Apocalypse Explained, volume 1 - Swedenborg Foundation

APOCALYPSE EXPLAINED 111from cogitative faith only, his sight is unattended with awe beforethe Lord’s Divine majesty; but when this sight is from love, it isattended with awe at the Divine majesty; this is because man isthen turned to the Lord, for love turns him, but cogitative faithapart from love does not (as can be seen from the passages citedabove from Heaven and Hell, about turning). That this is so is wellknown in the spiritual world. It is clear, therefore, that by “I sawhim,” stated a second time, is signified the presence of the Divinemajesty.77. And I fell at his feet signifies adoration from humiliation ofheart in presence of the Divine. This is evident from thesignification of “falling at the feet,” as being adoration fromhumiliation. Humiliation of heart is meant, because humiliationthat springs from the heart in presence of the Divine produces thatprostration. All affections, whatsoever they are, have correspondinggestures in the body. Into these gestures the body is borne and fallsas of itself, when man is interiorly in the affection. Humiliationbefore a man produces a bowing down, according to the estimationof him; but in presence of the Divine it produces total prostration,especially when man thinks that the Divine in respect to power andwisdom is everything, and man in comparison is nothing, or thatfrom the Divine is all good and from man nothing but evil.When man is in this acknowledgment from the heart he comes asit were out of himself, and thence falls upon his face, and when heis thus out of himself he also is removed from the proprium [what ishis own], which in itself is wholly evil; when this is removed, theDivine fills him and raises him up; not that the Divine desires suchhumiliation on its account, but because evil is then removed, andso far as evil is removed with man so far the Divine flows in; forevil alone stands in the way. (An example of such humiliation maybe seen in Earths in the Universe, n. 91.) Man’s state when theDivine presence with him removes proprium, and afterwards infillshim is thus described in this verse: “When I saw him I fell at hisfeet as dead; and he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me,Fear not.” This state is more fully described in Daniel: