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Exodus第3章

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1 Now Moses fed the sheep of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Madian: and he drove the flock to the inner parts of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, Horeb.

2 And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he saw that the bush was on fire and was not burnt.

3 And Moses said: I will go and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

4 And when the Lord saw that he went forward to see, he called to him out of the midst of the bush, and said: Moses, Moses. And he answered: Here I am.

5 And he said: Come not nigh hither, put off the shoes from thy feet: for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

6 And he said: I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Moses hid his face: for he durst not look at God.

7 And the Lord said to him: I have seen the affliction of my people in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of the rigour of them that are over the works:

8 And knowing their sorrow, I am come down to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians, and to bring them out of that land into a good and spacious land, into a land that floweth with milk and honey, to the places of the Chanaanite, and Hethite, and Amorrhite, and Pherezite, and Hevite, and Jebusite.

9 For the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have seen their affliction, wherewith they are oppressed by the Egyptians.

10 But come, and I will send thee to Pharao, that thou mayst bring forth my people, the children of Israel out of Egypt.

11 And Moses said to God: Who am I that I should go to Pharao, and should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?

12 And he said to him: I will be with thee: and this thou shalt have for a sign, that I have sent thee: When thou shalt have brought my people out of Egypt, thou shalt offer sacrifice to God upon this mountain.

13 Moses said to God: Lo, I shall go to the children of Israel, and say to them: The God of your fathers hath sent me to you. If they should say to me: What is his name? what shall I say to them?

14 God said to Moses: I AM WHO AM. He said: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: HE WHO IS, hath sent me to you.

15 And God said again to Moses: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me to you: This is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.

16 Go, gather together the ancients of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath appeared to me, saying: Visiting I have visited you: and I have seen all that hath befallen you in Egypt.

17 And I have said the word to bring you forth out of the affliction of Egypt, into the land of the Chanaanite, the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and Pherezite, and Hevite, and Jebusite, to a land that floweth with milk and honey.

18 And they shall hear thy voice: and thou shalt go in, thou and the ancients of Israel, to the king of Egypt, and thou shalt say to him: The Lord God of the Hebrews hath called us: we will go three days' journey into the wilderness, to sacrifice unto The Lord our God.

19 But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go, but by a mighty hand.

20 For I will stretch forth my hand and will strike Egypt with all my wonders which I will do in the midst of them: after these he will let you go.

21 And I will give favour to this people, in the sight of the Egyptians: and when you go forth, you shall not depart empty:

22 But every woman shall ask of her neighbour, and of her that is in her house, vessels of silver and of gold, and raiment: and you shall put them on your sons and daughters, and shall spoil Egypt.

   

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Apocalypse Revealed#468

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468. And his feet like pillars of fire. This symbolizes the Lord's Divinity on the natural plane in respect to His Divine love, which sustains all things.

This, too, is apparent, from the explanation in no. 49 above, where it is said of the Son of Man that "His feet were like fine brass, as though fired in a furnace."

The angel's feet looked like pillars of fire because the Lord's Divinity on the natural plane - which fundamentally is the Divine humanity that He took on in the world - supports His Divinity from eternity, as the body does the soul, and likewise as the Word's natural meaning supports its spiritual and celestial meanings, on which subject see The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Sacred Scripture, nos. 27-49. To be shown that feet symbolize something natural, see no. 49, and a pillar something that supports, no. 191.

Fire symbolizes love because spiritual fire is nothing else. Therefore it is customary in worship to pray that heavenly fire, that is to say, heavenly love, may kindle the worshipers' hearts. People know that there is a correspondence between fire and love from the fact that a person grows warm with love, and cold with its loss. Nothing else produces vital warmth but love, in both senses. The origin of these correspondences is owing to the existence of two suns, one in the heavens, which is pure love, and the other in the world, which is nothing but fire. This, too, is the reason for the correspondence between all spiritual and natural things.

[2] Since fire symbolizes Divine love, therefore on Mount Horeb Jehovah appeared to Moses in a bush on fire (Exodus 3:1-3). Moreover He descended upon Mount Sinai in fire (Deuteronomy 4:36). For this reason, too, the seven lamps of the lampstand in the Tabernacle were lit every evening, so as to burn before Jehovah (Leviticus 24:2-4). For the same reason fire burned continually on the altar and was not extinguished (Leviticus 6:13), and the priests took fire from the altar in their censers and burned incense (Leviticus 16:12-13).

Therefore Jehovah went before the children of Israel by night in a pillar of fire (Exodus 13:21-22). Fire from heaven consumed the burnt offerings on the altar, as a sign of His being well pleased (Leviticus 9:24, 1 Kings 18:38). The burnt offerings were called offerings by fire to Jehovah, and offerings by fire for a restful aroma to Jehovah (Exodus 29:18; Leviticus 1:9, 13, 17; 2:2, 9-11; 3:5, 16; 4:35; 5:12; 7:30; 21:6; Numbers 28:2; Deuteronomy 18:1).

Therefore in the book of Revelation the Lord's eyes looked like a flame of fire (Revelation 1:14; 2:18; 19:12, cf. Daniel 10:5-6). And seven lamps of fire burned before the throne (Revelation 4:5).

It is apparent from this what lamps containing oil and lamps without oil symbolize (Matthew 25:1-11). The oil means fire, and thus love.

And so on in many other places.

In an opposite sense fire symbolizes hellish love, and this is plain from so many passages in the Word that it would be impossible to cite them all because of their number. See something on the subject in the book Heaven and Hell, published in London, nos. 566-575.

  
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Many thanks to the General Church of the New Jerusalem, and to Rev. N.B. Rogers, translator, for the permission to use this translation.