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John 1:18

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18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.

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Explanation of John 1:18

Од страна на Brian David

Ancient of Days, by William Blake

The Lord, in His essence, is infinite. He is the source of all energy, the well-spring of reality itself. His love is of such power that we would be destroyed by its direct heat, which is infinitely greater than the heat of the finite sun. His wisdom, the direct outpouring of His love, is of such power that we would be blinded by its brightness, which is infinitely brighter than the light of the finite sun. His immensity – which is beyond immensity – is inaccessible to our finite imaginative powers. In His essence, He is unknowable to us.

Yet we know Him. How? The Writings say that His love and wisdom project as a human form, then pass through that form almost like a filter to come to us as divine truth. That truth is like a container that is conformed to our minds, enough that we can hang onto an idea of the Lord and receive His love. We can have ideas that are filled with the Lord, and feel like we know Him, though really what we know is just the amount we can handle.

That divine truth is, itself, "the only begotten son." It was the son as the soul within the physical man Jesus; it was the son as the inner meaning of the Old Testament; it was the son as expressed by the Lord in other ways before Moses, and it is still the son now as the inner meaning of the Old and New Testaments together. It knows the Father – the love that is the Lord’s essence – and does, in fact, declare the Father to us, if only we will listen.

(Референци: Arcana Coelestia 2025 [4], 4211, 4724, 5321 [2], 6849, 6887, 7211, 8705, 10579)

Од делата на Сведенборг

 

Arcana Coelestia #6887

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6887. 'This is My name forever' means that the Divine Human has the essential nature of the Divine itself. This is clear from the meaning of 'the name of God' as everything in its entirety by which God is worshipped, thus His essential nature, dealt with in 2724, 3006, 6674. But the Divine itself cannot be worshipped because the Divine itself cannot be approached either in faith or in love, being - according to the Lord's words in John - entirely above comprehension,

Nobody has ever seen God; the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has made Him known. John 1:18.

And elsewhere in the same gospel,

You have never heard His voice nor seen His shape. John 5:37.

Therefore 'the name of God', being the essential nature of the Divine itself, is the Divine Human that can be approached and worshipped.

[2] The fact that the Divine Human is 'the name of God' is evident in John,

Jesus said, Father, glorify Your name. A voice therefore came from heaven, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. John 12:28.

With respect to the Divine Human the Lord here calls Himself 'the Father's name'. In Isaiah,

I Jehovah have called You in righteousness, and I will hold Your hand, because I will guard You, and give You to be a covenant of the people, 1 a light of the nations, to open the blind eyes, to bring the bound out of prison, out of the dungeon-house those who sit in darkness. I am Jehovah, that is My name; and My glory I will not give to another. Isaiah 42:6-8.

These and the previous verses of this chapter in Isaiah plainly refer to the Lord. He it is who is meant by 'the name of Jehovah', as is evident from the declaration that He will not give His glory to another, which means - since it has reference to the Lord - to Himself, seeing that He and Jehovah are one.

[3] In Moses,

Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way, and to bring you to the place which I have prepared. Take notice of His face, and hear His voice; for He will not tolerate your transgression, since My name is within Him. Exodus 23:20-21.

'The angel of Jehovah' here is used to mean the Lord in respect of His Divine Human, see 6831. And since the Divine Human has the essential nature of the Divine itself, it says that Jehovah's name is within Him. Also in the Lord's Prayer the words 'Our Father in heaven, may Your name be kept holy' are used to mean the Lord in respect of His Divine Human, as well as everything in its entirety by which one should worship Him.

Фусноти:

1. The Latin means for the people but the Hebrew means of the people, which Swedenborg has in some other places where he quotes this verse.

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