Session Five
BY THE PASSION OF THE CROSS THE LORD DID NOT TAKE AWAY SINS,
BUT BORE THEM
BY THE PASSION OF THE CROSS THE LORD DID NOT TAKE AWAY SINS,
BUT BORE THEM
The Christian Churches that were before the establishment of the New (Christian) Church see the Lord's passion on the cross as a key doctrine of salvation. However, because they accept the literal sense of the Word as being the inerrant and genuine truth and do not know that it is only the apparent truth, they have conceived the erroneous idea that the Lord Jesus Christ's death on the cross caused the Father to be moved to mercy and, thus, to forgave mankind of their sins on the Lord's behalf and, thus, redeemed them, and that the Holy Spirit is sent to help and comfort them while still on earth.
This, of course, is the result of being blinded by, not only the acceptance of the literal (natural) sense of the Word as the inerrant truth, but by thinking that they themselves have a life that is their own. This is exactly what the Adamic Church (Adam and Eve) did when they ate of 'the tree of knowledge of good and evil'. Let us try to understand what is truly meant by the Lord's passion of the cross. We read in Revelation, Chapter 13, verse 7, "It was granted to him (the beast) to make war with the saints &…;". And in verse 10 is read, "He who leads into captivity; he who kills with the sword &…;." Then is said, "Here is the patience and faith of the saints". Now, turn to Revelation, chapter 14, where we see those who were with the Lamb (the Glorified Lord Jesus Christ) called the One hundred and forty-four thousand, those who are redeemed from the earth. They are who followed the Lamb - the followers of the Lord. Here, we also see the gospel proclaimed to those in the spiritual world as well as on earth. Here, we see a warning given to those who do not worship the Lord. Then in verse 12 we read, "Here is the patience of the saints." Let us now understand that 'patience'.
The Church had to go through all those temptations spoken of here and then, the truth that is from good was implanted within them and they were made spiritual. Their acceptance into heaven was not without undergoing such temptations. Such are made spiritual because when the truth is acknowledged in the heart then faith is implanted by the Lord and this faith then becomes the man's own, that is, his claiming or appropriating it for himself. What is here expressed are those who had sustained such temptations, that is, the power of the dragon and the beast mentioned here in the book of Revelation that would have overcome them, if not for the Lord, if not for His good and the truth, for their acceptance of His life. One can see that if he fights against such evils from his own strength, that is, with his own faith alone, which comes from eating or appropriating the knowledge of good and evil that he, too, would succumb just as those did of the Most Ancient Church - the Adamic Church. We see here that those who are in that faith that is implanted through truths that come from good by the Lord have a life of charity, not of faith alone. These are those in whom faith and charity act as one, like good and truth in the will and understanding act as one in the Lord and in those in whom the Lord reigns.
What comes into 'light' here is that one must have a living faith in which he lives the truths that are taught from the Word, because it is right and good to do so. In other words, a person needs to live, that is, to will accordingly (a good life), and not to live an evil life. This 'living' is contrary to the doctrine that teaches that by a faith in the Lord's passion on the cross that a man's sins are done away with and the Father's anger is satisfied.
You can understand that if the Lord bore the sins of mankind when He put on the human of man that everyone must also bare them (Don't we today go through temptation bearing our sins?). Therefore, He did not take them away. We still go through temptation to sin. In other words, aren't we to 'take up the cross', that is, to fight against concupiscence and to follow the Lord, which means to acknowledge Him to be God? One can only fight evil by his life, by his living, by his willingly following the truth, and not by just his having the truth in his memory - by knowing the truth.
The Lord's passion on the cross was just His last temptation that He underwent and is the full subjugation of the hells and His glorification - the uniting of the Human with the Divine and the Divine with the Human. After all, wasn't the Lord victorious over the hells when they attacked Him?
Basically, it is the Lord's life in us that overcomes the hells that attack us (the Lord does not tempt us.) that makes us purified and prepared for Heaven. For the truth that comes from the Lord's good implanted within the mind - within our will and understanding - and is not any immediate imputation of salvation, which is the Lord's life through one's faith alone, but as we allow His good to reign in us, that is, the Lord to reign in our heart and mind, in our will and understanding, and not our self (our proprium). The Word plainly shows this in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Concerning the Lord,
Here is the Word.
15 [1]. There are some within the Church who believe that, by the passion of the cross, the Lord took away sins and made satisfaction to the Father, and thus redeemed mankind. Some also believe that He transferred to Himself the sins of those who have faith in Him, and that He bore them and cast them into the depth of the sea, that is, into hell. These beliefs they confirm to themselves by the words of John concerning Jesus:
'Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!' (John i. 29).
