(36) And from thence I went to the east to the ends of the heaven, and saw here the three eastern portals of heaven open and small portals above them.

(55) Moreover, when Stephen saw the heaven opened, and the Lord JESUS at the right hand of God, there his spirit did not first swing itself up aloft into the upper heaven, but it penetrated or pressed into the innermost birth or geniture, wherein heaven is everywhere.

(14) And the vision was shown to me thus: Behold, in the vision clouds invited me and a mist summoned me, and the course of the stars and the lightnings sped and hastened me, and the winds in the vision caused me to fly and lifted me upward, and bore me into heaven.

(2) When we passed beyond that place, we sent our minds up further. We saw with our eyes and heard with our ears hymns, angelic praises and angelic rejoicing. Heavenly majesties were singing hymns, and we rejoiced too.

(110) I will here shew thee the right ground, and it is no otherwise in heaven than as thou here findest in the letter, for the spirit looketh undisturbed into this depth, also it is very apprehensible.

(71) And he translated my spirit into the heaven of heavens, And I saw there as it were a structure built of crystals, And between those crystals tongues of living fire.

(121) Therefore heaven must be a firmament between the sparkle which had conceived from the Heart of God in the first glance; that though the body might happen to perish, yet the holy seed might remain, which is the soul, which qualifieth, mixeth or uniteth with the Heart of God, out of which a new body might come to be, when the whole God should kindle again the deep of this world in the light of the Heart of God; and just so it is come to be with the body. The love of God have mercy, and take pity on it!

(7) In the midst of heaven he beheld it come forth

(1) While I was listening to these things as as those there spoke them, there was within me a stillness of silence, and I heard the Blessedness whereby I knew proper self. And I ascended to the Vitality as I sought it. And I mutually entered it and stood, not firmly but quietly. And I saw an eternal, intellectual, undivided motion, all-powerful, formless, unlimited by limitation.

(1) Oppressed with stupor, I unto my guide Turned like a little child who always runs For refuge there where he confideth most; And she, even as a mother who straightway Gives comfort to her pale and breathless boy With voice whose wont it is to reassure him, Said to me: "Knowest thou not thou art in heaven, And knowest thou not that heaven is holy all And what is done here cometh from good zeal? After what wise the singing would have changed thee And I by smiling, thou canst now imagine, Since that the cry has startled thee so much, In which if thou hadst understood its prayers Already would be known to thee the vengeance Which thou shalt look upon before thou diest. The sword above here smiteth not in haste Nor tardily, howe'er it seem to him Who fearing or desiring waits for it. But turn thee round towards the others now, For very illustrious spirits shalt thou see, If thou thy sight directest as I say." As it seemed good to her mine eyes I turned, And saw a hundred spherules that together With mutual rays each other more embellished.

(163) Here the spirit went forth, and as he was generated in the heart, so he went forth now at the mouth; but how welcome a guest he was before God, and in God, also before the holy angels of the other kingdoms, I leave to thee to consider of.

(33) And to the east of those beasts I saw the ends of the earth whereon the heaven rests, and the portals of the heaven open.

(25) But there is a great Difference in Souls, and therefore a the going to Heaven is very unlike; some of them are through true Repentance and Sorrow for their Misdeeds, through their Faith (in the Time of their Bodies) set [or ingrafted] into the Heart of God, [and] new regenerated through the Birth of Jesus Christ; and they instantly (with the Breaking of their Bodies) leave all that is earthly, and instantly also lay off the Region of the Stars; and they comprehend, in their Essences of the first Principle, the Mercy of God the Father in the kind Love of Jesus Christ; and these] also stand, in the Time of their Bodies, according to the Essences of the Soul, (which they receive from the Passion and Death of Christ) in the Gate of the Heaven; and their Departure from the Body is a very pleasant Entering into the Element before God, into a still Rest, expecting their Bodies, without [irksome] Longing; where then the Paradise shall flourish again, which the Soul tastes very well, but effects no Source [or Work] till the first Adam, [as he was] before the Fall, dbe again upon it.

(22) I saw the spirits of the children of men who were dead, and their voice went forth to heaven and made suit.

(70) I take heaven to witness that I perform here what I must do; for the spirit driveth me to it, so that I am wholly captivated therewith, and cannot be freed from it, whatever may befall me hereafter, or ensue upon it. The Holy Gate.

(83) And when I had gone forth below and seen the heaven, and the sun rising in the east, and the moon setting in the west, and a few stars, and the whole earth, and everything as †He had known† it in the beginning, then I blessed the Lord of judgement and extolled Him because He had made the sun to go forth from the windows of the east, †and he ascended and rose on the face of the heaven, and set out and kept traversing the path shown unto him.

(3) I visited a bodily dwelling. I cast out the one who was in it first, and I went in. And the whole multitude of the rulers became troubled. And all the matter of the rulers as well as all the powers born of the earth were shaken when they saw the likeness of the image, since it was mixed. And I was the one who was in the image, not resembling him who was in the body first. For he was an earthly man, but I, I am from above the heavens. I did not refuse them even to become Christ, but I did not reveal myself to them in the love that was coming forth from me. I revealed that I am a stranger to the regions below.

(25) And now as the whole earth was, together with the word, so was the fruit also; but the word remained in the centre of the heaven, which is also in this place hiddenly; and this birth or geniture caused the seven qualifying or fountain spirits, out of or from the outermost, corrupt and dead birth or geniture, to form the body; and itself, viz. the Word or Heart of God, remained in its heavenly seat, sitting on the throne of majesty, and filled the astral and also the mortal birth or geniture, but to them was the holy life altogether incomprehensible.

(109) And I asked one of the holy angels who was with me and said unto him: 'What is this shining thing? for it is not a heaven but only the flame of a blazing fire, and the voice of weeping and crying and lamentation and strong pain.'

(91) But now, that the spirit conceiveth itself at the heart, and cometh forth and closeth together the teeth, and hisseth with the tongue through the teeth, signifieth that the heart of God has moved itself, and with its spirit made a closure round about it, which is the firmament of heaven: Also, as the teeth do shut and close together, and then the spirit goeth through the teeth, so also the spirit goeth forth from the heart into the astral birth or geniture.