aroused which corresponds to a certain process in the macrocosm. In such a way a correspondence between microcosm and macrocosm is evoked. Through a similar concentration on the eye, the pupil acquires knowledge of the sun. One finds the entire spiritual organization of the macrocosm spiritually within one's own organs. ... All around us are parts of our self. This is represented, for example, in the myth of Dionysos. It is for this reason that the Rosicrucian training places such a great value upon an objective and quiet contemplation of the external world: If you wish to know yourself, behold yourself in the mirror of the outer world and its beings! What is in your soul shall speak to you far more clearly from the eyes of companions than if you harden yourself and sink into your own soul.  - Rudolf Steiner, Esoteric Development

Review: Karmic Relationships Vol 4

Karmic Relationships Vol 4: Esoteric Studies: 004 by Rudolf Steiner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In this book, the last lecture Rudolf Steiner ever gave is included. He wasn't able to finish it.

Springing from Powers of the Sun,
Radiant Spirit-powers, blessing all Worlds!
For Michael's garment of rays
Ye are predestined by Thought Divine.
He, the Christ-messenger, revealeth in you —
Bearing mankind aloft — the sacred Will of Worlds.
Ye, the radiant Beings of Aether-Worlds,
Bear the Christ-Word to Man.
Thus shall the Heralds of Christ appear
To the thirstily waiting souls,
To whom your Word of Light shines forth In cosmic age of Spirit-Man.
Ye, the disciples of Spirit-Knowledge,
Take Michael's Wisdom beckoning,
Take the Word of Love of the Will of Worlds Into your soul's aspiring, a c t i v e l y !

When the audiobook reader said these words, I felt as if I were conveyed forward in thought by a higher power than me. Light touched me, as if saying: "You know what to do. Do it now."

This world is dark. There is little light anywhere. This darkness encloses on me, on everyone, like a vice, pressing down on us, making us long for something we cannot have. We do not want to step forward, dance, sing, let our light so shine, so that light comes forward though the softness in that dance that Ahrimanic darkness would harden. But we deserve more than his lies.

I, for one, am done with Ahriman. Good riddance. I am done checking frantically on Instagram, narcissistically hoping for a garment that would clothe me and make me safe. I am done with neediness. I am done with fear. I am done with envious lust. Ahriman, I will not fear to sting you.

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Intimations on Autism

Without a kind of marriage, nothing ever exists or is produced. In the very organic forms of man, both composite and simple, and even in the most simple, there is a passive and an active, which, if they were not coupled as in a marriage, like that of man and wife, could not even be there, still less produce anything, and the case is the same throughout universal nature. These incessant marriages derive their source and origin from the heavenly marriage; and thereby there is impressed upon everything in universal nature, both animate and inanimate, an idea of the Lord's kingdom. - Emanuel Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia 718

The love of recognizing objects, from the love of being circumspect and defending one's self, has the sense of touch, the pleasures whereof are titillations. That the love of conjoining one's self with one's consort, from the love of uniting good and truth, has the sense of touch is because that sense is common to all the senses and hence takes tribute from all. That this love brings all the above-mentioned senses into communion with itself and appropriates to itself their pleasures, is well known. That the sense of touch is dedicated to conjugial love and is the sense proper thereto, is evident from its every sport and from the exaltation of its refinements to the supremely exquisite. But the further pursuit of this subject is left to lovers. - Emanuel Swedenborg, Conjugial Love 210

"The Lord God said: it is not good for man to be alone." - Genesis 2:18

Autism is the separation of intention and form, of feeling from thought. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Happiness, sadness, pain, heartache, love, tears, joy - this is all there, but the body does not respond. Fire is inside, but it cannot inflame the body's form. The body is obstinate, unwilling to cooperate.

Why? It doesn't know how. There is no bridge, no intermediate principle (link) between the fire of intention and the heavy, plod-plod body that would carry out the intention. There is no water slide, only the precipice and the abyss below. There is no ease; only the abrupt transition from above to below. Everything is collision; nothing is ease-y. Everything is hard.

