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2 Samuel 3

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1 Now there was a long war between Saul's people and David's people; and David became stronger and stronger, but those on Saul's side became more and more feeble.

2 While David was in Hebron he became the father of sons: the oldest was Amnon, son of Ahinoam of Jezreel;

3 And the second, Chileab, whose mother was Abigail, the wife of Nabal the Carmelite; and the third, Absalom, son of Maacah, the daughter of Talmai, king of Geshur;

4 And the fourth, Adonijah, the son of Haggith; and the fifth, Shephatiah, the son of Abital;

5 And the sixth, Ithream, whose mother was David's wife Eglah. These were the sons of David, whose birth took place in Hebron.

6 Now while there was war between Saul's people and David's people, Abner was making himself strong among the supporters of Saul.

7 Now Saul had among his wives a woman named Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah: and Ish-bosheth said to Abner, Why have you taken my father's wife?

8 And Abner was very angry at the words of Ish-bosheth, and he said, Am I a dog's head of Judah? I am this day doing all in my power for the cause of your father Saul and for his brothers and his friends, and have not given you up into the hands of David, and now you say I have done wrong with a woman.

9 May God's punishment be on Abner, if I do not for David as the Lord in his oath has said,

10 And if I do not take away the kingdom from the family of Saul and make David ruler over Israel and Judah from Dan as far as Beer-sheba!

11 And so great was Ish-bosheth's fear of Abner that he was not able to say a word in answer.

12 And Abner sent men to David at Hebron, saying, Make an agreement with me, and I will give you my support in getting all Israel on your side.

13 And he said, It is well; I will make an agreement with you, but on one condition, which is, that when you come before me, Saul's daughter Michal is to come with you; till she comes you will not see my face.

14 And David sent men to Saul's son Ish-bosheth, saying, Give me back Michal, my wife, whom I made mine for the price of the private parts of a hundred Philistines.

15 So Ish-bosheth sent and took her from her husband Paltiel, the son of Laish.

16 And her husband went with her as far as Bahurim, weeping while he went. Then Abner said to him, Go back. And he went back.

17 Then Abner had a talk with the chief men of Israel, saying, In the past it was your desire to make David your king: so now, do it:

18 For the Lord has said of David, By the hand of my servant David I will make my people Israel safe from the Philistines, and from all who are against them.

19 And Abner said the same things to Benjamin: and he went to David in Hebron to make clear to him what seemed good to Israel and to all the people of Benjamin.

20 So Abner, with twenty men, came to Hebron, to David. And David made a feast for Abner and the men who were with him.

21 And Abner said to David, Now I will go, and make all Israel come to my lord the king, so that they may make an agreement with you, and your kingdom may be as wide as your heart's desire. Then David sent Abner away and he went in peace.

22 Now the servants of David and Joab had been out attacking a band of armed men, and they came back with a great store of goods taken in the fight: but Abner was no longer in Hebron with David, for he had sent him away and he had gone in peace.

23 When Joab and his men came, news was given them that Abner, the son of Ner, had come to the king, who had let him go away again in peace.

24 Then Joab came to the king, and said, What have you done? when Abner came to you why did you send him away and let him go?

25 Is it not clear to you that Abner, the son of Ner, came with deceit to get knowledge of your going out and your coming in and of all you are doing?

26 And when Joab had come out from David, he sent men after Abner, and they overtook him at the water-spring of Sirah, and made him come back with them: but David had no knowledge of it.

27 And when Abner was back in Hebron, Joab took him on one side by the doorway of the town to have a word with him quietly, and there he gave him a wound in the stomach, causing his death in payment for the death of his brother Asahel.

28 And when David had word of it he said, May I and my kingdom be clear for ever in the eyes of the Lord from the blood of Abner, the son of Ner:

29 May it come on the head of Joab and all his father's family: among the men of Joab's family may there ever be some who are diseased or lepers, or who do the work of women, or are put to the sword, or are wasted from need of food!

