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Ezekiel 34

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1 And the word of Jehovah was unto me, saying,

2 Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord Jehovih* unto the shepherds, Woe to the shepherds of Israel who are shepherds of themselves! Should not the shepherds pasture the flock?

3 You eat the fat, and you clothe yourselves with the wool, you sacrifice the nourished; but the flock you pasture not.

4 The sick you have not made·​·firm, neither have you healed him who was·​·sick, neither have you bound·​·up him who was broken, neither have you returned him who was expelled, neither have you sought him who was·​·lost; but with firmness and with severity you have had·​·dominion over them.

5 And they were scattered, from being without a shepherd; and they became food for every animal of the field, and they were scattered.

6 My flock wandered in all the mountains, and on every high hill; and My flock was scattered on all the faces of the earth, and none inquired and none sought them.

7 Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of Jehovah;

8 As I am alive, says the Lord Jehovih, surely because My flock was for plunder, and My flock was food to every wild·​·animal of the field, because there was no shepherd, neither did My shepherds inquire for My flock, but the shepherds pastured for themselves, and pastured not My flock;

9 therefore, O ye shepherds, hear the word of Jehovah;

10 thus says the Lord Jehovih; Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require My flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from pasturing the flock; neither shall the shepherds pasture themselves any·​·more; and I will rescue My flock from their mouth, and they shall not be food for them.

11 For thus says the Lord Jehovih; Behold, I, even I, will then inquire·​·after My flock, and seek· them ·out.

12 As a shepherd is seeking·​·out his drove in the day that he is in the midst of his flock that are exposed*; so will I seek·​·out My flock, and will rescue them from all the places where they have been scattered in the day of cloud and dense·​·darkness.

13 And I will bring· them ·out from the people, and bring· them ·together from the lands, and will bring them to their own ground, and pasture them in the mountains of Israel by the channels, and in all the dwellings of the land.

14 I will pasture them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their home be; there shall they lie·​·down in a good home, and in a pasture with·​·oil shall they pasture in the mountains of Israel.

15 I will shepherd My flock, and I will cause them to lie·​·down, says the Lord Jehovih.

16 I will seek him who was lost, and return him who was expelled, and will bind·​·up him who was broken, and will make·​·firm that which was·​·sick; but I will blot·​·out the fat* and the firm; I will pasture them with judgment.

17 And as for you, O My flock, thus says the Lord Jehovih; Behold, I am judging between the animals·​·of·​·the·​·flock*, between the rams and the he-goats.

18 Seems it a·​·little thing for you to have eaten up the good pasture, but must you trample with your feet the remainder of your pastures? And to have drunk of the submerged waters, must you dirty the remainder with your feet?

19 And as for My flock, they eat that which you have trampled with your feet; and they drink what is dirtied with your feet.

20 Therefore thus says the Lord Jehovih unto them; Behold, I, and I will judge between the well·​·fed animal·​·of·​·the·​·flock and between the lean animal·​·of·​·the·​·flock.

21 Because you have pushed with side and with shoulder, and charged·​·at all the sick with your horns, until you have scattered them outside;

22 and I will save My flock, and they shall no more be for plunder; and I will judge between the animals·​·of·​·the·​·flock*.

23 And I will raise·​·up one shepherd over them, and he shall shepherd them, even My servant David; he shall shepherd them, and he shall be their shepherd.

24 And I, Jehovah, will be their God, and My servant David a chief in their midst; I, Jehovah, have spoken.

25 And I will cut for them a covenant of peace, and will cause the evil animals to cease from the land; and they shall dwell securely in the wilderness, and sleep in the forests.

26 And I will put them and the places all around My hill as a blessing; and I will cause the shower to come·​·down in its time; there shall be showers of blessing.

27 And the tree of the field shall give her fruit, and the earth shall give her produce, and they shall be securely on their ground, and shall know that I am Jehovah, when I have broken the braces of their yoke, and rescued them from the hand of those who served themselves on them.

28 And they shall no more be plunder to the nations, neither shall the wild·​·animal of the land devour them; but they shall dwell securely, and none shall frighten them.

