In general, men are driven by intellect and women by affections, and because of this men in the Bible generally represent knowledge and truth and women generally represent love and the desire for good. This generally carries over into marriage, where the man's growing knowledge and understanding and the woman's desire to be good and useful are a powerful combination. In many cases in the Bible, then, "husband" refers to things of truth and understanding, much as "man" does. Magnificent things can happen in a true marriage, though, when both partners are looking to the Lord. If a husband opens his heart to his wife, it's as though she can implant her loves inside him, transforming his intellectual urges into a love of growing wise. She in turn can grow in her love of that blooming wisdom, and use it for joy in their married life and in their caring for children and others in their life. Many couples, even in heaven, stay in that state -- called "Spiritual" -- growing deeper and deeper to eternity. There is the potential, though, for the couple to be transformed: through the nurturing love of his wife the husband can pass from a love of growing wise to an actual love of wisdom itself, and the wife can be transformed from the love of her husband's wisdom into the wisdom of that love -- the actual expression of the love of the Lord they have built together. In that state -- called "Celestial" -- the husband represents love and the desire for good, and the wife represents truth and knowledge.

881. Prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. This symbolizes the New Church conjoined with the Lord through the Word.

We are told that John saw the holy city New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven, and now that he saw the city prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. This makes it apparent that Jerusalem means the church, which John saw first as a city and then as a virgin bride - seeing it as a city representatively, and as a virgin bride spiritually. Thus he had two images, one within the other or above the other, even as angels do when they see, hear or read in the Word about a city, perceiving it in the conception of their lower thought as a city, but in the conception of their higher thought as doctrine. And if they desire it and pray to the Lord, they see the latter as a maiden, having a beauty and apparel commensurate with the character of the church. I, too, have been given to see the church in this way.

[2] The bride's being prepared symbolizes her being attired for betrothal, and the church is made ready for betrothal and then for conjunction or marriage in no other way than by the Word; for the Word is the one and only means of conjunction or marriage, inasmuch as the Word originates from the Lord and is about the Lord, and thus embodies the Lord. It is also called a covenant therefore, and a covenant symbolizes spiritual conjunction. Moreover it was for this reason that the Word was given.

That the husband is the Lord is apparent from verses 9 and 10 in this chapter, in which the Jerusalem is called the bride, the Lamb's wife.

To be shown that the Lord is called a bridegroom and husband, and the church His bride and wife, and that their marriage is like the marriage between goodness and truth, and takes place through the Word, see no. 797 above.

It can be seen from this that Jerusalem's being prepared as a bride adorned for her husband symbolizes the New Church conjoined with the Lord through the Word.