9229. 'And men of holiness shall you be to Me' means a state of life then composed of good. This is clear from the meaning of 'men of holiness' as those who are led by the Lord, for the Divine which emanates from the Lord is holiness itself, 6788, 7499, 8127 (end), 8302, 8806. Consequently those who receive that emanation in faith and also in love are called holy ones. Anyone who imagines that a person is holy from any other source, or that anything present with a person is holy apart from that which comes and is received from the Lord is very much mistaken; for that which is the person's own, and is called his proprium, is evil.

The human proprium is nothing but evil, see 210, 215, 694, 874-876, 987, 1047, 4328, 5660, 5786, 8480, 8944.

To the extent that a person can be withheld from his proprium, the Lord can be present with him, and therefore to the same extent holiness resides with him, 1023, 1044, 1581, 2256, 2388, 2406, 2411, 8206, 8393, 8988 (end), 9014.

[2] The truth that the Lord is the Only Holy One, and that nothing is holy except that which emanates from the Lord, and so that which a person receives from the Lord, is evident from everywhere in the Word, as in John,

I make Myself holy, that they also may be made holy in the truth. John 17:19.

'Making Himself holy' means making Himself Divine by His own power. Consequently those who receive Divine Truth emanating from the Lord in faith and life are said to be 'made holy in the truth'.

[3] This also explains why after the Resurrection, when the Lord spoke to the disciples, He breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit, John 20:22. 'Breathing on (or into)' was a sign that represented the imparting of life through faith and love, as also in Genesis,

Jehovah breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man (homo) became a living soul. Genesis 2:7.

Other examples like this may be seen elsewhere, such as Psalms 33:6; 104:29-30; Job 32:8; 33:4; John 3:8. Therefore also the Word is said to be inspired because it comes from the Lord, and those who wrote the Word have been called 'inspired'. Breathing, and so breathing on or inspiring, corresponds to the life of faith, see 97, 1119, 1120, 3883-3896. This explains why the term spirit in the Word is derived from the word for wind, and holiness from the Lord is called Jehovah's wind, 8286, and why the Holy Spirit is the holiness emanating from the Lord, 3704, 4673 (end), 5307, 6788, 6982, 6993, 8127 (end), 8302, 9199.

[4] So also it says in John 1:33 that the Lord baptizes with the Holy Spirit, and in Luke 3:16 that He baptizes with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 'Baptizing' in the internal sense means regenerating, 4255, 5120 (end), 9088; 'baptizing with the Holy Spirit' means regenerating by means of the good of faith; and 'baptizing with fire' means regenerating by means of the good of love, 'fire' being the good of love, see 934, 4906, 5215, 6314, 6832, 6834, 6849, 7324. In John,

Who is not going to fear You, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For You alone are holy. Revelation 15:4.

In Luke the angel telling Mary about the Lord said,

That which is holy will be born from you. Luke 1:35.

And in Daniel,

I saw in the visions of my head while on my bed, and behold, a vigilant and holy one came down from heaven. Daniel 4:13.

In these places 'that which is holy' and 'a holy one' stand for the Lord.

[5] Because the Lord alone is holy He is called in the Old Testament the Holy One of Israel, the Redeemer, the Saviour, and the Regenerator, as in Isaiah 1:4; 5:19, 24; 10:20; 12:6; 17:7; 29:19; 30:11-12, 15; 31:1; 37:23; 41:14, 16, 20; 43:3, 14; 45:11; 47:4; 48:17; 49:7; 54:5; 55:5; 60:9, 14; Jeremiah 50:29; 51:5; Ezekiel 39:7; Psalms 71:22; 78:41; 89:18. This is why the Lord in heaven, and consequently heaven itself, is called the dwelling-place of holiness, Jeremiah 25:30; 31:23; ¹ Isaiah 63:15; the sanctuary, ² Ezekiel 11:16; 24:21; and also the mountain of holiness, Psalms 3:4. It is also why the middle of the tent [of meeting], where the ark containing the law was, was called The Holy of Holies, Exodus 26:33-34; for the law in the ark in the middle of the tent [of meeting], represented the Lord in respect of the Word. For the law is the Word, 6752, 7463.

