4342. 'And he divided the sons over towards Leah' means the deployment of external truths beneath their own specific affection. This is clear from the meaning of 'dividing over towards' as deployment; from the meaning of 'the sons' as truths, dealt with in 489, 491, 533, 1147, 2623, 3373; and from the representation of 'Leah' as the affection for exterior truth, dealt with in 3793, 3819. Consequently 'the sons' in this case means the truths that belong to exterior affection, and therefore means external truths. The expression external truths is being used for those which are called sensory truths, that is to say, truths which enter in immediately from the world by way of the bodily senses, while interior truths, meant by Rachel's sons, are those which are present interiorly within the natural and more immediately beneath the eye of the rational, and to which misconceptions and resulting illusions cling less easily than to sensory truths. For the more that truths enter in by the interior way the more they are purified from worldly and earthly things.
