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Genesis 50

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1 Joseph fell on his father's face, wept on him, and kissed him.

2 Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to embalm his father; and the physicians embalmed Israel.

3 Forty days were fulfilled for him, for that is how many the days it takes to embalm. The Egyptians wept for him for seventy days.

4 When the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the house of Pharaoh, saying, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying,

5 'My father made me swear, saying, "Behold, I am dying. Bury me in my grave which I have dug for myself in the land of Canaan." Now therefore, please let me go up and Bury my father, and I will come again.'"

6 Pharaoh said, "Go up, and bury your father, just like he made you swear."

7 Joseph went up to bury his father; and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his house, all the elders of the land of Egypt,

8 all the house of Joseph, his brothers, and his father's house. Only their little ones, their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen.

9 There went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company.

10 They came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, and there they lamented with a very great and severe lamentation. He mourned for his father seven days.

11 When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, "This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians." Therefore, its name was called Abel Mizraim, which is beyond the Jordan.

12 His sons did to him just as he commanded them,

13 for his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the field, for a possession of a burial site, from Ephron the Hittite, before Mamre.

14 Joseph returned into Egypt--he, and his brothers, and all that went up with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father.

15 When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "It may be that Joseph will hate us, and will fully pay us back for all of the evil which we did to him."

16 They sent a message to Joseph, saying, "Your father commanded before he died, saying,

17 'You shall tell Joseph, "Now please forgive the disobedience of your brothers, and their sin, because they did evil to you."' Now, please forgive the disobedience of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him.

18 His brothers also went and fell down before his face; and they said, "Behold, we are your servants."

19 Joseph said to them, "Don't be afraid, for am I in the place of God?

20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save many people alive.

21 Now therefore don't be afraid. I will nourish you and your little ones." He comforted them, and spoke kindly to them.

22 Joseph lived in Egypt, he, and his father's house. Joseph lived one hundred ten years.

23 Joseph saw Ephraim's children to the third generation. The children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were born on Joseph's knees.

24 Joseph said to his brothers, "I am dying, but God will surely visit you, and bring you up out of this land to the land which he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob."

25 Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, "God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here."

26 So Joseph died, being one hundred ten years old, and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.

   

Ze Swedenborgových děl

 

Arcana Coelestia # 6559

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6559. 'And will fully return to us all the evil with which we repaid him' means that a punishment as merited is therefore impending. This is clear from the meaning of 'returning the evil with which they repaid him' as a punishment as merited; for the return of evil that is done to someone is the punishment that is duly merited. What the returning of evil is, or what the nature of punishments in the spiritual world is, must be stated because it will show what the internal sense is of the words under consideration here. If in the world of spirits evil spirits do anything evil that exceeds the evil they assimilated by the life they led in the world, those who administer punishment become present in an instant and chastise those spirits in exact accord with the degree of their transgression. For the rule in the next life is that no one should become more evil than he had been in the world. Those who suffer punishment have no knowledge at all of how the ones who administer such punishment know that the evil they do exceeds what they assimilated in the world. But they are told that the nature of order in the next life is such that evil itself carries its own punishment, so that the evil that is committed is completely bound up with the evil inflicted as punishment, that is, within the evil itself lies its own punishment. It is therefore in keeping with order that those who repay with punishment should be instantly present.

[2] This is what happens when evil spirits in the world of spirits perform evil. But in their own hell one spirit chastises another in accord with the evil they assimilated by their actions in the world; for they take that evil with them into the next life. From all this it may now be seen how one is to understand the statement that a punishment as merited is therefore impending, meant by 'will fully return to us all the evil with which we repaid him'.

But as for good spirits, if by chance they utter what is evil or do what is evil, they are not punished but are pardoned and also freed from blame; for it is not their intention to utter what is evil or to do what is evil. And they know that such evil words and deeds were aroused in them by hell and for that reason were not their own fault. This fact can also be recognized from their action against that evil and subsequent grief.

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

Komentář

 

Dig

  
by Vincent van Gogh

In general, digging in the Bible means applying your own mind, your own faculties to find or create spiritual things. This is reflected in our everyday language; we often speak of investigators “digging for the truth.” In most cases, the idea of digging is connected with wells, and to dig a well means to investigate the Lord’s Word and draw ideas from it. In a more negative sense, a pit – which is like a well but with no water – represents falsity, so to dig a pit represents using your intellect to fabricate falsities. Finally, there is the idea of digging through walls in order to steal from others, which represents doing evil in a cunning and concealed way, invading someone’s life and attacking their desires for good and concepts of truth.

In Genesis 26:18, to dig signifies to open.