The Bible

 

Genesis 17:3

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3 Da faldt Abram på sit Ansigt, og Gud sagde til ham:


The Project Gutenberg Association at Carnegie Mellon University

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #6003

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6003. And He said, I am God, the God of thy father. That this signifies the Divine intellectual from which is the influx, is evident from the representation of Isaac, who is here the “father,” as being the Divine rational or intellectual of the Lord (see ab ove n. 5998); for it is said, “God, the God of thy father.” That the influx is from this is because all truth is of the intellectual, thus also natural truth, which is represented by Jacob (n. 6001). (What the Divine rational or intellectual is which is represented by Isaac, see n. 1893, 2066, 2072, 2083, 2630, 3012, 3194, 3210.) In the original tongue, “God” is named in the first place in the singular, but in the second place in the plural; that is, in the first the name is “El,” and in the second it is “Elohim.” The reason is that by “God” in the first place is signified that there is one God and only one, and by “God” in the second place that He has many attributes. Thus arises the name “Elohim” or “God” in the plural, as in the Word almost everywhere. As there are many attributes, and the Ancient Church assigned a name to each, therefore its descendants, with whom the knowledge of such things was lost, believed there were many gods, and each family chose one of them for its God-as Abraham, Shaddai (n. 1992, 3667, 5628), and Isaac, the God who was called “Pachad” or “Dread.” And as the God of each was one of the Divine attributes, therefore the Lord said unto Abram, “I am God Shaddai” (Genesis 17:1), and here unto Jacob, “I am the God of thy father.”

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #3194

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3194. Isaac came from coming from [or to] Beer-lahai-roi. That this signifies Divine good rational born from Divine truth itself, is evident from the representation of Isaac, as being the Lord’s Divine rational (see n. 2083, 2630); here, as to the Divine good therein, because Divine truth called forth out of the natural (which Divine truth is represented by Rebekah) was not as yet conjoined with good; this conjunction is treated of in the verses which follow; and also from the signification of “to come from coming from Beer-lahai-roi,” as denoting to be born from Divine truth; Beer-lahai-roi in the original tongue signifies “the fountain to the Living One that seeth me;” as above (Genesis 16:13-14) where we read:

Hagar called the name of Jehovah that was speaking unto her, “Thou art the God that seeth me; for she said, Have I also here seen after Him that seeth me? Therefore she called the fountain Beer-lahai-roi (the fountain to the Living One that seeth me).

What is signified by these words may be seen above (n. 1952); where also it is evident that the “fountain” is Divine truth; and that the “Living One that seeth me” is Divine good rational, which is there called the Lord’s interior man, from Divine truth. The case in regard to this very deep arcanum is this: The veriest Divine has Good and Truth; the Lord as to the Divine Human came forth from the Divine good, and was born of the Divine truth; or what is the same, the very esse [or being] of the Lord was Divine good, and the very existere [or manifestation] was Divine truth; and this was the source of the Lord’s Divine good rational, with which He conjoined the Divine truth from the Human.

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