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Genesis 2

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1 And the heavens and the earth were completed, and all the army of them.

2 And on the seventh day God completed His work* which He had made; and He ceased* on the seventh day from all His work which He had made.

3 And God blessed the seventh day, and made· it ·holy, because in it He ceased from all His work which God created to make.

4 These are the births of the heavens and of the earth when He created them, in the day in which Jehovah* God made the earth and the heavens.

5 And every shrub of the field was not·​·yet in the earth, and every herb of the field was not·​·yet growing, for Jehovah God had not caused it to rain on the earth. And there was no man to till the ground.

6 And He made a mist to go·​·up from the land, and watered all the faces of the ground.

7 And Jehovah God formed man*, dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of lives*, and man became a living soul.

8 And Jehovah God planted a garden in Eden from the east, and there He set man whom He had formed.

9 And out·​·of the ground Jehovah God made to grow every tree desirable for seeing, and good for food; the tree of lives also, in the midst of the garden; and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

10 And a river went·​·out from Eden to water the garden, and from thence it was separated, and was made* into four heads.

11 The name of the first is Pishon; it surrounds all the land of Havilah, where there is gold.

12 And the gold of that land is good; the bdellium and the onyx stone is there.

13 And the name of the second river is Gihon; it surrounds all the land of Cush.

14 And the name of the third river is Hiddekel; it is the one going eastward·​·toward Assyria; and the fourth river, it is Euphrates.

15 And Jehovah God took man, and placed him in the garden of Eden, to till it and to keep it.

16 And Jehovah God commanded man*, saying, Of every tree of the garden eating thou shalt eat.

17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest of it, dying thou shalt die.

18 And Jehovah God said, It is not good that man should be alone; I will make for him a help as with him.

19 And Jehovah God formed out·​·of the ground every animal of the field, and every fowl of the heavens, and brought it to man to see what he would call it; and whatever man called a living soul, that was its name.

20 And man gave* names to every beast, and to the fowl of the heavens, and to every wild·​·animal of the field; but for man there was not found a help as with him.

21 And Jehovah God caused a deep·​·sleep to fall upon man, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed the flesh instead·​·of it.

22 And the rib which Jehovah God had taken from man, He built* into a woman* and brought her to man.

23 And man said, This one, this time is bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh; for this she shall be called a wife, for this was taken out·​·of a man*.

24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

25 And the two of them were naked, man and his wife, and were· not ·ashamed.

   


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

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True Christian Religion # 470

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470. II. Man is not life, but a receiver of life from God.

It is generally believed that the life which a person has is his own, so that he is not merely a receiver of life but also is life. This general belief exists because he appears to live, that is, to feel, think, speak and act exactly as if of himself. The result is that the statement that man is a receiver of life and is not life must inevitably seem an unheard-of idea or a kind of paradox to those whose thought is based on the senses, because it is contrary to appearances. I have traced to appearances the reason for this wrong belief that man is also life, and that consequently life is implanted in man from creation, and propagated subsequently by transfer. But the reason for this mistake based on appearances is that most people at the present time are natural, and only a few are spiritual; and a natural man bases his judgment on appearances and the mistakes these lead to, and these are diametrically opposed to this truth, that man is merely a receiver of life, and is not life.

[2] The fact that man is not life, but a receiver of life from God, is proved by the following clear evidence, that all created things are in essence finite, and man, being finite, could only be created of finite substances. That is why the Book of Creation tells us that Adam was made of earth and its dust, and this is the reason for his name, since Adam means the ground. In fact every person is composed exclusively of substances to be found in the earth or emitted from the earth into the atmosphere. The emanations from the earth in the atmosphere are absorbed by people by means of the lungs and by pores throughout the body; the denser substances are absorbed in the form of food made from the earth's products.

[3] As for man's spirit, however, this too was created from finite substances. What is man's spirit but a receiver of mental life? The finite materials of which it is composed are spiritual substances, to be found in the spiritual world, and also transferred to our earth and there stored up. If they were not present there along with material substances, no seed could at the inmost level have been made fertile, and so grow in a wonderful way without any aberration from its first structure until it produces fruits and new seeds. Nor would any worms be procreated by effluvia from the earth and from gases given off by plants and impregnating the atmosphere.

[4] Can anyone reasonably suppose that the Infinite could create anything other than that which is finite, or that man, being finite, is anything but a form, which the Infinite can bring to life by the life in itself? This is what is meant by the following:

Jehovah God formed man, dust from the earth, and He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, Genesis 2:7.

God, being infinite, is life in Himself. This cannot be created and copied into man, for this would be making him God. The idea that this happened was the madness of the serpent, or the devil, which he passed on to Eve and Adam, for the serpent said:

On the day when you eat of the fruit of that tree, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, Genesis 3:5.

[5] This deadly conviction, that God infused and copied Himself into men, was held by the people of the most ancient church in its final period leading up to its termination, as I have heard from their own lips. On account of their horrendous belief that they were thus gods, they lie hidden deep within a cavern, which no one can approach closely without falling victim to an inner vertigo. The previous section made it known that Adam and his wife mean and describe the most ancient church.

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