3452. 'And we said, Let there be now a solemn agreement between us, between us and you, and let us make a covenant with you' means that their matters of doctrine concerning faith, regarded in themselves, should not be refused recognition, that is to say, insofar as they are drawn from the literal sense of the Word. This is clear from the meaning of 'a solemn agreement between us' as the general agreement between matters of doctrine and the literal sense of the Word; from the meaning of 'between us and you' as agreement with the internal sense; and from the meaning of 'let us make a covenant' as the fact that in this way they could be joined together - 'a covenant' meaning a joining together, see 665, 666, 1023, 1038, 1864, 2003, 2021. The meaning which flows from all this is that this being so, their matters of doctrine concerning faith, regarded in themselves, should not be refused recognition, for as has been stated, no matters of doctrine at all, provided they are drawn from the Word, are refused recognition. They are acceptable to the Lord provided that the person who possesses them is leading a charitable life, for everything in the Word is able to be joined to that life. But the interior aspects of the Word are able to be joined to the life present in the interior good that flows from charity. See what has been stated and brought forward in 3324.

665. That establishing a covenant' means that he would be regenerated becomes quite clear from the fact that the only kind of covenant that can exist between the Lord and man is conjunction by virtue of love and faith. And so a covenant means conjunction; indeed it is the heavenly marriage that is the supreme covenant of all. The heavenly marriage or conjunction does not show itself however except with people who are being regenerated. Regeneration itself therefore in the broadest sense is meant by a covenant. The Lord enters into a covenant with man when He regenerates him, and consequently among men of old a covenant had no other representation. From the sense of the letter no other impression is gained than that the covenant made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and so often with their descendants, concerned just those personages. But those people were by nature such as to be incapable of being regenerated, for they focused worship exclusively on things that were external, and imagined external things to be sacred without things that are internal allied to them. Consequently the covenants made with them were no more than representations of regeneration, as were all their religious ceremonies, and as were Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob themselves who represented the things of love and faith. In a similar way priests or high priests, whatever their character, including infamous ones, could represent the heavenly and most holy priesthood. In representations no attention is paid to the person who represents but to that which is represented by him. Thus all the kings of Israel and Judah, including the worst of them, represented the Lord's kingship, and so indeed did the Pharaoh who promoted Joseph over the land of Egypt. These and many other considerations which in the Lord's Divine mercy will be dealt with later on show that the covenants made so often with the sons of Jacob were nothing more than religious ceremonies which were representative.