7833. 'According to the household of his fathers, a member of the flock according to the household' means according to each one's specific kind of good. This is clear from the meaning of 'household of fathers' as one family's good, distinct from another's good; for 'a father's house' means a person in respect of internal good, 3128. The implications of this are as follows: All the tribes of Israel mean all forms of the truth and good of faith and charity in their entirety, each tribe meaning one general kind of good or of truth, see 3858, 3926, 3939, 4060, 6375, 6377, 6640. Thus every separate family within a tribe meant a specific kind of good, and therefore the good of one specifically, distinct from another's good. But the household of the fathers within a family meant an individual type belonging to one specific kind. The reason why all these kinds of good were meant by the tribes, families, and households into which the children of Israel were divided was in order that they might represent heaven; for the varieties of good there are divided into general, specific, and individual. And these determine the ways in which angels are linked to one another. It should be recognized that one person's good is never exactly the same as another's good. Rather, they are varied, so varied that they can be distinguished into higher overall categories, and these into lower sub-divisions, down to particular and most particular kinds. Regarding forms of the good of love and faith, that they are so varied, see 684, 690, 3241, 3267, 3744-3746, 3986, 4005, 4149, 5598, 7236. From this it may now be evident why they were commanded to take for themselves each one a member of the flock according to the household of his fathers, a member according to the household.

5598. 'And our generation' means regarding the truths of faith there. This is clear from the meaning of 'generation' as the birth of truth from good or faith from charity, dealt with in 1145, 1255, 4070, 4668. The reason 'generation' has this meaning in the internal sense is that in heaven no other kind of birth is meant than what is called regeneration, which is effected by means of the truth of faith and the good of charity. By this kind of generation or birth the children of men become the children of the Lord; these are they who are called 'the born of God' in John 1:13. The variations that exist in the offspring of good from truth and truth from good within that kind of generation are what determine the brotherly or blood relationships and the relationships by marriage that exist in heaven.

[2] In heaven unending variations exist; but those variations are effected by the Lord in such a way that they resemble families in which there are brothers, sisters, sons-in-law, daughters-in-law, grandsons, granddaughters, and so on. In general however all are organized into the kind of form that makes one united whole. They are like the variations within the human body, in which no one member is exactly the same as any other; indeed no one part within any member is the same as any other part. Even so, all those varying parts are organized into the kind of form in which they act as a single whole, and each fits in directly or remotely with the activity of another. Seeing a form such as this in the human being, one may deduce what the form must be like in heaven, with which there is a correspondence - a most perfect one - of everything in the human being.