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Genesis第28章

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1 And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan.

2 Arise, go to Paddan-aram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father. And take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother's brother.

3 And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a company of peoples.

4 And give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee. That thou mayest inherit the land of thy sojournings, which God gave unto Abraham.

5 And Isaac sent away Jacob. And he went to Paddan-aram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother.

6 Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan-aram, to take him a wife from thence. And that as he blessed him he gave him a charge, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan.

7 And that Jacob obeyed his father and his mother, and was gone to Paddan-aram.

8 And Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father.

9 And Esau went unto Ishmael, and took, besides the wives that he had, Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael Abraham's son, the sister of Nebaioth, to be his wife.

10 And Jacob went out from Beer-sheba, and went toward Haran.

11 And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set. And he took one of the stones of the place, and put it under his head, and lay down in that place to sleep.

12 And he dreamed. And behold, a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God ascending and descending on it.

13 And, behold, Jehovah stood above it, and said, I am Jehovah, the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed.

14 And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. And in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

15 And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee, whithersoever thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land. For I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.

16 And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely Jehovah is in this place. And I knew it not.

17 And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.

18 And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put under his head, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it.

19 And he called the name of that place Beth-el. But the name of the city was Luz at the first.

20 And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on,

21 so that I come again to my father's house in peace, and Jehovah will be my God,

22 then this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God's house. And of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.

   

来自斯威登堡的著作

 

Arcana Coelestia#3688

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3688. 'The sister of Nebaioth, as a wife in addition to the wives he had' means an affection for celestial truth more internally. This is clear from the meaning of 'a sister' as intellectual or rational truth, dealt with in 1495, 2508, 2524, 2556, 3386; from the representation of 'Nebaioth' as the good that constitutes the spiritual Church, dealt with in 3268 - therefore 'the sister of Nebaioth' means the affection for celestial truth, or what amounts to the same, the affection for spiritual good; from the meaning of 'wives' or the daughters of Heth as affections for truth from a non-genuine source, dealt with in 3470, 3620-3622, 3686, and from the meaning of 'taking a wife' as being brought into association or joined together. From all these meanings it is evident that these words, together with those that come immediately before them, mean the joining together of the good represented by 'Esau' with truth from a Divine source, thus with the affection for celestial truth more internally.

[2] The actuality of these matters is indeed as stated already, yet they are of such a nature that they can hardly be understood at all as long as the most general features of the subject remain unknown. Furthermore they are the kind of things in which the world of today does not have any interest, for it is earthly things, not heavenly ones, in which it is interested, for the reason, as people even say, that they see and know earthly things, but they do not see or know the heavenly. Now because what is contained in the internal sense of the Word has to be not merely disclosed but also explained, let an example be taken to show what the expressions the truth of good, which 'Esau' represents, and the good of truth, which 'Jacob' represents, are used to mean. At the same time the example will clarify the point that until a person has been regenerated the good of truth in relation to the truth of good exists inversely, but after he has been regenerated they are joined together. This example will accordingly illustrate the matters stated so far.

[3] Take as our example the kind of person who can be regenerated; for the Lord foresees that he can be, and because He foresees it He also makes provision for it. At the outset while a young child he does not yet know what the works of charity towards the neighbour are, for he does not yet know what charity is or what the neighbour is. Consequently because he knows from the Word that one ought to give to the poor and that anyone who does so has his reward in heaven he helps beggars more than all others for he believes that these are the poor who are meant in the Word. He does not take into account the fact that the kind of people who beg on the streets for the most part lead godless and even criminal lives, despise everything associated with Divine worship, and surrender themselves completely to laziness and inactivity. Nonetheless a person in the first stages of regeneration helps those people with all his heart. These good actions are examples of the good which springs from external truth and with which his regeneration begins. The truth of good, which is more internal, flows accordingly into those actions, fashioning these as directed by the cognitions which the child knows?

[4] At a later stage however, when more enlightened, he is willing to do good to all he believes to be poor and needy, but he still makes scarcely any distinction between the godly poor and needy and the ungodly poor and needy. He believes that all are to be regarded and rated equally as the neighbour. But when he becomes more enlightened in these matters he does make a distinction and provides help only to the good and upright. He knows that providing help to the evil does harm to many, for by the aid and support these get he gives them the opportunity to harm others. At length when he is being regenerated he does not do good to any but the good and the godly, for at this point he is not stirred by an affection simply for the person he does good to but by the good itself residing with that person. And since the Lord is present within all good and godliness he accordingly bears witness also, through his affection towards what is good, to his love to the Lord. When he is at heart moved by charity such as this he can become regenerate.

[5] From this it is evident that in relation to this state his previous state was an inverse one, that is to say, he believed that to be good which was not in fact good. Nevertheless at the beginning of regeneration he still had to put into practice that which, though not in fact good, he believed to be so since what he knew went no further and since more interior good that flows from charity was not able to enter into any truth apart from that of which he actually knew. It is also evident that more interior good was always present and fashioning it, and this good could not have manifested itself previously until by means of cognitions he had been gradually enlightened about the nature of goods and truths. From this it is evident to some extent what is meant by the good of truth, which 'Jacob' represents here, what is meant by the truth of good, which 'Esau' represents, and that at first these exist inversely but subsequently are joined together.

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