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.

731. 'Wiping out everything ¹ I have made from over the face ² of the ground' means man's proprium, which is so to speak wiped out when he is being given life. This is clear from what has been stated already about the proprium. The human proprium is altogether evil and false. So long as it remains, a person is dead, but when he undergoes temptations, it is dispersed, that is, broken down and moderated by truths and goods from the Lord. In this way it is made alive and seems to be no longer present. Its apparent absence and causing no further harm is meant by 'being wiped out', though in fact it is in no way wiped out but remains. It is very similar to the behaviour of black and white. When these are variously modified by rays of light, they are converted into beautiful colours, such as blue, golden, and purple hues. By means of the latter, according to individual characteristics, as in the case of flowers, what is beautiful and pleasing is presented, although radically and fundamentally it is still the colours black and white. Now because the subject here is at the same time the final vastation of those who belonged to the Most Ancient Church, those who perished are meant as well by 'wiping out everything' I have made from over the face ² of the ground. ¹ This is also the case with verse 23 below. 'Everything I have made' is every thing, or every person who has celestial seed within him, that is, who belonged to the Church. This also is why in this verse, and in verse 23 below, the expression used is 'the ground', which means the member of the Church who has good and truth sown in him. And this grew more and more with those called Noah after evils and falsities had been dispersed, as stated already. But among the people before the Flood who perished, that seed was choked by tares.

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