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Numbers 8

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1 And the Lord said to Moses,

2 Say to Aaron, When you put the lights in their places, the seven lights will give light in front of the support.

3 And Aaron did so; he put the lights in their places so that they gave light in front of the support, as the Lord gave orders to Moses.

4 The support for the lights was of hammered gold work, from its base to its flowers it was of hammered work; from the design which the Lord had given to Moses, he made the support for the lights.

5 And the Lord said to Moses,

6 Take the Levites out from among the children of Israel and make them clean.

7 And this is how you are to make them clean: let the holy water which takes away sin be put on them, and let the hair all over their bodies be cut off with a sharp blade, and let their clothing be washed and their bodies made clean.

8 Then let them take a young ox and its meal offering, crushed grain mixed with oil, and take another ox for a sin-offering.

9 And make the Levites come forward in front of the Tent of meeting, and let all the children of Israel come together:

10 And you are to take the Levites before the Lord: and the children of Israel are to put their hands on them:

11 And Aaron is to give the Levites to the Lord as a wave offering from the children of Israel, so that they may do the Lord's work.

12 And the Levites are to put their hands on the heads of the oxen, and one of the oxen is to be offered for a sin-offering and the other for a burned offering to the Lord to take away the sin of the Levites.

13 Then the Levites are to be put before Aaron and his sons, to be offered as a wave offering to the Lord.

14 So you are to make the Levites separate from the children of Israel, and the Levites will be mine.

15 After that, the Levites will go in to do whatever has to be done in the Tent of meeting; you are to make them clean and give them as a wave offering.

16 For they have been given to me from among the children of Israel; in place of every mother's first son, the first to come to birth in Israel, I have taken them for myself.

17 For every mother's first son among the children of Israel is mine, the first male birth of man or beast: on the day when I sent death on all the first sons in the land of Egypt, I made them mine.

18 And in place of the first sons among the children of Israel, I have taken the Levites.

19 And I have given them to Aaron and to his sons, from among the children of Israel, to undertake for them all the work of the Tent of meeting, and to take away sin from the children of Israel so that no evil may come on them when they come near the holy place.

20 All these things Moses and Aaron and the children of Israel did to the Levites; as the Lord gave orders to Moses about the Levites, so the children of Israel did.

21 And the Levites were made clean from sin, and their clothing was washed, and Aaron gave them for a wave offering before the Lord; and Aaron took away their sin and made them clean.

22 And then the Levites went in to do their work in the Tent of meeting before Aaron and his sons: all the orders which the Lord had given Moses about the Levites were put into effect.

23 And the Lord said to Moses,

24 This is the rule for the Levites: those of twenty-five years old and over are to go in and do the work of the Tent of meeting;

25 But after they are fifty years old, they are to give up their work and do no more;

26 But be with their brothers in the Tent of meeting, taking care of it but doing no work. This is what you are to do in connection with the Levites and their work.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 10093

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10093. Which is waved, and which is uplifted. That this signifies which is acknowledged and perceived, is evident from the signification of being “waved,” when said of the breast, as being that which is vivified by acknowledgment (see above, n. 10091); and from the signification of “uplifted,” as being the Divine celestial, which is of the Lord alone, perceived in heaven and in the church (of which below). How the case herein is shall be briefly told. There are two kingdoms from which are the heavens, the celestial and the spiritual. Divine truth in the spiritual kingdom is acknowledged, but in the celestial kingdom it is perceived. The reason of this is that Divine truth in the spiritual kingdom is received in the intellectual part, but in the celestial kingdom in the will part. That which is received in the intellectual part is said to be acknowledged, but that which is received in the will part is said to be perceived. (That the former have only an acknowledgment of Divine truth, but the latter a perception of it, see what has been abundantly shown above concerning these two kingdoms in the places cited in n. 9277, 9596, 9684.)

[2] As regards uplifting, that is called an “uplifting” 1 which was Jehovah’s or the Lord’s, and it was given to Aaron for the sake of the representation; and as Aaron represented the Lord as to Divine good (n. 9806), therefore that which was uplifted from the sacrifices and given to Aaron represented the Divine of the Lord, and is also called “the anointing” in Moses.

The breast of the waving and the hind quarter of the uplifting have I taken from among the sons of Israel of the sacrifices of the eucharistic things, and I have given them to Aaron the priest and to his sons for a statute of eternity from among the sons of Israel; this is the anointing of Aaron and the anointing of his sons from the fire-offerings of Jehovah, on the day in which I made them draw near to minister in the priest’s office to Jehovah (Leviticus 7:34-35).

It is called “the anointing” because “anointing” denotes inauguration to represent the Lord as to Divine good (see n. 9954, 10019). Elsewhere also in the same:

Jehovah spoke unto Aaron, Behold, I have given thee the charge of Mine upliftings, in respect to all the holy things of the sons of Israel, unto thee I have given them for an anointing, and to thy sons. To thee have I given the uplifting in respect to all the waving of the sons of Israel, all the fat of the pure oil, and all the fat of the new wine and of the grain of the firstfruits; and in respect to all the firstfruits which they shall give to Jehovah, they shall be thine; in respect to everything devoted, everything that openeth the womb of all flesh which they shall bring to Jehovah of the firstlings of an ox, of a sheep, and of a goat, the flesh shall be thine, as the breast of waving and as the right hind quarter; every uplifting of the holy things. Thou shalt not have part nor inheritance in the land, because Jehovah is thy part and inheritance; and also every uplifting from the tithes and from the gifts, which have been given to the Levites (Numbers 18:8, 11-20, 28-29).

From all this it is evident what the “upliftings” were, namely, that all things were so called which belong to Jehovah, that is, to the Lord.

[3] And as the Levites represented Divine truths in heaven and the church that are of service to Divine good, they were also given to Aaron in the place of all the firstborn, which were Jehovah’s, that is, the Lord’s, concerning which it is thus written in Moses:

I have taken the Levites from the midst of the sons of Israel, in the place of every firstborn that openeth the womb from the sons of Israel, that the Levites may be Mine, for every firstborn is Mine; and because the Levites were given to Me, I have given them as gifts to Aaron and his sons (Numbers 3:12-13; 8:16-19).

The upliftings are called “gifts given to Jehovah,” that is, to the Lord, from among the sons of Israel; but it is meant that they do not belong to Jehovah from any gift, but from possession, because everything holy or Divine with man is not man’s, but is the Lord’s with him. That everything good and true, thus every holy Divine thing, is from the Lord God, and nothing from man, has been known in the church, whence it is plain that it is from appearance that it is called a gift from man. And therefore also in what presently follows it is said, “for this is an uplifting, and it shall be an uplifting from among the sons of Israel, this is an uplifting of Jehovah;” by which is signified that the uplifting from the sons of Israel is Jehovah’s uplifting, thus that a gift from them is a gift from the Lord. From this it is evident what an “uplifting” is.

Poznámky pod čarou:

1. Or heave-offering.

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