8797. 'Everyone touching the mountain will surely die' means that anyone belonging to the spiritual Church who forces his way through to celestial [communities] will be destroyed. This is clear from the meaning of 'the mountain' as the good of love, dealt with just above in 8795, at this point the Divine Good of Divine Love in the inmost heaven, since the people below the mountain represent the Lord's spiritual kingdom, which is the middle heaven; from the meaning of 'touching' as penetrating that far, at this point forcing one's way through, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'surely dying' as being destroyed.

[2] The situation here is that those belonging to the Lord's spiritual kingdom cannot flow into the celestial kingdom since this is higher or more internal and the spiritual kingdom is lower or more external; for what is more external or lower cannot flow into what is higher or more internal, 5259, 5779. However it sometimes happens that those in a lower heaven seek to go up into a higher heaven; they seek to do so because of a wrong desire that has its origin in pride, dominion, or envy. Those who have that desire and venture up are also let in now and again; but then they suffer badly. They are seized by anxiety, at length by pain, and also by blindness; their intelligence is destroyed, and their happiness. On account of all this they cast themselves down from there as if they are about to die, and do not revive until they have been cast down out of heaven.

[3] Such is the fate of those belonging to a lower heaven who force their way through to a higher heaven from a desire born of pride, dominion, or envy. The reason why they suffer badly is that the good of love in the higher heaven is comparatively like a devouring fire, and the truth of faith there is like fiery light blinding the sight of those coming up from below. These are the things that are meant in the internal sense by the Israelite people's being forbidden to touch Mount Sinai where Jehovah was. A similar fate would await those belonging to the celestial kingdom if they perhaps tried to go up above to the Divine. It also awaits those who are below heaven if they desire to go up into heaven; they too suffer badly, see 4225, 4226, 4299, 5057, 5058.

4225. In the first place it must be stated who are within the Grand Man and who are outside it. All who are governed by love to the Lord and charity towards the neighbour, and who from their hearts do good to him in the measure that good is present in him, and who have a conscience of what is just and fair, are within the Grand Man, for they abide in the Lord and are consequently in heaven. Not so all who are governed by self-love and love of the world and therefore by their own very evil desires. These do good solely because laws require them to do it; they do it for the sake of personal position, worldly wealth, and reputation resulting from these. Thus they are ruthless interiorly, and being selfish and worldly-minded they are steeped in hatred of and revenge against their neighbour, and take delight in his injury when he does not favour them. These are outside the Grand Man; indeed they are in hell. They do not correspond to any organs or members within the body but to various defects and diseases induced into them, which too will in the Lord's Divine mercy be described from experience later on.

[2] Those outside the Grand Man, that is, outside heaven, cannot enter it since their lives are contrary to it. Indeed if they do gain any kind of entrance, as some on occasions do who during their lifetime have learned to impersonate angels of light (their entry into heaven being sometimes permitted to let them see what they themselves are really like), they are admitted no further than the first part of the way in, that is, no further than the part where those people are gathered who are still simple and have not yet been fully taught. Such people who come in impersonating angels of light are able to remain there for barely a few moments because the life there is that of love to the Lord and of love towards the neighbour. And because nothing there corresponds to their own life they are scarcely able to breathe; for spirits and angels too are beings who breathe, see 3884-3893. As a consequence those impersonating angels start to experience pain, because the act of breathing is directly related to one's freedom to live in one's own way; and what is remarkable, they are at length scarcely able to move but become such as are weighed down, inwardly seized with anguish and torment, as a result of which they cast themselves away from there headlong, even into hell where breathing and freedom of movement return to them. And this is why in the Word life is represented by movement.

[3] The breathing of those who are within the Grand Man however is free when the good of love is alive in them. Yet they are distinguishable any one from another according to the nature and the amount of that good; and this is the origin of so many heavens, which in the Word are called 'rooms', John 14:2. And anyone present in his own heaven leads the life that is his own and has the whole of heaven flowing into him. Everyone there is a focal point of all influxes, and because of that he experiences most perfect equilibrium, doing so in accordance with the amazing form heaven takes, which is received from the Lord alone, with much variety from person to person.