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.

10124. 'When you make propitiation on it' means the resulting ability to receive good from the Lord. This is clear from the meaning of 'making propitiation on the altar' as the implantation - after evils and consequently falsities have been removed - of good from the Lord, and the reception of it by a person belonging to the Church or by an angel belonging to heaven, dealt with in 9506. For as shown immediately above in 10123, 'the altar' means heaven and the Church as regards the reception of good from the Lord. Since 'the altar' means the heaven and Church where celestial good reigns, which is the good of love received from the Lord and offered back to the Lord, a brief description of the nature of the reception of good in the celestial kingdom must be given. As has often been stated before, heaven is divided into two kingdoms, one of which is called the celestial kingdom and the other the spiritual kingdom. In both kingdoms good is implanted by means of truth; but with those who are in the spiritual kingdom good is implanted by means of truth in the understanding part of the mind, whereas with those who are in the celestial kingdom good is implanted by means of truth in the will part. The way in which the implantation of good by means of truth takes place in the spiritual kingdom is different from the way in which it does with those in the celestial kingdom. With those in the spiritual kingdom truth is implanted in the external or natural man, where at first it becomes knowledge. To the extent that the person has an affection for it, and lives in accord with it, it is then summoned into the understanding, where it becomes faith and at the same time charity towards the neighbour. This charity constitutes his new will and the faith a new understanding; and both constitute conscience.

[2] But with those in the celestial kingdom truth becomes neither knowledge, nor faith, nor conscience. Instead it becomes a power to receive that is subject to the good of love; and to the extent that they live a life in accord with it, it becomes a power of perception which grows fuller and more perfect as their love does so. This goes on in them day by day without their awareness, almost as it does with young children. The reason why it goes on without their awareness is that truth does not become fixed as knowledge in the memory, nor does it linger as a concept within the power of thought; rather it passes without delay into the will and becomes part of their life. Consequently they do not see truth but perceive it; and the extent and manner of their perception is determined by how much and in what way the good of love received from and offered back to the Lord is present in them. These in the celestial kingdom therefore are very different from those in the spiritual kingdom. And since their perception of truth springs from good they never substantiate it by the use of reasons. Instead whenever truths are the subject they merely say either 'Yes, yes' or 'No, no'.

[3] These are the ones who are meant by the Lord in Matthew,

Let your words be Yes, yes; No, no; anything beyond this is from evil ¹ . Matthew 5:37.

For reasoning about truths, about whether they are such or not, does not spring from good, because in that case truth is not seen with perception, only believed as a result of receiving it on authority and then corroborating it for oneself. What one believes on authority consists of other people's ideas within one's self and are not one's own; and anything believed on these grounds alone and then corroborated appears after such corroboration to be the truth, even when it is false. This becomes perfectly clear from the beliefs of any religion and from the variety of religions throughout the world.

From all this it is evident what the difference is between those who are in the Lord's celestial kingdom and those who are in His spiritual kingdom. The reason for their difference is that those in His celestial kingdom by the way they live convert the Church's truths immediately into forms of good, whereas those in the spiritual kingdom keep to truths, preferring faith to life. Those who by the way they live convert the Church's truths immediately into good, that is, those who belong to the celestial kingdom, are described by the Lord in Mark 4:26-29, and many times elsewhere. Regarding the difference between the celestial kingdom and the spiritual kingdom, see the places referred to in 9277.

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2762. That a “horse” signifies the faculty of understanding is from no other source than the representatives in the other life. Often there, in the world of spirits, horses are seen, and this with great variety, and those also that sit on them; and whenever they are seen they signify the faculty of understanding. There are such representatives continually with spirits. It is from the representation of the horse, as being the understanding, that when horses are mentioned in the Word, the spirits and angels with man at once know that the understanding is what is treated of. It is also from this that when spirits from a certain distant world on being imbued with intelligence and wisdom are taken up from the world of spirits into heaven, there appear to them horses shining as with fire; which also I have seen when they were taken up.

[2] From this I could see what is signified by the chariot of fire and horses of fire seen by Elisha when Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven; as also what is signified by the exclamation of Elisha then: “My Father, my Father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof” (2 Kings 2:11-12); and by Joash king of Israel saying the same to Elisha when he was dying: “My Father, my Father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof” (2 Kings 13:14). That by Elijah and Elisha was represented the Lord as to the Word, will of the Lord’s Divine mercy be told elsewhere; the doctrine of love and charity from the Word being meant by the “chariot of fire,” and the doctrine of faith therefrom by the “horses of fire.” The doctrine of faith is the same as the understanding of the Word as to its interiors, or as to its internal sense.

[3] That chariots and horses are seen in the heavens with spirits and angels, is evident from the fact of their being seen by the prophets, as by Zechariah (Zechariah 1:8-10; 6:3-7), and by others, and also by Elisha’s servant, as thus described in the book of Kings:

Jehovah opened the eyes of Elisha’s boy, and he saw; and behold the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha (2 Kings 6:17).

Moreover, where the abode of the intelligent and wise is, in the world of spirits, chariots and horses appear continually; for the reason as said that by chariots and horses are represented the things of wisdom and of intelligence. Resuscitated persons after death, who are entering into the other life, see represented to them a young man sitting upon a horse, and then alighting from the horse; and by this is signified that they are to be instructed in the knowledge of good and truth before they can come into heaven (see Part First,n. 187-188).

[4] That chariots and horses signified these things, was well known in the Ancient Church, as also is evident from the book of Job, which is a book of that Church, where are these words:

God hath made her to forget wisdom, and hath not imparted to her intelligence; what time she lifteth up herself on high she scorneth the horse and his rider (Job 39:17-19).

From the Ancient Church the signification of the horse, as being the faculty of understanding, was extended to the wise round about, even into Greece. From this it came to pass that when they described the sun (by which was signified love, n. 2441, 2495), they placed in it the god of their wisdom and intelligence, and gave him a chariot and four horses of fire; and that when they described the god of the sea, because by the sea were signified knowledges in general (n. 28, 2120), they gave horses also to him; and that when they described the rise of knowledges from the understanding, they represented a flying horse which with his hoof broke open a fountain, where dwelt the virgins that were the sciences; and by the Trojan horse nothing else was signified than a contrivance of their understanding for destroying city walls.

Even at this day the intellect is often described, according to the custom received from those ancient people, under the figure of a flying horse, or Pegasus; and learning is described as a fountain; but scarcely anyone knows that a horse, in the mystic sense, signifies the understanding, and a fountain truth; still less that these significatives were handed down to the Gentiles from the Ancient Church.