Arcana Coelestia #9339
9339. Verses 31-33 And I will set your boundary from the Sea Suph even to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness even to the River; 1 for I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you will drive them out 2 from before you. You shall not make a covenant with them and their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest perhaps they cause you to sin against Me when you serve their gods; for it will be a snare to you.
'And I will set your boundary from the Sea Suph even to the Sea of the Philistines' means the full range of truths from factual ones to interior truths of faith. 'And from the wilderness even to the River' means from delight belonging to the sensory level even to good and truth belonging to the rational level. 'For I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand' means dominion over evils. 'And you will drive them out from before you' means the removal of them. 'You shall not make a covenant with them and their gods' means no contact with evils and falsities. 'They shall not dwell in your land' means that evils must not exist together with the Church's forms of good. 'Lest perhaps they cause you to sin against Me' means lest evils turn away forms of good from the Lord. 'When you serve their gods' means if worship is kindled by falsities. 'For it will be a snare to you' means owing to evils that are enticing and deceptive.
Footnotes:
1. i.e. the Euphrates
2. The Latin means I will drive them out but the Hebrew means You will drive them out.
Arcana Coelestia #7930
7930. 'To inflict the plague' means damnation which they bring on themselves. This is clear from the meaning of 'the plague' here as the damnation of those belonging to the spiritual Church who have been governed by faith separated from charity, dealt with in 7879, 7926. Regarding damnation, that the ones to inflict it on the evil are the evil themselves, see just above in 7926.
'And you shall keep this custom as a statute for yourself and your children for evermore' means that all this will be in keeping with Divine order as it will apply from now on to those belonging to the spiritual Church. This is clear from the meaning of 'keeping this custom for evermore' as that all this is to be observed from now on; from the meaning of 'as a statute' as in keeping with order, dealt with in 7884; and from the representation of the children of Israel, [to whom 'yourself and your children' refers here,] 1 as those who belong to the spiritual Church, dealt with in 4286, 6426, 6637, 6862, 6868, 7035, 7062, 7198, 7201, 7215, 7223.
The order meant here is that which has existed in heaven since the time that the Lord, from His Divine Human, began to bring order to all things in heaven and on earth, which was immediately after the Resurrection, Matthew 28:18. In keeping with this new order those belonging to the spiritual Church could now be raised to heaven and enjoy eternal blessedness; it could not be done in keeping with the old order. Formerly the Lord brought things into order by means of heaven; but latterly He did so by means of His Human which He glorified and made Divine in the world. The glorification of His Human brought so great an increase of might that those were raised to heaven who could not be raised previously, and also so great an increase that the evil departed from all around and were shut away in their hells. This order is what is meant here. 2
Footnotes:
1. This clause translates what Swedenborg has in his rough draft.
2. [NCBS editor's note] From sections 7930 to 7932, there are some differences between the first and third Latin editions, regarding where the text should be divided into its sections. These differences have been carried over into the translations into English and other modern languages; different translators have made different decisions about it. The text is all there in each translation, but you may find what you are looking for in 7930, 7931, or 7932.
