Week 2    Day 4

    Listen:

Removing the Right Eye and Right Hand

Arcana Coelestia 10061:5

[In] Matthew:

Jesus said, If thy right eye has caused thee to stumble, pluck it out and cast it from thee. And if thy right hand has caused thee to stumble, cut it off and cast it from thee. It is better for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body be cast into Gehenna (Matt. 5:29, 30).

Here the “right eye” denotes the understanding and faith of falsity from evil, and the “right hand,” the falsity itself from evil. Everyone is able to know that by “eye” here is not meant the eye, nor by “right hand” the right hand; and that the eye that causes to stumble is not to be plucked out, nor the hand that causes to stumble to be cut off; for from this there would be nothing of salvation for man.

Apocalypse Explained 600:8

In Matthew:

If thy right eye has caused thee to stumble, pluck it out and cast it from thee. And if thy right hand has caused thee to stumble, cut it off and cast it from thee (5:29, 30).

That by the “right eye” and the “right hand” the Lord did not mean the right eye and the right hand, anyone can see from its being said that the eye “must be plucked out” and the hand “must be cut off” if they cause to stumble. But as the “eye” signifies in the spiritual sense everything belonging to the understanding and to thought from it, and the “right hand” everything belonging to the will and to affection from it, it is evident that “if the right eye has caused thee to stumble it must be plucked out” signifies that if one thinks evil, the evil must be rejected from the thought. Also, “if the right hand has caused thee to stumble it must be cut off” signifies that if evil is willed, the evil of the will must be cast out. For the eye itself cannot cause to stumble, nor can the right hand, but the thought of the understanding and the affection of the will, to which they correspond, can.

It is said the “right eye” and the “right hand,” and not the left eye and the left hand, because the “right” signifies good, and in the contrary sense evil, while the “left” hand signifies truth, and in the contrary sense falsity, and all cause of stumbling comes from evil, not from falsity, unless the falsity is the falsity of evil.

That these things are said of the internal man, whose part it is to think and to will, and not of the external, whose part it is to see and to act, is evident also from the words that immediately precede respecting the “woman of another,” that merely looking upon her from lust is committing adultery.

Arcana Coelestia 2701:2

That the “eye” signifies the understanding is because the sight of the body corresponds to the sight of its spirit, which is the understanding; and because it corresponds, in the Word the understanding is signified by the “eye” in almost every place where it is mentioned, even where it is believed to be otherwise, as where the Lord says in Matthew... “If thy right eye causes thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee” (Matt. 5:29; 18:9). The “left eye” is the intellectual, but the “right eye” is its affection. That the right eye is to be plucked out means that the affection is to be subdued, if it causes stumbling.

Apocalypse Revealed 48

That in these passages, by “eyes” is signified the understanding, everyone sees. Hence it is evident what the Lord meant by “eye” in these places:

The lamp of the body is the eye; if thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be light; if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be darkened. If therefore the light (lumen) that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness (Matt. 6:22-23; Luke 11:34).

If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee; for it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast out into the Gehenna of fire (Matt. 5:29; 18:9).

By “eye” in these places is not meant the eye, but the understanding of truth.

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