736. 17:9 "This is the mind which has wisdom." This symbolically means that this is the interpretation in the natural sense, but intended for people who have the spiritual meaning from the Lord.

This is the mind means symbolically that this is the meaning and interpretation of the things seen. Which has wisdom means symbolically that it is for people who are interiorly wise.

This is the interpretation in the natural sense for people who have the spiritual meaning because the interpretation given by the angel was put in terms of the natural sense and not the spiritual sense, for he said that the beast's seven heads were seven mountains, and also that they were seven kings, and that one of them is, and the other has not yet come. He said, too, that the beast was the eighth, and of the seven, and so on with everything else he said to the end of the chapter. None of this can be understood except by people who have the spiritual meaning from the Lord. This, then, is what the mind's having wisdom means symbolically.

The interpretation given by the angel was put in terms of the natural sense and not the spiritual meaning because the natural sense is the foundation, containing vessel, and buttress of its spiritual and celestial senses, as may be seen in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Sacred Scripture, nos. 27-49. Therefore interpretations elsewhere in the Word are given also in terms of the natural sense, which still cannot be understood without the spiritual meaning, as may be seen in many places in the Prophets and also in the Gospels.