Arcana Coelestia (Potts) n. 8887

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8887. To keep it holy. That this signifies no violation in any manner, is evident from what was commanded concerning the Sabbath, as before shown (n. 8495), and from what here follows concerning the sanctification of the Sabbath, namely, "Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; and the seventh day is the Sabbath to Jehovah thy God; thou shalt not do any work, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy sojourner that is within thy gates; for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested in the seventh day; wherefore Jehovah blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." From these words it is evident that by "keeping the Sabbath holy" is signified not to violate it in any manner; but in the internal sense that those things which are signified by "the Sabbath" are not to be violated in any manner, namely, the union of the Divine essence of the Lord with His Human essence, also the union of this with the heavens, and the consequent conjunction in these of good and truth (see n. 8886); for if these things are violated, spiritual life perishes with that man, and becomes life merely natural and afterward sensuous; and then falsity is readily learned in place of truth, and evil in place of good, for falsity and evil then universally reign with him.


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