Page:A Compendium of the Theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg.djvu/144

48 man, but altogether Divine. For the man who is made new by regeneration still retains within him an inclination to evil, yea, evil itself, but is withheld from evil by an inflowing of the life of the Lord's love,—and this by exceedingly strong power; but the Lord entirely cast out every evil which was hereditary to Him from the mother, and made Himself Divine even as to the vessels, that is, as to truths. This is what in the Word is called glorification, (ib. n. 3318.)

The union of the Lord's Human Essence with His Divine was not effected at once, but successively through the whole course of His life, from infancy to the end of His life in the world. He thus ascended continually to glorification, that is, to union. This is what is said in John: "Jesus said, Father, glorify Thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I both have glorified it, and will glorify it again" (xii. 28). (ib. n. 2033.)

The reason why the union itself was fully effected by the passion of the cross, is because that was the last temptation which the Lord suffered in the world, and conjunction is effected by temptations. For in temptations man, to appearance, is left to himself alone; and yet he is not left, for God is then most present in his inmost parts, and supports him. When therefore any one conquers in temptation, he is in inmost conjunction with God; and the Lord was then in inmost union with God His Father. That in the passion of the cross the Lord was left to Himself, is evident from this His exclamation upon the cross: "O God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" and also from these words of the Lord: "No man taketh life from Me, but I lay it down of Myself; I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again; this commandment have I received from My Father" (John x. 18). From these passages, now, it is evident that the Lord did not suffer as to the Divine, but as to the Human; and that then an inmost and thus a complete union was effected. (T. C. R n. 126.)

Of the, by which is meant the unition of the Divine Human of the Lord with the Divine of the Father, which was fully completed by the passion of the cross, the Lord thus speaks: "After Judas went out, Jesus said, Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him; if God be glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and will straightway glorify Him" (John xiii. 31, 32). Here glorification is predicated both of God the Father and of the Son; for it is said, "God is