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Leviticus 26

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1 Do not make images of false gods, or put up an image cut in stone or a pillar or any pictured stone in your land, to give worship to it; for I am the Lord your God.

2 Keep my Sabbaths and give honour to my holy place: I am the Lord.

3 If you are guided by my rules, and keep my laws and do them,

4 Then I will give you rain at the right time, and the land will give her increase and the trees of the field will give their fruit;

5 And the crushing of the grain will overtake the cutting of the grapes, and the cutting of the grapes will overtake the planting of the seed, and there will be bread in full measure, and you will be living in your land safely.

6 And I will give you peace in the land, and you will take your rest and no one will give you cause for fear; and I will put an end to all evil beasts in the land, and no sword of war will go through your land.

7 And you will put to flight those who are against you, and they will be put to death by your swords.

8 Then five of you will put to flight a hundred, and a hundred of you will put to flight ten thousand, and all who are against you will be put to death by your swords.

9 And I will have pleasure in you and make you fertile and greater in number; and I will keep my agreement with you.

10 And old stores long kept will be your food, and you will take out the old because of the new;

11 And I will put my holy House among you, and my soul will not be turned away from you in disgust.

12 And I will be present among you and will be your God and you will be my people.

13 I am the Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt so that you might not be servants to them; by me the cords of your yoke were broken and I made you go upright.

14 But if you do not give ear to me, and do not keep all these my laws;

15 And if you go against my rules and if you have hate in your souls for my decisions and you do not do all my orders, but go against my agreement;

16 This will I do to you: I will put fear in your hearts, even wasting disease and burning pain, drying up the eyes and making the soul feeble, and you will get no profit from your seed, for your haters will take it for food.

17 And my face will be turned from you, and you will be broken before those who are against you, and your haters will become your rulers, and you will go in flight when no man comes after you.

18 And if, even after these things, you will not give ear to me, then I will send you punishment seven times more for your sins.

19 And the pride of your strength will be broken, and I will make your heaven as iron and your earth as brass;

20 And your strength will be used up without profit; for your land will not give her increase and the trees of the field will not give their fruit.

21 And if you still go against me and will not give ear to me, I will put seven times more punishments on you because of your sins.

22 I will let loose the beasts of the field among you, and they will take away your children and send destruction on your cattle, so that your numbers will become small and your roads become waste.

23 And if by these things you will not be turned to me, but still go against me;

24 Then I will go against you, and I will give you punishment, I myself, seven times for all your sins.

25 And I will send a sword on you to give effect to the punishment of my agreement; and when you come together into your towns I will send disease among you and you will be given up into the hands of your haters.

26 When I take away your bread of life, ten women will be cooking bread in one oven, and your bread will be measured out by weight; you will have food but never enough.

27 And if, after all this, you do not give ear to me, but go against me still,

28 Then my wrath will be burning against you, and I will give you punishment, I myself, seven times for your sins.

29 Then you will take the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters for food;

30 And I will send destruction on your high places, overturning your perfume altars, and will put your dead bodies on your broken images, and my soul will be turned from you in disgust.

31 And I will make your towns waste and send destruction on your holy places; I will take no pleasure in the smell of your sweet perfumes;

32 And I will make your land a waste, a wonder to your haters living in it.

33 And I will send you out in all directions among the nations, and my sword will be uncovered against you, and your land will be without any living thing, and your towns will be made waste.

34 Then will the land take pleasure in its Sabbaths while it is waste and you are living in the land of your haters; then will the land have rest.

35 All the days while it is waste will the land have rest, such rest as it never had in your Sabbaths, when you were living in it.

36 And as for the rest of you, I will make their hearts feeble in the land of their haters, and the sound of a leaf moved by the wind will send them in flight, and they will go in flight as from the sword, falling down when no one comes after them;

37 Falling on one another, as before the sword, when no one comes after them; you will give way before your haters.

38 And death will overtake you among strange nations, and the land of your haters will be your destruction.

39 And those of you who are still living will be wasting away in their sins in the land of your haters; in the sins of their fathers they will be wasting away.

40 And they will have grief for their sins and for the sins of their fathers, when their hearts were untrue to me, and they went against me;

41 So that I went against them and sent them away into the land of their haters: if then the pride of their hearts is broken and they take the punishment of their sins,

42 Then I will keep in mind the agreement which I made with Jacob and with Isaac and with Abraham, and I will keep in mind the land.

43 And the land, while she is without them, will keep her Sabbaths; and they will undergo the punishment of their sins, because they were turned away from my decisions and in their souls was hate for my laws.

44 But for all that, when they are in the land of their haters I will not let them go, or be turned away from them, or give them up completely; my agreement with them will not be broken, for I am the Lord their God.

45 And because of them I will keep in mind the agreement which I made with their fathers, whom I took out of the land of Egypt before the eyes of the nations, to be their God: I am the Lord.

46 These are the rules, decisions, and laws, which the Lord made between himself and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai, by the hand of Moses.

   

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Apocalypse Explained # 946

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946. Because thy judgments have been made manifest. That this signifies that Divine truths are revealed to them, is evident from the signification of judgments, as denoting Divine truths, of which we shall speak presently; and from the signification of being manifested, as denoting to be revealed. That Divine truths are revealed at the end of the church, and that they have been revealed, will be shown in what follows in this chapter, because the subject there treated of is concerning them.

The reason why judgments signify Divine truths is, that the laws of government in the Lord's spiritual kingdom are called judgments; but the laws of government in the Lord's celestial kingdom are called justice. For the laws of government in the Lord's spiritual kingdom are laws from Divine truth, whereas the laws of government in the Lord's celestial kingdom are laws from Divine Good. This is why judgment and justice are mentioned in the following passages in the Word.

