Doctrine of Life #79
79. That to commit adultery in the spiritual sense means to adulterate the Word’s goods and falsify its truths is clear from the following:
Babylon...has made all nations drink of the wine...of her licentiousness. (Revelation 14:8)
(The angel said, ) “...I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters, with whom the kings of the earth committed whoredom....” (Revelation 17:1-2)
(Babylon made) all nations (drink) of the wine of the wrath of her licentiousness, and the kings of the earth have committed whoredom with her.... (Revelation 18:3)
(God) has judged the great harlot who corrupted the earth with her licentiousness.... (Revelation 19:2) Licentiousness is attributed to Babylon because Babylon means people who arrogate the Lord’s Divine power to themselves and profane the Word by adulterating and falsifying it. Consequently Babylon is also called “the mother of the whoredoms and abominations of the earth” (Revelation 17:5).
[2] Licentiousness also has the same symbolic meaning in the Prophets, as in Jeremiah:
In the prophets of Jerusalem I have seen a shocking obstinacy in committing adultery and walking in lies. (Jeremiah 23:14) In Ezekiel:
...two women, the daughters of one mother, ...committed harlotry in Egypt; they committed harlotry in their youth.... (One) played the harlot under Me, and she lusted for her lovers, the neighboring Assyrians.... She committed her harlotries with them.... (Yet) she has never given up her harlotries in Egypt....
(The other) corrupted her love more than she, and her harlotries more than her sister’s harlotries.... She increased her harlotries..., she loved (Chaldeans).... Then the Babylonians came to her, into the bed of love, and they defiled her with their licentiousness. (Ezekiel 23:2-17) The reference here is to the Israelite and Jewish churches, which in this passage are the daughters of one mother. Their harlotries mean adulterations and falsifications of the Word. And because Egypt in the Word symbolizes knowledge, Assyria reasoning, Chaldea the profanation of truth, and Babylon the profanation of good, therefore we are told that they committed harlotry with them.
[3] The same is said in Ezekiel of Jerusalem, which symbolizes the church in respect to doctrine:
(O Jerusalem, ) you trusted in your beauty, and played the harlot because of your fame, so that you poured out your harlotries on everyone passing by.... You committed harlotry with the Egyptians, your neighbors, enormously fat, and increased your harlotry.... You played the harlot with the Assyrians.... When you were not satisfied by those with whom you played the harlot, you increased your harlotry as far as the land of the Chaldean trader.... Adulterous woman, who takes strangers instead of her husband! All men make payment to their harlots, but you made your payments to all your lovers, ...to come to you from all around for your harlotries.... Therefore, O harlot, hear the word of Jehovah! (Ezekiel 16:15, 26, 28-29, 32-33, 35ff.) That Jerusalem means the church may be seen in The Doctrine Regarding the Lord 62-63.
References to licentiousness have the same symbolic meaning in Isaiah 23:17-18, 57:3; in Jeremiah 3:2, 6, 8-9, 5:1, 7, 13:27, 29:23; in Micah 1:7; in Nahum 3:3-4; in Hosea 4:2, 10-11; also in Leviticus 20:5; Numbers 14:33, 15:39; and elsewhere.
For this reason, too, the Lord called the Jewish nation “an adulterous generation” (Matthew 12:39, 16:4, Mark 8:38).
Ezekiel 23:2-17
2
Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother:
3
and they played the prostitute in Egypt; they played the prostitute in their youth; there were their breasts pressed, and there was handled the bosom of their virginity.
4
The names of them were Oholah the elder, and Oholibah her sister: and they became mine, and they bore sons and daughters. As for their names, Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem Oholibah.
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Oholah played the prostitute when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on the Assyrians [her] neighbors,
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who were clothed with blue, governors and rulers, all of them desirable young men, horsemen riding on horses.
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She bestowed her prostitution on them, the choicest men of Assyria all of them; and on whoever she doted, with all their idols she defiled herself.
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Neither has she left her prostitution since [the days of] Egypt; for in her youth they lay with her, and they handled the bosom of her virginity; and they poured out their prostitution on her.
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Therefore I delivered her into the hand of her lovers, into the hand of the Assyrians, on whom she doted.
10
These uncovered her nakedness; they took her sons and her daughters; and her they killed with the sword: and she became a byword among women; for they executed judgments on her.
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Her sister Oholibah saw this, yet was she more corrupt in her doting than she, and in her prostitution which were more than the prostitution of her sister.
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She doted on the Assyrians, governors and rulers, [her] neighbors, clothed most gorgeously, horsemen riding on horses, all of them desirable young men.
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I saw that she was defiled; they both took one way.
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She increased her prostitution; for she saw men portrayed on the wall, the images of the Chaldeans portrayed with vermilion,
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dressed with girdles on their waists, with flowing turbans on their heads, all of them princes to look on, after the likeness of the Babylonians in Chaldea, the land of their birth.
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As soon as she saw them she doted on them, and sent messengers to them into Chaldea.
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The Babylonians came to her into the bed of love, and they defiled her with their prostitution, and she was polluted with them, and her soul was alienated from them.
