231. (iii) THE GENUINE TRUTH IN THE LITERAL SENSE OF THE WORD, ON WHICH DOCTRINE IS BASED, IS NOT VISIBLE TO ANY BUT THOSE WHO ARE ENLIGHTENED BY THE LORD.
Enlightenment comes only from the Lord, and to those who love truths because they are true, and make them their guide to a useful life. No others find enlightenment in the Word. Enlightenment comes only from the Lord, because the Word is from Him and so He is in it. The reason only those are enlightened who love truths because they are true, and make them a guide to a useful life, is that they are in the Lord and the Lord is in them; for the Lord is truth itself, as was shown in the chapter on the Lord. The Lord is loved when one lives in accordance with His Divine truths, and so useful deeds are done by their guidance, as stated in this passage of John:
On that day you will know that you are in me and I in you; he who has my commandments and keeps them loves me, and I shall love him, and I shall show myself to him, and come to him, and make my dwelling with him. John 14:20, 21, 23.
Those are meant who are enlightened when they read the Word, and for whom the Word shines and shows through.
[2] The reason why for them the Word shines and shows through is that the details of the Word contain a spiritual and a celestial sense, and these senses are filled with the light of heaven. Therefore the Lord by means of them and their light floods into the natural sense of the Word and the light this sheds on man. So it is that a person acknowledges truth by an inward perception, and then sees it in his thought processes; this happens whenever he has affection for truth for truth's sake. The affection leads to perception, the perception to thought, and thus comes the acknowledgment we call faith.