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Daniel 7

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1 In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon, Daniel saw a dream and visions of his head upon his bed: then he wrote the dream; he told the sum of the matters.

2 Daniel spoke and said, I saw in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of the heavens broke forth upon the great sea.

3 And four great beasts came up from the sea, different one from another.

4 The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I beheld till its wings were plucked; and it was lifted up from the earth, and made to stand upon two feet as a man, and a man's heart was given to it.

5 And behold, another beast, a second, like unto a bear, and it raised up itself on one side; and [it had] three ribs in its mouth between its teeth; and they said thus unto it: Arise, devour much flesh.

6 After this I saw, and behold, another, like a leopard, and it had four wings of a bird upon its back; and the beast had four heads; and dominion was given to it.

7 After this I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and exceeding strong; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and broke in pieces, and stamped the rest with its feet; and it was different from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns.

8 I considered the horns, and behold, there came up among them another, a little horn, before which three of the first horns were plucked up by the roots; and behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking great things.

9 I beheld till thrones were set, and the Ancient of days did sit: his raiment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was flames of fire, [and] its wheels burning fire.

10 A stream of fire issued and came forth from before him; thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened.

11 I beheld therefore, because of the voice of the great words that the horn spoke; I beheld till the beast was slain, and its body destroyed, and it was given up to be burned with fire.

12 As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was taken away; but their lives were prolonged for a season and a time.

13 I saw in the night visions, and behold, there came with the clouds of heaven [one] like a son of man, and he came up even to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.

14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom [that] which shall not be destroyed.

15 As for me Daniel, my spirit was grieved in the midst of my body, and the visions of my head troubled me.

16 I came near unto one of them that stood by, and asked him the certainty of all this. And he told me, and made me know the interpretation of the things:

17 These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, [that] shall arise out of the earth.

18 But the saints of the most high [places] shall receive the kingdom, and they shall possess the kingdom for ever, even to the ages of ages.

19 Then I desired to know the certainty concerning the fourth beast, which was different from them all, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and its nails of brass; which devoured, broke in pieces, and stamped the rest with its feet;

20 and concerning the ten horns that were in its head, and the other that came up, and before which three fell: even that horn that had eyes, and a mouth speaking great things, and whose look was more imposing than its fellows.

21 I beheld, and that horn made war with the saints, and prevailed over them;

22 until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most high [places]; and the appointed time arrived, and the saints possessed the kingdom.

23 He said thus: The fourth beast shall be a fourth kingdom upon the earth, which shall be different from all the kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.

24 And as to the ten horns, out of this kingdom shall arise ten kings; and another shall arise after them; and he shall be different from the former, and he shall subdue three kings.

25 And he shall speak words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High [places], and think to change seasons and the law; and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and a half time.

26 And the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end.

27 But the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heavens, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most high [places]. His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.

28 So far is the end of the matter. As for me Daniel, my thoughts much troubled me, and my countenance was changed in me; but I kept the matter in my heart.

   

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Conjugial Love # 193

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193. 8. A woman is actually transformed into a wife according to the description in the book of creation. We are told in this book that woman was created from the rib of a man, and that when she was brought to him, the man said,

She...is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'Ishshah (Woman) because she was taken from 'Ish (Man). (Genesis 2:22-24)

In the Word, a rib from the breast symbolically means, in its spiritual sense, not a rib but natural truth. This is the symbolism of the ribs which the bear carried between its teeth in Daniel 7:5; for bears symbolize people who read the Word in its natural sense and see truths there without understanding. The breast of a man symbolizes that essential and distinctive quality which makes it different in character from the breast of a woman. This quality is wisdom, as may be seen above in no. 187; for truth supports wisdom, as a rib supports the breast. These distinctive qualities are symbolized, because the breast is where all the qualities of a person are, so to speak, at their center.

[2] It follows from this that woman was created from man by a transmission and replication of his distinctive wisdom, which is formed from natural truth, and that man's love for this wisdom was transferred to woman so as to become conjugial love; moreover, that the purpose of this was to replace love of self in man with love for his wife, who, from a nature innate in her, cannot help but turn the love of self in man to his love for her. I have been told, too, that this comes about as a result of the wife's love, without either the man or the wife being conscious of it. It is because of this that no one is ever able to love his partner with a truly conjugial love so long as he is possessed of a conceit in his own intelligence from a love of self.

[3] Once this secret of the creation of woman from man has been understood, it can be seen that in marriage a woman is similarly created or formed, so to speak, from her husband, and that this transformation is brought about by the wife - or rather, through the wife by the Lord, who infuses into women the inclination to achieve it. For a wife receives into her an image of her husband by assimilating his affections into her (see above, no. 173); by uniting the internal will of her husband with hers (concerning which below); and also by incorporating into her the propagations of his soul (of which also below).

It is apparent from this that a woman is transformed into a wife according to the description in the book of creation understood in respect to its inner meaning, and that she is transformed through the qualities she takes from her husband and his "breast" and implants in herself.

  
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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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Forever

  
Amuletic Brooch with inscribed prayer.

It is hard for us to conceive this, but time does not exist in spiritual reality. Time is an aspect of physical reality that no longer constrains us in spiritual life, just as we are no longer constrained by our physical bodies in spiritual life. That is what "forever" means in the Bible. It doesn't just mean "for a long time," "for the rest of your life" or even "until the sun expands and destroys the earth and all life here." It means to eternity without end.