4344. 'And over towards the two servant-girls' means beneath the affection for the things that serve those two affections. This is clear from the meaning of 'the servant-girls' as the affections for knowledge and for cognitions, dealt with in 1895, 2567, 3835, 3849, and as subservient means employed in the joining together of the external man and the internal, dealt with in 3913, 3917; and from the representation of Zilpah and Bilhah, to whom 'the servant-girls' refers here, as subservient exterior affections that are employed as means, dealt with in 3849, 3931.

3835. 'And Laban gave to her Zilpah his servant-girl - to Leah his daughter to be her servant-girl' means external affections or external bonds which are subservient means. This is clear from the meaning of 'a servant-girl' as external affections, dealt with in 1895, 2567. Laban's giving her means that they derive from a parallel good springing from a common stock, for this is the source of such affections. They are called external bonds because all affections are bonds, see 1077, 1080, 1835, 1944. For nothing else holds someone in bonds than his affection. No person's affection seems to him to be a bond, but it is nevertheless called such for the reason that it governs him and is for him binding. Internal affections however are called internal bonds, even as affections for truth and good are called the bonds of conscience. External bonds or affections correspond to these, for everything internal possesses a corresponding external. Since it is by means of external things that one who is being regenerated is introduced to internal things, and since this state is the subject here, mention is therefore made here of Laban's servant-girl's being given to his daughter Leah as a servant-girl. This description means that the kind of affections which served as means were given. The fact that these affections were the most external, like those called bodily affections, is evident from the consideration that 'Leah' represents the affections for external truth. But in the Lord's Divine mercy more about these matters too will appear elsewhere.