This book is edited by Leonard Fox and Donald L. Rose and translated by David Gladish and Jonathan Rose.
From the back of the book: “Throughout the final twenty-seven years of his life, Swedenborg explored the realms of heaven and hell and spoke with angels about the nature of life after death, discussed with newly arrived spirits their misconceptions about the afterlife, and debated with devils or spirits from hell. As an Enlightenment scholar, Swedenborg recorded these encounters, attesting to God’s will that humanity might know the truth of eternal life.”
Emanuel Swedenborg [1688 – 1772] learns that our last moments on earth become our first moments of death. He writes, “When a person arrives after death in the spiritual world…he seems to himself to be alive as he was in the world, living in a similar house, room, and bedroom, with similar clothes and with similar companions at home….The reason this happens to every person after death is so that death should not seem like death but a continuation of life, and so that the last act of natural life should become the first of spiritual life; and from this he should advance toward his goal, which may be either in heaven or in hell. The reasons the recently dead find this likeness in everything is that their minds remain exactly as they were in the world; and because the mind is not confined to the head but pervades the whole body, it has a similar body, for the body is an organ of the mind and runs without a break from the head. The mind is therefore the person himself, but he is then not a material but a spiritual person; and because after death he is the same person, he is presented in accordance with the concepts in his mind with things similar to those he possessed at home in the world. But this lasts only a few days….When newcomers to the spiritual world are in this first state, angels come to them and bid them welcome.’
In my previous entry I wrote about Billy Fingers’ reference to the Supra World and Robert Monroe’s description of The Park. Swedenborg does not give the “place” a specific name but tells us the following: “The state of a person’s spirit that immediately follows his life in the world being such, he is then recognized by his friends and by those he had known in the world; for this is something that spirits perceive not only from one’s face and speech but also from the sphere of his life when they draw near. Whenever anyone in the other life thinks about another he brings his face before him in thought, and at the same time many things of his life; and when he does this the other becomes present, as if he had been sent for or called. This is so in the spiritual world because thoughts there are shared, and there is no such space there as in the natural world. So all, as soon as they enter the other life, are recognized by their friends, their relatives, and those in any way known to them; and they talk with one another, and afterward associate in accordance with their friendships in the world. I have often heard that those that have come from the world were rejoiced at seeing their friends again, and that their friends in turn were rejoiced that they had come. Very commonly husband and wife come together and congratulate each other, and continue together, and this for a longer or shorter time according to their delight in living together in the world.”
Apparently after newcomers realize they are dead and have the opportunity of meeting old acquaintances, they proceed to experience their earthly perception of death. Most have misconceptions about it. Some think they will have eternal rest, others think they will glorify God eternally with hymns and praise, others believe they will rest in a paradisiacal garden, others believe they will have endless conversations about important topics, while others believe they will feast with the prophets of old.
All are right and all are wrong. Each belief-set is allowed to be experienced until the newcomers succumb to “letus gaudiorum”. The angel explained to them that it is “the condition of ‘the death of your joys. You thought they were the special joys of heaven, but they’re only the fringe benefits of heavenly joys.’
“‘So what is heavenly joy?’ they asked the angel.
“The angel gave this brief answer: ‘It’s the joy in doing something that’s of use to yourself and to other people. The joy of usefulness derives its essential quality from love and its outward expression from wisdom. The joy of use, arising from love, via wisdom, is the life and soul of all heavenly joys!’”
Swedenborg was told in many ways and by many angels that “Love and wisdom without usefulness are nothing. They are only abstract entities. They do not become real before they exist in useful activity.”
Finding one’s place in heaven or hell is explained by an angel: Newcomers “are led along paths to various societies, until there is an immediate internal recognition that this is where they belong, where their ruling love is in harmony with the ruling love of others there and where they are recognized by the angels of that society and joyfully received.”
Swedenborg writes that “Some societies are employed in taking care of little children; others in teaching and training them as they grow up; others in teaching and training in like manner the boys and girls that have acquired a good disposition from their education in the world, and in consequence have come into heaven. There are other societies that teach [divine truth], and lead [those who are ignorant of them] into the way to heaven….” As long as one combines love, wisdom and usefulness, one is happy in death.
From My Reading 