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Numbers 11

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1 And when the people complained, it displeased the LORD: and the LORD heard it; and his anger was kindled; and the fire of the LORD burnt among them, and consumed them that were in the uttermost parts of the camp.

2 And the people cried unto Moses; and when Moses prayed unto the LORD, the fire was quenched.

3 And he called the name of the place Taberah: because the fire of the LORD burnt among them.

4 And the mixt multitude that was among them fell a lusting: and the children of Israel also wept again, and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat?

5 We remember the fish, which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlick:

6 But our soul is dried away: there is nothing at all, beside this manna, before our eyes.

7 And the manna was as coriander seed, and the colour thereof as the colour of bdellium.

8 And the people went about, and gathered it, and ground it in mills, or beat it in a mortar, and baked it in pans, and made cakes of it: and the taste of it was as the taste of fresh oil.

9 And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it.

10 Then Moses heard the people weep throughout their families, every man in the door of his tent: and the anger of the LORD was kindled greatly; Moses also was displeased.

11 And Moses said unto the LORD, Wherefore hast thou afflicted thy servant? and wherefore have I not found favour in thy sight, that thou layest the burden of all this people upon me?

12 Have I conceived all this people? have I begotten them, that thou shouldest say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom, as a nursing father beareth the sucking child, unto the land which thou swarest unto their fathers?

13 Whence should I have flesh to give unto all this people? for they weep unto me, saying, give us flesh, that we may eat.

14 I am not able to bear all this people alone, because it is too heavy for me.

15 And if thou deal thus with me, kill me, I pray thee, out of hand, if I have found favour in thy sight; and let me not see my wretchedness.

16 And the LORD said unto Moses, Gather unto me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom thou knowest to be the elders of the people, and officers over them; and bring them unto the tabernacle of the congregation, that they may stand there with thee.

17 And I will come down and talk with thee there: and I will take of the spirit which is upon thee, and will put it upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with thee, that thou bear it not thyself alone.

18 And say thou unto the people, Sanctify yourselves against to morrow, and ye shall eat flesh: for ye have wept in the ears of the LORD, saying, Who shall give us flesh to eat? for it was well with us in Egypt: therefore the LORD will give you flesh, and ye shall eat.

19 Ye shall not eat one day, nor two days, nor five days, neither ten days, nor twenty days;

20 But even a whole month, until it come out at your nostrils, and it be loathsome unto you: because that ye have despised the LORD which is among you, and have wept before him, saying, Why came we forth out of Egypt?

21 And Moses said, The people, among whom I am, are six hundred thousand footmen; and thou hast said, I will give them flesh, that they may eat a whole month.

22 Shall the flocks and the herds be slain for them, to suffice them? or shall all the fish of the sea be gathered together for them, to suffice them?

23 And the LORD said unto Moses, Is the LORD's hand waxed short? thou shalt see now whether my word shall come to pass unto thee or not.

24 And Moses went out, and told the people the words of the LORD, and gathered the seventy men of the elders of the people, and set them round about the tabernacle.

25 And the LORD came down in a cloud, and spake unto him, and took of the spirit that was upon him, and gave it unto the seventy elders: and it came to pass, that, when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied, and did not cease.

26 But there remained two of the men in the camp, the name of the one was Eldad, and the name of the other Medad: and the spirit rested upon them; and they were of them that were written, but went not out unto the tabernacle: and they prophesied in the camp.

27 And there ran a young man, and told Moses, and said, Eldad and Medad do prophesy in the camp.

28 And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of Moses, one of his young men, answered and said, My lord Moses, forbid them.

29 And Moses said unto him, Enviest thou for my sake? would God that all the LORD's people were prophets, and that the LORD would put his spirit upon them!

30 And Moses gat him into the camp, he and the elders of Israel.

31 And there went forth a wind from the LORD, and brought quails from the sea, and let them fall by the camp, as it were a day's journey on this side, and as it were a day's journey on the other side, round about the camp, and as it were two cubits high upon the face of the earth.

32 And the people stood up all that day, and all that night, and all the next day, and they gathered the quails: he that gathered least gathered ten homers: and they spread them all abroad for themselves round about the camp.

33 And while the flesh was yet between their teeth, ere it was chewed, the wrath of the LORD was kindled against the people, and the LORD smote the people with a very great plague.

34 And he called the name of that place Kibroth-hattaavah: because there they buried the people that lusted.

35 And the people journeyed from Kibroth-hattaavah unto Hazeroth; and abode at Hazeroth.

   

Commentarius

 

Teeth

  

In Genesis 49:12, "teeth whiter than milk" signify the Celestial Spiritual [milk] in the Lord's Natural [teeth], where Judah is here representing the Lord. (Arcana Coelestia 2184-2185).

