7602. 'And the barley' means its good. This is clear from the meaning of 'the barley' as the good of the exterior natural. The reason why 'the barley' means that good is that it is a product of the field and is a grain that serves for food. For 'grain' in general means the good of truth, 3580, 5295, 5410, 5959, as do 'barley and wheat' in particular - 'barley' the good of the exterior natural, and 'wheat' the good of the interior natural. The former is meant by 'the barley' in Joel,

The minchah has been cut off, and the drink offering, from the house of Jehovah; the priests have been mourning, the ministers of Jehovah. The field has been devastated, the land has been mourning because the grain has been laid waste, the new wine has failed, the oil languishes. Farmers have been put to shame, vine dressers have wailed over the wheat and over the barley, for the reason that the harvest of the field has perished. Joel 1:9-11.

The prophet is referring at this point to a laying waste of what is good and true, as is clear from what follows it there. Not those products therefore are meant by 'the grain', 'the new wine', 'the wheat', and 'the barley', but spiritual things; that is, 'the wheat' means interior good, and 'the barley' exterior good. 'Barley' has a similar meaning in Ezekiel 4:9 and Deuteronomy 8:8. In the Book of Judges,

When Gideon reached the camp, there was a man recounting a dream to his companion. And he said, Behold, I have dreamed a dream; and behold, a cake of barley bread rolled towards the camp of Midian, and came all the way to a tent, and struck it so that it fell, and overturned it, and so the tent collapsed. Judges 7:13.

'Midian' means those who are guided by the truth that goes with simple good, and in the contrary sense those who fail to lead a good life, 3242, 4756, 4788, 6777. This good is the good of the exterior natural and is meant by 'barley bread'. But sensory pleasure, if this is what a person has in view instead of that good, is what is meant by 'a cake of barley bread'. This is the state that the Midianites described here represented on that occasion.

560. THE INTERNAL SENSE

Before one can go any further, reference must be made to the Church as it was before the Flood. In general it went the same way as subsequent Churches, as the Jewish Church before the Lord's Coming and the Christian Church after; that is, people corrupted and adulterated the cognitions of true faith. In particular as regards the member of the Church before the Flood, he conceived dreadful persuasions in the process of time and immersed the goods and truths of faith in filthy desires, to such an extent that scarcely any remnants resided with him. And once they had become such those people suffocated themselves so to speak, for nobody can live without remnants. Indeed, as already stated, it is remnants that make man's life superior to that of animals; it is from remnants, or from the Lord through them, that anyone is enabled to be a human being, to know what good and truth are, and to reflect on individual things, and so to think and to reason. For remnants alone are what contain spiritual and celestial life.