Arcana Coelestia #3812
3812. And Laban said to him, Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. That this signifies conjoined in respect to truths and to goods, is evident from the signification of the words, “thou art my bone and my flesh,” as being conjunction. The ancients had this form of speaking concerning those who were of one house, or of one family, or in some relationship—“my bone and my flesh” (see n. 157); and hence by these words is signified conjunction. The reason why it signifies as to truths and as to goods, is that all spiritual conjunction is effected by these, and all natural conjunction has relation to the same. Moreover, by “bone and flesh” is signified what is man’s own; by “bone,” the own of his understanding, and by “flesh” the own of his will; thus by “bone” is signified what is his own in respect to truth, for this is of the understanding; and by “flesh” is signified what is his own in respect to good, for this is of the will (n. 148, 149).
[2] As regards man’s own in general it is of two kinds, one infernal and the other heavenly; that which is infernal is received by man from hell, and that which is heavenly from heaven, that is, through heaven from the Lord; for all evil, as well as all the derivative falsity, flows in from hell; and all good, and the derivative truth, from the Lord. This is known to men from the doctrine of faith, but scarcely one in ten thousand believes it. For this reason man appropriates to himself or makes his own the evil which flows in from hell, and the good which flows in from the Lord does not affect him, consequently is not imputed to him. The reason why man does not believe that evil flows in from hell, and good from the Lord, is that he is in the love of self, which love carries this with it, insomuch that it is exceedingly indignant when it is said that everything inflows. This therefore is the reason why all that is man’s own is nothing but evil (see n. 210, 215, 694, 731, 874-876, 987, 1023, 1044, 1047). But that man believes that evil is from hell and good from the Lord comes from the fact that he is not in the love of self, but in love toward his neighbor and in love to the Lord, for this love is attended with such a belief. Thus it is that man receives from the Lord a heavenly own (concerning which see above n. 155, 164, 731, 1023, 1044, 1937, 1947, 2882, 2883, 2891).
[3] In both senses this own is signified by “bone and flesh;” and consequently by “bones” in the Word is signified truth, and in the opposite sense falsity, and by “flesh” good, and in the opposite sense evil. That this is the signification of “bones,” may be seen from the following passages.
In Isaiah:
Jehovah shall lead thee continually, and shall satisfy thy soul in droughts, and shall make strong thy bones; that thou mayest be like a watered garden (Isaiah 58:11); where “making strong the bones” signifies to make alive the own of the understanding, that is, to enlighten it with intelligence; whence it is said, “that thou mayest be like a watered garden.” (That a “garden” signifies intelligence, may be seen above, n. 100, 108, 1588.) Again:
Then ye shall see, and your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall flourish like the grass (Isaiah 66:14); where by “bones flourishing like the grass,” the like is signified as above.
[4] In Jeremiah:
Her Nazirites were whiter than snow, they were fairer than milk; their bones were more ruddy than gems, a sapphire was their polishing; their form is darker than blackness, they are not known in the streets; their skin cleaveth to their bone, it is withered, it is become like wood (Lam. 4:7-8).
The “Nazirite” denotes the celestial man (n. 3301); “whiter than snow and fairer than milk” denotes to be in celestial truth; and because this truth is from the love of good, it is said that “their bones were more ruddy than gems.” (“Whiteness” and “fairness” are predicated of truth, n. 3301; “ruddiness,” of good, n. 3300; “gems,” of truths which are from good, n. 114.) By “their skin cleaving to their bone” is described a changed state as to the celestial things of love, namely, that there was no flesh on the bones, that is, no longer any good; for then all truth becomes like skin which cleaves to the bone; it is “withered and become like wood.”
[5] In Ezekiel:
Utter a parable against the rebellious house, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord Jehovih, Set on the caldron, set it on, and also pour waters into it; gathering the pieces thereof into it, every good piece, the thigh and the shoulder; fill it with the choice bones; taking the choice of the flock; and let there be also a hearth of bones under it; let the bones also be boiled in the midst of it (Ezekiel 24:3-5, 10); where a “caldron” signifies violence offered to good and truth, wherefore it is called a “city of bloods” (verse 6); the “pieces, the good piece, the thigh, and the shoulder gathered into it” are flesh, by which are meant goods; the “choice bones” with which the caldron was filled denote truths a “hearth of bones,” the affection of truth; the “bones being boiled in the midst of it,” violence offered to truths. Everyone can see that Divine arcana are stored within this parable; and also that these arcana can in no wise be known unless it is known what is signified in the internal sense by a “caldron” or “pot,” by “pieces,” by “thigh and shoulder,” by “choice bones,” by a “hearth of bones,” and by “boiling.”
In Micah:
Is it for you to know judgment, who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones; who have eaten the flesh of My people, and have flayed their skin from off them; and have broken their bones, and have divided them as into the pot, and as flesh in the midst of the caldron? (Micah 3:1-3); where the signification is the same.
