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Ezekiel 21

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1 And the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

2 Son of man, set thy face towards Jerusalem, and drop thy word towards the holy places, and prophesy against the land of Israel,

3 And say to the land of Israel, Thus saith the LORD; Behold, I am against thee, and will draw forth my sword out of its sheath, and will cut off from thee the righteous and the wicked.

4 Seeing then that I will cut off from thee the righteous and the wicked, therefore shall my sword go forth from its sheath against all flesh from the south to the north:

5 That all flesh may know that I the LORD have drawn my sword out of its sheath: it shall not return any more.

6 Sigh therefore, thou son of man, with the breaking of thy loins; and with bitterness sigh before their eyes.

7 And it shall be, when they say to thee, Why sighest thou? that thou shalt answer, For the tidings; because it cometh: and every heart shall melt, and all hands shall be feeble, and every spirit shall faint, and all knees shall be weak as water: behold, it cometh, and shall be brought to pass, saith the Lord GOD.

8 Again the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

9 Son of man, prophesy, and say, Thus saith the LORD; say, A sword, a sword is sharpened, and also furbished:

10 It is sharpened to make a grievous slaughter; it is furbished that it may glitter: should we then make mirth? it contemneth the rod of my son, as every tree.

11 And he hath given it to be furbished, that it may be handled: the sword is sharpened, and it is furbished, to give it into the hand of the slayer.

12 Cry and howl, son of man: for it shall be upon my people, it shall be upon all the princes of Israel: terrors by reason of the sword shall be upon my people: smite therefore upon thy thigh.

13 Because it is a trial, and what if the sword contemneth even the rod? it shall be no more, saith the Lord GOD.

14 Thou therefore, son of man, prophesy, and smite thy hands together, and let the sword be doubled the third time, the sword of the slain: it is the sword of the great men that are slain, which entereth into their private chambers.

15 I have set the point of the sword against all their gates, that their heart may faint, and their ruins be multiplied: ah! it is made bright, it is sharpened for the slaughter.

16 Go thee one way or other, either on the right hand, or on the left, whithersoever thy face is set.

17 I will also smite my hands together, and I will cause my fury to rest: I the LORD have said it.

18 The word of the LORD came to me again, saying,

19 Also, thou son of man, appoint thee two ways, that the sword of the king of Babylon may come: both ways shall come forth from one land: and choose thou a place, choose it at the head of the way to the city.

20 Appoint a way, that the sword may come to Rabbah of the Ammonites, and to Judah in Jerusalem the fortified.

21 For the king of Babylon stood at the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways, to use divination; he made his arrows bright, he consulted with images, he looked in the liver.

22 At his right hand was the divination for Jerusalem, to appoint captains, to open the mouth in the slaughter, to lift up the voice with shouting, to appoint battering rams against the gates, to cast a mount, and to build a fort.

23 And it shall be to them as a false divination in their sight, to them that have sworn oaths: but he will call to remembrance the iniquity, that they may be taken.

24 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Because ye have made your iniquity to be remembered, in that your transgressions are disclosed, so that in all your doings your sins do appear; because, I say, that ye are come to remembrance, ye shall be taken with the hand.

25 And thou, profane wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come, when iniquity shall have an end,

26 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Remove the diadem, and take off the crown: this shall not be the same: exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high.

27 I will overturn, overturn, overturn it: and it shall be no more, until he cometh whose right it is; and I will give it him.

28 And thou, son of man, prophesy and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD concerning the Ammonites, and concerning their reproach; even say thou, The sword, the sword is drawn: for the slaughter it is furbished, to consume because of the glittering:

29 While they see vanity to thee, while they divine a lie to thee, to bring thee upon the necks of them that are slain, of the wicked, whose day is come, when their iniquity shall have an end.

30 Shall I cause it to return into its sheath? I will judge thee in the place where thou wast created, in the land of thy nativity.

31 And I will pour out my indignation upon thee, I will blow against thee in the fire of my wrath, and deliver thee into the hand of brutish men, and skillful to destroy.

32 Thou shalt be for fuel to the fire; thy blood shall be in the midst of the land; thou shalt be no more remembered: for I the LORD have spoken it.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Coronis (An Appendix to True Christian Religion) #58

  
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58. The state of consummation of the Israelitish Church is described in both the historical parts of the Word, and its prophetic parts: in the prophetic, by the atrocious deeds of the kings, first of those of the Israelites, and afterwards of those of the Jews, by whom and under whom the land is said to have been profaned. But it is needless to recite them, because they are well known; only those passages from the prophetic parts shall be adduced in which the consummation and devastation of that Church are treated of. In these passages by "earth" and "land," "Zion," "Jerusalem," "cities," "mountains," "hills," "valleys," and "rivers," similar things are signified as above (n. 55). The following are from the prophetic parts of the Word:

[2] I saw the earth, and behold it was empty and void; and towards the heavens, and their light was not.... I saw, when, behold, Carmel 1 was a desert, and all the cities were desolated at the presence of Jehovah.... For thus hath Jehovah said, The whole land shall be wasteness, yet will I not make a consummation. For this shall the earth mourn, and the heavens above be blackened.

