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Deuteronomy 33

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1 And this is the blessing, wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the children of Israel before his death.

2 And he said, Jehovah came from Sinai, And rose up from Seir unto them; He shone forth from mount Paran, And he came from the myriads of the sanctuary; From his right hand [went forth] a law of fire for them.

3 Yea, he loveth the peoples, All his saints are in thy hand, And they sit down at thy feet; Each receiveth of thy words.

4 Moses commanded us a law, The inheritance of the congregation of Jacob.

5 And he was king in Jeshurun, When the heads of the people And the tribes of Israel were gathered together.

6 Let Reuben live, and not die; And let his men be few.

7 And this of Judah; and he said, Hear, Jehovah, the voice of Judah, And bring him unto his people; May his hands strive for them; And be thou a help to him against his oppressors.

8 And of Levi he said, Thy Thummim and thy Urim are for thy godly one, Whom thou didst prove at Massah, With whom thou didst strive at the waters of Meribah;

9 Who said to his father and to his mother, I see him not, And he acknowledged not his brethren, And knew not his own children; For they have observed thy word, And kept thy covenant.

10 They shall teach Jacob thine ordinances, And Israel thy law: They shall put incense before thy nostrils, And whole burnt-offering upon thine altar.

11 Bless, Jehovah, his substance! And let the work of his hands please thee; Crush the loins of his adversaries, And of them that hate him, that they may never rise again!

12 Of Benjamin he said, The beloved of Jehovah, -- he shall dwell in safety by him; He will cover him all the day long, And dwell between his shoulders.

13 And of Joseph he said, Blessed of Jehovah be his land! By the precious things of the heavens, By the dew, and by the deep that lieth beneath,

14 And by the precious fruits of the sun, And by the precious things put forth by the months,

15 And by the best things of the ancient mountains, And by the precious things of the everlasting hills,

16 And by the precious things of the earth and the fulness thereof. And let the good will of him that dwelt in the bush Come upon the head of Joseph, Upon the top of the head of him that was separated from his brethren.

17 His majesty is as the firstling of his ox; And his horns are as the horns of a buffalo. With them shall he push the peoples Together to the ends of the earth. These are the myriads of Ephraim, And these are the thousands of Manasseh.

18 And of Zebulun he said, Rejoice, Zebulun, in thy going out; And thou, Issachar, in thy tents!

19 They shall invite [the] peoples to the mountain; There they shall offer sacrifices of righteousness; For they will suck the abundance of the seas, And the hidden treasures of the sand.

20 And of Gad he said, Blessed be he that enlargeth Gad! As a lion doth he dwell, and teareth the arm, even the top of the head.

21 And he provided the first part for himself, For there was reserved the portion of the lawgiver; And he came with the heads of the people; The justice of Jehovah and his judgments Hath he executed with Israel.

22 And of Dan he said, Dan is a young lion; He shall spring forth from Bashan.

23 And of Naphtali he said, Naphtali, satisfied with favour, And full of the blessing of Jehovah, Possess thou the west and the south.

24 And of Asher he said, Asher shall be blessed with sons; Let him be acceptable to his brethren, And let him dip his foot in oil.

25 Iron and brass shall be thy bolts; And thy rest as thy days.

26 There is none like unto the ùGod of Jeshurun, Who rideth upon the heavens to thy help, And in his majesty, upon the clouds.

27 [Thy] refuge is the God of old, And underneath are the eternal arms; And he shall drive out the enemy from before thee, And shall say, Destroy [them]!

28 And Israel shall dwell in safety alone, The fountain of Jacob, in a land of corn and new wine; Also his heavens shall drop down dew.

29 Happy art thou, Israel! Who is like unto thee, a people saved by Jehovah, The shield of thy help, And the sword of thine excellency? And thine enemies shall come cringing to thee; And thou shalt tread upon their high places.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 3928

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3928. 'And she called his name Naphtali' means the essential nature of it, that is to say, of the temptation in which one overcomes and also of the resistance offered by the natural man. This is clear from the meaning of 'name' and of 'calling the name' as the essential nature, dealt with in 144, 145, 1754, 1896, 2009, 2724, 3421. The particular nature is that which is meant by 'Naphtali', for the name Naphtali is derived from the word 'wrestlings'. And for the same reason 'Naphtali' represents this second general truth of the Church. Temptation is the means by which the internal man is joined to the external, for they are at variance with each other but are made to agree and to correspond by means of temptations. The external man is indeed such that of itself it does not desire anything except bodily and worldly things; these are the delights of the natural man's life. But the internal man - when opened towards heaven and desiring the things of heaven, as is the case with those who are able to be regenerated - takes delight in heavenly things. And when a person undergoes temptations these two types of delight conflict with each other. The person is not directly aware of the conflict, because he is not aware of what heavenly delight is and of what hellish delight is, let alone that they are so utterly contrary to each other. But celestial angels cannot be present at all with a person in his bodily and worldly delight until this has been made subservient, that is to say, until bodily and worldly delight is no longer regarded as an end in itself but something which is meant to be subservient to heavenly delight, as shown above in 3913. Once this has been achieved the angels are able to reside with that person in both; but in this case his delight becomes blessedness, and at length happiness in the next life.

[2] Anyone who believes that the delight of the natural man prior to regeneration is not hell-like, and that devilish spirits are not in possession there, is much mistaken. He is unaware of what the situation is with man - that prior to regeneration genii and spirits from hell have possession of his natural man, no matter how much he seems to himself to be like any other person, and also that he is able to participate with everybody else in what is holy and to reason about the truths and goods of faith, indeed is able to believe that he has become strong in these. If this person does not feel within himself some measure of affection for what is right and fair in his daily work, and for what is good and true in society and in life, let him recognize that his kind of delight in things is the kind that exists with those in hell, for his delight entails no other love than self-love and love of the world. And when these constitute his delight no charity or any faith is present within it. The only means that will weaken and dispel this delight once it has become predominant is the affirmation and acknowledgement of the holiness of faith and of the good of life, which is the first means meant, as shown above, by Dan, and after this by temptation, which is the second means and is meant by Naphtali; for this second means follows the other. Indeed people who do not affirm and acknowledge the goodness and the truth which constitute faith and charity are unable to enter any conflict brought about by temptation as there is nothing within to oppose the evil and falsity towards which natural delight gravitates.

[3] In other places in the Word where Naphtali is mentioned he means a person's state following temptations, as in the prophecy of Jacob, who by then was Israel,

Naphtali is a hind let loose, giving beautiful words. Genesis 49:21.

'A hind let loose' stands for the affection for natural truth in a state that is free, which arises following temptation. This state is also what is at stake within temptations, which are meant by 'Naphtali', for the battle fought in temptations is a struggle for freedom. Likewise in Moses' prophecy,

To Naphtali he said, Naphtali, satisfied with favour, and full with the blessing of Jehovah, will possess the west and the south. Deuteronomy 33:23.

For the representations of Jacob's sons, and of the tribes, depend on the order in which they are mentioned, 3862. And in the prophecy of Deborah and Barak,

Zebulun is a people that consigned its soul to die, as did Naphtali, on the heights of the field. Judges 5:18.

This too refers in the internal sense to the conflicts brought about by temptations, and to a person's presence among those who do not fear anything evil because they are rooted in forms of truth and good, meant by 'being on the heights of the field'.

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