There is some reflection of the human form in everything in the created universe. . . . God is a person, and the created universe is an image of God. (Divine Love and Wisdom #63–64)
So says Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772). But he admits that this is not always very clear to us here in this material universe.
“Heart and lungs” of a galaxy
Imagine my surprise, then, when not long ago an article popped up in my news feed about a recent scientific study suggesting that galaxies have a “heart” and “lungs”! “Really?” I thought, “That sounds like clickbait!” (Okay, okay, sort of nerdy clickbait!)
But when I read the article, “How the ‘heart and lungs’ of a galaxy extend its life,” that’s exactly it said. The original published scientific study, “Simulations of pulsed overpressure jets: formation of bellows and ripples in galactic environments,” by Carl Richards and Michael Smith of the University of Kent, is very mathematical and theoretical. It makes only one brief mention of “lungs,” and says nothing at all about a “heart.” But in the article covering the study, also published by the Royal Astronomical Society, the authors of the scientific paper do make the analogy explicit:
In their analogy, the researchers compared the supermassive black hole at the centre of a galaxy to its heart and the two bi-polar supersonic jets of gas and radiation they emit to airways feeding a pair of lungs.
Maybe ol’ Swedenborg wasn’t so far off about everything in the created universe reflecting the human form—which is the form of God, its creator!
For more on God and black holes, please click here to read on.
In the Bible, various time periods or ages of human spiritual history are described in narrative fashion. The general pattern of these ages is that they start in a relatively pristine state, but then decline over time until they become completely corrupted and come to their end. A new period or age then begins, and it, too, goes through a similar cycle.
If the earth is flat, this might be physically possible. Jesus could appear very high in the clouds, so that the eyes of everyone on the flat expanse of the earth could see him—especially if he came in “radiance and glory.”
Oh yes, the memes are circulating!
These same Christians may get very discouraged when, after the excitement of converting and being baptized has passed, they return to their daily life and find themselves falling right back into some of the same evil desires and sinful actions they thought had been completely washed away by the waters of baptism.
Is spanking biblical?
What is lacking in these New Age ideas is a clear understanding of Swedenborg’s concept of distinct levels and gradual levels (“discrete degrees” and “continuous degrees” in traditional Swedenborgianese). This is the subject of Part 3 of Divine Love and Wisdom (#
Spiritual Insights for Everyday Life 