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

 

Nehemiah 10:36

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36 Also the firstborn of our sons, and of our cattle, as it is written in the law, and the firstlings of our herds and of our flocks, to bring to the house of our God, unto the priests that minister in the house of our God:

From Swedenborg's Works

 

Arcana Coelestia #3504

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3504.'So that my soul may bless you' means allying it to its own life, consequently life that corresponds to the rational. This is clear from the meaning of 'being blessed' as being endowed with celestial and spiritual good, dealt with in 981, 1731, 2846, 3017, 3406. For the good of early childhood and consequently the good of life, which is the same as the good of the natural, and which is represented by 'Esau', is not spiritual good, for the good of early childhood is devoid of knowledge and intelligence, and so of wisdom. The good of early childhood becomes spiritual good through the implantation of truth, and so through regeneration, see 1616, 1802, 2280, 2290, 2291, 2299, 2304, 2305, 2307, 3494 (end). This is how the correspondence between rational things and natural is effected, and so how the allying of the natural man to the life of the rational is effected. This allying to its own life is what is meant by 'my soul may bless you'.

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