Merriam-Webster defines “blasphemy” as “the act of insulting or
showing contempt or lack of reverence for God.” For the most part, Swedenborg uses the term with the same meaning, though the focus is usually on blasphemies against “the Word” -- true ideas that come from the Lord, especially through the Bible -- rather than blasphemies aimed at the idea of the Lord himself.
Such blasphemies are a big deal, closing the mind to the things the Lord wants to teach us. One of the clearest statements of this is in Arcana Coelestia No. 9222: “(T)hose who repudiate the Word cannot receive anything taught by the Word; for when it is read or heard by them it is met with a negative attitude of mind that either annihilates truth or turns it into falsity.”
Think about the concept of “annihilating the truth.” It sure doesn’t sound like a good thing, but we could all likely come up with examples where it seems to be happening.
Swedenborg talks about two ways people blaspheme the Word. One is by simply repudiating it: Denying that it exists, denying that the Lord exists and rejecting the idea wholly. The other is by “falsifying” it -- taking passages out of context and twisting them to give them meanings that support our own evil desires.
The most frequent example of such “falsification” in Swedenborg is the concept of salvation by faith -- a dominant religious idea during Swedenborg’s life. The doctrine includes “believing ... that God the Father was willing to be reconciled to the human race by … the blood of His Son; and that by this He was moved, and still is moved, to mercy. Who is there that has an enlightened understanding that does not see that this … is contrary to the Divine?” (Apocalyse Explained No. 778)
The point is that the Bible should be accepted as the source of the Lord’s Word, that it has to be looked at as a whole, and that it has to be looked at in the light of the essential truth that the Lord is “Love itself, Mercy itself, and Goodness itself; and these are His Being,” as it says elsewhere in Apocalyse Explained No. 778.
There is another interesting passage on blasphemy, also in Arcana Coelestia No. 9222. It describes two degrees of blasphemy, “those that come out of the understanding but not at the same time out of the will, and those that come out of the will by way of the understanding.”
In Swedenborg, “the understanding” refers to the intellect, the mind, the thinking part of us (it is sometimes translated as “discernment”). “The will” refers to what we want and love, to the heart, to the feeling part of us. If we are getting the truth all wrong in our minds, that is a matter of confusiuon and ignorance, it says. It is a much more dangerous and evil thing if we are twisting the truth to make it match our evil desires.
Passages from Swedenborg
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 9222
Let the nature of blasphemy against God's truth be stated briefly here. God's truth is the Word and teachings drawn from the Word. Those who repudiate it in their heart blaspheme it even though they praise and declare it with their lips. Hidden within repudiation lies blasphemy, which also bursts out into the open when they are left to think by themselves, especially in the next life. For there when external [restraints] have been removed people's hearts speak.
[2] Those who blaspheme or repudiate the Word cannot receive anything at all of the truth or good of faith. For the Word teaches the existence of the Lord, of heaven and hell, of life after death, of faith and charity, and of many other things, about which no one would have any knowledge whatever without the Word or revelation, 8944. Therefore those who repudiate the Word cannot receive anything taught by the Word; for when it is read or heard by them it is met with a negative attitude of mind that either annihilates truth or turns it into falsity.
[3] First of all therefore with a member of the Church comes belief in the Word; and this is the chief characteristic of one who is guided by the truth of faith and governed by the good of love. But with those who are steeped in the evils of self-love and love of the world non-belief in the Word is the chief characteristic; for when they think about it they instantly reject it and also blaspheme it. If anyone were to see how great the blasphemies are against the Word, and what they are like, with those who are steeped in the evils of those kinds of love he would be horrified. While in the world the person is unaware of their existence, since they lie concealed behind the ideas of his conscious thought, and it is this that comes out into speech with other people. Even so they are revealed in the next life, where they appear horrible.
[4] There are two kinds of blasphemies - those that come out of the understanding but not at the same time out of the will, and those that come out of the will by way of the understanding. The second kind are the ones which are so horrible, not the first. Those that come out of the will by way of the understanding spring from evil of life, whereas those that come solely out of the understanding and not at the same time out of the will spring from falsity of doctrine or from the illusions of the outward senses that deceive a person set fast in a state of ignorance. These things have been stated in order that people may know the nature of blasphemy against God's truth, that is, the Word, and against teachings drawn from it, meant by 'reviling God and cursing a governor of the people'.