30 So Joab and Abishai his brother put Abner to death, because he had put to death their brother Asahel in the fight at Gibeon.

31 And David said to Joab and all the people who were with him, Go in grief and put haircloth about you, in sorrow for Abner. And King David went after the dead body.

32 And they put Abner's body to rest in Hebron; and the king and all the people were weeping loudly by the resting-place of Abner's body.

33 And the king made a song of grief for Abner and said, Was the death of Abner to be like the death of a foolish man?

34 Your hands were free, your feet were not chained: like the downfall of a man before evil men, so was your fall. And the weeping of the people over him went on again.

35 And the people came to make David take food, while it was still day, but David with an oath said, May God's punishment be on me if I take a taste of bread or any other thing till the sun has gone down!

36 And all the people took note of it and were pleased: like everything the king did, it was pleasing to the people.

37 So it was clear to Israel and to all the people on that day that the king was not responsible for the death of Abner, the son of Ner.

38 And the king said to his servants, Do you not see that a chief and a great man has come to his end today in Israel?

39 While I, though I am crowned king, have little strength, and these men, the sons of Zeruiah, are out of my control: may the Lord give to the evil-doer the reward of his evil-doing!

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 4779

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4779. 'And put sackcloth on his loins' means mourning for lost good. This is clear from the meaning of 'putting sackcloth over the loins' as an act representative of mourning for lost good. For 'the loins' means conjugial love and from this all celestial and spiritual love, 3021, 3294, 4277, 4280, 4575. This meaning of 'the loins' is derived from correspondence, for as all the organs, members, and viscera of the human body correspond to the Grand Man, as shown at the ends of chapters, so the loins correspond to those who are within the Grand Man, which is heaven, and in whom genuine conjugial love has existed. And because conjugial love is the fundamental of all kinds of love 'the loins' therefore means in general all celestial and spiritual love. From this arose the custom of putting sackcloth over their loins when they mourned over lost good; for all good belongs to love.

[2] The fact that people put sackcloth over their loins to testify to this mourning becomes clear from the historical and the prophetical parts of the Word, as in Amos,

I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; so will I cause sackcloth to come up over all loins, and baldness over every head, and I will make it as the mourning for an only-begotten son, and its end as a bitter day. Amos 8:10.

'Causing sackcloth to come up over all loins' stands for mourning over lost forms of good, 'all loins' standing for all forms of the good of love. In Jonah,

The men of Nineveh believed in God, and therefore they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloths, from the greatest even to the least of them. And when word reached the king of Nineveh he rose up from his throne, and laid aside his royal robe from upon him, and covered himself with sackcloth and sat in ashes. And he proclaimed that man and beast were to be covered with sackcloths. Jonah 3:5-8.

Clearly this was a sign representative of mourning over evil on account of which Nineveh was to perish, and so mourning over lost good.

[3] In Ezekiel,

They will let forth a cry over you with their voice and will cry out bitterly; and they will cause dust to come up over their heads, and will roll themselves in ashes, and will make themselves bald over you, and will gird themselves with sackcloths. Ezekiel 27:30-31.

This refers to Tyre, each action mentioned here being representative of mourning for falsities and evils and so for lost truths and goods. 'Letting forth a cry and crying out bitterly' stands for lamentation over falsity or lost truth, 2240; 'causing dust to come up over the head' stands for having been condemned on account of evil, 278; 'rolling themselves in ashes' for having been condemned on account of falsities; 'making themselves bald' for mourning because the natural man has no truth, 3301 (end); 'girding themselves with sackcloths' for mourning because the natural man has no good. Similarly in Jeremiah,

O daughter of My people, gird yourself with sackcloth. and roll yourself in ashes; make mourning as for an only-begotten son, very bitter wailing; for suddenly he who lays waste will come upon you. Jeremiah 6:26.

And elsewhere in the same prophet,

The elders of the daughter of Zion will sit on the ground, they will become silent; they will cause dust to come up over their head, they will gird themselves with sackcloths; the virgins of Jerusalem will cause their heads to come down to the ground. Lamentations 2:10.

