Apocalypse Revealed # 379
379. "And made their robes white in the blood of the Lamb." This symbolically means, and by truths have purified those religious beliefs from the falsities accompanying evil, and so have been reformed by the Lord.
Some evils are evils that accompany falsity, and some falsities are falsities that accompany evil. Evils that accompany falsity are found among people who, in accord with their religion, believe that evils do not condemn, provided they orally confess that they are sinners. And falsities that accompany evil are found among people who justify the evils they harbor.
As in no. 378 above, robes here symbolize general truths drawn from the Word, which constitute the people's religious beliefs. They are said to have made their robes white in the blood of the Lamb because the color white is predicated of truths (nos. 167, 231, 232), meaning therefore that they used truths to purify their falsities.
This symbolically means also that thus they were reformed by the Lord, because all who have fought against evils in the world and have believed in the Lord are, after their departure from the world, taught by the Lord and led by truths away from the falsities of their religion. And so they are reformed. That is because people who refrain from evils as being sins possess goodness of life, and goodness of life desires truths, and acknowledges and accepts them. But this is never the case with evil of life.
People believe that the blood of the Lamb here and elsewhere in the Word symbolizes the Lord's suffering of the cross. But the suffering of the cross was the final temptation or trial by which the Lord completely overcame the hells and fully glorified His humanity. By these two means He saved mankind (see The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Lord, nos. 12-14, 15-17, and also no. 67 above). Moreover, because by His suffering of the cross the Lord fully glorified His humanity, which is to say, made it Divine, therefore nothing else can be meant by His flesh and blood but the Divinity in Him and emanating from Him - His flesh meaning the Divine goodness of His Divine love, and His blood meaning the Divine truth emanating from that goodness.
[2] Blood is mentioned many times in the Word, and everywhere it symbolizes, in the spiritual sense, either the Lord's Divine truth, which is the same as the Divine truth of the Word, or in an opposite sense, the Divine truth of the Word falsified or profaned, as can be seen from the following passages.
First, that blood symbolizes the Lord's Divine truth or the Divine truth of the Word can be seen from these passages:
Blood was called the blood of the covenant, and a covenant conjoins, a conjunction that the Lord accomplishes by His Divine truth. So, for example, in Zechariah:
By the blood of your covenant, I will set your prisoners free from the pit... (Zechariah 9:11)
After Moses read the Book of the Law in the hearing of the people, he sprinkled half the blood on the people and said,
This is the blood of the covenant which Jehovah has made with you in accordance with all these words. (Exodus 24:3-8)
Moreover,
(Jesus) took the cup..., and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you. ...this is My blood, the blood of the new covenant... (Matthew 26:27-28, cf. Mark 14:24, Luke 22:20)
The blood of the new covenant or testament symbolizes nothing else than the Word, which is called a covenant or testament - the Old Covenant or Testament, and the New Covenant or Testament - thus symbolizing the Divine truth in it.
[3] Since blood has this symbolic meaning, the Lord therefore gave His disciples wine, saying, "This is My blood" - wine symbolizing Divine truth (no. 316). Wine is also on that account called "the blood of grapes" (Genesis 49:11, Deuteronomy 32:14).
This is still further apparent from these words of the Lord:
Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you will have no life in you... For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. (John 6:53-56).
It is clearly apparent that blood here means Divine truth, because the text says that he who drinks has life, and abides in the Lord, and the Lord in him. This is the effect of Divine truth and a life in accordance with it, and an effect confirmed by the Holy Supper, as everyone in the church may know.
[4] Since blood symbolizes the Lord's Divine truth, which is the same as the Divine truth of the Word, and this is the essence of the Old and New Covenants or Testaments, therefore blood was the holiest representative symbol in the Israelite Church, in which every single thing corresponded to something spiritual. So, for example, the people were to take some of the blood of the paschal lamb and put it on the doorposts and lintel of their houses to keep the plague from coming upon them (Exodus 12:7, 13, 22). The blood of the burnt offering was to be sprinkled on the altar, at the base of the altar, on Aaron and his sons, and on their vestments (Exodus 29:12, 16, 20-21).
[5] The blood of the Lamb has a like symbolism in the following verses in the book of Revelation:
...war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon... And they overcame it by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony... (Revelation 12:7, 11)
For no one can think that Michael and his angels overcame the dragon with anything other than the Lord's Divine truth in the Word. Angels in heaven, indeed, cannot think of any blood, nor do they think of the Lord's suffering, but of His Divine truth and resurrection. Consequently, when a person thinks about the Lord's blood, angels perceive His Divine truth, and when a person thinks about the Lord's suffering, they perceive His glorification, and then only His resurrection. I have been granted to know the reality of this by much experience.
[6] That blood symbolizes Divine truth is apparent also from these verses in the book of Psalms:
(God) will save the souls of the needy... Precious shall be their blood in His sight. And they shall live, and He will give them the gold of Sheba. (Psalms 72:13-15)
The blood, precious in the sight of God, stands for Divine truth among those people. The gold of Sheba is the resulting wisdom.
In Ezekiel:
Gather together... to My great sacrifice... on the mountains of Israel, that you may eat flesh and drink blood. You shall... drink the blood of the princes of the earth... You shall... drink blood till you are drunk at My sacrifice which I am sacrificing for you... (Thus) I will set My glory among the nations. (Ezekiel 39:17-21)
Blood here does not mean blood, because the statement is that they will drink the blood of the princes of the earth and that they will drink blood till they are drunk. But the true meaning of the word emerges when blood is understood to mean Divine truth. The subject there, too, is the Lord's church, which He would establish among gentiles.
