In most cases, the meaning of "before" is pretty straightforward, both as a way of assessing relative time, and in its use meaning "in someone's presence." It takes on a deeper significance, though, when used in connection with the Lord. To be "before" the Lord means not just in His presence, but also receiving the desire for good and the understanding of truth from Him, and living according to them. And when used as an assessment of time in connection with the Lord, "before" means "from eternity," and refers to a spiritual state rather than time as we experience it.

(Odkazy: Apocalypse Revealed 366, 617; Arcana Coelestia 6983, 8439, 9888)

616. And I heard the sound of harpists playing their harps. This symbolizes a confession of the Lord from a glad heart by spiritual angels in the lower heavens.

To play harps means, symbolically, to confess the Lord in consequence of spiritual truths, as may be seen in no. 276 above. It follows that this springs from a glad heart. Consequently harps symbolize spiritual angels.

The angels here are angels of the lower heavens, because the Lord's voice through the higher heavens sounded like the voice of many waters, and like the voice of loud thunder (nos. 614, 615).

The sound of harpists playing their harps was heard because sound or speech flowing down from the lower heavens sometimes sounds like the sound of harps. Not that the angels are playing harps, but that the sound of a confession of the Lord from a glad heart is heard as such below.