Arcana Coelestia # 9262
9262. 'And do not kill the innocent and the righteous' means detesting the destruction of good, interior and exterior. This is clear from the meaning of 'the innocent' as a person governed by interior good, and so in the abstract sense as interior good, dealt with below; from the meaning of 'the righteous' as a person governed by exterior good, and in the abstract sense as exterior good, since 'righteous' has reference to the good of love towards the neighbour, but 'innocent' to the good of love to the Lord - the good of love towards the neighbour being exterior good, and the good of love to the Lord being interior good; and from the meaning of 'killing' as destroying. The fact that 'righteous' means the good of love towards the neighbour will also be seen below. But the reason why 'the innocent' means the good of love to the Lord is that people endowed with innocence are those who love the Lord; for innocence consists in the acknowledgement in a person's heart that left to himself he intends nothing but evil and perceives nothing but falsity, and that all good of love and all truth of faith come from the Lord alone. No others can acknowledge these things in their heart except those who have been joined to the Lord in love. Such people inhabit the inmost heaven, which is accordingly called the heaven of innocence. Therefore the good that is theirs is interior good; for the Divine Good of Love coming from the Lord is that which inhabitants of the heaven of innocence receive. Therefore also they appear naked and also look like young children. So it is that innocence is represented by nakedness and also by early childhood. For its representation by nakedness, see 165, 213, 214, 8375; and by early childhood, 430, 1616, 2280, 2305, 2306, 3183, 3494, 4563, 4797, 5608 (end).
[2] From all that has just been stated regarding innocence it may be seen that what is Divine and the Lord's cannot be received except within innocence. This being so, good is not good unless there is innocence within it, 2526, 2780, 3994, 6765, 7840, 7887, that is, unless there is the acknowledgement that from the self nothing but evil and falsity arises and that from the Lord comes all goodness and truth. Believing the former about the self, and believing the latter about the Lord and also desiring it to be so, are what constitutes innocence. Therefore the good of innocence is God's goodness itself coming from the Lord and residing with a person. So it is that 'the innocent' means a person governed by interior good and in the abstract sense means interior good.
[3] Because 'the innocent' or 'innocence' means Divine Good coming from the Lord, shedding innocent blood was a thoroughly atrocious crime. And when it had been committed the whole land was under damnation until the crime had been expiated, as becomes clear from the process of investigation and absolution from guilt if someone had been found slain in the land. That process is spoken of in Moses as follows,
When one is found slain in the land, lying in the field, and it is not known who smote him, then your elders and your judges shall come out and they shall measure [the distance] to the cities which are around the one slain. It shall be however, that in the city nearest to the one slain the elders of this city shall take an ox's heifer by means of which no work has been done, which has not pulled in the yoke; and the elders of this city shall bring the heifer down to a barren valley which is neither tilled nor sown, and there they shall break the heifer's neck in the valley. Then the priests, the sons of Levi, shall come near, and all the elders of this city standing by the one slain. They shall wash their hands over the heifer whose neck has been broken in the valley; and they shall answer and say, Our hands have not shed this blood, and our eyes have not seen it; expiate Your people Israel whom You have redeemed, O Jehovah, and do not set innocent blood in the midst of Your people Israel. In this way the blood will be expiated for them. But you shall put away the innocent blood from the midst of you, if you do what is right in the eyes of Jehovah. Deuteronomy 21:1-10.
Anyone can see that this process of investigation and absolution from guilt when innocent blood had been shed in the land holds within it the arcana of heaven, of which people cannot have any knowledge at all unless they know what is meant by 'one slain, [lying] in the field', by 'an ox's heifer by means of which no work has been done, and which has not pulled in the yoke', by 'a barren valley which is neither tilled nor sown', by 'breaking the neck of the heifer in the valley', by 'washing hands over the heifer', and by all the other details of the process. Unless everything laid down had meant those arcana it would have been totally unsuitable for the Word that has been dictated by God and inspired in every word and part of a letter. For without its deeper meaning such a process would have been an observance which had nothing holy about it, indeed which had scarcely any value.
[4] But exactly which arcana lie within it is nevertheless evident from the internal sense, that is, if it is known that 'one slain in the land, lying in the field' means truth and good wiped out in the Church where good exists; that 'the city nearest to the one slain' means the truth taught by the Church whose good has been wiped out; that 'an ox's heifer by means of which no work has been done, and which has not pulled in the yoke' means the good of the external or natural man, who has not as yet, through enslavement to evil desires, drawn falsities into his faith and evils into his life; that 'a barren valley which is neither tilled nor sown' means the natural mind that is not cultivated with truths or forms of the good of faith owing to lack of knowledge; that 'breaking its neck in the valley' means purification, on account of absence of blame because it was due to lack of knowledge; and that 'washing the hand' means being absolved from that atrocious crime. Once these things are known it is evident that 'shedding innocent blood' means wiping out Divine Truth and Good that come from the Lord, thus the Lord Himself as He exists with a member of the Church.
[5] It should be recognized that this entire process represented in heaven the kind of crime that had no blame attached to the commission of it because it was due to ignorance that had innocence within it and was therefore as something not evil. Each detail within that process, even the smallest, represented some essential aspect of the reality portrayed by the whole. But which aspect each one represented is clear from the internal sense.
'One who has been slain' is truth and good that have been wiped out, see 4503.
'The land' is the Church, 662, 1066, 1067, 1262, 1413, 1607, 1733, 1850, 2117, 2118 (end), 2928, 3355, 4447, 4535, 5577, 8011, 8732.
'The field' is the Church in respect of good, thus the Church's good, 2971, 3310, 3766, 4982, 7502, 7571, 9139.
