angers, they
were to conceive of God as invisible, consequently without form and
quality, they would not be able to think about God at all, inasmuch as
such an invisible [being] does not fall into any idea of thought. On
hearing this, it was given me to tell them that they do well to think
of God under the Human Form, and that many on our Earth think in like
manner, especially when they think of the Lord; and that the ancients
thought in no other way. I then told them about Abraham, Lot, Gideon,
Manoah and his wife, and what is related of them in our Word, namely,
that they saw God under the Human Form, and acknowledged Him, thus
seen, to be the Creator of the universe, and called Him Jehovah, and
this also from an interior perception; but that at the present day
that interior perception is lost in the Christian world, and only
remains with the simple who are in faith.

159. Previous to this conversation, they had believed that our company
also consisted of those who want to confuse them by the idea of three
in relation to God; wherefore, on hearing what was said, they were
affected with joy, and said that God, whom they then called the Lord,
had also sent some to teach them concerning Him; and that they are
unwilling to admit strangers who disturb them, especially with the
idea of three persons in the Divinity, knowing as they do that God
is One, consequently that the Divine is One, and does not consist of
three in unanimity, unless they are disposed to think of God as of an
angel, in whom there is an Inmost of life which is invisible, and from
which he thinks and is wise; an External of life, which is visible
under a human form, from which he sees and acts; and a Proceeding
of life, which is the sphere of love and of faith from him; for from
every spirit and angel there proceeds a sphere of life by which he is
known at a distance[cc]; and as to the Lord, that that Proceeding of
life from Him is the Divine itself which fills and constitutes the
heavens, because it proceeds from the very Esse of the life of love
and of faith. They said that in this and in no other manner can they
perceive a trinity and unity together. On hearing this, it was given
me to say that such an idea of a trinity and unity together agrees
with the angelic idea concerning the Lord, and that it is from the
Lord's own doctrine concerning Himself. For He teaches that the Father
and Himself are One; that the Father is in Him and He in the Father;
th