117. Religion has existed from ancient times, and the inhabitants of the world have everywhere known of the existence of God, and something of the life after death, not on their own or owing to their own acumen, but from the Ancient Word (as discussed above, nos. 101-103 above), and later from the Israelite Word.

From these two sources religions have spread to southeast Asia and its islands, through Egypt and Ethiopia into African kingdoms, and from the maritime regions of Asia to Greece, and from there to Italy.

However, because the Word could be written only in representational terms, namely in terms of such things as are found in the world, which correspond to heavenly things and so symbolize them, therefore the religions of many nations were turned into idolatrous ones, and in Greece into myths, where Divine attributes and predicates became so many gods, over which the people set a supreme one that they called Jove, after the name Jehovah.

It is common knowledge that people had a concept of paradise, of the flood, of holy fire, and of the four ages, extending from the first, golden one to the final, iron one, which in the Word symbolize the four states of the church, as in Daniel 2:31-35.

People also know that the Muslim religion which followed, and which destroyed many peoples’ earlier religions, was derived from the Word of both Testaments.

70. The Word Exists in All of the Heavens, and Is the Source of the Angels’ Wisdom

No one has known before that the Word exists in the heavens, nor could it have been known as long as the church remained unaware that angels and spirits are people, like people in the world, and that they have the same kinds of things that people do, in every respect, the sole difference being that angels and spirits are spiritual, and everything they have comes from a spiritual origin, while people in the world are natural, and everything they have comes from a natural origin. As long as this fact remained hidden, they could not know that the Word exists also in the heavens, and that angels read it there, and so do spirits below the heavens.

However, lest this remain hidden forever, I have been given to be in the company of angels and spirits, to speak with them, and to see their surroundings, and afterward to report much of what I have heard and seen. This I have done in the book Heaven and Hell (London, 1758); and it can be seen from it that angels and spirits are people, and that they have in abundance everything that people in the world have.

That angels and spirits are people may be seen in the aforementioned book, Heaven and Hell 73-77 and 453-456; that they have the same things as people have in the world, nos. 170-190; that they also hold Divine worship and hear sermons in the temples they have, nos. 221-227; and that they have written materials and also books, nos. 258-264, including the Word, no. 259.