Genesis 9
1
And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.
2
And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.
3
Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.
4
But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
5
And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man.
6
Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.
7
And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.
8
And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying,
9
And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;
10
And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
11
And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
12
And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:
13
I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.
14
And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:
15
And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.
16
And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.
17
And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.
18
And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.
19
These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread.
20
And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard:
21
And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.
22
And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.
23
And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.
24
And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
25
And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.
26
And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
27
God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.
28
And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years.
29
And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years: and he died.
Heaven and Hell #9
9. In their wisdom, angels press on even further. They say that it is not just everything good and true that comes from the Lord, but every bit of life as well. They support this by pointing out that nothing can come into being from itself. Everything presupposes something prior. This means that everything has come into being from a First, which they call the essential reality of the life of everything. Everything endures in the same way, too, because enduring is a constant coming into being. If anything were not kept in constant connection with the First, through intermediate means, it would instantly collapse and disintegrate. They add that there is only one single wellspring of life, with human life as one stream flowing from it. If it were not constantly supplied from its wellspring, it would immediately peter out.
[2] Still further, they say that nothing flows from that unique wellspring of life, the Lord, that is not divinely good and divinely true. These affect every individual according to the way they are accepted. People who accept them into their faith and life are in heaven, while people who reject or stifle them transform them into hell. They actually change what is good into evil and what is true into falsity - life into death.
Angels also support their belief that the Lord is the source of every bit of life by observing that everything in the universe goes back to what is good and true. Our volitional life, the life of our love, goes back to what is good, while our cognitive life, the life of our faith, goes back to what is true. Since everything good and true comes to us from above, it follows that this is the source of all of our life.
[3] Because angels believe this, they decline any thanks offered them for the good they do. In fact they feel hurt and withdraw if anyone gives them credit for anything good. It bewilders them to discover that people can believe they are wise on their own or do good on their own. Doing good for one's own sake, in their language, cannot be called "good," because it stems from self. Doing good for its own sake is what they call "good from the Divine." This, they say, is the kind of good that makes heaven, because this kind of good is the Lord. 1
각주:
1. [Swedenborg's footnote] Good from the Lord has the Lord within it, but good attributed to oneself does not: 1802, 3951, 8478.
