The Bible

 

Genesis 1

Study

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 #894

Study this Passage

  
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894. 'At the beginning, on the first of the month' means a starting point. This is now clear from what has been said above. Everything that this statement embodies is an arcanum so deep that it cannot be described, except for just the point that no definite period of time ever exists when anyone is regenerate enough to be able to say, 'Now I am perfect'. In fact an unlimited number of states of evil and falsity exist with everyone, not only simple states but also varied and complex ones which, as has been stated, have to be disposed of in such a way that they do not recur. In some states a person can be called fairly perfect, but in countless others he cannot. People who have been regenerated during their lifetime, and in whose lives faith in the Lord and charity towards the neighbour have been present, are in the next life being perfected all the time.

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

Commentary

 

Love correspondence

  
tiny hand my love, by Jenny Stein

To some degree, there really is no spiritual meaning to the word “love” in the Bible. Why? Because if you truly love another, that is already a spiritual state. To put it simply, the Lord is Love Itself, a perfect and infinite love that is the source of all actual life and substance in the universe. Thus everything we are and everything we experience is a product of the Lord's love; there is no way for us to have any love from ourselves that is not ultimately the Lord's love, because the Lord's love is everything. When we feel love, what we're really doing is opening ourselves to be a conduit for the Lord's love -- truly a spiritual state. This also means that the more we can align our love with the Lord's love, the stronger our experience of love will be. The Lord's love is a constant desire to be conjoined with us, to be able to love us fully while protecting our right to choose. So the more we try to love that way, the more in harmony with Him we will be and the more powerful our feelings of love will be. In a general sense, then, most uses of “love” in the Bible represent a desire for union, connection, powered, and enriched by the Lord.

In Matthew 6:24, this signifies celestial of love. (Arcana Coelestia 3875[3])

In Malachi 2:11, this signifies to conjoin oneself with falsity. (Arcana Coelestia 4434[3])