The Bible

 

Ezekiel 42

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1 And he took me out into the inner square in the direction of the north: and he took me into the rooms which were opposite the separate place and opposite the building to the north.

2 On the north side it was a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide,

3 Opposite the space of twenty cubits which was part of the inner square, and opposite the stone floor of the outer square. There were covered ways facing one another on the third floor.

4 And in front of the rooms was a walk, ten cubits wide and a hundred cubits long; and their doors were facing north.

5 And the higher rooms were shorter: for the covered ways took up more space from these than from the lower and middle rooms.

6 For they were on three floors, and they had no pillars like the pillars of the outer square; so the highest was narrower than the lowest and middle floors from the earth level.

7 And the wall which went outside by the side of the rooms, in the direction of the outer square in front of the rooms, was fifty cubits long.

8 For the rooms in the outer square were fifty cubits long: and in front of the Temple was a space of a hundred cubits.

9 And under these rooms was the way in from the east side, as one goes into them from the outer square at the head of the outer wall.

10 (And he took me) to the south, and in front of the separate place and in front of the building there were rooms.

11 And there was a walk in front of them like that by the rooms on the north; they were equally long and wide; and the ways out of them were the same in design and had the same sort of doors.

12 And under the rooms on the south was a door at the head of the outer wall in the direction of the east as one goes in.

13 And he said to me, The north rooms and the south rooms in front of the separate place are the holy rooms, where the priests who come near the Lord take the most holy things for their food: there the most holy things are placed, with the meal offering and the sin-offering and the offering for error; for the place is holy.

14 When the priests go in, they may not go out of the holy place into the outer square, and there they are to put the robes in which they do the work of the Lord's house, for they are holy: and they have to put on other clothing before they come near that which has to do with the people.

15 And when he had come to the end of measuring the inner house, he took me out to the doorway looking to the east, and took its measure all round.

16 He went round and took the measure of it on the east side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.

17 And he went round and took the measure of it on the north side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.

18 And he went round and took the measure of it on the south side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.

19 And he went round and took the measure of it on the west side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.

20 He took its measure on the four sides: and it had a wall all round, five hundred long and five hundred wide, separating what was holy from what was common.

   

The Bible

 

Ezekiel 40:6

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6 Then he came to the doorway looking to the east, and went up by its steps; and he took the measure of the doorstep, one rod wide.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #36

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36. I became in the spirit on the Lord's day. (1:10) This symbolizes a spiritual state then owing to Divine influx.

"I became in the spirit" means, symbolically, a spiritual state, the state in which John was while he was experiencing the visions, and which we will take up in the following exposition. "On the Lord's day" symbolizes influx from the Lord then, for that day brings the Lord's presence, as it is a holy day.

Concerning the prophets we read that they were in the spirit or in vision, and that the Word came to them from Jehovah.

When they were in the spirit or in vision, they were not in the body, but in their spirit, a state in which they saw phenomena such as are found in heaven. But when the Word came to them, they were then in the body and heard Jehovah speaking.

These two states of the prophets must be properly distinguished. In the state of vision the eyes of their spirit were open and the eyes of their body closed; and they heard then what angels said, and what Jehovah said through angels, and also saw representations produced for them in heaven. Moreover, they sometimes seemed to themselves to be taken then from place to place, their body remaining where it was.

[2] This was the state in which John was when he wrote the book of Revelation, and the state sometimes experienced by Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Daniel. They also said that they were then in vision or in the spirit. For Ezekiel says,

The Spirit lifted me up... and brought me back into Chaldea, to those in captivity, in a vision (of God), in the spirit of God. (Thus) went up from me the vision that I had seen. (Ezekiel 11:1, 24)

He also says that the Spirit lifted him up, and he heard behind him an earthquake, and more (Ezekiel 3:12, 24). So, too, that the Spirit lifted him up between earth and heaven, that it brought him in visions of God to Jerusalem, and that he saw abominations (Ezekiel 8:3f.). He was likewise in a vision of God or in the spirit when he saw the four living creatures, which were cherubim (Ezekiel 1; 10), as also when he saw a new earth and a new temple, and an angel measuring them (Ezekiel 40; 41; 42; 43; 44; 45; 46; 47; 48). That he was then in the visions of God, he himself says (Ezekiel 40:2), and that the spirit lifted him up (Ezekiel 43:5).

[3] The same was the case with Zechariah, who had an angel with him at the time, when he saw a man riding a horse among the myrtle trees (Zechariah 1:8ff.); when he saw the four horns, and then a man with a measuring line in his hand (Zechariah 1:18; 2:1ff.); when he saw Joshua the high priest (Zechariah 3:1ff.); when he saw the lampstand and two olive trees (Zechariah 4:1ff.); when he saw the flying scroll and the ephah (Zechariah 5:1, 6); when he saw the four chariots coming from between two mountains, and the horses (Zechariah 6:1ff.).

Daniel was in a like state when he saw the four beasts coming up from the sea (Daniel 7:1ff.), and when he saw the combat between the ram and the male goat (Daniel 8:1ff.). He himself says that he saw these things in visions (Daniel 7:1-2, 7, 13; 8:2; 10:1, 7-8), and that the angel Gabriel appeared to him in a vision (Daniel 9:21).

[4] The same was the case with John, as when he saw the Son of Man in the midst of the seven lampstands (Revelation 1), and finally, the new heaven and the new earth, and then the New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven (Revelation 21, 22. John himself says that he saw these things in the spirit and in vision (1:10; 4:2; 9:17; 21:10). This, too, is meant by the statement, "I saw," everywhere it occurs in this book.

[5] It is clearly apparent from this that to be in the spirit is to be in a state of vision, which is brought about by an opening of the sight of a person's spirit; and when this is opened, phenomena found in the spiritual world are as clearly visible as those in the natural world are to the sight of the body.

The reality of this is something I can attest to from many years' experience.

The disciples were in this state when they saw the Lord after His resurrection, which is why are told that their eyes were opened (Luke 24:30-31).

Abraham was in a like state when he saw the three angels and spoke with them. 1

So, too, Hagar, Gideon, Joshua and others, when they saw angels of Jehovah. Likewise when Elisha's lad saw the mountain full of fiery chariots and horses all around Elisha, for Elisha prayed and said,

"Jehovah, open, I pray, his eyes that he may see." And Jehovah opened the eyes of the lad, and he saw. (2 Kings 6:17)

As regards the Word, however, it was not revealed in a state of the spirit or of vision, but the Lord dictated it to the prophets in an audible voice. Consequently we are nowhere told that the prophets spoke it from the Holy Spirit, but from Jehovah. See The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Lord, no. 53.

Footnotes:

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.