878. He put his hand out symbolizes their personal power, and he took it and brought it in to himself, into the ark, means that they did good and thought about truth under their own direction. This can be seen from the symbolism of a hand as power and so here as the personal power that they exercised. Putting out one's hand, taking a dove, and bringing it in to oneself is laying claim to the truth meant by the dove and using it for one's own purposes.

The symbolism of a hand as power, authority, and the arrogant self-assurance these impart, is established by many scriptural passages, such as this one from Isaiah:

I will exact punishment on the fruit of the bloated heart of Assyria's king because he said, "In the power of my hand have I acted, and in my wisdom, because I have understanding." (Isaiah 10:12-13)

The hand obviously stands for personal power, to which Assyria's king attributed his success; hence the punishment inflicted on him. In the same author:

Moab will stretch out its hands in its own midst — as a swimmer stretches them out to swim — and [Jehovah] will lay their arrogance low, together with the floodgates ¹ of their hands. (Isaiah 25:11)

The hands stand for personal power resulting from a sense of superiority to others and so from arrogance.

[2] In the same author:

Their residents, their hand shortened, have felt panic and shame. (Isaiah 37:27)

Having shortened hands stands for lacking any power. In the same author:

Will the clay say to its potter, "What are you doing?" or will your work say, " [My maker] has no hands"? (Isaiah 45:9)

Not having hands stands for not having any power. In Ezekiel:

The monarch will mourn and the chieftain will be clothed in shock, and the hands of the people of the land will be uneasy. (Ezekiel 7:27)

The hands stand for various kinds of power. In Micah:

Doom to those who contemplate wickedness and practice evil on their beds, because they do it in the morning light, and because their hand is as a god. ² (Micah 2:1)

Their hand stands for their personal power, which they trust in as their god. In Zechariah:

Doom to shepherds who are good for nothing, abandoning the flock! A sword against their arm and against their right-hand eye! Their arm will utterly shrivel and their right-hand eye go utterly dark. (Zechariah 11:17)

[3] Because a hand symbolizes different kinds of power, the Word frequently calls humanity's evil ways and false thinking the works of their hands. ³ Evil grows out of selfishness in our will, and falsity out of selfishness in our intellect. This fact becomes clear from the nature of human selfhood [or autonomy], which is unremitting evil and falsity. For a description of human selfhood in these terms, see above at §§39, 41, 141, 150, 154, 210, 215.

Since hands in general mean power, the Word many times attributes hands to Jehovah, or the Lord, and in those places, on an inner level, hands mean omnipotence. In Isaiah, for instance:

Jehovah, your hand is lifted high. (Isaiah 26:11)

Here the hand stands for divine power. In the same author:

Jehovah stretches out his hand, they are all consumed. (Isaiah 31:3)

Again it stands for divine power. In the same author:

Concerning the work of my hands do you command me? My hands spread out the heavens, and to their whole army I gave commands! (Isaiah 45:11-12)

Again it stands for divine power.

The Word frequently refers to regenerate people as the work of Jehovah's hands. In the same author:

My hand founded the earth, and my right hand measured the heavens by palm-breadths. (Isaiah 48:13)

The hand and the right hand stand for omnipotence.

[4] In the same author:

Is my hand shortened, so that redemption fails; or do I not have in me the power to rescue? (Isaiah 50:2)

This stands for divine power. In Jeremiah:

You brought your people Israel out of the land of Egypt by signs and portents, and by a strong hand, and by an outstretched arm. (Jeremiah 32:17, 21)

This stands for divine power, and verse 17 uses the word power where verse 21 uses hand. ⁴ The saying that the people of Israel were brought out of Egypt by a strong hand and an outstretched arm comes up repeatedly [Deuteronomy 4:34; 5:15; 7:19; 26:8; Psalms 136:11-12]. In Ezekiel:

This is what the Lord Jehovih has said: "On the day when I chose Israel and raised my hand ⁵ to the seed of the house of Jacob and became known to them in the land of Egypt, I raised my hand to them to bring them out of the land of Egypt." (Ezekiel 20:5-6, 23)

In Moses:

Israel saw the massive hand that Jehovah used against the Egyptians. (Exodus 14:31)

