Week 5    Day 5

    Listen:

The Inheritance Dan

Joshua 19:40-48

40 For the tribe of the sons of Dan according to their families came the seventh lot.

41 And the border of their inheritance was Zorah and Eshtaol, and Ir-shemesh,

42 and Shaalbin, and Aijalon, and Jethlah,

43 and Elon, and Timnath, and Ekron,

44 and Eltekeh, and Gibbethon, and Baalath,

45 and Jehud, and Bene-berak, and Gath-rimmon,

46 and Me-jarkon, and Rakkon, with the border next to Joppah.

47 And the border of the sons of Dan went out beyond them; and the sons of Dan went up and fought with Leshem, and captured it, and smote it with the mouth of the sword, and possessed it, and dwelt in it, and called Leshem “Dan,” as the name of Dan their father.

48 This is the inheritance of the tribe of the sons of Dan according to their families, these cities and their villages.

The Meaning of “Dan” in the Word

AC 3923. Therefore she called his name Dan. This signifies its quality... The quality itself is within the name “Dan,” for he was so called from “judging.” But though the name was given to him from “judging,” it nevertheless involves... the good of life, and the holy of faith, and also in the supreme sense the justice and mercy of the Lord.

It is this general principle of the church that is signified by “Dan,” and that is represented by the tribe named from Dan. This general principle is the first that is to be affirmed or acknowledged, before a man can be regenerated or made a church. Unless these things are affirmed and acknowledged, the rest of the things both of faith and of life cannot possibly be received, and therefore cannot be affirmed, still less acknowledged. For he who affirms mere faith with himself, and not the holy of faith, that is, charity (for this is the holy of faith), and does not affirm this by the good of life, that is, by the works of charity, can no longer have a taste for the essence of faith, because he rejects it.

Affirmation together with acknowledgment is the first general principle with the man who is being regenerated, but it is the last with him who has been regenerated; and therefore “Dan” is the first with him who is to be regenerated, and “Joseph” is the last, for “Joseph” is the spiritual man himself. But “Joseph” is the first with him who has been regenerated, and “Dan” the last. This is because the man who is to be regenerated begins from the affirmation that it is so, namely, the holy of faith and the good of life. But the regenerate man, who is spiritual, is in spiritual good itself, and from this he regards such affirmation as last; for with him the holy things of faith and goods of life have been confirmed.

AC 3923.8. The reason why, as before said, “Dan” is the first boundary, and also the last, is that the affirmative of truth and good is the first of all things when faith and charity are beginning with man, and the last when man is in charity and thereby in faith. It was from this also that the last lot fell to Dan when the land of Canaan was divided for inheritance (Josh. 19:40, etc.); for the lot was cast before Jehovah (Josh. 18:6), and hence it fell according to the representation of each tribe.

AC 6397.1-2. [Dan] shall judge his people as one of the tribes of Israel.... [I]n this prophetic utterance of Israel, in the internal sense, by his twelve sons are described in general all who are in the Lord’s kingdom in respect to their quality. That they who are signified by “Dan” are in the ultimate heaven, or in the ultimate part of the Lord’s kingdom, because they are in truth and not yet in good, was represented by the lot of Dan falling last, when the land of Canaan was distributed for an inheritance among the tribes....

Thus the ultimates [or last things] of that land represented the ultimates in the Lord’s kingdom... and therefore Dan represented those who are in the ultimates there. For before truth has been conjoined with good, it is in the ultimate; but if truth is completely separated from good, it is not then within any border of the Lord’s kingdom but is outside of it.

AE 450. Among these twelve tribes, from each of which twelve thousand are said to be sealed, the tribe of Dan is not mentioned, but in its stead the tribe of Manasseh... The tribe of Dan is not mentioned because that tribe represented and signified... such people as were not in the very truths of heaven and the church, but they were in the good of life according to the doctrinals of their religion. And these doctrinals were for the most part not genuine truths but falsities, and yet these falsities were accepted by the Lord as truths, because these people were in the good of life, and on account of this the falsities of their religion were not tainted with evil, but inclined to good. The others were taken in place of the tribe of Dan because the tribe of Dan was the last [or ultimate] of the tribes, and therefore signified, in the Lord’s kingdom, the ultimates in which those are who are in the good of life and of faith according to their religion in which there are no genuine truths....

previous		next