with the children of Judah and Israel in the manifestation of the law, when their sins were manifested, and that God required the cup back again into Joseph's house, that is, the law went back into Joseph's house: Then Judah and Israel could not keep it, and so it went into the grace, and there the Covenant of grace, viz. the right Joseph, presented itself before their eyes, and said, while you are robbers and evil, do you suppose I cannot find you out? But they could not answer him, but must yield themselves to his sentence.
62. For Israel could neither keep the Covenant nor the Law, and therefore must now fall down before him, and yield themselves to his mercy and compassion. Israel would now give up himself to be God's own servant, but he would not have them minister to him with their Law, but would have that to be his servant wherein the cup lay. He would not have only an outward worship and service of God, in the figure of Christ, with the Law, but he would have Benjamin, viz. the inward ground of the heavenly world's substance, for a servant; but the minister or servant of the Law, viz. the natural man, should go home again in peace into his father's country, and take the bestowed grace along with him in his life for food: this the spirit of God sets thus in a figure under these acts, pointing at the future.
63. Under this figure now the spirit intimates, by Judah, who was surety for Benjamin, very secretly and mystically, that the poor soul could not thus with the grace go home again to its father's country, unless it had Benjamin, that is, Christ, in substance in it. For Judah pleaded exceeding hard that he durst not go home, unless he brought Benjamin along with him, or else he would himself remain there a servant.
64. Thus the poor soul gives itself up to God, when God's righteousness calls it to go back again home with the Covenant. Then it will by no means go back, except it have Benjamin, that is, Christ substantially with it, else it cannot see God: as here Judah in this image and type excuses himself and says, If he came back and brought not Benjamin with him, then he should bring his father's grey hairs under the earth, seeing his soul clave to Benjamin's soul (Gen. xliv. 30, 31).
65. That is, if the Adamical man should go into Paradise again, without Christ's life and substance, then would he bring his father, the life's nature, into the eternal divine forgetfulness: 1 for the life of the human nature would not be manifest according to the divine property; that is, it could not live in the kingdom of heaven.
66. Indeed God calls the soul to go home with the Law into Paradise; but that cannot be, unless it have Christ in life and substance in it, and then it dares go home again into its first native country of its Father.
1 Or, hiddenness.
The Seventy- Second Chapter
How Joseph Manifested himself
before his Brethren.
And what is to be understood thereby [Gen. xlv.]
1. MOSES says further, Then Joseph could no longer withhold himself before all those that stood about him; and he cried, Let everyone go forth from me. And none were with him, when Joseph made himself known to his brethren. And he wept aloud: so that the Egyptians and Pharaoh's people heard. And he said to his brethren, I am Joseph, does my father yet live? And his brethren could not answer him, they were so terrified in his presence (Gen. xlv. 1-3).
The inward figure stands thus:
2. God gave Israel the Law, and commanded them thereby to go home again into Paradise, even as the figure of the promised land (into which they were to go, but could not for a long time, till Joshua led them in) was as a type and prefiguration of the true leading in by Jesus; and under the Law they had also the Paradisical Covenant of grace, as also the prophets, who lead them to God's mercy and compassion.
3. But they could not by any of these come again into their first Adamical Paradisical country of their Father, to rest. God's righteousness blamed them without ceasing, and required the power and ability, that they should give full obedience to the Law and the Covenant.
4. But seeing that could not be, and that neither the Law nor the Covenant could bring them in, back again, then the heavenly
with the children of Judah and Israel in the manifestation of the law, when their sins were manifested, and that God required the cup back again into Joseph's house, that is, the law went back into Joseph's house: Then Judah and Israel could not keep it, and so it went into the grace, and there the Covenant of grace, viz. the right Joseph, presented itself before their eyes, and said, while you are robbers and evil, do you suppose I cannot find you out? But they could not answer him, but must yield themselves to his sentence.
62. For Israel could neither keep the Covenant nor the Law, and therefore must now fall down before him, and yield themselves to his mercy and compassion. Israel would now give up himself to be God's own servant, but he would not have them minister to him with their Law, but would have that to be his servant wherein the cup lay. He would not have only an outward worship and service of God, in the figure of Christ, with the Law, but he would have Benjamin, viz. the inward ground of the heavenly world's substance, for a servant; but the minister or servant of the Law, viz. the natural man, should go home again in peace into his father's country, and take the bestowed grace along with him in his life for food: this the spirit of God sets thus in a figure under these acts, pointing at the future.
63. Under this figure now the spirit intimates, by Judah, who was surety for Benjamin, very secretly and mystically, that the poor soul could not thus with the grace go home again to its father's country, unless it had Benjamin, that is, Christ, in substance in it. For Judah pleaded exceeding hard that he durst not go home, unless he brought Benjamin along with him, or else he would himself remain there a servant.
64. Thus the poor soul gives itself up to God, when God's righteousness calls it to go back again home with the Covenant. Then it will by no means go back, except it have Benjamin, that is, Christ substantially with it, else it cannot see God: as here Judah in this image and type excuses himself and says, If he came back and brought not Benjamin with him, then he should bring his father's grey hairs under the earth, seeing his soul clave to Benjamin's soul (Gen. xliv. 30, 31).
65. That is, if the Adamical man should go into Paradise again, without Christ's life and substance, then would he bring his father, the life's nature, into the eternal divine forgetfulness: 1 for the life of the human nature would not be manifest according to the divine property; that is, it could not live in the kingdom of heaven.
66. Indeed God calls the soul to go home with the Law into Paradise; but that cannot be, unless it have Christ in life and substance in it, and then it dares go home again into its first native country of its Father.
1 Or, hiddenness.
The Seventy- Second Chapter
How Joseph Manifested himself
before his Brethren.
And what is to be understood thereby [Gen. xlv.]
1. MOSES says further, Then Joseph could no longer withhold himself before all those that stood about him; and he cried, Let everyone go forth from me. And none were with him, when Joseph made himself known to his brethren. And he wept aloud: so that the Egyptians and Pharaoh's people heard. And he said to his brethren, I am Joseph, does my father yet live? And his brethren could not answer him, they were so terrified in his presence (Gen. xlv. 1-3).
The inward figure stands thus:
2. God gave Israel the Law, and commanded them thereby to go home again into Paradise, even as the figure of the promised land (into which they were to go, but could not for a long time, till Joshua led them in) was as a type and prefiguration of the true leading in by Jesus; and under the Law they had also the Paradisical Covenant of grace, as also the prophets, who lead them to God's mercy and compassion.
3. But they could not by any of these come again into their first Adamical Paradisical country of their Father, to rest. God's righteousness blamed them without ceasing, and required the power and ability, that they should give full obedience to the Law and the Covenant.
4. But seeing that could not be, and that neither the Law nor the Covenant could bring them in, back again, then the heavenly
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