The Bible

 

Genesis 21

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1 And the Lord visited Sara, as he had promised: and fulfilled what he had spoken.

2 And she conceived and bore a son in her old age, at the time that God had foretold her.

3 And Abraham called the name of his son, whom Sara bore him, Isaac.

4 And he circumcised him the eighth day, as God had commanded him,

5 When he was a hundred years old: for at this age of his father was Isaac born.

6 And Sara said: God hath made a laughter for me: whosoever shall hear of it will laugh with me.

7 And again she said: Who would believe that Abraham should hear that Sara gave suck to a son, whom she bore to him in his old age.

8 And the child grew and was weaned: and Abraham made a great feast on the day of his weaning.

9 And when Sara had seen the son of Agar the Egyptian playing with Isaac her son, she said to Abraham:

10 Cast out this bondwoman, and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with my son Isaac.

11 Abraham took this grievously for his son.

12 And God said to him: Let it not seem grievous to thee for the boy, and for thy bondwoman: in all that Sara hath said to thee, hearken to her voice: for in Isaac shall thy seed be called.

13 But I will make the son also of the bondwoman a great nation, because he is thy seed.

14 So Abraham rose up in the morning, and taking bread and a bottle of water, put it upon her shoulder, and delivered the boy, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Bersabee.

15 And when the water in the bottle was spent, she cast the boy under one of the trees that were there.

16 And she went her way, and sat over against him a great way off as far as a bow can carry, for she said: I will not see the boy die: and sitting over against, she lifted up her voice and wept.

17 And God heard the voice of the boy: and an angel of God called to Agar from heaven, saying: What art thou doing, Agar? fear not: for God hath heard the voice of the boy, from the place wherein he is.

18 Arise, take up the boy, and hold him by the hand: for I will make him a great nation.

19 And God opened her eyes: and she saw a well of water, and went and filled the bottle, and gave the boy to drink.

20 And God was with him: and he grew, and dwelt in the wilderness, and became a young man, an archer.

21 And he dwelt in the wilderness of Pharan, and his mother took a wife for him out of the land of Egypt.

22 At the same time Abimelech, and Phicol the general of his army said to Abraham: God is with thee in all that thou dost.

23 Swear therefore by God, that thou wilt not hurt me, nor my posterity, nor my stock: but according to the kindness that I have done to thee, thou shalt do to me, and to the land wherein thou hast lived a stranger.

24 And Abraham said: I will swear.

25 And he reproved Abimelech for a well of water, which his servants had taken away by force.

26 And Abimelech answered: I knew not who did this thing: and thou didst not tell me, and I heard not of it till to day.

27 And Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech: and both of them made a league.

28 And Abraham set apart seven ewe lambs of the flock.

29 And Abimelech said to him: What mean these seven ewe lambs which thou hast set apart?

30 But he said: Thou shalt take seven ewe lambs at my hand: that they may be a testimony for me, that I dug this well.

31 Therefore that place was called Bersabee: because both of them did swear.

32 And they made a league for the well of oath.

33 And Abimelech, and Phicol the general of his army arose and returned to the land of the Palestines. But Abraham planted a grove in Bersabee, and there called upon the name of the Lord God eternal.

34 And he was a sojourner in the land of the Palestines many days.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #2682

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2682. 'And she put the boy under one of the shrubs' means despair that no truth or good at all was perceived. This is clear from the meaning of 'the boy' as spiritual truth, dealt with in 2669, 2677, and from the meaning of 'a shrub' or a bush as perception, yet so small as to be scarcely anything at all - that smallness being the reason for the use of the expression, 'under one of the shrubs' (for by 'shrubs' the same is meant, though in a minor degree, as by trees, which mean perceptions, see 103, 2163) - and also from the feeling expressed in the action, which is the feeling of despair. From this it is evident that 'she put the boy under one of the shrubs' means despair that no truth or good at all was perceived. That being put under one of the shrubs means being left desolate so far as truth and good are concerned, to the point of despair, is evident in Job,

In poverty and in hunger, one all alone. They were fleeing to the drought, to the previous night's desolation and devastation, picking mallows on the shrub; in the cleft of the valleys to dwell, in holes of the dust and rocks; among the shrubs they were groaning, under the wild thistle they were joined together. Job 30:3-4, 6-7.

This is a reference to the desolation of truth, which is described by means of expressions used commonly in the Ancient Church - for the Book of Job is a book of the Ancient Church - such as 'in poverty and in hunger, one all alone', 'fleeing to the drought, the previous night's desolation and devastation', 'in the clefts of valleys and rocks to dwell', as well as 'picking mallows on the shrubs', and 'groaning among the shrubs'. So also in Isaiah,

They will come and all of them will rest in rivers of desolations, in the clefts of rocks, and on all bushes, and in all water-courses. Isaiah 7:19.

This also is a reference to desolation, which is described by means of similar forms of expression, namely 'resting in rivers of desolations, in the clefts of rocks, and on bushes'.

[2] In this present verse the subject is the second state of those who are being reformed, which is a state when they are reduced to ignorance, so that they do not know any truth at all, even to the point of despair. The reason they are reduced to such ignorance is so that the persuasive light which shines from the proprium may be extinguished. This light is such that it illuminates falsities as much as it does truths and so leads to a belief in what is false by means of truths and a belief in what is true by means of falsities, and at the same time to trust in themselves. They are also reduced to such ignorance in order that they may be led through actual experience into a recognition of the fact that no good or truth at all originates in themselves or what is properly their own but in the Lord. Those who are being reformed are reduced to ignorance, even to the state of despair, at which point they receive comfort and enlightenment, as is clear from what follows. For the light of truth from the Lord cannot flow into the persuasive thinking that originates in the proprium; indeed its nature is such as to extinguish that light. In the next life that persuasive thinking presents itself as the light in winter, but with the approach of the light of heaven a kind of darkness consisting in ignorance of all truth takes the place of that wintry light. This state with those who are being reformed is called a state of desolation of truth, and is also frequently the subject in the internal sense of the Word.

[3] But few are able to know about that state because few at the present day are being regenerated. To people who are not being regenerated, it is all the same whether they know the truth or whether they do not, and also whether what they do know is the truth or whether it is not, provided that they can pass a thing off as the truth. But people who are being regenerated give much thought to doctrine and to life since they give much thought to eternal salvation. Consequently if truth deserts them, they grieve at heart because truth is the object of all their thought and affection. The nature of the state of those who are being regenerated and the nature of those who are not may become clear from the following consideration: While in the body a person lives as to his spirit in heaven and as to his body in the world. He is born into both and has been so created that he is in effect able as to his spirit to be with angels, and at the same time to be with men through the things which belong to the body. But since those who believe that they have a spirit which will continue to live after death are few in number those who are being regenerated are few. To those who do believe that they have a spirit the next life forms the whole of their thought and affection, and the world in comparison none at all. But to those who do not believe that they have a spirit the world forms the whole of their thought and affection and the next life in comparison none at all. The former are those who can be regenerated, but the latter those who cannot.

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