501. And their bodies will lie in the street of the great city. (11:8) This symbolically means that these two essential elements of the New Church have been utterly rejected by people inwardly caught up in the doctrinal falsities connected with justification by faith alone.

The bodies of the two witnesses symbolize the two essential elements of the New Church, namely, an acknowledgment of the Lord as the only God of heaven and earth, and conjunction with Him by a life in accordance with the Ten Commandments (nos. 490ff.). The street of the great city symbolizes doctrinal falsity connected with justification by faith alone - the street symbolizing falsity, as we shall see next, and the city symbolizing doctrine (no. 194). It is called a great city because the doctrine is the prevailing doctrine throughout the Protestant Reformed Christian world among the clergy, though not in the same way among the laity.

Streets in the Word have almost the same symbolic meaning as ways, because streets are a city's ways. Still, streets symbolize doctrinal truths or falsities, because a city symbolizes doctrine (no. 194), while ways symbolize a church's truths or falsities, because the earth symbolizes the church (no. 285).

[2] That streets symbolize doctrinal truths or falsities can be seen from the following passages:

Justice has been rejected, and righteousness stands afar off, for truth has stumbled in the street, and rectitude cannot enter. (Isaiah 59:14)

The chariots raced madly in the streets, they rushed in every direction in the town squares. (Nahum 2:4)

In the days of Jael, the ways were deserted... The town squares were deserted... in Israel... (Judges 5:6-7)

How the glorious city is forsaken...! Therefore her young men shall fall in her streets... (Jeremiah 49:25-26, cf. 50:30)

Those who ate delicacies are devastated in the streets... Darker than black is the appearance (of the Nazirites); they go unrecognized in the streets... They wandered blind in the streets... They tracked our steps so that we could not go into our streets. (Lamentations 4:5, 8, 14, 18)

I will cut off nations, their corners will be devastated; I will make their streets desolate... (Zephaniah 3:6)

(After) sixty-two weeks, the street (of Jerusalem) shall be built again..., but in distressful times. (Daniel 9:25)

...the street of the city (New Jerusalem) was pure gold, like transparent glass. (Revelation 21:21)

In the middle of its street... on this side and that, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits... (Revelation 22:1-2)

And so on elsewhere, as in Isaiah 15:3; 24:10-11; 51:20.

As streets symbolize the church's doctrinal truths, therefore they taught in the streets (2 Samuel 1:20). And we are told,

We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets. (Luke 13:26)

For this reason also hypocrites prayed on street corners (Matthew 6:2, 5). And for this reason the master of the house in Luke 14:21 ordered his servants to go out into the streets and squares and bring people in.

For the same reason, too, anything false or falsified is called mire, filth and excrement in the streets (Isaiah 5:25; 10:6, Micah 7:10, Psalms 18:42).

Prophets who prophesied falsely were cast out into the streets of Jerusalem, and no one buried them (Jeremiah 14:16).

457. Still did not repent of the works of their hands. This symbolically means, nor did they refrain from their native proclivities, which are evils of every kind, as being sins.

The works of a person's hands symbolize a person's native proclivities, which are evils and their attendant falsities, because the hands symbolize in summary the things that emanate from a person; for the forces of the mind and consequently of the body are directed into the hands and terminate there. Consequently the hands in the Word symbolize power. For the same reason the works of a person's hands symbolize his native proclivities, which are evils and falsities of every kind. Evils are the native proclivities of his will, and the attendant falsities the native proclivities of his intellect.

We are told regarding the people who are the subject here that they did not repent, because people who make faith alone the totality of religion say to themselves, "What need do I have of repentance, when through faith alone our sins are forgiven and we are saved? What do our works contribute to this? I know that I was born in sin and that I am a sinner. If I confess this and pray that my faults not be imputed to me, then I have repented. What need do I have of anything more?"

Thus the person then gives no thought to sin, even to the point of not knowing what sins are. Consequently the delight and gratification they afford continually carry him along in them and into them, the way a favorable wind and current carry a ship onto rocks when both captain and crew are asleep.

[2] In the natural sense of the Word, the works of a person's hands mean carved images, cast images, and idols; but in its spiritual sense, they symbolize evils and falsities of every kind, which are a person's native proclivities. As, for example, in the following passages:

...do not provoke Me to anger by the work of your hands...; (if you were) to provoke Me to anger by the work of your hands to your own hurt..., I will repay them according to their work and according to the deeds of their hands. (Jeremiah 25:6-7, 14)

...the children of Israel have provoked Me... to anger by the work of their hands... (Jeremiah 32:30, cf. 44:8)

I will utter My judgments against them concerning all their wickedness, because they... bowed themselves to the works of their hands. (Jeremiah 1:16)

In that day... people's eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel, and... not to the altars, the work of their hands, and... what their fingers have made... (Isaiah 17:7-8, cf. 31:7; 37:19, Jeremiah 10:9)

[3] The work of a person's hands is his own doing, thus evil and falsity, and this can be clearly seen from the fact that it was for this reason that the Israelites were forbidden to built an altar or temple out of hewn stones, or to use an iron tool on those stones; for they symbolized the work of a person's hands:

If you make Me an altar of stones, you shall not build it of hewn stones; for if you use your chisel on it, you will profane it. (Exodus 20:25)

Joshua built... an altar of... stones, on which he did not use an iron tool. (Joshua 8:30-31)

The temple (at Jerusalem)...was built of whole stone, and no hammer or axe or any iron tool was heard... while it was being built. (1 Kings 6:7)

[4] Everything that the Lord does is likewise called the work of His hands, and these are His inherent attributes, which in themselves are goods and truths. As, for example, in the following places:

The works of (Jehovah's) hands are truth and judgment. (Psalms 111:7)

Your mercy, O Jehovah, endures forever; do not cease the works of Your hands. (Psalms 138:8)

Thus said Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker: "Seek from Me signs concerning My children; concerning the work of My hands, command Me." (Isaiah 45:11)

Your people are all just..., the offshoot of My planting, the work of My hands... (Isaiah 60:21)

...O Jehovah, You are our Father, we are the clay, and You our potter, and all we the work of Your hands. (Isaiah 64:8)