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Exodus 30

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1 Thou shalt make also an altar to burn incense, of setim wood.

2 It shall be a cubit in length, and another in breadth, that is, foursquare, and two in height. Horns shall go out of the same.

3 And thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold, as well as the grate thereof, as the walls round about and the horns. And thou shalt make to it a crown of gold round about,

4 And two golden rings under the crown on either side, that the bars may be put into them, and the altar be carried.

5 And thou shalt make the bars also of setim wood, and shalt overlay them with gold.

6 And thou shalt set the altar over against the veil, that hangeth before the ark of the testimony before the propitiatory wherewith the testimony is covered, where I will speak to thee.

7 And Aaron shall burn sweet smelling incense upon it in the morning. When he shall dress the lamps, he shall burn it:

8 And when he shall place them in the evening, he shall burn an everlasting incense before the Lord throughout your generations.

9 You shall not offer upon it incense of another composition nor oblation, and victim, neither shall you offer libations.

10 And Aaron shall pray upon the horns thereof once a year, with the blood of that which was offered for sin, and shall make atonement upon it in your generations. It shall be most holy to the Lord.

11 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

12 When thou shalt take the sum of the children of Israel according to their number, every one of them shall give a price for their souls to the Lord, and there shall be no scourge among them, when they shall be reckoned.

13 And this shall every one give that passeth at the naming, half a sicle according to the standard of the temple. A sicle hath twenty obols. Half a sicle shall be offered to the Lord.

14 He that is counted in the number from twenty years and upwards, shall give the price.

15 The rich man shall not add to half a sicle, and the poor man shall diminish nothing.

16 And the money received which was contributed by the children of Israel, thou shalt deliver unto the uses of the tabernacle of the testimony, that it may be a memorial of them before the Lord, and he may be merciful to their souls.

17 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

18 Thou shalt make also a brazen laver with its foot, to wash in: and thou shalt set it between the tabernacle of the testimony and the altar. And water being put into it,

19 Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and feet in it:

20 When they are going into the tabernacle of the testimony, and when they are to come to the altar, to offer on it incense to the Lord,

21 Lest perhaps they die. It shall be an everlasting law to him, and to his seed by successions.

22 And the Lord spoke to Moses,

23 Saying: Take spices, of principal and chosen myrrh five hundred sicles, and of cinnamon half so much, that is, two hundred and fifty sicles, of calamus in like manner two hundred and fifty.

24 And of cassia five hundred sicles by the weight of the sanctuary, of oil of olives the measure hin:

25 And thou shalt make the holy oil of unction, an ointment compounded after the art of the perfumer,

26 And therewith thou shalt anoint the tabernacle of the testimony, and the ark of the testament,

27 And the table with the vessels thereof, the candlestick and furniture thereof, the altars of incense,

28 And of holocaust, and all the furniture that belongeth to the service of them.

29 And thou shalt sanctify all, and they shall be most holy: he that shall touch them shall be sanctified.

30 Thou shalt anoint Aaron and his sons, and shalt sanctify them, that they may do the office of priesthood unto me.

31 And thou shalt say to the children of Israel: This oil of unction shall be holy unto me throughout your generations.

32 The flesh of man shall not be anointed therewith, and you shall make none other of the same composition, because it is sanctified, and shall be holy unto you.

33 What man soever shall compound such, and shall give thereof to a stranger, he shall be cut off from his people.

34 And the Lord said to Moses: Take unto thee spices, stacte, and onycha, galbanum of sweet savour, and the clearest frankincense, all shall be of equal weight.

35 And thou shalt make incense compounded by the work of the perfumer, well tempered together, and pure, and most worthy of sanctification.

36 And when thou has beaten all into very small powder, thou shalt set of it before the tabernacle of the testimony, in the place where I will appear to thee. Most holy shall this incense be to you.

37 You shall not make such a composition for your own uses, because it is holy to the Lord.

38 What man soever shall make the like, to enjoy the smell thereof, he shall perish out of his people.

   

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Arcana Coelestia # 2959

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2959. 'The land [is worth] four hundred shekels of silver' means the price of redemption by means of truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'four hundred shekels', dealt with below, and from the meaning of 'silver' as truth, dealt with in 1551, 2048, 2937. The reason 'four hundred shekels' means the price of redemption is that 'four hundred' means vastation and 'a shekel' price. What vastation is, see 2455 (end), 2682, 2694, 2699, 2702, 2704, where it is shown that there are two types of vastation. The first takes place when the Church altogether ceases to exist, that is, when there is no longer any charity or faith. At that point the Church is said to be vastated or laid waste. The second takes place when those who belong to the Church are reduced to a state of ignorance and also of temptation, for the reason that the evils and falsities residing with them are to be set apart and so to speak dissipated. Those who emerge from this vastation are those who are specifically called the redeemed, for at that point they are taught the goods and truths of faith, and are reformed and regenerated by the Lord, as shown in the paragraphs quoted. Now since the number four hundred, when used to specify a period of time - such as four hundred years - means the duration and also the state of vastation, so that same number, when used to specify the number of shekels, means the price of redemption; and when the word 'silver' is mentioned together with this number, the price of redemption by means of truth is meant.

[2] That 'four hundred years' means the duration and the state of vastation becomes clear also from what Abraham was told,

Jehovah said to Abraham, 1 Know for sure that your seed will be strangers in a land not theirs. And they will serve them, and these will afflict them for four hundred years. Genesis 15:13.

