The Bible

 

1 Mose 7:24

Study

       

24 Und die Wasser hatten überhand auf der Erde hundertfünfzig Tage.

Commentary

 

Night

  

The sun in the Bible represents the Lord, with its heat representing His love and its light representing His wisdom. “Daytime,” then, represents a state in which we are turned toward the Lord, receiving His love and being enlightened by His truth. And “nighttime,” obviously, represents states in which we are turned away from the Lord, left cold and blind to the truth. The most common word used for it in the New Christian theology is “obscurity.” The darkness is not absolute, of course. The light of the moon represents the understanding we can have based on facts and our own intelligence. But while the moon reflects some of the sun's light, it offers almost no heat, so this kind of understanding is a cold one, without the warmth of love. And at its darkest and coldest, night represents a state of judgment. This happens when a person -- or a church -- becomes so mired in evil and falsity that there is no light or heat. The Lord can then step in, separate the good from the evil, consign the evil to hell and begin rebuilding based on the remnant that is still good. Drastic as that sounds, it is something that we all go through repeatedly in various aspects of our loves, so that we can be rid of what is evil and let the Lord rebuild us as angels.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #781

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781. Verse 16 And those who were going in, male and female of all flesh, went in, as God had commanded him; and Jehovah closed the way behind him.

'Those who were going in' means things residing with the member of the Church. 'Male and female of all flesh went in' means that truths and goods of every kind resided with him. 'As God had commanded' means for the reception of which he had been made ready. 'And Jehovah closed the way behind him' means that man no longer had the kind of communication with heaven that the member of the celestial Church had had.

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