Firstborn, in a supreme sense, represents the Lord as to divine celestial love, and also peope who were of the celestial church. The sanctification of the firstborn, as in Exodus 13, signifies faith in the Lord. The firstborn, in the spiritual sense of the Word, is good, for with infants the good of innocence is first infused by the Lord, by virtue of which man first becomes a man. Since good is of love, and man does not reflect upon his own love, but only upon the thoughts of his memory, and since good has not at first a quality, but acquires one when it is formed in truths, and without a quality nothing is perceived, hence it was unknown that good was the primary principle, or firstborn. Good is first conceived from the Lord in man, and is produced by truths, in which good is manifested, in its own form and effigy. Firstborn, as in Psalm 89:28, signifies the Lord's humanity.

6265. 'And Joseph brought them away from his thighs' means that the good belonging to the will and the truth belonging to the understanding were brought away from an affection originating in love on the part of spiritual good. This is clear from the representation of 'Joseph' as the internal celestial, dealt with in 5869, 5877; from the representation of Manasseh and Ephraim, the ones here whom 'Joseph brought away', as the good belonging to the will and the truth belonging to the understanding, dealt with in 5354, 6222; from the meaning of 'the thighs' as an affection originating in love, dealt with in 3021, 4277, 4280, 4575, 5050-5062; and on the part of spiritual good is meant because they were brought away from Israel, who represents spiritual good, 6253. The words used here mean that the internal celestial took good belonging to the will and truth belonging to the understanding away from spiritual good, that is, away from the affection arising from its love; they have this meaning because 'Israel', who represents spiritual good, had made that goodness and truth draw near him. Besides this they had to be brought to him by Joseph, who represents the internal celestial; for that reason they were brought away and after that, as described in what follows, were brought to him again by Joseph.

[2] The explanation for all this is that the inflow of love came to that goodness and truth from the internal celestial by way of spiritual good - in keeping with true order. That external procedure had therefore to be strictly adhered to when they were going to be blessed; for they were being presented to the Lord, the Source of the foretelling meant here by the blessing, 6254. This now explains why Joseph brought his sons away from his father's thighs, and why he himself after that brought them to him again.