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Genesis 1:20

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20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

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Arcana Coelestia #300

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300. As regards the first arcanum, that 'Jehovah God' is used to mean the Lord and at the same time heaven, it should be recognized that in the Word, always for some hidden reason, the Lord is sometimes called simply Jehovah, sometimes Jehovah God, sometimes Jehovah and God interchangeably, sometimes the Lord Jehovah, sometimes the God of Israel, and sometimes simply God. In Genesis 1, for example, where again an utterance is made in the plural, 'Let Us make man in Our image', God is the only name used. Not until the next chapter, where the celestial man is the subject, is He called Jehovah God-Jehovah, because He alone has Being and is Living, and so from His essence; God, because of His ability to accomplish all things, and so from His power, as is clear in the Word where the two names are used separately, Isaiah 49:4-5; 55:7; Psalms 18:2, 28, 30-31; Psalms 38:15. Consequently any angel or spirit who spoke to a person, or who people thought had the ability to accomplish something, they called God, as is clear in David,

God stands in the assembly of God, in the midst of the Gods will He judge. Psalms 82:1.

And elsewhere in David,

Who in the sky will be compared to Jehovah? Who will be likened to Jehovah among the sons of gods? Psalms 89:6.

And elsewhere in the same,

Confess the God of Gods; confess the Lord of lords. Psalms 136:2-3

It is from power that even men are called 'gods', as in Psalms 82:6; John 10:34-35. And Moses is spoken of as 'a god to Pharaoh', Exodus 7:1. And this also is why [in Hebrew] the word for God, Elohim, is plural. But because angels have no power whatsoever from themselves, as they themselves also confess, but from the Lord only, and as there is but one God, Jehovah God is therefore used in the Word to mean the Lord alone. Yet when anything is accomplished through the ministry of angels He is spoken of in the plural, as in Genesis 1. In the present chapter too, since a celestial man, as man, did not bear comparison with the Lord, but with angels, it is therefore said that 'the man has become as one of Us in knowing good and evil', that is, become someone wise and having intelligence.

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

Van Swedenborgs Werken

 

Arcana Coelestia #7996

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7996. 'No son of a foreigner shall eat it' means that those not in possession of truth and good are set apart from them. This is clear from the meaning of 'a foreigner' as those who are outside the Church and unreceptive of anything of the truth or good of faith, as the nations in the land of Canaan were, dealt with in 2049, 2115, thus those who are not in possession of truth and good; and from the meaning of 'not eating it' as not having any contact with them or being joined to them, thus being set apart from them. The verses immediately following deal with those who shall eat the Passover together and those who shall not eat it. The Passover was a supper, representing the groups of good people living in association with one another in heaven. The statutes in the verses that follow indicate who exactly could be included and who could not. In general the banquets within the Church in ancient times, both midday meals and suppers, were held in order that people might be brought into association with one another and joined together in love, and in order that they might inform one another about matters of love and faith, and so about the things of heaven, see 3596, 3832, 5161. Such were the delights surrounding feasts in those times, and they were the end in view in holding midday meals and suppers. People's minds were thereby nourished, and also their bodies in a parallel and corresponding way. As a result they enjoyed good health and long life, they received intelligence and wisdom, and they were also brought into communication with heaven, some into open communication with angels. But as in course of time all internal things disappear and give way to external ones, so it is with the ends to which banquets and feasts are held. At the present day these are held not to draw people together into any spiritual fellowship but to create worldly connections. That is to say, they are held for the sake of material gain, the quest for high office, and mere pleasures. They provide nourishment for the body, but none for the mind.

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