29 And I will raise·​·up for them a plant for a name, and they shall be no more consumed* by famine in the land, and they shall no more bear the humiliation of the nations.

30 And they shall know that I, Jehovah their God, am with them, and that they, even the house of Israel, are My people, says the Lord Jehovih.

31 And you are My flock, the flock of My pasture; you are man, and I am your God, says the Lord Jehovih.

   


Thanks to the Kempton Project for the permission to use this New Church translation of the Word.

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Arcana Coelestia # 4169

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4169. 'Your sheep and your she-goats have not miscarried' means its state as regards good and the good of truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'sheep' as good, dealt with below, and from the meaning of 'she-goat' as the good of truth, dealt with in 3995, 4006. The word good when used by itself means the good of the will, whereas the expression the good of truth means the good of the understanding. The good of the will consists in doing good from good, whereas the good of the understanding consists in doing it from truth. To people who do good from truth those two activities seem to be one and the same, when in fact they are considerably different from each other. For doing good from good consists in doing it from the perception of good, and that perception does not exist with any except those who are celestial. But doing good from truth is doing it from knowledge and consequently from the understanding. It amounts to doing it without any perception that it is good, and so solely as something that a person has been taught to do by others, or else by the exercise of his own intellect has decided that it is good. Such truth may well be faulty, but if it has good as its end in view, then a person's action arising out of that truth becomes tantamount to good.

[2] 'Sheep' means goods. This may be seen from many places in the Word, from which places let merely the following be quoted: In Isaiah,

He was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. He is led like a lamb 1 to the slaughter, and like a sheep before its shearers, he did not open his mouth. Isaiah 53:7.

This refers to the Lord, where He is compared to 'a sheep' not by virtue of truth but of good. In Matthew,

Jesus said to the twelve whom He sent out, Do not go into the way of the gentiles, and do not enter any city of the Samaritans; go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Matthew 10:5-6.

'The gentiles' to whom they were forbidden to go stands for those among whom evils exist - 'gentiles' meaning evils, see 1259, 1260, 1849; 'the cities of the Samaritans' stands for those among whom falsities are present; and 'sheep' stands for those among whom forms of good may be found.

[3] In John,

Jesus after the Resurrection said to Peter, Feed My lambs. A second time He said, Feed My sheep; the third time He said, Feed My sheep. John 21:15-17.

'Lambs' stands for those who have innocence within them. The first reference to 'sheep' stands for people whose practice of good stems from good, the second for those whose practice of it stems from truth. In Matthew,

When the Son of Man comes in His glory He will place the sheep at His right hand but the goats at His left. And He will say to those at His right hand, Come, O blessed of My Father, possess as an inheritance the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave Me food, I was thirsty and you gave Me drink, I was a stranger and you took Me in, I was naked and you clothed Me, I was sick and you visited Me, I was in prison and you came to Me. Insofar as you did it to one of the least of these My brothers you did it to Me. Matthew 25:31-40.

Here it is quite plain that 'sheep' stands for goods, that is, for those in whom good is present. Every kind of good flowing from charity, which will in the Lord's Divine mercy be described elsewhere, is included here in the internal sense. 'Goats' means in particular those who have faith but no charity.

[4] Similarly in Ezekiel,

As for you, O My flock, said the Lord Jehovih, Behold, I am judging between one member of the flock and another, between rams of the sheep, and he-goats. Ezekiel 34:17.

'He-goats' means in particular those whose faith is not linked to any charity. This becomes clear from the meaning of 'he-goats' in the good sense as those who possess the truth of faith and from this some charity, but in the contrary sense those whose faith is not linked to any charity. Such people reason about salvation from basic assumptions that faith is what saves. The same point is apparent from what the Lord says about the goats in the passage in Matthew quoted above. But people who do not possess any truth of faith, or at the same time any good of charity, are carried away into hell without undergoing any such judgement, that is to say, without any examination to prove that they are governed by falsity.

Poznámky pod čarou:

1. The Latin means cattle, but the Hebrew means lamb, which Swedenborg has in other places where he quotes this verse.

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