When we eat, our bodies break down the food and get from it both energy and materials for building and repairing the body. The process is similar on a symbolic level in the Bible. Food represents the desire for good and the insight that comes from that desire for good – goodness and understanding that come from the Lord. But to put them to use we have to take them in and make them our own – which is spiritual eating.

2124. I have been told that good present in the will, as it was with members of the Most Ancient Church, existed no longer in those before the Flood, and that at the present time with members of the Christian Church good present in the understanding is starting to perish, so much so that little of it is left. The reason for this is that they believe nothing except that which they grasp with the senses, and nowadays they not only reason from the senses but also do so about Divine arcana by means of a philosophy unknown to the ancients. As a result the light of understanding is utterly darkened; and that darkness is growing so deep that it can hardly be dispelled.