1300. The symbolism of mortar, or clay, 1 as the goodness that forms the substance of the mind (in other words, that forms people in the church) is also evident in the Word. In Isaiah, for instance:
Now Jehovah, you are our Father; we are clay, and you are our potter, and we are all the work of your hand. (Isaiah 64:8, 9)
Clay stands for the individual in the church who is actually being formed, and so for the charitable goodness that does all the work of shaping or forming us — that is, reforming and regenerating us. In Jeremiah:
Like clay in a potter's hand — that is how you are in my hand, 2 house of Israel. (Jeremiah 18:6)
The meaning is similar. Whether the text speaks of building with clay or of forming from clay, it is the same thing.
അടിക്കുറിപ്പുകൾ:
1. Mortar in the modern sense — a compound of sand, concrete, and sometimes lime — is not intended here. "Clay" in the Bible may refer to any viscous mud, not necessarily true clay. In the Middle East in biblical times, bricks were made of mud and straw and mortared together with tar (see note 3 in §1279), with true clay, or with more mud. [SS]
2. The translation here assumes the reading vos in manu mea ("you are in my hand") for nos in manu tua ("we are in your hand"). This emendation matches the Hebrew (אַתֶּם בְּיָדִי ['attem bǝyāḏî]), as the third Latin edition (Swedenborg [1749-1756] 1949-1973) points out. [LHC]