And by the Lord's words in Isaiah:
Let us take only John 1: 29. "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world." It is necessary to understand what 'Lamb' signifies in order to see, at least, some internal or spiritual sense, and to know why only understanding the Word's literal sense often leads to fallacies. First, any student of the Word can tell you that because a lamb is easily led that what is meant by it (lamb) is the innocence of infancy and goodness. In this way, one sees signified the Lord, who is innocent of all sin. Next, we need to see that this refers to His Divine Humanity, which is the Divine Itself from which His humanity comes. It is this Divine Human of the Lord that 'Lamb' signified which was His glorification and His overcoming the hells. We, also, need to understand that 'lamb' signifies the Word as well and from where one learns truths. Finally, 'lamb' signifies divine good, because with the Lord both good and truth are one or united, just as the Divine or Good united with the Human or Truth and was made one. (The Lord said, I am the Truth.) Thus, one sees that it is by the truths of the Word when acted in love that becomes one's life that sins are 'as if' taken away or removed. Still, we need to see what is meant by 'taken away or removed'. To remove is to separate from, thus, by removing our sins is to separate them from us so that they are not a part of our life and thus are not the center of our life; they 'as it were' are put to the periphery of our life and no longer rule us.
15 [1] cont. Both these passages (in John and Isaiah) relate to the temptations and passion of the Lord; and by His taking away sins and grieves, and by the iniquities of us all being laid upon Him, the same is meant as by bearing sorrows and iniquities.
The following shows what is meant by bearing our iniquities.
15 [2] First, therefore, it shall be stated what is meant by bearing iniquities, and afterwards, what is meant by taking them away. By bearing iniquities nothing else is meant than enduring grievous temptations; also suffering the Jews to do with Him as they had done with the Word, and to treat Him in the same manner because He was the Word. For the Church, which was at that time with the Jews, was utterly devastated; and it was devastated in consequence of their having perverted all things of the Word to such an extent that there was no truth left; and for this reason they did not acknowledge the Lord. This is meant and signified by all the circumstances of the Lord's passion. The prophets were also treated in a similar manner, because they represented the Lord as to the Word, and thence as to the Church: and the Lord was Himself the Prophet.
Those who are Christian and have read the Old and New Testaments know how the Lord was treated by the Israelitish and Jewish Church, how they rejected both Him and the Prophets from Isaiah to include all the others, even John the Baptist and, thus, they so did the written Word. There are far too many verses to list here, but they are in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Concerning the Lord 15: [3] - [8]. In these places of the Word is the state of the Church and the Word represented as, also, is the Lord, He being the greatest Prophet, and, so too, the other prophets. Therefore come the Doctrine of the Church, which comes from the Word, for the Lord Himself, as the greatest Prophet, signifies the Church Itself, and the Word Itself.
In regards to the state of the Church, look carefully at how the Word reveals the prophets as bearing the iniquities of Israel and Judah - the temptations that they went though. They, the prophets, including the Lord, Himself, who is the Prophet were, thus, only a sign to them (those of the Israelitish and Jewish Church) of what was going to happen to them and, so, too, to anyone who turns away from the Lord as being their life.
Let us continue again with the Word.
16 [1]. The state of the Church from the Word, as represented in the Prophets, is what is meant by their bearing iniquities and sins of the people. This is evident from what is said of the prophet Isaiah,
"That he went naked and barefoot three years, for a sign and a wonder". Isa.xx3;
[3] It is evident from what follows in the same chapter that the prophet, by thus bearing the iniquities of the house of Israel and the house of Judah, did not take them away and so expiate them, but only represented and demonstrated them:
Just knowing what the spiritual sense of the words 'bread and water' is will show that what is meant here is that in time the Church of Israel and Judah would not see (or accept) the Lord or His truths and thus, also, the Word of the New Testament. This was what exactly happened. They rejected the Lord as the Messiah and His Truth - the Word of the New Testament. As such, their sins were not taken away, yet there were in that Church those - a remnant - who lived according to the truths, not just being able to quote them as many did, that the Lord revealed in establishing the first Christian Church as there are in that first Christian Church that now lives accordingly and a New Church is being established today from them
.
16 [4] So, when the same prophet showed himself, and said,
The meaning is similar where it is said of the Lord,
'He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.
. . . Jehovah has laid on Him the iniquities of us all . . .
Here the passion of the Lord is treated of throughout the whole chapter.
End.