There is a consolation: the autistic person, if they know feeling, know it more purely than anyone else. Whereas the woman moving with smooth gestures and the man holding his head up with a well-defined presence may think they feel, they don't. For they have confused intention and form. They are one for the socially adept. If they have never been separate, how could they be seen as different? The autistic individual, with the locked-in obsession, the tense muscles, and the abrupt motions, may not move their hands like ripples on the water or walk with well-tuned rhythm, but they don't have to. The water and the rhythm are there, pure, in the spirit, untainted by bodily coating. Autism is spirit distilled from matter.

And yet there is a possibility for change. A remote one, a delicate one, but a glimmer that is nevertheless there: courting. The autistic spirit must court the non-responsive body. For what is it that happens in any developing relationship? The one must see his spirit in her spirit. See the courting couple! See the way the man leans on the table and how the woman, mirroring his gesture, unconsciously responds. See smiles light up between a group of people like a wildfire, no one aware of what he or she is doing. This is unconscious, but it is the same unconsciousness that the hand has when it picks up an object on the table. When we court, we become organs in a single body. Your body is a marriage, and every marriage is a body.

So too with the heart (the intention) and the head (the organ of form). For Joe Blow on the street, they are a happily married couple who have slept skin to skin for decades. For the toe-walking, stiff-gestured autistic, the two are apart. They fear and hate each other. For how could you trust thought when it distorts everything and pins everything down? How could you trust feeling when it has no place to be? And yet they are both mistaken. Thought embraces feeling; feeling gives warmth for thought. And despite the fear, despite the terrifying plod-plod of the form that is the body, despite the open abyss that is emotion, they can unite. And it is wonderful.

The beginning is sight. The spirit, the feeling, intending fire in the heart, must see the form of thought and body. They must simply look at each other. They stand in front of each other, tentative, unsure, afraid. But then they notice: we are not that different, you and I. Like in the scene in Disney's Tarzan which can only be described as bespeaking a deeply spiritual reality, feeling says "I have hands, but so do you." And they touch. And then the relief comes. And then the tears. The dam breaks. The hand reaches through the mirror. The eyes soften and let in the world.

And in that moment, the autistic person says this: "I am not alone. I never was. The warmth in me, hidden, distilled, pure, had forgotten the taste of touch where, through form, warmth discovers itself anew in another. And while this was not without value, it was exhausting, and I deserve rest. This rest is reincarnation through touch; resurrection through matching palms. I can have me and you at the same time. And this grace is only discovered where the oneness of warmth, of feeling, of intention, of verbitude (link) realizes that it can slip, warmly, comfortably, under the covers with definition, with body, with thought, with form, with nounitude. This light is possible. You can have it. And it is seeking you. Just let her reach out and touch her palms to yours.

Review: Karmic Relationships V.3

Karmic Relationships V.3 by Rudolf Steiner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

For Anthroposophy, there are seven archangels. Gabriel is one of them, and Michael is another. Each one has to do with certain qualities, and they trade off taking control every three hundred years.

Steiner says that in the three hundred years ending in 1870, Gabriel was in charge. He has to do with heredity, and so with that era nationality, race, and ethnicity were huge concerns. We are now in an age of Michael. Michael rules the principle of intelligence, and until the 9th century AD, all intelligence came directly from him. Intelligence didn't belong to human beings - we just received it. But since the 9th century, intelligence has descended to the individual level. It is *ours* now when it wasn't before. Where before we were mirrors, now we are lamps. No more do we treat learning as a gift from above; now everyone can post tweets and Facebook statuses about their opinion and assert it to be their own intelligence. For Michaelic intelligence has descended to earth, and that's really dangerous.

Why? Because with the personal-ization of intelligence, the possibility has arisen for us to be blind to the spiritual. Every Richard Dawkins or Daniel Dennett can be blind to spiritual realities and pronounce it common sense. This is the influence of Ahriman, an evil god who *is* materialism, whom Steiner describes as biting, cynical, and overwhelmingly intelligent. He wants to make all intelligence purely earthly, purely personal. And if the state of the world is anything to go by, he's doing really well.

But Michael has a plan. Ever since his intelligence started descending to individual earthly humans, he has assembled legions in the spiritual worlds to bring light again to earth. According to Steiner, Michael assembled a spiritual school of sorts in the 15th century, where he taught them the plan to go into the world and express divine intelligence again. This school was "acted out" in the spiritual world though imaginations at the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. And becoming in 1870, it came to earth, and it got bigger and bigger until the end of the twentieth century (still in the future for Steiner). Among other things, it came to earth as Anthroposophy.

