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Genesis 17

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1 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord came to him, and said, I am God, Ruler of all; go in my ways and be upright in all things,

2 And I will make an agreement between you and me, and your offspring will be greatly increased.

3 And Abram went down on his face on the earth, and the Lord God went on talking with him, and said,

4 As for me, my agreement is made with you, and you will be the father of nations without end.

5 No longer will your name be Abram, but Abraham, for I have made you the father of a number of nations.

6 I will make you very fertile, so that nations will come from you and kings will be your offspring.

7 And I will make between me and you and your seed after you through all generations, an eternal agreement to be a God to you and to your seed after you.

8 And to you and to your seed after you, I will give the land in which you are living, all the land of Canaan for an eternal heritage; and I will be their God.

9 And God said to Abraham, On your side, you are to keep the agreement, you and your seed after you through all generations.

10 And this is the agreement which you are to keep with me, you and your seed after you: every male among you is to undergo circumcision.

11 In the flesh of your private parts you are to undergo it, as a mark of the agreement between me and you.

12 Every male among you, from one generation to another, is to undergo circumcision when he is eight days old, with every servant whose birth takes place in your house, or for whom you gave money to someone of another country, and not of your seed.

13 He who comes to birth in your house and he who is made yours for a price, all are to undergo circumcision; so that my agreement may be marked in your flesh, an agreement for all time.

14 And any male who does not undergo circumcision will be cut off from his people: my agreement has been broken by him.

15 And God said, As for Sarai, your wife, from now her name will be not Sarai, but Sarah.

16 And I will give her a blessing so that you will have a son by her: truly my blessing will be on her, and she will be the mother of nations: kings of peoples will be her offspring.

17 Then Abraham went down on his face, and laughing, said in his heart, May a man a hundred years old have a child? will Sarah, at ninety years old, give birth?

18 And Abraham said to God, If only Ishmael's life might be your care!

19 And God said, Not so; but Sarah, your wife, will have a son, and you will give him the name Isaac, and I will make my agreement with him for ever and with his seed after him.

20 As for Ishmael, I have given ear to your prayer: truly I have given him my blessing and I will make him fertile and give him great increase; he will be the father of twelve chiefs, and I will make him a great nation.

21 But my agreement will be with Isaac, to whom Sarah will give birth a year from this time.

22 And having said these words, God went up from Abraham.

23 And Abraham took Ishmael, his son, and all whose birth had taken place in his house, and all his servants whom he had made his for a price, every male of his house, and on that very day he gave them circumcision in the flesh of their private parts as God had said to him.

24 Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he underwent circumcision.

25 And Ishmael, his son, was thirteen years old when he underwent circumcision.

26 Abraham and Ishmael, his son, underwent circumcision on that very day.

27 And all the men of his house, those whose birth had taken place in the house and those whom he had got for money from men of other lands, underwent circumcision with him.

   

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Arcana Coelestia #2116

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2116. That they “were circumcised by [ab] him” signifies that they are justified by the Lord, may be seen from the representation and thence the signification of “being circumcised,” as being to be purified (explained above, n. 2039). Their “being circumcised by him,” that is, by Abraham, was also representative, namely, that they are purified and thereby justified by the Lord. But in regard to justification, the case is not as is commonly supposed, namely, that all evils and sins are wiped away and utterly blotted out when men, as they imagine, believe-even if it were their last and dying hour-however they may have lived in evils and in misdeeds during the entire course of their lives; for I have been fully instructed that not the smallest evil which a man during his bodily life has thought and has carried out into act is wiped away and utterly blotted out; but that it all remains, even to the very least of it.

[2] The truth is that with those who have meditated and practiced acts of hatred, of revenge, of cruelty, and of adultery, and who thereby have lived in no charity, the life thence contracted awaits them after death, nay, so do all things of that life both in general and in particular, which return in succession; and from this comes their torment in hell. But with those who have lived in love to the Lord and in charity toward the neighbor, their evils of life also all remain, but they are tempered by the goods which during their life in the world they have received from the Lord by means of a life of charity; and thereby they are uplifted into heaven, nay, are withheld from the evils which they have appertaining to them, so that these do not appear. They who in the other life doubt their having evils with them, because the evils do not appear, are let into them until they know that the case is really so, and then are again uplifted into heaven.

[3] This then is what is meant by being justified; for in this way men come to acknowledge not their own righteousness, but that of the Lord. As to its being said that those are saved who have faith-this is true; but in the Word by “faith” nothing else is meant than love to the Lord and charity toward the neighbor, and thus a life from these loves. The doctrinal things and dogmas of faith are not faith, but belong to faith; for they are one and all for the sake of the end that a man may become such as they teach him to be, as may be clearly seen from the Lord’s words that in love to God and love toward the neighbor consist all the law and the prophets, that is, the universal doctrine of faith (Matthew 22:34-39; Mark 12:28-35). (That there cannot possibly be any other faith that is faith, was shown in Part First, n. 30-38, 379, 389, 724, 809, 896, 904, 916, 989, 1017, 1076, 1077, 1121, 1158, 1162, 1176, 1258, 1285, 1316, 1608, 1798, 1799, 1834, 1843, 1844; and also that heaven itself consists in love to the Lord and in mutual love, n. 537, 547, 553, 1112, 2057)

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