Faith # 68
68. 4. The failure of caring in the people described in Matthew shows that goats mean people who are devoted to a faith divorced from caring. We can see that the goats and sheep in Matthew 25:31-46 have the same meaning as the goat and the ram in Daniel because deeds of caring are listed for the sheep and it says that they did them, and the same deeds of caring are listed for the goats but it says that they did not do them, and that this is why these latter are condemned. A neglect of deeds is characteristic of people who are devoted to a faith divorced from caring because of their refusal to believe that deeds have anything to do with salvation or the church. When people so set aside caring—which consists of deeds—then faith fails as well, because faith comes out of caring; and when there is neither caring nor faith, there is damnation.
If the goats in this passage had meant all evil people it would have listed all the evil things they did rather than all the deeds of caring they did not do.
People like this are also meant by goats in Zechariah:
My wrath blazes against the shepherds, and I will execute judgment upon the goats. (Zechariah 10:3)
And in Ezekiel:
Behold, I am judging between sheep and sheep, between rams and goats. Is it too little for you to have eaten up the good pasture? Will you also trample what remains of the food with your feet? You attack all the weak sheep with your horns until you have scattered them. Therefore I will save my flock, so that it will no longer be prey. (Ezekiel 34:17-18, 21-22, and following)
A Faith Divorced from Caring Destroys the Church and Everything It Stands For
Arcana Coelestia # 7367
7367. Self-love reigns with a person, that is, a person is immersed in self-love, when in what he thinks and does he has no regard for his neighbour, thus no regard for the public, let alone the Lord, only for himself and for kith and kin. Consequently that love reigns when everything is done for his and their sakes alone; or if he does act for the public and his neighbour's sake it is merely in order that others may see him doing it.
