Doctrine of Holy Scripture - Swedenborg Foundation

DOCTRINE OF HOLY SCRIPTURE 157emptily, but every single thing has its signification. The subjecthere treated of is the state of the church when all knowledges oftruth from the Word have been destroyed, and consequently man,having become sensuous, persuades himself that falsities are truths.[2] The “star fallen from heaven” signifies the knowledges oftruth destroyed; the “sun and air darkened” signifies the light oftruth become thick darkness; the “locusts that came out of thesmoke of the pit” signify falsities in the outermost things such asexist with those who have become sensuous, and who see and judgeall things from fallacies; a “scorpion” signifies their persuasiveness.That the locusts appeared “like horses prepared for war” signifiestheir reasonings as it were from the understanding of truth; that thelocusts had “crowns like gold upon their heads, and faces as thefaces of men” signifies that they appeared to themselves asconquerors, and as wise; their having “hair as the hair of women”signifies that they appeared to themselves as if they were in theaffection of truth; their having “teeth as the teeth of lions” signifiesthat sensuous things, which are ultimate things of the natural man,appeared to them as having power over all things.[3] Their having “breastplates as breastplates of iron” signifiesargumentations from fallacies by which they fight and prevail; that“the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots running towar” signifies reasonings as if from the truths of doctrine from theWord for which they were to fight; their having “tails likescorpions” signifies persuasions; their having “stings in their tails”signifies their cunning arts of deceiving thereby; their having“power to hurt men five months” signifies that they induce a kindof stupor on those who are in the understanding of truth andperception of good; their having “a king over them, the angel of thebottomless pit, whose name is Abaddon or Apollyon” signifies thattheir falsities were from hell, where dwell those who are merelynatural and in self-intelligence.[4] This is the spiritual sense of these words, of which nothingappears in the sense of the letter. Everywhere in Revelation it is thesame. Be it known that in the spiritual sense all things hang