Thou, therefore, that art vastated, what wilt thou do? (Jer. 4:23-31; 5:10, 18).

The lion hath come up from his thicket, and the destroyer of nations... hath gone forth from his place, to reduce the land to a waste.... In that day... the heart of the king shall perish, and the heart of the princes; and the priests shall be astonished (Jer. 4:7, 9).

In that day, every place where there were a thousand vines shall be... for thorns and briars,... because all the land shall be thorns and briars (Isa. 7:23-24).

A voice of the cry of the shepherds and... of the powerful ones of the flock, for Jehovah layeth waste their pastures: whence the sheepfolds of peace were devastated. Jehovah hath forsaken His tabernacle, for their land was reduced to a desolation (Jer. 25:36-38).

This house shall be like Shiloh, and Jerusalem shall be a devastation (Jer. 26:9; 27:17).

Jerusalem, and all the cities of Judah, shall be a desolation and a devastation in this day, because of the wickedness of your works; . . . your land is become a desolation, an astonishment and a curse (Jer. 44:2, 6, 22).

I will give the land to devastation, because they have committed transgression (Ezek. 15:8).

They shall be devastated in the midst of the devastated lands, and her cities in the midst of the desolated cities.... Then I will make the rivers drought,... the land into the hand of the evil, and I will vastate the land and the fulness thereof (Ezek. 30:7, 12).

When I shall extinguish thee, I will cover the heavens, and will make the stars thereof black. I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine;... and I will set darkness upon the land... when I shall bring on thy breaking up (Ezek. 32:7-9);

in like manner as the Lord foretold concerning the consummation of the present Christian Church (Matt. 24:29).

[3] I will give Mount Seir to wasteness and to devastation.... I will make thee the wastes of eternity... (Ezek. 35:3-4, 7, 9, 12, 14-15).

In that day they shall bring up a proverb against you... and say, In vastating we are vastated (Micah 2:4).

Fear and the pit have taken hold of us, devastation and breaking up (Lam. 3:47).

The mountain of Zion is vastated (Lam. 5:18).

Thine iniquity is consummated, O daughter of Zion (Lam. 4:22).

Woe to the sinful nation, heavy with iniquity;... they have provoked the Holy One of Israel.... From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness;... your land is a solitude.... The daughter of Zion is left as a tent in a vineyard, as a besieged city (Isa. 1:4-8, and following verses).

What will ye do in the day of visitation and devastation? Consummation is finished, justice is overwhelmed; for the Lord Jehovih is making a consummation and decision in the whole land (Isa. 10:3, etc., Isa. 10:22-23).

I have heard a consummation and decision from the Lord Jehovih of hosts in the whole land (Isa. 28:22).

The prophet fell upon his face, and said, Lord Jehovih! Thou art making a consummation with the remnants of Israel (Ezek. 11:13).

My sanctuary was profaned, and the land of Israel was devastated (Ezek. 25:3).

Were even Noah, Daniel and Job in the midst of it,... they only shall be delivered, but the land shall become a desolation (Ezek. 14:14, 16).

[4] The completion of the consummation of the Israelitish and Jewish Church was accomplished when the Lord our Saviour, after receiving the sponge of vinegar, cried out upon the cross,

It is consummated (John 19:29-30);

for it is said in David:

They gave gall for My meat, and in My thirst they gave Me vinegar to drink:... let their habitation be devastated (Psalm 69:21, 25).

And in another place:

Without cause have they hid for Me the pit of the net; without cause have they digged for My soul. Let devastation come upon him before he is aware;... let him fall into devastation. Rescue My soul from their devastators, and My only one,-that is, the Church-from the lions' whelps (Psalm 35:7-8, 17).

I will make Jerusalem heaps, a habitation of dragons; I will reduce the cities of Judah to a waste;... behold, I am feeding them, even this people, with wormwood, and I will give them waters of gall to drink (Jer. 9:11-15).

Full consummation, after this, is described in Hosea thus:

The sons of Israel shall sit many days: no king, no prince, no sacrifice, no image, no ephod, and no teraphim (Hosea 3:4).

Such is their state at the present day. There is no need to adduce more passages. The passages in which the vastation, desolation and consummation of this Church are further mentioned, shall be only named: as, for example, Isa. 9:13-21; 22:4-14: Jer. 7:31-34; 25:33; 47:4: Ezek. 13:14-15; 14:8, 15; 19:7; 25:12-13; 26:2; 29:9-10, 12; 32:12, 15: Joel 1:15-20; 2:3; 3:19: Nahum 1:8-9: Zeph. 1:15; 2:9: Lam. 1:16: Psalm 73:17-19; 74:3.

The devastated are also called "thrust through" 2 (Ezek. 11:6-7; 21:30, 34; 26:6; 28:8, 23; 31:17-18; 32:20-24, 28-32; 35:8: Zeph. 2:12: Lam. 4:9: Psalm 69:27: and in other places). They are said to be "thrust through" because a "sword," by which this is done, signifies falsity destroying truth.

Footnotes:

1. See R.V. margin.

2. In most of these passages our ordinary Bibles have "slain"; but Young's Literal Translation of the Bible has "pierced," which, of course, is the same as "thrust through."

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

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