Arcana Coelestia #42
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
Deuteronomy 7
1
When Yahweh your God shall bring you into the land where you go to possess it, and shall cast out many nations before you, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations greater and mightier than you;
2
and when Yahweh your God shall deliver them up before you, and you shall strike them; then you shall utterly destroy them: you shall make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them;
3
neither shall you make marriages with them; your daughter you shall not give to his son, nor shall you take his daughter for your son.
4
For he will turn away your son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so the anger of Yahweh would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly.
5
But you shall deal with them like this: you shall break down their altars, and dash their pillars in pieces, and cut down their Asherim, and burn their engraved images with fire.
6
For you are a holy people to Yahweh your God: Yahweh your God has chosen you to be a people for his own possession, above all peoples who are on the face of the earth.
7
Yahweh didn't set his love on you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all peoples:
8
but because Yahweh loves you, and because he would keep the oath which he swore to your fathers, has Yahweh brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9
Know therefore that Yahweh your God, he is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness with them who love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations,
10
and repays those who hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him who hates him, he will repay him to his face.
11
You shall therefore keep the commandment, and the statutes, and the ordinances, which I command you this day, to do them.
12
It shall happen, because you listen to these ordinances, and keep and do them, that Yahweh your God will keep with you the covenant and the loving kindness which he swore to your fathers:
13
and he will love you, and bless you, and multiply you; he will also bless the fruit of your body and the fruit of your ground, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your livestock and the young of your flock, in the land which he swore to your fathers to give you.
14
You shall be blessed above all peoples: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your livestock.
15
Yahweh will take away from you all sickness; and none of the evil diseases of Egypt, which you know, he will put on you, but will lay them on all those who hate you.
16
You shall consume all the peoples whom Yahweh your God shall deliver to you; your eye shall not pity them: neither shall you serve their gods; for that will be a snare to you.
17
If you shall say in your heart, "These nations are more than I; how can I dispossess them?"
18
you shall not be afraid of them: you shall well remember what Yahweh your God did to Pharaoh, and to all Egypt;
19
the great trials which your eyes saw, and the signs, and the wonders, and the mighty hand, and the outstretched arm, by which Yahweh your God brought you out: so shall Yahweh your God do to all the peoples of whom you are afraid.
20
Moreover Yahweh your God will send the hornet among them, until those who are left, and hide themselves, perish from before you.
21
You shall not be scared of them; for Yahweh your God is in the midst of you, a great and awesome God.
22
Yahweh your God will cast out those nations before you by little and little: you may not consume them at once, lest the animals of the field increase on you.
23
But Yahweh your God will deliver them up before you, and will confuse them with a great confusion, until they be destroyed.
24
He will deliver their kings into your hand, and you shall make their name to perish from under the sky: no man shall be able to stand before you, until you have destroyed them.
25
You shall burn the engraved images of their gods with fire. You shall not covet the silver or the gold that is on them, nor take it for yourself, lest you be snared in it; for it is an abomination to Yahweh your God.
26
You shall not bring an abomination into your house, and become a devoted thing like it. You shall utterly detest it, and you shall utterly abhor it; for it is a devoted thing.
