The Bible

 

Genesis 8

Study

   

1 And God remembered Noe, and all the living creatures, and all the cattle which were with him in the ark, and brought a wind upon the earth, and the waters were abated.

2 The fountains also of the deep, and the flood gates of heaven were shut up, and the rain from heaven was restrained.

3 And the waters returned from off the earth going and coming: and they began to be abated after a hundred and fifty days.

4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, the seven and twentieth day of the month, upon the mountains of Armenia.

5 And the waters were going and decreasing until the tenth month: for in the tenth month, the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains appeared.

6 And after that forty days were passed, Noe, opening the window of the ark which he had made, sent forth a raven:

7 Which went forth and did not return, till the waters were dried up upon the earth.

8 He sent forth also a dove after him, to see if the waters had now ceased upon the face of the earth.

9 But she, not finding where her foot might rest, returned to him into the ark: for the waters were upon the whole earth: and he put forth his hand, and caught her, and brought her into the ark.

10 And having waited yet seven other days, he again sent forth the dove out of the ark.

11 And she came to him in the evening, carrying a bough of an olive tree, with green leaves, in her mouth. Noe therefore understood that the waters were ceased upon the earth.

12 And he stayed yet other seven days: and he sent forth the dove, which returned not any more unto him.

13 Therefore in the six hundreth and first year, the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were lessened upon the earth, and Noe opening the covering of the ark, looked, and saw that the face of the earth was dried.

14 In the second month, the seven and twentieth day of the month, the earth was dried.

15 And God spoke to Noe, saying:

16 Go out of the ark, thou and thy wife, thy sons, and the wives of thy sons with thee.

17 All livings things that are with thee of all flesh, as well in fowls as in beasts, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, bring out with thee, and go ye upon the earth: increased and multiply upon it.

18 So Noe went out, he and his sons: his wife, and the wives of his sons with him.

19 And all living things, and cattle, and creeping things that creep upon the earth, according to their kinds, went out of the ark.

20 And Noe built an altar unto the Lord: and taking of all cattle and fowls that were clean, offered holocausts upon the altar.

21 And the Lord smelled a sweet savour, and said: I will no more curse the earth for the sake of man: for the imagination and thought of man's heart are prone to evil from his youth: therefore I will no more destroy every living soul as I have done.

22 All the days of the earth, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, night and day, shall not cease.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #720

Study this Passage

  
/ 10837  
  

720. That “pairs” signify things relatively profane, is evident from the signification of the number “two.” A “pair” or “two” not only signifies marriage (and is, when predicated of the heavenly marriage, a holy number), but it also signifies the same as “six.” That is to say, as the six days of labor are related to the seventh day of rest, or the holy day, so is the number “two” related to “three;” and therefore the third day in the Word is taken for the seventh, and involves almost the same, on account of the Lord’s resurrection on the third day. And hence the Lord’s coming into the world, and in glory, and every coming of the Lord, is described equally by the “seventh” and by the “third” day. For this reason the two days that precede are not holy, but relatively are profane. Thus in Hosea:

Come and let us return unto Jehovah, for He hath wounded, and He will heal us; He hath smitten and He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us; on the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live before Him (Hosea 6:1-2).

And in Zechariah:

It shall come to pass in all the land, saith Jehovah, that two parts therein shall be cut off and die, and the third shall be left therein; and I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined (Zechariah 13:8-9).

And that silver was most pure when purified seven times appears in Psalms 12:6; from all of which it is plain that as “seven” does not signify seven, but things that are holy, so by “pairs” are signified not pairs, but things relatively profane; and therefore the meaning is not that the unclean beasts, or evil affections, in comparison with the clean beasts, or good affections, were few in the proportion of two to seven, for the evils in man are far more numerous than the goods.

  
/ 10837  
  

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