A congregation is a group of people with common loves, interests, and purposes. It often refers to a church group. In the Word it is almost always used to speak of the whole group of the Children of Israel, as the tabernacle of the congregation, or the people of the congregation. Sometimes the original Hebrew is translated as assembly, too. This is a case where readers and translators need to be aware of the context and potential nuances of meaning. Swedenborg writes that,'The congregation of the people' stands for people who are ruled by truths constituting intelligence, since 'congregation' is used with reference to truths... as also is 'people'... 'the assembly of the old' stands for people who are ruled by good. The usage of the term congregation also implies an ordering, or arrangement of truths.

(Odkazy: Apocalypse Explained 417; Arcana Coelestia 6338, 7843, 7891; The Apocalypse Explained 724 [17])

1172. 'Dedan' means cognitions of lower celestial things that exist in ritual forms. This is clear from the following places in the Word: In Ezekiel,

The sons of Dedan were your traders, many islands were the merchandise of your hand; horns of ivory, and ebony they brought as your present. Ezekiel 27:15

'Horns of ivory, and ebony' in the internal sense means the exterior goods that constitute forms of worship or ritual. In the same prophet,

Dedan, she was your trader in chariot-cloaks, ¹ Arabia and all the princes of Kedar Ezekiel 27:20-21.

Here 'chariot-cloaks' ¹ in like manner means exterior goods, or those that constitute forms of ritual. In Jeremiah,

Their wisdom has become rotten. Flee! they have turned themselves away, they have taken themselves down to dwell in the deep, O inhabitants of Dedan. Jeremiah 49:7-8.

Here 'Dedan' in the proper sense stands for forms of ritual which have no internal worship, that is, no worship of the Lord from the heart within them, and which are spoken of as 'turning themselves back, and taking themselves down to dwell in the deep'. From the quotations above it is now clear that 'the sons of Cush' means cognitions of spiritual things, and 'the sons of Raamah' cognitions of celestial.

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