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 9:6

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

The White Horse #14

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14. The Lord is the Word.

In the innermost sense of the Word the only consideration is the Lord Himself, and all the states of the glorification of His human form are described; that is, of His union with the Divine Itself; and all the states in which He was bringing hell into subjection to Himself, imposing order on everything there, and in heaven also: 2249, 7014. So, the whole life of the Lord in the world is described in that sense, and through the Word the presence of the Lord with the angels is continuous: 2523. Therefore the Lord alone is in the innermost part of the Word, and the divinity and sanctity of the Word derive from that: 1873, 9357. The Lord's saying that the Scripture concerning Himself has been fulfilled means the fulfilment of all things in its innermost sense: 7933.

The Word means divine truth: 4692, 5075, 9987. The Lord is the Word because He is the divine truth: 2533. The Lord is also the Word because it comes from Him and is about Him, see Arcana Caelestia 2859, and about the Lord alone in the innermost sense, and thus the Lord Himself is there: 1873, 9357. And because in every single part of the Word there is the marriage of divine good and divine truth, that marriage is in the Lord alone: 3004-3005, 3009, 4138, 5194, 5502, 6343, 7945, 8339, 9263, 9314. The divine Word is the one and only reality, and that in which it is, which is from what is divine, is the only true essence: 5272, 6880, 7004, 8200. And because the divine truth proceeding from the Lord, as from the sun in heaven, is the light there, and the divine good is the warmth there; and because all things there exist from these, just as everything in the world exists from light and warmth, which are also in their own essential substances and act through them; and because the natural world comes into being through heaven or the spiritual world; it is clear that all things which have been created were created from the divine truth, and so from the Word, according to these words from John: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and through it 1 all things were made that were made; and THE WORD WAS MADE FLESH; John 1:1-3, 14, 2803, 2894, 5272, 7850. More about the creation of all things from the divine truth, and thus from the Lord, may be seen in the work Heaven and Hell 137, and more fully in the section where there is a discussion of the sun in heaven, which is the Lord, and which is His divine love: 116-125. And the divine truth is light, and the divine good is warmth from that same sun in heaven: 126-140.

The linking of the Lord with man comes through the Word by means of its internal sense: 10375. This linking comes about through every single detail of the Word, and for this reason the Word is wonderful compared with everything ever written: 10632-10634. Once the Word was written, the Lord spoke through it to people: 10290. In addition there may also be seen ideas raised in the work Heaven and Hell concerning the linking of heaven with people through the Word: 303-310.

Footnotes:

1. Nearly always, if not always, Swedenborg renders John 1:3 Omnia per Ipsum' (the Revd John Elliott), rather than the 'per illud' used here. The form ipsum may be either masculine or neuter, enabling through Him as a translation. The current Swedenborg Society editions of De Equo Albo and De Nova Hierosolyma, however, have 'illud' (it, neuter), and that is the form I have translated.

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