4936. On several occasions spirits have appeared holding rods, who, I was told, were magicians. They are in front, a long way off on the right, deeply within caverns. Magicians who have been more malevolent ones are hidden more deeply than the rest within them. They seem to themselves to have rods, and by means of delusions they also produce many more kinds of rods, believing that they can use these to perform miracles. For they imagine that these rods have power within them, and they imagine this because the right hand and the arm, which by correspondence are embodiments of strength and power, support themselves on those rods. This has made it evident to me why people of old assigned rods to magicians, for the gentiles of old received this idea from the representative Ancient Church, in which rods, like the hand, meant power, see 4876. And because these meant power Moses was commanded, when miracles were performed, to stretch out his rod or his hand, Exodus 4:17, 20; 8:5-20; 9:23; 10:3-21; 14:21, 26-27; 17:5-6, 11-12; Numbers 20:7-10.

8050. 'For by strength of hand Jehovah brought you out from there' means that they were delivered by the Lord's Divine power. This is clear from the meaning of 'strength of hand' as power or, when used in reference to Jehovah, as almighty power (the fact that 'strength' means power is self-evident; and the fact that 'hand' likewise means power, see 878, 3387, 4931-4937, 5327, 5328, 5544, 6947, 7188, 7189, 7518, 7673); and from the meaning of 'bringing out' as delivering. That 'Jehovah' is the Lord, see above in 8046.