The Bible

 

Genesis 28

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1 And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, saying: Take not a wife of the stock of Chanaan:

2 But go, and take a journey to Mesopotamia of Syria, to the house of Bathuel thy mother's father, and take thee a wife thence of the daughters of Laban thy uncle.

3 And God almighty bless thee, and make thee to increase, and multiply thee: that thou mayst be a multitude of people.

4 And give the blessings of Abrabam to thee, and to thy seed after thee: that thou mayst possess the land of thy sojournment, which he promised to thy grandfather.

5 And when Isaac had sent him away, he took his journey and went to Mesopotamia of Syria to Laban the son of Bathuel the Syrian, brother to Rebecca his mother.

6 And Esau seeing that his father had blessed Jacob, and had sent him into Mesopotamia of Syria, to marry a wife thence; and that after the blessing he had charged him, saying: Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Chanaan:

7 And that Jacob obeying his parents was gone into Syria:

8 Experiencing also that his father was not well pleased with the daughters of Chanaan:

9 He went to Ismael, and took to wife, besides them he had before, Maheleth the daughter of Ismael, Abraham's son, the sister of Nabajoth.

10 But Jacob being departed from Bersabee, went on to Haran.

11 And when he was come to a certain place, and would rest in it after sunset, he took of the stones that lay there, and putting under his head, slept in the same place.

12 And he saw in his sleep a ladder standing upon the earth, and the top thereof touching heaven: the angels also of God ascending and descending by it;

13 And the Lord leaning upon the ladder, saying to him: I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac; the land, wherein thou sleepest, I will give to thee and to thy seed.

14 And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth: thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and IN THEE and thy seed all the tribes of the earth SHALL BE BLESSED.

15 And I will be thy keeper whithersoever thou goest, and will bring thee back into this land: neither will I leave thee, till I shall have accomplished all that I have said.

16 And when Jacob awaked out of sleep, he said: Indeed the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.

17 And trembling he said: How terrible is this place! this is no other but the house of God, and the gate of heaven.

18 And Jacob, arising in the morning, took the stone, which he had laid under his head, and set it up for a title, pouring oil upon the top of it.

19 And he called the name of the city Bethel, which before was called Luza.

20 And he made a vow, saying: If God shall be with me, and shall keep me in the way by which I walk, and shall give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on,

21 And I shall return prosperously to my father's house: the Lord shall be my God:

22 And this stone, which I have set up for a title, shall called the house of God: and of all things that thou shalt give to me, I will offer tithes to thee.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #3740

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3740. And all that Thou shalt give me, tithing I will tithe it to Thee. That this signifies that He made all things Divine in general and in particular by His own power, is evident from the signification of “giving,” when predicated of the Lord, as being that He gave to Himself (see n. 3705), thus that it was by His own power; and from the signification of “tithing,” and of “tithes,” as being the goods and truths which are stored up by the Lord in man’s interiors, and which goods are called “remains” (n. 576, 1738, 2280). When these are predicated of the Lord they are the Divine goods and Divine truths which the Lord procured to Himself by His own power (n. 1738, 1906).

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #3705

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3705. The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it. That this signifies the good in which He was, that it was from what was His own, is evident from the signification of “land,” as being here the good of the natural, concerning which in what follows; from the signification of “whereon thou liest,” as being that in which He was; and from the signification of “giving it to thee,” as being from what was His own; concerning which also in what follows. That the “land” signifies the good of the natural which will hereafter be represented by Jacob, is because by the “land of Canaan” is signified the Lord’s kingdom (see n. 1413, 1437, 1585, 1607, 1866); and because it signifies the Lord’s kingdom, it also in the supreme sense signifies the Lord (see n. 3038); for the Lord is the all in all of His kingdom, and whatever there is not from Him, and does not look to Him, is not of His kingdom. The Lord’s kingdom is also signified in the Word by “heaven and earth” (n. 1733, 1850, 2117, 2118); but in this case its interior is signified by “heaven,” and its exterior by “earth” (n. 82, 1411, 1733, 3355); consequently in the supreme sense “heaven” signifies the Lord as to His Divine rational, and “earth” as to his Divine natural; here therefore “the land whereon thou liest” signifies the good of the natural, in which He was and which was to be represented by Jacob. That “Jacob” denotes the Lord as to the Divine natural has already been frequently stated.

[2] Moreover, that the signification of “land” is various, see above (n. 620, 636, 1067, 2571, 3368, 3379); and this for the reason that Canaan, which is called the “holy land,” signifies the Lord’s kingdom in general; and when mention is made of “heaven” together with “land” (or “earth”), then, as before said, “heaven” signifies what is interior, and “earth” what is exterior; and consequently it also signifies the Lord’s kingdom on earth, that is, the church; and therefore it also signifies the man who is a kingdom of the Lord, or who is a church. Thus in such a man “heaven” signifies what is interior, and “earth” what is exterior; or what is the same, “heaven” signifies the rational, and “earth” the natural; for the rational is interior with man, and the natural exterior. And as “earth” has these significations, it also signifies that which makes man a kingdom of the Lord, namely, the good of love which is from the Divine; from all which it is evident how various are the significations of “earth” (or “land”) in the Word.

[3] That “to thee will I give it” signifies that it was from what was His own, may be seen from the signification of “giving,” in the Word, when it is predicated of the Lord; for as before shown, the Lord is Divine good and also Divine truth; and the former is what is called “Father,” and the latter “Son”; and whereas Divine good is of Himself, consequently His own, it follows that by “giving to thee,” when said by Jehovah, and predicated of the Lord, is signified that it is from what is His own. This shows what is signified in the internal sense by what the Lord so often said, that the Father “gave” to Him, that is, that He Himself gave to Himself; as in John:

Father, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee; even as Thou gavest Him authority over all flesh; that whatsoever Thou hast given Him, to them He should give eternal life. I have glorified Thee on the earth; I have accomplished the work which Thou gavest Me to do. I have manifested Thy name unto the men whom Thou gavest Me out of the world; Thine they were, and Thou gavest them Me. Now they have known that all things whatsoever Thou hast given Me are from Thee; for the words which Thou gavest Me I have given them. I pray for them whom Thou hast given Me, for they are Thine; and all things that are Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine (John 17:1-10); where by the Father “having given” is signified that they were from Divine good which was His; thus from what was His own.

[4] From all this it is evident how deep an arcanum lies concealed in each word that the Lord spoke; also how much the sense of the letter differs from the internal sense, and still more from the supreme sense. The reason why the Lord so spoke, was that man, who at that time was in total ignorance of any Divine truth, might still in his own way apprehend the Word, and thus receive it; and the angels in their way; for they knew that Jehovah and He were one, and that the “Father” signified the Divine good; hence also they knew that when He said that the Father “gave” to Him, it was that He Himself gave to Himself, and that thus it was from what was His own.

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