ほとんどの場合、"before "の意味は簡単です。相対的な時間を評価する方法としても、"誰かの前で "という意味でも、"before "は使われます。しかし，主に関連して使われる場合には，より深い意味を持ちます。主の前に」いるということは、主の前にいるだけでなく、主から善の欲求と真理の理解を受けて、それに従って生きることを意味します。そして、主に関連して時間の評価として使われる場合、「前に」とは「永遠に」という意味であり、私たちが経験する時間ではなく、霊的な状態を指します。

(Odkazy: 啓示による黙示録解説366, 617; 天界の秘義6983, 8439, 9888)

8439. 'Come near before Jehovah' means a state in which that influx is accepted and applied. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming near before Jehovah' as influx, dealt with in 8159, and therefore also acceptance, acceptance being the response to influx since the two answer to each other. To the extent that a person accepts influx from God he is said to come near before Him; nothing other than this is meant in the spiritual sense by 'coming near before Jehovah'. What enables a person to draw near Him is faith and love; and since both faith and love come from Jehovah, that is, from the Lord, drawing near Him is also the acceptance of goodness and truth flowing in from Him. The reason why applying is also meant is that receiving it has no value unless it is applied, that is to say, put to a useful purpose. For what flows in from God passes first into perception, which belongs to a person's understanding; from there it passes into his will, and after that into action, that is, into a good deed, which is the useful purpose, and in this reaches its goal. When this passage of goodness and truth from the Lord is complete, the goodness and truth become the person's own, for now they flow all the way through to the final level of order, that is, of the natural order, which all Divine influx heads towards. The person who has the Divine flowing all the way through him may be called a road of heaven. From all this it may now be seen that 'coming near before Jehovah' means a state in which that influx is accepted and put to use, here a state in which the good meant by 'manna' and the delight meant by 'selav' are accepted.