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Genesis第35章

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1 And God said to Jacob, Arise, go up to Beth-el, and dwell there: and make there an altar to God, who appeared to thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother.

2 Then Jacob said to his household, and to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments:

3 And let us arise, and go up to Beth-el; and I will make there an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went.

4 And they gave to Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and the ear-rings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem.

5 And they journeyed: and the terror of God was on the cities that were round them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob.

6 So Jacob came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan (that is Beth-el) he and all the people that were with him.

7 And he erected there an altar, and called the place El-beth-el; because there God appeared to him, when he fled from the face of his brother.

8 But Deborah, Rebekah's nurse, died, and she was buried beneath Beth-el, under an oak: and the name of it was called Allon-bachuth.

9 And God appeared to Jacob again when he came out of Padan-aram; and blessed him.

10 And God said to him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name; and he called his name Israel.

11 And God said to him, I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a multitude of nations shall spring from thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins.

12 And the land which I gave to Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land.

13 And God went up from him, in the place where he talked with him.

14 And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him, even a pillar of stone: and he poured a drink-offering thereon, and he poured oil thereon.

15 And Jacob called the name of the place where God spoke with him, Beth-el.

16 And they journeyed from Beth-el; and there was but a little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor.

17 And it came to pass when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said to her, Fear not; thou shalt have this son also.

18 And it came to pass as her soul was in departing (for she died) that she called his name Ben-oni: but his father called him Benjamin.

19 And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Beth-lehem.

20 And Jacob set a pillar on her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel's grave to this day.

21 And Israel journeyed, and spread his tent beyond the tower of Edar.

22 And it came to pass, when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine: and Israel heard it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve:

23 The sons of Leah; Reuben, Jacob's first-born, and Simeon, and Levi, and Judah, and Issachar, and Zebulun:

24 The sons of Rachel; Joseph, and Benjamin:

25 And the sons of Bilhah, Rachel's handmaid; Dan, and Naphtali:

26 And the sons of Zilpah, Leah's handmaid; Gad, and Asher. These are the sons of Jacob, who were born to him in Padan-aram.

27 And Jacob came to Isaac his father to Mamre, to the city of Arbah (which is Hebron) where Abraham and Isaac sojourned.

28 And the days of Isaac were a hundred and eighty years.

29 And Isaac expired and died, and was gathered to his people, being old and full of days; and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.

   

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Arcana Coelestia#9327

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9327. 'I will send My terror before you' means the terror felt, on account of truths springing from good, by those immersed in evils arising from falsity. This is clear from the meaning of 'terror' as the terror felt by those immersed in evils that arise from falsity; and from the meaning of 'the children of Israel', before whom the terror would be sent, as those governed by spiritual good, which is truth springing from good, dealt with in 5803, 5806, 5812, 5817, 5819, 5826, 5833, 7957, 8234, 8805. The nations in the land of Canaan who would feel terror on account of the children of Israel mean evils arising from falsity and falsities arising from evil, see 1413, 1437, 1573, 1574, 1607, 1868, 4517, 6306, 8054, 8317. So it is that 'I will send My terror before you' means the terror felt by those immersed in evils arising from falsity, on account of truths springing from good. The implications of all this are that all power in the spiritual world is provided by truths that spring from good, thus by truths that emanate from the Lord.

[2] This is made perfectly clear by the consideration that the Lord arranges into order all things in heaven and all things in hell, as well as all things in the world, by means of truths coming from Him. For Divine Truth emanating from the Lord is the actual means by which all things are brought into being and by which all things are kept in being. This is incomprehensible to those who think on solely a material level, as those people do who attribute the origin and continued existence of all things to natural forces. These people cannot have any other idea about truths than this, that truths do not possess any power because they are solely objects of thought, and thought is not seen by them to be an essential entity, still less something substantial, 1 even though they know that thought controls the whole body and causes individual parts to move in exact accord with its own disposition. Nor also do they see that in the whole of creation nothing exists which lacks connection with truth that springs from good. Regarding truth, that it holds all power within it and is a supreme essential entity, see 8200. From all this it is evident that angels possess power which they receive from God's truth that emanates from the Lord, and that this is why they are called 'powers'. As regards the nature of truths that spring from good, that is, of truths coming from the Lord, see my experience involving the arm which corresponds to such truth, spoken of in 4932-4935.

[3] Since all power belongs to truth it follows that no power whatever resides in falsity arising from evil, since it is an absence of truth springing from good, and so is an absence of power. Therefore also those in hell, since all there are steeped in falsities arising from evil, have absolutely no power at all. This being so, thousands of them can be rebuffed, thrown down, and dispelled by a single angel, almost exactly as fluff in the air can be by a puff from the mouth. From this one may see the reason for the terror felt by those steeped in falsities arising from evil on account of truths springing from good. This terror is called 'the terror of God' in Genesis 35:5; Job 13:21; and in Ezekiel,

I will put My terror in the land of the living, when he had been made to lie in the midst of the uncircumcised with those slain by the sword, Pharaoh and all his multitude. Ezekiel 32:32.

And in Moses,

If you despise My statutes, and if your soul abhors My judgements, so that you do not do all My commandments, I will inject dismay into their heart, that the sound of a driven leaf may pursue them, and they may flee, like flight from the sword, and they may fall without [anyone] pursuing. Leviticus 26:15, 36.

This describes the terror experienced by those who despise and reject statutes, judgements, and commandments, thus that felt by those who are immersed in evils arising from falsity and in falsities arising from evil. It says that 'the sound of a leaf will pursue them, and they will flee, like flight from the sword'; and the reason why it says this is that 'a leaf' means truth, 885, and 'the sword' truth engaged in conflict against falsity arising from evil, 2799, 6353, 8294. The fact that those people possess absolutely no power at all against truth is meant by 'they will fall without [anyone] pursuing'.

脚注:

1. i.e. having real existence in a higher dimension

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