The Bible

 

Exodus 23

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1 Thou shalt not raise a false report: put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness.

2 Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment:

3 Neither shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause.

4 If thou meet thine enemy's ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again.

5 If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help with him.

6 Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause.

7 Keep thee far from a false matter; and the innocent and righteous slay thou not: for I will not justify the wicked.

8 And thou shalt take no gift: for the gift blindeth the wise, and perverteth the words of the righteous.

9 Also thou shalt not oppress a stranger: for ye know the heart of a stranger, seeing ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.

10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:

11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.

12 Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.

13 And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect: and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth.

14 Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.

15 Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:)

16 And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.

17 Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD.

18 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning.

19 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.

20 Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared.

21 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him.

22 But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries.

23 For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off.

24 Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images.

25 And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee.

26 There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfil.

27 I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee.

28 And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee.

29 I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee.

30 By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.

31 And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee.

32 Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.

33 They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be a snare unto thee.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #10114

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10114. 'And if anything of the flesh of fillings [of the hand], and of the bread, is left until the morning' means spiritual and celestial forms of good which have not been linked to the new state. This is clear from the meaning of 'anything of the flesh and of the bread that is left' as that which has not been made their own, for 'eating' means making one's own, 10109, so that what has not been eaten means what has not been made their own; from the meaning of 'the flesh' as good, dealt with in 7850, 9127; from the meaning of 'fillings [of the hand]' as reception, dealt with in 10076, 10110, so that 'the flesh of fillings [of the hand]' means the reception of truth in good, and therefore the joining together of this truth and good, though in this instance the lack of any such reception or joining together is meant because what is left of the flesh must be understood; from the meaning of 'the bread' as celestial good, which is inmost good, dealt with in 10077; and from the meaning of 'the morning' as a new state, dealt with in 8211, 8427. From these meanings it is evident that 'anything of the flesh of fillings [of the hand], and of the bread, left until the morning' means spiritual and celestial forms of good which have not been linked to the new state. For the flesh of the sacrifice means spiritual good, which is the good of charity towards the neighbour, and the bread of it celestial good, which is the good of love to the Lord.

[2] What more should be understood by not being linked to the new state must be stated briefly. A new state is every state in which good and truth are joined together, and this occurs when the actions of a person who is being regenerated spring from good, thus from affection and love, and not as previously from truth or mere obedience. A new state also occurs when the good of love arises among those in heaven, a state called 'the morning' there; for different states of love and faith come round there, like midday, evening, [pre-dawn] twilight, and morning on earth. In addition a new state occurs when an old Church comes to an end and a new one begins. All these new states are meant in the Word by 'the morning'; each has been dealt with specifically in various places in the explanations of Genesis and Exodus.

Similar things are meant by the rule that 'none of the flesh of the Passover lamb shall be left until the morning' and that what did remain of it was to be burned with fire, Exodus 12:10, and also by the command that 'the fat of the feast shall not remain through the night until morning', Exodus 23:18.

[3] Similar things were also meant by the rule that what remained from the flesh of a eucharistic sacrifice could be eaten on the following day as well, but had to be burned on the third day, Leviticus 7:16-18; 19:6-7, 'the third day' too meaning a new state, see 4901, 5123, 5159. The reason for the concession contained in this rule was that eucharistic sacrifices were offerings made in connection with vows or they were voluntary offerings. They were presented by people not so much, as all other sacrifices were, for the sake of being purified and sanctified, as in order that they might eat in a holy place and bear witness to the joy in their heart that Divine worship gave them. And these feasts, which they called holy, brought greater gladness to those people than all other worship. Similar things were also meant by the command that they should not leave any of the manna until the morning, spoken of in Moses as follows,

Moses said, Let no man leave any of the manna until the morning. But they did not obey Moses, for they did leave some of it 1 until the morning; and it produced worms and became putrid. Exodus 16:19-20.

Footnotes:

1. literally, did make a remainder of it

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