'The city' is teachings presenting the truth, thus the truth taught by the Church, 402, 2268, 2449, 2712, 2943, 3216, 4492, 4493.
'Ox' is the good of the external or natural man, 2180, 2566, 2781, 9134, so that 'a heifer' is good in its infancy, 1824, 1825.
[6] 'No work had been done by it, and it had not pulled in the yoke', it is evident, means that up to then it had not, owing to lack of knowledge, served falsities and evils; for 'working' and 'pulling in the yoke' mean serving.
'A valley' is the lower mind, which is called the natural mind, 3417, 4715; 'a barren valley' is that mind when devoid of truths and forms of good, 3908; so that 'a valley which is neither tilled nor sown' is the natural mind not yet cultivated with truths and forms of good, thus which is still lacking in knowledge, 'the seed with which it is sown' being the truth of faith, 1025, 1447, 1610, 1940, 2848, 3038, 3373, 3671, 6158.
'Breaking the neck' is expiation, because the slaughter of various beasts, like the offering of sacrifice, meant expiation.
'Washing the hand' means purification from falsities and evils, 3147; here therefore it means purification from that atrocious crime; for 'shedding blood' in general means violence done to goodness and truth, 9127, so that 'shedding innocent blood' means wiping out what is Divine residing with a person and comes from the Lord, thus the Lord Himself residing with that person; for truth and good residing with a person are the Lord Himself since they come from Him.
[7] The like is meant by 'shedding innocent blood' in Deuteronomy 19:10; 27:25; Isaiah 59:3, 7; Jeremiah 2:34; 7:6; 19:4; 22:3, 17; Joel 3:19; Psalms 94:21. 'One who is innocent' means in the proximate sense someone who is blameless and also free from evil, to which people also bore witness in former times by washing their hands, Psalms 26:6; 73:13; Matthew 27:24; John 18:38; 19:4. The reason for this is that good which comes from the Lord and resides with a person is blameless and free from evil; this good is the good of innocence in the internal sense, as has been shown. But good that is blameless and free from evil as it exists in the external man, which is exterior good, is called 'righteous', as also in David,
The throne of perdition will not be linked to You - those who gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous and condemn innocent blood. Psalms 94:20-21.
John 19
1
So Pilate then took Jesus, and flogged him.
2
The soldiers twisted thorns into a crown, and put it on his head, and dressed him in a purple garment.
3
They kept saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!" and they kept slapping him.
4
Then Pilate went out again, and said to them, "Behold, I bring him out to you, that you may know that I find no basis for a charge against him."
5
Jesus therefore came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. Pilate said to them, "Behold, the man!"
6
When therefore the chief priests and the officers saw him, they shouted, saying, "Crucify! Crucify!" Pilate said to them, "Take him yourselves, and crucify him, for I find no basis for a charge against him."
7
The Jews answered him, "We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God."
8
When therefore Pilate heard this saying, he was more afraid.
9
He entered into the Praetorium again, and said to Jesus, "Where are you from?" But Jesus gave him no answer.
10
Pilate therefore said to him, "Aren't you speaking to me? Don't you know that I have power to release you, and have power to crucify you?"
11
Jesus answered, "You would have no power at all against me, unless it were given to you from above. Therefore he who delivered me to you has greater sin."
12
At this, Pilate was seeking to release him, but the Jews cried out, saying, "If you release this man, you aren't Caesar's friend! Everyone who makes himself a king speaks against Caesar!"
13
When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called "The Pavement," but in Hebrew, "Gabbatha."
14
Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, at about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, "Behold, your King!"
15
They cried out, "Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar!"
16
So then he delivered him to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus and led him away.
17
He went out, bearing his cross, to the place called "The Place of a Skull," which is called in Hebrew, "Golgotha,"
18
where they crucified him, and with him two others, on either side one, and Jesus in the middle.
19
Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. There was written, "JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS."
20
Therefore many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.
21
The chief priests of the Jews therefore said to Pilate, "Don't write, 'The King of the Jews,' but, 'he said, I am King of the Jews.'"
22
Pilate answered, "What I have written, I have written."
23
Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also the coat. Now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.
24
Then they said to one another, "Let's not tear it, but cast lots for it to decide whose it will be," that the Scripture might be fulfilled, which says, "They parted my garments among them. For my cloak they cast lots." Therefore the soldiers did these things.
25
But there were standing by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.
26
Therefore when Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold your son!"
27
Then he said to the disciple, "Behold, your mother!" From that hour, the disciple took her to his own home.
28
After this, Jesus, seeing that all things were now finished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, "I am thirsty."
29
Now a vessel full of vinegar was set there; so they put a sponge full of the vinegar on hyssop, and held it at his mouth.
30
When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, "It is finished." He bowed his head, and gave up his spirit.
31
Therefore the Jews, because it was the Preparation Day, so that the bodies wouldn't remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a special one), asked of Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
32
Therefore the soldiers came, and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who was crucified with him;
33
but when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was already dead, they didn't break his legs.
34
However one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.
35
He who has seen has testified, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, that you may believe.
36
For these things happened, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, "A bone of him will not be broken."
37
Again another Scripture says, "They will look on him whom they pierced."
38
After these things, Joseph of Arimathaea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked of Pilate that he might take away Jesus' body. Pilate gave him permission. He came therefore and took away his body.
39
Nicodemus, who at first came to Jesus by night, also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred Roman pounds.
40
So they took Jesus' body, and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as the custom of the Jews is to bury.
41
Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden. In the garden was a new tomb in which no man had ever yet been laid.
42
Then because of the Jews' Preparation Day (for the tomb was near at hand) they laid Jesus there.
