10507. 'And now, go! lead the people to what I have spoken of to you' means bringing this nation to represent the Church, and does not mean that the Church was to exist among them. This is clear from the meaning of 'leading the people to the land of Canaan' as causing the Church to exist there; for 'the land of Canaan' means the Church, and 'leading the people to that land' in the spiritual sense means establishing the Church among that people, for that nation was therefore being led to that land in order that the Church might come into being there. Here however the meaning is that they were being brought merely to represent it, for it says, 'Lead the people to what' and not 'to the land which'.

Among the Israelite and Jewish nation the Church did not exist but only that which was representative of the Church, see 4281, 4288, 4311, 4500, 4899, 4912, 6304, 7048, 9320.

'The land of Canaan' means the Church, 3686, 3705, 4447, 5136, 6516, and therefore 'the land' or 'the earth' in the Word means the Church, in the places referred to in 9325.

4282. Verses 26-28 And he' said, Let me go, for the dawn is coming up. And he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. And he ¹ said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob. And he' said, Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for as a prince you have contended with God and with men, and have prevailed.

'He said, Let me go, for the dawn is coming up' means that the temptation came to an end when the joining together was at hand. 'And he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me' means that a joining together was to take place. 'And he said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob' means the essential nature of good done from truth. 'And he said, Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel' means the Divine celestial-spiritual at this point, for 'Israel' is the celestial-spiritual man within the natural, and so is the natural man, whereas the celestial-spiritual man proper - that is, the rational man - is 'Joseph'. 'For as a prince you have contended with God and with men, and have prevailed' means repeated victories in conflicts over truths and goods.

[2] In the internal historical sense in which Jacob and his descendants are the subject the same words have the following meaning: 'Let me go, for the dawn is coming up' means that the genuine representative role would depart from the descendants of Jacob before they entered into the representatives connected with the land of Canaan. 'And he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me' means that they insisted on being representative. 'And he said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob' means that they were the descendants of Jacob - together with their essential nature. 'And he said, Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel' means that they could not as [the descendants of] Jacob play the representative part, except by virtue of the new nature that was imparted to them. 'For as a prince you have contended with God and with men, and have prevailed' means on account of the stubborn perverseness which was a product of their evil desires and of false delusions.

Poznámky pod čarou: