9371. THE INTERNAL SENSE.

Verses 1-2. And He said unto Moses, Come up unto Jehovah, thou and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and bow yourselves afar off; and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah; and they shall not come near; and the people shall not come up with him. “And He said unto Moses,” signifies that which concerns the Word in general; “come up unto Jehovah,” signifies conjunction with the Lord; “thou and Aaron,” signifies the Word in the internal sense and the external sense; “Nadab and Abihu,” signifies doctrine from both senses; “and seventy of the elders of Israel,” signifies the chief truths of the church which are of the Word, or of doctrine, and which agree with good; “and bow yourselves afar off,” signifies humiliation and adoration from the heart, and then the influx of the Lord; “and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah,” signifies the conjunction and presence of the Lord through the Word in general; “and they shall not come near,” signifies no separate conjunction and presence; “and the people shall not come up with him,” signifies no conjunction whatever with the external apart from the internal.

8781. 'Behold, I am coming to you in the thickness of a cloud' means that it will be made in a form utterly natural. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming to you' - when said by Jehovah to Moses, who represents the truth from God which the spiritual Church possesses, 8760 - as revelation; and from the meaning of 'the thickness of a cloud' as in a form utterly natural, like that in which the Old Testament Word exists in the letter. For the meaning of 'a cloud' as the Word in the letter, see preface to Genesis 18, and 4060, 4391, 5922, 6343 (end), 6752, 8106, 8443. 'Thickness' means dimness, such as that of a person's thought when it is lit solely by the inferior light of the senses, that is, by wholly natural light. It was in dimness such as this that the descendants of Jacob at that time thought about the Divine, and also that the Jews at the present day think about Him; for the Divine cannot be seen by anyone except in ways that are in keeping with his state of life and consequent discernment. So it is that heavenly light cannot be seen by those ruled by self-love and love of the world, which that nation more than others was ruled by, except as 'the thickness of a cloud'. The letter of the Word, especially the prophetical part, is nothing else in contrast to its internal sense. In its internal sense light exists such as may be compared to the light of the sun on top of clouds, the light which in the Word is called 'the glory'. This also explains why the Word says that Jehovah is carried on top of the clouds, rides above the clouds, flies above them, has His triclinium ¹ above them, that the Lord is going to come in the clouds of heaven, and many more statements like these, which would never have been made to describe Jehovah, that is, the Lord, unless they had meant the bright light of truth in which He is present in heaven, and 'clouds' had meant a shadowy light of truth in which those below heaven see.

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