918. Saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the vintage of the clusters of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe. That this signifies that the collecting and separation of the good from the evil may take place, because there are no longer any truths of faith, since there is no spiritual good, which is charity, is evident from the signification of thrusting in the sharp sickle and gathering the vintage, as denoting to collect the good and to separate them from the evil (concerning which see above, n. 911). The same is here signified by gathering the vintage as above by reaping. But gathering the vintage is spoken of, because it relates to clusters and grapes; and reaping is spoken of because it relates to the harvest; and by each is signified to devastate and make an end of the church, which is signified both by the harvest and vintage. And when the church is devastated, and thereby brought to its end, then the good are collected and separated from the evil. What is further signified by gathering the vintage, will be seen in what follows; and from the signification of clusters, as denoting the goods of faith and the truths therefrom, of which we shall speak presently; and from the signification of, for her grapes are fully ripe, as denoting, because there are no longer any goods of charity, thus because it is the end of the church. From these things it is evident that by, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vintage of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe, is signified that the collecting and separation of the good from the evil may take place, because there are no longer any goods and truths of faith, since there is no spiritual good, which is charity. The reason why there are no truths of faith is that there is no good of charity, and that truth is not possible without good; for truth derives its essence or its life from good. Whence it follows that truths and the faith thereof have no existence, if there is no good or charity.

[2] What charity is, which is the same as spiritual good, shall be briefly explained. Charity, or spiritual good, consists in doing good because it is truth; that is, it is to do truth. And to do truth is to do those things which the Lord has commanded in His Word. It is evident, therefore, that charity is spiritual good. And when a man does good because it is truth, or does truth, then charity becomes moral good, which, in the external form, is like the good that is done at this day with every man who is a moral and civil man. But there is this difference, that genuine moral good is good from the spiritual good from which it proceeds. For spiritual good is from the Lord, but moral good is from man. Therefore, unless the good from man is from the Lord, that is, through man from the Lord, it is not good. The end for the sake of which [a thing is done], declares its quality. Moral good separated from spiritual good, regards man, his honour, profit, and pleasure, as the end for which it is done. But moral good from spiritual good has regard to the Lord, heaven, and eternal life, as the end. These things are said, in order that it may be known, why it is that there is no truth of faith where there is no good of charity; consequently, that where these two do not exist, the church is devastated; this is the subject treated of here and in what now follows in the Apocalypse. That there is no faith where there is no charity, may be seen also in the small work concerning the Last Judgment 33-39).

[3] That clusters and grapes signify the good of charity, is evident from the passages in the Word where they are mentioned, as in the following.

In Jeremiah:

"Consuming I will consume them; there shall be no grapes on the vine, neither figs on the fig-tree, and the leaf shall fall off; and I will give them to those who pass by over them" (8:13).

No grapes on the vine, signifies that there is no spiritual good in man. No figs on the fig-tree, signifies that there is no natural good in him. The vine and the fig-tree signify man as to the church, thus the church with him. But these may be seen further explained above (n. 403).

[4] In Isaiah:

"My beloved had a vineyard in the horn of a son of oil, which he fenced about, and gathered out the stones thereof; and he planted it with a noble vine, and built a tower in the midst of it; also he hewed out a wine-press in it, and he waited for it to bring forth grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes" (5:1, 2, 4).

By the vineyard of the beloved, is signified the spiritual church, which was instituted with the sons of Israel. In the horn of a son of oil, signifies, which had truths from the good of charity. Which he fenced about, and gathered out the stones, signifies the guarding it from falsities and evils. He planted it with a noble vine, signifies that it was gifted with genuine truths. He built a tower in the midst of it, signifies the interior things, which receive influx, and by which there is communication with heaven. Also he hewed out a wine-press in it, signifies the production of truth from good. And he waited for it to bring forth grapes, but it brought forth wild grapes, signifies the hope of the fructification of those things from the good of charity; but in vain, because there was iniquity in the place of good.

[5] In Micah:

"Woe is me, I am become as the gatherings of the summer, as the gleanings of the vintage; not a cluster to eat; my soul desireth the first-fruits. The holy one has perished from the earth, and the upright one amongst men; all lie in wait for bloods" (7:1, 2).

Grief because of the vastation of good and the truth therefrom in the church, is meant and described by, Woe is me, I am become as the gatherings of the summer, as the gleanings of the vintage. That there is no longer any spiritual good, nor natural good, from which the Lord is worshipped, is signified by, there is no cluster to eat, my soul desireth the first-fruits. That there is no longer spiritual or natural truth, is signified by the holy one has perished, and the upright one amongst men. That the truths and goods of the Word, and thence of the Church, are destroyed by falsities and evils, is signified by, all lie in wait for bloods.

