387. And with death, signifies the consequent extinction of spiritual life. This is evident from the signification of "death," as being the extinction of spiritual life (See above, n. 78, 186). That this is what "death" here signifies is evident from the series of things in the internal sense; for it is said that "there was given unto them power to kill with sword, with famine, and with death;" and "sword" signifies falsity destroying truth, "famine" the deprivation of the knowledges of truth and good; thence "death" signifies the extinction of spiritual life; for where falsity reigns, and where there are no knowledges of truth and good, there is no spiritual life, for spiritual life is acquired by means of the knowledges of truth and good applied to the uses of life. For man is born into all evil and falsity from evil; he is therefore born also into an entire ignorance of all spiritual knowledges; therefore in order that he may be led away from the evils and consequent falsities into which he is born, and be led into the life of heaven and be saved, he must needs acquire the knowledges of truth and good, by means of which he can be led into spiritual life and become spiritual. From this series of things in the internal sense it is evident that "death" here signifies the extinction of spiritual life; this is meant, too, by spiritual death.

2011. 'For I have made you the father of a multitude of nations' means here, as previously, that from Him comes all truth and resulting good. This is clear from the meaning of 'father' as that which comes from Him, from the meaning of 'multitude' as truth, and also from the meaning of 'nations' as resulting good, all dealt with above in 2005-2007. The fact that these same words mean in the more universal or more remote sense the union of the Human Essence with the Divine Essence, see above, in 2004. For the union of the Lord's Human Essence with the Divine Essence is as the union of truth with good, and the union of His Divine Essence with the Human Essence that of good with truth - which is reciprocal union. Indeed within the Lord it was truth itself that united itself to good, and good that united itself to truth, for the Infinite Divine cannot be called anything else than Good and Truth themselves. Consequently the human mind is not at all mistaken when it thinks of the Lord as Good itself and Truth itself.