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Genesis 1

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1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

2 And the earth was waste and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light. And there was light.

4 And God saw the light that it was good; and God divided between the light and the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening, and there was morning -- the first Day.

6 And God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it be a division between waters and waters.

7 And God made the expanse, and divided between the waters that are under the expanse and the waters that are above the expanse; and it was so.

8 And God called the expanse Heavens. And there was evening, and there was morning -- a second day.

9 And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together to one place, and let the dry [land] appear. And it was so.

10 And God called the dry [land] Earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.

11 And God said, Let the earth cause grass to spring up, herb producing seed, fruit-trees yielding fruit after their kind, the seed of which is in them, on the earth. And it was so.

12 And the earth brought forth grass, herb producing seed after its kind, and trees yielding fruit, the seed of which is in them, after their kind. And God saw that it was good.

13 And there was evening, and there was morning -- a third day.

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens, to divide between the day and the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years;

15 and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens, to give light on the earth. And it was so.

16 And God made the two great lights, the great light to rule the day, and the small light to rule the night, -- and the stars.

17 And God set them in the expanse of the heavens, to give light on the earth,

18 and to rule during the day and during the night, and to divide between the light and the darkness. And God saw that it was good.

19 And there was evening, and there was morning -- a fourth day.

20 And God said, Let the waters swarm with swarms of living souls, and let fowl fly above the earth in the expanse of the heavens.

21 And God created the great sea monsters, and every living soul that moves with which the waters swarm, after their kind, and every winged fowl after its kind. And God saw that it was good.

22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply on the earth.

23 And there was evening, and there was morning -- a fifth day.

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth living souls after their kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth, after their kind. And it was so.

25 And God made the beast of the earth after its kind, and the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing of the ground after its kind. And God saw that it was good.

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and over the cattle, and over the whole earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth on the earth.

27 And God created Man in his image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

28 And God blessed them; and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and over every animal that moveth on the earth.

29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb producing seed that is on the whole earth, and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree producing seed: it shall be food for you;

30 and to every animal of the earth, and to every fowl of the heavens, and to everything that creepeth on the earth, in which is a living soul, every green herb for food. And it was so.

31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning -- the sixth day.

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Heaven and Hell #137

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137. It says in John,

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word: all things were made by means of him, and without him nothing was made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of humankind. He was in the world, and the world was made by means of him. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory. (John 1:1, 3-4, 10, 14)

It is clear that the Lord is the one who is meant by "the Word," since it says that the Word was made flesh. Precisely what is meant by "the Word," though, is not yet known and must therefore be stated. The Word in this passage is the divine truth that is in the Lord and from the Lord, 1 so here it is also called the light, which is divine truth, as has been shown earlier in this chapter. Now we need to explain the statement that all things were made and created by means of divine truth.

[2] In heaven, it is divine truth that possesses all power, and apart from it there is no power whatever. 2 All angels are called "powers" because of divine truth, and are powers to the extent that they are recipients or vessels of it. Through it they prevail over the hells and over all who oppose them. A thousand enemies there cannot bear one ray of heavenly light, which is divine truth. Since angels are angels because of their acceptance of divine truth, it follows that all heaven is from this source and no other, since heaven is made up of angels.

[3] People cannot believe that this kind of power is inherent in divine truth if the only concept of truth they have has to do with thought or speech, which have no power in them except to the extent that other people concede it by being obedient. There is an intrinsic power within divine truth, though, power of such nature that by means of it heaven, the world, and everything in them was created.

We can illustrate the fact that this kind of power is inherent in divine truth by two comparisons - by the power of what is true and good in us, and by the power of light and warmth from the sun in our world.

By the power of what is true and good in us: Everything we do, we do out of our discernment and intent. Out of our intent, we act by means of what is good, and out of our discernment by means of what is true. In fact, all the elements of our volition are related to what is good, and all the elements of our discernment are related to what is true. 3 On this basis, then, we set our whole body in motion and a thousand things there rush to do our bidding of their own accord. We can see from this that our whole body is formed for obedience to what is good and true and therefore from what is good and true.

[4] By the power of light and warmth from the sun in our world: Everything that grows in our world - things like trees, shrubs, flowers, grasses, fruits, and seeds - arises only by means of the warmth and light of the sun. So we can see what kind of productive power is inherent in that warmth and light. What about the divine light that is divine truth, then, and the divine warmth that is divine good, the source from which heaven comes into being and consequently the world as well, since as we have shown above, it is through heaven that the world comes into being?

This enables us to determine how to understand the statement that all things were made by means of the Word, and that without him nothing was made that was made, and further that the world was made by means of him, namely that this was accomplished by means of divine truth from the Lord. 4

This is also why in the book of creation it first mentions light and then the things that arise from light (Genesis 1:3-4). It is also why everything in all heaven and earth has to do with what is good and true and to their union if it is to be anything at all. 5

Notes de bas de page:

1. [Swedenborg's footnote] "The Word" in Sacred Scripture has various meanings - speech, the thought of the mind, every entity that actually comes into being, or anything at all, and in the highest sense divine truth and the Lord: 9987."The Word" means divine truth: 2803, 2884 [2894?], 4692, 5075, 5272, 7830 [7930?], 9987."The Word" means the Lord: 2533, 2859.

