§464 we leave only the body behind 269
accord with what we have thought and what we have done intentionally.
I know these things seem paradoxical and hard to believe, but they are
true nevertheless.
Let no one believe, then, that there is anything we have thought or
done in secret that will remain hidden after death. Believe rather that
absolutely everything will come out into broad daylight.
While our outer or natural memory is still part of us after death, still 464
the merely natural things that are in it are not recreated in the other life,
only spiritual things that are connected to the natural ones by correspon-
dence. Still, when they are presented visually, they look just the same
as they did in the natural world. This is because everything we see in
the heavens looks as it did in the world, even though in essence it is not
natural but spiritual, as has been explained in the chapter on representa-
tions and appearances in heaven (§§ 170 – 176 ).
[ 2 ] As for our outer or natural memory, though, to the extent that its
contents are derived from matter, time, space, and everything else proper
to nature, it does not fulfi ll the same function for the spirit that it ful-
fi lled in the world. This is because in the world, when we thought on
the basis of our outer sensitivity and not at the same time on the basis of
our inner or intellectual sensitivity, we were thinking on the natural level
and not on the spiritual one. However, in the other life, when our spirit
is in the spiritual world, we do not think on the natural level but on the
spiritual one. Thinking on the spiritual level is thinking intelligently or
rationally. This is why our outer or natural memory then goes dormant
as far as material things are concerned. The only things that come into
play are what we have gained in the world through those material things
and have made rational. The reason our outer memory goes dormant as
far as material things are concerned is that they cannot be recreated. Spir-
its and angels actually talk from the affections and consequent thoughts
of their minds, so they cannot utter anything that does not square with
these, as you may gather from what was said about the language of angels
in heaven and their communication with us (§§ 234 – 257 ). [ 3 ] This is why
we are rational after death to the extent that we have become rational by
means of languages and the arts and sciences in this world, and emphati-
cally not to the extent that we have become skilled in them.
I have talked with any number of people who were regarded as
learned in the world because of their knowledge of such ancient lan-
guages as Hebrew and Greek and Latin, but who had not developed
their rational functioning by means of the things that were written in