Bible

 

Exodus 13:17

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17 And it came to pass, when Pharaoh let the people go, that God did not lead them the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near; for God said, That the people may not repent when they see conflict, and return to Egypt.

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Face

  
Photo by Caleb Kerr

“The eyes are the windows of the soul.” That's a sentiment with roots somewhere in murky antiquity, but one that has become hopelessly cliché because it is both poetic and obviously true. We feel that if we can look in someone's eyes, we can truly know what they are inside. And it's not just the eyes; really it is the face as a whole that conveys this. As Swedenborg puts it, the face is “man's spiritual world presented in his natural world” (Heaven and Hell, No. 91). Our faces reveal our interior thoughts and feelings in myriad ways, which is why psychologists, poker players and criminal investigators spend so much time studying them. It makes sense, then, that people's faces in the Bible represent their interiors, the thoughts, loves and desires they hold most deeply. We turn our faces to the ground to show humility when we bow in worship; we turn them to the mountains when seeking inspiration; we turn them toward our enemies when we are ready to battle temptation. When things are hard, we need to “face facts,” or accept them internally. When the topic is the Lord's face, it represents the Lord's interiors, which are perfect love and perfect mercy. And when people turn away from the Lord and refuse his love, it is described as the Lord “hiding his face.”

(Odkazy: Heaven and Hell 91)


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Pillar

  

In Exodus 13:21, this signifies a state of illumination tempered by the obscurity of truth, and a state of obscurity tempered by illumination from good. (Arcana Coelestia 8106, 8108)

In Revelation 10:1, this signifies that the Lord's Divine Natural, which in itself is the Divine Humanity which He took in the world, sustains and supports His Eternal Divinity as the body does the soul, and as the natural sense of the Word does its spiritual and celestial senses; for feet signifies the natural, pillars signify support, and fire, the Divine Love. (Apocalypse Revealed 468)

In Exodus 26:32, this signifies what supports heaven and the church, namely the goods of love and of faith from the Lord. (Arcana Coelestia 9674)

(Odkazy: Exodus 8, 8:21, 21)