1165. In the Word 'Mizraim' or Egypt means knowledge, that is, various facts, by which people wish to probe into the arcana of faith and so confirm the false assumptions acquired in that way. 'Mizraim' also means simply knowledge, and so knowledge that is useful. This is clear not only from the places just quoted but also from very many others which would fill up page after page if they were all included. See Isaiah 19:1-end; Isaiah 30:1-3; 31:1-3; Jeremiah 2:18, 36; Jeremiah 42:14-end; Jeremiah 46:1-end; Ezekiel 16:26; 23:3; Ezekiel 29:1-end; Ezekiel 30:1-end; Hosea 7:11; 9:3, 6; 11:1, 5, 11; Micah 7:12 [NCBS: 7:15]; Zechariah 10:10-11; Psalms 80:8 and following verses.

2479. A certain person who had recently become a spirit was angry because he could not remember many of the things he had known during his lifetime. He grieved for the delight which he had now lost and in which he had taken very great pleasure. But he was told that he had lost absolutely nothing and still knew every single one of them, but that in the next life he was not allowed to summon such things up. It was sufficient that he was now able to think and speak far better and more perfectly and was unable to submerge the rational side of himself, as had happened previously, in dense, obscure, material, and bodily things which were of no use in the kingdom he had now entered. As for the things that existed in the kingdom of the world he was told that they were left behind, and that now he possessed whatever was suited to use in eternal life and that he could become blessed and happy in no other way. Thus anybody is wanting in knowledge who believes that in the next life, where the physical memory is not used, intelligence ceases. The reality is that to the extent the mind can be drawn from sensory and bodily interests it is lifted up to spiritual and celestial things.