2. Before treating of the New Jerusalem and its doctrine, something shall be said of the New Heaven and the New Earth. In the small work on The Last Judgment and the Destruction of Babylon it was shown what is meant by the "first heaven and the first earth" which had passed away. After they had passed away, and thus after the Last Judgment had been accomplished, the new heaven was created, that is, formed by the Lord. This heaven was formed of all those who after the Lord's advent even to the present time, had lived a life of faith and charity; since they alone were forms of heaven. For the form of heaven, according to which all consociations and communications are there effected, is the form of Divine Truth from the Divine Good which proceeds from the Lord; and this form a man puts on as to his spirit by a life according to Divine Truth.

That the form of heaven is from this source, may be seen in the work Heaven and Hell 200-212; and that all angels are forms of heaven, in Heaven and Hell 51-58, 73-77. From this it may be known, of whom the new heaven was composed, and hence also what its quality is; namely, that it is altogether of one mind; for he, who lives a life of faith and charity, loves another as himself, and through love conjoins him to himself, and thus reciprocally and mutually, because love in the spiritual world is conjunction. When, therefore, all act alike, then from many, yea, from countless numbers consociated according to the form of heaven, there arises one mind, and there results, as it were, a one; for there is nothing which separates and divides, but everything conjoins and unites.

9488. 'And a cubit and a half its breadth' means what is complete so far as truth is concerned. This is clear from the meaning of 'one and a half' as what is complete, the reason why this number means what is complete being that 'three' has this meaning (for the half of a number is similar in meaning to the whole number, because a number that results from multiplication keeps the same meaning as a simple number of which it is the product through multiplication, 5291, 5335. Regarding 'three', that it means what is complete, see 2788, 7715, 9198; and that all numbers in the Word mean spiritual realities, 482, 487, 575, 647, 648, 755, 813, 1963, 1988, 2075, 2252, 3252, 4264, 4495, 4670, 5265, 5291, 5335, 5708, 6175, 7973); and from the meaning of 'breadth' as truth, dealt with immediately above in 9487.

5265. 'The seven good cows are seven years' means a state when truth within the interior natural is multiplied. This is clear from the meaning of 'the cows' in the good sense as the truths belonging to the interior natural, dealt with in 5198; and from the meaning of 'years' as states, dealt with in 482, 487, 488, 493, 893. There were seven because 'seven' means that which is holy and therefore adds the idea of holiness to the matter under discussion, dealt with in 395, 433, 716, 881, as well as implying a whole period from start to finish, 728. This explains why in the dream seven cows and seven heads of grain were seen, and after that why there were seven years of abundance of corn and seven years of famine. It also explains why the seventh day was made holy, why in the representative Church the seventh year was a sabbatical year, and why after seven times seven years there was a Jubilee.

[2] 'Seven' means things that are holy because of the meanings that numbers have in the world of spirits. Each number there holds some spiritual reality within it. Visual indications of numbers have appeared to me frequently, simple and compound ones, and also on one occasion a long sequence of them, when I have wondered what meanings they possessed. I have been told that they have their origin in conversations held by angels, and that it is customary from time to time to use numbers to express spiritual realities too. These numbers are not seen in heaven but in the world of spirits, where the visual presentation of such things takes place. The most ancients, who were celestial people and who talked to angels, knew all about this, which was why they used numbers to express an evaluation of the Church. The numbers used by them conveyed a general overall idea of matters for which words served to provide a detailed description. The meaning contained within every number did not however continue to be known among the descendants of these people; only the meanings of the simple numbers survived, that is to say, the meanings of two, three, six, seven, eight, twelve, and from these the meanings of twenty-four, seventy-two, and seventy-seven. In particular their descendants knew that 'seven' meant that which was most holy - that is to say, that in the highest sense 'seven' meant the Divine Himself, and in the representative sense the celestial element of love - and that the state of the celestial man was therefore meant by 'the seventh day', 84-87.

[3] It is quite evident from the numbers used plentifully in the Word that numbers mean spiritual realities, such as the following ones in John,

Let him who has intelligence reckon the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, that is, its number is six hundred and sixty-six. Revelation 13:18.

And elsewhere in the same book,

The angel measured the wall of the holy Jerusalem, a hundred and forty-four cubits, which is the measure of a man, that is, of an angel. Revelation 11:17.

The number one hundred and forty-four is twelve squared and twice seventy-two.