6866. 'And Moses said to God' means perception received from the Divine, and a state of humility. This is clear from the meaning of 'saying' as perception, dealt with often; from the representation of 'Moses' as the Lord in respect of the law of God, dealt with in 6723, 6752, 6771, 6827, the Divine being meant by 'God'. These words also imply a state of humility, as is evident from what follows, for he says, 'Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should lead the children of Israel out?' Since 'Moses' represents the Lord and mention is made here of humility, something must be said about the Lord's state of humility when He was in the world. To the extent that the Human which had not yet been made Divine came to the forefront in the Lord He was in a state of humility; but to the extent that His Human which had been made Divine came to the forefront He could not be in a state of humility, for to that extent He was God and was Jehovah. The reason why He was in a state of humility when the Human which had not yet been made Divine came to the forefront was that the human which He derived from His mother was evil by heredity, and this could not draw near the Divine except in a state of humility. For when real humility is present in a person he surrenders all power to think or do anything by himself and abandons himself completely to the Divine, and in this condition draws near to the Divine. The Divine was, it is true, within the Lord, since He had been conceived from Jehovah; but the more the inheritance from His mother came to the forefront in His Human the more remote the Divine seemed to be. For in spiritual and celestial things dissimilarity of state is what lies behind remoteness and absence, while similarity of state is what lies behind nearness and presence; and what lies behind similarity and dissimilarity is love. From this one may now recognize the source of the state of humility that existed with the Lord when He was in the world. but later on, when He had cast off all the human derived from His mother, so completely that He was no longer her son, and had clothed Himself with the Divine, the state of humility came to an end; for then He was one with Jehovah.

6827. 'And Moses was feeding the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian' means that the law from God instructed those who were guided by the truth that went with simple good, 'the priest of Midian' being the good of the Church where those people were. This is clear from the representation of 'Moses' as the Lord in respect of the law of God, dealt with in 6752 (initially 'Moses' represented the Lord in respect of the truth that the law from God possessed, 6771, but here he represents Him in respect of that law itself - one is allowed to speak in this way of stages of development that took place in the Lord before He became the law of God itself in respect of His Human. The whole of the Word deals in its inmost or highest sense solely with the Lord and the glorification of His Human; but since that inmost or highest sense goes far beyond human understanding, let it be the internal sense of the Word that is explained here, the sense in which the subject is the Lord's kingdom, the Church and the establishment of it, and also the regeneration by the Lord of members of the Church. These are the subject in the internal sense because human regeneration is an image representative of the Lord's glorification, see 3138, 3212, 3245, 3246, 3296, 3490, 4402, 5688);

[2] from the meaning of 'feeding' as instructing, dealt with in 3795, 5201; from the meaning of 'the flock' as one who learns and is led by means of truth to the good of charity, dealt with in 343, so that in a general sense 'the flock' is the Church, 3767, 3768, here the Church where those people are who are guided by the truth that goes with simple good, who are meant by 'Midian', 3242, 4756; from the meaning of 'father-in-law' as the good from which, as from a father, sprang the good that was joined to truth, here the truth that the law from God possessed, which 'Moses' represents, see 6793 ('Jethro' being the essential nature of that good); and from the meaning of' the priest of Midian' as the good of the Church where those who were guided by the truth that went with simple good were, dealt with in 6775. From all this it is evident that 'Moses was feeding the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian' means that the law from God instructed those who were guided by the truth that went with simple good, and that 'the priest of Midian' is the good of the Church where those people were.