[5] These passages now make it quite clear that a hand symbolizes power. In fact the symbolism was so strong that a hand also came to serve as a representation of power. This is visible in the miracles performed in Egypt, when Moses was commanded to stretch out his staff or his hand in order to accomplish a given result. For example:

Moses stretched out his hand and hail fell on Egypt. (Exodus 9:22)

Moses stretched out his hand and darkness fell. (Exodus 10:21-22)

Moses stretched out his hand and staff over the Suph Sea ⁶ and it dried up. And he stretched out his hand and it returned to its place. (Exodus 14:21, 27)

No clear-thinking person can believe that there was any power in Moses' hand or staff. Rather, since the act of lifting and stretching out a hand symbolized divine power, it had become representative [of that power] in the Jewish religion.

[6] The instance in which Joshua extended a javelin was similar:

Jehovah said, "Stretch out the javelin that is in your hand toward Ai, because I will deliver it into your hand." When Joshua stretched out the javelin that was in his hand, they came into the city and seized it, and Joshua did not draw back the hand with which he had stretched out the javelin until he had exterminated all the residents of Ai. (Joshua 8:18-19, 26)

This shows what the case was with the representative acts and objects that formed the external ritual of the Jewish religion. It also shows what the Word is like, in that the particulars of its outward meaning do not seem as if they would be representative of the Lord and his kingdom. This applies to the examples here of times when leaders stretched their hands out, and to all other details as well. Their representative nature will never be clear as long as our minds cling exclusively to the literal narrative.

The same evidence indicates how far the Jews fell away from a true understanding of the Word and the rituals of their religion, since they identified worship with outward forms alone. They went so far as to ascribe power to Moses' staff ⁷ and Joshua's javelin, when in reality these were no more powerful than a piece of wood. It was because those objects symbolized the Lord's omnipotence, and because heaven viewed them this way, that signs and wonders occurred when those men stretched out a hand or a staff as ordered. The same is true of the fact that when Moses raised his hands on top of the hill, Joshua won, and when he dropped them Joshua lost, which led others to support his hands (Exodus 17:9-13). ⁸

[7] The situation was similar when one person, seeking to transfer power, laid hands on another to consecrate that other, as the people did to the Levites (Numbers 8:9-10, 12) and as Moses did to Joshua when Joshua was to take his place (Numbers 27:18, 23). This is the source of modern rites of ordination and benediction that involve the laying on of hands.

The extent to which a hand symbolized and represented power can be seen from the stories of Uzzah and Jeroboam, which the Word tells in the following way.

Concerning Uzzah: Uzzah put (his hand) out onto the ark of God, grasped it, and died for doing so (2 Samuel 6:6-7). The ark represented the Lord and so represented everything that was sacred and heavenly. Uzzah's "putting it out" onto the ark represented his own, independent power, or human autonomy. Because human autonomy is profane, the word hand does not appear in the text (although it is implied) to prevent the angels from being aware that anything so profane touched something holy. And since he put it out, he died.

[8] Concerning Jeroboam: It happened that when he heard the word that the man of God had shouted in denunciation of the altar, Jeroboam put his hand out from the altar, saying, "Seize him!" And his hand that he had put out in denunciation of the man shriveled up, and he could not draw it back to himself. He said to the man of God, "Please entreat Jehovah your God to restore my hand to me." And the man of God entreated Jehovah, and his hand was restored to him and became as it had been before (1 Kings 13:4, 5, 6).

Here again putting out a hand symbolizes a person's own, independent power or autonomy, which is profane. Jeroboam wanted to violate what was holy by putting his hand out toward the man of God, so his hand shriveled, but since he was an idolater and incapable of profaning anything, as noted earlier [§§303, 408, 661:1], his hand was restored.

The symbolism and representation of a hand as power can be deduced from objects in the world of spirits that have a representative meaning. Sometimes an arm becomes visible there — a bare arm, possessing such tremendous strength that it could crush bone and pound one's deepest marrow more or less into oblivion. The arm strikes so much terror into the inhabitants that their hearts turn to water. And it actually does have the strength that it seems to have. ⁹

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