[6] In Hosea:

"I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness: as the first-fruit on the fig-tree in the beginning. I saw your fathers" (9:10).

These things are said concerning the Ancient Church, and its establishment. That church is here meant by Israel; its first state by, in the wilderness, and in the beginning; and the spiritual good with them, by grapes; and the good therefrom arising in the natural man, by the first-fruit in the fig-tree. That the men of the Ancient Church are there meant by Israel in the wilderness, and by their fathers in the beginning, and not the sons of Jacob, is evident in Moses:

[7] "Their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall, clusters of bitterness to them" (Deuteronomy 32:32).

Here the sons of Jacob are described, such as they were in the wilderness. That religion with them was infernal, because they worshipped the gods and idols of the nations, is signified by their vine being of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah. That instead of the goods of charity, they were given to hatred and to the falsities breaking forth therefrom, instead of truths. This is signified by, their grapes are grapes of gall, clusters of bitterness to them.

[8] In Moses:

"He tieth to the vine his ass, and to the choice vine the son of his she-ass; he washeth his garment in wine, and his covering in the blood of grapes" (Genesis 49:11).

These form the last address of the father of Israel to his sons, here [spoken] to Judah, by whom, in the highest sense, is meant the Lord as to the celestial church, and the Word. And by the blood of grapes is signified the Divine truth from His Divine good; and, in a relative sense, the good of charity. But this and the rest may be seen explained in Arcana Coelestia 6375-6379).

[9] By the blood of the grapes is also signified truth from spiritual good, the same as by wine (also Deuteronomy 22:14). The reason why grapes signify the good of charity is, that by a vineyard is signified the spiritual church, and by a vine the man of that church. Therefore, by clusters or bunches, and by grapes, which are the fruits, are signified the goods which constitute that church; these are called spiritual goods, and also goods of charity. And because all truth is from good, as all wine is from grapes, therefore by wine, in the Word, is signified truth from good. Concerning this signification of wine see above (n. 219, 376). But by clusters or bunches are properly signified the variations of the state of spiritual good, or of the good of charity, because in them many grapes cohere in series. But what is meant by variations of the state of good will be explained elsewhere.

[10] Because the land of Canaan represented and thence signified the church, and the church being a church from spiritual good - for this is the mark of the church, therefore

those who went to explore that land brought from it a cluster of grapes of a remarkable size, which was carried on a staff by two (Numbers 13:23, 24).

This was a representative sign of the church signified by the land of Canaan. The reason why the church is a church from the good of charity is, that this good, strictly considered, is the good of life arising from love to the Lord; consequently, it is the effect of that love. By the good of charity is meant justice, sincerity, and uprightness in every work and in every function, from the love of justice, sincerity, and uprightness; this love comes solely from the Lord.

[11] Because it has been hitherto unknown, what was represented by the Nazarite, and what was signified by his abstaining from grapes and from wine, and by making the hair of his head to grow, it is permitted here to make it known. Concerning his abstinence from grapes and from wine it is thus written:

"He shall abstain from wine and strong drink, vinegar of wine and vinegar of strong drink he shall not drink, yea, he shall not drink any bruising of grapes; the grapes also either fresh or dry he shall not eat. All the days of his Nazariteship, he shall not eat anything that is made of the grape of the vine, from the kernels even to the skin" (Numbers 6:3, 4).

This law was for the Nazarite before he fulfilled the days of his Nazariteship, because he then represented the Lord as to His first state. The Lord, like every man, passed through a first state which was sensual. For every man is first sensual; afterwards he is made natural and rational, then, spiritual; and lastly, if the third degree is opened in him, he becomes celestial, such as an angel of the third heaven becomes. The Sensual of man is signified by the hair of the head (concerning which see above, n. 66, 555). And because the Sensual is the most external of man's life, where all power resides, therefore the Nazarites had such great strength. That all power resides in the extremes or ultimates, consequently, in the ultimate sense of the Word, this being the sense of the letter, which also corresponds to and signifies hair, may be seen above (n. 346, 417, 567, 666, 726). Such power pertained to the Lord in His childhood, by which He overcame and subjugated the most direful hells, where all are sensual.

This state of the Lord was represented by the days of fulfilment with the Nazarites, which being fulfilled, the Lord entered from the sensual and natural into the spiritual and celestial Divine. Now because that state, together with its good and truth, is signified by grapes and wine, therefore it was not lawful for the Nazarite to eat grapes and drink wine, before he had fulfilled those days.

[12] That afterwards it was lawful for him is evident from the twentieth verse of that chapter, where it is said,

"And after that the Nazarite may drink wine."

