Commentary

 

261 - Daily and Yearly Preparation for Heaven

By Jonathan S. Rose

Title: Daily and Yearly Preparation for Heaven

Topic: Salvation

Summary: The daily sacrifices, weekly sabbaths, and three annual feasts prescribed in the Old Testament are a picture of how to prepare for heaven.

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References:
2 Peter 2:22, 10
Numbers 28:1
Exodus 23:14, 17
Leviticus 23:1, 5, 10, 33
Deuteronomy 16:1, 9, 13-14
Luke 6:1
Acts of the Apostles 2:1; 20:16
Nehemiah 8:13-14
Ezekiel 45:21, 25
Zechariah 14:16
John 7:2, 37

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The Bible

 

Acts 20:16

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16 For Paul had determined to sail by Ephesus, because he would not spend the time in Asia: for he hasted, if it were possible for him, to be at Jerusalem the day of Pentecost.

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Arcana Coelestia #9140

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9140. 'Sending in his beast of burden' means if he does it with little self-awareness. This is clear from the meaning of 'beast of burden' as a bodily desire or appetite. The reason why there is little self-awareness is that when such a desire or appetite reigns in a person he scarcely uses his power of reason and so has little awareness about himself. All beasts, whatever their genus and species, mean affections; gentle and useful beasts mean good affections, while savage and useless beasts mean evil affections, 45, 46, 142, 143, 714-719, 1823, 2180, 2781, 3218, 3519, 5198, 7523, 7872, 9090. When an animal is called 'a beast of burden' it means merely bodily affections, which in themselves possess little reason; for the more that a person's actions spring from the body, the less they do so from reason. This is because the body lives in the world and so is remote from heaven, where true reason resides. Furthermore the word in the original language for a beast of burden is formed from another meaning brutish and stupid, and so having little awareness, as in Isaiah 19:11; in David, Psalms 49:10; 73:22; in Jeremiah 51:17; and elsewhere.

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