155. Internal Meaning of Ezekiel, Chapter 32

Lament over those who by knowledges [scientiae] have perverted the holy things of the church. (3, 3)

1-2 They pervert all truths of the church. (3)

3-8 They fall into all falsities of evil, until they no longer see what is good and true. (3)

9-10 Those who are outside the church are horrified at their falsities. (3)

11-12 They destroy all things of the church by reasonings from the natural man. (3)

13-16 They shall be cast into hell, that they may no longer pervert truths in those who are in an affection for truth. (15)

15 In hell they will be associated with those who have profaned the holy things of the Word; (15, 17)

24-25 also with those who have falsified truths of doctrine; (15)

26-30 with those who have falsified the sense of the letter of the Word.

31-32 All of these will be with those who by knowledges [scientiae] have perverted the holy things of the church, and thus they will be separated from those who are of the church, lest they persecute them. (15)

409. The same applied to the heresy called Cain, which was vastated with the passage of time, for it did, it is true, acknowledge love, yet it made faith the chief thing and set it above love. The heresies descending from Cain however gradually strayed even from this, and Lamech, who was the sixth in the line, went so far as to reject faith altogether. At this point new light or the morning began to dawn, and a new Church came into being which is here called 'Adah and Zillah', the names of the wives of Lamech. They are called the wives of Lamech, who was devoid of any faith, just as the internal and external Church among the Jews, who were also devoid of any faith, are in the Word called wives. The same was also represented by Leah and Rachel, Jacob's two wives, Leah representing the external Church and Rachel the internal. These Churches, seemingly two, are nevertheless one, for a Church that is purely external or representative and lacks the internal is something completely idolatrous or dead, but the internal Church and the external together constitute one and the same Church, as Adah and Zillah do here. But because, like Lamech, Jacob, that is, the descendants of Jacob, were totally devoid of faith, the Church could not continue with them. Instead it was transferred to gentiles whose lives were not contrary to faith but were without knowledge. Rarely, if ever, does a Church remain with people who, once vastated, are in possession of truths. Instead it is transferred to those who know absolutely nothing about such truths, for such people embrace faith far more easily than the former do.