7945. 'So they did' means an act initiated by the will. This is clear from the fact that 'did' is repeated here, and that when used first it meant an act initiated by the understanding, whereas here it means an act initiated by the will. In the Word it is common for what seem like repetitions to occur in which one matter is mentioned twice. But the first mention has reference to truth that belongs to the understanding, and the second to good that belongs to the will. The reason for this is that every detail of the Word contains the heavenly marriage, which is the marriage of goodness and truth, 683, 793, 801, 2173, 2516, 2712, 4138 (end), 5138, 5502, 6343, and contains in the highest sense the Divine marriage, which is that of Divine Good within the Lord and Divine Truth going forth from Him, 3004, 5502, 6179. These considerations show also that the Word is most holy.

793. From this point onwards to the end of the present chapter the subject is the people before the Flood who perished. This becomes clear from the details in the description given. People who possess the internal sense can recognize instantly, and indeed from any single word, what the subject is, better still from the combination of many. When the subject changes different words instantly appear, or else the same words combined differently. The reason is that some words are peculiar to spiritual matters, others peculiar to celestial; or what amounts to the same, some are peculiar to things of the understanding, others to those of the will. For example, 'desolation' is a word used of spiritual things, 'vastation' of celestial; 'city' is used of spiritual, 'mountain' of celestial; and so on. The same applies to combinations of words. And what is bound to amaze everybody, the difference in Hebrew is frequently just a matter of vocalization. In what belongs to the class of spiritual words the first three vowels [of the alphabet] are normally prominent, but in the case of what is celestial the last two. The fact that these verses contain a different subject is also discernible from the repetition discussed already. That is to say, the statement, 'And the waters grew stronger and stronger over the earth', is a repetition of what has already been stated in the previous verse. It is also discernible from everything that follows.