9. In a broader sense “the Law” means everything Moses wrote in his five books, as we can see from the following passages. In Luke,

Abraham said to the rich man in hell, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.” (Luke 16:29, 31)

In John,

Philip said to Nathanael, “We have found the one of whom Moses in the Law, and also the prophets, wrote.” (John 1:45)

In Matthew,

Do not think that I have come to destroy the Law and the Prophets: I have come not to destroy but to fulfill. (Matthew 5:17-18)

Or again,

All the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John. (Matthew 11:13)

In Luke,

The Law and the Prophets extended to [the time of] John; since then, the Kingdom of God has been proclaimed. (Luke 16:16)

In Matthew,

Whatever you want people to do for you, you do the same for them. This is the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12)

Or again,

Jesus said, “You are to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and you are to love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37, 39-40)

In these passages “the Law and the Prophets” and “Moses and the prophets” mean everything written in the books of Moses and in the books of the prophets.

The following passages also show that “the Law” means specifically everything written by Moses. In Luke,

When the days of their purification according to the Law of Moses were completed, they brought Jesus to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord-as it is written in the Law of the Lord, “Every male who opens the womb is to be called holy to the Lord, ”- and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” And the parents brought Jesus into the Temple to do for him according to the custom of the Law. When they had completed all things according to the Law of the Lord... (Luke 2:22-24, 27, 39)

In John,

The Law of Moses commanded that people like this should be stoned. (John 8:5)

Or again,

The Law was given through Moses. (John 1:17)

We can see from these passages that sometimes it says “the Law” and sometimes “Moses” when it is talking about whatever is written in his books. See also Matthew 8:4; Mark 10:2-4; 12:19; Luke 20:28, 37; John 3:14; 7:19, 51; 8:17; 19:7.

Then too, many things that are commanded are called the law by Moses-for example, commandments about burnt offerings (Leviticus 6:9; 7:37), sacrifices (Leviticus 6:25; 7:1-11), the meal offering (Leviticus 6:14), leprosy (Leviticus 14:2), jealousy (Numbers 5:29-30), and Naziritehood (Numbers 6:13, 21).

In fact, Moses himself called his books the Law:

Moses wrote this Law and gave it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who carried the ark of the covenant of Jehovah, and said to them, “Take the book of this Law and put it beside the ark of the covenant of Jehovah.” (Deuteronomy 31:9, 25-26)

It was placed beside [the ark]: within the ark were the stone tablets that are “the law” in a strict sense.

Later, the books of Moses are called “the Book of the Law”:

Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the scribe, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of Jehovah.” When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law, he tore his clothes. (2 Kings 22:8, 11; 23:24)

820. 19:11 Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. This symbolizes the spiritual sense of the Word revealed by the Lord and the deeper meaning of the Word thereby disclosed, which is the coming of the Lord.

Seeing heaven opened symbolizes a revelation by the Lord and a disclosure then, which we will take up below. A horse symbolizes an understanding of the Word, and a white horse a deeper understanding (no. 298). And because this is the symbolic meaning of a white horse, and a deeper understanding of the Word is an understanding of the spiritual sense, therefore that sense is here symbolized by the white horse.

This is the coming of the Lord, because that sense makes it clearly apparent that the Lord embodies the Word, that the Word deals with Him alone, that He is God of heaven and earth, and that the New Church originates from Him alone.

The Lord told His disciples that they would see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with glory and power (Matthew 17:5; 24:30; 26:64; Mark 14:61-62; Revelation 1:7; Acts of the Apostles 1:9, 11). And the Lord said this also when He spoke with His disciples about the culmination of the age, which is the final period of the church when a judgment takes place.

Everyone who does not think beyond the literal sense believes that when the Last Judgment arrives, the Lord will appear in clouds of the sky, accompanied by angels and the blowing of trumpets. But this is not the meaning. Rather it means that the Lord will appear in the Word, as can be seen from the exposition above in nos. 24 and 642, and He appears clearly in the Word's spiritual sense. He appears not only as being an embodiment of the Word, that is, of Divine truth itself, or as being inmostly present in the Word and in everything springing from it, but also as being a single God, having the Trinity in Him, thus as being the only God of heaven and earth. Moreover, it appears also that He came into the world to glorify His humanity, that is, to make it Divine.

[2] The humanity that the Lord glorified, that is, the humanity that He made Divine, was the natural humanity, which He could not glorify or make Divine except by taking on a humanity in a virgin in the natural world, to which He then united His Divinity which He had from eternity. This union was achieved by temptations suffered by the humanity He had taken on, the last of which was His suffering of the cross and at the same time His fulfilling all of the Word, not only by His fulfilling all of the Word in its natural sense, but also by His fulfilling all of the Word in its spiritual sense, and also in its celestial sense, which, as we said before, deals with Him alone.

But on this subject see what we disclosed in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Lord, and in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Sacred Scripture.

Now because the Lord embodies the Word, and the Word became flesh (John 1:1-2, 14), and the Word became flesh in order that He might fulfill it, it is apparent that the Lord's appearing on the clouds of heaven means His coming in the Word. That the clouds of heaven symbolize the Word in its literal sense may be seen in nos. 24 and 642 above.

It is apparent that it is the Lord's appearing in the Word that is meant, because the white horse symbolizes a deeper understanding of the Word, and we are told that the name of Him who sat on the horse is "The Word of God," and that His name is "King of kings and Lord of lords" (verses 13, 16).

[3] It is apparent from this now that John's seeing heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, symbolizes the spiritual sense of the Word revealed by the Lord and the deeper meaning of the Word thereby disclosed, which is the coming of the Lord.

That the Word's spiritual sense has at this day been revealed, which no one in the Christian world has previously known anything about, may be see in Arcana Coelestia (The Secrets of Heaven), in which we expounded two of the books of Moses - Genesis and Exodus - in accordance with that sense. It may be seen also in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem Regarding the Sacred Scripture, nos. 5-26; in the short treatise, The White Horse, from beginning to end, and from the numbers collected there from Arcana Coelestia regarding the sacred scripture; and furthermore in this exposition of the book of Revelation, in which not even one little verse can be understood apart from its spiritual meaning.