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Exodus 11

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1 And the Lord said to Moses, I will send one more punishment on Pharaoh and on Egypt; after that he will let you go; and when he does let you go, he will not keep one of you back, but will send you out by force.

2 So go now and give orders to the people that every man and every woman is to get from his or her neighbour ornaments of silver and of gold.

3 And the Lord gave the people grace in the eyes of the Egyptians. For the man Moses was highly honoured in the land of Egypt, by Pharaoh's servants and the people.

4 And Moses said, This is what the Lord says: About the middle of the night I will go out through Egypt:

5 And death will come to every mother's first male child in all the land of Egypt, from the child of Pharaoh on his seat of power, to the child of the servant-girl crushing the grain; and the first births of all the cattle.

6 And there will be a great cry through all the land of Egypt, such as never has been or will be again.

7 But against the children of Israel, man or beast, not so much as the tongue of a dog will be moved: so that you may see how the Lord makes a division between Israel and the Egyptians.

8 And all these your servants will come to me, going down on their faces before me and saying, Go out, and all your people with you: and after that I will Go out. And he went away from Pharaoh burning with wrath.

9 And the Lord said to Moses, Pharaoh will not give ear to you, so that my wonders may be increased in the land of Egypt.

10 All these wonders Moses and Aaron did before Pharaoh: but the Lord made Pharaoh's heart hard, and he did not let the children of Israel go out of his land.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 7780

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7780. 'Even to the firstborn of the servant-girl who is behind the mill' means falsified truths of faith that occupy the very last place. This is clear from the meaning of 'the firstborn' as faith, dealt with immediately above in 7779, and since faith is meant, so is truth in its entirety because truth, being that which one ought to believe, is the component of faith; and from the meaning of 'a servant-girl' as a rather external affection for truth, or an affection for knowledge, dealt with in 1895, 2567, 3835, 3849, and 'the servant-girl behind the mill' as the most external affection for knowledge since 'behind the mill' means that which occupies the very last place. The expression 'behind the mill' is used because 'the mill' has reference to matters of faith. For by means of a mill grain is ground into flour and so prepared for making bread, and 'flour' means truth which results in good, 'bread' the actual good that results from it. Thus 'sitting at the mill' is acquiring and learning the kinds of things that will be of service to faith, and through faith of service to charity. This is why when the ancients described learning the basic elements of faith they described it as 'sitting at the mill', or learning elements even more basic as 'sitting behind the mill'. It is because such things were meant that in His teachings about the final period of the Church the Lord says,

Two women grinding at the mill; one will be taken and the other will be left behind. Matthew 24:41.

These words would never have been used if 'the mill' had not meant matters of faith. For what 'the mill' and 'grinding' mean in the internal sense, see 4335. With regard to the truths of faith that occupy the first place and those that occupy the very last, it should be recognized that the truths of faith which emanate directly from the good of charity occupy the first place, for they are the outward form taken by good, whereas the truths which occupy the last place are bare truths. For when truths derive in succession from good, each degree of them departs further away from it, till at length they become bare truths. This is the kind of truths meant by 'servant-girls behind mills'.

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