4835. 'Come [in] to your brother's wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her' means that this - that representative of the Church - might be continued. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming (or going in) to a brother's wife and performing the duty of a husband's brother to her' as preserving and continuing that which constitutes the Church. The requirement laid down in the Mosaic Law, that if a man died without issue his brother was to marry his widow and raise up seed for his brother, and that the firstborn was to receive his dead brother's name, whereas all other sons were to be his own, was called the duty of a brother-in-law. The fact that this directive was nothing new in the Jewish Church but a practice already in existence is clear from the words used here; and the same goes for many other directives given to the Israelites through Moses, such as the law forbidding them to take wives from the daughters of the Canaanites and requiring them to marry within their own families, Genesis 24:3-4; 28:1-2. From these and many other examples it is evident that a Church had existed previously in which the same kind of practices were followed as those at a later time which were declared to and demanded of the sons of Jacob. Altars and sacrifices likewise had been in use since ancient times, as is evident from Genesis 8:20-21; 22:3, 7-8. From this it is plain that the Jewish Church was not a new Church but a revival of the Ancient Church which had perished.

[2] What the law regarding the duty of a brother-in-law had been is clear in Moses,

If brothers dwell together but one of them dies, and has no son, the wife of the dead one shall not marry a stranger outside [the family]; her brother-in-law shall go in to her, and take her to himself as his wife, and so perform the duty of a brother-in-law to her. Then it will happen, that the firstborn whom she bears shall succeed to the name of his dead brother, so that his name is not wiped out from Israel. But if the man is unwilling to take his sister-in-law, his sister-in-law shall go up to the gate to the elders, and she shall say, My brother-in-law refuses to raise up for his brother a name in Israel; he is unwilling to perform the duty of a brother-in-law for me. Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him; and if he stands and says, I do not desire to take her, his sister-in-law shall go up to him in the sight of the elders, and she shall remove his shoe from upon his foot and spit in his face; and she shall answer and say, So will it be done to the man who does not build up his brother's house. Therefore his name will be called in Israel, The house of him who has his shoe taken off. Deuteronomy 25:5-10.

[3] Anyone who does not know what the duty of a brother-in-law represents inevitably believes that the practice existed solely for the sake of preserving a name and consequently an inheritance. But the preservation of a name and an inheritance was not in itself a great enough reason why a brother should have been required to enter into a marriage with his sister-in-law. Rather, the practice was ordained so that the preservation and continuation of the Church might be represented through it. For a marriage represented the marriage of good and truth, which is the heavenly marriage. It therefore represented the Church too, for the Church is a Church by virtue of the marriage of good and truth, and when this marriage exists within it the Church makes one with heaven, which is the true heavenly marriage. And because a marriage represented these things, 'sons and daughters' were therefore representations and also meaningful signs of truths and goods. This being so, 'being without issue' meant a lack of good and truth, and so meant that no representative of the Church existed in that house any longer, and that as a consequence it was not in communion with the Church. In addition 'brother' represented a kindred good to which the truth represented by a widow might be joined. For to be the kind of truth that has life, produces fruit, and thereby continues that which constitutes the Church, truth cannot be joined to any other good but that which is its own and a kindred one. This was how those in heaven perceived the duty of a brother-in-law.

[4] The meaning of this practice - of a sister-in-law removing the shoe from upon the foot of the man who refused to do the duty of a brother-in-law, and of her spitting in his face - was this: Anyone devoid of good and truth, external and internal, would destroy those things that constitute the Church; for 'the shoe' means that which is external, 1748, and 'the face' that which is internal, 1999, 2434, 3527, 4066, 4796. From this it is evident that 'the duty of a brother-in-law' represented the preservation and continuation of the Church. But when through the Lord's Coming representatives of internal things came to an end, that particular law was done away with. It is like a person's soul or spirit in relation to his body. A person's soul or spirit is the internal part of him and his body the external; or what amounts to the same, the soul or spirit is the true likeness of the person, whereas the body is merely a representative image of him. When a person rises again his representative image or that which is external, namely his body, is cast aside, for he is now conscious in that which is internal, namely the true likeness of him. It is also like a person who is in darkness and from there looks at things belonging to light; or what amounts to the same, like one who is in the light of the world and from there looks at things belonging to the light of heaven. For the light of the world in comparison with the light of heaven is as darkness. Within that darkness, that is, within the light of the world, things belonging to the light of heaven as they exist essentially cannot be seen, but are seen so to speak within a representative image, even as the human mind is seen in a person's face. Therefore when the light of heaven is seen in its own essential brightness, the darkness of representative images is dispelled. This was effected through the Lord's Coming.