Here similar representative actions are described which, as above, were appropriate for the types of good and truth which had become lost.

[4] In Isaiah,

A prophecy concerning Moab. He will go up to Bayith, and to Dibon into the high places to weep; over Nebo and over Medeba Moab will howl. On all heads there is baldness; every beard is shaved off; in its streets they have girded themselves with sackcloth; on its roots and in its streets everyone will wail, descending into weeping. Isaiah 15:2-3.

'Moab' stands for those who adulterate all good, 2468. The mourning over that adulteration meant by 'Moab' is described by the kinds of things that correspond to that type of evil. Virtually the same description therefore occurs in Jeremiah,

Every head is bald, and every beard shaved off; upon all hands are cuts, and over the loins is sackcloth; on all the roofs of Moab and in its streets there is mourning everywhere. Jeremiah 48:37-38.

[5] When king Hezekiah heard the blasphemous utterances of the Rabshakeh against Jerusalem 'he rent his clothes, and covered himself with sackcloth', Isaiah 37:1; 2 Kings 19:1. The reason for mourning was that his utterances were directed against Jehovah, the king, and Jerusalem. Their being utterances made in opposition to truth is meant by the king rending his clothes, 4763, and utterances made in opposition to good by his covering himself with sackcloth; for when in the Word truth is dealt with, so also is good. This is so because of the heavenly marriage, which is a marriage of good to truth and of truth to good in every single part; as also in David,

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have loosed 1 my sackcloth and girded me with gladness. Psalms 30:11.

Here 'dancing' has reference to truths, and 'gladness' to goods, as they also do in other parts of the Word. 'Loosing sackcloth' accordingly means releasing from mourning over lost good.

[6] In 2 Samuel,

David said to Joab and to all the people who were with him, Rend your clothes, and gird sackcloth round you, and wail before Abner. 2 Samuel 3:31.

Because an outrageous act had been committed against that which was true and good David therefore commanded them to rend their clothes and gird sackcloths round them. Something similar occurred in the case of Ahab, for when he heard Elijah's words that he was to be cut off because he had acted contrary to what was fair and right - meaning in the spiritual sense contrary to what is true and good - 'he tore his clothes apart, and put sackcloth over his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went about slowly, 1 Kings 21:27.

[7] The use of 'sackcloth' to refer to lost good is also clear in John,

When he opened the sixth seal, behold, a great earthquake took place, and the sun became black as sackcloth, and the full moon became like blood. Revelation 6:12.

'An earthquake' stands for an alteration in the state of the Church as regards good and truth, 3355. 'The sun' stands for the good of love, 1529, 1530, 2441, 2495, 4060, 4300, 4696, and therefore 'sackcloth' here has reference to lost good. 'The moon' stands for the truth of faith, 1529, 1530, 2120, 2495, 4060, and 'blood' has reference to this because 'blood' means truth that has been falsified and rendered profane, 4735.

[8] Because 'being clothed in sackcloth and rolling oneself in ashes' represented mourning over evils and falsities, it also represented both humility and repentance. For humility begins first with the acknowledgement that in oneself one is nothing but a source of evil and falsity. Repentance begins with the same acknowledgement and does not become a reality except through humility, and humility does not become a reality except through heartfelt confession that in oneself one is such a source of evil and falsity. For 'putting on sackcloth' was an expression of humility, see 1 Kings 21:27-29, also of repentance, Matthew 11:21; Luke 10:13. But the fact that this was no more than some representative, and so merely an external activity of the body and not an internal activity of the heart, is evident in Isaiah,

Is he to bow his head like a rush and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, and a day of that which is pleasing to Jehovah? Is not this the fast that I choose, to loose 2 the bonds of wickedness, to break bread for the hungry? Isaiah 58:5-7.

Poznámky pod čarou:

1. literally, opened

2. literally, to open

  
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Thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.