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Numbers 8

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1 And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying,

2 Speak unto Aaron, and say unto him, When thou lightest the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light in front of the candlestick.

3 And Aaron did so; he lighted the lamps thereof [so as to give light] in front of the candlestick, as Jehovah commanded Moses.

4 And this was the work of the candlestick, beaten work of gold; unto the base thereof, [and] unto the flowers thereof, it was beaten work: according unto the pattern which Jehovah had showed Moses, so he made the candlestick.

5 And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying,

6 Take the Levites from among the children of Israel, and cleanse them.

7 And thus shalt thou do unto them, to cleanse them: sprinkle the water of expiation upon them, and let them cause a razor to pass over all their flesh, and let them wash their clothes, and cleanse themselves.

8 Then let them take a young bullock, and its meal-offering, fine flour mingled with oil; and another young bullock shalt thou take for a sin-offering.

9 And thou shalt present the Levites before the tent of meeting: and thou shalt assemble the whole congregation of the children of Israel:

10 and thou shalt present the Levites before Jehovah. And the children of Israel shall lay their hands upon the Levites:

11 and Aaron shall offer the Levites before Jehovah for a wave-offering, on the behalf of the children of Israel, that it may be theirs to do the service of Jehovah.

12 And the Levites shall lay their hands upon the heads of the bullocks: and offer thou the one for a sin-offering, and the other for a burnt-offering, unto Jehovah, to make atonement for the Levites.

13 And thou shalt set the Levites before Aaron, and before his sons, and offer them for a wave-offering unto Jehovah.

14 Thus shalt thou separate the Levites from among the children of Israel; and the Levites shall be mine.

15 And after that shall the Levites go in to do the service of the tent of meeting: and thou shalt cleanse them, and offer them for a wave-offering.

16 For they are wholly given unto me from among the children of Israel; instead of all that openeth the womb, even the first-born of all the children of Israel, have I taken them unto me.

17 For all the first-born among the children of Israel are mine, both man and beast: on the day that I smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt I sanctified them for myself.

18 And I have taken the Levites instead of all the first-born among the children of Israel.

19 And I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and to his sons from among the children of Israel, to do the service of the children of Israel in the tent of meeting, and to make atonement for the children of Israel; that there be no plague among the children of Israel, when the children of Israel come nigh unto the sanctuary.

20 Thus did Moses, and Aaron, and all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the Levites: according unto all that Jehovah commanded Moses touching the Levites, so did the children of Israel unto them.

21 And the Levites purified themselves from sin, and they washed their clothes: and Aaron offered them for a wave-offering before Jehovah; and Aaron made atonement for them to cleanse them.

22 And after that went the Levites in to do their service in the tent of meeting before Aaron, and before his sons: as Jehovah had commanded Moses concerning the Levites, so did they unto them.

23 And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying,

24 This is that which belongeth unto the Levites: from twenty and five years old and upward they shall go in to wait upon the service in the work of the tent of meeting:

25 and from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting upon the work, and shall serve no more,

26 but shall minister with their brethren in the tent of meeting, to keep the charge, and shall do no service. Thus shalt thou do unto the Levites touching their charges.

   

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Apocalypse Revealed # 378

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378. "And have washed their robes." This symbolically means, who have cleansed their religious beliefs of the evils accompanying falsity.

Washing in the Word symbolizes a cleansing oneself of evils and falsities, and robes symbolize general truths (no. 328). General truths are concepts of goodness and truth drawn from the literal sense of the Word, in accordance with which these people have lived, so that they are religious beliefs. And because every matter of religion has relation to goodness and truth, therefore robes are mentioned twice - "have washed their robes" and "have made their robes white."

Robes or religious beliefs are cleansed only in the case of people who fight against evils and so reject falsities, who thus undergo temptations or trials, which are symbolically meant by "the great tribulation" (no. 377).

That to be washed means, symbolically, to be cleansed of evils and falsities, and so to be reformed and regenerated, can be seen from the following passages:

When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and rinsed away the blood of Jerusalem... by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of purification... (Isaiah 4:4)

Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; put away the evil of your doings from My eyes. Cease to do evil... (Isaiah 1:16)

Wash your heart of its wickedness, O Jerusalem, that you may be saved. (Jeremiah 4:14)

Wash me clean of my iniquity..., and I shall be whiter than snow. (Psalms 51:2, 7)

...if you wash yourself with soda, and use much soap, your iniquity will still retain its spots. (Jeremiah 2:22)

If I wash myself with melted snow, and cleanse my hands with soap..., yet... my own clothes will abhor me. (Job 9:30-31)

Who... has washed his clothing in wine, and his vesture in the blood of grapes. (Genesis 49:11)

This is said of the celestial church, from which come people prompted by love toward the Lord, and in the highest sense it is said of the Lord Himself. Wine and the blood of grapes are spiritual and celestial Divine truth.

I washed you with water, and rinsed off your blood from upon you... (Ezekiel 16:9)

This is said of Jerusalem. Water is truth, and blood is an adulteration of truth.

[2] It can be seen from this what washing in the Israelite Church represented and thus symbolized. As, for example, that Aaron was to wash himself before he put on the vestments of his ministry (Leviticus 16:4, 24), and before he approached the altar to minister (Exodus 30:18-21; 40:30-31).

[3] It can be seen from this that among the children of Israel washing represented a spiritual washing, which is a cleansing from evils and falsities, and thus reformation and regeneration.

It is apparent also from the aforesaid what baptism by John in the Jordan symbolized (Matthew 3, Mark 1:4-13), and what the symbolic meaning of the following words by John regarding the Lord is, that He baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire (Luke 3:16, John 1:33), and regarding himself, that he baptized with water (John 1:26). The meaning is that the Lord washes or purifies a person by Divine truth and Divine goodness, and that John by his baptism represented this. For the Holy Spirit is Divine truth, the fire is Divine goodness, and the water is representative of these. For water symbolizes the truth in the Word, which becomes goodness by one's living in accordance with it (no. 50).

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.