mean the Lord’s divine truth that comes from divine wisdom. For more
on the point that “Jehovah” and “God,” or “Jehovah” and “the Holy One
of Israel” appear in many passages in the Word together and yet they
mean One Being, see Teachings on the Lord the Redeemer.10
We May Derive Heretical Ideas
from the Word’s Literal Meaning, but We Are Condemned
Only If We Become Adamant about Those Ideas254 I have already shown [§§^226 –^228 ] that the Word is impossible to under-
stand without a body of teaching, and that a body of teaching is like an
oil lamp for making genuine truths visible. This is because the Word was
written entirely in correspondences. As a result, many things in the Word
are apparent truths, not naked truths. Many things in it were written to
be understood by people who are merely earthly. Yet these things were
written in such a way that simple people can understand them simply,
intelligent people intelligently, and wise people wisely.
Since the Word is like this, its apparent truths, which are clothed
truths, can be taken for naked truths. If apparent truths become convic-
tions, however, they turn into mistaken ideas that are actually false. In
Christianity all the heresies that have existed and that are currently in exis-
tence were born as a result of apparent truths being taken for genuine
truths and being reinforced as such.
Our heretical ideas themselves do not condemn us; but using the Word
and reasoning from our own lower self to reinforce the false ideas in the
heresy and living in evil ways do condemn us. We are all born into the reli-
gion of our country or our family. We are initiated into it from early child-
hood. We retain that religion and cannot rid ourselves of its falsities,
because of our interactions in the world and also our own intellectual
inability to scrutinize truths that we have inherited in this way. Living in
evil ways does condemn us, however, and so does becoming adamant
about falsities to the point of destroying genuine truth. If people stay in
their religion and believe in God, or—if Christians—they believe in the
Lord, regard the Word as holy, and follow the Ten Commandments for
religious reasons, then they simply will not swear allegiance to things that