1432. And Abram took Sarai his wife. That this signifies good to which truth has been adjoined, is evident from that which is signified in the Word by a man and his wife (see n. 915); thus here, in the internal sense, by “Sarai” is signified nothing else than truth. In all things of man both in general and in particular there is an image of a marriage; nor can there possibly be anything so small as not to contain this image within it, whether it be in the external man and each and everything belonging to it, or in the internal man and each and everything belonging to it. The reason is that all things both in general and in particular come forth and subsist from the Lord, and from the unition of His Human Essence, as in a marriage, with His Divine Essence; and from the conjunction or heavenly marriage of both with His kingdom in the heavens and on earth. In the present case therefore, where there was to be represented the truth that is joined to the Lord’s good, and this by historic facts concerning Abram, it could be represented in no other way than by a “wife.” That there is an image of a marriage in all things both in general and in particular, may be seen above n. 54, 55, 718, 747, 917).

718. That by “man [vir] and wife” is signified that the truths were conjoined with goods, is evident from the signification of “man” as being truth, which is of the understanding, and from the signification of “wife” as being good, which is of the will (concerning which before), and also from the fact that man has not the least of thought, nor the least of affection and action, in which there is not a kind of marriage of the understanding and the will. Without a kind of marriage, nothing ever exists or is produced. In the very organic forms of man, both composite and simple, and even in the most simple, there is a passive and an active, which, if they were not coupled as in a marriage, like that of man and wife, could not even be there, still less produce anything, and the case is the same throughout universal nature. These incessant marriages derive their source and origin from the heavenly marriage; and thereby there is impressed upon everything in universal nature, both animate and inanimate, an idea of the Lord’s kingdom.