Arcana Coelestia volume 1 - Swedenborg Foundation

ARCANA COELESTIA 374That Moses was forty days and forty nights upon Mount Sinai,likewise signifies the duration of the temptation, that is, it signifiesthe Lord’s temptation, as is evident from his abiding in the mountforty days and forty nights, neither eating bread nor drinking water,supplicating for the people that they might not be destroyed (Deut.9:9, 11, 18, 25–29; 10:10).[5] The reason why “forty days” signify the duration oftemptation is, as just said, that the Lord suffered himself to betempted of the devil forty days. And therefore—as all things wererepresentative of the Lord—when the idea of temptations waspresent with the angels, that idea was represented in the world ofspirits by such things as are in this world, as is the case with allangelic ideas during their descent into the world of spirits: theybeing presented representatively. And in the same way the idea oftemptation was presented by the number “forty” because the Lordwas to be tempted forty days. With the Lord, and consequentlywith the angelic heaven, it is the same whether a thing is present oris to come; what is to come is present, or what is to be done isdone. From this came the representation of temptations, as also ofvastations, in the representative church, by “forty.” But these thingscannot as yet be very well comprehended, because the influx of theangelic heaven into the world of spirits is not known, nor that suchis the nature of this influx.731. Every substance that I have made will I destroy from off thefaces of the ground. That this signifies man’s own, which is as ifdestroyed when vivified, is evident from what has been said beforerespecting this own. Man’s own is all evil and falsity. So long as thiscontinues, the man is dead; but when he comes into temptations itis dispersed, that is, loosened and tempered by truths and goodsfrom the Lord, and thus is vivified and appears as if it were notpresent. That it does not appear and is no longer hurtful is signifiedby “destroyed”; and yet it is not destroyed, but remains. It is almostas with black and white, which when variously modified by the raysof light are turned into beautiful colors—such as blue, yellow, andpurple—whereby according to their arrangement are presentedlovely and agreeable tints, as in flowers, yet remaining radically andfundamentally black and white. But as here at the same time the