26
Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore.
Ezekiel 37:26
Job 16
2
I have heard many such things: miserable comforters are ye all.
3
Shall vain words have an end? or what emboldeneth thee that thou answerest?
4
I also could speak as ye do: if your soul were in my soul's stead, I could heap up words against you, and shake mine head at you.
5
But I would strengthen you with my mouth, and the moving of my lips should asswage your grief.
6
Though I speak, my grief is not asswaged: and though I forbear, what am I eased?
7
But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company.
8
And thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me: and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face.
9
He teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; mine enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me.
10
They have gaped upon me with their mouth; they have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully; they have gathered themselves together against me.
11
God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.
12
I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.
13
His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground.
14
He breaketh me with breach upon breach, he runneth upon me like a giant.
15
I have sewed sackcloth upon my skin, and defiled my horn in the dust.
16
My face is foul with weeping, and my eyelids is the shadow of death;
17
Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure.
18
O earth, cover not thou my blood, and let my cry have no place.
19
Also now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and my record is on high.
20
My friends scorn me: but mine eye poureth out tears unto God.
21
O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbour!
22
When a few years are come, then I shall go the way whence I shall not return.
Arcana Coelestia # 8609
8609. 'And they took a stone' means the lowest level of God's truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'a stone' as truth, 643, 1298, 3720, 3769, 3771, 3789, 3798, 6426, in this instance the lowest level of truth since it was put underneath him and he sat on it. An ordinary stone furthermore means a lower level of truth, while a precious stone means a higher or more internal level of truth. What the lowest level of truth is becomes clear from what has been stated above in 8603 about the levels of truth that follow one another in order; that is to say, there are interior truths and exterior truths, the lowest of which are meant by the lowest level of truth.
