9472. 'And pieces of shittim wood' means good deeds worthy of merit that proceed from the Lord, and so are the Lord's alone. This is clear from the meaning of 'pieces of wood' as the good of merit, dealt with in 1110, 2784, 2812, 4943, 8740. The good of merit is good proceeding from the Lord's Divine Human, which is Christian good, or spiritual good present with a person. This good is the one by means of which a person is saved; for good which proceeds from any other source is not good since it has nothing of God in it, nor thus of heaven, nor therefore any health or salvation in it. Shittim wood was the wood of the most excellent kind of cedar, and 'the cedar' means the spiritual Church. The fact that shittim wood was a species of cedar is clear in Isaiah,

I will plant ¹ in the wilderness the cedar of shittah, and the myrtle, and the oil tree. ² Isaiah 41:19.

Here 'the cedar of shittah' stands for spiritual good, 'the oil tree' for celestial good. Since the good worthy of merit, which is the Lord's alone, is the one and only good that reigns in heaven and makes heaven, that wood was the one and only wood that was used in the construction of the tabernacle, by which heaven was represented. It was used for example to make the actual ark, which had the Testimony in it; its poles; the table on which the loaves of the Presence were laid, and its poles; the boards for the dwelling-place; the poles and the pillars of the covering; and also the altar and its poles, as is clear from verses 10, 13, 23, 28, of the present chapter, and from Exodus 26:15, 26, 37; 27:1, 6.

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4943. On the lower earth beneath the feet and soles of the feet there are also those who have regarded good deeds and works to be meritorious. Many of these appear to themselves to be cutting pieces of wood. The place where they are is quite a cold one, but they seem to themselves to find warmth in the work they do. I talked to these people too and was allowed to ask them whether they wished to leave that place. Their replies were that they had not done enough meritorious work. But once this stage is completed they are released from there. These people likewise are natural, for the desire to earn salvation through merit is not a spiritual desire. What is more, they regard themselves to be those who are superior to others, and some of them are also contemptuous of others. If in the next life they do not receive greater joy than all others, they are angry with the Lord, which explains why sometimes when they are cutting pieces of wood, it appears as though something of the Lord is underneath their pile of wood - their anger being that which produces this appearance. But because they have led a devout life and have acted in the ways they did out of ignorance that had some degree of innocence within it, angels are therefore sent to them periodically to console them. Sometimes, in addition, something that looks like a sheep appears from above on the left, and from this too they receive consolation when they see it.