904. 21:15 And he who talked with me had a gold reed to measure the city, its gates, and its wall. This symbolically means that to people who possess the goodness of love, the Lord grants a faculty for understanding and knowing the nature of the Lord's New Church as regards its doctrine and its introductory truths, and as regards the Word from which they are drawn.

He who spoke with me symbolizes the Lord speaking from heaven, because it was an angel speaking, one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls mentioned in verse 9, who means the Lord speaking from heaven (no. 895). A reed symbolizes a power or ability springing from the goodness of love - a reed symbolizing power or ability (no. 485), and gold the goodness of love (nos. 211, 726). To measure means, symbolically, to learn the character of a thing, thus to understand and know it (no. 486). The city, the holy Jerusalem, symbolizes the church in respect to its doctrine (nos. 879, 880). Its gates symbolize concepts of truth and goodness from the Word's literal sense, which are truths and goods owing to the spiritual life in them (no. 899). And the wall symbolizes the Word in its literal sense from which the doctrine and concepts come (no. 898).

It is apparent from this that "he who talked with me had a gold reed to measure the city, its gates, and its wall," symbolically means that to people who possess the goodness of love, the Lord grants a faculty for understanding and knowing the nature of the Lord's New Church as regards its doctrine and its introductory truths, and as regards the Word from which they are drawn.

[2] These symbolic meanings cannot be seen at all in the literal sense, for one sees in it only that an angel speaking with John had a gold reed with which to measure the city and its gates and wall. But even so, that these words contain another meaning, a spiritual meaning, is clearly apparent from the fact that the city Jerusalem does not mean a real city, but the church. Consequently everything said about Jerusalem as a city symbolizes such things as have to do with the church, and everything having to do with the church is, in itself, spiritual.

Such a spiritual meaning is present also in what is said in chapter 11 above, where we are told the following:

I was given a reed like a measuring rod. And the angel stood by, saying, "Rise and measure the temple of God, the altar, and those who worship there." (Revelation 11:1)

A similar spiritual meaning is present, too, in everything that the angel measured with a reed in Ezekiel 40; 41; 42; 43; 44; 45; 46; 47; 48. Also in these verses in Zechariah:

I raised my eyes and looked, and behold, a man with a measuring line in his hand. So I said, "Where are you going?" And he said to me, "To measure Jerusalem, to see what its width is and what its length." (Zechariah 2:1-2)

Indeed, such a spiritual meaning is present in everything connected with the Tabernacle and in everything connected with the Temple in Jerusalem, whose measurements we are told, and also in the measurements themselves. And yet nothing of this can be seen in the literal sense.

5. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant John. This symbolizes the things that have been revealed by the Lord through heaven to people who possess goodness of life arising from charity and its accompanying faith.

"He sent and signified it by His angel" means, in the spiritual sense, things that have been revealed by the Lord from heaven or through heaven. For in the Word an angel frequently means the angelic heaven, and in the highest sense the Lord Himself. That is because no angel ever speaks with a person in dissociation from heaven, for each has such a conjunction with all the rest there that everyone speaks in accord with the communion, even though the angel is not conscious of it.

In the Lord's sight, in fact, heaven is as a single person, whose soul is the Lord Himself. Therefore the Lord speaks with a person through heaven, as a person does from his soul through his body in speaking with another. And this the person does in conjunction with each and every part of his mind, at whose center are the things that he is saying. But this secret cannot be explained in a few words. We have explained it in part in Angelic Wisdom Regarding Divine Love and Wisdom.

In the highest sense the Lord is meant by an angel because heaven is not heaven in consequence of the angels' own qualities, but owing to the Lord's Divinity from which they have their love and wisdom, indeed their life. It is on this account that in the Word the Lord is Himself called an angel.

It is apparent from this that the angel did not of himself speak with John, but that the Lord did so by means of heaven through the angel.

[2] As for saying that this statement means that these things have been revealed to people who possess goodness of life arising from charity and its accompanying faith, that is because it is they who are meant by John. For by the Lord's twelve disciples or apostles are meant all in the church who possess truths arising from goodness, and in an abstract sense, all constituents of the church. By Peter are meant all who are governed by faith, and abstractly, faith itself. By James are meant those who are impelled by charity, and abstractly, charity itself. And by John are meant those who possess goodness of life arising from charity and its accompanying faith, and abstractly, the resulting goodness of life itself. That these are what are meant by John, James and Peter in the Gospels may be seen in the short work The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine (London, 1758), no. 122.

[3] Now because goodness of life arising from charity and its accompanying faith is what forms the church, therefore it was through the apostle John that secrets were revealed concerning the state of the church, the secrets that are contained in his visions.

The fact that the names of persons and places in the Word all symbolize things having to do with heaven and the church is something we showed many times in Arcana Coelestia (The Secrets of Heaven), also published in London.

It can be seen from this that the phrase, "He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant John," means, in the spiritual sense, the things that have been revealed by the Lord through heaven to people who possess goodness of life arising from charity and its accompanying faith. For charity produces goodness through faith, and not charity by itself or faith by itself.