The Bible

 

Ezekiel 45

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1 And in your causing the land to fall in inheritance, ye lift up a heave-offering to Jehovah, a holy [portion] of the land: the length -- five and twenty thousand [is] the length, and the breadth ten thousand; it [is] holy in all its border round about.

2 There is of this for the sanctuary five hundred by five hundred, square, round about; and fifty cubits of suburb [is] to it round about.

3 And by this measure thou dost measure: the length [is] five and twenty thousand, and the breadth ten thousand: and in it is the sanctuary, the holy of holies.

4 The holy [portion] of the land it [is]; for priests, ministrants of the sanctuary, it is, who are drawing near to serve Jehovah; and it hath been to them a place for houses, and a holy place for a sanctuary.

5 `And of the five and twenty thousand of length, and of the ten thousand of breadth, there is to the Levites, ministrants of the house, for them -- for a possession -- twenty chambers.

6 `And of the possession of the city ye give five thousand of breadth, and of length five and twenty thousand, over-against the heave-offering of the holy [portion]: to all the house of Israel it is.

7 As to the prince, on this side, and on that side, of the heave-offering of the holy place, and of the possession of the city, at the front of the heave-offering of the holy place, and at the front of the possession of the city, from the west corner westward, and from the east corner eastward -- and the length [is] over-against one of the portions from the west border unto the east border --

8 of the land there is to him for a possession in Israel, and My princes do not oppress any more My people, and the land they give to the house of Israel according to their tribes.

9 `Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Enough to you -- princes of Israel; violence and spoil turn aside, and judgment and righteousness do; lift up your exactions from off My people -- an affirmation of the Lord Jehovah.

10 Just balances, and a Just ephah, and a Just bath -- ye have.

11 The ephah and the bath is of one measure, for the bath to bear a tenth of the homer, and the ephah a tenth of the homer: according to the homer is its measurement.

12 And, the shekel [is] twenty gerah: twenty shekels, five and twenty shekels, fifteen shekels -- is your maneh.

13 `This [is] the heave-offering that ye lift up; a sixth part of the ephah of a homer of wheat, also ye have given a sixth part of the ephah of a homer of barley,

14 and the portion of oil, the bath of oil, a tenth part of the bath out of the cor, a homer of ten baths -- for ten baths [are] a homer;

15 and one lamb out of the flock, out of two hundred, out of the watered country of Israel, for a present, and for a burnt-offering, and for peace-offerings, to make atonement by them -- an affirmation of the Lord Jehovah.

16 All the people of the land are at this heave-offering for the prince in Israel.

17 And on the prince are the burnt-offerings, and the present, and the libation, in feasts, and in new moons, and in sabbaths, in all appointed times of the house of Israel: he doth make the sin-offering, and the present, and the burnt-offering, and the peace-offerings, to make atonement for the house of Israel.

18 `Thus said the Lord Jehovah: In the first [month], in the first of the month, thou dost take a bullock, a son of the herd, a perfect one, and hast cleansed the sanctuary:

19 and the priest hath taken of the blood of the sin offering, and hath put on the door-post of the house, and on the four corners of the border of the altar, and on the post of the gate of the inner court.

20 And so thou dost do on the seventh of the month, because of each erring one, and because of the simple one -- and ye have purified the house.

21 `In the first [month], in the fourteenth day of the month, ye have the passover, a feast of seven days, unleavened food is eaten.

22 And the prince hath prepared on that day, for himself, and for all the people of the land, a bullock, a sin-offering.

23 And the seven days of the feast he prepareth a burnt-offering to Jehovah, seven bullocks, and seven rams, perfect ones, daily seven days, and a sin-offering, a kid of the goats, daily.

24 And a present of an ephah for a bullock, and an ephah for a ram, he doth prepare, and of oil a hin for an ephah.

25 In the seventh [month], in the fifteenth day of the month, in the feast, he doth according to these things seven days; as the sin-offering so the burnt-offering, and as the present so also the oil.

   

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Apocalypse Revealed #191

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191. "'I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God.'" This symbolically means that the truths they possess, springing from goodness derived from the Lord, sustain the Lord's church in heaven.

A temple symbolizes the church, and the temple of My God symbolizes the Lord's church in heaven. It is apparent from this that a pillar symbolizes what sustains and stabilizes the church, and that is the Divine truth in the Word.

In the highest sense, a temple symbolizes the Lord in respect to His Divine humanity, particularly in respect to Divine truth. In a representative sense, however, a temple symbolizes the Lord's church in heaven, and so also the Lord's church in the world.

That a temple in the highest sense symbolizes the Lord in respect to His Divine humanity, and particularly in respect to Divine truth, is apparent from the following passages:

(Jesus said to the Jews,) "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." ...He was speaking of the temple of His body. (John 2:19, 21)

I saw no temple in (the New Jerusalem), for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. (Revelation 21:22)

Behold..., the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple, and the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire. (Malachi 3:1)

I will bow myself toward Your holy temple... (Psalms 138:2)

...I will look again toward Your holy temple... And my prayer went to You, to Your holy temple. (Jonah 2:4, 7)

Jehovah is in His holy temple. (Habakkuk 2:20)

The holy temple of Jehovah or of the Lord is His Divine humanity, for it is to this that people bow, look to, and pray, and not to the temple merely, as the temple is not, in itself, holy. It is called a holy temple, because holiness is predicated of Divine truth (no. 173).

"The temple that sanctifies the gold" in Matthew 23:16-17 means nothing else than the Lord's Divine humanity.

[2] That a temple in a representative sense symbolizes the Lord's church in heaven, is apparent from the following passages:

(The) voice (of Jehovah) from the temple...! (Isaiah 66:6)

...a loud voice came out of the temple of heaven... (Revelation 16:17)

The temple of God was opened in heaven, and the ark of His covenant was seen in His temple. (Revelation 11:19)

...the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened. And out of the temple came the seven angels... And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God... (Revelation 15:5-6, 8)

I called upon Jehovah, and cried out to my God; He heard my voice from His temple... (Psalms 18:6)

I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty, and His skirts filled the temple. (Isaiah 6:1)

[3] That a temple symbolizes the church in the world is apparent from these passages:

Our holy... temple... has become a conflagration... (Isaiah 64:11)

I will shake all nations..., that I may fill this house with glory... The glory of this latter house shall be greater than the former... (Haggai 2:7, 9)

The new temple in Ezekiel 40; 41; 42; 43; 44; 45; 46; 47; 48 describes a church to be established by the Lord. A church is also meant in Revelation 11:1 by the temple that the angel measured. So likewise elsewhere, as in Isaiah 44:28, Jeremiah 7:2-4, 9-11, Zechariah 8:9.

...the disciples (of Jesus) came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said to them, ."..Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left... upon another, that shall not be demolished." (Matthew 24:1-2)

The temple here symbolizes the church today; and its demolition means, symbolically, that not one stone would be left upon another. This symbolizes the end of that church, when not any truth would remain. For when the disciples spoke with the Lord about the temple, the Lord foretold the consecutive states of this church, even to its last one, or the end of the age; and the end of the age means the final period of the church, which is the one that exists today. This was represented by the destruction of that temple to its foundations.

[4] A temple has these three symbolic meanings, namely the Lord, the church in heaven, and the church in the world. Because these three are bound up together, they cannot be separated. Consequently one cannot be meant without the other. Therefore anyone who divorces the church in the world from the church in heaven, or the one or the other from the Lord, is without the truth.

The temple here means the church in heaven, because reference to the church in the world follows after this (no. 194).

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.