7430. 'The finger of God is this' means that the power came from the Divine. This is clear from the meaning of 'the finger of God' as power from the Divine. The reason why 'finger' means power is that the fingers are parts of the hands, and by 'hands' is meant power, 878, 4931-4937, 6344, 6424, 6948. The meaning of 'finger' as power is clear from the following places also: In David,

When I look at the heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and stars which You have established ¹ ... Psalms 8:3

In Luke,

Jesus said, If I cast out demons by the finger of God, surely the kingdom of God has come to you. Luke 11:20.

When Jesus took aside from the people the deaf man who spoke with difficulty and put His finger into his ears, and spat and touched his tongue, Mark 7:32-33, this too was an action representative of Divine power.

[2] The fact that 'finger' represents power is also evident from rituals observed in the Church among the Jews, the ritual in which blood was put on the thumb, and the ritual in which the priest sprinkled blood with his finger, both commanded in the following places in Moses,

You shall slaughter the ram, and put some of the blood on the thumb of the right hand of Aaron and of his sons, and on the big toe of his right foot. Exodus 29:20.

The priest shall take some of the blood of the guilt-offering, and the priest shall put it on the lobe of the right ear of the one to be cleansed from leprosy, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot. Then the priest shall dip his right finger in some of the oil which is on the palm of his left hand, and sprinkle some of the oil on his finger seven times before Jehovah. Some of the rest of the oil that is on his palm the priest shall put on the lobe of the right ear of the one to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the big toe of his right foot. Leviticus 14:14, 16-17.

You shall take some of the blood of the young bull, and place it with your finger on the horns of the altar. Exodus 29:11.

Further places in which such rituals occur are Leviticus 4:6; 9:9.

[3] All these rituals served to mean the hidden and holy things of heaven. This is clear from the consideration that the Word has a Divine origin and is inspired as to every tittle, Luke 16:17; and this being so, 'thumb' and 'finger' mean the power of good exercised through truth, as is evident from their internal sense in the places just quoted. Power is again meant by 'finger' in David,

Blessed be Jehovah, who trains my hands for conflict, and my fingers for war. Psalms 144:1

And in Isaiah,

He will not look to the altars, the work of his hands, and what his fingers have made. Isaiah 17:8.

'The altars' stands for worship in general, 4541, 'the work of hands' and 'what fingers have made' for the kinds of things that are the product of what is properly one's own, thus of one's own power.

Notes de bas de page:

1919. That 'Abram said to Sarai' means perception is clear from what has been stated above in 1898. The perception which the Lord had was represented and is here meant by 'Abram said to Sarai', but thought which sprang from that perception is meant by 'Sarai said to Abram' - perception being the source of thought. The thought possessed by those who have perception comes from no other source. Yet perception is not the same as thought. To see that it is not the same, let conscience serve to 'illustrate this consideration.

[2] Conscience is a kind of general and thus obscure dictate which presents those things that flow in from the Lord by way of the heavens. Those things that flow in manifest themselves in the interior rational man where they are enveloped so to speak in cloud. This cloud is the product of appearances and illusions concerning the goods and truths of faith. Thought is, in truth, distinct and separate from conscience; yet it flows from conscience, for people who have conscience think and speak according to it. Indeed thought is scarcely anything more than a loosening of the various strands that make up conscience, and a converting of these into separate ideas which pass into words. Hence it is that the Lord holds those who have conscience in good thoughts regarding the neighbour and withholds them from evil thoughts. For this reason conscience can never exist except with people who love the neighbour as themselves and have good thoughts regarding the truths of faith. These considerations brought forward here show how conscience differs from thought, and from this one may recognize how perception differs from thought.

[3] The Lord's perception came directly from Jehovah, and so from Divine Good, whereas His thought came from intellectual truth and the affection for it, as stated above in 1904, 1914. No idea, not even an angelic one, is adequate as a means to apprehend the Lord's Divine perception, and thus this lies beyond description. The perception which angels have - described in 1384 and following paragraphs, 1394, 1395 - adds up to scarcely anything at all when contrasted with the perception that was the Lord's. Because the Lord's perception was Divine, it was a perception of everything in heaven; and being a perception of everything in heaven it was also a perception of everything on earth. For such is the order, interconnection, and influx that anyone who has a perception of heavenly things has a perception of earthly as well.

[4] But after the Lord's Human Essence had become united to His Divine Essence, and had become at the same time Jehovah, the Lord was then above what is called perception, for He was above the order which exists in the heavens and from there upon earth. It is Jehovah who is the source of order, and therefore one may say that Jehovah is Order itself, for from Himself He governs order, not merely, as is supposed, in the universal but also in its most specific singulars, for it is these singulars that make up the universal. To speak of the universal and then separate such singulars from it would be no different from speaking of a whole that has no parts within it and so no different from speaking of something consisting of nothing. Thus it is sheer falsity - a figment of the imagination, as it is called - to speak of the Lord's Providence as belonging to the universal but not to its specific singulars; for to provide and govern universally but not specifically is to provide and govern absolutely nothing. This is true philosophically, yet, strange to say, philosophers themselves, including the more eminent, understand this matter in a different way and think in a different way.