9229. 'And men of holiness shall you be to Me' means a state of life then composed of good. This is clear from the meaning of 'men of holiness' as those who are led by the Lord, for the Divine which emanates from the Lord is holiness itself, 6788, 7499, 8127 (end), 8302, 8806. Consequently those who receive that emanation in faith and also in love are called holy ones. Anyone who imagines that a person is holy from any other source, or that anything present with a person is holy apart from that which comes and is received from the Lord is very much mistaken; for that which is the person's own, and is called his proprium, is evil.

The human proprium is nothing but evil, see 210, 215, 694, 874-876, 987, 1047, 4328, 5660, 5786, 8480, 8944.

To the extent that a person can be withheld from his proprium, the Lord can be present with him, and therefore to the same extent holiness resides with him, 1023, 1044, 1581, 2256, 2388, 2406, 2411, 8206, 8393, 8988 (end), 9014.

[2] The truth that the Lord is the Only Holy One, and that nothing is holy except that which emanates from the Lord, and so that which a person receives from the Lord, is evident from everywhere in the Word, as in John,

I make Myself holy, that they also may be made holy in the truth. John 17:19.

'Making Himself holy' means making Himself Divine by His own power. Consequently those who receive Divine Truth emanating from the Lord in faith and life are said to be 'made holy in the truth'.

[3] This also explains why after the Resurrection, when the Lord spoke to the disciples, He breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit, John 20:22. 'Breathing on (or into)' was a sign that represented the imparting of life through faith and love, as also in Genesis,

Jehovah breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man (homo) became a living soul. Genesis 2:7.

Other examples like this may be seen elsewhere, such as Psalms 33:6; 104:29-30; Job 32:8; 33:4; John 3:8. Therefore also the Word is said to be inspired because it comes from the Lord, and those who wrote the Word have been called 'inspired'. Breathing, and so breathing on or inspiring, corresponds to the life of faith, see 97, 1119, 1120, 3883-3896. This explains why the term spirit in the Word is derived from the word for wind, and holiness from the Lord is called Jehovah's wind, 8286, and why the Holy Spirit is the holiness emanating from the Lord, 3704, 4673 (end), 5307, 6788, 6982, 6993, 8127 (end), 8302, 9199.

[4] So also it says in John 1:33 that the Lord baptizes with the Holy Spirit, and in Luke 3:16 that He baptizes with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 'Baptizing' in the internal sense means regenerating, 4255, 5120 (end), 9088; 'baptizing with the Holy Spirit' means regenerating by means of the good of faith; and 'baptizing with fire' means regenerating by means of the good of love, 'fire' being the good of love, see 934, 4906, 5215, 6314, 6832, 6834, 6849, 7324. In John,

Who is not going to fear You, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For You alone are holy. Revelation 15:4.

In Luke the angel telling Mary about the Lord said,

That which is holy will be born from you. Luke 1:35.

And in Daniel,

I saw in the visions of my head while on my bed, and behold, a vigilant and holy one came down from heaven. Daniel 4:13.

In these places 'that which is holy' and 'a holy one' stand for the Lord.

[5] Because the Lord alone is holy He is called in the Old Testament the Holy One of Israel, the Redeemer, the Saviour, and the Regenerator, as in Isaiah 1:4; 5:19, 24; 10:20; 12:6; 17:7; 29:19; 30:11-12, 15; 31:1; 37:23; 41:14, 16, 20; 43:3, 14; 45:11; 47:4; 48:17; 49:7; 54:5; 55:5; 60:9, 14; Jeremiah 50:29; 51:5; Ezekiel 39:7; Psalms 71:22; 78:41; 89:18. This is why the Lord in heaven, and consequently heaven itself, is called the dwelling-place of holiness, Jeremiah 25:30; 31:23; ¹ Isaiah 63:15; the sanctuary, ² Ezekiel 11:16; 24:21; and also the mountain of holiness, Psalms 3:4. It is also why the middle of the tent [of meeting], where the ark containing the law was, was called The Holy of Holies, Exodus 26:33-34; for the law in the ark in the middle of the tent [of meeting], represented the Lord in respect of the Word. For the law is the Word, 6752, 7463.