In Isaiah:

"There shall be no end to peace upon the throne of David, to establish it, and to uphold it in judgment and justice from now and for ever" (9:7).

This speaks of the Lord and His kingdom. His spiritual kingdom is signified by the throne of David; and because this kingdom is in Divine truths from the Divine Good, it is said, in "judgment and justice."

In Jeremiah:

"I will raise up to David a just shoot, and he shall reign a king, and he shall act intelligently, and shall execute judgment and justice" (23:5).

These words also are spoken of the Lord, and of His spiritual kingdom. And since this kingdom is in Divine truths from the Divine Good, it is said that He shall reign a King, and shall act intelligently, and that He shall execute judgment and justice. The Lord is called King from Divine truth. And whereas Divine truth is also Divine intelligence, it is said that He shall act intelligently. And because Divine truth is from the Divine Good, it is said that He shall execute judgment and justice.

[2] In Isaiah:

"Jehovah shall be exalted; for he dwelleth on high; he hath filled Zion with judgment and justice" (33:5).

By Zion is meant heaven and the church, where the Lord reigns by Divine truth. And because all Divine truth is from Divine Good, it is said, "He hath filled Zion with judgment and justice."

In Jeremiah:

"I Jehovah, doing justice and judgment in the earth; for in these I am well pleased" (9:24).

Here also by judgment and justice is signified Divine truth from the Divine Good.

In Isaiah:

"They shall ask of me the judgments of justice; they shall desire to draw near unto God" (58:2).

The judgments of justice are Divine truths from the Divine Good. Similarly judgment and justice; for the spiritual sense conjoins those things the sense of the letter separates.

In Hosea:

"I will betroth thee to me for ever; and I will betroth thee to me in justice and judgment, and in mercy and in truth" (2:19, 20).

The subject there treated of is the celestial kingdom of the Lord, which consists of those who are in love to the Lord. And because the Lord's conjunction with them is comparatively like the conjunction of a husband with a wife - for the good of love so conjoins - therefore it is said, I will betroth thee to me in justice and judgment. And justice is mentioned in the first place, and judgment in the second, because those who are in the good of love to the Lord are also in truths; for they see them from good. Because justice is said of good, and judgment of truth, therefore it is also said, in mercy and in truth; mercy being also said of good, because it is of love.

[3] In David:

"Jehovah is in the heavens; thy justice as the mountains of God, and thy judgments as a great abyss" (Psalm 36:5, 6).

Justice is said of Divine Good, therefore it is compared to the mountains of God; for by mountains of God are signified the goods of love; see above (n. 405, 510, 850). And judgments are said of Divine truths, therefore they are compared to a great abyss; for by a great abyss is signified Divine truth. From these things it is now evident that by judgments are signified Divine truths.

[4] In many passages in the Word, judgments, precepts, and statutes are mentioned. And by judgments are there signified civil laws; by precepts the laws of spiritual life; and by statutes the laws of worship. That by judgments are signified civil laws, is clear from Exodus (Exodus 21, 22, 23), where the things that are there commanded are called judgments; because from them judgments were given by judges in the gates of the city. But still they signify Divine truths, such as are in the Lord's spiritual kingdom in the heavens, for they contain them in the spiritual sense, as is evident from the explanation in Arcana Coelestia (n. 8971-9103, 9124-9231, 9247-9348).

That the laws with the sons of Israel were called judgments, precepts, and statutes, is clear from the following passages:-

In Moses:

"I will speak unto thee all the precepts, the statutes, and the judgments, which thou shalt teach them, that they may do them" (Deuteronomy 5:31).

In the same:

"These are the precepts, the statutes, and the judgments, which Jehovah your God commanded to teach you" (Deuteronomy 6:1).

In the same:

"Therefore, thou shalt keep the precepts, the statutes, and the judgments, which I command thee this day, to do them" (Deuteronomy 7:11).

In David:

"If his sons forsake my law and walk not in my judgments; if they profane my statutes, and keep not my precepts, I will visit their prevarication with a rod" (Psalm 89:30-32),

besides frequently elsewhere:

As Leviticus 18:5; 19:37; 20:22; 25:18; 26:15; Deuteronomy 4:1; 5:1, 6, 7; 17:19; 26:17; Ezekiel 5:6, 7; 11:12, 20; 18:9; 20:11, 13, 25; 37:24.

By precepts in these passages are meant the laws of life, especially those in the Decalogue, which are therefore called the Ten Precepts. But by the statutes are meant the laws of worship, which principally related to sacrifices, and the ministry of holy things. And by judgments are meant civil laws, which, because representative of spiritual laws, were therefore significative of Divine truths, such as those in the Lord's spiritual kingdom in the heavens.

Continuation:-

[5] When, therefore, a man shuns and turns away from evils as sins, and is raised into heaven by the Lord, it follows that he is no longer in his proprium, but in the Lord, and that consequently he thinks and wills goods. Now because a man thinks and wills, so also does he act; for every action of a man proceeds from the thought of his will, therefore again it follows, that when a man shuns and turns away from evils, he does goods, not from himself, but from the Lord. Therefore to shun evils is to do goods. The goods which a man then does are meant by good works; and good works in their whole extent are meant by charity.

Because a man cannot be reformed unless he thinks, wills, and acts as of himself, that which he does as of himself is conjoined to him, and remains with him. Because that which a man does as of himself receives no life, but flows through like ether, therefore the Lord wills that a man should not only shun and turn away from evils as of himself, but should also think, will, and act as of himself, yet still acknowledge in heart, that all these things are from the Lord. This he will acknowledge because it is the truth.

  
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Translation by Isaiah Tansley. Many thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.