[6] All this shows why it is that the angels are called holy in Matthew 25:31; Mark 8:38; Luke 9:26; Psalms 149:1; Daniel 8:13; also the prophets, Luke 1:70; and the apostles too, Revelation 18:20. Not that they are holy by their own virtue but that the Lord, who alone is holy and the only source of holiness, makes them so. For truths are meant by 'the angels', because they are those who receive truth from the Lord, 1925, 4085, 4295, 4402, 7268, 7873, 8192, 8301; teachings which present the truth that comes through the Word from the Lord are meant by 'the prophets', 2534, 7269; and all the truths and forms of the good of faith in their entirety which come from the Lord are meant by 'the apostles', 3488, 3858 (end), 6397.

[7] Consecrations ³ among the Israelite and Jewish people took place in order that the Lord who alone was holy might be represented, and in order that holiness, which He alone is the source of, might be represented. This is the reason for the consecration of Aaron and his sons, Exodus 29:1ff; Leviticus 8:10-11, 13, 30; the consecration of their garments, Exodus 29:21ff; the consecration of the altar in order that it might be most holy, ⁴ Exodus 29:37ff; the consecration of the tent of meeting, the ark of the Testimony, the table, all the vessels, the altar of incense, the altar of burnt offering and its vessels, and the laver and its base, Exodus 30:26ff.

[8] The truth that the Lord is the real Holiness that was represented is evident also from the Lord's words in Matthew when they are seen in the internal sense,

Fools and blind! Which of the two is greater, the gold or the temple that makes the gold holy? And which of the two is greater, the gift or the altar that makes the gift holy? Matthew 23:17-19.

'The temple' represented the Lord Himself, and so did 'the altar', while 'the gold' was a sign of the good that comes from the Lord, and 'the gift' or a sacrifice was a sign of things constituting faith and charity that come from the Lord.

The Lord was represented by 'the temple', see 2777, 3720, and by 'the altar', 2777, 2811, 4489, 8935, 8940. 'Gold' was a sign of good that comes from the Lord, 1551, 1552, 5658, and 'a sacrifice' a sign of worship springing from faith and charity that come from the Lord, 922, 923, 2805, 2807, 2830, 6905, 8680, 8682, 8936.

[9] From all this it is now evident why it is that the children of Israel were called a holy people in Deuteronomy 26:19 and elsewhere, or as in the present verse men of holiness. That is to say, they were so called because every single aspect of their worship represented Divine realities that are the Lord's, and celestial and spiritual things of His kingdom and Church. On this account they were called holy in a representative sense; they themselves were not holy on that account, because representatives had regard to the holy things that were represented, not to the person who represented them, see 665, 1097 (end), 1361, 3147, 3881 (end), 4208, 4281, 4288, 4293, 4307, 4444, 4500, 6304, 7048, 7439, 8588, 8788, 8806.

[10] On that account also was Jerusalem called holy, and Zion the mountain of holiness in Zechariah 8:3 and elsewhere, as well as in Matthew,

And the tombs were opened, and many bodies of dead holy ones were raised; and coming out of their tombs after the Lord's resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. Matthew 27:52-53.

Here Jerusalem is called 'the holy city', when in fact, quite to the contrary, it was unholy because the Lord was crucified there at that time, for which reason it is called 'Sodom and Egypt' in John,

Their bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. Revelation 11:8.

Yet it is called holy, because it means the Lord's kingdom and the Church, 402, 2117, 3654. The appearance of 'dead holy ones' there, an event witnessed by some in vision, was a sign of the salvation of people who belonged to the spiritual Church, and of the raising of those people to the Holy Jerusalem, which is heaven - the people who had been kept up to that time on the lower earth, spoken of in 6854, 6914, 7091, 7828, 7932, 8049, 8054, 8159, 8321.

Notes de bas de page:

3570. 'And he brought it to him, and he ate' means first of all a conjunction of good, 'and he brought him wine, and he drank' means followed by a conjunction of truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'eating' as being joined and being made one's own as regards good, dealt with just above in 3568; from the meaning of 'wine' as truth deriving from good, dealt with in 1071, 1798; and from the meaning of 'drinking' as being joined and being made one's own as regards truth, 3168. The implications of this - that the good of the rational, represented by Isaac, first of all joins good to itself, then it joins truth to itself, which it does through the natural, represented by Jacob - are as follows: While the natural dwells in that state when good occupies the external position and truth the internal one, dealt with above in 3539, 3548, 3556, 3563, many things are allowed to come in which are not good but which are nevertheless useful - such things as serve as means towards good in their own order. But the good of the rational does not join to itself and make its own anything from that source apart from that which is suited to its own good, for it receives no other kind of good. Whatever is unsuited it rejects. All else in the natural it leaves behind to serve as the means for allowing in and introducing further things suited to itself.

