Charity is like warmth in springtime or summer that causes grass, plants, and trees to grow. Without charity, or spiritual warmth, nothing grows.
Emanuel SwedenborgRead
In a word, to grow old in heaven is to grow young.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Growing old can lead to a revitalization of the spirit in a heavenly state.
Emanuel Swedenborg's quote suggests a paradoxical view of aging, implying that in a heavenly or spiritual context, the process of growing older leads to a rejuvenation or youthfulness of the soul. This perspective challenges conventional notions of aging, encouraging a deeper understanding of life and the afterlife where wisdom and purity grow, rather than decline.
Themes
AgingYouthSpiritGrowthLife
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about embracing life at every stage, one could say, 'In a word, to grow old in heaven is to grow young.'
More from Emanuel Swedenborg
All quotes βIt can in no sense be said that heaven is outside of any one; it is within ... and a man, also, so far as he receives heaven, is a recipient, a heaven, and an angel.
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I have seen a thousand times that Angels are human form, or men, for I have conversed with them as man to man, sometimes with one alone, sometimes with many in company.
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True charity is the desire to be useful to others with no thought of recompense.
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Hell and Heaven are near man, yes, in him; and every man after death goes to that Hell or heaven in which he was, or to his spirit, during his abode in the world.
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For in every particular of the Word there is an internal sense which treats of things spiritual and heavenly, not of things natural and worldly, such as are treated of in the sense of the letter.
Emanuel SwedenborgRead
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