There it may be seen that 'four hundred years' is used to mean the duration of the stay of the children of Israel in Egypt. Yet it is not the duration of their stay in Egypt that is meant but something that is not evident to anyone except from the internal sense. This becomes clear from the fact that the duration of the stay of the children of Israel in Egypt was no more than half the stated period, as becomes quite clear from the descendants of Jacob down to Moses. For the facts are that Levi was descended from Jacob, Kohath from Levi, Amram from Kohath, and Aaron and Moses from Amram, Exodus 6:16-20; Levi and his son Kohath went down to Egypt together with Jacob, Genesis 46:11; and Moses came two generations later, and was eighty years old when he spoke to Pharaoh, Exodus 7:7. These facts show that the period of time from Jacob's entry into Egypt until his sons' departure from that land was approximately two hundred and fifteen years.

[3] That 'four hundred' is used in the Word to mean something other than its numerical value in the historical sense is clearer still from its being said that

The length of time that the children of Israel dwelt in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years, and at the end of the four hundred and thirty years, it happened on that same day, that all the armies of Jehovah went out of the land of Egypt. Exodus 12:40-41.

The duration of the stay of the children of Israel in that land was in fact only half that number of years; but it was from Abraham's entry into Egypt that the four hundred and thirty years were measured. Consequently what is said at this point in Exodus is for the sake of the internal sense Lying within those words. In the internal sense the sojourn of the sons of Jacob in Egypt represents and means the vastation of the Church, the state and duration of which are described by the number four hundred and thirty years. Thirty describes the state of vastation of the sons of Jacob as being no vastation at all, for they were such as could not be reformed through any state of vastation (for the meaning of the number thirty, see 2276); and 'four hundred years' represents the general state of vastation of those who belonged to the Church.

[4] Those therefore who come out of that vastation are referred to as the redeemed, as is also evident from the words addressed to Moses,

Therefore say to the children of Israel, I am Jehovah, and I will bring you out from beneath the burdens of Egypt, and I will rescue you from their slavery, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm, and with great judgements. Exodus 6:6.

And elsewhere,

Jehovah has brought you out by means of a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of slaves, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Deuteronomy 7:8; 13:5.

And elsewhere,

You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, but Jehovah your God redeemed you. Deuteronomy 15:15; 24:18.

In Samuel,

Your people whom You redeemed for Yourself from Egypt. 2 Samuel 7:23.

Since those who emerge from the state of vastation are referred to as the redeemed, 'four hundred shekels' therefore means the price of redemption.

[5] As regards 'a shekel' meaning the price or valuation, this is clear from the following places in the Word: In Moses,

All your valuations shall be according to the shekel of holiness. Leviticus 27:25.

And elsewhere,

If a soul commits a trespass and has sinned inadvertently in the holy things of Jehovah, he shall bring his guilt offering to Jehovah, a ram without blemish out of the flock, according to your valuation in silver shekels, according to the shekel of holiness. Leviticus 5:15.

From this it is evident that 'a shekel' means the price or valuation. It is called 'the shekel of holiness' because the price or valuation has regard to truth and good from the Lord - truth and good from the Lord being, within the Church, holiness itself. Consequently it is called 'the shekel of holiness' many times elsewhere, as in Exodus 30:24; Leviticus 27:3; Numbers 3:47, 50; 7:13, 19, 25, 31, 37, 43, 49, 55, 61, 67, 73; 18:16.

[6] That 'a shekel' is the price of what is holy is quite evident in Ezekiel when the holy land and the holy city are the subject. There the shekel is referred to as follows,

The shekel there shall be twenty gerahs; twenty shekels, twenty-five shekels, fifteen shekels, shall be your maneh (pound). Ezekiel 45:12.

Anyone may see that here 'shekel', 'pound', and the numbers mentioned mean holy things, that is, good and truth, for the holy land and the holy city or new Jerusalem, which are the subject there, mean nothing else than the Lord's kingdom where neither shekel, nor gerahs, nor pound, nor the numbering of them occurs. But the number itself, from the meaning it has in the internal sense, determines the valuation or price of good and truth.

[7] In Moses it is said that every man (vir) should give a ransom for his soul, so that there would be no plague. He had to give half a shekel, according to the shekel of holiness, a shekel being twenty gerahs. Half a shekel was to be the thruma (offering) to Jehovah, Exodus 30:12-13. Here ten gerahs, which make half a shekel, are remnants which are received from the Lord. Remnants are goods and truths stored away with a person - such remnants, being meant by 'ten', see 576, 1738, 1906, 2284. That remnants are goods and truths from the Lord that are stored away with a person, see 1906, 2284. Consequently they are also called 'the thruma (or offering) to Jehovah', and it is said that by means of this a soul will be redeemed. The reason it is stated several times that a shekel was twenty gerahs, as in these verses from Exodus, and also in Leviticus 27:25; Numbers 3:47; 18:16; and elsewhere, is that the shekel of twenty gerahs means the valuation of the good preserved in remnants - twenty meaning the good preserved in remnants, see 2280. Also therefore a shekel was a weight according to which the price of both gold and silver was determined, Genesis 24:22; Exodus 38:24; Ezekiel 4:10; 45:12 - the price of gold because 'gold' means good, 113, 1551, 1552, and the price of silver because 'silver' means truth, 1551, 2048. From this it is now evident that 'the land [is worth] four hundred shekels of silver' means the price of redemption by means of truth. The reason it is called 'the land' is that the spiritual Church is the subject, which is reformed and regenerated by means of truth received from the Lord, 2954. That 'the land' means the Church, see 662, 1066, 1068, 1262, 1733, 1850, 2117, 2118 (end).

Poznámky pod čarou:

1. In Genesis 15 the patriarch's name is still Abram.

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