This, of course, is the result of being blinded by, not only the acceptance of the literal (natural) sense of the Word as the inerrant truth, but by thinking that they themselves have a life that is their own. This is exactly what the Adamic Church (Adam and Eve) did when they ate of 'the tree of knowledge of good and evil'. Let us try to understand what is truly meant by the Lord's passion of the cross. We read in Revelation, Chapter 13, verse 7, "It was granted to him (the beast) to make war with the saints &…;". And in verse 10 is read, "He who leads into captivity; he who kills with the sword &…;." Then is said, "Here is the patience and faith of the saints". Now, turn to Revelation, chapter 14, where we see those who were with the Lamb (the Glorified Lord Jesus Christ) called the One hundred and forty-four thousand, those who are redeemed from the earth. They are who followed the Lamb - the followers of the Lord. Here, we also see the gospel proclaimed to those in the spiritual world as well as on earth. Here, we see a warning given to those who do not worship the Lord. Then in verse 12 we read, "Here is the patience of the saints." Let us now understand that 'patience'.
The Church had to go through all those temptations spoken of here and then, the truth that is from good was implanted within them and they were made spiritual. Their acceptance into heaven was not without undergoing such temptations. Such are made spiritual because when the truth is acknowledged in the heart then faith is implanted by the Lord and this faith then becomes the man's own, that is, his claiming or appropriating it for himself. What is here expressed are those who had sustained such temptations, that is, the power of the dragon and the beast mentioned here in the book of Revelation that would have overcome them, if not for the Lord, if not for His good and the truth, for their acceptance of His life. One can see that if he fights against such evils from his own strength, that is, with his own faith alone, which comes from eating or appropriating the knowledge of good and evil that he, too, would succumb just as those did of the Most Ancient Church - the Adamic Church. We see here that those who are in that faith that is implanted through truths that come from good by the Lord have a life of charity, not of faith alone. These are those in whom faith and charity act as one, like good and truth in the will and understanding act as one in the Lord and in those in whom the Lord reigns.
What comes into 'light' here is that one must have a living faith in which he lives the truths that are taught from the Word, because it is right and good to do so. In other words, a person needs to live, that is, to will accordingly (a good life), and not to live an evil life. This 'living' is contrary to the doctrine that teaches that by a faith in the Lord's passion on the cross that a man's sins are done away with and the Father's anger is satisfied.
You can understand that if the Lord bore the sins of mankind when He put on the human of man that everyone must also bare them (Don't we today go through temptation bearing our sins?). Therefore, He did not take them away. We still go through temptation to sin. In other words, aren't we to 'take up the cross', that is, to fight against concupiscence and to follow the Lord, which means to acknowledge Him to be God? One can only fight evil by his life, by his living, by his willingly following the truth, and not by just his having the truth in his memory - by knowing the truth.
The Lord's passion on the cross was just His last temptation that He underwent and is the full subjugation of the hells and His glorification - the uniting of the Human with the Divine and the Divine with the Human. After all, wasn't the Lord victorious over the hells when they attacked Him?
Basically, it is the Lord's life in us that overcomes the hells that attack us (the Lord does not tempt us.) that makes us purified and prepared for Heaven. For the truth that comes from the Lord's good implanted within the mind - within our will and understanding - and is not any immediate imputation of salvation, which is the Lord's life through one's faith alone, but as we allow His good to reign in us, that is, the Lord to reign in our heart and mind, in our will and understanding, and not our self (our proprium). The Word plainly shows this in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Concerning the Lord,
Here is the Word.
15 [1]. There are some within the Church who believe that, by the passion of the cross, the Lord took away sins and made satisfaction to the Father, and thus redeemed mankind. Some also believe that He transferred to Himself the sins of those who have faith in Him, and that He bore them and cast them into the depth of the sea, that is, into hell. These beliefs they confirm to themselves by the words of John concerning Jesus:
'Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!' (John i. 29).
And by the Lord's words in Isaiah:
- 'He has borne our grieves, and carried our sorrows. He was wounded for our transgressions; He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and with His wound (stripes) we are healed.
Jehovah has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth: He is brought as a Lamb to the slaughter.
He was cut off of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was He stricken.
And He made His grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death.
He shall see the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied.
By His knowledge . . . shall He justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.
