2954. I will give the silver of the field; take it of me. That this signifies redemption as to the truths of the church which are from the Lord, is evident from the signification of “giving silver,” as being to redeem by truth (see above, n. 2937); for “silver” is truth (n. 1551); from the signification of “field,” as being the church, and also the doctrine of truth (see n. 368, 2936); and from the signification of “taking of me,” as being what is reciprocal with those who are of the church; the reciprocal is faith that redemption is from the Lord alone. As regards redemption, it is the same as reformation and regeneration and the consequent deliverance from hell and salvation. The redemption or reformation and salvation of the men of the spiritual church is effected through truth; but that of the men of the celestial church through good. The reasons have been repeatedly stated above, namely, that the spiritual have nothing of the will of good, but in its stead have been gifted with the faculty of understanding what is good. The understanding of good is what is principally called truth, and indeed the truth of faith; but willing and thence doing this is what is called good. The spiritual therefore, through the understanding of good, or what is the same, through truth, are introduced into the will of good, or what is the same, into good; not however into anything of the will of good from themselves, for with them all the will of good has been lost (see n. 895, 927, 2124); but into a new will which they receive from the the Lord, (n. 863, 875, 1023, 1043, 1044); and when they have received this will they are then called specifically the redeemed.

895. The waters were dried up from off the earth. That this signifies that falsities did not then appear, is evident from what has been said. Specifically it signifies that falsities have been separated from the things of the will of the man of this church. The “earth” here signifies man’s will, which is nothing but cupidity; wherefore it is said that “the waters were dried up from off the earth.” His “ground” as said above, is in his intellectual part, in which truths are sown-never in his will part, which in the spiritual man is separate from the intellectual; wherefore it is said afterwards in this verse that the face of the “ground” was dried. With the man of the Most Ancient Church there was ground in his will, in which the Lord sowed goods, and then from the goods the man could know and perceive truth, or from love could have faith; but if this method were followed now, man could not but perish eternally, for his will is wholly corrupted. How the case is with this sowing in man’s will part, or-as is the case now-in his intellectual part, is evident from considering that revelations were made to the man of the Most Ancient Church by means of which he from his infancy was initiated into a perception of goods and truths, but as those revelations were sown in his will part, he without new instruction perceived innumerable things, so that from one general principle he knew from the Lord the particulars and the singulars which now men have to learn and so know, and yet after all they can know scarcely a thousandth part of them. For the man of the spiritual church knows nothing but what he learns, and what he knows in this way he retains and believes to be true. Indeed even if he learns what is false, and this is impressed on his mind as true, he believes it, because he has no other perception than that it is so, for so is he persuaded. Those who have conscience have from conscience a certain dictate, but no other than that a thing is true because they have so heard and learned. This is what forms their conscience, as is evident from those who have a conscience of what is false.