The Bible

 

Genesis 1

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1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first Day.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.

10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.

11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.

12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.

14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:

15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.

16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.

17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,

18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.

23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.

25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

The Bible

 

Genesis 9

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1 And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.

2 And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered.

3 Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.

4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.

5 And surely your blood of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man.

6 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.

7 And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply; bring forth abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein.

8 And God spake unto Noah, and to his sons with him, saying,

9 And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you;

10 And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.

11 And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.

12 And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:

13 I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.

14 And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:

15 And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.

16 And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.

17 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.

18 And the sons of Noah, that went forth of the ark, were Shem, and Ham, and Japheth: and Ham is the father of Canaan.

19 These are the three sons of Noah: and of them was the whole earth overspread.

20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard:

21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.

22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.

23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.

24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.

25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.

26 And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years.

29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years: and he died.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #868

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868. 'Until the waters dried up from over the earth' means the apparent dispersal of falsities. This is clear from a person's state when he is being regenerated. Nowadays everyone imagines that evils and falsities with a person are totally dispersed and done away with when he is being regenerated, so that when he has been regenerated no evil or falsity is left, and he is therefore clean and righteous, like someone washed and made clean with water. But this is completely false. Not a single evil nor a single falsity is ever dispersed so as to be done away with. Instead everything fixed in him by heredity since infancy and everything he has acquired through his own actions remains. As a consequence, even though he has been regenerated a person is still nothing but evil and falsity, as is forcibly demonstrated to souls after death. From this it also becomes quite clear that no one has any good or any truth at all unless it derives from the Lord, and that all a person's evil and falsity derive from the proprium, and that man, a spirit too, and even an angel, if left in the smallest degree to himself, of himself rushes headlong towards hell. This also is why in the Word it is said that heaven is not pure. 1 This the angels acknowledge, and anyone who does not do so cannot be among them. It is the Lord's mercy alone which gives them freedom, indeed it raises them up from hell, and withholds them from it and from rushing back there if left to themselves. The fact that they are withheld by the Lord to prevent them rushing into hell, angels perceive clearly, as also do good spirits to a limited extent. Evil spirits however, like men, do not believe this, even though they have been shown it many times, as in the Lord's Divine mercy will be described from experience further on.

[2] Man's state therefore being such that no evil or falsity can possibly be so dispersed as to be done away with, because the life which is his own consists in evil and falsity, the Lord in His Divine mercy so subdues a person's evils and falsities by means of temptations while He is regenerating him that they do seem to be dead. They are not dead however, only subdued so that they are unable to fight against the goods and truths that have been derived from the Lord. At that time by means of temptations the Lord also gives him a new ability to receive goods and truths. He does so by granting him ideas of and affections for good and truth towards which evils and falsities can be turned, and by instilling into his general concepts of things - dealt with already - the details and the finer points to such details, which have been stored away in the individual and of which he knows nothing at all, since they are interior to the sphere of his comprehension and perception. The nature of these things is such that they are able to serve as receptacles or vessels, so that charity can be instilled in them by the Lord, and innocence in charity. Through the remarkable combination of these things with a man, spirit, or angel, a kind of rainbow can be represented, and this is why the rainbow became a sign of the covenant, see Chapter 9:12-16, to be dealt with, in the Lord's Divine mercy, when those verses are explained. When a person has been so formed he is said to be regenerated. All his evils and falsities still remain, as also do all his truths and goods that have been preserved. In the case of an evil person, all his evils and falsities, exactly as these existed with him during his lifetime, reappear in the next life and are converted into delusions and hellish punishments. But in the case of a good person, all his states of good and truth, such as those of friendship, charity, and innocence, together with their joys and delights - now increased and multiplied immensely - are recalled in the next life. These are the things meant by 'the waters drying up', namely the apparent dispersal of falsities.

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