Metaphysical Bible Interpretation of Joshua Chapter 20
Metaphysically Interpreting Joshua 20:1-9
20:1And Jehovah spake unto Joshua, saying, 20:2Speak to the children of Israel, saying, Assign you the cities of refuge, whereof I spake unto you by Moses, 20:3that the manslayer that killeth any person unwittingly and unawares may flee thither: and they shall be unto you for a refuge from the avenger of blood. 20:4And he shall flee unto one of those cities, and shall stand at the entrance of the gate of the city, and declare his cause in the ears of the elders of that city; and they shall take him into the city unto them, and give him a place, that he may dwell among them. 20:5And if the avenger of blood pursue after him, then they shall not deliver up the manslayer into his hand; because he smote his neighbor unawares, and hated him not beforetime. 20:6And he shall dwell in that city, until he stand before the congregation for judgment, until the death of the high priest that shall be in those days: then shall the manslayer return, and come unto his own city, and unto his own house, unto the city from whence he fled.
20:7And they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill-country of Naphtali, and Shechem in the hill-country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (the same is Hebron) in the hill-country of Judah. 20:8And beyond the Jordan at Jericho eastward, they assigned Bezer in the wilderness in the plain out of the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan out of the tribe of Manasseh. 20:9These were the appointed cities for all the children of Israel, and for the stranger that sojourneth among them, that whosoever killeth any person unwittingly might flee thither, and not die by the hand of the avenger of blood, until he stood before the congregation.
November 2, 1902: Joshua 20:1-9
In Scripture symbology, in its reference to the man-consciousness, “cities” represent aggregation of thoughts in the organism. There are also heaven’s cities, which represent aggregations of thoughts not yet precipitated into form. As there are cell centres in the body whose office it is to purify and renew the blood, so there are centres in thought that perform a like office. The blood is renewed and purified by coming in contact with a higher principle, the oxygen of the air; so our thoughts are saved, renewed, and purified by coming in touch with more spiritual thoughts, namely the elders in the cities of Refuge.
This, lesson is about life, the thoughts of life. The thought that life can be killed results in the destruction of some form of life in the organism, and then there is a thought of like character communicated to the next of kin, or most closely related thought and a destructive vortex set up in the consciousness. If this were allowed to spread without a check, it would involve in time the whole system, and death would result. To restore equilibrium we are commanded to establish these protective centres for the readjustment of our thoughts that have unwittingly destroyed life forms through ignorantly thinking that life can be destroyed.
Every time we think of death we send a thrill of negation through the organism that puts out some of its living cells. If we do not call that thought to account, protect and spiritualize it in a “City of Refuge,” it will become subject to all the thoughts of death in the mortal world, and go down with them. But we can call all such thoughts about life up into some of these high “Cities of Refuge” and give then the protection of the Spirit of the Lord.
The inner meaning of some of these Refuge localities indicates the mental state, or attitude from which we are to view life in order to realize the protection of the Spirit. “Kedesh (sacred) in Galilee (circuit, to whirl) in Mount Naphtali” (struggled for); this means that the understanding that life is sacred, holy, of divine origin, that it is eternally active and unending, and that it is established in consciousness and made permanent through struggling for it, will isolate our ignorant thoughts about its destructibility. So each of these cities has a significance which we may discern as our progress in spiritual development opens up to the hidden recesses of the soul.
The “high priest” represents our highest concept of God's law for man. When that concept is changed, the “high priest” dies, and we release all thoughts along certain lines, and they gravitate to their natural places. Thus the thought that man can be slain goes back to his home without fear of injury; he has been spiritualized through right understanding, and all conditions are changed.
– UNITY magazine.
Transcribed by Lloyd Kinder on 12-28-2013
