The Bible

 

Genesis 7

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1 And Jehovah said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into the ark; for thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation.

2 Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee seven and seven, the male and his female; and of the beasts that are not clean two, the male and his female:

3 of the birds also of the heavens, seven and seven, male and female, to keep seed alive upon the face of all the earth.

4 For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living thing that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the ground.

5 And Noah did according unto all that Jehovah commanded him.

6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.

7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.

8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of birds, and of everything that creepeth upon the ground,

9 there went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, male and female, as God commanded Noah.

10 And it came to pass after the seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.

11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.

12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.

13 In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark;

14 they, and every beast after its kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of every sort.

15 And they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is the breath of life.

16 And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God commanded him: and Jehovah shut him in.

17 And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lifted up above the earth.

18 And the waters prevailed, and increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters.

19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high mountains that were under the whole heaven were covered.

20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.

21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both birds, and cattle, and beasts, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man:

22 all in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, of all that was on the dry land, died.

23 And every living thing was destroyed that was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and creeping things, and birds of the heavens; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only was left, and they that were with him in the ark.

24 And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #841

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841. 'Noah', as previously, means the member of the Ancient Church, and 'every wild animal and every beast that was with him in the ark' means all things that resided with him. This becomes clear from what has been stated already concerning Noah and concerning the meaning of 'wild animal' and 'beast'. In the Word 'wild animal' takes on a two-fold sense; it stands for things with a person that are alive and for things that are dead. The reason why it stands for those that are alive is that this expression in Hebrew means a living thing. But because the most ancient people in their humility acknowledged that they themselves were but wild animals, things with a person that are dead were therefore meant as well by the same expression. Here 'wild animal' means both what is alive and what is dead in their entirety, as is usually the case with someone after temptation. Things that are alive and those that are dead - that is, those that are the Lord's and those that are the person's own - seem so intermingled that at that time the person scarcely knows what truth and good are. At that time however the Lord is re-arranging and restoring all things to order, as becomes clear from what follows. For the fact that 'wild animal' means things that are alive with man, see the previous chapter, 7:14, and also verses 17, 19 of the present chapter. And from what has been shown several times already about wild animals and beasts, for example in 45, 46, 142, 143, 246, it is clear that it also means the things with a person that are dead.

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