5449. 'As sure as Pharaoh lives' means a certainty. This is clear from the fact that 'as sure as Pharaoh lives' is a phrase that is employed to say something emphatically, thus to state a certainty. Joseph, it is true, knew they were not spies and that they had not come to see the nakedness of the land; nevertheless he used that phrase because of the certainty described in the internal sense - the certainty that unless they are joined by means of good to the interior man, the truths known to the Church, with whomsoever they are present, possess no other end in view than material gain. But once they have become joined through good to the interior man they have what is really good and true, and so the Church, the Lord's kingdom, and the Lord Himself as their end in view. And when people have these as their end in view, material gain also comes their way, insofar as they have need of it, in keeping with the Lord's words in Matthew,

Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Matthew 6:33.