e with the Divine, that thus,
through man, as through the uniting medium, the very ultimate of
nature might live from the Divine, which would be the case had man
lived according to Divine order.

--_Arcana Coelestia, nn._ 3699-3702

ITS FUNCTION

Divine truth, in passing from the Lord through the three heavens to
men in the world, is written and made the Word in each heaven. The
Word, therefore, is the union of the heavens with one another, and of
the heavens with the Church in the world. Hence there flows in from
the Lord through the heavens a holy Divine with the man who
acknowledges the Divine in the Lord and the holy in the Word, while he
reads it. Such a man can be instructed and can draw wisdom from the
Word as from the Lord Himself or from heaven itself, in the measure
that he loves it, and thus can be nourished with the same food with
which the angels themselves are fed, and in which there is life,
according to these words of the Lord:

"The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they
are life."

"The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of
water springing up into everlasting life."

"Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word which
proceedeth out of the mouth of God."

--_Apocalypse Explained, n._ 1074

HOW TO USE IT

They who, in reading the Word, look to the Lord, by acknowledging that
all truth and all good are from Him, and nothing from themselves,--they
are enlightened, and see truth and perceive what is good from the Word.
That enlightenment is from the light of heaven.

--_Arcana Coelestia, n._ 9405

ITS DISSEMINATION OF LIGHT

There cannot be any conjunction with heaven unless somewhere upon the
earth there is a Church where the Word is and by it the Lord is known.
It is sufficient that there be a Church where the Word is, even
though it should consist of few relatively. The Lord is present by it,
nevertheless, in the whole world. The light is greatest where those
are who have the Word. Thence it extends itself as from a centre out
to the last periphery. Thence comes the enlightenment of nations and
peoples outside the Church, too, by the Word.

--_Doctrine concerning the Sacred Scripture, nn._ 104, 106

A CANON ON A NEW PRINCIPLE

The books of the Word are all those which have an internal sense. In
the Old Testament they are the five books of Moses, the book of
Joshua, the book of Judges, the two books of Samu