[7] Second, that blood symbolizes Divine truth can be clearly seen from its opposite meaning, in which it symbolizes the Divine truth of the Word falsified or profaned, as is apparent from these passages:
He who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed, and shuts his eyes from seeing evil... (Isaiah 33:15)
You shall destroy those who speak falsehood; Jehovah abhors the bloody and deceitful man. (Psalms 5:6)
...everyone recorded for life in Jerusalem, when the Lord has... rinsed away (her) blood... from her midst, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of purification. (Isaiah 4:3-4)
...on the day you were born... I saw you trampled in your blood, and I said to you in your blood, "Live!" ...I washed you and rinsed away the blood upon you... (Ezekiel 16:5-6, 9, 22, 36, 38)
They wandered blind in the streets; they have defiled themselves with blood, and what they cannot touch, they touch with their garments. (Lamentations 4:13-14)
The garment is polluted with blood. (Isaiah 9:5)
Also on your skirts is found the blood of the souls of the innocent... (Jeremiah 2:34)
Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; put away the evil of your doings... (Isaiah 1:15-16)
...your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken a lie... They make haste to shed innocent blood. (Isaiah 59:3, 7)
...Jehovah is coming out... to visit the iniquity... of the earth; then the earth will disclose her blood... (Isaiah 26:21)
...as many as received Him, to them He gave the ability to be children of God..., who were born, not of blood... (John 1:12-13)
In (Babylon) was found the blood of prophets and saints... (Revelation 18:24)
...the sea... became as the blood of a dead man... ...the springs of water... became blood. (Revelation 16:3-4. Cf. Isaiah 15:9, Psalms 105:29)
The like is symbolized by the rivers, ponds, and pools of water in Egypt being turned into blood (Exodus 7:15-25).
...the moon (shall be turned) into blood, before the coming of the great... day of Jehovah. (Joel 2:31)
...the moon became... blood. (Revelation 6:12)
In these places and many others, blood symbolizes the truth of the Word falsified, and also profaned. But this can be seen more clearly when these passages in the Word are read in context.
So, then, since blood in an opposite sense symbolizes the truth of the Word falsified or profaned, it is apparent that blood in a true sense symbolizes the truth of the Word not falsified.
John 5
1
After these things, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
2
Now in Jerusalem by the sheep gate, there is a pool, which is called in Hebrew, "Bethesda," having five porches.
3
In these lay a great multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, or paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water;
4
for an angel went down at certain times into the pool, and stirred up the water. Whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was made whole of whatever disease he had.
5
A certain man was there, who had been sick for thirty-eight years.
6
When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had been sick for a long time, he asked him, "Do you want to be made well?"
7
The sick man answered him, "Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I'm coming, another steps down before me."
8
Jesus said to him, "Arise, take up your mat, and walk."
9
Immediately, the man was made well, and took up his mat and walked. Now it was the Sabbath on that day.
10
So the Jews said to him who was cured, "It is the Sabbath. It is not lawful for you to carry the mat."
11
He answered them, "He who made me well, the same said to me, 'Take up your mat, and walk.'"
12
Then they asked him, "Who is the man who said to you, 'Take up your mat, and walk'?"
13
But he who was healed didn't know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, a crowd being in the place.
14
Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, "Behold, you are made well. Sin no more, so that nothing worse happens to you."
15
The man went away, and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
16
For this cause the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill him, because he did these things on the Sabbath.
17
But Jesus answered them, "My Father is still working, so I am working, too."
18
For this cause therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also called God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
19
Jesus therefore answered them, "Most certainly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing. For whatever things he does, these the Son also does likewise.
20
For the Father has affection for the Son, and shows him all things that he himself does. He will show him greater works than these, that you may marvel.
21
For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom he desires.
22
For the Father judges no one, but he has given all judgment to the Son,
23
that all may honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He who doesn't honor the Son doesn't honor the Father who sent him.
24
"Most certainly I tell you, he who hears my word, and believes him who sent me, has eternal life, and doesn't come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.
25
Most certainly, I tell you, the hour comes, and now is, when the dead will hear the Son of God's voice; and those who hear will live.
26
For as the Father has life in himself, even so he gave to the Son also to have life in himself.
27
He also gave him authority to execute judgment, because he is a son of man.
28
Don't marvel at this, for the hour comes, in which all that are in the tombs will hear his voice,
29
and will come out; those who have done good, to the resurrection of life; and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment.
30
I can of myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is righteous; because I don't seek my own will, but the will of my Father who sent me.
31
"If I testify about myself, my witness is not valid.
32
It is another who testifies about me. I know that the testimony which he testifies about me is true.
33
You have sent to John, and he has testified to the truth.
34
But the testimony which I receive is not from man. However, I say these things that you may be saved.
35
He was the burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light.
36
But the testimony which I have is greater than that of John, for the works which the Father gave me to accomplish, the very works that I do, testify about me, that the Father has sent me.
37
The Father himself, who sent me, has testified about me. You have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his form.
38
You don't have his word living in you; because you don't believe him whom he sent.
39
"You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and these are they which testify about me.
40
Yet you will not come to me, that you may have life.
41
I don't receive glory from men.
42
But I know you, that you don't have God's love in yourselves.
43
I have come in my Father's name, and you don't receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.
44
How can you believe, who receive glory from one another, and you don't seek the glory that comes from the only God?
45
"Don't think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you, even Moses, on whom you have set your hope.
46
For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote about me.
47
But if you don't believe his writings, how will you believe my words?"
