23. Nothing is more common in the Word than for the word 'day' to be used to mean the particular time at which events take place, as in Isaiah,

The day of Jehovah is near. Behold, the day of Jehovah comes. I will make heaven tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, on the day of My fierce anger. Its time is close at hand, and its days will not be prolonged. Isaiah 13:6, 9, 13, 22.

And in the same prophet,

Her antiquity is in the days of antiquity. On that day Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, like the days of one king. Isaiah 23:7, 15.

Since 'day' stands for the particular time it also stands for the state associated with that particular time, as in Jeremiah, Woe to us, for the day has declined, for the shadows of evening have lengthened! Jeremiah 6:4

And in the same prophet,

If you break My covenant that is for the day and My covenant that is for the night, so that there is neither daytime nor night at their appointed time. Jeremiah 33:20, 25.

Also,

Renew our days as of old. Lamentations 5:21.

4736. 'Throw him into [this] pit in the wilderness' means that for the time being they should conceal it among their falsities, that is, that they should consider it a falsehood but nevertheless keep it because it is of importance to the Church. This is clear from the meaning of 'the pit' as falsities, dealt with above in 4728, and from the meaning of 'the wilderness' as a place where there is no truth; for 'wilderness' has a wide range of meanings. It is a place that is uninhabited and so uncultivated, and when used to refer to the Church means a place where there is no good and consequently no truth, 2708, 3900. Thus 'the pit in the wilderness' is used here to mean falsities among which no truth is present because no good is there.

[2] The expression 'no truth is present because no good is there' is used for the reason that if a person believes that faith saves without works, truth may indeed exist. Even so, it is not truth residing with him, because it does not look to good nor is it rooted in good. This truth is not a living one because it contains a false premise, and therefore when a truth of this kind exists with that person it is nothing but a falsehood based on the false premise that reigns within it. That premise may be likened to the soul from which all else has its life. On the other hand falsities can exist which are accepted as truths if good lies within them, especially if it is the good of innocence, as with gentiles and even with many within the Church.