2. [Swedenborg's footnote] Divine truth emanating from the Lord is what possesses all power: 6948, 8200. All power in heaven belongs to the true from the good: 3091, 3563, 6344, 6413 [6423?], 8304, 9643, 10019, 10182. Angels are called powers, and are powers as a result of their acceptance of divine truth from the Lord: 9639. Angels are recipients of divine truth from the Lord, and are therefore often called "gods" in the Word: 4295, 4402, 8301, 8192, 9398 [8988?].

3. [Swedenborg's footnote] Discernment is the recipient of what is true, and volition is the recipient of what is good: 3623, 6125, 7503, 9300, 9930. Therefore, all the elements of our discernment are related to what is true, whether these things are actually true or whether we believe them to be so; and all the elements of our volition are similarly related to what is good: 803, 10122.

4. [Swedenborg's footnote] Divine truth emanating from the Lord is the only thing that is real: 6880, 7004, 8200. By means of divine truth all things were made and created: 2803, 2884, 5272, 7835 [7796?].

5. [Swedenborg's footnote] [Swedenborg's note at this point refers the reader back to the note in §107 above.]

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

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Arcana Coelestia #9306

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9306. 'Take notice of his face' means holy fear. This is clear from the meaning of 'taking notice of the face', when it has reference to the Lord, whom 'the angel' is used to mean to here, as fearing that He may be angry on account of evils, or provoked on account of transgressions, as below; and fearing these things is holy fear. Regarding this fear, see 2826, 3718, 3719, 5459, 5534, 7280, 7788, 8816, 8925. The words 'taking notice of his face' are used because 'the face' means the interior things that constitute a person's life, thus his thought and affection, and in particular his faith and love. The reason for this is that the face has been fashioned so that it can produce an image of a person's interiors. It has been so fashioned to the end that those things which belong to the internal man may appear within the external, thus to the end that those things which belong to the spiritual world can be visualized in the natural world and so have an effect on one's neighbour. It is well known that the face presents visually, or as if in a mirror, what a person thinks and loves. This is so with honest people's faces, and especially with angels' faces, see 1999, 2434, 3527, 3573, 4066, 4326, 4796-4799, 5102, 5695, 6604, 8248-8250. For this reason 'face' in the original language is a general term that is used to describe the feelings a person has which reveal themselves, such as those of indulgence, favour, goodwill, helpfulness, or kindness, and also lack of pity, anger, or vengeance. So it is that in that language when this word is coupled with another it means beside, with, in front of, on account of, or else against, thus whatever is within, from, for, or against the person himself. For as has been stated, 'the face' is a person's true self, or that present within a person which reveals itself.

[2] All this enables one to know what is meant by the face of Jehovah, or 'the face of the angel', who in this instance is the Lord in respect of His Divine Human - namely the Divine Good of Divine Love, and the Divine Truth emanating from that Divine Good, since these reside within Jehovah or the Lord, come from Him, indeed are Himself, see 222, 223, 5585. From this it is evident what 'the face of Jehovah' means in the Blessing,

Jehovah make His face shine upon you and be merciful to you. Jehovah lift up His face upon you and give you peace. Numbers 6:25-26.

In David,

God be merciful to us and bless us and make His face shine upon us. Psalms 67:1.

The like may be seen in Psalms 80:3, 7, 19; 119:134-135; Daniel 9:17; and in other places.

[3] So it is that the Lord's Divine Human is called 'the angel of Jehovah's face' in Isaiah,

I will cause the mercies of Jehovah to be remembered. He has rewarded 1 them according to His mercies, and according to the abundance of His mercies; and He became their Saviour. And the angel of His face saved them; in His love and in His pity He redeemed them. Isaiah 63:7-9.

The reason why the Lord's Divine Human is called 'the angel of Jehovah's face' is that the Divine Human is the Divine Himself facially, that is, in outward form, as also the Lord teaches in John,

If you know Me you know My Father also, and from now on you know Him and have seen Him. Philip said, Show us the Father. Jesus said to him, Have I been with you so long, and yet you do not know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father. I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me. John 14:7-11.

[4] 'Jehovah's (or the Lord's) face' also means anger, vengeance, punishment, and ill. It does so because simple people, in accepting the general idea that all things come from God, believe that even ill, especially the misery of punishment, comes from Him. For this reason - in keeping with that general idea, and also with appearances - anger, vengeance, punishment, or ill is attributed to Jehovah the Lord, when in fact the Lord is not the source of them but man. Regarding this, see 1861, 2447, 5798, 6071, 6832, 6991, 6997, 7533, 7632, 7877, 7926, 8197, 8227, 8228, 8282, 8483, 8632, 8875, 9128. This kind of meaning appears here in 'take notice of his face, lest you provoke him, for he will not bear your transgression', and also in Leviticus,

Whoever eats any blood, I will set My face against the soul eating blood and will cut him off from among his people. Leviticus 17:10.

In Jeremiah,

I have set My face against the city for ill and not for good. Jeremiah 21:10.

And in David,

Jehovah's face is against evildoers, to cut off the memory of them from the earth. Psalms 34:16.

Notes de bas de page:

1. Reading retribuit (has rewarded) for retribuet (will reward)

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