The Bible

 

Genesis 1:20

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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.

Commentary

 

Resurrection, the first

  

'The first resurrection,' mentioned in Revelation 20:5, 6, does not mean a first resurrection, but the essence and primary part of resurrection, which is salvation and eternal life. There is only one resurrection to life. A second does not happen, and is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible.

(References: Apocalypse Explained 6; Apocalypse Revealed 851; Revelation 20:5-6)

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #3908

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3908. 'If you do not, I am [in]' means that otherwise [the affection for interior truth] would not rise again. This is clear from the meaning of 'dying' as not rising again into life. In ancient times wives used to call themselves dead when they did not bear any son or daughter and also believed themselves to be so since no memory of them - no life so to speak - would remain for posterity. But the reason why they called and believed themselves to be such lay in fact in worldly causes. But since every cause is the manifestation of another cause prior to itself, and thus every aspect of a cause existing in the natural world is the product of a cause in the spiritual world, so too is the cause referred to. The cause existing in the spiritual world originated in the heavenly marriage of good and truth, in which marriage no other births take place than the truths of faith and the goods of charity. Those truths and goods are the sons and daughters born in that world, and are also meant by sons and daughters in the Word. Anyone who does not give birth to these - to the truths of faith and the goods of charity - is so to speak dead. For he belongs among the dead who do not rise again, that is to say, into life or heaven. From this one may see what is meant by Rachel's words, If you do not, I am dead.

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