The Bible

 

Ezekiel 27

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1 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:

2 Thou therefore, O son of man, take up a lamentation for Tyre:

3 And say to Tyre that dwelleth at the entry of the sea, being the mart of the people for many islands: Thus saith the Lord God: O Tyre, thou hast said: I am of perfect beauty,

4 And situate in the heart of the sea. Thy neighbours, that built thee, have perfected thy beauty:

5 With fir trees of Sanir they have built thee with all sea planks: they have taken cedars from Libanus to make thee masts.

6 They have cut thy oars out of the oaks of Basan: and they have made thee benches of Indian ivory and cabins with things brought from the islands of Italy.

7 Fine broidered linen from Egypt was woven for thy sail, to be spread on thy mast: blue and purple from the islands of Elisa, were made thy covering.

8 The inhabitants of Sidon, and the Arabians were thy rowers : thy wise men, O Tyre, were thy pilots.

9 The ancients of Gebal, and the wise men thereof furnished mariners for the service of thy various furniture: all the ships of the sea, and their mariners were thy factors.

10 The Persians, and Lydians, and the Libyans were thy soldiers in thy army: they hung up the buckler and the helmet in thee for thy ornament.

11 The men of Arad were with thy army upon thy walls round about: the Pygmeans also that were in thy towers, hung up their quivers on thy walls round about: they perfected thy beauty.

12 The Carthaginians thy merchants supplied thy fairs with a multitude of all kinds of riches, with silver, iron, tin, and lead.

13 Greece, Thubal, and Mosoch, they were thy merchants: they brought to thy people slaves and vessels of brass.

14 From the house of Thogorma they brought horses, and horsemen, and mules to thy market.

15 The men of Dedan were thy merchants: many islands were the traffic of thy hand, they exchanged for thy price teeth of ivory and ebony.

16 The Syrian was thy merchant: by reason of the multitude of thy works, they set forth precious stones, and purple, and broidered works, and fine linen, and silk, and chodchod in thy market.

17 Juda and the land of Israel, they were thy merchants with the best corn: they set forth balm, and honey, and oil, and rosin in thy fairs.

18 The men of Damascus were thy merchants in the multitude of thy works, in the multitude of divers riches, in rich wine, in wool of the best colour.

19 Dan, and Greece, and Mosel have set forth in thy marts wrought iron: stacte, and calamus were in thy market.

20 The men of Dedan were thy merchants in tapestry for seats.

21 Arabia, and all the princes of Cedar, they were the merchants of thy hand: thy merchants came to thee with lambs, and rants, and kids.

22 The sellers of Saba, and Reema, they were thy merchants: with all the best spices, and precious stones, and gold, which they set forth in thy market.

23 Haran, and Chene, and Eden were thy merchants; Saba, Assur, and Chelmad sold to thee.

24 They were thy merchants in divers manners, with bales of blue cloth, and of embroidered work, and of precious riches, which were wrapped up and bound with cords: they had cedars also in thy merchandise.

25 The ships of the sea, were thy chief in thy merchandise : and thou wast replenished, and glorified exceedingly in the heart of the sea.

26 Thy rowers have brought thee into great waters: the south wind hath broken thee in the heart of the sea.

27 Thy riches, and thy treasures, and thy manifold furniture, thy mariners, and thy pilots, who kept thy goods, and were chief over thy people: thy men of war also, that were in thee, with all thy multitude that is in the midst of thee: shall fall in the heart of the sea in the day of thy ruin.

28 Thy fleets shall be troubled at the sound of the cry of thy pilots.

29 And all that handled the oar shall come down from their ships: the mariners, and all the pilots of the sea shall stand upon the land:

30 And they shall mourn over thee with a loud voice, and shall cry bitterly: and they shall cast up dust upon their heads, and shall be sprinkled with ashes.

31 And they shall shave themselves bald for thee, and shall be girded with haircloth: and they shall weep for thee with bitterness of soul, with most bitter weeping.

32 And they shall take up a mournful song for thee, and snail lament thee: What city is like Tyre, which is become silent in the midst of the sea?

33 Which by thy merchandise that went from thee by sea didst fill many people: which by the multitude of thy riches, and of thy people didst enrich the kings of the earth.

34 Now thou art destroyed by the sea, thy riches are in the bottom of the waters, and all the multitude that was in the midst of thee is fallen.

35 All the inhabitants of the islands are astonished at thee: and all their kings being struck with the storm have changed their countenance.

36 The merchants of people have hissed at thee: thou art brought to nothing, and thou shalt never be any more.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Explained #1171

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1171. Stood afar off.- That this signifies not so now, in those things by reason of fear, is evident from the signification of standing afar off, which denotes to be in externals, concerning which see above (n. 1133); in this case, therefore, not to be in that foolish wisdom, intelligence, and knowledge, from which they before, through fear, confirmed the evils and falsities of their religion and its doctrine; for fear causes man to remove himself from these things when he sees those who were of such a character punished and tormented.

Continuation.- To the preceding observations we will add the following:-

1. That before reformation the light of the understanding is like the light of the moon, clear according to the knowledges of truth and good; but after reformation it is like the light of the sun, clear according to the application of the knowledges of truth and good to the uses of life.

2. The reason why the understanding has not been destroyed is that man may be able to know truths, and from them see the evils of his will; and when he sees these, may be able to resist them as if from himself, and thus be reformed.

3. But still, man is not reformed by virtue of understanding but by means of his understanding acknowledging truths, and from these seeing evils; for the operation of the Lord's Divine Providence is into the love of man's will, and from that love into the understanding, and not from his understanding into the love of his will.

4. That the love of the will, according to its quality, imparts intelligence; natural love from spiritual giving intelligence in things civil and moral; but spiritual love in natural giving intelligence in spiritual things. But love merely natural, and the conceit arising from it, imparts no intelligence in spiritual things, but rather gives the faculty of confirming whatsoever it pleases, and after such confirmation the understanding is so infatuated that it sees falsity as truth, and evil as good. This love, however, does not take away the faculty of understanding truths in their own light; it takes it away when it is present, but not when it is absent.

5. When the will is reformed and the wisdom which belongs to the understanding becomes that of the love which belongs to the will, or when wisdom becomes the love of truth and of good in its own form, then man is like a garden, in the time of spring, when heat is united to light, imparting life (animam) to the germinations. Spiritual germinations are the productions of wisdom from love, and there are in this case in every production a soul from that love, and its clothing from wisdom. The will is therefore like a father, and the understanding like a mother.

6. Such then is the life of man, not only the life of his mind (animus), but also that of his body, because the life of the mind acts in unison with the life of the body by correspondences. For the life of the will or love corresponds to the life of the heart, and the life of the understanding or wisdom corresponds to the life of the lungs; and these are the two sources of the life of the body. That this is the case is unknown, nevertheless it is from this fact that an evil man cannot live in heaven, nor a good man in hell. For each of these becomes as it were dead, if he is not among those with whom the life of his will and that of his understanding originating in it act in unison; among such, and among such only, does his heart beat responsively and his lungs breathe freely.

  
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Translation by Isaiah Tansley. Many thanks to the Swedenborg Society for the permission to use this translation.