In general, men are driven by intellect and women by affections, and because of this men in the Bible generally represent knowledge and truth and women generally represent love and the desire for good. This generally carries over into marriage, where the man's growing knowledge and understanding and the woman's desire to be good and useful are a powerful combination. In many cases in the Bible, then, "husband" refers to things of truth and understanding, much as "man" does. Magnificent things can happen in a true marriage, though, when both partners are looking to the Lord. If a husband opens his heart to his wife, it's as though she can implant her loves inside him, transforming his intellectual urges into a love of growing wise. She in turn can grow in her love of that blooming wisdom, and use it for joy in their married life and in their caring for children and others in their life. Many couples, even in heaven, stay in that state -- called "Spiritual" -- growing deeper and deeper to eternity. There is the potential, though, for the couple to be transformed: through the nurturing love of his wife the husband can pass from a love of growing wise to an actual love of wisdom itself, and the wife can be transformed from the love of her husband's wisdom into the wisdom of that love -- the actual expression of the love of the Lord they have built together. In that state -- called "Celestial" -- the husband represents love and the desire for good, and the wife represents truth and knowledge.

4245. 'And I am sending to tell my lord, so as to find favour in your eyes' means information concerning its state, and also deference and self-abasement on the part of truth in the presence of good. This is clear from the meaning of 'sending to tell' as providing information concerning one's state. The consequent deference and self-abasement on the part of truth in the presence of good is self-evident, for Jacob calls Esau his 'lord' and speaks of sending to him 'to find favour in your eyes', which are words of deference and self-abasement. Described at present is the nature of the state when truth and good are turned around, that is to say, when truth is becoming subordinate to good; or what amounts to the same, when people who have had an affection for truth begin to have an affection for good. But the incidence of that turning around and subordination is not recognized by any but the regenerate, yet not by any of the regenerate except those who reflect on the matter.

[2] At the present day those who are being regenerated are few, and those who reflect fewer still. For that reason these things which are stated about truth and good are bound to be obscure and are perhaps of such a nature as not to be acknowledged, especially among people who place the truths of faith in first position and the good which flows from charity in second and who as a result give much thought to matters of doctrine but not to the good deeds of charity, and who consider eternal salvation to be a product of the former, not of the latter. Those who think in this way cannot possibly know, let alone perceive, that the truth of faith is subordinate to the good that flows from charity. The things which are the substance and the basis of a person's thought have an affect on him. If he were to think from the goods of charity he would see plainly that the truths of faith occupied the second position, and he would also see truths themselves so to speak in light. For the good which flows from charity is like a flame which provides light and so illuminates every single thing which he had previously assumed to be true. He would also discern how falsities had intermingled themselves and had taken on the appearance of truths.