That at the end of the days of fulfilment,

he should shave his head, and put the hair of his head upon the fire, which was under the sacrifice of the peace offerings (ver. 18),

represented the sensual, then new, from the celestial Divine; for new hair grew afterwards upon the Nazarite. This also represented that the Lord from ultimate Divine truth, which is the sense of the letter, entered into interior Divine truth, which is the Word in the internal sense, even to the highest there. For the Lord, while He was in the world, was the Word, because He was the Divine truth, and that more interiorly by degrees, as He grew up, even to the highest, which is purely Divine, entirely above the perceptions of the angels.

It must be known that the Lord, during His abode in the world, from infancy to the last day there, successively advanced to union with the very Divine that was in Him from conception (concerning this successive progression see the Arcana Coelestia 1864, 2033, 2632, 3141, 4585, 7014, 10076). From these considerations it is evident, what was represented by its not being granted to the Nazarite to eat anything of the grape, nor to drink anything of wine, before the fulfilment of the days of his Nazariteship.

10076. 'For it is the ram of fillings [of the hand]' means a representative sign of the Lord's Divine power in the heavens which comes through Divine Truth emanating from His Divine Good, and the transmission and the reception of that Truth there. This is clear from the meaning of 'the ram' as a person internally in respect of the good of innocence and charity within him, dealt with above in 9991, for all beasts serve to mean some human affection or inclination, 9280, which is why people possessing charity and innocence are called sheep and lambs, and 'a ram' therefore, being a male sheep, means the good of charity and innocence in the internal man, or in the highest sense that same good present internally in the Lord's Human (for that which in the internal sense means something truly human, thus something constituting the Church or heaven with a person, in the highest sense means that same virtue present in a matchless degree within the Lord when He was in the world; indeed the subject everywhere in the Word in its inmost sense is the Lord, and this is what gives it its holiness); and from the meaning of 'fillings of the hand' as a representative sign of Divine Truth emanating from the Lord's Divine Good in the heavens, and as the transmission of that Truth to the angels there and their reception of it. For as has been shown previously, just as a person who is being regenerated experiences two states, the first being a time when the truths of faith are being implanted in and joined to the good of love, and the second a time when the good of charity is the source of his actions, so it was in a matchless degree within the Lord. The first state of the glorification of His Human consisted in His making it Divine Truth and joining it to the Divine Good which was within Him and was called the Father, and in His thereby becoming the Divine Good of Divine Love, which is Jehovah. The second state of His glorification was when the Divine Good of Divine Love was the source of what He did, and the Divine Truth emanating from that Good was the means by which He accomplished it.

[2] In the case of a person, in the first state he learns things that must compose his faith, and while he is learning them, under the influence of good, that is, through good from the Lord, so the power of understanding is taking shape in him. When the truths giving shape to the understanding have been implanted in and joined to good he passes into the second state, in which his actions spring from good through the use of truths. From this it is evident what the second state of a person who is being regenerated is like, namely a state in which thought and actions spring from good, or what amounts to the same thing, from love, or what also amounts to the same thing, from the will; for what a person wills he loves, and what he loves he calls good. But a person begins to be in the second state when his entire self from head to toe is the same as his love, and so is the same as his will and his understanding springing from it. Who can ever credit it that the entire person is an image of his will and of his understanding rooted in it, consequently an image of his good and so of his truth, or else an image of his evil and so of his falsity? For good or evil compose the will, and truth or falsity compose the understanding. All angels in heaven are acquainted with this arcanum; but the reason why people in the world are not acquainted with it is that they have no knowledge of their soul, nor consequently any knowledge that the body is shaped so as to be a likeness of it, and therefore that the nature of the entire person is determined by that of his soul. This fact is clearly demonstrated by spirits and angels as seen in the next life. All these are human forms, and the nature of those forms is determined by that of the affections belonging to their love and faith, so much so that anyone in whom the good of love and charity is present may be called an embodiment of love and charity, and on the other hand anyone in whom evils resulting from self-love and love of the world are present, thus in whom hatred and the like are present, may be called an embodiment of hatred.

[3] The same fact is also clearly demonstrated by the three entities present in the whole natural order which flow one from another, namely effect, cause, and end. An effect owes its whole existence to the cause, for an effect is nothing other than the outward manifestation of a cause, because when a cause becomes an effect it clothes itself in things such as exist on external levels, in order that it may manifest itself in a lower sphere, which is the sphere of effects. The situation is similar with the cause of a cause, which in a higher sphere is called the final cause or the end. The end constitutes the all within the cause, making it a cause set to achieve something. For a cause that is not set to achieve something cannot be called a cause, for what other reason is there for its existence? Setting out to achieve something is the end, which is the first thing within the cause and also its last. From this it is evident that the end is so to speak the soul of the cause and so to speak its life, and consequently is also the soul and life of the effect. For if a cause and an effect lack the ability to complete the end in view, none of these has any real existence, because it does not set out to achieve anything, and so is like some dead object devoid of soul and life; and such a thing expires, like a body when the soul departs from it.

