Lesson 4 – Allegory: Heaven and Earth
I hope you agree this is great short bible study series. In this lesson we unpack the symbolic correspondence found in the sacred scriptures to discuss the allegorical meaning of Heavens and Earth.
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” – Genesis 1:1
Transcript, Exercise and Homework
Heaven and Earth are familiar elements that come up over and over again in scripture and it is the subject we will unpack in this episode today.
We will primarily focus on the Word in the Bible, which is used by the mono-theistic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam, but at times I will use examples from other sacred texts to illustrate the universality of the ancient Word and its allegorical nature, as provided through the infinite love and wisdom of our Creator.
When we look at the common use in modern language of the terms Heaven and Earth, we see that in day to day language we don’t use these terms often, except to refer to our planet or the soil we walk on (Earth) and our concept of a place after death or the sky above the earth (Heaven).
Regarding earth, we can talk about being grounded or say “being down to earth” when we focus on things in nature or practical concepts. When someone is raising high ideals, or pondering less pragmatic or philosophical concepts may be called “lofty”.
We hear people refer to what is morally good as “heavenly” – we even use it for describing a blissful experience.
We do clearly appreciate earth as being associated with what is lower and heaven with what is higher, perhaps even ethereal. In other words, natural or worldly vs spiritual or metaphysical.
In our sacred scriptures this allegory and parabolic distinction holds true also.
In Isaiah we read:
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts.” – Isaiah 55:9
In this passage we see a relationship between higher levels of thinking and lower level thinking in connection with our allegorical concept today.
And further on we read:
“For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; And the former shall not be remembered or come to mind.” – Isaiah 65:17
Here we see scripture starting to correlate a new heaven and new earth with a new state of mind.
Important note!
The principles behind the allegorical nature of divine revelation is ultimately derived from our infinite creator and principles of creation itself. All we need to do is to look for these spiritual principles by discounting the finite (or natural) elements, such as space and time. – The Freedom Philosopher
It should be familiar to you right now that, when focusing on allegory in sacred scripture, that this means being reflective of inner qualities, which apply to your own mind and spiritual state.
It is in this sense that we must proceed.
I think it is pretty clear, with what we’ve discussed so far, that Heaven equates to what is more spiritual and Earth to more what is more natural. These two example verses from scripture relate to our thoughts and ways of thinking. In other words, an inner world focus with reflective thoughts and external world focus with sense based thoughts.
I think this is a good way to look at the allegory behind these terms: internal for heaven and external for earth. Another way to highlight it is to look at internal as our rational mind and external as our sense based natural mind.
Emanuel Swedenborg
Swedenborg uses the term Correspondence for the allegories, because any visual object or element in the natural world, directly corresponds to a spiritual cause – being a spiritual quality or process.
I would like to share a couple of quotes from Emanuel Swedenborg where he discusses the terms Heaven and Earth. And please bear with me a little, as I also introduce a couple of other related terms too, which will help clarify today’s key allegory.
In his work Arcana Coelestia (translated Heavenly Secrets) we read:
“The Lord is He who sows, the “seed” is His Word, and the “earth” is man, as He himself has deigned to declare.” – Emanuel Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia 29
Where, of course he refers to the parable of the sower (Matthew 13:19-24, 37-39; Mark 4:14-21; Luke 8:11-16).
To the same purport The Lord, Jesus Christ gives this description:
“So is the kingdom of God, as a man when he casteth seed into the earth, and sleepeth and riseth night and day, and the seed groweth and riseth up, he knoweth not how; for the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself, first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear” – Mark 4:26-28
Emanuel Swedenborg continues:
By the “kingdom of God” in the universal sense, is meant the universal heaven; in a sense less universal, the true church of the Lord; and in a particular sense, everyone who is of true faith, or who is regenerate by a life of faith. Wherefore such a person is also called “heaven” because heaven is in him; and likewise the “kingdom of God” because the kingdom of God is in him as the Lord Himself teaches in Luke:
“Being demanded of the Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come, He answered them, and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation; neither shall they say, Lo here! or, Lo there! for behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20-21).
We can see from this that ‘Heaven’ and ‘Kingdom of God’ are being used pretty much synonymously.
Later in the same work – Arcana Coelestia – he concludes:
“That the internal man is called “heaven” and the external “earth” is evident from the passages of the Word already cited in the preceding chapter” …
And after citing another couple of verses from Isaiah, he surmises that
“it is evident that both “heaven” and “earth” are predicated of man.” – Emanuel Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia 82
And reflecting as a whole on Genesis chapter 1, he writes:
“These are the nativities of the heavens and of the earth, when He created them, in the day in which Jehovah God made the earth and the heavens. The “nativities of the heavens and of the earth” are the formations of the celestial man.” – Emanuel Swedenborg, Arcana Coelestia 89
This reflects that our natural (sensual/sense based) thinking is ‘earth’, which when it is in harmony with heaven and informed through the internal man with what is good and true, it is a ‘new earth’. This transformation process is our spiritual growth, during which our mind is also allegorically referred to as ‘ground’, ‘field’ and ‘fertile soil’.
So, heaven is allegory for our inner rational mind and earth for our external sense based mind. Mind can be otherwise translated with man (person), spirit and being. Or, at risk of overly simplifying it: thought.
Now, let us have a look at a couple of passages from scripture to highlight this, for the moment only focussing on our topic for today: Heaven and Earth
Your Exercise
“Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You.” – Psalm 73:25
replace heaven with inner thoughts and earth with external thoughts
Whom have I in inner thoughts but You? And there is none upon external thoughts that I desire besides You.
Rather than thinking about heaven and earth as physical separate locations, then emerges an image of a mind in which the external sense based view and experience of life is in alignment with an appropriate spiritual view acknowledging the Divine as the source of all that is good and true.
Exercise 2
“For as the new heavens and the new earth Which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the Lord, “So shall your descendants and your name remain.” – Isaiah 66:22
now replacing heaven with internal mind and earth with external mind again
“For as the new internal mind and the new external mind, Which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the Lord, “So shall your descendants and your name remain.”
Same here, the oft considered promise of a physical replacement of our planet and solar system, when considering the allegorical nature and removing concepts of time and space (which are irrelevant for spiritual work!), the image emerges of the Lord granting us a new way of thinking. A new way of seeing life and experiencing it. Furthermore, here He promises that this new quality is instilled forever.
This passage now links beautifully with a promise we find in chapter 36 of the prophet Ezekiel:
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” Ezekiel 36:26
And a promise found in chapter 2 of Revelation
“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it.”’ – Revelation 2:17
And also 1 Corinthians 10:13, which I will let you look up for yourself.
The term “name” will be the focus of our next episode, which you do not want to miss!
Homework:
Why don’t you test this out for yourself too? I’ll leave you with a couple of quotes from scripture.
Quote 1 – Job 20
“The heavens will reveal his iniquity, And the earth will rise up against him.” – Job 20:27
Quote 2 – Psalm 50
“He shall call to the heavens from above, And to the earth, that He may judge His people:” – Psalm 50:4
Other references you may like to read and continue to practice on:
Psalm 76:8, Psalm 135:6, Psalm 148:13, Isaiah 1:2, Isaiah 51:16 and Jeremiah 10:12
It is worth going through all of these, so you get the hang of it before proceeding to the next lesson.
“As in Heaven, so upon the Earth.” – Matthew 6:10