5600. ABOUT A CERTAIN CHRISTIAN AMONG MOHAMMEDANS: ABOUT THE ONE GOD. AULAEVILL. There was a report about the Mohammedans, that they acknowledge the Lord, but only as the Grand Prophet, and do not acknowledge His Divinity, for the reason that they have not been able to understand how the Divine could exist divided into three persons, consequently into three Gods, and that, therefore, they have acknowledged one God the Creator of the universe, but the Lord as the Grand Prophet; and have affirmed the Holy Spirit to be spirits and angels. That Christian wanted to know whether such was their doctrine and sentiment. He approached them at the western part, wishing to question them about that matter. They spoke as they thought from their religion; but they asked the Christian what he believes about God - whether he believes that He is One. He said that he believed that God was One; but they examined the ideas of his thought, which easily takes place in the other life. They said that he does not believe that God is one, but that He is three, because in his thought he sets up three persons; and everyone of them as God. They then said, further, that he says one God, but, in heart, in faith, or in thought, he believes in three; when, nevertheless, a Christian ought to speak as he thinks and believes and not differently. Since he was unable to deny this, they then went on to say that it ought to be to the shame of Christians to think three gods, and that the very heathen are wiser, for their wise ones think that there is one God, and do not have more in their idea, as the Christians do. Wherefore, he retired, and said that he would never return to them; for he was overwhelmed with shame. He wanted to say that the three were one through agreement; but, still, he set up the idea of three Gods who were unanimous, when, yet, God is one. That there is a Divine Trine, but a Trine in the Lord, see the Heavenly Doctrine,* concerning the Lord, Nos. [288-291 and 297],** and the appendix to the Heavenly Doctrine* at the article concerning the Lord [HD 306].** The Mohammedans kept him in the idea of his thought, in a manner which occurs in the other life, and he was not able to tear himself away from it, thus, not to deny it; and, then, he was, of consequence, overwhelmed with shame. I presented, afterwards, the Trinity in one person, and this in the Lord, together with certain [declarations] from the Word; and then they said that they perceived the thing could be so, and would be able to believe it, if, in the world, they had not felt differently. Nevertheless, they see that He is more than they have believed, from the fact that He had bound Mohammed, and, also, that He is called the Son of God, and that He was conceived of God Himself. * That is, The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine. -ED. ** The references we have applied within the brackets in the text; are to the chapter "On the Lord," in the work mentioned in the preceding note, viz.: The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine - which, being published to the world in the year 1758, was, probably in preparation at the time this portion of Swedenborg's Diary [now called Spiritual Experiences] was written; that is, between "the 9th January, 1757" (see No. 5366, above), and "the 30th of March 1757" (see No. 5699 of the present work, in the succeeding volume). "[HD 306]" comes in, as Swedenborg here mentions, in an "appendix" to the above indicated chapter "On the Lord;" which appendix consists of references to passages in the Arcana Coelestia, where the various points summarily presented in the chapter itself maybe found discussed at large. The fact that Swedenborg, according to the Latin Editor left blanks, instead of filling in the nos. of the work to which he was referring seems to favor the inference that the references were to then unfinished work, - as, we have pointed out, the "Heavenly Doctrine" at that time was. -ED.