2685. 'Withdrawing herself about a bowshot' means the extent to which the state was away from the doctrine of truth. This is clear from the meaning of 'being withdrawn from' as being away from, and from the meaning of 'a bow' as the doctrine of truth, dealt with in the next paragraph. 'Shot' means that it was as far away as possible, as far away as an arrow could be shot from a bow. Here the expression 'a bowshot' is used because the bow is used in reference to the spiritual man, who is also called 'an archer', as he is in verse 20 - 'and he dwelt in the wilderness, and was an archer'.

1437. 'They came out to go into the land of Canaan' means that in this manner He drew closer to the celestial things of love. This is clear from the meaning of 'the land of Canaan'. That 'the land of Canaan' represents the Lord's kingdom in heaven and on earth becomes clear from many things in the Word. The reason it does so is that the representative Church was established in that land, a Church in which every single thing represented the Lord and the celestial and spiritual things of His kingdom. This applied not only to religious observances but also to everything associated with those observances - to both the persons who ministered and to the things they administered, and even to the places where the ministrations took place because the representative Church was centred there the land was consequently called 'the Holy Land', even though it was anything but holy, seeing that idolaters and profaners inhabited it. This then is the reason why 'the land of Canaan' here and in what follows means the celestial things of love Indeed the celestial things of love, these alone, exist in the Lord's kingdom and constitute that kingdom