The Heathen, or Peoples Outside of the Church, in Heaven.
There is a general opinion that those born outside of the church, who are called the nations, or heathen, cannot be saved, because not having the Word they know nothing about the Lord, and apart from the Lord there is no salvation.
But that these also are saved this alone makes certain, that the mercy of the Lord is universal, that is, extends to every individual.That these equally with those within the church, who are few in comparison, are born men, and that their ignorance of the Lord is not their fault.
Any one who thinks from any enlightened reason can see that no man is born for hell, for the Lord is love itself and His love is to will the salvation of all.
Therefore He has provided a religion for every one, and by it acknowledgment of the Divine and interior life. For to live in accordance with one's religion is to live interiorly, since one then looks to the Divine, and so far as he looks to the Divine he does not look to the world but separates himself from the world, that is, from the life of the world, which is exterior life.
That the heathen equally with Christians are saved any one can see who knows what it is that makes heaven in man.For heaven is within man, and those that have heaven within them come into heaven.
Heaven with man is acknowledging the Divine and being led by the Divine. The first and chief thing of every religion is to acknowledge the Divine. A religion that does not acknowledge the Divine is no religion.
The precepts of every religion look to worship, thus to the way in which the Divine is to be worshiped that the worship may be acceptable to Him.When this has been settled in one's mind, that is, so far as one wills this or so far as he loves it, he is led by the Lord.
Every one knows that the heathen as well as Christians live a moral life, and many of them a better life than Christians.
Moral life may be lived either out of regard to the Divine or out of regard to men in the world.A moral life that is lived out of regards to the Divine is a spiritual life.
In outward form the two appear alike, but in inward form they are wholly different; the one saves man, the other does not.
For he who lives a moral life out of regard to the Divine is led by the Divine. He who leads a moral life out of regard to men in the world is led by himself.
But this may be illustrated by an example. He that refrains from doing evil to his neighbor because it is antagonistic to religion, that is, antagonistic to the Divine, refrains from doing evil from a spiritual motive.
He that refrains from doing evil to another merely from fear of the law, or the loss of reputation, of honor, or gain, that is, from regard to self and the world, refrains from doing evil from a natural motive, and is led by himself,not by the Divine.
The life of the latter is natural, that of the former is spiritual. A man whose moral life is spiritual has heaven within him. But he whose moral life is merely natural does not have heaven within him.
For the reason that heaven flows in from above and opens man's interiors, and through his interiors flows into his exteriors; while the world flows in from beneath and opens the exteriors but not the interiors, For there can be no flowing in from the natural world into the spiritual, but only from the spiritual world into the natural.
Therefore if heaven is not also received, the interiors remain closed. All this makes clear who those are that receive heaven within them, and who do not.
And yet heaven is not the same in one as in another. It differs in each one in accordance with his affection for good and its truth. Those that are in an affection for good out of regard to the Divine, love Divine truth, since good and truth love each other and desire to be conjoined.
This explains why the heathen, although they are not in genuine truths in the world, yet because of their love receive truths in the other life.
The heathen (religions outside the Christian Church)who have led a moral life and have lived in obedience and subordination and mutual charity in accordance with their religion, and have thus received something of conscience, are accepted in the other life, and are there instructed with solicitous care by the angels in the goods and truths of faith; and that when they are being taught they behave themselves modestly, intelligently, and wisely, and readily accept truths and adopt them.
They have not worked out for themselves any principles of falsity antagonistic to the truths of faith that will need to be shaken off, still less cavils against the Lord, as many Christians have who cherish no other idea of Him than that He is an ordinary man. The heathen on the contrary when they hear that Jehovah God has become a Man, and has thus manifested Himself in the world, immediately acknowledge it and worship the Lord, saying that because God is the God of heaven and of earth, and because the human race is His, He has fully disclosed Himself to men.
It is a Divine truth that apart from the Lord there is no salvation.But this is to be understood to mean that there is no salvation except from the Lord.
There are many earths in the universe, and all of them full of inhabitants, scarcely any of whom know that the Lord took on the Human on our earth. Yet because they worship the Divine under a human form they are accepted and led by the Lord.
Harry
