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Exodus 30

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1 And thou shalt make an altar for the burning of incense: of acacia-wood shalt thou make it;

2 a cubit the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof -- square shall it be; and two cubits its height; of itself shall be its horns.

3 And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, the top thereof, and the sides thereof round about, and the horns thereof; and thou shalt make upon it a border of gold round about.

4 And two rings of gold shalt thou make for it under its border; by its two corners shalt thou make [them], on the two sides thereof; and they shall be for receptacles for the staves, with which to carry it.

5 And thou shalt make the staves of acacia-wood, and overlay them with gold.

6 And thou shalt put it in front of the veil which is before the ark of the testimony in front of the mercy-seat which is over the testimony, where I will meet with thee.

7 And Aaron shall burn thereon fragrant incense: every morning, when he dresseth the lamps, he shall burn the incense.

8 And when Aaron lighteth the lamps between the two evenings, he shall burn the incense -- a continual incense before Jehovah throughout your generations.

9 Ye shall offer up no strange incense thereon, nor burnt-offering, nor oblation; neither shall ye pour drink-offering thereon.

10 And Aaron shall make atonement for its horns once in the year: with the blood of the sin-offering of atonement shall he make atonement for it, once in the year, throughout your generations: it is most holy to Jehovah.

11 And Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying,

12 When thou shalt take the sum of the children of Israel according to those of them that are numbered, then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul to Jehovah on their being numbered, that there be no plague among them on their being numbered.

13 This shall they give -- every one that passeth among them that are numbered -- half a shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary, -- twenty gerahs the shekel; a half shekel shall be the heave-offering for Jehovah.

14 Every one that passeth among those that are numbered, from twenty years old and above, shall give the heave-offering of Jehovah.

15 The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel, when ye give the heave-offering of Jehovah, to make atonement for your souls.

16 And thou shalt take the atonement-money of the children of Israel, and devote it to the service of the tent of meeting; and it shall be a memorial to the children of Israel before Jehovah, to make atonement for your souls.

17 And Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying,

18 Thou shalt also make a laver of copper, and its stand of copper, for washing; and thou shalt put it between the tent of meeting and the altar, and shalt put water in it.

19 And Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet out of it.

20 When they go into the tent of meeting, they shall wash with water, that they may not die; or when they come near to the altar to serve, to burn an offering by fire to Jehovah.

21 And they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they may not die; and it shall be an everlasting statute for them, for him and for his seed throughout their generations.

22 And Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying,

23 And thou, take best spices -- of liquid myrrh five hundred [shekels], and of sweet cinnamon the half -- two hundred and fifty, and of sweet myrtle two hundred and fifty,

24 and of cassia five hundred, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of olive oil a hin;

25 and make of it an oil of holy ointment, a perfume of perfumery after the work of the perfumer: it shall be the holy anointing oil.

26 And thou shalt anoint the tent of meeting with it, and the ark of the testimony,

27 and the table and all its utensils, and the lamp-stand and its utensils, and the altar of incense,

28 and the altar of burnt-offering and all its utensils, and the laver and its stand.

29 And thou shalt hallow them, that they may be most holy: whatever toucheth them shall be holy.

30 And Aaron and his sons thou shalt anoint, and shalt hallow them, that they may serve me as priests.

31 And thou shalt speak to the children of Israel, saying, A holy anointing oil shall this be unto me throughout your generations.

32 Upon man's flesh shall it not be poured, neither shall ye make [any] like it, after the preparation of it: it is holy -- holy shall it be unto you.

33 Whoever compoundeth [any] like it, or whoever putteth [any] of it upon any strange thing, shall be cut off from his peoples.

34 And Jehovah said to Moses, Take fragrant drugs -- stacte, and onycha, and galbanum -- fragrant drugs and pure frankincense; in like proportions shall it be.

35 And thou shalt make it into incense, a perfume, after the work of the perfumer, salted, pure, holy.

36 And thou shalt beat [some] of it to powder, and put [some] of it before the testimony in the tent of meeting, where I will meet with thee: it shall be unto you most holy.

37 And the incense that thou shalt make, ye shall not make for yourselves according to the proportions of it; it shall be unto thee holy to Jehovah.

38 Whoever maketh like unto it, to smell it, shall be cut off from his peoples.

   

Commentaar

 

Priests

  

'Priests' represent the Lord regarding His divine good. When they do not acknowledge the Lord, they do not signify the Lord.

(Referenties: Apocalypse Revealed 854; Arcana Coelestia 3670)

Van Swedenborgs Werken

 

Arcana Coelestia #3660

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3660. 'And blessed him' means that this good was accordingly joined [to the rational]. This is clear from the meaning of 'being blessed' as being joined to, dealt with in 3504, 3514, 3530, 3565, 3584. The reason why Isaac the father now blessed Jacob his son [a second time] - even though the latter had come to him deceitfully and had taken the blessing that was Esau's, an action that had made Isaac tremble, as is evident from verses 27:33, 35 of the previous chapter - is that he now perceived it was to be Jacob's descendants, not Esau's, who were to have possession of the land of Canaan. It was on account of this perception that the blessing was re-affirmed by Isaac. The deceit which had made Isaac tremble however meant and foretold the false impression which that nation would give in regard to representatives. That is to say, there was nothing in the least genuine or from the heart in its representation of the Divine or the heavenly things of the Lord's kingdom. Thus that nation was not at all like the Ancient Church but was interested only in things that were external separated from anything internal. Nor indeed did their interest end there, for they fell away so many times into plain idolatry.

[2] But what the expression being joined to, or conjunction, describes, meant in the internal sense by 'being blessed', has been stated already, namely this: Both the good and the truth of the natural were to be linked to the rational, or what amounts to the same, the external man to the internal. For to make His Natural Divine, the Lord imparted such good and truth to it as could correspond to the good and truth of the Divine Rational. Unless goods and truths in the one correspond to those in the other no conjunction is possible. The goods and truths of the natural, that is, those proper to the natural man, are countless, so countless that a person can hardly know the most general kinds of them, though when natural good and truth are referred to these are seen by him as a simple whole; for the entire natural, and everything there, is nothing else. This being so one may see that goods and truths of the natural exist which are able to accommodate the goods and truths of the rational, and goods and truths of the natural exist which are not able to do so; consequently that goods and truths of the natural exist which, by means of correspondence, are able to be linked to the goods and truths of the rational. It is the latter that are referred to in this chapter and those that follow.

[3] The ability to know those goods and truths and to distinguish one from another, and also to see the nature of them and so to see how suited they are for conjunction, can hardly exist in anyone as long as he does not think from what is interior, that is, from the enlightenment provided by the light of heaven. For at this time such things seem to him to be both obscure and joyless. But such things are nevertheless suited to the mental grasp and understanding of angels, and also to the mental grasp of spirits; for their thoughts are not interspersed with concerns about worldly, bodily, and earthly things, as they had been previously when they lived as men in the world. They - that is to say, angels and spirits - receive the delight of intelligence and the blessedness of wisdom when they have such things from the internal sense of the Word. Indeed the Divine is in that case shining on them, for in the highest sense the Lord is the subject, and in the representative sense the Church and regeneration. They come consequently within the Divine sphere of the Lord and of His ends and purposes.

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