In Psalms 3:7; 37:12, 58:6; Matthew 8:12, teeth signify the lowest natural things in man: in the genuine sense, their truths, in the opposite sense, their falsities. So the gnashing of teeth signifies the collision of falsities with truths. (Arcana Coelestia 4424[3])

In Exodus 21:27, this signifies truth in the natural, here the ultimate, which is the sensuous. (Arcana Coelestia 9062)

The tooth signifies the corporeal proprium, which is the lowest degree of man. (Arcana Coelestia 10283[12])

'Teeth,' as in Genesis 49:12, in the genuine sense, signify the natural level of life. Any hard part of the body, like bones and cartilage, corresponds to the truths and goods of the lowest natural level. 'Teeth' signify the outer edges of the life of the natural self, or the sensory level. There is a natural sensory will, and a natural sensory understanding. When the sensory levels are separated from the interior of the mind, their supposed truths are really mere falsities, and do violence to truths and destroy them. This situation appears in many passages, because sensory people do not see any truth in its own light, but engage in reasoning and altercations about everything... These altercations are heard in the hells as the gnashing of teeth. Viewed in itself, this is the collision of falsity and truth. This is the meaning of 'gnashing of teeth' in Matthew 8:12, 13:42, 50, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30, and Luke 13:28.

(Notae: Apocalypse Revealed 435)


from the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg

 

Arcana Coelestia #4424

Studere hoc loco

  
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4424. What the Lord's words quoted above embody in the internal sense becomes clear without explanation, for at this point the Lord uses comparisons rather than representatives and meaningful signs. Only the meaning of the words of the final verse has to be stated - 'He will cut him off and assign him his part with the hypocrites, where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth'.

He will cut him off means separation and removal from goods and truths, for people who have a knowledge of what is good and true, as those within the Church do, but who lead a life of evil are said to be cut off when that knowledge is removed from them; for in the next life their knowledge of good and truth is separated from them and they are restricted to evils and derivative falsities also. The reason why this takes place is so that they do not communicate with heaven through their knowledge of good and truth and with hell through their evil and consequent falsity, and thereby are left hanging between the two. A further reason is so that they do not profane goods and truths, as happens when these are mixed together with falsities and evils. The same is also meant by the Lord's words addressed to the one who hid his talent in the earth,

Take the talent from him and give it to him who has ten talents, for to everyone who has, it will be given, so that he may have in abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away. Matthew 25:28-29.

And what the Lord says elsewhere has the same meaning - Matthew 13:12; also Mark 4:25, and Luke 8:18.

[2] And assign him his part with the hypocrites means that his lot, meant by 'part', lies with those who outwardly give the appearance of knowing the truth so far as doctrine is concerned, and of cherishing good so far as life is concerned, but who inwardly have no belief at all in truth nor any desire at all for good, who are 'the hypocrites'. People like this have become 'cut off' in the sense described here. Consequently when external things are taken away from these people, as happens to all in the next life, they are seen to be what they are like internally - people devoid of faith and charity. Yet they have pretended to have these, so that, capturing the attention of others, they could earn themselves positions of importance, monetary gain, and reputation. Within the Church that has become ruined virtually everyone is like this, for they have things that are external but none that are internal. Hence the interior aspects of those people are engulfed in the deluge described immediately above in 4423.

[3] Where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth means their state in the next life, 'wailing' that state as regards evils, and 'gnashing of teeth' that state as regards falsities, for 'teeth' in the Word means lowest natural things - in the genuine sense truths going with these, and in the contrary sense falsities going with them. Teeth also correspond to those things. For these reasons 'the gnashing of teeth' means the clash of falsities and truths. People immersed in wholly natural things and governed by ideas resulting from sensory illusions, believing nothing which they do not see by means of these, are said to be where there is 'the gnashing of teeth', and in the next life seem to themselves to be there when they draw conclusions about the truths of faith on the basis of their own illusions. A Church in which good and truth have been brought to ruin teems with people such as these. The same is meant again in other places by the gnashing of teeth, as in Matthew,

The sons of the kingdom will be thrown into outer darkness, where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Matthew 8:12.

'The sons of the kingdom' means those within the ruined Church.

'Darkness' means falsities, 4418, for they are in darkness when surrounded by the dark cloud mentioned above. 'The gnashing of teeth' means the clash of falsities with truths there. The same matter occurs in other places, such as Matthew 13:42, 50; 22:13; 25:30; and Luke 13:28.

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