[2] It is the rational that exists within the internal man. What goes on there is unknown to the natural since it is above its range of discernment. Consequently anyone who leads a merely natural life cannot know anything whatever about those things that are going on with him in his internal man, that is, in his rational. The Lord re-arranges those things without a person's being at all conscious of it. Consequently he knows nothing at all about how he is regenerated; indeed he is scarcely aware of his being regenerated. If he does wish to know however let him merely pay attention to his ultimate intentions, which are rarely disclosed to anyone. If those intentions are directed towards good, that is to say, if he considers the neighbour and the Lord more than he does himself he is in a state of regeneration. But if his intentions are directed towards evil, that is to say, if he considers himself more than he does the neighbour and the Lord, let him realize that he is not in any state of regeneration.

[3] A person's ultimate aims and intentions in life determine where he is in the next life, aims which look towards what is good placing him among angels in heaven, aims which look towards what is evil placing him among devils in hell. A person's ultimate intentions are nothing else than his loves; for what a person loves he has as his end in view. And being his loves, his ultimate aims and intentions constitute his inmost life, see 1317, 1568, 1571, 1645, 1909, 3425, 3562, 3565. Aims present in a person which look towards what is good reside in his rational, and are called the rational as regards good or the good of the rational. Through those aims residing there, that is, by means of the good there, the Lord re-arranges all things that are in the natural; for the end in view is like the soul, and the natural like the body belonging to that soul. The nature of the soul determines that of the body which surrounds it, as does the nature of the rational as regards good determine that of the natural clothing it.

[4] It is well known that a person's soul begins in the mother's ovum, and is after that developed in her womb, and is there surrounded with a tiny body, which indeed is such that by means of it the soul is able to function properly in the world into which it is born. A similar situation exists when a person is born again, that is, when he is regenerated. The new soul which he acquires at that time is an end which has good in view. This end in view has its beginnings in the rational, where first of all it is so to speak in the ovum, and is after that developed so to speak in the womb. The tiny body with which that soul is surrounded is the natural, and the good there comes to be of such a nature that it acts in obedience to the soul's ends in view. The truths there are like fibres in the body, for it is from good that truths take shape, 3470. From this it is clear that a person's reformation is imaged by the formation of him in the womb. And if you are willing to believe it, it is also celestial good and spiritual truth from the Lord that are shaping him and at that time endowing him with power that enables him to receive that good and that truth gradually - and indeed in the manner and to the extent that he looks as a human being towards ends that are of heaven and not as an animal towards those that are of the world.

[5] The matter of the rational as regards good first of all joining the good, then the truth, to itself by means of the natural - meant by Jacob's bringing savoury food and bread to Isaac and his eating it, and bringing him wine and his drinking it - may also be illustrated by means of the duties the body performs for its soul. It is the soul that enables the body to desire food and it is also the soul that enables the body to savour it. Different kinds of food are introduced through the delight that goes with appetite and the delight that goes with taste, thus through external good; but not all of these pass into the life of the body. Rather, some kinds of food serve as solvents to digest food, some as neutralizers, some as openers of and others as introducers into vessels. But good types of food are selected and introduced into the bloodstream, and then become blood. And from the latter the soul joins to itself such things as are of use to it.

[6] A similar situation exists with the rational and the natural. Corresponding to the desire for food and to taste are the desire and the affection for knowing truth; and corresponding to different kinds of food are facts and cognitions, 1480. And because they so correspond a similar situation exists with them. The soul which is the good of the rational provides the desire for those things and is moved by them, so that the things which belong to knowledge and doctrine are introduced through the delight that belongs to desire, and through the good that belongs to affection. But not everything that is introduced is such that it becomes the good which nourishes life; instead some things serve as the means so to speak to digest and neutralize, some to open up and introduce. But goods which nourish life are applied by the soul, and so joined by the soul, to itself, and from these it forms truths for itself. From this it is evident how the rational re-arranges the natural so that the rational as the soul may be served by it, or what amounts to the same, so that the natural may serve the end in view, which is the soul, in developing itself so that it may be of use in the Lord's kingdom.