In general, men are driven by intellect and women by affections, and because of this men in the Bible generally represent knowledge and truth and women generally represent love and the desire for good. This generally carries over into marriage, where the man's growing knowledge and understanding and the woman's desire to be good and useful are a powerful combination. In many cases in the Bible, then, "husband" refers to things of truth and understanding, much as "man" does. Magnificent things can happen in a true marriage, though, when both partners are looking to the Lord. If a husband opens his heart to his wife, it's as though she can implant her loves inside him, transforming his intellectual urges into a love of growing wise. She in turn can grow in her love of that blooming wisdom, and use it for joy in their married life and in their caring for children and others in their life. Many couples, even in heaven, stay in that state -- called "Spiritual" -- growing deeper and deeper to eternity. There is the potential, though, for the couple to be transformed: through the nurturing love of his wife the husband can pass from a love of growing wise to an actual love of wisdom itself, and the wife can be transformed from the love of her husband's wisdom into the wisdom of that love -- the actual expression of the love of the Lord they have built together. In that state -- called "Celestial" -- the husband represents love and the desire for good, and the wife represents truth and knowledge.

1182. 'Babel, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar' means that these types of worship existed in those areas, and that at the same time these same nations mean types of worship themselves, whose external features appear holy but whose interiors are unholy. This is clear from the meaning of 'Babel' and of 'the land of Shinar'. In the Word much reference is made to Babel, and wherever it occurs it means such worship, that is to say, worship whose exteriors look holy but whose interiors are unholy. But since Babel is the subject in the next chapter it will be shown there that Babel means such things, and also that such worship in the beginning was not as unholy as it became subsequently. For the real nature of external worship is determined entirely by its interiors. The more undefiled the interiors are, the more undefiled is the external worship, but the more foul the interiors the more foul the external worship. And the more unholy the interiors are, the more unholy is the external worship. To put it briefly, the more love of the world and self-love exist in someone with whom external worship exists, the less life and holiness his worship has within it. The more hatred towards the neighbour there is present within his self-love and love of the world, the more unholiness his worship has within it. The more wickedness there is present within his hatred, the more unholiness still his worship has within it. And the more deceit that wickedness contains, the more unholiness still his worship has within it. These types of love and these forms of evil are the interior features of the external worship meant by 'Babel', which is dealt with in the next chapter.