6227. Verses 3-7 And Jacob said to Joseph, God Shaddai showed Himself to me in Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me. And He said to me, Behold, I am making you fruitful and will cause you to be multiplied, and I will make you into a congregation of peoples, and I will give this land to your seed after you as an everlasting possession. And now your two sons born to you in the land of Egypt, prior to my coming to you, to Egypt, they are mine, Ephraim and Manasseh; as Reuben and Simeon will they be mine. And your offspring ¹ that you beget after them will be yours; they will be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance. And as for me, when I was coming from Paddan, Rachel died on me in the land of Canaan on the road when there was still a stretch of land to go to Ephrath; and I buried her there on the road to Ephrath, that is, Bethlehem.

'And Jacob said to Joseph' means a communication of the truth of the natural with the internal. 'God Shaddai showed Himself to me in Luz in the land of Canaan' means the Divine appearing within the natural in a previous state. 'And blessed me' means a foretelling about a bestowal of life. 'And he said to me, Behold, I am making you fruitful and will cause you to be multiplied' means a bestowal of life through the good of charity and the truth of faith. 'And I will make you into a congregation of peoples' means an increase without limit. 'And I will give [this] land to [your] seed after you as an everlasting possession' means the Lord's kingdom belonging to those who have that goodness and truth within them. 'And now your two sons born to you in the land of Egypt' means goodness and truth within the natural that come from the internal. 'Prior to my coming to you, to Egypt' means before the truth of the natural existed within factual knowledge there. 'They are mine' means that they are within me. 'Ephraim and Manasseh' means the Church's understanding and will. 'As Reuben and Simeon will they be mine' means that they will be truth and the good of truth. 'And your offspring that you beget after them' means interior truths and forms of good which are begotten later on. 'Will be yours' means that they will be in the rational which is within the internal. 'They will be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance' means that they will be of the same essential nature as that of the Church's truths and forms of good, and will exist together among them. 'And as for me, when I was coming from Paddan' means from a state of cognitions. 'Rachel died on me in the land of Canaan' means the end of a former affection for interior truth. 'On the road when there was still a stretch of land' means what comes in between. 'To go to Ephrath' means the spiritual of the celestial in a former state. 'And I buried her on the road to Ephrath' means a casting away of that state. 'That is, Bethlehem' means replacing this, a state in which there is a new affection for truth and good.

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1153. That 'the sons of Gomer' also means those who possessed external worship, but an external worship derived from that which existed with the nation Gomer, follows from what has been stated and shown several times already about the meaning of 'sons', as well as from the fact that Gomer is one of those nations which possessed external worship corresponding to internal. Seven nations which possessed such worship are mentioned by name in the previous verse, and seven again, called 'the sons of Gomer and of Javan', in this. The specific differences however between one nation and another cannot be stated, as only their names are given here. In the Prophets however when the subject is specifically this or that type of Church-worship the differences can be established. In general all variations of external worship, as also of internal, arise according to the adoration of the Lord in the worship, and the adoration is according to the love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour that exist there. For it is within love that the Lord is present, and thus within worship. The differences of worship therefore existing among the nations mentioned here depend on the nature of His presence within.

[2] To make it easier to talk about how types of worship differ and how they did so in the Ancient Church among various nations, let it be realized that all true worship consists in adoration of the Lord. Adoration of the Lord consists in being humble; and being humble consists in the self-acknowledgement that with oneself there is nothing living and nothing good, but that with oneself everything is dead, indeed corpse-like. Being humble also consists in the acknowledgement that everything living and everything good come from the Lord. The more a person acknowledges these things not just with the lips but in his heart, the more humility he has; and consequently the more adoration - which is true worship - and the more love and charity, and the more happiness. The first contains the second, and they are so linked together as to be inseparable. This shows what these differences of worship are and the nature of them.

[3] Those who are mentioned here and are called 'the sons of Gomer and of Javan' are people who likewise possessed external worship corresponding to internal, but it was somewhat more remote than that of the people mentioned in the previous verse. This also is why they are called 'sons'. Generations descending one after another, or derivatives, here progress from what is interior towards things that are exterior. The more someone relies on the senses, the more exterior he becomes, and consequently becomes further removed from true worship of the Lord. For when it is more concerned with the world, the body, and the earth, and less with the spirit, it consequently becomes more remote. Because these people called the sons of Gomer and of Javan relied more on the senses, they focused worship even more on external things than those referred to as their parents and cousins had done. Consequently they form a second group here.