Apocalypse Explained # 649
649. Verse 7. And when they shall have finished their testimony, signifies in the end of the church, when the Divine of the Lord is no longer acknowledged, and thence there is no longer any good of love or truth of doctrine. This is evident from the signification of "testimony," as being the acknowledgment of the Divine in the Lord, and thence of the good of love and truth of doctrine (of which presently), and from the signification of "to finish it," as being to bring to an end; and as this comes to an end at the end of the church; "to finish" here signifies the end of the church; and as there is then no longer any acknowledgment of the Divine in the Lord, there is therefore no good of love or truth of doctrine.
[2] That this is the signification of "testimony," can be seen from what has been thus far said about "the two witnesses," namely, that by them the good of love and charity and the truth of doctrine and faith are meant, because these are what especially testify concerning the Lord, for they are from the Lord, and are His with man; therefore "their testimony" signifies preaching concerning these. That "testimony" here signifies the acknowledgment of the Divine in the Lord is evident from what follows in Revelation:
That the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy (Revelation 19:10).
For unless a man acknowledges this from the heart, and believes it from spiritual faith, he can have no ability to receive the good of love or the truth of doctrine.
[3] At the end of the church indeed the Lord is preached, and from doctrine a Divine is also attributed to Him like the Divine of the Father; yet scarcely anyone thinks of His Divine, for the reason that they place it above or outside of His Human; therefore they do not look to the Lord when they look to His Divine, but to the Father as to another, and yet the Divine that is called the Father is in the Lord, as He Himself teaches in John 10:30, 38; 14:7. For this reason men think of the Lord in the same way as they think of a common man, and from that thought their faith flows, however much they may say with the lips that they believe in His Divine. Let anyone explore, if he can, the idea of his thought about the Lord, whether it be not such. But when it is such man cannot be conjoined to the Lord by faith and love, nor through conjunction receive any good of love or truth of faith. This, then, is why there is at the end of the church no acknowledgment of the Lord, that is, of the Divine in the Lord and from the Lord. It is believed that there is an acknowledgment of the Divine of the Lord, because such is the doctrine of the church; but so long as His Divine is separated from His Human, His Divine is yet not acknowledged interiorly but only exteriorly, and to acknowledge exteriorly is to acknowledge with the mouth only and not with the heart, or in speech only and not in faith.
[4] That this is so can be seen from Christians in the other life, where the thoughts of the heart are manifested. When they are permitted to speak from doctrine and from what they have heard from preaching they attribute a Divine to the Lord, and call it their belief; but when their interior thought and faith are explored they have no other idea of the Lord than as of a common man who has no Divine. It is man's interior thought that is the source of his faith; and as such is the thought and consequent faith of man's spirit, there is plainly no acknowledgment of the Divine in the Lord and from the Lord in the Christian world at the end of the church. In other words, there is an external acknowledgment of the Divine of the Lord, but no internal, and an external acknowledgment is of the natural man alone, while internal acknowledgment is of his very spirit; and after death the external acknowledgment is put to sleep, while the internal is the acknowledgment of his spirit. From this it can in some measure be seen how what follows is to be understood, namely, "the beast that cometh up out of the abyss shall overcome and kill the two witnesses," and their "bodies shall be seen upon the street of the city that is called Sodom and Egypt," and afterwards that "the spirit of life entered into them."
Genesis 2
1
The heavens and the earth were finished, and all their vast array.
2
On the seventh day God finished his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
3
God blessed the seventh day, and made it holy, because he rested in it from all his work which he had created and made.
4
This is the history of the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that Yahweh God made the earth and the heavens.
5
No plant of the field was yet in the earth, and no herb of the field had yet sprung up; for Yahweh God had not caused it to rain on the earth. There was not a man to till the ground,
6
but a mist went up from the earth, and watered the whole surface of the ground.
7
Yahweh God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
8
Yahweh God planted a garden eastward, in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed.
9
Out of the ground Yahweh God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the middle of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
10
A river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from there it was parted, and became four heads.
11
The name of the first is Pishon: this is the one which flows through the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;
12
and the gold of that land is good. There is aromatic resin and the onyx stone.
13
The name of the second river is Gihon: the same river that flows through the whole land of Cush.
14
The name of the third river is Hiddekel: this is the one which flows in front of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
15
Yahweh God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
16
Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat;
17
but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it; for in the day that you eat of it you will surely die."
18
Yahweh God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."
19
Out of the ground Yahweh God formed every animal of the field, and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. Whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.
20
The man gave names to all livestock, and to the birds of the sky, and to every animal of the field; but for man there was not found a helper suitable for him.
21
Yahweh God caused a deep sleep to fall on the man, and he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place.
22
He made the rib, which Yahweh God had taken from the man, into a woman, and brought her to the man.
23
The man said, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. She will be called 'woman,' because she was taken out of man."
24
Therefore a man will leave his father and his mother, and will join with his wife, and they will be one flesh.
25
They were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
