Week 6    Day 3

    Listen:

O How Learned

False notions of being Learned

CL 232. After some time I again heard from the lower earth, as before, the cries, “Oh, how learned!” and “Oh, how wise!” And I looked around to see what angels were then present, and behold, angels were there who were from the heaven immediately over those who were crying “Oh, how learned!” And I spoke to them about the cry. They said, “These ‘learned’ are those who merely reason whether a thing is or is not, and rarely think that it is so, and therefore, they are like winds that blow and pass away, or like bark on trees without a heart, or as shells of almonds without any kernel, or rinds on fruits with no pulp. For their minds are without interior judgment and are united with the bodily senses only. If therefore, the very senses do not judge, they can form no conclusion. In a word they are merely sensual, and by us are called “reasoners” because they never come to any conclusion, but take up whatever they hear and discuss whether it is, by perpetually contradicting. And they like nothing more than to attack truths themselves, and so by bringing them into dispute to tear them in pieces. These are they who believe themselves learned above all in the world.”

[2] Hearing these things I asked the angels to conduct me to them. And they brought me to a cavern from which steps led down to the lower earth. We descended and followed the cry, “Oh, how learned!” And behold, some hundreds were standing in one place beating the ground with their feet.

Surprised at this at first, I asked, “Why do they stand this way and beat the ground with the soles of their feet?” And I said, “They may thus make a hollow in the ground with their feet.” At this the angels smiled and said, “They appear to stand this way because they do not think about anything that it is so, but they only think and discuss whether it is, and as the thought makes no further progress they appear merely to tread and wear away a single patch of ground and make no progress.” But then I went towards this congregation, and behold, they appeared to me men of not unhandsome face and in elegant clothing. But the angels said, “In their own light they appear this way, but if light from heaven flows in, their faces change and their garments also.” And it was so. They then appeared with swarthy countenances and clothed in black sackcloth. But when this light was withdrawn, they appeared as before.

Presently I spoke to some of them and said, “I heard the crowd around you shouting, ‘Oh, how learned!’ May I then be permitted some conversation with you, to discuss subjects of the highest learning?”

[3] They answered, “Say whatever you please and we will satisfy you.” And I asked, “What must the religion be by which a man is saved?” They replied, “We must divide the question into several, and cannot give an answer until we have formed a conclusion upon them. The first consideration must be, Whether religion is anything? The second, Whether there is salvation or not? The third, Whether one religion is more effective than another? The fourth, Whether there is a heaven, and a hell? And fifth, Whether there is eternal life after death? Besides others.” I asked about the first question, “Whether religion is anything?” And they began to discuss it, with abundance of arguments as to whether there is religion, and whether what is called so is anything. And I begged that they would refer it to the congregation, and they referred it. And the common response was that this proposition required so much investigation that it could not be finished within the evening. I asked, “Can you finish it within a year?” And one said it could not be done within a hundred years. I replied, “Meanwhile you are without religion.”

And he responded, “Should it not first be shown whether there is religion, whether what is so-called is anything? If it is, it must be for the wise also. If not, then it must be only for the common people. It is known that religion is called a bond. But it is asked, ‘For whom?’ If only for the common people, in itself it is nothing. If also for the wise it is something.”

[4] Hearing these things I said to them, “You are anything but learned, for you are only able to think whether a thing is, and to turn it this way and that. Who can become learned unless he knows something for certain, and goes forward in that, as a man advances from step to step, and so on successively into wisdom. Otherwise you do not so much as touch truths with the finger-nail, but put them more and more out of sight. To reason only whether a thing is, is it not like arguing about a cap which is never put on? Or a shoe that is never worn? What comes of it except that you do not know whether there is anything? That is to say, Whether there is salvation? Whether there is eternal life after death? Whether one religion is more effective than another? Whether there is a heaven and a hell? You cannot think anything about these things so long as you stick fast in the first step and beat the sand there, and do not set foot beyond foot and go forward. Beware lest your minds, while they stand thus without outside of judgment, grow hard within and become statues of salt, and you, friends of Lot’s wife.”

[5] Having said this I went away, and they in indignation threw stones after me. And then they appeared to me like graven images of stone, in which there is nothing of human reason. I asked the angels about their lot, and they said, “Their lot is that they are let down into the deep, and into a desert there, and are set to carrying packs; and then being unable to bring forth anything from reason, they chatter and talk nonsense. And from a distance they appear then like asses bearing burdens.”

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