The Bible

 

Ezekiel 39

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1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:

2 And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, and will cause thee to come up from the north parts, and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:

3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.

4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands, and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.

5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.

6 And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.

7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the holy One in Israel.

8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.

9 And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years:

10 So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down any out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire: and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that robbed them, saith the Lord GOD.

11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the noses of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog and all his multitude: and they shall call it The valley of Hamon-gog.

12 And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land.

13 Yea, all the people of the land shall bury them; and it shall be to them a renown the day that I shall be glorified, saith the Lord GOD.

14 And they shall sever out men of continual employment, passing through the land to bury with the passengers those that remain upon the face of the earth, to cleanse it: after the end of seven months shall they search.

15 And the passengers that pass through the land, when any seeth a man's bone, then shall he set up a sign by it, till the buriers have buried it in the valley of Hamon-gog.

16 And also the name of the city shall be Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.

17 And, thou son of man, thus saith the Lord GOD; Speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field, Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh, and drink blood.

18 Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan.

19 And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you.

20 Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord GOD.

21 And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them.

22 So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward.

23 And the heathen shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity for their iniquity: because they trespassed against me, therefore hid I my face from them, and gave them into the hand of their enemies: so fell they all by the sword.

24 According to their uncleanness and according to their transgressions have I done unto them, and hid my face from them.

25 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Now will I bring again the captivity of Jacob, and have mercy upon the whole house of Israel, and will be jealous for my holy name;

26 After that they have borne their shame, and all their trespasses whereby they have trespassed against me, when they dwelt safely in their land, and none made them afraid.

27 When I have brought them again from the people, and gathered them out of their enemies' lands, and am sanctified in them in the sight of many nations;

28 Then shall they know that I am the LORD their God, which cause them to be led into captivity among the heathen: but I have gathered them unto their own land, and have left none of them any more there.

29 Neither will I hide my face any more from them: for I have poured out my spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord GOD.

   

Commentary

 

Seven

  

Seven, as in Revelation 15:1, signifies everything in an universal sense. The number 'seven' was considered holy, as is well known, because of the six days of creation, and the seventh, which is the celestial self, where peace, rest, and the Sabbath is. The number seven occurs so frequently in the rites of the Jewish church and is held holy everywhere.

So times were divided into seven, longer and shorter intervals, and were called weeks, like the great intervals of times till the coming of the Messiah, in Daniel 9:24-25. The time of seven years is called 'a week' by Laban and Jacob, as in Genesis 29:27-28. So wherever the number seven occurs, it is considered holy and sacred, as in Psalm 119:164, and in Isaiah 30:26.

As the periods of a person's regeneration are distinguished into six, prior to the seventh, or the celestial self, so the times of vastation are also distinguished, until nothing celestial is left. This was represented by the many captivities of the Jews, and by the last Babylonian captivity, which lasted seven decades, or seventy years. This was also represented by Nebuchadnezzar, in Daniel 4:16, 22, 29. It also refers to the vastation of the end times, in Revelation 15:1, 7-8. They should 'tread the holy city under foot, forty and two months, or six times seven,' as in Revelation 11:2 and Revelation 5:1. So the severity and increments of punishment were expressed by the number seven, as in Leviticus 26:18, 21, 24, 28 and Psalm 79:12.

(References: Apocalypse Explained 5, 7-8, 15; Arcana Coelestia 395; Daniel 9, 9:24, 9:25; Psalms 119)


The Bible

 

Isaiah 26

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1 In that day, this song will be sung in the land of Judah: "We have a strong city. God appoints salvation for walls and bulwarks.

2 Open the gates, that the righteous nation may enter: the one which keeps faith.

3 You will keep whoever's mind is steadfast in perfect peace, because he trusts in you.

4 Trust in Yahweh forever; for in Yah, Yahweh, is an everlasting Rock.

5 For he has brought down those who dwell on high, the lofty city. He lays it low. He lays it low even to the ground. He brings it even to the dust.

6 The foot shall tread it down; Even the feet of the poor, and the steps of the needy."

7 The way of the just is uprightness. You who are upright make the path of the righteous level.

8 Yes, in the way of your judgments, Yahweh, have we waited for you. Your name and your renown are the desire of our soul.

9 With my soul have I desired you in the night. Yes, with my spirit within me will I seek you earnestly; for when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.

10 Let favor be shown to the wicked, yet he will not learn righteousness. In the land of uprightness he will deal wrongfully, and will not see Yahweh's majesty.

11 Yahweh, your hand is lifted up, yet they don't see; but they will see your zeal for the people, and be disappointed. Yes, fire will consume your adversaries.

12 Yahweh, you will ordain peace for us, for you have also worked all our works for us.

13 Yahweh our God, other lords besides you have had dominion over us, but by you only will we make mention of your name.

14 The dead shall not live. The deceased shall not rise. Therefore have you visited and destroyed them, and caused all memory of them to perish.

15 You have increased the nation, O Yahweh. You have increased the nation! You are glorified! You have enlarged all the borders of the land.

16 Yahweh, in trouble they have visited you. They poured out a prayer when your chastening was on them.

17 Like as a woman with child, who draws near the time of her delivery, is in pain and cries out in her pangs; so we have been before you, Yahweh.

18 We have been with child. We have been in pain. We gave birth, it seems, only to wind. We have not worked any deliverance in the earth; neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen.

19 Your dead shall live. My dead bodies shall arise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in the dust; for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth will cast forth the dead.

20 Come, my people, enter into your rooms, and shut your doors behind you. Hide yourself for a little moment, until the indignation is past.

21 For, behold, Yahweh comes forth out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity. The earth also will disclose her blood, and will no longer cover her slain.