GROUND/FIELD/CLAY/DUST
Definition:
Flesh, man.
Scripture:
- Adam (which is also the word used for “man”) is called “the dust from the ground.” Human bodies were literally made from the ground. In this sense, the word ground is not even symbolic of flesh/man, but literal.
Genesis 2:7 (LSV) And YHWH God forms the man—dust from the ground, and breathes into his nostrils breath of life, and the man becomes a living creature.
- Our bodies are called “clay” (earthen) vessels.
2 Corinthians 4:7 (KJV) But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.
- When the Lord put His word into our fleshly mind, it is symbolically referred to as a sower sowing a seed into the ground. The word of God is literally going into ground when He speaks into our mind.
Mark 4:20 (KJV) And these are they which are sown on good ground; such as hear the word, and receive it…
- Nebuchadnezzar has a dream of a statue with feet made of iron and clay mixed. Daniel interprets this to mean that a nation would “mix” themselves with the seed of man.
Daniel 2:42-43 (KJV) And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken. 43 And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.
- We are called God’s field.
1 Corinthians 3:9 (NKJV) For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building.
- Our flesh is referred to as an unfruitful house and an unfruitful land, which thorns grow upon (Note: It seems strange at first that the land AND THE HOUSES would be said to grow thorns. Physical houses aren’t known for growing thorns. But this refers to our flesh.) After the Spirit is poured out on us, the Spirit is said to produce a “fruitful field” instead of the unfruitful land/house.
Isaiah 32:13 (KJV) Upon the land of my people shall come up thorns and briers [profitless, unfruitful]; yea, upon all the houses of joy in the joyous city … [v.15] Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field [the fruitfulness of our flesh], and the fruitful field be counted for a forest.
- Also, in Leviticus, a garment, an earthen vessel and a bronze pot are all symbolically used synonymously for a body.
Leviticus 6:27-28 (KJV) Whatsoever shall touch the flesh thereof shall be holy: and when there is sprinkled of the blood thereof upon any garment, thou shalt wash that whereon it was sprinkled in the holy place. 28 But the earthen vessel wherein it is sodden shall be broken: and if it be sodden in a brasen pot, it shall be both scoured, and rinsed in water.
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