314. * something. Even though everything has now been explained and unraveled for them, so that they now know everything which has been told about the sacrifices and rites, are they still in the same obscurity? So they do not grow wise. The same thing would also have happened to them [if they had been instructed during life].* For that was their character, and so they would surely have profaned the holy things at heart and would have mingled profanity with holiness, thus rushing into the harshest spiritual death of all. To these words they replied that they do not wish to understand anything, that is, of these things that have been told. [Church; Jews; Profane; Display (Representation)] [See also WE 6349, concluding the explanation of Lev. 1.]
Leviticus Chap. 5 6356. Here the subject is other sins, some of them not committed by error. * It should be noted here that a person was not allowed to sacrifice, before he had been convicted, or had himself confessed his sin. For when one is convicted, one admits the sin, and is ashamed of it. When it is admitted, one can be healed of it. So without some admission, either tacit or open, the sin is not forgiven. This principle is derived from the fact that humankind is nothing but evil, for from their root, nothing but evil sprouts forth. This root is inborn, and thereafter springs up. For the human mind and will is first shaped by evil, consequently the root and its outgrowth, which forms new roots. Unless one admits these things, and believes that there is nothing good in us, the sin can never be forgiven, nor thus we ourselves be reformed. This has been proven to me so many times * These words are supplied from the index entries.
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