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Genesis第43章

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1 Now the land was in bitter need of food.

2 And when the grain which they had got in Egypt was all used up, their father said to them, Go again and get us a little food.

3 And Judah said to him, The man said to us with an oath, You are not to come before me again without your brother.

4 If you will let our brother go with us, we will go down and get food:

5 But if you will not send him, we will not go down: for the man said to us, You are not to come before me if your brother is not with you.

6 And Israel said, Why were you so cruel to me as to say to him that you had a brother?

7 And they said, The man put a number of questions to us about ourselves and our family, saying, Is your father still living? have you another brother? And we had to give him answers; how were we to have any idea that he would say, Come back with your brother?

8 Then Judah said to Israel, his father, Send the boy with me, and let us be up and going, so that we and you and our little ones may not come to destruction.

9 Put him into my care and make me responsible for him: if I do not give him safely back to you, let mine be the sin for ever.

10 Truly, if we had not let the time go by, we might have come back again by now.

11 Then their father Israel said to them, If it has to be so, then do this: take of the best fruits of the land in your vessels to give the man, perfumes and honey and spices and nuts:

12 And take twice as much money with you; that is to say, take back the money which was put in your bags, for it may have been an error;

13 And take your brother and go back to the man:

14 And may God, the Ruler of all, give you mercy before the man, so that he may give you back your other brother and Benjamin. If my children are to be taken from me; there is no help for it.

15 So they took what their father said for the man, and twice as much money in their hands, and Benjamin, and went on their journey to Egypt, and came before Joseph.

16 And when Joseph saw Benjamin, he said to his chief servant, Take these men into my house, and make ready a meal, for they will take food with me in the middle of the day.

17 And the servant did as Joseph said, and took the men into Joseph's house.

18 Now the men were full of fear because they had been taken into Joseph's house and they said, It is because of the money which was put back in our bags the first time; he is looking for something against us, so that he may come down on us and take us and our asses for his use.

19 So they went up to Joseph's chief servant at the door of the house,

20 And said, O my lord, we only came down the first time to get food;

21 And when we came to our night's resting-place, on opening our bags we saw that every man's money was in the mouth of his bag, all our money in full weight: and we have it with us to give it back;

22 As well as more money, with which to get food: we have no idea who put our money in our bags.

23 Then the servant said, Peace be with you: have no fear: your God, even the God of your father, has put wealth in your bags for you: I had your money. Then he let Simeon come out to them.

24 And the servant took them into Joseph's house, and gave them water for washing their feet; and he gave their asses food.

25 And they got ready the things for Joseph before he came in the middle of the day: for word was given to them that they were to have a meal there.

26 And when Joseph came in, they gave him the things which they had for him, and went down to the earth before him.

27 And he said, How are you? is your father well, the old man of whom you were talking to me? is he still living?

28 And they said, Your servant, our father, is well, he is still living. And they went down on their faces before him.

29 Then, lifting up his eyes, he saw Benjamin, his brother, his mother's son, and he said, Is this your youngest brother of whom you gave me word? And he said, God be good to you, my son.

30 Then Joseph's heart went out to his brother, and he went quickly into his room, for he was overcome with weeping.

31 Then, after washing his face, he came out, and controlling his feelings said, Put food before us.

32 And they put a meal ready for him by himself, and for them by themselves, and for the Egyptians who were with him by themselves; because the Egyptians may not take food with the Hebrews, for that would make them unclean.

33 And they were all given their seats before him in order of birth, from the oldest to the youngest: so that they were looking at one another in wonder.

34 And Joseph sent food to them from his table, but he sent five times as much to Benjamin as to any of the others. And they took wine freely with him.

   

来自斯威登堡的著作

 

Arcana Coelestia#5704

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5704. 'The firstborn according to his birthright, and the youngest according to his youth' means in conformity with the order truths take beneath good. This is clear from the meaning of 'taking seats according to birthright, and according to youth' as in conformity with the order truths take beneath good. The sons of Israel represent the truths known to the Church existing in their proper order, see the explanation at Chapters 29, 30 of Genesis, and therefore taking their seats according to their order of birth means in conformity with the order truths take. But the truths known to the Church, which 'the sons of Israel' represent, do not come to be arranged into any kind of proper order except through Christian good, that is, through the good of charity towards the neighbour and of love to the Lord. For good has the Lord within it, and therefore has heaven within it. Good consequently has life within it, making it a force that is active and filled with life. But truth devoid of good cannot possibly have any life within it. Good arranges truths into order in keeping with itself, as is quite evident from every kind of love, including self-love and love of the world, and so such love as gives rise to vengeance, hatred, and other evils like these. People governed by those loves call evil good because they take delight in evil. This so-called good of theirs imposes a certain kind of order on those falsities which to them are truths - a kind of order that enables these falsities to lend support to it, till at length all those falsities, which they call truths, are arranged into an order that becomes a sequence of false beliefs. But this order is the kind of order that exists in hell, whereas the order in which truths are ranged beneath the good of heavenly love is the kind that exists in heaven. This also explains why a person with whom the latter kind of order resides, that is, a person who has been regenerated, is called a miniature heaven and also is heaven in the smallest form of all that it can take; for his interiors correspond to the heavens.

[2] The fact that good is what brings order to truths is evident from order as it exists in the heavens. All the communities there are ranged in conformity with the order in which truths that are received from the Lord exist beneath good. For [in His own Being] the Lord is nothing else than Divine Good, while Divine Truth, which does not exist within Him, goes forth from Him. And it is in conformity with this Divine Truth ranged beneath Divine Good that all the communities of heaven have been arranged into order. As regards the Lord's being nothing else than Divine Love whereas Divine Truth does not exist within Him but goes forth from Him, this can be illustrated by a comparison made with the sun of this world. The sun is nothing else than fire, while its light does not exist within it but goes forth from it. What is more, objects in the world dependent on light, such as plants, are subject to the order imparted to them by the heat that goes forth from the fire of the sun and exists within the light of the sun, as is evident in springtime and summertime. For since the Whole natural order is a theatre representative of the Lord's kingdom, so is this whole situation involving the sun representative. The sun represents the Lord; its fire represents His Divine Love; the heat from it represents the good that flows from this Love, and its light the truths that constitute faith. And since they have these representations, 'the sun' is also used in the spiritual sense of the Word to mean the Lord, 1053, 1521, 1529-1531, 3636, 3643, 4321 (end), 5097, 5377, 'fire' to mean love, 934, 4906, 5071, 5215, so that the sun's fire in a representative sense is Divine Love, while the heat from that fire is good flowing from Divine love. As regards 'light' meaning truth, see 2776, 3138, 3190, 3195, 3222, 3339, 3636, 3643, 3862, 3993, 4302, 4409, 4413, 4415, 4526, 5219, 5400.

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