The Bible

 

Genesis 1:5

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5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first Day.

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #23

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23. Nothing is more common in the Word than for the word 'day' to be used to mean the particular time at which events take place, as in Isaiah,

The day of Jehovah is near. Behold, the day of Jehovah comes. I will make heaven tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, on the day of My fierce anger. Its time is close at hand, and its days will not be prolonged. Isaiah 13:6, 9, 13, 22.

And in the same prophet,

Her antiquity is in the days of antiquity. On that day Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, like the days of one king. Isaiah 23:7, 15.

Since 'day' stands for the particular time it also stands for the state associated with that particular time, as in Jeremiah, Woe to us, for the day has declined, for the shadows of evening have lengthened! Jeremiah 6:4

And in the same prophet,

If you break My covenant that is for the day and My covenant that is for the night, so that there is neither daytime nor night at their appointed time. Jeremiah 33:20, 25.

Also,

Renew our days as of old. Lamentations 5:21.

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

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #1613

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1613. 'The length of it and the breadth of it' means the celestial dimension and the spiritual dimension, or what amounts to the same, good and truth. 'length' means good and 'breadth' truth; see what has been stated already in 650. The reason is that 'land' means the heavenly kingdom, or Church, to which length and breadth are not attributable, only those things that match them and correspond to them, that is to say, goods and truths. The celestial dimension, or good, being primary, is compared to length, while the spiritual dimension, or truth, being secondary, is compared to breadth.

[2] That 'breadth' is truth is quite clear from the Prophetical part of the Word, as in Habakkuk,

I am rousing the Chaldeans, a bitter and hasty nation, marching' into the breadths of the earth. Habakkuk 1:6.

'Chaldeans' stands for people under the influence of falsity, 'marching 1 into the breadths of the earth' for the destruction of truths, for these words are used in reference to the Chaldeans. In David,

O Jehovah, You have not shut me up into the hand of the enemy. You have made my feet stand in a broad place. Psalms 31:8.

'Standing in a broad place' stands for abiding in the truth. In the same author,

Out of my distress I called on Jah; He answered me in a broad place. Psalms 118:5.

'Answering in a broad place' stands for answering with the truth. In Hosea,

Jehovah will pasture them like a lamb in a broad place. Hosea 4:16.

'Pasturing in a broad place' stands for teaching the truth.

[3] In Isaiah,

Asshur will go through Judah, it will deluge it and pass through and will reach even to the neck; and the outstretching of its wings will fill the breadth of the land. Isaiah 8:8.

'Asshur' stands for reasoning which would 'deluge the land', or the Church; 'wings' stands for reasonings from which falsities result; 'filling the breadth of the land' stands for its being full of falsities, or things contrary to the truth. Because the length of the land meant good and its breadth truth it is said that the New Jerusalem when measured lies four-square, its length being the same as its breadth, Revelation 21:16. From this anyone may see that length and breadth have no other meaning, since the New Jerusalem is nothing else than the Lord's kingdom in heaven and on earth. Because of the meaning things have in the internal sense it became commonplace in former times to refer to celestial and spiritual things by means of things on earth, such as length and breadth, just as height and depth are used nowadays in everyday speech when people are referring to wisdom.

Footnotes:

1. literally, walking

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