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Amos 2

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1 Thus saith the Lord: For three crimes of Moab, and for four I will not convert him: because he hath burnt the bones of the king of Edom even to ashes.

2 And I will seed a fire into Moab, and it shall devour the houses of Carioth: and Moab shall die with a noise, with the sound of the trumpet:

3 And I will cut off the judge from the midst thereof, and will slay all his princes with him, saith the Lord.

4 Thus saith the Lord: For three crimes of Juda, and for four I will not convert him: because he hath cast away the law of the Lord, and hath not kept his commandments: for their idols have caused them to err, after which their fathers have walked.

5 And I will send a fire into Juda, and it shall devour the houses of Jerusalem.

6 Thus saith the Lord: For three crimes of Israel, and for four I will not convert him: because he hath sold the just man for silver, and the poor man for a pair of shoes.

7 They bruise the heads of the poor upon the dust of the earth, and turn aside the way of the humble: and the son and his father have gone to the same young woman, to profane my holy name.

8 And they sat down upon garments laid to pledge by every altar: and drank the wine of the condemned in the house of their God.

9 Yet I cast out the Amorrhite before their face: whose height was like the height of cedars, and who was strong as an oak: and I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots beneath.

10 It is I that brought you up out of the land of Egypt, and I led you forty years through the wilderness, that you might possess the land of the Amorrhite.

11 And I raised up of your sons for prophets, and of your young men for Nazarites. Is it not so, O ye children of Israel, saith the Lord?

12 And you will present wine to the Nazarites: and command the prophets, saying: Prophesy not.

13 Behold, I will screak under you as a wain screaketh that is laden with hay.

14 And flight shall perish from the swift, and the valiant shall not possess his strength, neither shall the strong save his life.

15 And he that holdeth the bow shall not stand, and the swift of foot shall not escape, neither shall the rider of the horse save his life.

16 And the stout of heart among the valiant shall flee away naked in that day, saith the Lord.

   

Commentary

 

Nazarites

  

'Nazarites' represent the Lord regarding His divine human, especially His divine natural. 'Nazarites,' in the Israelitish churches, represent the Lord regarding the Word in its literal sense. 'Nazarites' represent the Lord regarding His divine human, and therefore, the person of the celestial church, who is a likeness of the Lord. 'The hair' represents the natural level of that person. When they Nazarites were sanctified, they were to put off their old or former natural self, which they were born into, and were to put on the new self. This is what is signified, 'that when the days were fulfilled, in which they should separate themselves to Jehovah, they should let down the hair of their head, and should put it on the fire beneath the sacrifice.' The state of the celestial self is that he is in good, and from good, he knows all truths. He never thinks and speaks from truths concerning good, still less from scientific ideas concerning good. The order of Nazarites was instituted to represent the conjunction of the external self with the internal, and thus the conjunction of the celestial paradise with the earthly paradise. This conjunction, which cannot be effected in a person, could nevertheless be represented. Therefore, an image of the Lord could be exhibited, who alone conjoined both in Himself. A 'Nazarite' is holy not only regarding his internal faculties, but also in his body.

(References: Apocalypse Explained 364; Arcana Coelestia 3300)


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