The Bible

 

Génesis 16

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1 Y SARAI, mujer de Abram no le paría: y ella tenía una sierva egipcia, que se llamaba Agar.

2 Dijo, pues, Sarai á Abram: Ya ves que Jehová me ha hecho estéril: ruégote que entres á mi sierva; quizá tendré hijos de ella. Y atendió Abram al dicho de Sarai.

3 Y Sarai, mujer de Abram, tomó á Agar su sierva egipcia, al cabo de diez años que había habitado Abram en la tierra de Canaán, y dióla á Abram su marido por mujer.

4 Y él cohabitó con Agar, la cual concibió: y cuando vió que había concebido, miraba con desprecio á su señora.

5 Entonces Sarai dijo á Abram: Mi afrenta sea sobre ti: yo puse mi sierva en tu seno, y viéndose embarazada, me mira con desprecio; juzgue Jehová entre mí y ti.

6 Y respondió Abram á Sarai: He ahí tu sierva en tu mano, haz con ella lo que bien te pareciere. Y como Sarai la afligiese, huyóse de su presencia.

7 Y hallóla el ángel de Jehová junto á una fuente de agua en el desierto, junto á la fuente que está en el camino del Sur.

8 Y le dijo: Agar, sierva de Sarai, ¿de dónde vienes tú, y á dónde vas? Y ella respondió: Huyo de delante de Sarai, mi señora.

9 Y díjole el ángel de Jehová: Vuélvete á tu señora, y ponte sumisa bajo de su mano.

10 Díjole también el ángel de Jehová: Multiplicaré tanto tu linaje, que no será contado á causa de la muchedumbre.

11 Díjole aún el ángel de Jehová: He aquí que has concebido, y parirás un hijo, y llamarás su nombre Ismael, porque oído ha Jehová tu aflicción.

12 Y él será hombre fiero; su mano contra todos, y las manos de todos contra él, y delante de todos sus hermanos habitará.

13 Entonces llamó el nombre de Jehová que con ella hablaba: Tú eres el Dios de la vista; porque dijo: ¿No he visto también aquí al que me ve?

14 Por lo cual llamó al pozo, pozo del Viviente que me ve. He aquí está entre Cades y Bered.

15 Y parió Agar á Abram un hijo y llamó Abram el nombre de su hijo que le parió Agar, Ismael.

16 Y era Abram de edad de ochenta y seis años, cuando parió Agar á Ismael.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #1902

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1902. 'And Abram hearkened to Sarai's voice' means it could not have been achieved in any other way. This becomes clear from the train of thought in the internal sense and from the necessity that the human rational can be born in this and no other way. If man were not steeped in any hereditary evil, the rational would be born straightaway from the marriage of the celestial things belonging to the internal man with the spiritual things belonging to the same; and through the rational the faculty of knowing would be born. This would mean that on entering the world a person would possess straightaway within himself fully-formed faculties of reason and of knowing, for this would all be in accordance with the order that belongs to influx. This may be deduced from the fact that all animals without exception are born into a fully-formed faculty of knowing what they need and what is suitable for them in the way of food, safety, habitat, and producing offspring, because their inborn nature is in accordance with order. For what other reason is man born without the same faculties than that in his case order has been destroyed - for he alone is born without any knowledge?

[2] That which causes him to be born without any knowledge is hereditary evil received from his father and from his mother. Because of that evil all his faculties are turned in a contrary direction insofar as goods and truths are concerned, so that the latter are not able through an immediate influx of celestial and spiritual things from the Lord to be translated into correspondent forms. This is the reason why man's rational has to be formed in an entirely different manner or way, that is to say, by means of facts and cognitions entering in through the senses, and so by the external route, thus by what is a reversal of order. In this way, miraculously so, a person is made rational by the Lord. This is described by 'going in to the servant-girl', which means the joining of the internal man to the exterior man, and by the statement that 'Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai', which means that it could not have been achieved in any other way.

[3] Because the Lord was born as any other is born and had a heredity from the mother, He was like any other in this respect also, the purpose being that through the conflicts brought about by temptations and through victories He might restore all things to order. His Rational as well therefore was conceived and born as it is with any other, yet with the difference that the Divine, or Jehovah - and so the life belonging to love towards the whole human race, on whose behalf and for whose salvation He fought in all His temptations - resided in every single thing that was His inmostly.

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