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Numbers 11

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1 Now the people were saying evil against the Lord; and the Lord, hearing it, was angry and sent fire on them, burning the outer parts of the tent-circle.

2 And the people made an outcry to Moses, and Moses made prayer to the Lord, and the fire was stopped.

3 So that place was named Taberah, because of the fire of the Lord which had been burning among them.

4 And the mixed band of people who went with them were overcome by desire: and the children of Israel, weeping again, said, Who will give us flesh for our food?

5 Sweet is the memory of the fish we had in Egypt for nothing, and the fruit and green plants of every sort, sharp and pleasing to the taste:

6 But now our soul is wasted away; there is nothing at all: we have nothing but this manna before our eyes.

7 Now the manna was like a seed of grain, like small clear drops.

8 The people went about taking it up from the earth, crushing it between stones or hammering it to powder, and boiling it in pots, and they made cakes of it: its taste was like the taste of cakes cooked with oil.

9 When the dew came down on the tents at night, the manna came down with it.

10 And at the sound of the people weeping, every man at his tent-door, the wrath of the Lord was great, and Moses was very angry.

11 And Moses said to the Lord, Why have you done me this evil? and why have I not grace in your eyes, that you have put on me the care of all this people?

12 Am I the father of all this people? have I given them birth, that you say to me, Take them in your arms, like a child at the breast, to the land which you gave by an oath to their fathers?

13 Where am I to get flesh to give to all this people? For they are weeping to me and saying, give us flesh for our food.

14 I am not able by myself to take the weight of all this people, for it is more than my strength.

15 If this is to be my fate, put me to death now in answer to my prayer, if I have grace in your eyes; and let me not see my shame.

16 And the Lord said to Moses, Send for seventy of the responsible men of Israel, who are in your opinion men of weight and authority over the people; make them come to the Tent of meeting and be there with you.

17 And I will come down and have talk with you there: and I will take some of the spirit which is on you and put it on them, and they will take part of the weight of the people off you, so that you do not have to take it by yourself.

18 And say to the people, Make yourselves clean before tomorrow and you will have flesh for your food: for in the ears of the Lord you have been weeping and saying, Who will give us flesh for food? for we were well off in Egypt: and so the Lord will give you flesh, and it will be your food;

19 Not for one day only, or even for five or ten or twenty days;

20 But every day for a month, till you are tired of it, turning from it in disgust: because you have gone against the Lord who is with you, and have been weeping before him saying, Why did we come out of Egypt?

21 Then Moses said, The people, among whom I am, are six hundred thousand men on foot; and you have said, I will give them flesh to be their food for a month.

22 Are flocks and herds to be put to death for them? or are all the fish in the sea to be got together so that they may be full?

23 And the Lord said to Moses, Has the Lord's hand become short? Now you will see if my word comes true for you or not.

24 And Moses went out and gave the people the words of the Lord: and he took seventy of the responsible men of the people, placing them round the Tent.

25 Then the Lord came down in the cloud and had talk with him, and put on the seventy men some of the spirit which was on him: now when the spirit came to rest on them, they were like prophets, but only at that time.

26 But two men were still in the tent-circle one of them named Eldad and the other Medad: and the spirit came to rest on them; they were among those who had been sent for, but they had not gone out to the tent: and the prophet's power came on them in the tent-circle.

27 And a young man went running to Moses and said, Eldad and Medad are acting as prophets in the tent-circle.

28 Then Joshua, the son of Nun, who had been Moses' servant from the time when he was a child, said, My lord Moses, let them be stopped.

29 And Moses said to him, Are you moved by envy on my account? If only all the Lord's people were prophets, and the Lord might put his spirit on them!

30 Then Moses, with the responsible men of Israel, went back to the tent-circle.

31 Then the Lord sent a wind, driving little birds from the sea, so that they came down on the tents, and all round the tent-circle, about a day's journey on this side and on that, in masses about two cubits high over the face of the earth.

32 And all that day and all night and the day after, the people were taking up the birds; the smallest amount which anyone got was ten homers: and they put them out all round the tents.

33 But while the meat was still between their teeth, before it was tasted, the wrath of the Lord was moved against the people and he sent a great outburst of disease on them.