Apocalypse Explained (Tansley) n. 778
[2] But how the Word is blasphemed by falsifying it shall be illustrated by the following example. Those who separate faith from good works say that, "God the Father removed, in fact cast away, the human race from Himself because of their evils, and that therefore His Son was sent; or that the Son Himself, being moved with compassion, came into the world, and by suffering the punishment of extreme condemnation, which was the passion of the cross, and by shedding His own blood upon it, and, lastly, by His death, reconciled mankind to the Father by thus interceding for them." Because this is among the primary doctrines held by those who separate faith from its life, which is charity, I wish to state briefly how the Divine is thereby blasphemed. He is blasphemed by this, that they believe and think that the Divine removed or cast away mankind from Himself, although God is Love itself, Mercy itself, and Goodness itself; and these are His Being (Esse). From these things it is clear that it is impossible for God to remove or cast away any one of the human race; for this would be to act contrary to His own Being (Esse), which, as was said, is that from which all love, all mercy, and all good flow. ...
From these things it is evident, how the Divine is blasphemed by the falsification of the Word. For it is thought that God is in some respect an avenger, and revengeful, that He is angry, that He casts into hell and punishes; when, nevertheless, it is evil which punishes itself, consequently hell, from which evil is, and not the Divine. The Divine is blasphemed by the falsification of the Word, also, by their believing and thinking that God the Father was willing to be reconciled to the human race by the punishment of the final condemnation, which was the passion of the cross; and thus by the blood of His Son; and that by this He was moved, and still is moved, to mercy. Who is there that has an enlightened understanding that does not see that this, also, is contrary to the Divine, and, consequently, contrary to the real truth of the Word? For what is contrary to, or against, the Divine, is blasphemy. Hence, also, wresting the sense of the letter of the Word to confirm this doctrine is blasphemy.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 7456
Anyone blaspheming the name of Jehovah shall surely be killed; all the congregation shall certainly stone him. Lev. 24:16.
'Blaspheming the name of Jehovah' means using malevolent falsities to do violence to truths and forms of good that relate to worship. 'The name of Jehovah' means everything in one embrace that is used to worship Jehovah, see 2724, 3006, thus every aspect of faith and charity, 6674. This also explains why the Israelite woman s son who blasphemed the name of Jehovah was led outside the camp and stoned, Lev. 24:11, 14, 23.
Apocalypse Explained (Tansley) n. 991
(v. 11) And they blasphemed the God of heaven. That this signifies the falsification of the Word, is evident from the signification of blaspheming when said of God, as denoting to falsify the Word even to the destruction of the Divine truth in the heavens (concerning which see n. 778); and from the signification of the God of heaven, as denoting the Divine truth proceeding from the Lord. This is meant here and in other parts of the Word by the God of heaven, because the whole heaven consists of that Divine. This is why the angels are called gods, and that they signify Divine truths from the Lord, and why also the Lord is called the Word, which is Divine truth. Hence now by their blaspheming the God of heaven, is signified the falsification of the Word, even to the destruction of the Divine truth in the heavens.
Apocalypse Revealed (Rogers) n. 715
- And people blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail, as the plague was exceedingly great. This symbolically means, because the people entrenched such falsities in themselves, they denied truths to the extent that they could not acknowledge them, owing to feelings of repugnance springing from their interior falsities and evils.
To blaspheme God means, symbolically, to deny and not to acknowledge that the Lord alone is God of heaven and earth (no. 571, 582, 697), and to deny and not acknowledge likewise the truth in the Word. "As the plague was exceedingly great" means, symbolically, owing to the aforementioned dreadful and atrocious falsities from their entrenched dogma of justification by faith alone (no. 714). They cannot acknowledge truths owing to those falsities, because an affirmation of falsity is a denial of the truth.
Who (or What) is Swedenborg?
The ideas on this site are based on the works of Emanuel Swedenborg, an 18th-century Swedish scientist and theologian. Swedenborg claimed that his religious writings, the sole focus of the last three decades of his life, were done at the behest of the Lord himself, and constituted a revelation for a successor to the Christian Church.
In keeping with Swedenborg’s own statements, modern believers downplay his role as author, attributing the ideas to the Lord instead. For this reason they generally refer to Swedenborg’s theological works as “the Writings,” and some resist the label “Swedenborgian” as placing emphasis on the man rather than the message.
Since “the Writings” would be an unfamiliar term to new readers, we have elected to use the name “Swedenborg” as a label for those theological works, much as we might use “Isaiah” or “Matthew” to refer to books of the Bible. The intent, however, is not to attribute the ideas to Swedenborg, any more than we would attribute the divinity of the Bible to Isaiah the man or Matthew the man.
So when you read “according to Swedenborg” on this site, it’s really shorthand for “according to the theological works from the Lord through Swedenborg.” When you read “Swedenborg says,” it’s really shorthand for “the theological works of Swedenborg say.”