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Exodus 5:18

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18 Go therefore now, and work; for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall ye deliver the tale of bricks.

from the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg

 

Arcana Coelestia #7113

Studere hoc loco

  
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7113. 'To make bricks' means for fabrications and falsities which are to be introduced. This is clear from the meaning of 'making bricks' as fabricating falsities, dealt with in 1296, 6669. The historical account in the sense of the letter says that the children of Israel were to make the bricks, thus it was as if they were to fabricate falsities; but the meaning in the internal sense is that those in hell who are steeped in falsities would introduce them. Since, as stated already, those falsities seem to belong to those who receive them, the sense of the letter speaks in accordance with that appearance; but its real meaning is explained by means of the internal sense. There are very many things like this in the sense of the letter, see 5094, 6400, 6948.

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