The Bible

 

Exodus 23:14-19 : The Three Annual Festivals

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14 Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.

15 Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:)

16 And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.

17 Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD.

18 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning.

19 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.

The Bible

 

Ezekiel 44:30

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30 And the first of all the firstfruits of all things, and every oblation of all, of every sort of your oblations, shall be the priest's: ye shall also give unto the priest the first of your dough, that he may cause the blessing to rest in thine house.

Commentary

 

Blood

  
Blood of Christ tryptich, by att. to Jean Bellegambe and his workshop

The internal meaning of “blood” is a little tricky. In most cases, blood is linked with Divine Truth and it’s relationship with the Lord. But in some cases, especially when discussing the first half of Genesis, the Works of Swedenborg link blood to a state of caring, or love to the neighbor. No absolute explanation is offered for this, but it’s worth noting that blood takes a number of forms in the body – it sometimes carries nutrients and oxygen, sometimes waste products, and sometimes nutrients and carbon dioxide. So it’s not unreasonable for blood to have different meanings in different contexts.