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.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #42

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42. Verse 21 And God created the great sea monsters, and every living creature that creeps, which the waters produced abundantly according to their kinds; and all winged birds according to their kinds; and God saw that it was good.

As has been stated, 'fish' means facts, here facts quickened and brought to life through faith from the Lord. 'Sea monsters' means those facts' general sources, below which and from which details derive. Nothing whatever exists in the universe that does not depend on some general source for its commencement and continuance. In the Prophets sea monsters or whales are mentioned several times, and in those places they mean those general sources of facts. Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, who represents human wisdom or intelligence - that is, knowledge in general - is called 'a great sea monster', as in Ezekiel,

Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great monster lying in the midst of his 1 rivers, who has said, It is my river and I have made myself. Ezekiel 29:3.

[2] And elsewhere in Ezekiel,

Raise a lamentation over Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and say to him, You are like a monster in the seas, and you have come forth in your rivers, and have troubled the waters with your feet. Ezekiel 32:2

These words mean people who wish to penetrate the mysteries that are part of faith by means of facts, and so from themselves. In Isaiah,

On that day Jehovah will make a visitation with His hard and great and strong sword upon Leviathan the full-length serpent, 2 and upon Leviathan the twisting serpent, and He will slay the monsters that are in the sea. Isaiah 27:1.

'Slaying the monsters in the sea' means preventing people's knowing facts even in their general aspects. In Jeremiah,

Nebuchadnezzar king of Babel has devoured me, he has troubled me, he has made me an empty vessel, he has swallowed me up like a sea monster, he has filled his belly with my delicacies, he has cast me out. Jeremiah 51:34.

This stands for the fact that mankind did swallow cognitions of faith, which are 'the delicacies' here, just as the sea monster swallowed up Jonah. In that story the sea monster stands for people who treat general cognitions of faith as mere facts, and behave accordingly.

Footnotes:

1. The Latin means your; but the Hebrew means his which Swedenborg has in other places where he quotes this verse.

2. i.e. a serpent that is on the move and not coiled up

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

The Bible

 

Deuteronomy 11

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1 Therefore you shall love Yahweh your God, and keep his instructions, and his statutes, and his ordinances, and his commandments, always.

2 Know this day: for I don't speak with your children who have not known, and who have not seen the chastisement of Yahweh your God, his greatness, his mighty hand, and his outstretched arm,

3 and his signs, and his works, which he did in the midst of Egypt to Pharaoh the king of Egypt, and to all his land;

4 and what he did to the army of Egypt, to their horses, and to their chariots; how he made the water of the Red Sea to overflow them as they pursued after you, and how Yahweh has destroyed them to this day;

5 and what he did to you in the wilderness, until you came to this place;

6 and what he did to Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben; how the earth opened its mouth, and swallowed them up, and their households, and their tents, and every living thing that followed them, in the midst of all Israel:

7 but your eyes have seen all the great work of Yahweh which he did.

8 Therefore you shall keep all the commandment which I command you this day, that you may be strong, and go in and possess the land, where you go over to possess it;

9 and that you may prolong your days in the land, which Yahweh swore to your fathers to give to them and to their seed, a land flowing with milk and honey.

10 For the land, where you go in to possess it, isn't as the land of Egypt, that you came out from, where you sowed your seed, and watered it with your foot, as a garden of herbs;

11 but the land, where you go over to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, [and] drinks water of the rain of the sky,

12 a land which Yahweh your God cares for: the eyes of Yahweh your God are always on it, from the beginning of the year even to the end of the year.

13 It shall happen, if you shall listen diligently to my commandments which I command you this day, to love Yahweh your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,

14 that I will give the rain of your land in its season, the former rain and the latter rain, that you may gather in your grain, and your new wine, and your oil.

15 I will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full.

16 Take heed to yourselves, lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them;

17 and the anger of Yahweh be kindled against you, and he shut up the sky, so that there shall be no rain, and the land shall not yield its fruit; and you perish quickly from off the good land which Yahweh gives you.

18 Therefore you shall lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul; and you shall bind them for a sign on your hand, and they shall be for symbols between your eyes.

19 You shall teach them your children, talking of them, when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up.

20 You shall write them on the door posts of your house, and on your gates;

21 that your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers to give them, as the days of the heavens above the earth.

22 For if you shall diligently keep all this commandment which I command you, to do it, to love Yahweh your God, to walk in all his ways, and to cling to him;

23 then will Yahweh drive out all these nations from before you, and you shall dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourselves.

24 Every place whereon the sole of your foot shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness, and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even to the hinder sea shall be your border.

25 No man shall be able to stand before you: Yahweh your God shall lay the fear of you and the dread of you on all the land that you shall tread on, as he has spoken to you.

26 Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse:

27 the blessing, if you shall listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God, which I command you this day;

28 and the curse, if you shall not listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods, which you have not known.

29 It shall happen, when Yahweh your God shall bring you into the land where you go to possess it, that you shall set the blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse on Mount Ebal.

30 Aren't they beyond the Jordan, behind the way of the going down of the sun, in the land of the Canaanites who dwell in the Arabah, over against Gilgal, beside the oaks of Moreh?

31 For you are to pass over the Jordan to go in to possess the land which Yahweh your God gives you, and you shall possess it, and dwell therein.

32 You shall observe to do all the statutes and the ordinances which I set before you this day.