9140. And shall let his beast go in. That this signifies if he does this with but little consciousness, is evident from the signification of a “beast of burden,” as being bodily pleasure, or appetite. That it signifies with but little consciousness, is because when a man is in these cupidities, he consults reason but little, and thus has but little consciousness of what he is doing. All beasts, of whatsoever genus and species, signify affections; gentle and useful beasts, good affections; and fierce and useless beasts, evil affections (n. 45, 46, 142, 143, 714-719, 1823, 2180, 2781, 3218, 3519, 5198, 7523, 7872, 9090). When a beast is called a “beast of burden” it signifies mere bodily affections which have in them but little reason; for the more a man acts from the body, the less he acts from reason, the body being in the world, thus remote from heaven, where genuine reason is. Moreover, in the original tongue a “beast of burden” is so called from its brutishness and stupidity, thus from its little consciousness; as in Isaiah 19:11; Psalms 49:10; 73:22; Jeremiah 51:17.

1910. And she conceived. That this signifies the first life of the rational, is evident from the signification of “conception,” as being the first life. As regards the rational, it receives its life, as before said, from the life of the internal man flowing into the life of the affection of knowledges [cognitiones et scientiae] in the exterior man. The life of the affection of these knowledges gives a sort of body to the rational, or clothes the life of the internal man as the body clothes the soul; for this is precisely the case with these knowledges. In everything appertaining to man, in everything of his affection and in everything of his thought, there is the idea or likeness of soul and body, for there is nothing, however simple it may appear, that is not composite, and that does not come forth from what is prior to itself.