57. I foresee that very many at this day, tinctured with the paradoxes of this faith, will say, how can theological things be perceived by the understanding? are they not spiritual which transcend it? Explain, therefore, if you can, the mystery of redemption and justification, that reason may see it and acquiesce. This mystery then shall be opened in the following manner. Who does not know that God is one, and that besides Him there is no other, and that God is love itself, and wisdom itself, or that He is good itself, and truth itself; and that the very God Himself as to Divine truth, which is the Word, descended and assumed the Human to remove the hells, and consequently damnation from man, which he effected by combats with, and victories over the devil, that is, over all the hells, which at that time infested and spiritually slew every man coming into the world; and that afterwards He glorified His Human, by uniting in it the Divine truth with Divine good, and thus He returned to the Father from whom He came forth? When these things are perceived, then the following passages in John may be understood:
The Word was with God, and God was the Word, and the Word became flesh (John 1:1, 14). And also the following in the same:
I went forth from the Father, and came into the world; again I leave the world and go to the Father (John 16:28, 29). Hence also it is evident, that without the coming of the Lord into the world, no mortal could have been saved, and they are saved who believe in Him, and live well. This face of faith presents itself as clear as the day to those who are enlightened by the Word, and it is the face of the faith of the New Church. See the FAITH OF THE NEW HEAVEN AND OF THE NEW CHURCH IN ITS UNIVERSAL AND IN ITS PARTICULAR FORM, below (n. 116, 117).
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