[6] All this shows why it is that the angels are called holy in Matthew 25:31; Mark 8:38; Luke 9:26; Psalms 149:1; Daniel 8:13; also the prophets, Luke 1:70; and the apostles too, Revelation 18:20. Not that they are holy by their own virtue but that the Lord, who alone is holy and the only source of holiness, makes them so. For truths are meant by 'the angels', because they are those who receive truth from the Lord, 1925, 4085, 4295, 4402, 7268, 7873, 8192, 8301; teachings which present the truth that comes through the Word from the Lord are meant by 'the prophets', 2534, 7269; and all the truths and forms of the good of faith in their entirety which come from the Lord are meant by 'the apostles', 3488, 3858 (end), 6397.

[7] Consecrations ³ among the Israelite and Jewish people took place in order that the Lord who alone was holy might be represented, and in order that holiness, which He alone is the source of, might be represented. This is the reason for the consecration of Aaron and his sons, Exodus 29:1ff; Leviticus 8:10-11, 13, 30; the consecration of their garments, Exodus 29:21ff; the consecration of the altar in order that it might be most holy, ⁴ Exodus 29:37ff; the consecration of the tent of meeting, the ark of the Testimony, the table, all the vessels, the altar of incense, the altar of burnt offering and its vessels, and the laver and its base, Exodus 30:26ff.

[8] The truth that the Lord is the real Holiness that was represented is evident also from the Lord's words in Matthew when they are seen in the internal sense,

Fools and blind! Which of the two is greater, the gold or the temple that makes the gold holy? And which of the two is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift holy? Matthew 23:17-19.

'The temple' represented the Lord Himself, and so did 'the altar', while 'the gold' was a sign of the good that comes from the Lord, and 'the gift' or a sacrifice was a sign of things constituting faith and charity that come from the Lord.

The Lord was represented by 'the temple', see 2777, 3720, and by 'the altar', 2777, 2811, 4489, 8935, 8940. 'Gold' was a sign of good that comes from the Lord, 1551, 1552, 5658, and 'a sacrifice' a sign of worship springing from faith and charity that come from the Lord, 922, 923, 2805, 2807, 2830, 6905, 8680, 8682, 8936.

[9] From all this it is now evident why it is that the children of Israel were called a holy people in Deuteronomy 26:19 and elsewhere, or as in the present verse men of holiness. That is to say, they were so called because every single aspect of their worship represented Divine realities that are the Lord's, and celestial and spiritual things of His kingdom and Church. On this account they were called holy in a representative sense; they themselves were not holy on that account, because representatives had regard to the holy things that were represented, not to the person who represented them, see 665, 1097 (end), 1361, 3147, 3881 (end), 4208, 4281, 4288, 4293, 4307, 4444, 4500, 6304, 7048, 7439, 8588, 8788, 8806.

[10] On that account also was Jerusalem called holy, and Zion the mountain of holiness in Zechariah 8:3 and elsewhere, as well as in Matthew,

And the tombs were opened, and many bodies of dead holy ones were raised; and coming out of their tombs after the Lord's resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. Matthew 27:52-53.

Here Jerusalem is called 'the holy city', when in fact, quite to the contrary, it was unholy because the Lord was crucified there at that time, for which reason it is called 'Sodom and Egypt' in John,

Their bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. Revelation 11:8.

Yet it is called holy, because it means the Lord's kingdom and the Church, 402, 2117, 3654. The appearance of 'dead holy ones' there, an event witnessed by some in vision, was a sign of the salvation of people who belonged to the spiritual Church, and of the raising of those people to the Holy Jerusalem, which is heaven - the people who had been kept up to that time on the lower earth, spoken of in 6854, 6914, 7091, 7828, 7932, 8049, 8054, 8159, 8321.

Poznámky pod čarou:

4317. In the internal historical sense 'because he touched, in the hollow of Jacob's thigh, the sinew of that which was displaced' means because of their heredity which could not be rooted out through regeneration because they would not allow that to happen. This is clear from the meaning of 'the thigh' as conjugial love, and consequently all celestial and spiritual love, dealt with in 4280, and 'the hollow of the thigh' as the place where conjugial love, and also all celestial and spiritual love, is joined to natural good, 4277, 4280. Consequently 'touching it', that is, so damaging it that limping results, means destroying the good that flows from those loves. And since it was Jacob in whom this was done, that among his descendants which had come down from him, and so was hereditary, is meant. 'The sinew of that which was displaced' means falsity, see 4303, in this case falsity which stems from hereditary evil. The fact that this heredity could not be rooted out through regeneration because they would not allow that to happen follows from this and from the whole train of thought.

[2] The possession of such a heredity and their inability to be regenerated is quite clear from all that is recorded in the Word about them, and especially from the following in Moses,

Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, You yourselves saw all that Jehovah did before your eyes in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh and all his servants, and to all his land; and Jehovah has not given you a heart to know, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, even to this day. Deuteronomy 29:2, 4.

