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Deuteronomy 9

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1 Hear, O Israel: Thou shalt go over the Jordan this day; to possess nations very great, and stronger than thyself, cities great, and walled up to the sky,

2 A People great and tall, the sons of the Enacims, whom thou hast seen, and heard of, against whom no man is able to stand.

3 Thou shalt know therefore this day that the Lord thy God himself will pass over before thee, a devouring and consuming fire, to destroy and extirpate and bring them to nothing before thy face quickly, as he hath spoken to thee.

4 Say not in thy heart, when the Lord thy God shall have destroyed them in thy sight: For my justice hath the Lord brought me in to possess this land, whereas these nations are destroyed for their wickedness.

5 For it is not for thy justices, and the uprightness of thy heart that thou shalt go in to possess their lands: but because they have done wickedly, they are destroyed at thy coming in: and that the Lord might accomplish his word, which he promised by oath to thy fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

6 Know therefore that the Lord thy God giveth thee not this excellent land in possession for thy justices, for thou art a very stiffnecked people.

7 Remember, and forget not how then provokedst the Lord thy God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that thou camest out of Egypt unto this place, thou hast always strove against the Lord.

8 For in Horeb also thou didst provoke him, and he was angry, and would have destroyed thee,

9 When I went up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, the tables of the covenant which the Lord made with you: and I continued in the mount forty days and nights, neither eating bread, nor drinking water.

10 And the Lord gave me two tables of stone written with the finger of God, and containing all the words that he spoke to you in the mount from the midst of the Are, when the people were assembled together.

11 And when forty days were passed, and as many nights, the Lord gave me the two tables of stone, the tables of the covenant,

12 And said to me: Arise, and go down from hence quickly: for thy people, which thou hast brought out of Egypt, have quickly forsaken the way that thou hast shewn them, and have made to themselves a molten idol.

13 And again the Lord said to me: I see that this people is stiffnecked:

14 Let me alone that I may destroy them, and abolish their name from under heaven, and set thee over a nation, that is greater and stronger than this.

15 And when I came down from the burning mount, and held the two tables of the covenant with both hands,

16 And saw that you had sinned against the Lord your God, and had made to yourselves a molten calf, and had quickly forsaken his way, which he had shewn you:

17 I cast the tables out of my hands, and broke them in your sight.

18 And I fell down before the Lord se before, forty days and nights neither eating bread, nor drinking water, for all your sins, which you had committed against the Lord, and had provoked him to wrath:

19 For I feared his indignation and anger, wherewith being moved against you, he would have destroyed you. And the Lord heard me this time also.

20 And he was exceeding angry against Aaron also, and would have destroyed him, and I prayed in like manner for him.

21 And your sin that you had committed, that is, the calf, I took, and burned it with fire, and breaking it into pieces, until it was as small as dust, I threw it into the torrent, which cometh down from the mountain.

22 At the burning also, and at the place of temptation, and at the graves of lust you provoked the Lord:

23 And when he sent you from Cadesbarne, saying: Go up, and possess the land that I have given you, and you slighted the commandment of the Lord your God, and did not believe him, neither would you hearken to his voice:

24 But were always rebellious from the day that I began to know you.

25 And I lay prostrate before the Lord forty days and nights, in which I humbly besought him, that he would not destroy you as he had threatened:

26 And praying, I said: 0 Lord God, destroy not thy people, and thy inheritance, which thou hast redeemed in thy greatness, whom thou hast brought out of Egypt with a strong hand.

27 Remember thy servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: look not on the stubbornness of this people, nor on their wickedness and sin:

28 Lest perhaps the inhabitants of the land, out of which thou hast brought us, say: The Lord could not bring them into the land that he promised them, and he hated them: therefore he brought them out, that he might kill them in the wilderness,

29 Who are thy people and thy inheritance, whom thou hast brought out by thy great strength, and in thy stretched out arm.

   

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Apocalypse Revealed # 529

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529. Then the temple of God was opened in heaven, and the ark of His covenant was seen in His temple. (11:19) This symbolizes the New Heaven, in which the Lord is worshiped in His Divine humanity, and where people live in accordance with the Ten Commandments, which constitute the two essential elements of the New Church that are the means of conjunction.

The temple of God symbolizes the Lord's Divine humanity, also heaven where angels dwell, and likewise the church on earth. To be shown that the temple of God has these three symbolic meanings, and that the three cannot be separated, see no. 191. Here, however, the temple of God symbolizes the Lord in His Divine humanity in heaven where angels dwell, because it is said to be the temple of God in heaven. The ark in the temple means the Ten Commandments, for the ark had as its sole contents the two tables on which the Ten Commandments were written. 1 The temple's being opened means, symbolically, that these two, the Divine humanity and the Ten Commandments, which are the two essential elements of the New Church, are now visible, and that they became visible after the evil were cast into hell (no. 528). The ark is called the ark of His covenant in His temple because a covenant symbolizes conjunction, as we will see below. But first we must say something about the Ten Commandments.

[2] What nation in the entire world does not know that it is evil to kill, commit adultery, steal, and bear false witness? If nations did not know this and enact laws to keep people from doing these things, it would be all over with them. For society, the republic, or kingdom would collapse without these laws.

Who can suppose that the Israelite nation was so stupid in comparison to all other nations as not to know that such actions are evil? One may wonder, therefore, why these laws, being so universally known throughout the whole world, were promulgated by Jehovah Himself from Mount Sinai, attended by the great miracle they were, and written, moreover, with His finger.

But listen, they were promulgated by Jehovah with such a great miracle and written with His finger in order that people might know that these laws are not only civil and moral laws, but also spiritual laws, and that to disobey them is not only to do evil to one's fellow citizen and to society, but is also to sin against God. Their promulgation by Jehovah from Mount Sinai made them therefore laws of religion. For it is evident that whatever Jehovah God commands, He commands to make it a matter of religion, so that it must be obeyed for His sake, and for a person's own sake, that he may be saved.

[3] Because these laws were the first elements of the church to be established by the Lord with the Israelite nation, and because they embrace in brief summary everything having to do with religion which makes possible a conjunction of the Lord with a person and of a person with the Lord, therefore they were so holy that nothing was more holy.

That they were so very holy can be seen from the following: That Jehovah Himself, that is to say, the Lord, descended in fire; that the mountain then smoked and quaked; and that this was attended by thunderings, lightnings, a thick cloud, and the sound of a trumpet (Exodus 19:16, 18, Deuteronomy 5:22-26). That before Jehovah descended, the people readied themselves and sanctified themselves for three days (Exodus 19:10-11, 15). That in the Temple at Jerusalem the Ark constituted the inner sanctuary (1 Kings 6:19ff., 8:3-9). That the tablets on which the Law was written were called the tablets of the covenant, and because of them the Ark was called the ark of the covenant, with the Law itself being called the covenant (Numbers 10:33, Deuteronomy 4:13, 23; 5:2-3; 9:9, Joshua 3:11, 1 Kings 8:19, 21, and elsewhere).

The Law's being called a covenant symbolizes conjunction. The reason is that covenants are made for the sake of love, friendship, and association, thus for the sake of conjunction. That is why we find it said of the Lord that He will be "a covenant to the people" (Isaiah 42:6; 49:8), and He is called "the Messenger of the covenant" (Malachi 3:1). His blood also is called "the blood of the covenant" (Matthew 26:28, cf. Zechariah 9:11, Exodus 24:4-10). And therefore the Word is called the Old and New Testaments or Covenants.

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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.