Bible

 

Genesis 50

Studie

   

1 And Joseph falleth on his father's face, and weepeth over him, and kisseth him;

2 and Joseph commandeth his servants, the physicians, to embalm his father, and the physicians embalm Israel;

3 and they fulfil for him forty days, for so they fulfil the days of the embalmed, and the Egyptians weep for him seventy days.

4 And the days of his weeping pass away, and Joseph speaketh unto the house of Pharaoh, saying, `If, I pray you, I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh, saying,

5 My father caused me to swear, saying, Lo, I am dying; in my burying-place which I have prepared for myself in the land of Canaan, there dost thou bury me; and now, let me go up, I pray thee, and bury my father, and return;'

6 and Pharaoh saith, `Go up and bury thy father, as he caused thee to swear.'

7 And Joseph goeth up to bury his father, and go up with him do all the servants of Pharaoh, elders of his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt,

8 and all the house of Joseph, and his brethren, and the house of his father; only their infants, and their flock, and their herd, have they left in the land of Goshen;

9 and there go up with him both chariot and horsemen, and the camp is very great.

10 And they come unto the threshing-floor of Atad, which [is] beyond the Jordan, and they lament there, a lamentation great and very grievous; and he maketh for his father a mourning seven days,

11 and the inhabitant of the land, the Canaanite, see the mourning in the threshing-floor of Atad, and say, `A grievous mourning [is] this to the Egyptians;' therefore hath [one] called its name `The mourning of the Egyptians,' which [is] beyond the Jordan.

12 And his sons do to him so as he commanded them,

13 and his sons bear him away to the land of Canaan, and bury him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought with the field for a possession of a burying-place, from Ephron the Hittite, on the front of Mamre.

14 And Joseph turneth back to Egypt, he and his brethren, and all who are going up with him to bury his father, after his burying his father.

15 And the brethren of Joseph see that their father is dead, and say, `Peradventure Joseph doth hate us, and doth certainly return to us all the evil which we did with him.'

16 And they give a charge for Joseph, saying, `Thy father commanded before his death, saying,

17 Thus ye do say to Joseph, I pray thee, bear, I pray thee, with the transgression of thy brethren, and their sin, for they have done thee evil; and now, bear, we pray thee, with the transgression of the servants of the God of thy father;' and Joseph weepeth in their speaking unto him.

18 And his brethren also go and fall before him, and say, `Lo, we [are] to thee for servants.'

19 And Joseph saith unto them, `Fear not, for [am] I in the place of God?

20 As for you, ye devised against me evil -- God devised it for good, in order to do as [at] this day, to keep alive a numerous people;

21 and now, fear not: I do nourish you and your infants;' and he comforteth them, and speaketh unto their heart.

22 And Joseph dwelleth in Egypt, he and the house of his father, and Joseph liveth a hundred and ten years,

23 and Joseph looketh on Ephraim's sons of the third [generation]; sons also of Machir, son of Manasseh, have been born on the knees of Joseph.

24 And Joseph saith unto his brethren, `I am dying, and God doth certainly inspect you, and hath caused you to go up from this land, unto the land which He hath sworn to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.'

25 And Joseph causeth the sons of Israel to swear, saying, `God doth certainly inspect you, and ye have brought up my bones from this [place].'

26 And Joseph dieth, a son of an hundred and ten years, and they embalm him, and he is put into a coffin in Egypt.

   

Ze Swedenborgových děl

 

Arcana Coelestia # 6571

Prostudujte si tuto pasáž

  
/ 10837  
  

6571. 'And you thought evil against me' means that the things which have become alienated intend nothing but evil. This is clear from the representation of the sons of Jacob, to whom 'you refers here, as the things which have become alienated from truth and good, dealt with above in 6557, for when the brothers contemplated evil against Joseph they represented things which have become alienated; and from the meaning of 'thinking evil against me' as intending evil, for evil that is contemplated against someone is evil that is intended. And since things which have become alienated cannot intend what is good, it is therefore said that they intend nothing but evil. What is implied when it is said that the things which have become alienated from truth and good intend nothing but evil is this: A person who has become alienated from good and truth intends nothing but evil, since he cannot intend good; and what he intends reigns in him and is therefore present in all his thoughts, and in every smallest part of his being. For that which is a person's intention or end in view constitutes his actual life, that end in view being his love, and that love his life. What is more, a person's essential character is exactly like the end he holds in view; and the image of him seen in the light of heaven is also exactly like it. And what will perhaps astonish you, as is the image that he presents overall, so is the image presented in every smallest feature of his will. This means that a person is wholly and completely identifiable with his end in view.

[2] From this it may be seen that a person who is in himself an evil end cannot possibly be among those who are good ends, that is, one who is in hell cannot possibly be in heaven; for these ends conflict with each other, though the good ends triumph because they are from the Divine. From this it may also be seen that those people do not think correctly who believe that anyone at all can be admitted into heaven solely through an act of mercy. If one who is in himself an evil end comes into heaven, he finds it difficult to stay alive, like one in mortal agony, and is grievously tormented, quite apart from the fact that he looks like a devil there in the light of heaven. From this it is evident that those who have become alienated from truth and good cannot help contemplating what is evil. This is so in the smallest details of their thought and will, as is plainly evident from the sphere that emanates from people like this when a long way off. For one detects from that sphere what they are like; that sphere is so to speak a spiritual vapour appearing out of every detail of their life.

  
/ 10837  
  

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