23. Nothing is more common in the Word than for the word 'day' to be used to mean the particular time at which events take place, as in Isaiah,

The day of Jehovah is near. Behold, the day of Jehovah comes. I will make heaven tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, on the day of My fierce anger. Its time is close at hand, and its days will not be prolonged. Isaiah 13:6, 9, 13, 22.

And in the same prophet,

Her antiquity is in the days of antiquity. On that day Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, like the days of one king. Isaiah 23:7, 15.

Since 'day' stands for the particular time it also stands for the state associated with that particular time, as in Jeremiah, Woe to us, for the day has declined, for the shadows of evening have lengthened! Jeremiah 6:4

And in the same prophet,

If you break My covenant that is for the day and My covenant that is for the night, so that there is neither daytime nor night at their appointed time. Jeremiah 33:20, 25.

Also,

Renew our days as of old. Lamentations 5:21.

590. There is a perpetual equilibrium between heaven and hell. From hell there continually breathes forth and ascends an effort to do evil, and from heaven there continually breathes forth and descends an effort to do good. In this equilibrium is the world of spirits; which world is intermediate between heaven and hell (see above, 421-431). The world of spirits is in this equilibrium because every man after death enters first the world of spirits, and is there kept in a state like that in which he was while in the world, and this would be impossible if there were not a perfect equilibrium there; for by means of this the character of everyone is explored, since there they are left in the same freedom as they had been in the world. Spiritual equilibrium is freedom with man and spirit (as has been said just above, 589). What each one's freedom is, the angels recognize by a communication of affections and thoughts therefrom; and it becomes visible to the sight of angelic spirits by the ways in which the spirits go. Those who are good spirits there travel in the ways that go towards heaven, but evil spirits in the ways that go towards hell. Ways actually appear in that world; and that is the reason why "ways" in the Word signify the truths that lead to good, or in the opposite sense the falsities that lead to evil; and for the same reason "going", "walking", and "journeying" in the Word signify progressions of life. ¹ Such ways I have often been permitted to see, also spirits going and walking in them freely, in accord with their affections and the thoughts therefrom.

Bilješke: