Spiritual Experiences (Buss) n. 1629

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1629. I was afterwards shown the mode in which they operate who would believe from themselves, and become angels, as also what is the quality of their faith and endeavor, as it appears to a spiritual idea. There was a certain choir which in its own gyral movements simulated [angelic] gyres, and celebrated in gyres the praises of the Lord, as if they were angels. [The nature of these gyres] was not understood by me, but it was by others, who said that the whole was simulated, and was not angelic, because those concerned in it were not in true faith. In idea, it appeared to me like something composed of close threads, or like a kind of net of which the thread-work was so closed up that there was no opening any farther than to the mere simple ideas of the words, within which there was nothing [substantial], so that the ideas did not go beyond the words, and consequently, not beyond the representations or celebrations which the bare words expressed. So entire was the closure as to interiors and intimates, because they led themselves, and from themselves would fain celebrate the Lord. This net appeared as if white, inasmuch as there were truths involved, but they still implied self-justification.


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