16. Verse 1. In the beginning God created heaven and earth. The most ancient times of all are called 'the beginning', and are throughout the Prophets referred to as 'days of antiquity' and also 'days of eternity'. 'The beginning' also embodies within it that first Period when a person is being regenerated, for at that time he is being born anew and receiving life. Regeneration itself is therefore called a new creation of man. Almost everywhere in the prophetical sections 'to create', 'to form', and 'to make' mean to regenerate, though each of these verbs has a different shade of meaning, as in Isaiah,

Every one who is called by My name - I have created him for My glory, I have formed him, I have also made him. Isaiah 43:7

This is why the Lord is called Redeemer, One who forms from the womb, Maker, and also Creator, as in the same prophet,

I am Jehovah, your Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King. Isaiah 43:15.

In David,

A people to be created will praise Jah. Psalms 102:18.

In the same author,

You send forth Your Spirit; they are created; and You renewest the face ¹ of the ground. Psalms 104:30.

'Heaven' means the internal man, and 'earth' the external man prior to regeneration. This will be seen further on.

Bilješke:

1162. That 'the sons of Ham' means things that belong to separated faith follows from what appears above. To know what 'Ham' means and from that 'the sons of Ham', one must know what faith separated from charity is. Faith separated from charity is no faith. And where there is no faith there is no worship, neither internal nor external. If any worship does exist it is corrupted worship, and this is why 'Ham' likewise means corrupted internal worship. The individual belief is false in people who apply the term 'faith' to a mere knowledge of celestial and spiritual things separated from charity. For sometimes the most evil people of all - such as those who have led lives continually hating, getting revenge, and committing adultery, and who are therefore like those in hell and after life in the body become devils - are more knowledgeable than others. From this it becomes clear that knowledge is not faith. Rather, faith is the acknowledgement of the things that belong to faith; and that acknowledgement is in no way external but internal, being the operation of the Lord alone through the charity present with a person. Nor is acknowledgement in any way of the lips but of the life. It is from a person's life that the nature of his acknowledgement may be known. All who have a knowledge of the cognitions of faith but have no charity are called 'the sons of Ham'. Whether their knowledge is a knowledge of the interior cognitions of the Word and its deepest mysteries, or a knowledge of all that the literal sense of the Word contains, or a knowledge of other truths, from which these may be regarded, no matter what name they are given, or whether it is a knowledge of all the rituals that constitute external worship, they are 'sons of Ham' if they have no charity. That those called 'the sons of Ham' are such is clear from the nations now under discussion.