1410. Jehovah said unto Abram. That this signifies the first mental advertence of all, depends upon the fact that this historical is representative, and the words themselves significative. Such was the style in the Ancient Church, that when anything was true, they said “Jehovah said,” or, “Jehovah spoke,” which signified that it was so; as has been shown above. But after significatives had been turned into representatives, then Jehovah or the Lord did actually speak with men; and when it is then said that Jehovah said, or, Jehovah spoke with anyone, it signifies the same as before; for the Lord’s words in the true historicals involve the same as His words in the made-up ones. There is only this difference, that the latter are composed to be like true history, and the former are not so composed. Wherefore that “Jehovah said unto Abram,” signifies nothing else than the first mental advertence; as when in the Ancient Church anyone was admonished by conscience, or by some other dictate, or by their Word, that a thing was so, it was then said in like manner that “Jehovah said.”

82. Verse 1. And the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the army of them. By these words is meant that man is now rendered so far spiritual as to have become the “sixth day;” “heaven” is his internal man, and “earth” his external; “the army of them” are love, faith, and the knowledges thereof, which were previously signified by the great luminaries and the stars. That the internal man is called “heaven” and the external “earth” is evident from the passages of the Word already cited in the preceding chapter, to which may be added the following from Isaiah:

I will make a man more rare than solid gold, even a man than the precious gold of Ophir; therefore I will smite the heavens with terror, and the earth shall be shaken out of its place (Isaiah 13:12-13).

Thou forgettest Jehovah thy Maker, that stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundations of the earth; but I will put My words in thy mouth, and I will hide thee in the shadow of My hand, that I may stretch out the heaven, and lay the foundation of the earth (Isaiah 51:13, 16).

From these words it is evident that both “heaven” and “earth” are predicated of man; for although they refer primarily to the Most Ancient Church, yet the interiors of the Word are of such a nature that whatever is said of the church may also be said of every individual member of it, who, unless he were a church, could not possibly be a part of the church, just as he who is not a temple of the Lord cannot be what is signified by the temple, namely, the church and heaven. It is for this reason that the Most Ancient Church is called “man” in the singular number.