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Exodus 33

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1 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: God, get thee up from this place, thou and thy people which thou has brought out of the land of Egypt, into the land concerning which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying: To thy seed I will give it.

2 And I will send an angel before thee, that I may cast out the Chanaanite, and the Amorrhite, and the Hethite, and the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite.

3 That thou mayst enter into the land that floweth with milk and honey. For I will not go up with thee, because thou art a stiffnecked people: lest I destroy thee in the way.

4 And the people hearing these very bad tidings, mourned: and no man put on his ornaments according to custom.

5 And the Lord said to Moses: Say to the children of Israel: Thou are a stiffnecked people; once I shall come up in the midst of thee, and shall destroy thee. Now presently lay aside thy ornaments, that I may know what to do with thee.

6 So the children of Israel laid aside their ornaments by mount Horeb.

7 Moses also taking the tabernacle, pitched it without the camp afar off, and called the name thereof, The tabernacle of the covenant. And all the people that had any question, went forth to the tabernacle of the covenant, without the camp.

8 And when Moses went forth to the tabernacle, all the people rose up, and every one stood in the door of his pavilion, and they beheld the back of Moses, till he went into the tabernacle.

9 And when he was gone into the tabernacle of the covenant, the pillar of the cloud came down, and stood at the door, and he spoke with Moses.

10 And all saw that the pillar of the cloud stood at the door of the tabernacle. And they stood, and worshipped at the doors of their tents.

11 And the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man is wont to speak to his friend. And when he returned into the camp, his servant Josue the son of Nun, a young man, departed not from the tabernacle.

12 And Moses said to the Lord; Thou commandest me to lead forth this people: and thou dost not let me know whom thou wilt send with me, especially whereas thou hast said: I know thee by name, and thou hast found favour in my sight.

13 If therefore I have found favour in thy sight, show me thy face, that I may know thee, and may find grace before thy eyes: look upon thy people this nation.

14 And the Lord said: My face shall go before thee, and I will give thee rest.

15 And Moses said: If thou thyself dost not go before, bring us not out of this place.

16 For how shall we be able to know, I and thy people, that we have found grace in thy sight, unless thou walk with us, that we may be glorified by all people that dwell upon the earth?

17 And the Lord said to Moses: This word also, which thou hast spoken, will I do: for thou hast found grace before me, and thee I have known by name.

18 And he said: Shew me thy glory.

19 He answered: I will shew thee all good, and I will proclaim in the name of the Lord before thee: and I will have mercy on whom I will, and I will be merciful to whom it shall please me.

20 And again he said: Thou canst not see my face: for man shall not see me and live.

21 And again he said: Behold there is a place with me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock.

22 And when my glory shall pass, I will set thee in a hole of the rock, and protect thee with my right hand, till I pass:

23 And I will take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face thou canst not see.

   

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Messenger

  

'A messenger' signifies communication.

(Odkazy: Arcana Coelestia 4239)

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Arcana Coelestia # 4234

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4234. 'Jacob went on his way' means the progression of truth so that it might be joined to spiritual and celestial good. This is clear from the representation of 'Jacob' at this point as the truth of the natural. What 'Jacob' represented has been stated already, namely the Lord's Natural. And because the subject in the internal sense where the historical narrative has to do with Jacob is the Lord and how He made His Natural Divine, Jacob therefore first represented truth within that Natural and then truth to which the parallel good meant by Laban had been allied. And once this good had been allied to it Jacob represented that kind of good. That kind of good is not however Divine good within the Natural but intermediate good by means of which He was able to receive Divine good. Jacob represented such intermediate good when he departed from Laban, though essentially that good is truth, which by virtue of being intermediate has the capacity to join itself to Divine good within the Natural. It is that kind of truth that Jacob represents now.

[2] The good however to which that truth was to be joined is represented by 'Esau' - 'Esau' being the Divine Good of the Lord's Divine Natural, see 3300, 3302, 3494, 3504, 3527, 3576, 3599, 3669, 3677. It is the actual joining together of the two - the joining of the Divine truth to the Divine good of the Lord's Divine Natural - that is the subject now in the highest sense. For once Jacob has departed from Laban and come to the Jordan, and so to the place of entry into the land of Canaan, he comes to represent that conjunction; for in the internal sense the land of Canaan means heaven, and in the highest sense the Lord's Divine Human, 3038, 3705. This explains why the words 'And Jacob went on his way' mean the progression of truth so that it might be joined to spiritual and celestial good.

[3] But these matters are such that a full and intelligible explanation of them cannot be given at all, for the reason that not even the learned in the Christian world possess the vaguest notions on the subject. For scarcely any knowledge exists of what man's natural is, or of what his rational is, or of the fact that the two are altogether distinct and separate from each other. Nor is there much knowledge of what spiritual truth is or of the good which goes with that truth, or of the fact that these likewise are distinct and separate. Still less is it known that when a person is being regenerated truth is joined to good, in one distinct and separate way in the natural, in another in the rational, and by means that are countless. In fact it is not even known that the Lord made His Human Divine according to the same order as that by which He regenerates man.

[4] Since therefore not even the vaguest notions exist about these matters, any statements made about them are bound to seem obscure. Nevertheless such statements must be made because the internal sense of the Word cannot be explained in any other way. If nothing else they will show what angelic wisdom is and the nature of it, for the internal sense of the Word is primarily for angels.

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