Arcana Coelestia # 2165
2165. That 'I will take a piece of bread' means something heavenly or celestial to go with [that something natural] is clear from the meaning of 'bread' as that which is celestial, dealt with already in 276, 680, 681, 1798. The reason 'bread' here means that which is celestial is that bread means all food in general, and so in the internal sense all heavenly or celestial food. What celestial food is has been stated in Volume One, in 56-58, 680, 681, 1480, 1695. That 'bread' means all food in general becomes clear from the following places in the Word: One reads of Joseph telling the man in charge of his house to bring the men, that is, his brothers, into the house, and then to slaughter what needed to be slaughtered and made ready. And after that, when these things had been made ready and the men were to eat them, he said, Set on bread, Genesis 43:16, 31, by which he meant that the table was to be made ready by them. Thus 'bread' stood for all the food that made up the entire meal. Regarding Jethro one reads that Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law before God, Exodus 18:12. Here also 'bread' stands for all the food that made up the entire meal. And regarding Manoah, in the Book of Judges,
Manoah said to the angel of Jehovah, Let us now detain you, and let us make ready a kid before you. And the angel of Jehovah said to Manoah, If you detain me I will not eat your bread. Judges 13:15-16.
Here 'bread' stands for the kid. When Jonathan ate from the honeycomb the people told him that Saul had commanded the people with an oath, saying,
Cursed be the man who eats bread this day. 1 Samuel 14:27-28.
Here 'bread' stands for all food. Elsewhere, regarding Saul,
When Saul sat down to eat bread he said to Jonathan, Why has not the son of Jesse come either yesterday or today, to bread? 1 Samuel 20:24, 27.
This stands for coming to the table, where there was food of every kind. Regarding David who said to Mephibosheth, Jonathan's son,
You will eat bread at my table always. 2 Samuel 9:7, 10.
Similarly regarding Evil-Merodach who said that Jehoiachin the king of Judah was to eat bread with him always, all the days of his life, 2 Kings 25:29. Regarding Solomon the following is said,
Solomon's bread for each day was thirty cors 1 of fine flour, sixty cors of meal, ten fatted oxen, twenty pasture-fed oxen, and a hundred sheep, besides harts and wild she-goats and roebucks and fatted fowl. 1 Kings 4:22-23.
Here 'bread' plainly stands for all the provisions that are mentioned.
[2] Since then 'bread' means every kind of food in general it consequently means in the internal sense all those things that are called heavenly or celestial foods. This becomes even clearer still from the burnt offerings and sacrifices that were made of lambs, sheep, 2 she-goats, kids, he-goats, young bulls, and oxen, which are referred to by the single expression bread offered by fire to Jehovah, as is quite clear from the following places in Moses where the various sacrifices are dealt with and which, it says, the priest was to burn on the altar as the bread offered by fire to Jehovah for an odour of rest, Leviticus 3:11, 16. All those sacrifices and burnt offerings were called such. In the same book,
The sons of Aaron shall be holy to their God, and they shall not profane the name of their God, for it is the fire-offerings to Jehovah, the bread of their God, that they offer. You shall sanctify him, for it is the bread of your God that he offers. No man of Aaron's seed who has a blemish in himself shall approach to offer the bread of his God. Leviticus 21:6, 8, 17, 21.
Here also sacrifices and burnt offerings are referred to as 'bread', as they are also in Leviticus 22:25. Elsewhere in the same author,
Command the children of Israel, and say to them, My gift, My bread, for fire-offerings of an odour of rest, you shall take care to offer to Me at their appointed times. Numbers 28:2.
Here also 'bread' stands for all the sacrifices that are mentioned in that chapter. In Malachi,
Offering polluted bread on My altar. Malachi 1:7.
This also has regard to sacrifices. The consecrated parts of the sacrifices which they ate were called 'bread' as well, as is clear from these words in Moses,
The person who has touched anything unclean shall not eat any of the consecrated offerings, but he shall surely bathe his flesh in water, and when the sun has set he will be clean. And afterwards he shall eat of the consecrated offerings, because it is his bread. Leviticus 22:6-7.