[6] In Ezekiel:
He brought me out in the spirit of Jehovah, and set me down in the midst of the valley, which was full of bones. And He said unto me, Shall these bones live? He said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones hear the word of Jehovah; thus saith the Lord Jehovih unto these bones, Behold I will cause breath to enter into you that ye may live; I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come up upon you, and will cover you with skin, and put breath in you that ye may live. I prophesied, and the bones came together, bone to its bone; and I held and lo there were sinews upon them, and flesh came up, and skin covered them above; and there was no breath in them and breath came into them, and they revived, and stood upon their feet (Ezekiel 37:1, 3-8, 10).
The subject here treated of in general is the setting up again of the church among the Gentiles; and in particular, the regeneration of man: “dry bones” denote the own of the understanding, which is inanimate before it receives the life of good from the Lord, but is thereby animated or made alive; the “flesh which the Lord causes to come up upon the bones” is the own of the will, which is called the heavenly or celestial own, and thus signifies good; “breath” is the Lord’s life, and when this inflows into that good of the man which he seems to himself to will and do from his own, the good is then vivified, and from the good the truth, and out of the dry bones there is made a man.
[7] In David:
All My bones are unloosed, My heart is become like wax, I can number all My bones. They have parted My garments among them, and upon My vesture have they cast a lot (Psalms 22:14, 17-18); where the subject is the Lord’s temptations as to Divine truths, which were the Lord’s own, and hence are called “My bones;” and as to Divine good, which was the Lord’s own, and hence is called “My heart.” (That the “heart” signifies good, may be seen above, n. 3313, 3635.) And because “bones” signify these truths, the numbering of which denotes to desire to dissipate them through reasonings and falsities, therefore there immediately follow the words, “they parted My garments, and cast a lot upon My vesture;” for “garments” also signify truths, but exterior ones (n. 297, 1073, 2576); “dividing them and casting a lot upon the vesture,” involves the like-as also in Matthew 27:35. Again:
My soul exulteth in Jehovah; it shall be glad in His salvation. All my bones shall say, Who is like unto Thee? (Psalms 35:9-10); where it is evident that in the spiritual sense “bones” denote the own of the understanding. Again:
Thou shalt cause me to hear joy and gladness; the bones which Thou hast bruised shall exult (Psalms 51:8); where the “exulting of the bones which were bruised” signifies re-creation through truths after temptations.
[8] As “bone” signified the own of the understanding, that is, the own as to truth, and in the supreme sense the Divine truth which was the Lord’s own, it was for this reason ordained as a statute of the passover that they should not break a bone of the paschal lamb; concerning which we read in Moses:
In one house shall it be eaten; thou shall not carry forth of the flesh abroad out of the house; neither shall ye break a bone thereof (Exodus 12:46).
And in another place:
They shall not leave of it until the morning, nor break a bone thereof (Numbers 9:12);
“not to break a bone,” in the supreme sense signifies not to do violence to truth Divine; and in the representative sense, not to do violence to the truth of any good whatever; for the quality of good and the form of good are from truths, and truth is the support of good, as bones are of flesh.
[9] That the Word, which is Divine truth itself, vivifies the dead, was represented by the man reviving and standing upon his feet who, when cast into the sepulcher of Elisha, touched his bones (2 Kings 13:21). (That Elisha represented the Lord as to truth Divine, or the Word, may be seen above, n. 2762.) That in the opposite sense “bones” signify the falsity which is from man’s own, is manifest from the following passages.
In Jeremiah:
In that time they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their sepulchers; and they shall spread them before the sun, and the moon, and all the army of the heavens, which they had loved, and which they had served (Jeremiah 8:1-2
In Ezekiel:
I will lay the carcasses of the sons of Israel before their idols, and I will scatter your bones round about your altars (Ezekiel 6:5).
In Moses:
God who brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of a unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and shall destroy their arrows (Numbers 24:8).
In the second book of Kings:
Josiah the king brake in pieces the pillars, and cut down the groves, and filled their place with the bones of man; he took the bones out of the sepulchers, and burned them upon the altar that he might defile it; he sacrificed all the priests of the high places who were there, upon the altars, and burned men’s bones upon them (2 Kings 23:14, 16, 20).
In Moses:
The soul that hath touched upon the surface of the field one that is slain with the sword, or one dead, or the bone of a man, or a sepulcher, shall be unclean seven days (Numbers 19:16, 18).
[10] As “bones” signify falsities, and “sepulchers” the evils in which they are, and as hypocrisy is evil appearing outwardly as good, but is inwardly defiled with things false and profane, therefore the Lord says in Matthew:
Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye make yourselves like unto whited sepulchers, which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but are within full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness; even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity (Matthew 23:27-28).
From these passages it is now evident that by “bones” is signified the own of the understanding, both as to truth and as to falsity.
2 Kings 23
1
The king sent, and they gathered to him all the elders of Judah and of Jerusalem.
