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如申命记 32:42

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42 我要使我的飲血飲醉,就是被殺被擄之人的血。我的刀要,乃是仇敵中首領之

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Apocalypse Revealed # 806

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806. "And He has avenged the blood of His servants shed by her hand." This symbolizes a retribution for the injuries and violence done to the souls of worshipers of the Lord.

His avenging the blood of His servants shed by her hand symbolizes a retribution for the injuries and violence done to the souls of worshipers of the Lord, because His avenging symbolizes retribution. To shed blood means, symbolically, to do violence to the Lord's Divinity and to the Word (nos. 327, 684), in this case to worshipers of the Lord, who are meant by His servants. Roman Catholics inflicted injuries and violence on their souls by transferring Divine worship of the Lord to themselves and preventing their reading of the Word.

The Lord is said to have avenged or exacted retribution for the blood of His servants as though He did this to take revenge or punish; but still He does not act to take revenge or punish, just as He does not act out of anger or wrath, even though anger and wrath are occasionally attributed to Him in the Word (see nos. 525, 635, 658, 673 above).

Anger and revenge are attributed to the Lord when evil people are separated from the good and cast into hell, as happens at the time of a last judgment. That time is therefore called wrath and a day of wrath, and a day of vengeance. Not that the Lord is angry or vengeful, but that those people are angry at the Lord and filled with vengeance against Him. The case is like that of a criminal after sentence has been passed, who is angry at the law and filled with vengeance against the judge. For the law is not angry, nor is the judge taking revenge.

[2] Vengeance is meant in this sense in the following passages:

...the day of vengeance is in My heart, and the year of My redeemed has come. (Isaiah 63:4)

The reference there is to the Lord and the Last Judgment.

...the day of Jehovah's vengeance, the year of retribution for the case of Zion. (Isaiah 34:8)

Behold, your God will come for vengeance; for the retribution of God He will come, and He will save you. (Isaiah 35:4)

...these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. (Luke 21:22)

The reference there is to the culmination of the age, when the Last Judgment takes place.

The Spirit of the Lord Jehovih is upon Me... to proclaim the day Jehovah's good pleasure, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn. (Isaiah 61:1-2)

Shall My soul not take vengeance... for this? (Jeremiah 5:9, 29)

I will take vengeance (on Babylon), and will not allow anyone to intercede. (Isaiah 47:3)

...His thought is against Babylon to destroy it, because it is the vengeance of Jehovah, vengeance for His temple. (Jeremiah 51:11, cf. 51:36)

Sing, O nations, His people, for He will avenge the blood of His servants, and visit vengeance on His adversaries; He will purge His land, His people. (Deuteronomy 32:43)

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.

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Jeremiah 5

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1 "Run back and forth through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad places of it, if you can find a man, if there are any who does justly, who seeks truth; and I will pardon her.

2 Though they say, 'As Yahweh lives;' surely they swear falsely."

3 O Yahweh, don't your eyes look on truth? You have stricken them, but they were not grieved. You have consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. They have made their faces harder than a rock. They have refused to return.

4 Then I said, "Surely these are poor. They are foolish; for they don't know the way of Yahweh, nor the law of their God.

5 I will go to the great men, and will speak to them; for they know the way of Yahweh, and the law of their God." But these with one accord have broken the yoke, and burst the bonds.

6 Therefore a lion out of the forest shall kill them, a wolf of the evenings shall destroy them, a leopard shall watch against their cities; everyone who goes out there shall be torn in pieces; because their transgressions are many, [and] their backsliding is increased.

7 "How can I pardon you? Your children have forsaken me, and sworn by what are no gods. When I had fed them to the full, they committed adultery, and assembled themselves in troops at the prostitutes' houses.

8 They were as fed horses roaming at large: everyone neighed after his neighbor's wife.

9 Shouldn't I punish them for these things?" says Yahweh; "and shouldn't my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

10 "Go up on her walls, and destroy; but don't make a full end. Take away her branches; for they are not Yahweh's.

11 For the house of Israel and the house of Judah have dealt very treacherously against me," says Yahweh.

12 They have denied Yahweh, and said, "It is not he; neither shall evil come on us; neither shall we see sword nor famine.

13 The prophets shall become wind, and the word is not in them. Thus shall it be done to them."

14 Therefore thus says Yahweh, the God of Armies, "Because you speak this word, behold, I will make my words in your mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them.

15 Behold, I will bring a nation on you from far, house of Israel," says Yahweh. "It is a mighty nation. It is an ancient nation, a nation whose language you don't know, neither understand what they say.

16 Their quiver is an open tomb, they are all mighty men.

17 They shall eat up your harvest, and your bread, [which] your sons and your daughters should eat. They shall eat up your flocks and your herds. They shall eat up your vines and your fig trees. They shall beat down your fortified cities, in which you trust, with the sword.

18 "But even in those days," says Yahweh, "I will not make a full end with you.

19 It will happen, when you say, 'Why has Yahweh our God done all these things to us?' Then you shall say to them, 'Just like you have forsaken me, and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve strangers in a land that is not yours.'

20 "Declare this in the house of Jacob, and publish it in Judah, saying,

21 'Hear now this, foolish people, and without understanding; who have eyes, and don't see; who have ears, and don't Hear:

22 Don't you fear me?' says Yahweh 'Won't you tremble at my presence, who have placed the sand for the bound of the sea, by a perpetual decree, that it can't pass it? and though its waves toss themselves, yet they can't prevail; though they roar, yet they can't pass over it.'

23 "But this people has a revolting and a rebellious heart; they have revolted and gone.

24 Neither do they say in their heart, 'Let us now fear Yahweh our God, who gives rain, both the former and the latter, in its season; who preserves to us the appointed weeks of the harvest.'

25 "Your iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withheld good from you.

26 For among my people are found wicked men. They watch, as fowlers lie in wait. They set a trap. They catch men.

27 As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit. Therefore they have become great, and grew rich.

28 They have grown fat. They shine; yes, they excell in deeds of wickedness. They don't plead the cause, the cause of the fatherless, that they may prosper; and they don't judge the right of the needy.

29 "Shall I not punish for these things?" says Yahweh. "Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?

30 "An astonishing and horrible thing has happened in the land.

31 The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?