He has poured out His soul unto death: and He was numbered with the transgressors; and He bares the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors'
Let us take only John 1: 29. "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world." It is necessary to understand what 'Lamb' signifies in order to see, at least, some internal or spiritual sense, and to know why only understanding the Word's literal sense often leads to fallacies. First, any student of the Word can tell you that because a lamb is easily led that what is meant by it (lamb) is the innocence of infancy and goodness. In this way, one sees signified the Lord, who is innocent of all sin. Next, we need to see that this refers to His Divine Humanity, which is the Divine Itself from which His humanity comes. It is this Divine Human of the Lord that 'Lamb' signified which was His glorification and His overcoming the hells. We, also, need to understand that 'lamb' signifies the Word as well and from where one learns truths. Finally, 'lamb' signifies divine good, because with the Lord both good and truth are one or united, just as the Divine or Good united with the Human or Truth and was made one. (The Lord said, I am the Truth.) Thus, one sees that it is by the truths of the Word when acted in love that becomes one's life that sins are 'as if' taken away or removed. Still, we need to see what is meant by 'taken away or removed'. To remove is to separate from, thus, by removing our sins is to separate them from us so that they are not a part of our life and thus are not the center of our life; they 'as it were' are put to the periphery of our life and no longer rule us.
15 [1] cont. Both these passages (in John and Isaiah) relate to the temptations and passion of the Lord; and by His taking away sins and grieves, and by the iniquities of us all being laid upon Him, the same is meant as by bearing sorrows and iniquities.
The following shows what is meant by bearing our iniquities.
15 [2] First, therefore, it shall be stated what is meant by bearing iniquities, and afterwards, what is meant by taking them away. By bearing iniquities nothing else is meant than enduring grievous temptations; also suffering the Jews to do with Him as they had done with the Word, and to treat Him in the same manner because He was the Word. For the Church, which was at that time with the Jews, was utterly devastated; and it was devastated in consequence of their having perverted all things of the Word to such an extent that there was no truth left; and for this reason they did not acknowledge the Lord. This is meant and signified by all the circumstances of the Lord's passion. The prophets were also treated in a similar manner, because they represented the Lord as to the Word, and thence as to the Church: and the Lord was Himself the Prophet.
Those who are Christian and have read the Old and New Testaments know how the Lord was treated by the Israelitish and Jewish Church, how they rejected both Him and the Prophets from Isaiah to include all the others, even John the Baptist and, thus, they so did the written Word. There are far too many verses to list here, but they are in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Concerning the Lord 15: [3] - [8]. In these places of the Word is the state of the Church and the Word represented as, also, is the Lord, He being the greatest Prophet, and, so too, the other prophets. Therefore come the Doctrine of the Church, which comes from the Word, for the Lord Himself, as the greatest Prophet, signifies the Church Itself, and the Word Itself.
In regards to the state of the Church, look carefully at how the Word reveals the prophets as bearing the iniquities of Israel and Judah - the temptations that they went though. They, the prophets, including the Lord, Himself, who is the Prophet were, thus, only a sign to them (those of the Israelitish and Jewish Church) of what was going to happen to them and, so, too, to anyone who turns away from the Lord as being their life.
Let us continue again with the Word.
16 [1]. The state of the Church from the Word, as represented in the Prophets, is what is meant by their bearing iniquities and sins of the people. This is evident from what is said of the prophet Isaiah,
"That he went naked and barefoot three years, for a sign and a wonder". Isa.xx3;
- And of the prophet Ezekiel,
"That he brought out the stuff for removing . . . and covered his face that he might not see the ground. That thus he was a sign to the house of Israel, and also said, I am your sign." Ezekiel .xii 3-11.
- "Lie you upon your left side, and lay the iniquities of the house of Israel upon it; according to the number of days that you shall lie upon it, you shall bear their iniquities. For I will give you the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days; that you may bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.
And when you have accomplished them, you shall lie again upon your left side, that you may bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days"
[3] It is evident from what follows in the same chapter that the prophet, by thus bearing the iniquities of the house of Israel and the house of Judah, did not take them away and so expiate them, but only represented and demonstrated them:
- "Jehovah said, Even thus shall the children of Israel eat their defiled bread among the nations, whither I will drive them . . .
- That they may lack bread and water, and be desolate, a man and his brother, and waste away for their iniquity".
Just knowing what the spiritual sense of the words 'bread and water' is will show that what is meant here is that in time the Church of Israel and Judah would not see (or accept) the Lord or His truths and thus, also, the Word of the New Testament. This was what exactly happened. They rejected the Lord as the Messiah and His Truth - the Word of the New Testament. As such, their sins were not taken away, yet there were in that Church those - a remnant - who lived according to the truths, not just being able to quote them as many did, that the Lord revealed in establishing the first Christian Church as there are in that first Christian Church that now lives accordingly and a New Church is being established today from them
.
16 [4] So, when the same prophet showed himself, and said,
- Lo. I am your sign, it is also added, 'As I have done, so shall it be done unto them'.
The meaning is similar where it is said of the Lord,
'He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.
. . . Jehovah has laid on Him the iniquities of us all . . .
- By this knowledge He has justified many, because He has borne their iniquities.'
Here the passion of the Lord is treated of throughout the whole chapter.
End.
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