2
The king went up to the house of Yahweh, and all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people, both small and great: and he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of Yahweh.
3
The king stood by the pillar, and made a covenant before Yahweh, to walk after Yahweh, and to keep his commandments, and his testimonies, and his statutes, with all [his] heart, and all [his] soul, to confirm the words of this covenant that were written in this book: and all the people stood to the covenant.
4
The king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the threshold, to bring forth out of the temple of Yahweh all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the Asherah, and for all the army of the sky, and he burned them outside of Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron, and carried the ashes of them to Bethel.
5
He put down the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense in the high places in the cities of Judah, and in the places around Jerusalem; those also who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the army of the sky.
6
He brought out the Asherah from the house of Yahweh, outside of Jerusalem, to the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and beat it to dust, and cast its dust on the graves of the common people.
7
He broke down the houses of the sodomites, that were in the house of Yahweh, where the women wove hangings for the Asherah.
8
He brought all the priests out of the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had burned incense, from Geba to Beersheba; and he broke down the high places of the gates that were at the entrance of the gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were on a man's left hand at the gate of the city.
9
Nevertheless the priests of the high places didn't come up to the altar of Yahweh in Jerusalem, but they ate unleavened bread among their brothers.
10
He defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.
11
He took away the horses that the kings of Judah had given to the sun, at the entrance of the house of Yahweh, by the room of Nathan Melech the officer, who was in the court; and he burned the chariots of the sun with fire.
12
The altars that were on the roof of the upper room of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars which Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of Yahweh, did the king break down, and beat [them] down from there, and cast the dust of them into the brook Kidron.
13
The high places that were before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mountain of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile.
14
He broke in pieces the pillars, and cut down the Asherim, and filled their places with the bones of men.
15
Moreover the altar that was at Bethel, and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, had made, even that altar and the high place he broke down; and he burned the high place and beat it to dust, and burned the Asherah.
16
As Josiah turned himself, he spied the tombs that were there in the mountain; and he sent, and took the bones out of the tombs, and burned them on the altar, and defiled it, according to the word of Yahweh which the man of God proclaimed, who proclaimed these things.
17
Then he said, "What monument is that which I see?" The men of the city told him, "It is the tomb of the man of God, who came from Judah, and proclaimed these things that you have done against the altar of Bethel."
18
He said, "Let him be! Let no man move his bones." So they let his bones alone, with the bones of the prophet who came out of Samaria.
19
All the houses also of the high places that were in the cities of Samaria, which the kings of Israel had made to provoke [Yahweh] to anger, Josiah took away, and did to them according to all the acts that he had done in Bethel.
20
He killed all the priests of the high places that were there, on the altars, and burned men's bones on them; and he returned to Jerusalem.
21
The king commanded all the people, saying, "Keep the Passover to Yahweh your God, as it is written in this book of the covenant."
22
Surely there was not kept such a Passover from the days of the judges who judged Israel, nor in all the days of the kings of Israel, nor of the kings of Judah;
23
but in the eighteenth year of king Josiah was this Passover kept to Yahweh in Jerusalem.
24
Moreover those who had familiar spirits, and the wizards, and the teraphim, and the idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, did Josiah put away, that he might confirm the words of the law which were written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in the house of Yahweh.
25
Like him was there no king before him, who turned to Yahweh with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; neither after him arose there any like him.
26
Notwithstanding, Yahweh didn't turn from the fierceness of his great wrath, with which his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocation with which Manasseh had provoked him.
27
Yahweh said, "I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel, and I will cast off this city which I have chosen, even Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, 'My name shall be there.'"
28
Now the rest of the acts of Josiah, and all that he did, aren't they written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
29
In his days Pharaoh Necoh king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah went against him; and [Pharaoh Necoh] killed him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.
30
His servants carried him in a chariot dead from Megiddo, and brought him to Jerusalem, and buried him in his own tomb. The people of the land took Jehoahaz the son of Josiah, and anointed him, and made him king in his father's place.
31
Jehoahaz was twenty-three years old when he began to reign; and he reigned three months in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah.
32
He did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, according to all that his fathers had done.
33
Pharaoh Necoh put him in bonds at Riblah in the land of Hamath, that he might not reign in Jerusalem; and put the land to a tribute of one hundred talents of silver, and a talent of gold.
34
Pharaoh Necoh made Eliakim the son of Josiah king in the place of Josiah his father, and changed his name to Jehoiakim: but he took Jehoahaz away; and he came to Egypt, and died there.
35
Jehoiakim gave the silver and the gold to Pharaoh; but he taxed the land to give the money according to the commandment of Pharaoh: he exacted the silver and the gold of the people of the land, of everyone according to his taxation, to give it to Pharaoh Necoh.
36
Jehoiakim was twenty-five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem: and his mother's name was Zebidah the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah.
37
He did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, according to all that his fathers had done.
