1094. And the earth was lightened with his glory.- That this signifies the church now in light from the influx and reception of Divine Truth, is evident from the signification of the earth, as denoting the church, of which we have frequently spoken; and from the signification of being lightened, as denoting to be in light; and from the signification of glory, is here said of the Lord, who is meant there by the angel, as denoting Divine Truth (concerning which see n. 33, 288, 345, 874). That the Divine Truth is denoted by glory, because it is the light of heaven from which the angels derive all their wisdom and happiness, and also their magnificence, may be seen above (n. 678).

It is said of the angel coming down out of heaven, that he had great power, and that the earth was lightened with his glory because the Last Judgment was accomplished upon those meant by the harlot, or Babylon, this being the meaning of the words of the angel: "Fallen, fallen is Babylon, and is become a habitation of demons and a hold of every unclean spirit, and a hold of every unclean and hateful bird" (verse 2). And when judgment was accomplished upon them, then the Divine Truth proceeding from the Lord came into its light and into its power; for as long as the Babylonians were tolerated under heaven, they were like dense and dusky clouds between heaven and the earth which intercept the rays of light from the sun, and obscure the day. The reason was that they not only falsified, but also rejected the Divine Truth, that is the Word, and also destroyed the Lord's Divine Power by transferring it to themselves. As long as they were permitted to make habitations for themselves under the heavens, these and several other things were like dusky clouds between heaven and earth, through which the Divine Truth could not pass and enlighten any man of the Church. But as soon as they had been driven away and cast into hell, then the Divine truth which proceeded from the Lord as a Sun, increased in power and light to such a degree that the Lord could not only more powerfully lead, and more clearly enlighten, the spirits under the heavens, but also men in the Church. This is the reason why the spiritual sense of the Word was not revealed before, nor the state of heaven and hell manifested until the Last Judgment was accomplished, for previous to this, the Divine Truth would not have had power and light.

[2] Continuation concerning the Athanasian Creed.- Since a man at his birth, is not in any society either heavenly or infernal, being without thought, and yet is born for eternal life, it follows that, in course of time, he opens either heaven or hell to himself, enters into societies, and becomes an inhabitant either of heaven or of hell, even while he is in the world. The reason why a man becomes an inhabitant there is, that his real dwelling place, and country, as it is called, is in the spiritual world; after he has dwelt a few years in the natural world, he will live there for ever. It may be inferred, from these things, how necessary it is for a man to know, what it is that opens heaven in him, and introduces him into its societies; also, what it is that opens hell in him, and introduces him into its societies. This will be shown in the sections appended to the following articles. We will merely state here that a man introduces himself successively into more and more societies of heaven, according to the increase of wisdom, and successively into more and more interior societies, according to the increase of the love of good; again, so far as heaven is opened to him, so far hell is closed; but it is man himself that opens hell to himself, for heaven is opened to man by the Lord.

7779. 'From Pharaoh's firstborn who is to sit on his throne' means falsified truths of faith that occupy the first place. This is clear from the meaning of 'firstborn' as faith, dealt with in 352, 2435, 6344, 7035; from the representation of 'Pharaoh' as factual knowledge in general perverting the Church's truths, dealt with in 6015, 6651, 6679, 6683, 6692, so that 'Pharaoh's firstborn' is faith consisting of such truths, that is, faith consisting of falsified truths of faith; and from the meaning of 'throne' as the rule of truth, and in the contrary sense the rule of falsity, dealt with in 5313. The fact that 'Pharaoh's firstborn who is to sit on his throne' means falsified truths of faith that occupy the first place is evident from the use of the words 'even to the firstborn of the servant-girl who is behind the mill', which mean falsified truths of faith that occupy the very last place; besides which the king's son means that which is primary since the king is the head.

[2] Falsified truths occupying the first place are those which are taken to be essential truths, such as these: Faith saves a person irrespective of the life he has been leading; it saves a person in the final hour of his life; he is at that point pure and free from sins, which means that these are removed in an instant like dirt on the hands by water. Those falsified truths posit that faith does exist without charity, that so far as a person's salvation is concerned it does not matter what kind of life he leads, and also that a person who is a devil can become an angel of God in an instant. Such notions and others like them are the falsified truths occupying the first place; those that are immediately derived from them occupy the second place; and those which are remotely derived from them occupy the last place. For every truth has a long wide-ranging sequence of derivations, some of which are in a direct line from it, some at an angle, while those that merely touch on that truth stand on the outermost edges.

[3] The fact that such notions and others like them are falsified truths of faith is very plain to see. Does anyone who thinks properly not know that the life of faith makes a person spiritual, not faith except to the extent that it has been integrated into his life? A person's life is his love, and what he loves, that he wills and intends; and what he wills and intends, that he does. This is the essential nature (esse) of the person, not what he knows, or what he thinks but does not will. That essential nature of a person cannot possibly be changed into a different one by his thinking about mediation and salvation, only by new birth, which is being effected throughout a large part of his life. For he must be conceived, be born, and mature anew; and this is not effected by thinking and speaking, but by willing and acting.

[4] These matters have been stated because 'Pharaoh's firstborn' and 'the firstborn of the Egyptians' mean faith separated from charity, which - as has been shown in what has gone before - is not faith but the knowledge of such things as constitute faith. The reason why 'the firstborn of the Egyptians' represented that kind of faith is that the Egyptians, more than all others who constituted the representative Church after the time of the Flood, possessed a knowledge of the religious observances of the Church, 4749, 4964, 4966, 6004. At that time all ceremonies were representative of spiritual realities in heaven. The Egyptians had a greater knowledge of these than all others had; but in course of time they began to love merely their knowledge of them. They now began to think, as one finds at the present day, that the Church consisted entirely in knowing the kinds of things that have to do with the Church, and no longer in a charitable life. Thus they turned the whole order of the Church upside down; and once this had been turned upside down truths which are called the truths of faith were inevitably falsified. For if truths are applied in ways contrary to Divine order - as happens when they are applied to evils, or in the case of the Egyptians to acts of magic - they are no longer truths with those people but acquire from the evils to which they are applied the nature of falsities.

[5] Let the calf-worship among Egyptians serve to illustrate this. They knew what a calf represented, namely the good of charity. As long as they knew this and had this in mind, then when they saw calves, or when they prepared calves at charitable feasts, such as the ancients held, or later on when calves were used in sacrifices, they thought in a way that was sane and at the same time in company with the angels in heaven since a calf is for them the good of charity. But when they began to make calves of gold, place them in their temples, and worship them, they thought in an insane manner and at the same time in company with the hells. In that way they turned a true representative into a false one.