Love, Wisdom, and Joy

[sdi]

And they asked the angel, “What then is heavenly joy?”

To which the angel replied in these few words: “It is the delight of doing something that is useful to ourselves and to others; and the delight of use derives its essence from love and its existence from wisdom. The delight of use springing from love by wisdom is the life and soul of all heavenly joys.

(Emanuel Swedenborg, The Delights of Wisdom Pertaining to Conjugal Love, as translated by William Ross Woofenden)

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People who report having near-death experiences always say that life has two purposes: to learn and to love. I've wondered why it always two and only those two, and not one thing or many things. Swedenborg's angels have a ready answer: love is the source of life, wisdom is the means of life, and together these culminate in making oneself useful, which is joy.

This perhaps makes sense of what people mean when they say that "God is love;" in that sense, they are saying that God is the source, which is true (if tautological).

Comments

[boccaderlupo]

A Swedenborg reference randomly flitted into my rather closed world the other day, by chance. I have not read him, however. What you make of his work?

I've been thinking for a bit now on the distinction to be made between knowledge and wisdom. It seems as those these are truly distinct categories, and that trying to run down the former, we may in some cases end up forgoing the latter.

Hope you are well, amico.

[sdi]

I've only read a little of him so far, so I don't really know. He's at least among the most reputable Christian mystics, and what I've read so far doesn't belie that reputation. There seem to be connections to Plotinus among his teachings, but it's possible I'm reading him into them!

I would agree that knowledge and wisdom are distinct. I once heard the analogy that knowledge is food, and wisdom is what you get once the food is digested. (It seems the mind takes a lot longer than the body to digest food, though!)

And thank you, I'm doing okay! Been sick a lot for the last few months, but I'm slowly clawing my way back and not feeling too down. I hope all is well with you, too.