9686. 'And you shall make a screen for the tent door' means the intermediary uniting the second or middle heaven to the first or lowest heaven. This is clear from the meaning of 'a screen' as an intermediary uniting this heaven, which is represented by the tent of meeting, to the heaven represented by the court, which is the subject in the next chapter. For just as the veil between the holy place and the holy of holies has meant an intermediary uniting the inmost or third heaven and the middle or second heaven, so this screen means the like between the middle or second heaven and the first or lowest. The fact that there are three heavens, and that two of them were represented by the dwelling-place inside the veil and the dwelling-place outside the veil, has been shown above. And that the third or lowest heaven is represented by the court will in the Lord's Divine mercy be shown in the next chapter. The entrance from one to the other is meant by 'a door' where the screen was hung. As regards 'a door', that it means an entrance, see 2145, 2152, 2356, 2385, consequently communication, 8989, so that 'a screen' here, which served in place of a door, is an intermediary that communicates and unites.

2145. 'He was sitting at the tent door' means the holiness which existed with Him at that time, namely the holiness of love, which is meant by 'as the day was getting warmer', dealt with in what follows next. This is clear from the meaning of 'a tent' as holiness, dealt with in 414, 1102, 1566. And for the reason why 'tents' meant forms of holiness, see the same paragraphs. Since the Lord at this time had the perception meant by the oak-groves of Mamre, which is a lower rational perception, yet more interior than that meant by the oak-grove of Moreh, dealt with in 1442, 1443, it is here represented and so is meant by his sitting at the tent door, that is, at the entrance to holiness. As regards perceptions being more interior or less interior, this may be illustrated from the perceptions which the most ancient people had. From these people I have heard that the more they were immersed in mere facts acquired from the objects of hearing and sight the lower their perceptions became; but the more they were raised up from them towards the celestial things of charity and love the more interior these perceptions became, as they were then closer to the Lord.