4. This tower, on which the tongues were divided, and where the great city, Babel, stood, is a figure of the fallen earthly man who is entered into selfhood, and has made the formed word of God in him unto an idol; for the nature of the tower was even this, viz. that it should there stand as a great wonder, which men had made in their own contriving fancy, whereupon they would ascend up to God; and signifies that man has lost the right understanding of God, and his habitation and essence.
5. Man had compacted [or framed] his understanding, through the desire of self-elevation and exaltation into the sensual tongue, and contrived or conceived the same into a selfly propriety, in which conception or comprehension the spirit of the mental tongue of the five vowels was departed from him.
6. Not that we are to conceive, that this spirit was departed from its creature; only the free will of man had, in the formed word of the consonants 1 (wherein the spirit of the five vowels, viz. the unformed Spirit of God, did manifest itself) brought itself forth, as a peculiar god, out of the resignation to the unformed Spirit, into a self-fullness and self-willed weening and fancy; the type whereof was the tower, where the men of Babel would come and climb up to God in their own conceived will and thoughts. They themselves were gone forth from the Spirit of God, and would through their own power and ability take the kingdom of God to themselves in selfhood; they would enter with their own will, self -born in evil and good, into the property of God's holiness. This denotes and declares the divided tongues, where every property had brought itself forth out of the universal sensual tongue into a selfishness and a peculiar selfly understanding, so that they did not any longer understand one another; where the understanding was compacted and brought into a propriety out of and according to the three alphabets.
1 Or speechless, dumb letters.
7. This compacted formed tongue the Holy Ghost did open on the day of Pentecost in St Peter's sermon, where Peter, from the opened sensual tongue, spoke in one language all languages; and this was also Adam's language, whence he gave names to all creatures.
8. Thus understand us aright, what Babel and the tower of Babel does typify and point out. The city Babel is the Ham-like man, who builds this city upon the earth; the tower is his self-chosen god, and divine worship. All reason-taught, from the school of this world, are the master-builders of this tower. All those who have set up themselves to be teachers, and are chosen thereunto by man, without God's spirit, they are the master- workmen at this tower, and the idol of the world, none excepted; they carve and frame altogether only stone and wood for this tower.
9. For the name Nimrod shows us very clearly, also in its own sense of the formed word, that it is a self-contrived, formed, amassed and compacted lust, which did advance itself on high as a selfly god; the type whereof was the tower. God suffered them in their confounded understanding to set forth the figure of their property, as a type of what man would be in the presence of God.
4. This tower, on which the tongues were divided, and where the great city, Babel, stood, is a figure of the fallen earthly man who is entered into selfhood, and has made the formed word of God in him unto an idol; for the nature of the tower was even this, viz. that it should there stand as a great wonder, which men had made in their own contriving fancy, whereupon they would ascend up to God; and signifies that man has lost the right understanding of God, and his habitation and essence.
5. Man had compacted [or framed] his understanding, through the desire of self-elevation and exaltation into the sensual tongue, and contrived or conceived the same into a selfly propriety, in which conception or comprehension the spirit of the mental tongue of the five vowels was departed from him.
6. Not that we are to conceive, that this spirit was departed from its creature; only the free will of man had, in the formed word of the consonants 1 (wherein the spirit of the five vowels, viz. the unformed Spirit of God, did manifest itself) brought itself forth, as a peculiar god, out of the resignation to the unformed Spirit, into a self-fullness and self-willed weening and fancy; the type whereof was the tower, where the men of Babel would come and climb up to God in their own conceived will and thoughts. They themselves were gone forth from the Spirit of God, and would through their own power and ability take the kingdom of God to themselves in selfhood; they would enter with their own will, self -born in evil and good, into the property of God's holiness. This denotes and declares the divided tongues, where every property had brought itself forth out of the universal sensual tongue into a selfishness and a peculiar selfly understanding, so that they did not any longer understand one another; where the understanding was compacted and brought into a propriety out of and according to the three alphabets.
1 Or speechless, dumb letters.
7. This compacted formed tongue the Holy Ghost did open on the day of Pentecost in St Peter's sermon, where Peter, from the opened sensual tongue, spoke in one language all languages; and this was also Adam's language, whence he gave names to all creatures.
8. Thus understand us aright, what Babel and the tower of Babel does typify and point out. The city Babel is the Ham-like man, who builds this city upon the earth; the tower is his self-chosen god, and divine worship. All reason-taught, from the school of this world, are the master-builders of this tower. All those who have set up themselves to be teachers, and are chosen thereunto by man, without God's spirit, they are the master- workmen at this tower, and the idol of the world, none excepted; they carve and frame altogether only stone and wood for this tower.
9. For the name Nimrod shows us very clearly, also in its own sense of the formed word, that it is a self-contrived, formed, amassed and compacted lust, which did advance itself on high as a selfly god; the type whereof was the tower. God suffered them in their confounded understanding to set forth the figure of their property, as a type of what man would be in the presence of God.
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