[3] Burnt offerings and sacrifices in the Jewish Church represented nothing else than the heavenly things of the Lord's kingdom in heaven, and of the Lord's kingdom on earth, which is the Church. They also represented the things of the Lord's kingdom or Church as it exists with every individual; and in general they represented all those things that are composed of love and charity, for those things are celestial or of heaven. In addition each type of sacrifice represented some specific thing. In those times all of the sacrifices were called 'bread', and therefore when the sacrifices were abolished and other things serving for external worship took their place, the use of bread and wine was commanded.
[4] From all this it is now clear what is meant by that 'bread', namely that it means all those things which were represented in the sacrifices, and thus in the internal sense means the Lord Himself. And because 'bread' there means the Lord Himself it means love itself towards the whole human race and what belongs to love. It also means man's reciprocal love to the Lord and towards the neighbour. Thus the bread now commanded means all celestial things, and wine accordingly all spiritual things, as the Lord also explicitly teaches in John,
They said, Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat. Jesus said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, It was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. They said to Him, Lord, give us this bread always. Jesus said to them, I am the Bread of life he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst. John 6:31-35.
And in the same chapter,
Truly I say to you, He who believes in Me has eternal life. I am the Bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the Bread which comes down from heaven, that a man may eat of it and not die. I am the living Bread which came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this Bread he will live for ever. John 6:47-51.
[5] Now because this 'Bread' is the Lord it exists within the celestial things of love which are the Lord's, for the Lord is the celestial itself, because He is love itself, that is, mercy itself. This being so, 'bread' also means everything celestial, that is, all the love and charity existing with a person, for these are derived from the Lord. People who are devoid of love and charity therefore do not have the Lord within them, and so are not endowed with the forms of good and of happiness which are meant in the internal sense by 'bread'. This external symbol [of love and charity] was commanded because the worship of the majority of the human race is external, and therefore without some external symbol scarcely anything holy would exist among them. Consequently when they lead lives of love to the Lord and of charity towards the neighbour, that which is internal exists with them even though they do not know that such love and charity constitute the inner core of worship. Thus in their external worship they are confirmed in the kinds of good which are meant by 'the bread'.
[6] In the Prophets as well 'bread' means the celestial things of love, as in Isaiah 3:1, 7; 30:23; 33:15-16; 55:2; 58:7-8; Lamentations 5:9; Ezekiel 4:16-17; 5:16; 14:13; Amos 4:6; 8:11; Psalms 105:16. Those things are in a similar way meant by 'the loaves of the Presence' on the table, referred to in Leviticus 24:5-9; Exodus 25:30; 40:23; Numbers 4:7; 1 Kings 7:48.
Poznámky pod čarou:
1. A cor, or a homer, was a Hebrew measure of about 6 bushels or 220 litres.
2. The Latin has a word meaning oxen (boves), but comparison with other places where Swedenborg gives the same list of animals suggests that he intended sheep (oves).
Leviticus 23
2
Say to the children of Israel, These are the fixed feasts of the Lord, which you will keep for holy meetings: these are my feasts.
3
On six days work may be done; but the seventh day is a special day of rest, a time for worship; you may do no sort of work: it is a Sabbath to the Lord wherever you may be living.
4
These are the fixed feasts of the Lord, the holy days of worship which you will keep at their regular times.
5
In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at nightfall, is the Lord's Passover;
6
And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread; for seven days let your food be unleavened bread.
7
On the first day you will have a holy meeting; you may do no sort of field-work.
8
And every day for seven days you will give a burned offering to the Lord; and on the seventh day there will be a holy meeting; you may do no field-work.
10
Say to the children of Israel, When you have come to the land which I will give you, and have got in the grain from its fields, take some of the first-fruits of the grain to the priest;
11
And let the grain be waved before the Lord, so that you may be pleasing to him; on the day after the Sabbath let it be waved by the priest.
