1. Dat het Woord van het Oude Testament verborgenheden van de hemel bevat, en dat zowel het geheel als elke bijzonderheid daarvan op de Heer betrekking heeft, op Zijn hemel, op de Kerk, op het geloof en de dingen van het geloof, kan geen sterveling uit de letter opmaken. Uit de letter of uit de letterlijke zin ziet niemand iets anders, dan dat het in het algemeen gaat over de uiterlijke dingen van de Joodse Kerk, terwijl er overal een innerlijke zin is, dat nergens in het uiterlijke aan het licht komt, behalve dan het zeer weinige dat de Heer onthuld heeft en aan de apostelen heeft ontvouwd; zo bijvoorbeeld, dat de offeranden de Heer betekenen, het land Kanaän en Jeruzalem en ook het Paradijs, de hemel betekenen, waarom dan ook van het hemelse Kanaän en Jeruzalem gesproken wordt.

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This week we introduce a new filter into the program which is, "Is it useful?" Something can be true, and can even be kind, but not actually useful to say. That's the focus - can we refrain from saying things that aren't actually useful? This filter is important as we try to bring heaven to earth because the Lord's kingdom is a kingdom of uses. Things only exist if they have a use. There are no frivolous creations! When we speak, we too create, so let's make sure the things we create have a purpose.

(Riferimenti: Arcana Coelestia 1, 4730; Ephesians 4:22-29; James 3:1-12; Matthew 12:33-37)

1955. 'For she said, Have I not also here seen after Him who sees me?' means influx into the life of the exterior man without the rational serving as a go-between. This is clear from 'seeing after one who sees'. 'Seeing after one who sees' is seeing from that which is interior or higher. In the internal sense that which is inward or higher is expressed in the sense of the letter as after when what is inside or higher is manifesting itself in what is outward or lower. It is Hagar who is speaking here, and she, as shown already, means the life possessed by knowledge and belonging to the exterior man. Since it was that life from which the first rational sprang, the Lord therefore saw the reason why it did so; He saw it from His Interior Man within the Exterior Man, and without the Rational serving as a go-between. Anyone may see that these words embody arcana, if only from the consideration that nobody is able to know what is meant by seeing after Him who sees me except from the internal sense, where matters such as this are present which cannot be explained intelligibly except by means of ideas like those that angels have. These ideas do not fall into words, only into the sense conveyed by words - abstractedly, quite apart from the material ideas out of which the ideas come that belong to the sense conveyed by the words. These matters, which seem so obscure to man, present to the angels ideas so clear and distinct, ideas enriched by so many representations, that if anyone wrote about just a tiny fraction of them he would fill a whole book.