Title: Of Interest

Topic: The Word

Summary: The Old Testament commands us not to charge interest on loans, but a couple of parables in the New Testament chide us for NOT, at the very least, putting our money in the bank and getting interest? What is going on?

References:
Ex 22:25-27
Lev 25:35-37
Deut 23:19-20
Nehemiah 5:1-12
Psalms 15
Proverbs 28:6-8
Jeremiah 15:10
Ezekiel 18:5-17; 22:6-16
Luke 6:32-36
Matthew 25:14-30
Luke 19:12-13, 16-25

This video is a part of the Spirit and Life Bible Study series, whose purpose is to look at the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible through a Swedenborgian lens.

Firstborn, in a supreme sense, represents the Lord as to divine celestial love, and also peope who were of the celestial church. The sanctification of the firstborn, as in Exodus 13, signifies faith in the Lord. The firstborn, in the spiritual sense of the Word, is good, for with infants the good of innocence is first infused by the Lord, by virtue of which man first becomes a man. Since good is of love, and man does not reflect upon his own love, but only upon the thoughts of his memory, and since good has not at first a quality, but acquires one when it is formed in truths, and without a quality nothing is perceived, hence it was unknown that good was the primary principle, or firstborn. Good is first conceived from the Lord in man, and is produced by truths, in which good is manifested, in its own form and effigy. Firstborn, as in Psalm 89:28, signifies the Lord's humanity.