860. "그 수가 바다 모래 같으리라" 이 사람들이 많은 것을 뜻한다. 그 사람들이 많은 것을 "바다와 모래"에 비교한 것은 "바다"는 교회의 외적인 것을 뜻하며(402-403, 404, 470), "모래"는 밑바닥을 이루는 것 외에는 바다에서는 별로 소용이 없는 것이기 때문이다. 그들의 수가 그렇게 많기 때문에 일렀으되,

"뼈를 보면 장사하는 자로 하몬곡 골짜기에 장사하게 하고 성의 이름도 하모니라 하리라"(에스겔 39:15-16).

(옮기는 사람의 말 : 하몬 곡과 하모니는 다 히브리어로 사람이 많은 군중을 뜻함)

Seven, as in Revelation 15:1, signifies everything in an universal sense. The number 'seven' was considered holy, as is well known, because of the six days of creation, and the seventh, which is the celestial self, where peace, rest, and the Sabbath is. The number seven occurs so frequently in the rites of the Jewish church and is held holy everywhere.

So times were divided into seven, longer and shorter intervals, and were called weeks, like the great intervals of times till the coming of the Messiah, in Daniel 9:24-25. The time of seven years is called 'a week' by Laban and Jacob, as in Genesis 29:27-28. So wherever the number seven occurs, it is considered holy and sacred, as in Psalm 119:164, and in Isaiah 30:26.

As the periods of a person's regeneration are distinguished into six, prior to the seventh, or the celestial self, so the times of vastation are also distinguished, until nothing celestial is left. This was represented by the many captivities of the Jews, and by the last Babylonian captivity, which lasted seven decades, or seventy years. This was also represented by Nebuchadnezzar, in Daniel 4:16, 22, 29. It also refers to the vastation of the end times, in Revelation 15:1, 7-8. They should 'tread the holy city under foot, forty and two months, or six times seven,' as in Revelation 11:2 and Revelation 5:1. So the severity and increments of punishment were expressed by the number seven, as in Leviticus 26:18, 21, 24, 28 and Psalm 79:12.

(Odkazy: Apocalypse Explained 5, 7-8, 15; Arcana Coelestia 395; Daniel 9, 9:24, 9:25; Psalms 119)