8496. 'Bake what you will bake' means preparing good to be joined; 'and boil what you will boil' means preparing truth to be joined. This is clear from the meaning of 'baking', since it was done by means of fire, as preparing good to be joined; and from the meaning of 'boiling', since it was done by means of water, as preparing truth to be joined - 'water' meaning the truth of faith, 2702, 3058, 3424, 4976, 5668, and 'fire' meaning the good of love, 934, 5215, 6314, 6832, 6834, 6849, 7324, 7852. The fact that preparing them to be joined is meant is self-evident, for what was being baked and boiled was being prepared for the following sabbath day, by which a joining together is meant, as shown immediately above. They were forbidden to kindle fire on the sabbath day, Exodus 35:3, so they could not bake or boil anything then. The word 'bake' is used in connection with bread and the minchah, which was made by means of fire, see Isaiah 44:15, 19; 1 Samuel 28:24; Ezekiel 46:20; Leviticus 6:17; while 'boil' is used in connection with flesh, which was cooked in water, Exodus 29:31; Leviticus 6:28; 1 Samuel 2:13, 15.

6834. 'And the bramble bush was not at all being consumed' means Divine Truth united to Divine Good in the natural. This is clear from the meaning of 'the bramble bush' as true factual knowledge, dealt with above in 6831, 6833, but in this instance as Divine Truth in the natural, since the description has reference to the Lord (the natural is meant because there truth takes the form of factual knowledge); and from the meaning of 'not being consumed by the fire' as not being reduced to nothing by the good of Divine Love, 'fire' being the good of Divine Love, see just above in 6832. Thus the fact that it was united to it, that is to say, Divine Truth was united to Divine Good in the natural, is what is meant by the words used here. It is their meaning in the highest sense, in which the Lord is the subject. The implications of this are as follows: The Divine Good of Divine Love is the actual fire of the sun in the next life. That fire is so hot that if its heat were to fall on someone, even on an angel of the inmost heaven, without a shield to moderate it, he would be deprived of all conscious feeling and would be destroyed. This is how hot God's love is in the Lord. But when the Lord was in the world and united the Human Essence to the Divine Essence, He received in His Human the fire of that love and there united it to truth when He made Himself the law of God. This then is what one should understand by the statement that Divine Truth was united to Divine Good within the natural.