Page:The New Church - What, How, Why .djvu/51

Rh parts become translucent by the application of the law of correspondence according to which Scripture is written.

We can give here but one more instance of the application of the law to an extensive portion of the Word. This must be very general.

The story of the Israelites in Egyptian bondage, their deliverance, the journey in the wilderness, and final entrance into the Promised Land, though historically true, is none the less a parable. The Lord desired to reveal His relation to mankind, to show the relation of right and wrong to man obedient and disobedient. For this purpose He chose the Israelites and led them upon the great world as a stage for many years that He might dramatize the story of man's redemption.

Because the Egyptians, though skilled in science, were external and worldly, they stand for that bondage to sin in which they were and in which man is born. The long journey to the Holy Land is our