737. 'Noah was a son of six hundred years' means his initial state of temptation. This is clear from the fact from here down to Eber in Chapter 11 nothing else is meant by numbers, years of age, or names than real things, as was the case also with the ages and names of all those mentioned in Chapter 5. Here 'six hundred years' means the initial state of temptation. This becomes clear from its prime factors which are ten and six multiplied again by ten. When the same factors are involved it makes no difference whether the number arrived at is large or small. As for ten, this has been shown already at 6:3 to mean remnants, while the meaning of six here as labour and conflict is clear from places throughout the Word. For the situation is this: What has gone before dealt with man's preparation for temptation, that is to say, he was supplied by the Lord with truths of the understanding and with goods of the will. These truths and goods are remnants, but they are not brought forth so as to be acknowledged until man is being regenerated. In the case of those who are being regenerated by means of temptations the remnants existing with any man are for the angels present with him. From these remnants they draw out those things with which they protect him against the evil spirits who activate falsities with him and in this way attack him. It is because remnants are meant by 'ten' and conflict by 'six' that six hundred years are spoken of, a number in which ten and six are the prime factors and which means a state of temptation.

[2] As regards conflict being the particular meaning of 'six', this is clear from Genesis 1, which describes the six days of man's regeneration prior to his becoming celestial. During those six days there was constant conflict, but on the seventh day came rest. Consequently there are six days of labour, and the seventh is the sabbath, a word which means rest. This also is why a Hebrew slave was to serve for six years and in the seventh was to go free, Exodus 21:2; Deuteronomy 15:12; Jeremiah 34:14, and why for six years they were to sow the land and gather in the produce, but in the seventh they were to leave it alone, Exodus 23:10-12. The same applied to a vineyard. It is also the reason why in the seventh year the land was to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to Jehovah, Leviticus 25:3-4. Because 'six' means labour and conflict it also means the dispersion of falsity, as in Ezekiel,

Behold, six men coming from the direction of the upper gate, which looks towards the north, every man with a weapon of dispersion in his hand. Ezekiel 9:2.

And in the same prophet, against Gog,

I will cause you to turn about, and I will split you into six, and cause you to come up from the uttermost parts of the north. Ezekiel 39:2.

Here 'six' and 'splitting into six' stand for dispersion, 'the north' for falsities, and 'Gog' for people who seize on doctrinal matters based on things of an external nature with which they destroy internal worship. From Job,

He will deliver you in six troubles, and in a seventh no evil will touch you. Job 5:19.

This stands for the conflict that constitutes temptations.

[3] 'Six' occurs in other parts of the Word where it does not mean labour, conflict, or the dispersion of falsity, but the holiness of faith. In these instances it is related to twelve, which means faith and all things of faith in their entirety, and to three which means that which is holy. Consequently there is also a genuine derivative meaning to the number six, as in Ezekiel 40:5, where the man's measuring rod with which he measured the holy city of Israel was six cubits long; and in other places. The reason for this derivative is that in the conflict of temptation the holiness of faith is present, and also that six days of labour and conflict look forward to the holy seventh day.

4683. 'And he told it to his brothers' means to the adherents to faith separated from charity. This is clear from the representation of 'Joseph's brothers' as the Church which turns aside from charity to faith, and in the abstract sense as things that are matters of faith, dealt with above in 4665, 4671, 4679. In this case the adherents to faith separated from charity are meant because the statement that follows about them hating him all the more means still greater contempt and aversion. The position with that Church is that when it first comes into being its members proclaim charity. But they are led to do so solely on the basis of doctrine and thus of factual knowledge, not of actual charity nor thus of affection or what is in their hearts. In course of time, as charity and affection are blotted out in their hearts they proclaim faith, and at length when no charity exists any longer they proclaim faith alone, saying that this faith without works enables one to be saved. At this point also they no longer call works the works of charity but those of faith, naming them the fruits of faith.

[2] Members of that Church do, it is true, link faith and works together in this way, but doctrine, not life, is the basis on which they do so. And because they do not make salvation depend in any way at all on the life of faith, which is good, only on faith - even though they know plainly from the Word, and their own understanding also tells them, that doctrine is nothing without life, or that faith is nothing without its fruits - they make the saving power of faith depend on confidence. As a result of this they also forsake the fruits of faith, unaware that all confidence owes its existence to the end in view which is life, or that true confidence cannot possibly exist except in good, and that spurious and also false confidence rest in evil. And to set faith and charity even further apart they also declare persuasively that the confidence of only a moment's duration, engendered even in the final moment of life, can save a person, no matter what his life had been prior to that. Yet for all this they know that the life which is his own awaits everyone after death and that each will be judged according to the works he has done in life. These few remarks make clear the nature of faith separated from charity, and therefore the nature of the Church which makes faith essential and not the life of faith. The falsities which flow from this as their fountainhead will in the Lord's Divine mercy be mentioned further on.