Arcana Coelestia #30
30. Verses 14-17 And God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens, to make a distinction between the day and the night; and they will be for signs, and for set times, and for days and years. And they will be for lights in the expanse of the heavens, to give light upon the earth; and it was so. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to have dominion over the day, and the lesser light to have dominion over the night; and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.
No one can have an adequate understanding of what 'the great lights' are unless he knows what the underlying essence of faith is and how it develops in people who are being created anew. The very essence and life of faith is the Lord alone. In fact it is impossible for anyone who does not believe in the Lord to have life, as He Himself has said in John,
He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God will rest upon him. John 3:36.
[2] With people who are being created anew faith develops as follows: First of all they have no life, for life does not exist in anything evil and false but in what is good and true. Then they start to receive life from the Lord by means of faith - first by faith existing in the memory, which is factual faith, then by faith existing in the understanding, which is conceptual faith, and after this by faith existing in the heart, which is loving or saving faith. Factual faith and conceptual faith are represented in verses 3-13 by the inanimate, but faith made alive by means of love is represented in verses 20-25 by the animate. Consequently this is the first point at which love and faith deriving from it, which are called 'lights', are dealt with. Love is 'the greater light which has dominion over the day', and faith deriving from love is 'the lesser light which has dominion over the night'. And because they ought to make one the verb in the phrase 'let there be lights 'is singular and not plural.
[3] Love and faith have their place in the internal man as warmth and light do in the external, bodily man, and for this reason love and faith are represented by warmth and light. Therefore it is said that 'the lights' were set in the expanse of the heavens, that is, in the internal man - the greater light in his will and the lesser in his understanding. Yet they make their appearances in the will and understanding only as sunlight does in the objects it strikes. To the Lord alone belongs the mercy which moves the will with love and the understanding with truth or faith.
Joel 3
1
For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem,
2
I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.
3
And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink.
4
Yea, and what have ye to do with me, O Tyre, and Zidon, and all the coasts of Palestine? will ye render me a recompence? and if ye recompence me, swiftly and speedily will I return your recompence upon your own head;
5
Because ye have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried into your temples my goodly pleasant things:
6
The children also of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians, that ye might remove them far from their border.
7
Behold, I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them, and will return your recompence upon your own head:
8
And I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the children of Judah, and they shall sell them to the Sabeans, to a people far off: for the LORD hath spoken it.
9
Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up:
10
Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong.
11
Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O LORD.
12
Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about.
13
Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great.
14
Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision.
15
The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.
16
The LORD also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but The LORD will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel.
17
So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.
18
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the LORD, and shall water the valley of Shittim.
19
Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.
20
But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.
21
For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the LORD dwelleth in Zion.