[4] The situation is the same with the human being. His actual soul is his will; the attendant cause by means of which his will produces the effect is his understanding; and the effect which is produced resides in the body and so belongs to the body. The truth of this is plainly evident from the consideration that what a person wills, and therefore thinks, fittingly presents itself in an effect within the body, in this way when he speaks, in that way when he acts. From all this it is again evident that what a person's will is like determines what the entire person is like. Whether one speaks of the will, end, love, or good it amounts to the same thing; for everything that a person wills is seen by him to be the end, is loved by him, and is called good. Likewise whether one speaks of the understanding, the cause attending the end, faith, or truth, it again amounts to the same thing; for what a person under the influence of his will understands or thinks he takes to be the cause, believes, and calls the truth. When these things are understood by someone he may know what a person undergoing regeneration is like in his first state, and what he is like in the second.

[5] From all this people may have some idea of how to understand the teaching that when the Lord was in the world and glorified His Human He first made it Divine Truth, and step by step the Divine Good of Divine Love; and that ever after the Divine Good of Divine Love is the source of His acts in heaven and in the world, and of the life He imparts to them, which He accomplishes by means of Divine Truth emanating from the Divine Good of Divine Love of His Divine Human. For from this the heavens have come into being and are constantly coming into being, that is, being held in being; or what amounts to the same thing, from it the heavens have been created and are constantly being created, that is, preserved, for preservation is constant creation, even as being held in being is constant coming into being.

[6] Such considerations are also contained in the following words in John,

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. And the Word became flesh. John 1:1, 3, 14.

'The Word' is Divine Truth. The first state is described by the statement, 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God', and the second state by, 'All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made'. The situation was similar when the Lord came into the world, restored the heavens to order, and so to speak created them anew. The Lord is clearly meant by 'the Word' in the above words, for they say that 'the Word became flesh'. The transmission and the perception of Divine Truth emanating from the Divine Good of Divine Love of the Lord's Divine Human is what 'the filling of the hand' means and what the representative acts associated here with the second ram describe.

[7] Since the Lord in respect of Divine Good is represented by Aaron, 9806, the glorification of the Lord's Human is described in a representative manner by the process in which Aaron and his sons were consecrated. The first state of glorification is described by the things stated regarding the sacrifice of the young bull and the burnt offering of the first ram, and the second state of glorification by those stated regarding the second ram, called 'the ram of fillings [of the hand]'. The first state is called the anointing, while the second state is called the filling of the hand. So it was when Aaron and his sons were consecrated to the priesthood by anointing and filling of the hand that they were referred to as 'the anointed' and 'those whose hands he has filled', as in Moses,

The chief priest, on whose head the anointing oil has been poured, and who has filled his hand to wear the garments, shall not shave his head or rip apart the seams of his garments. Leviticus 21:10.

From these things also it is evident that 'the filling of the hand' is a representative sign of the transmission and the reception of Divine Truth emanating from the Lord's Divine Good in the heavens, for it says 'who has filled his hand', not who has had his hand filled. It also says that he has filled his hand 'to wear the garments', for by Aaron and the anointing of him the Lord in respect of Divine Good is represented, and by his garments the same as is represented by 'the filling of the hand', namely Divine Truth emanating from the Lord's Divine Good. For this representation of 'the garments', see 9814. The dispersion of that Truth is meant by 'ripping apart the seams of garments', and the dispersion of Divine Good in the heavens by 'shaving the head'.

[8] Since the inflowing and transmission of Divine Truth from the Lord, and the reception of it in the heavens, is meant by 'the filling of the hand', purification from evils and falsities is also meant by it. For to the extent that man or angel is purified from them he receives Divine Truth from the Lord. 'Filling the hand' is meant in this sense by the following words in Moses,

The sons of Levi struck down from the people three thousand men. And Moses said, Fill your hand today to Jehovah, so that He may bestow a blessing on you today. Exodus 32:28-29.

In the spiritual sense being blessed means being endowed with the good of love and faith, thus receiving what is Divine emanating from the Lord, 2846, 3017, 3406, 4981, 6091, 6099, 8939. The expression 'filling after Jehovah' ¹ is also used in Moses, by which acting in accord with Divine Truth, and thus also the reception of it, is meant,

Another Spirit has been with Caleb, and he has filled after Jehovah. Numbers 14:24; Deuteronomy 1:36.

And in another place,

Jehovah has sworn, saying, Surely none of the men who are twenty years old and over ² will see the land which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, because they have not filled after Me, except Caleb and Joshua, who have filled after Jehovah. Numbers 32:11-12.

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