12
And on the day of the waving of the grain, you are to give a male lamb of the first year, without any mark, for a burned offering to the Lord.
13
And let the meal offering with it be two tenth parts of an ephah of the best meal mixed with oil, an offering made by fire to the Lord for a sweet smell; and the drink offering with it is to be of wine, the fourth part of a hin.
14
And you may take no bread or dry grain or new grain for food till the very day on which you have given the offering for your God: this is a rule for ever through all your generations wherever you are living.
15
And let seven full weeks be numbered from the day after the Sabbath, the day when you give the grain for the wave offering;
16
Let fifty days be numbered, to the day after the seventh Sabbath; then you are to give a new meal offering to the Lord.
17
Take from your houses two cakes of bread, made of a fifth part of an ephah of the best meal, cooked with leaven, to be waved for first-fruits to the Lord.
18
And with the bread, take seven lambs of the first year, without any marks, and one ox and two male sheep, to be a burned offering to the Lord, with their meal offering and their drink offerings, an offering of a sweet smell made by fire to the Lord.
19
And you are to give one male goat for a sin-offering and two male lambs of the first year for peace-offerings.
20
And these will be waved by the priest, with the bread of the first-fruits, for a wave offering to the Lord, with the two lambs: they will be holy to the Lord for the priest.
21
And on the same day, let it be given out that there will be a holy meeting for you: you may do no field-work on that day: it is a rule for ever through all your generations wherever you are living.
22
And when you get in the grain from your land, do not let all the grain at the edges of the field be cut, and do not take up the grain which has been dropped in the field; let that be for the poor, and for the man from another country: I am the Lord your God.
23
And the Lord said to Moses,
24
Say to the children of Israel, In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, let there be a special day of rest for you, a day of memory, marked by the blowing of horns, a meeting for worship.
25
Do no field-work and give to the Lord an offering made by fire.
26
And the Lord said to Moses,
27
The tenth day of this seventh month is the day for the taking away of sin; let it be a holy day of worship; you are to keep from pleasure, and give to the Lord an offering made by fire.
28
And on that day you may do no sort of work, for it is a day of taking away sin, to make you clean before the Lord your God.
29
For any person, whoever he may be, who takes his pleasure on that day will be cut off from his people.
30
And if any person, whoever he may be, on that day does any sort of work, I will send destruction on him from among his people.
31
You may not do any sort of work: this is an order for ever through all your generations wherever you may be living.
32
Let this be a Sabbath of special rest to you, and keep yourselves from all pleasure; on the ninth day of the month at nightfall from evening to evening, let this Sabbath be kept.
33
And the Lord said to Moses,
34
Say to the children of Israel, On the fifteenth day of this seventh month let the feast of tents be kept to the Lord for seven days.
35
On the first day there will be a holy meeting: do no field-work.
36
Every day for seven days give an offering made by fire to the Lord; and on the eighth day there is to be a holy meeting, when you are to give an offering made by fire to the Lord; this is a special holy day: you may do no field-work on that day.
37
These are the fixed feasts of the Lord, to be kept by you as holy days of worship, for making an offering by fire to the Lord; a burned offering, a meal offering, an offering of beasts, and drink offerings; every one on its special day;
38
In addition to the Sabbaths of the Lord, and in addition to the things you give and the oaths you make and the free offerings to the Lord.
39
But on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have got in all the fruits of the land, you will keep the feast of the Lord for seven days: the first day will be a Sabbath, and the eighth day the same.
40
On the first day, take the fruit of fair trees, branches of palm-trees, and branches of thick trees and trees from the riverside, and be glad before the Lord for seven days.
41
And let this feast be kept before the Lord for seven days in the year: it is a rule for ever from generation to generation; in the seventh month let it be kept.
42
For seven days you will be living in tents; all those who are Israelites by birth are to make tents their living-places:
43
So that future generations may keep in mind how I gave the children of Israel tents as their living-places when I took them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.
44
And Moses made clear to the children of Israel the orders about the fixed feasts of the Lord.
