1368. The symbolism of Ur of the Chaldeans as outward worship that involves falsities can be seen from the symbolism of Chaldeans in the Word.
It was shown above at verse 9 that Babel symbolizes worship that has evil inside it [§1326]. Chaldea, on the other hand, symbolizes worship that has falsity inside it. Babel, then, symbolizes worship that has nothing good inside it, while Chaldea symbolizes worship that has nothing true inside. Worship that has nothing good and nothing true inside is worship that has a profane, idolatrous quality inside. The fact that Chaldea symbolizes this kind of worship in the Word can be seen from the following places. In Isaiah:
Look: the land of the Chaldeans! This people is not. Assyria founded [the land] among tsiyim. They will erect their spy towers; [the Chaldeans] will raise up their palaces. [Assyria] will make it a ruin. (Isaiah 23:13) 1
The land of Chaldeans who were not a people stands for falsity. "Assyria founded it" stands for the fact that rationalizations laid the foundation. The spy towers stand for delusions. In the same author:
This is what Jehovah, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, has said: "Because of you I have sent to Babylon and thrown down the bars of the gates, all of them, and the Chaldeans, in whose ships there is shouting." (Isaiah 43:14)
Babylon stands for worship that has evil deep inside. The Chaldeans stand for worship that has falsity deep inside. The ships are a knowledge of truth, but knowledge that has been perverted.
[2] In the same author:
Sit silent and go into the dark, daughter of the Chaldeans, because you will no longer be called an overseer of kingdoms. I was enraged with my people. I profaned my inheritance and gave them into your hand. These two things will come to you suddenly on one day: loss of children and widowhood together. To their full extent they will come over you, because of the abundance of your sorceries and because of the scope of your spells. (Isaiah 47:5-6, 9)
It is evident here that Chaldea is the profanation of truth, which is referred to as sorceries and spells. In the same author:
Leave Babylon; flee from the Chaldeans. (Isaiah 48:20)
This stands for running from the profanation of anything good or true in worship. In Ezekiel:
Make known to Jerusalem its abominations. Your father is an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. You whored with the sons of Egypt. You whored with the sons of Assyria. Therefore you multiplied your whoredom all the way into the land of Chaldea. (Ezekiel 16:2-3, 26, 28-29)
This speaks of the Jewish religion in particular. The sons of Egypt stand for facts. The sons of Assyria stand for rationalizations. The land of Chaldea, to which Jerusalem spread its increasing whoredom, stands for the profanation of truth. Anyone can see that Egypt, Assyria, and Chaldea do not mean different lands and that the passage is not talking about whoredom at all.
[3] In the same author:
Oholah whored and doted on her lovers, the neighboring Assyrians, and her whorings from [her time in] Egypt she did not abandon. She added to her whorings and looked at men, a portrayal on the wall, images of Chaldeans painted in vermilion, sashes girdling their hips, floppy dyed turbans on their heads, all of them appearing to be leaders, looking like the sons of Babylon, Chaldeans, in the land of their birth. She lusted for them at one glance of her eyes and sent messengers for them to Chaldea. The sons of Babylon defiled her through their whorings. (Ezekiel 23:5, 8, 14, 15, 16-17)
The Chaldeans are called sons of Babylon, who stand for the presence of profaned truth in worship. Oholah stands for the spiritual church, which is called Samaria [Ezekiel 23:4].
[4] In Habakkuk:
I am rousing the Chaldeans, a nation bitter and hasty, invading the breadth of the land to take possession of dwellings that are not theirs. Terrifying and fearsome [is that nation], and from itself alone do its judgment and its superiority issue. Its horses are nimbler than leopards, and its eyes are [nimbler] than wolves at evening. 2 And in all directions its riders spread, and its riders approach from a distance; they fly forward like an eagle darting in to eat. The whole [nation] comes intent on violence. Its breathless desire faces eastward. 3 (Habakkuk 1:6, 7, 8-9)
This passage depicts the nation of Chaldea through many representative images symbolizing the profanation of truth in worship.
[5] Two entire chapters in Jeremiah (chapters 50, 51) also describe Babylon and Chaldea, and they make it quite clear what each symbolizes: Babylon symbolizes the profanation of heavenly qualities in worship and Chaldea the profanation of spiritual qualities in worship.
These quotations show, then, what Ur of the Chaldeans symbolizes: external worship that has something profane and idolatrous deep inside. The worship of the Chaldeans was actually like this too, as I was permitted to learn from the Chaldeans themselves. 4
Footnotes:
1. For the points of interpretation of this verse, see notes 1 in §1306:2 (on "this people was not"), 2 in §1306:2 (on the meaning of "tsiyim"), and 3 in §1306:2 (on "spy towers"). [LHC]
2. Swedenborg quotes this passage in approximately this form — "Its horses are nimbler than leopards, and its eyes are [nimbler] than wolves at evening" — again in §6534:6 below, and later in his unpublished manuscript, Revelation Explained (Swedenborg 1994-1997a), at §281:11. The next and final two times he quotes it, in Revelation Explained 355:24, 780:8, he replaces the word "eyes," oculi, with the word "keen," acuti, producing a sentence that reads, "Its horses are nimbler than leopards and are keener than wolves at evening." This latter version accords with the original Hebrew, which the former does not. The error was probably due in some way to the fact that oculi and acuti look similar in Swedenborg's handwriting. [LHC]
3. The meaning of the Latin of the last sentence (desiderium anhelans facierum ejus orientem versus) is unclear. The Hebrew (מְגַמַּת פְּנֵיהֶם קָָדִימָה [mǝḡammaṯ pǝnêhem qāḏîmā]) is generally considered problematic, and the meaning of the first word, rendered by Swedenborg as desiderium anhelans ("breathless desire"), is uncertain. The difficulty presented by the Hebrew can be seen in the variety of ways in which it has been translated. For example, another Latin version, the Clementine Vulgate (Biblia Sacra [1592] 1822-1824), renders this verse Omnes ad praedam venient, facies eorum ventus urens ("They shall all come to the prey, their faces a burning wind"). The New Revised Standard Version translates it: "They all come for violence, with faces pressing forward." [LHC, RS, SS]
4. Swedenborg does not elsewhere report actual exchanges with Chaldeans in the spiritual world, though he does describe learning about the meaning of Chaldea through "living experiences" in Spiritual Experiences (Swedenborg 1978) §4842. [LSW]
