(April 24, 2012 at 4:21 pm)teaearlgreyhot Wrote: It seems that when you interpret it in such a symbolic way, you lose verifiability of any of its truth contents....Because anyone can see that God did not talk to a snake. Too many passages make no sense on the surface. Revelations for example is nothing but symbols. IMHO what the text says is less important than what you take from the text. Generally, every piece of literature has degree of symbolism. The difference between inspired scriptures and other works is their symbolic density and how the symbols reinforce each others meaning.
Swedenborg is not unique in claiming to have brought forth new spiritual revelations during the modern period. What makes Swedenborg any different from Joseph Smith, Mary Baker Eddy, or M. Blatsky? I study Swedenborg because his work offers me an exhaustive and internally consistent interpretation of the allegories, symbols, and figurative language used throughout the Word. In the Arcana Coelesia, he demonstrates line-by-line and word-by-word, the hidden significance of the text. Everyone has to judge for themselves whether this conformity is real or only apparent. I know many other religions consider the New Church a heresy. So be it. It works for me.
