31. For Christ is the wages of God's children: As they must serve their Lord for worldly wages, so God first pays them with his Covenant of grace, and then afterwards they receive also temporal wages: As Jacob must first receive the gift of God, as God appoints it for him, though it went very ill, as to reason. Afterwards he also received the wages according to his will, for which he must serve yet seven years more.
32. Which seven years, in the inward ground in this figure, signify the seven properties of the natural life, which must be given up to the service of God, into which God gives himself for wages in a coworking power, where the seven forms of life first help the Lord to bear a spiritual figure and image or type, and to manifest the line of
Christ. Then afterwards that same spiritual form discovers also the natural form, and bears a prince in the natural life, in whom God works, and through whom he rules the world; as is to be seen by Jacob.
33. He served seven years for Rachel, but seeing he feared God, the divine wages, viz. the line of Christ, was first given him. Afterwards God blessed also the human self-love, according to the kingdom of nature in him; so that of Rachel, whom he had taken in natural selflove, he begat a prince and wise man, even Joseph, by whom the spirit of God ruled, and made him a lord and governor.
34. And this figure presents to us that first Christ should be born in us, and so then Christ in us bears also the natural man, with understanding and wisdom, and appoints him to his service in the kingdom of nature, and also in the kingdom of grace; as he did Joseph.
The Fifty-Eighth Chapter
How Jacob served his Father-in-law 1 Twenty Years, and begat Twelve Sons and One Daughter, and how God blessed him, that he gat great Riches, and how Laban often changed his wages, and yet could not hurt him: What is to be understood thereby 2
1. WE see in this history especially, how it goes with the children of God in this world, how they must live in mere crosses and adversity, as Jacob did with his wives. For when Rachel saw that she was harren, she envied Leah, her sister (Gen. xxx. I); to signify that man's own love seeks not the honour of God, but itself; as now Rachel envied Leah because she had a name that God had blessed her, and said to Jacob, Give me children also, if not, I die.
2. Where we see how the ways of God are quite hidden to reason, although reason stands in the figure of the divine wonders, as here Rachel, which here signifies the own Adamical nature, which desires of Jacob the life's power from the blessing of God, and if it get not the same it must die. Which indeed the spirit of zeal in her desire does very well signify, according to her inward ground in the Covenant of God; but her reason understood it not, but only desired children, that she might be delivered from disgrace; but her inward ground stood hidden, and panted through the human nature to manifest itself in the human essence. Therefore the inward ground in the Covenant of grace signifies, through its own Adamical essence, that if the inward ground should not be manifested through the human essence it must then die eternally. Therefore says reason, Give me children, or else I die; which seems outwardly to be an opposition and discouragement: But the spirit of God has here its figure, under which it has its signification.
1 Stepfather. 2 Gen. xxx.
3. And then we see in both these sisters, who yet were daughters of God's Covenant in the Promise, how the poison of the Serpent, in the wrath of God in flesh and blood, so vehemently sets against the line of Christ in the Covenant, and always despises the same; and, as a proud Lucifer, elevates and puffs up the rational human ownhood of self-will, and would have the dominion.
31. For Christ is the wages of God's children: As they must serve their Lord for worldly wages, so God first pays them with his Covenant of grace, and then afterwards they receive also temporal wages: As Jacob must first receive the gift of God, as God appoints it for him, though it went very ill, as to reason. Afterwards he also received the wages according to his will, for which he must serve yet seven years more.
32. Which seven years, in the inward ground in this figure, signify the seven properties of the natural life, which must be given up to the service of God, into which God gives himself for wages in a coworking power, where the seven forms of life first help the Lord to bear a spiritual figure and image or type, and to manifest the line of
Christ. Then afterwards that same spiritual form discovers also the natural form, and bears a prince in the natural life, in whom God works, and through whom he rules the world; as is to be seen by Jacob.
33. He served seven years for Rachel, but seeing he feared God, the divine wages, viz. the line of Christ, was first given him. Afterwards God blessed also the human self-love, according to the kingdom of nature in him; so that of Rachel, whom he had taken in natural selflove, he begat a prince and wise man, even Joseph, by whom the spirit of God ruled, and made him a lord and governor.
34. And this figure presents to us that first Christ should be born in us, and so then Christ in us bears also the natural man, with understanding and wisdom, and appoints him to his service in the kingdom of nature, and also in the kingdom of grace; as he did Joseph.
The Fifty-Eighth Chapter
How Jacob served his Father-in-law 1 Twenty Years, and begat Twelve Sons and One Daughter, and how God blessed him, that he gat great Riches, and how Laban often changed his wages, and yet could not hurt him: What is to be understood thereby 2
1. WE see in this history especially, how it goes with the children of God in this world, how they must live in mere crosses and adversity, as Jacob did with his wives. For when Rachel saw that she was harren, she envied Leah, her sister (Gen. xxx. I); to signify that man's own love seeks not the honour of God, but itself; as now Rachel envied Leah because she had a name that God had blessed her, and said to Jacob, Give me children also, if not, I die.
2. Where we see how the ways of God are quite hidden to reason, although reason stands in the figure of the divine wonders, as here Rachel, which here signifies the own Adamical nature, which desires of Jacob the life's power from the blessing of God, and if it get not the same it must die. Which indeed the spirit of zeal in her desire does very well signify, according to her inward ground in the Covenant of God; but her reason understood it not, but only desired children, that she might be delivered from disgrace; but her inward ground stood hidden, and panted through the human nature to manifest itself in the human essence. Therefore the inward ground in the Covenant of grace signifies, through its own Adamical essence, that if the inward ground should not be manifested through the human essence it must then die eternally. Therefore says reason, Give me children, or else I die; which seems outwardly to be an opposition and discouragement: But the spirit of God has here its figure, under which it has its signification.
1 Stepfather. 2 Gen. xxx.
3. And then we see in both these sisters, who yet were daughters of God's Covenant in the Promise, how the poison of the Serpent, in the wrath of God in flesh and blood, so vehemently sets against the line of Christ in the Covenant, and always despises the same; and, as a proud Lucifer, elevates and puffs up the rational human ownhood of self-will, and would have the dominion.
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