5689. 'And he said, God be gracious to you, my son' means that the Divine was also present with the spiritual of the celestial, which is the intermediary, because it goes forth from the celestial of the spiritual, which is truth from the Divine. This is clear from the meaning of 'God be gracious - when this is said by the celestial of the spiritual, which is 'Joseph', to the spiritual of the celestial, which is 'Benjamin', and when the latter is also addressed by the former as 'son' - as the Divine presence also with the spiritual of the celestial, which is the intermediary, because this goes forth from the celestial of the spiritual, which is truth from the Divine. For 'Benjamin' is the spiritual of the celestial, see 3969, 4592; he is the intermediary too, 5411, 5413, 5443, 5639.

[2] Since, as stated above, the Lord's inner man was the celestial of the spiritual, and this was truth from the Divine or the clothing next to the Divine Himself within the Lord, and since the spiritual of the celestial, which is the intermediary, went forth from that, it follows that the Divine was also present with this intermediary. What goes forth from something acquires its essential being from that from which it goes forth; but it is clothed with coverings such as serve to enable communication to take place and thereby enable a useful purpose to be realized in a lower sphere. The coverings that clothe it are derived in part from such things as exist in that lower sphere, to the end that the internal from which it goes forth can operate in the lower sphere through the kinds of things present there.

[3] What provides its essential being is so to speak its father, since that essential being is its soul; and what provides its clothing is its mother, for that clothing is the body belonging to this soul. This is why, as stated above, the intermediary must be derived from both if it is to be an intermediary - from the internal as its father and from the external as its mother.

5413. 'For he said, Perhaps harm may come to him' means that without the celestial of the spiritual, which is 'Joseph', that intermediary will perish. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming to harm' here as perishing. These words were spoken by Benjamin's father because he loved him and was afraid that he would perish among his brothers, as Joseph had done. But they have been quoted and incorporated into the Word because of the internal sense, which is that if the intermediary is present with external things alone without the internal it will perish, the intermediary being 'Benjamin', the external things 'the sons of Jacob', and the internal 'Joseph'. Indeed the intermediary perishes whenever it exists with external things alone without the internal, for the situation with the intermediary is this: It derives its being from what is internal and is therefore also kept in being from there; for it is brought into being when the internal beholds the external, when the affection and intention exists there to link that external to itself. Accordingly what is intermediate exists joined to the internal; and extending from the internal it is joined to the external, but not to the external without the internal. From this it is evident that if the intermediary is present with the external alone it will perish. What is more, it is a law common both to things in the spiritual world and to those in the natural world that anything prior can remain in being with what is prior to that, but not with what is posterior without what is prior to it. If it exists solely with what is posterior it will perish. The reason for this is that everything unconnected to something prior to itself is unconnected to Him who is the First, the Source of all that comes into being and is kept in being.