[4835a] 'And raise up seed for your brother' means so that the Church does not perish. This is clear from the meaning of 'seed' as truth derived from good, or faith grounded in charity, dealt with in 1025, 1447, 16110, 1940, 2848, 3310, 3373, 3671. The same is also meant by the firstborn who was to succeed to the name of the dead brother, 352, 367, 2435, 3325, 3494. 'Raising up seed for a brother' means continuing that which constitutes the Church, in line with what has been stated just above in 4834, and thus means so that the Church does not perish.

10632. 'And He said, Behold, I am making a covenant' means the chief things through which the joining of the Lord to the human race by means of the Word is brought about. This is clear from the meaning of 'a covenant' as a joining together, dealt with in 665, 666, 1023, 1038, 1864, 1996, 2003, 2021, 6804, 8767, 8778, at this point the joining of Jehovah, that is, of the Lord, to the human race by means of the Word; for this joining together is the subject in what immediately follows. The fact that this is the meaning is also clear from the train of thought in the internal sense. For the subject in what went before was the Law which was laid down and declared from Mount Sinai. That Law serves in a broad sense to mean the Word, 6752, 7463; but also it was the beginning of the Word, for the Word was declared afterwards, first by Moses, then by all the others. The subject in what came next was the Israelite nation, who were not by nature such that the Word could be written among them as it could have been in other circumstances. This was because no Church could be established among them, and where the Church is, so is the Word. See what has been stated and shown on these matters in Chapters 32, 33, and up to here in the present chapter.

[2] But because Moses insisted on the people's behalf that Jehovah should be in their midst and that they should be accepted as an inheritance, and should accordingly be led into the land of Canaan - all of which means in the internal sense that the Church was to be established among that people, and thus that the Word was to be written there - and because these demands were accepted on account of Moses' insistence, the subject now is the chief commandments which had to be kept fully in order that those demands might be met. These commandments required them to worship the Lord alone and no other, and to acknowledge that He was the Source of everything good and true, besides a number of other commandments that form the subject in what immediately follows.

[3] When it is said that these form the subject in what immediately follows it should be recognized that those commandments are contained in the internal sense, whereas the kinds of things that represent them, thus that serve to mean them, are what the external or literal sense contains, as will be clear from the explanation of the things stated next in this chapter of Exodus. But since this covenant which Jehovah made with Moses is said to mean the joining of the Lord to the human race by means of the Word, something must be stated here regarding the nature of such a joining together. In most ancient times members of the Church possessed no Word, only direct revelation; and through this revelation a joining together was accomplished. For when direct revelation exists heaven is joined to those in the world; and the joining of heaven to those in the world constitutes a joining of the Lord to them since that which is Divine and the Lord's among the angels constitutes heaven.

[4] When this direct revelation came to an end, which happened when people turned aside from the good which had governed them, another kind of revelation took its place. This was accomplished by means of representative signs, through which members of the Church at that time knew what was true and good; consequently this Church was called the representative Church. In that Church a Word also existed, but it served that Church alone. When however this Church too was laid waste, which happened when they began to venerate in idolatrous ways those representative signs through which the Church in those times was joined to heaven, and in many lands when they began to use them for magic, the Lord provided for a Word to be written that would be Divine in every single part, even each syllable. It would consist of pure correspondences and so would be suited to the perception of angels in all the heavens, and at the same time to people in the world. And this Word was provided to the end that through it the Lord might be joined to the human race; for unless He had been joined to them through such a Word heaven would have completely departed from mankind, who as a consequence would have ceased to exist.

[5] The subject in what follows therefore is that joining together by means of the Word; and the chief commandments which ought to be kept by a person in order that this joining by means of the Word may exist in him are opened up.

The most ancients possessed direct revelation, see 2895, 3432.

Regarding the representative Church which subsequently took its place, and its Word, 2686, 2897, 3432, 10355.

The Word is the means by which the Lord is joined to the human race, in the places referred to in 10375, 10452.