In the same author,

I know the people's imagination, which they are performing today, before I bring them into the land which I have sworn [to give them]. Deuteronomy 31:21.

And further on,

I will hide My face from them; I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, sons with no truth in them. I would scatter them far, I would make the memory of them cease from mankind, except that I feared the wrath of the enemy. For they are a nation from whose counsel is perishing and in whom there is no intelligence. For from the vine of Sodom comes their vine, and from the fields of Gomorrah their grapes; they have grapes of hemlock, clusters that are bitter. The poison of dragons is their wine, and the cruel head of asps. Is not this stored up with Me, sealed up in My treasuries? Deuteronomy 32:20, 26-34.

The same things are said in many other places, in particular in Jeremiah.

[3] Further evidence that their heredity is meant by the touching of Jacob's thigh and his consequently having a limp may be seen in Hosea,

The controversy of Jehovah with Judah: He will make a visitation on Jacob over his ways, and will render to him according to his deeds. In the womb he supplanted his brother; in his grief he contended with God, and contended against the angel and prevailed; he wept and appealed to him. Hosea 12:2-4.

Here 'contending with God' means, in the internal historical sense, their insistence that a representative of the Church should exist with them, 4290, 4293. From this it is evident that the kind of heredity they possessed had been derived from Jacob himself, as may be shown from further places still but must be passed over for the time being.

[4] As regards heredity specifically, the belief at the present day in the Church is that all hereditary evil is derived from the first parent and that all are therefore condemned in respect of that evil. But this is untrue. The origin of hereditary evil in everyone lies with his parents and parents' parents, that is, with successive generations of ancestors. Every evil which each of these has acquired to himself by his own actions in life, inasmuch as it becomes so to speak part of his character through regular practice or habit, is passed on to his children and becomes hereditary in them; and that evil accompanies what has been implanted in parents from grandparents and ancestors. Hereditary evil coming from the father is more internal, and hereditary evil from the mother more external. That coming from the father cannot be rooted out easily whereas that from the mother can. When a person is being regenerated the deeply-implanted hereditary evil that is received from immediate forbears is rooted out; but with those who are not being regenerated, or who are unable to be, it remains. This then is hereditary evil; see also 313, 494, 2122, 2910, 3518, 3701. This matter is also plain to anyone who reflects, as well as from the fact that every family has some evil or good characteristic by which it is distinguished from other families; and that characteristic, as is well known, is inherited from parents and ancestors. The same applies to the Jewish nation which is still in existence. It is clearly different from all other nations and may be recognized not only from its particular disposition but also from its customs, speech, and facial characteristics.

[5] But few people know what hereditary evil is. It is believed to consist in the doing of evil, when in fact it consists in the willing and therefore thinking of it. It is within the will itself and therefore within thought that hereditary evil dwells. It is the actual inclination to evil which is within them and which attaches itself even when the person does what is good. It is recognized through the kind of delight which enters in when evil befalls another. This root lies hidden deep down, for the interior form itself receiving good and truth from heaven, that is, from the Lord by way of heaven, is perverted and so to speak twisted out of shape, with the result that when good and truth flow in from the Lord these are either cast back or perverted or smothered. This is why no perception of what is good and true exists at the present day, but instead, in the case of the regenerate, conscience which acknowledges as good and true that which has been learned from parents and teachers. Hereditary evil leads to loving oneself more than others, willing evil on another if he does not promote oneself to honour, and taking delight in acts of revenge. It also leads to loving the world more than heaven and to all evil desires or evil affections, which spring from the same source. Man does not know that such things exist within him, still less that they are the opposite of heavenly affections. In the next life however he is shown plainly how much evil, hereditary in origin, he has drawn to himself through his own actions in life, and also how far he has removed himself from heaven through evil affections from the same source.

[6] The fact that hereditary evil in Jacob's descendants could not be rooted out through regeneration because they would not allow that to happen is also evident from the historical descriptions in the Word - in all their temptations in the desert they gave in, as described in Moses, which they also did subsequently in the land of Canaan as often as they did not see miracles taking place. Those temptations however were external ones, and not internal or spiritual. In spiritual things they were incapable of being tempted because they had no knowledge of internal truths nor any possession of internal goods, as shown already; and nobody is able to be tempted except in what he knows or possesses. Temptations are the actual means by which regeneration is accomplished. This is what is meant by them not allowing regeneration to happen. Concerning their state and fate in the next life, see 939-941, 3481.