31. That 'the great lights' mean love and faith, and are also mentioned as the sun, the moon, and the stars, is clear from various places in the Prophets, as in Ezekiel,

When I have blotted you out, I will cover the heavens and darken their stars, I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon will not give its light. All the bright lights in the heavens I will make dark over you, and I will put darkness over your land. Ezekiel 32:7-8.

This refers to Pharaoh and the Egyptians, who are used in the Word to mean the sensory and the factual. The meaning here is that they will have blotted out love and faith by means of sensory evidence and factual knowledge. In Isaiah,

The day of Jehovah for making the earth a desolation; for the stars of the heavens and their constellations ¹ will not give their light; the sun will be darkened in its rising, and the moon will not shed its light. Isaiah 13:9-10.

In Joel,

The day of Jehovah is coming, a day of darkness and thick darkness. The earth quakes before Him, the heavens tremble, the sun and moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. Joel 2:10.

[2] In Isaiah, in reference to the Lord's Coming and the enlightenment of gentiles, and so to a new Church, in particular to individuals who are in darkness but who are beginning to receive the light and be regenerated,

Arise, shine, for your light has come. Behold, darkness is covering the earth, and thick darkness the peoples, but Jehovah will arise upon you, and nations will walk towards your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising. Jehovah will be for you an everlasting light; your sun will no more go down nor your moon be withdrawn, for Jehovah will be for you an everlasting light. Isaiah 60:1-3, 19-20.

In David,

Jehovah makes the heavens by intelligence, He spreads out the earth upon the waters, He makes the great lights, the sun to have dominion over the day, and the moon and stars to have dominion over the night. Psalms 136:5-9.

And in the same author,

Praise Jehovah, sun and moon, praise Him, all stars of light! Praise Him, heaven of heavens, and waters that are above the heavens! Psalms 148:3-4.

[3] In all of these places 'the lights' mean love and faith. Because the lights represented and meant love and faith in the Lord, the Jewish Church was commanded to keep a light burning all the time from evening till morning, for every command which that Church received was representative of the Lord. Concerning this light it is said,

Command the sons of Israel that they take oil for the light, to cause a lamp to burn continually. In the Tent of Meeting outside the veil which is before the testimony Aaron and his sons shall tend it from evening to morning before Jehovah. [Exodus 27:20-21]

That this means the love and faith which the Lord kindles and causes to shine in the internal man, and by means of the internal man in the external man, will in the Lord's Divine mercy be shown at that point in Exodus.

სქოლიოები:

1771. There were also certain spirits who did not believe that the Word of the Lord concealed such things in its bosom, that is, inwardly; for in the next life spirits retain a similar unbelief to that which they had when they were in the body. Such unbelief is not dispelled except by means which the Lord provides, and by living experiences. Consequently while I was reading some of the Psalms of David their interior sight or mind was opened; these particular spirits were not raised up among the angelic spirits. As I was reading they perceived the interior things of the Word which are present in those psalms, and astonished by those things they said that they had never believed such.

[2] At that time this same part of the Word was heard by many other spirits, but these all grasped it in different ways. With some it filled the ideas comprising their thought with many lovely and delightful feelings, and so with a kind of life - with each one according to his capacity to receive it. At the same time it filled them with an effecting power that penetrated to their inmost being. With some that power was so great that it seemed to them that they were being raised up towards the interior parts of heaven, and nearer and nearer the Lord - each according to the degree of his affection for truths, and for the goods joined to the truths.

[3] Also at that same time the Word was brought to some spirits who had no conception of an internal sense of the Word, but only of an external or literal sense, to whom the letter did not seem to possess any life. From all this it was clear what the Word is like when the Lord imparts life to it, namely that it possesses such an effecting power that it penetrates to people's inmost being; also what it is like when He does not impart life to it, namely nothing but the letter possessing scarcely any life at all.