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Ezekiel第37章

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1 The hand of the Lord had been on me, and he took me out in the spirit of the Lord and put me down in the middle of the valley; and it was full of bones;

2 And he made me go past them round about: and I saw that there was a very great number of them on the face of the wide valley, and they were very dry.

3 And he said to me, Son of man, is it possible for these bones to come to life? And I made answer, and said, It is for you to say, O Lord.

4 And again he said to me, Be a prophet to these bones, and say to them, O you dry bones, give ear to the word of the Lord.

5 This is what the Lord has said to these bones: See, I will make breath come into you so that you may come to life;

6 And I will put muscles on you and make flesh come on you, and put skin over you, and breath into you, so that you may have life; and you will be certain that I am the Lord.

7 So I gave the word as I was ordered: and at my words there was a shaking of the earth, and the bones came together, bone to bone.

8 And looking I saw that there were muscles on them and flesh came up, and they were covered with skin: but there was no breath in them.

9 And he said to me, Be a prophet to the wind, be a prophet, son of man, and say to the wind, The Lord has said: Come from the four winds, O wind, breathing on these dead so that they may Come to life.

10 And I gave the word at his orders, and breath came into them, and they came to life and got up on their feet, a very great army.

11 Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are all the children of Israel: and see, they are saying, Our bones have become dry our hope is gone, we are cut off completely.

12 For this cause be a prophet to them, and say, This is what the Lord has said: See, I am opening the resting-places of your dead, and I will make you come up out of your resting-places, O my people; and I will take you into the land of Israel.

13 And you will be certain that I am the Lord by my opening the resting-places of your dead and making you come up out of your resting-places, O my people.

14 And I will put my spirit in you, so that you may come to life, and I will give you a rest in your land: and you will be certain that I the Lord have said it and have done it, says the Lord.

15 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

16 And you, son of man, take one stick, writing on it, For Judah and for the children of Israel who are in his company: then take another stick, writing on it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and all the children of Israel who are in his company:

17 Then, joining them one to another, make them one stick, so that they may be one in your hand.

18 And when the children of your people say to you, Will you not make clear to us what these things have to do with us?

19 Then say to them, This is what the Lord has said: See, I am taking the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel who are in his company; and I will put it on the stick of Judah and make them one stick, and they will be one in my hand.

20 And the sticks with your writing on them will be in your hand before their eyes.

21 And say to them, These are the words of the Lord: See, I am taking the children of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and will get them together on every side, and take them into their land:

22 And I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel; and one king will be king over them all: and they will no longer be two nations, and will no longer be parted into two kingdoms:

23 And they will no longer make themselves unclean with their images or with their hated things or with any of their sins: but I will give them salvation from all their turning away in which they have done evil, and will make them clean; and they will be to me a people, and I will be to them a God.

24 And my servant David will be king over them; and they will all have one keeper: and they will be guided by my orders and will keep my rules and do them.

25 And they will be living in the land which I gave to Jacob, my servant, in which your fathers were living; and they will go on living there, they and their children and their children's children, for ever: and David, my servant, will be their ruler for ever.

26 And I will make an agreement of peace with them: it will be an eternal agreement with them: and I will have mercy on them and make their numbers great, and will put my holy place among them for ever.

27 And my House will be over them; and I will be to them a God, and they will be to me a people.

28 And the nations will be certain that I who make Israel holy am the Lord, when my holy place is among them for ever.

   

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Arcana Coelestia#2973

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2973. 'Which was in all its borders round about' means exterior cognitions. This is clear from the meaning of 'borders' and of 'round about' as things that are exterior, dealt with in 2936. Thus here '[every] tree which was in the borders round about' means exterior cognitions. Exterior cognitions have to do with the religious observances and matters of doctrine which constitute the external things of the Church, whereas interior cognitions have to do with matters of doctrine which constitute the internal things of the Church. What the external things of the Church are, and what the internal, has been stated several times already.

[2] Furthermore in various places in the Word mention is made of the middle or the midst and of the regions encircling it, as when the land of Canaan is referred to, 'the middle' is used to describe where Zion and Jerusalem are, while the areas encircling describe where the nations are who are round about. 'The land of Canaan' represented the Lord's kingdom, 'Zion' the celestial part of it and 'Jerusalem' the spiritual, and there Jehovah or the Lord had His dwelling-place. The things that were round about, even to the borders, represented celestial and spiritual things spread out and derived in order from there. Where the furthest boundaries lay, there the representatives of celestial and spiritual things ended. Those representatives had their origin in the things that existed in the Lord's kingdom in heaven, where the Lord as the Sun is in the middle, from where all celestial flame and spiritual light radiate. Those nearest to Him dwell in the brightest light, while those who are more remote dwell in less light, and those who are the most remote in the least bright. At this point lie the borders where hell, which is outside heaven, begins.

[3] With celestial flame and spiritual light the position is that the existence of celestial things which are forms of innocence and love, and spiritual things which are forms of charity and faith, is proportional to the heat and light that is received, for those things are the source of all heat and light in heaven. This then is why 'the middle' means that which is inmost, and the encircling regions that which is outermost; and the spacing of the things that radiate in order from the inmost to the outermost is determined by their degree of innocence, love and charity. It is similar with each individual community of heaven. Those members in the middle are the best of its kind, and the love and charity of that kind becomes correspondingly less as these become more remote, that is, as such love and charity exist with members away from the middle.

[4] It is also similar with man. The inmost part of him is where the Lord resides with him, and from there governs the outlying parts. When a person permits the Lord to bring order to the outlying parts so that these correspond to the inmost parts, his state is such that he can be received into heaven, and the inmost, the interior, and the external parts of him act as one. But if the person does not permit the Lord to bring order to those outlying parts so that they correspond, he moves away from heaven, as far away as he is from permitting the Lord to bring that order to them. The fact that man's soul resides in the middle or inmost part of his being and the body in the outlying region or outermost parts is well known, for the body is that which surrounds and clothes his soul or spirit.

[5] With those in whom celestial and spiritual love reigns, good from the Lord flows in by way of the soul into the body, as a consequence of which the body becomes full of light, but with those in whom bodily and worldly love reigns, good from the Lord cannot flow in by way of the soul into the body. Instead their interiors are engulfed in darkness, as a consequence of which the body too becomes full of darkness, according to the Lord's own teaching in Matthew,

The lamp of the body is the eye. If the eye is sound, the whole body is full of light. If the eye is evil, the whole body is full of darkness. If therefore the light is darkness, how great is the darkness! Matthew 6:22-23.

'The eye' means the understanding part, which belongs in the soul, 2701.

[6] But matters are worse still with people whose interiors are 'darkness' while their exteriors seem to be 'full of light'. They are such as outwardly pretend to be angels of light but inwardly they are devils. They are referred to as 'Babel'. These people, when the things that are round about are destroyed, are carried headfirst into hell. This was represented by the city of Jericho whose walls fell down, and the city was given to destruction, after the priests had gone round it seven times with the ark, and had sounded their trumpets, Joshua 6:1-17. The same is meant in Jeremiah,

Set yourselves against Babel round about, all you who bend the bow. Raise a shout over her round about, she has given her hand, her foundations have fallen, her walls have been destroyed. Jeremiah 50:14-15.

From this it is now evident what 'round about' means. Reference is also made several times in the Word to 'the encircling regions', as in Jeremiah 21:14; 46:14; 49:5; Ezekiel 36:3-4, 7; 37:21; Amos 3:11; and elsewhere. By 'the encircling regions' is meant the things that are exterior, concerning which, in the Lord's Divine mercy, more will be said elsewhere.

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