34 So that place was named Kibroth-hattaavah; because there they put in the earth the bodies of the people who had given way to their desires.

35 From Kibroth-hattaavah the people went on to Hazeroth; and there they put up their tents.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 8487

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8487. 'And the sun grew hot, and it melted' means its disappearance gradually as craving increased. This is clear from the meaning of 'the sun growing hot' as craving that is increasing, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'melting' as disappearing. The reason why 'the sun grew hot' means craving that was increasing is that 'the sun' in a good sense means heavenly love. It means this because the Lord is the Sun in the next life, the heat which comes from it being the good of love, and the light the truth of faith. (For more about that Sun - that it is the Lord and that heavenly love comes from it - see 1053, 1521, 1529-1531, 2120, 2441, 2495, 3636, 3643, 4060, 4321 (end), 4696, 5084, 5047, 5377, 7078, 7083, 7171, 7173, 7270.) Therefore 'the sun' in the contrary sense means self-love and love of the world, and the heat from the sun or its 'growing hot' in that sense means craving.

[2] The nature of the occurrence described here - that the good of truth, meant by 'the manna', disappeared gradually as craving increased, meant by its melting when the sun grew hot - must be explained briefly. The good of truth or spiritual good is indeed imparted to a member of the spiritual Church undergoing regeneration; but that good kills off every delight belonging to self-love and love of the world that has constituted his life previously, since they are contrary to each other. This being so, pure good of truth cannot remain for long with that person, but is modified by the Lord by means of the delights belonging to the two loves constituting his life previously. For if that good were not modified in this way it would hold no delight for him and so would be loathsome. This is what heavenly good is like initially with those undergoing regeneration. To the extent therefore that the delights of self-love and love of the world rise up, the good of heavenly love disappears, since, as has been stated, they are contrary to that good. So the reverse also occurs.

[3] This explains why in heaven there are changes of states, to which changes of times and seasons in the world correspond, 8426, and why such changes return those who are there to the delights that go with natural pleasures. For without such change of states the good of heavenly love would become so to speak dry and worthless. It is different when it is modified by natural delights, at once or in stages. This is why at first, when the children of Israel were given the man[na] every morning they were also given the selav in the evening; for 'the selav' means natural delight, and also the delight that goes with craving, 8452.

[4] But it should be recognized that the cravings to which those in heaven return when their evening comes are not cravings that are contrary to heavenly good, but ones that are to some extent in accord with it. For there are the delights of conferring benefits rather lavishly and getting some glory out of doing so, delights however which hold goodwill and the desire to serve others. Then there are the delights of opulence in home decor and personal dress, and very many other delights like these. Such delights are not ones that destroy the good of heavenly love, though they do nevertheless eclipse it. But eventually - depending on the degree the person's regeneration reaches - they become the lowest levels of heavenly good. At this point they are no longer spoken of as cravings but as delights. The fact that the good of heavenly love unless modified by such delights becomes so to speak dry, and after that is loathed as being so to speak worthless, is meant by the reaction of the children of Israel who, when they were no longer given the selav, called the manna dry food and worthless food. Their doing so is referred to in Moses as follows,

The rabble who were in the midst [of the people] had a strong craving, and so the children of Israel also wept repeatedly and said, Who will feed us with flesh? But now our soul is dry; there is nothing at all except the man[na] for our eyes [to look] at. Numbers 11:4, 6.

In the same author,

The people spoke against God and against Moses, Why have you caused us to come up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread, nor water; now our soul loathes this most worthless bread. Numbers 21:5.

And elsewhere in the same author,

Jehovah afflicted you, and caused you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor your fathers knew, in order that He might teach you that man does not live by bread only, but that man lives by every utterance of the mouth of Jehovah. Deuteronomy 8:3.

[5] 'Manna' is similar in meaning to 'unleavened bread', which means good pure and free from falsities, 8058. That bread is for a similar reason called the bread of misery, 1 Deuteronomy 16:3.

From all this one may now see how to understand the disappearance of the good of truth gradually as craving increased, meant by the melting of the man[na] when the sun grew hot.

Poznámky pod čarou:

1. Here Swedenborg follows Sebastian Schmidt; in other places Swedenborg has the bread of affliction.

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