2341. 'And he made a feast for them' means dwelling together. This is clear from the meaning of 'a feast'. 'Feasts' are mentioned in various places in the Word, and in those places they mean in the internal sense dwelling together, as in Jeremiah,

The word of Jehovah came to him, You shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and to drink. Jeremiah 16:8.

In that chapter the prophet is told many things by which he was to represent the necessity for good to have no connection with evil, nor truth to have any with falsity. Among other things he was required 'not to go into the house of feasting', which meant that good and truth were not to dwell together with evil and falsity.

[2] In Isaiah,

Jehovah Zebaoth will make on this mountain a feast of fat things for all peoples, a feast of sweet wines, of fat things full of marrow, of wines well-refined. Isaiah 25:6.

Here 'mountain' stands for love to the Lord, 795, 1430. People with whom that love exists dwell together with the Lord in good and truth, which are meant by 'a feast'. 'Fat things' and those 'full of marrow' are goods, 353, 'sweet and well-refined wines' are truths deriving from goods, 1071.

[3] The feasts made from the consecrated elements when sacrifices were offered represented in the Jewish Church nothing else than the Lord's dwelling together with man within the holy things of love meant by sacrifices, 2187. The same was at a later time meant by the Holy Supper, which the Primitive Church called a feast.

[4] Chapter 21 below refers to Abraham making a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned, in verse 8. This feast represented and therefore meant the dwelling together and initial conjunction of the Lord's Divine itself with His Human Rational. 'Feasts' have the same meaning in the internal sense in other places, as may also be deduced from the fact that feasts are occasions involving a number of people who are all simultaneously filled with love and charity, who are opening their minds to one another, and who are enjoying together the glad feelings that are the expressions of love and charity.

1114. [AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTORY NOTE - CONTINUED

This page continues and completes the 'Author's Introductory Note' that appears on page 1 of the first volume of this English translation. The items numbered 1-27 are the titles of the sections - describing the MARVELS - which occur 'before and after each chapter' of Volume One of the Latin (Chapters 1-15). Items 28 and 29 are the titles of sections that stand in Volume Two of the Latin, at the ends of Chapters 16, and 17 respectively.]

16. The Most Ancient Church, which was called Man, or Adam, 1114-1129.

17. Those before the Flood who perished, 1265-1272.

18. Position in the Grand Man, also place and distance in the next life, 1273-1278

19. Position and place, and also distance and time in the next life - continued, 1376-1382.

20. The perception spirits and angels have; also spheres in the next life, 1383-1400.

21. Perceptions and spheres in the next life - continued, 1504-1520.

22. The light in which angels are living, 1521-1534.

23. The light in which angels are living - continued; also their paradise gardens, and their dwelling-places, 1619-1633.

24. The speech of spirits and angels, 1634-1650.

25. The speech of spirits, and its variations continued, 1757-1764.

26. Sacred Scripture or the Word, and how it conceals within itself Divine matters which are fully visible to good spirits and to angels, 1767-1777

27. Sacred Scripture or the Word - continued, 1869-1879. Some facts about spirits and angels in general, 1880-1885.

28. Visions and dreams, including those that are prophetical which are described in the Word, 1966-1983.

29. The Last Judgement, 2117-2134.

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Genesis 10.

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THE MOST ANCIENT CHURCH, WHICH WAS CALLED MAN, OR ADAM

Angels and spirits, that is, human beings after death, are able to meet any they like of all those whom they have been acquainted with in the world or whom they have heard of. They see them and talk to them in person, when the Lord allows it. And what is remarkable, those people are with them in an instant and very much in person. Thus they are allowed to speak not only to friends, who normally find one another, but also to others whom they have admired and revered. In the Lord's Divine mercy I have been allowed to speak not only to those who were known to me during their lifetime but also to the most prominent characters mentioned in the Word. Thus I have been allowed to speak as well to those who belonged to the Most Ancient Church, the Church called Man, or Adam, and also to certain of those who belonged to the Churches that came after it. The reason for my being allowed to do so was so that I might know that the names found in the initial chapters of Genesis are used solely to mean Churches, and also that I might know the character of the members of the Churches of that time. The things that follow next therefore are what I have been given to know concerning the Most Ancient Churches.