Anthroposophy is a manifestation of the Michaelite impulse to reclaim personal intelligence and subsume it under the cosmic intelligence he personfies. Where we are locked inside our skulls, Anthroposophy urges us to see intelligence *in* the world, out in the open, where neither walls nor skin color nor even skin separates us. It is the impulse of universality, where light cleaves unto light.

But not only Anthroposophy. If you recall, Mormonism started at that time. Mormonism longs to gather Israel, to seek out the hidden flecks of light everywhere, to help the captive daughter of Zion "arise from the dust." For this dust is Ahriman, and whenever Mormons redeem the dead, establish converts, minister to their wards, or otherwise gather Zion, they are freeing Michaelic light from it.

And more: Sufism, with definite trans-debominational tendencies, really exploded in Africa in the eighteenth century, and Swedenborg notably predicted that it would and that it was planned. Moreover, Swedenborg himself spoke of a great "Last Judgment" that occurred in the eighteenth century. And then of course there's any number of spiritual movements since then that long to gather and integrate light.

Steiner writes that those who are karmically predestined to help in this battle between Michael and Ahriman will know who they are because they are drawn to Anthroposophy. They will find it hard to cope with the world; their ego and astral body (the soul) will be disconnected from the etheric and physical bodies. They will seem maladapted. But this is a deception. For these souls have the capacity to be more decisive than others; their karma, and thus their happiness and well-being, depends on this sense of initiative and resolve. But they are afraid of being tainted by Ahrimanic powers by doing this, like a bee afraid of the sting recoiling to itself if it stings a threat. But no matter. If you are reading this, you are connected by threads of fate, however slight, to this Michaelic impulse. I suspect many of you will see yourselves here. If so, know that you are therefore called to a fight where you will help Michael reclaim the world from the devil of porn, selfies, and fast food. No longer hide in the shadows! Be bold, put down your phone. Go and do!

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Instagram: Jacob and Esau, or Ego and Instinct

For #SwedenborgSaturday, here's a quote by #Swedenborg where he's explaining what it means when Rebekah tells her son Jacob that Esau is coming to kill him. Jacob is "natural truth," the part of your mind that plans, thinks in words, knows facts. "Jacob" is what knows the scripture mastery verses word-for-word, what can win arguments by appealing to the manual. Finally, Esau is "natural good," the part of you that acts spontaneously, dances with a fury, and lets you speak in a testimony meeting without thinking about what you're going to say. Swedenborg says that natural good is supposed to have the priority over natural truth, just like Esau had the birthright. But just as Jacob tricked Esau out of his birthright, natural truth always tricks its way to the top. Whenever you try to think your way through a situation (Jacob), don't trust your instincts (Esau), and put your foot in your mouth, Esau loses his birthright. Jacob is a thinker, but thinking should take the back seat to dancing, running, and hunting (like Esau does in the story). But Esau wants his revenge. Visceral, dense, hairy goodness wants to dethrone clean, clever, yuppie-ish truth. So he plots his revenge. That's what the passage in question means: "good" (Esau) has a continual purpose to "invert the priority" that truth (Jacob) has over it. Instinct can overthrow thought, the #Jungian #Shadow can swamp the ego, and it *will* unless you come to terms with it. The solution? Leah and Rachel, what Swedenborg call the affection of exterior and interior truth, respectively, but might more succinctly be called "adaptation." Of what? Of instinct to thought, of shadow to ego. You need to see the instinct you've rejected through the perspective of the thought that rejected it. "Wait, so sports *are* fun?" or "Oh, I actually *do* like being angry?" Etc. Only after these little "affections of truth" have taken place can the big union take place: of instinct with thought, where the shadow comes and falls upon the ego's neck, weeping with joy. #LDS #Mormon #spiritual #spirituality #spirit #Jung #CarlJung #ShadowWork #Bible #scripture #BookofMormon #faith #hope #love #faithhopelove #inspiratiom

A post shared by Christian Swenson (@swensonthechristian) on Jul 1, 2017 at 8:23pm PDT