2528. 'God said to him in the dream' means a perception that was less obscure. This is clear from what has been stated and explained above in 2514. The reason why in this chapter the name 'God' is used but not 'Jehovah', except in the last verse, is that spiritual matters, that is, matters of doctrine concerning faith, are the subject. For when spiritual matters are referred to, the name 'God' is used, but when celestial matters, that is, love and charity, are dealt with, the name Jehovah' is used, see 709, 732, 2001.

This can, of course, be a wonderful thing: It is essential for our journey to heaven, and is the reason for the holiness of marriage. But when the men represent falsity it can also be horrendously twisted, as in the attempted homosexual rape in Sodom (Genesis 19) and the rape of the concubine in Gibeah (Judges 19). In a general sense, men represent things of the intellect -- facts, ideas, knowledge, everything from the deepest truths to the most pernicious falsities about life and the Lord. Women in general represents things of affection -- desire, passion, caring, everything from the most exalted love for the Lord to the darkest hatred. When a man “knows” a woman in the Bible, then, it represents a joining together of those intellectual and affectionate faculties. “Know" is also often used in connection with virginity. A women who has “not known a man” represents the affection for truth, unsullied by falsity.