4786. 'And his father wept for him' means interior mourning. This is clear from the meaning of 'weeping' as the extremity of grief and sadness, and so as interior mourning. In the ancient Churches the external practices by which, internal things were represented included those of wailing and weeping over the dead. Their wailing and weeping meant interior mourning, although their actual mourning was not interior. One reads the following, for example, about the Egyptians who had set out with Joseph to bury Jacob,

When they came to the threshing-floor of Atad which is at the crossing of the Jordan they wailed there with an exceedingly great and grievous wailing, and he mourned for his father seven days. And the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning at the threshing-floor of Atad, and they said, This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians. Genesis 50:10-11.

And one reads about David weeping over Abner,

They buried Abner in Hebron, and the king lifted up his voice and wept at the grave of Abner; and all the people wept. 2 Samuel 3:32.

7997. The Passover supper represented the groups of angels in heaven living in association with one another according to their forms of good and truths, see above in 7836, 7996. And since it represented those groups it was decreed not only that each household should be together by itself to eat it on that occasion but also that none should be associated with them except those who could represent togetherness in love characteristic of heavenly communities. All others were to be set apart. Those to be set apart were 'foreigners', for these meant people who were not in possession of the Church's goodness and truth. Those to be set apart also 'strangers' and 'hired servants', since these represented people prompted by natural inclination alone and people seeking material gain who would make a show of doing what was good and true. None of these can be integrated among the angels in heaven. But they are allowed to wander around during the initial period after their arrival in the next life, before they undergo the stages of vastation of good and truth. When during that initial period they approach any heavenly community and sense the sphere of holiness emanating from the truth belonging to the good of innocence, meant by 'the blood of the Passover lamb', 7846, 7877, they can go no further but in fear and loathing make a hasty retreat.