AR 529
What nation in the entire world does not know
that it is evil to kill, commit adultery, steal,
and bear false witness?
If nations did not know this
and enact laws
to keep people from doing these things,
it would be all over with them.
For society, the republic, or kingdom
would collapse without these laws.
Who can suppose that the Israelite
nation
was so stupid in comparison to all other nations
as not to know that such actions are evil?
One may wonder, therefore, why these laws,
being so universally known throughout the whole world,
were promulgated by Jehovah Himself
from Mount Sinai,
attended by the great miracle they were,
and written, moreover, with His finger.
But listen, they were promulgated
by Jehovah
with such a great miracle and written with His finger
in order that people might know
that these laws are not only civil and moral laws,
but also spiritual laws,
and that to disobey them is not only to do evil
to one's fellow citizen and to society,
but is also to sin against God.
Their promulgation by Jehovah from Mount Sinai
made them therefore laws of religion.
For it is evident that whatever Jehovah God commands,
He commands to make it a matter of religion,
so that it must be obeyed for His sake,
and for a person's own sake,
that he may be saved.
Because these laws were the first elements
of the church to be established by the Lord
with the Israelite nation,
and because they embrace in brief summary
everything having to do with religion
which makes possible a conjunction
of the Lord with a person
and of a person with the Lord,
therefore they were so holy
that nothing was more holy.
. . . The Law's being called a covenant
symbolizes conjunction.
The reason is that covenants are made
for the sake of love, friendship, and association,
thus for the sake of conjunction.
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