6098. 'And they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers' means that it did not come up to their state of life. ¹ This is clear from the meaning of 'attaining to' here as coming up to, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'the days' and 'the years of life' as states of spiritual life, as above in 6093, 6095, 6097. The reason 'attaining to' here means coming up to is that his fathers Isaac and Abraham represented higher, that is, more internal, things than he. 'Abraham' in the highest sense represented the Lord's Divine itself, 'Isaac' the Lord's Divine Rational, and 'Jacob' His Divine Natural. For the representation of 'Abraham' as the Lord's Divine itself, see 1965, 1989, 2011, 7245, 7251, 3305 (end), 3439, 3703, 4615; for the representation of 'Isaac' as the Divine Rational, 1893, 2066, 2072, 2083, 2630, 2774, 3012, 3194, 3210, 4615; and for the representation of 'Jacob' as the Divine Natural in respect of truth and in respect of good, 3305, 3509, 3525, 3546, 3576, 3599, 4286, 4538, 4570, 4615. That being so, 'Abraham' also represents the celestial degree with man, 'Isaac' the spiritual degree, and 'Jacob' the natural, for the reason that the regeneration of man is an image of the Glorification of the Lord, 3138, 3212, 3296, 3490, 4402, 5688. From all this one may now see that 'they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers' means that it did not come up to their state of life.

სქოლიოები:

3296. 'And the greater will serve the less' means that the good of truth must for a time be subordinate. This is clear from the meaning of 'the greater' as good, from the meaning of 'serving' as being subordinate, and from the meaning of 'the less' as truth. This matter may be seen from what follows, being described there by means of Esau and Jacob. For as has been stated, 'Esau' represents good, and 'Jacob' truth. The rise of a struggle or conflict over priority and over lordship is described in the internal sense by Jacob's stealing the birthright from Esau and also the blessing. But the fact that this situation would last for a time only is evident from Isaac's prophecy concerning Esau,

And by your sword you will live, and you will serve your brother; and it will be, when you have dominion over him, that you will break his yoke from above your neck. Genesis 27:40.

[2] The fact that the things said in this verse have an internal sense, and that without that internal sense nobody can know what they mean, is quite evident, that is to say, what is meant by 'two nations are in your womb, and two peoples will be separated from your bowels', and by '[one] people will prevail over [the other] people, and the greater will serve the less'. The fact that they do mean the things that have been stated is clear from what follows where the subject is dealt with extensively. Furthermore one can scarcely credit that these statements embody such things unless one knows about good and truth, about the birth of the first from the second, and about the change of state with a person when being regenerated. In the internal sense the subject is indeed the Lord, here how the Lord made His Natural Divine. But in the representative sense the subject is the regeneration of man, for man's regeneration is an image of the Lord's glorification, 3043, 3138, 3212 - that is, in regeneration one sees as in a certain image the manner in which the Lord glorified His Human, or what amounts to the same, made it Divine. For as the Lord changed completely His human state into a Divine one, so also does the Lord when He is regenerating man change his state completely, for He turns his old man into a new man.