3087. Verses 17-20 And the servant ran to meet her, and said, Let me sip now a little water from your pitcher. And she said, Drink, my lord. And she hastened and lowered her pitcher on to her hand and gave him a drink. And she finished giving him the drink and said, I will draw for your camels also until they have finished drinking. And she hastened and emptied her pitcher into the trough, and ran again to the well to draw, and drew for all his camels.

'The servant ran to meet her, and said' means investigation by Divine Good. 'Let me sip now a little water from your pitcher' means to see whether it was possible for any truth from that source to be joined to it. 'And she said, Drink, my lord' means an affirmative response. 'And she hastened and lowered her pitcher on to her hand' means the submission of the recipients which was accomplished by power. 'And gave him a drink' means introduction. 'And she finished giving him the drink' means the subsequent stage. 'And said, I will draw for your camels also until they have finished drinking' means the affirmative response as regards the enlightenment of all facts within the natural man. 'And she hastened and emptied her pitcher into the trough' means the separation of the affection for truth which was being introduced into Divine good. 'And ran again to the well' means a lower affection for truth. 'And drew for all his camels' means by which general facts were enlightened.

5881. 'For they were filled with dismay at his presence' means turmoil among them. This is clear from the meaning of 'being filled with dismay' as turmoil; dismay is nothing other than this. Turmoil is used to mean the rearrangement and reordering of truths within the natural, a reordering about which the following ought to be known: The order in which the factual knowledge and the truths in the human memory are arranged is not known by men; but angels know it, if the Lord so pleases. It is an amazing order - facts and truths are grouped together in bundles, as also are the actual bundles; and all this in keeping with the interconnection of things of which the person has gained a mental grasp. The way they are grouped together is more amazing than anyone can ever imagine. In the next life visual presentations of them sometimes appear; for in the light of heaven, which is a spiritual light, things such as these can be displayed for the eye to see in a way utterly impossible in the light of the world. The arrangement of the facts and truths into those bundle-like forms depends entirely on the person's loves. Self-love and love of the world leads to their being arranged into hellish forms, whereas love towards the neighbour and love to God leads to their being arranged into heavenly ones. Consequently when a person is being regenerated and the good of the internal man is becoming joined to the truths of the external man, turmoil develops among the truths; for they are being rearranged into a different order. This turmoil is what is being described here and is meant by their being filled with dismay. The dismay which comes to be felt at this time reveals itself through anxiety arising out of the change in the state immediately before; that is to say, it arises out of being deprived of the delight which had been present in that state. The same turmoil also reveals itself through anxiety over the life they had previously led, in that they had relegated internal good and the internal itself to the lowest parts of their minds - an anxiety dealt with in what follows.