§56 each community is a heaven 29
b. Heaven is not granted out of sheer mercy, but according to our life; and every trace of the life
through which we are led into heaven by the Lord is from mercy, which is what “mercy” means:
5057 , 10659. If heaven were given by sheer mercy, it would be given to everyone: 2401. Informa-
tion about some evil people who had been rejected from heaven, and who believed that heaven
was granted to everyone out of sheer mercy: 4276 [ 4226 ].
c. Heaven is within us: 3884.
think that getting into heaven is simply a matter of being taken up
among the angels, regardless of the quality of their inner life, who believe
that heaven is granted merely because of [the Lord’s] mercy.b On the
contrary, unless heaven is within an individual, nothing of the heaven
that is outside fl ows in and is accepted.
There are many spirits who hold this opinion and who, because of
their faith, have been taken up into heaven. However, once they arrived,
because their inner life was contrary to the life angels are engaged in, they
began to be blinded in their understanding to the point that they became
virtually idiotic, while in regard to their self-control they began to be so
tormented that they carried on like people gone mad. In short, people
who have lived evil lives and who arrive in heaven bring their souls with
them and are tormented like fi sh out of water, in the air, or like animals
in the vacuum in air pumps once the air has been pumped out. It stands
to reason, then, that heaven is within us and not outside.c
Since everyone accepts the heaven that is outside according to the 55
quality of the heaven that is within, angels accept the Lord in the same
way, because it is the Lord’s divine nature that constitutes heaven. Con-
sequently, when the Lord renders himself present in any particular
community, his appearance depends on the nature of the good activity
that community is engaged in. It is therefore not exactly the same in one
community as in another. It is not that this difference is in the Lord: it is
in the individuals who are seeing him from their own goodness and
therefore in keeping with it. They are affected by the sight of him accord-
ing to the quality of their own love. The ones who love him deeply are
deeply moved, while the ones who love him less deeply are less deeply
moved. Evil people, who are outside of heaven, fi nd his presence intensely
painful.
When the Lord does appear in any community, he appears there as
an angel, but he is identifi ed by the divine quality that shines through.
Further still, heaven is where the Lord is recognized, trusted, and 56
loved. The different ways he is worshiped—in variations that stem from