Arcana Coelestia volume 7 - Swedenborg Foundation

ARCANA COELESTIA 3626The princes of Zoan are foolish, the wise, the counselors ofPharaoh. How say ye unto Pharaoh, I am the son of the wise, the son ofthe kings of antiquity? The princes of Zoan are become fools, theprinces of Noph are deceived; and they have seduced Egypt, thecornerstone of the tribes (Isa. 19:11, 13);treating of Egypt, by which is signified the memory-knowledge ofthe church (n. 4749), thus natural truth, which is the ultimate oforder; wherefore also Egypt is here called the “cornerstone of thetribes,” for the “tribes” are all things of truth in one complex (n.3858, 3862, 3926, 3939, 4060). But in this passage “Egypt” is thememory-knowledge which perverts the truths of the church, thustruths in the ultimate of order falsified, which are the “princes ofZoan” and the “princes of Noph.” He calls himself the “son of thekings of antiquity,” because the memory-knowledges in Egypt werefrom the truths of the ancient church. The truths themselves aresignified by “kings,” as was shown above, and the truths of theancient church are signified by the “kings of antiquity.”[5] Again:Asshur thinketh not right, and his heart doth not meditate right;for his heart is to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few. For he saith,Are not my princes kings? (Isa. 10:7–8);“Asshur” denotes reasoning about Divine truths, from which comefalsities, thus perverse reasoning (n. 1186). The truths thus falsified,or falsities, which are produced by reasoning and which appear asthe veriest truths, are signified by his saying, “Are not my princeskings?” That “Asshur” is reasoning, and that his “princes who arekings” are primary falsities which are believed to be the veriesttruths, cannot be seen and thence believed so long as the mind iskept in the historic sense of the letter, and still less if it is in thenegative as to there being anything more holy and more universalin the Divine Word than what appears in the letter; and yet in theinternal sense by “Asshur” nothing else than reason and reasoning isunderstood in the Word, and by “kings” truths themselves, and by“princes” the primary things of truth. Nothing is known in heavenof Asshur, and the angels also reject from themselves the idea of aking and a prince; and when they perceive it in man, they transfer