9371. THE INTERNAL SENSE.

Verses 1-2. And He said unto Moses, Come up unto Jehovah, thou and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and bow yourselves afar off; and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah; and they shall not come near; and the people shall not come up with him. “And He said unto Moses,” signifies that which concerns the Word in general; “come up unto Jehovah,” signifies conjunction with the Lord; “thou and Aaron,” signifies the Word in the internal sense and the external sense; “Nadab and Abihu,” signifies doctrine from both senses; “and seventy of the elders of Israel,” signifies the chief truths of the church which are of the Word, or of doctrine, and which agree with good; “and bow yourselves afar off,” signifies humiliation and adoration from the heart, and then the influx of the Lord; “and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah,” signifies the conjunction and presence of the Lord through the Word in general; “and they shall not come near,” signifies no separate conjunction and presence; “and the people shall not come up with him,” signifies no conjunction whatever with the external apart from the internal.

77. 6. He stood and measured the earth: He beheld and drove asunder the nations; aye, the mountains of eternity were scattered, and the hills of an age did bow themselves. The sun and moon stood still in their seat; at the light Thine arrows went at the splendor the shining of Thy spear: in anger the earth will go away, Thou shalt thresh the nations in the nostrils. Thou wentest forth for the salvation of Thy people, for saving Thine anointed; Thou didst strike off the head from the house of the impious; I will rest in the day of trouble; when He shall come up against the people who plunder him (Habakkuk 3:6, 11-13, 16).

Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord Jehovih, for the day of Jehovah is at hand. It shall come to pass in the day of the sacrifice of Jehovah I will visit the princes, I will visit them that fill their masters' houses with violence and deceit. Whence there shall be in that day a noise of a cry, howling and a great breaking (Zephaniah 1:7-10).

It shall come to pass in that time that I will search Jerusalem with lamps, and I will visit the men that are settled upon their lees. Then shall their wealth be for a prey, and their houses a devastation. The great day of Jehovah is near, it is near, it hasteneth greatly, the voice of the day of Jehovah crying out bitterly, a day of wrath is this day, a day of trouble and distress, a day of waste and devastation, a day of darkness and thick darkness, a day of cloud and cloudiness, a day of trumpet and alarm upon the fenced cities. Their silver and gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the anger of Jehovah; and the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of His zeal: for He shall make a speedy consummation of all them that dwell in the land (Zephaniah 1:12-18).

Jehovah in the morning, in the morning will He bring judgment to light, nor will He fail. Therefore wait ye upon Me, saith Jehovah, until the day that I rise up to the prey, to pour upon them Mine indignation, all the wrath of Mine anger, for the whole land shall be devoured in the fire of My zeal (Zephaniah 3:5, 8).

Of the city their corners shall be devastated, I will desolate their streets, their cities shall be devastated, so that there is no man, nor an inhabitant (Zephaniah 3:6).

It shall come to pass in all the land, two parts in it shall be cut off, they shall expire, but the third shall be left therein (Zechariah 13:8-9).

4156. And put them in the camel’s straw. That this signifies in memory-knowledges, is evident from the signification of the “camel’s straw,” as being such knowledges (n. 3114). They are called “straw,” both because this is the food of a camel, and because they are relatively gross and devoid of order. For this reason memory-knowledges are also signified by “thickets” of trees and of the forest (n. 2831). (That “camels” denote the general memory-knowledges which are of the natural man, may be seen above, n. 3048, 3071, 3143, 3145.)

[2] That memory-knowledges are relatively gross and devoid of order, and are therefore signified by “straw,” and also by “thickets,” is not apparent to those who are in mere memory-knowledges, and are on this account reputed learned. These believe that the more a man knows, or the more memory-knowledge he possesses, the wiser he is. But that the case is very different has been made evident to me from those in the other life who when they had lived in the world had been in mere memory-knowledges, and thereby had gained the name and reputation of being learned, for they are sometimes more stupid than those who have no such skill in memory-knowledges. The reason of this has also been disclosed, namely, that memory-knowledges are indeed a means of becoming wise, but are also a means of becoming insane. To those who are in the life of good, memory-knowledges are a means of becoming wise; but to those who are in a life of evil, they are a means of becoming insane; for by means of memory-knowledges these persons confirm not only their life of evil, but also principles of falsity, and this arrogantly and with persuasion, because they believe themselves to be wiser than others.

[3] From this it comes to pass that they destroy their rational; for it is not the man who can reason from memory-knowledges, even when he can apparently do so in a more lofty manner than others, who is in the enjoyment of the rational faculty; for this skill is the result of a mere fatuous light. But that man excels in the rational who is able clearly to see that good is good, and truth truth, consequently that evil is evil, and falsity falsity; whereas the man who regards good as evil and evil as good, and also the man who regards truth as falsity and falsity as truth, can by no means be said to be rational, but rather, irrational, however able he may be to reason. With him who clearly sees that good is good and that truth is truth, and on the other hand that evil is evil and falsity is falsity, light flows in from heaven, and enlightens his intellectual faculty, and causes the reasons which he sees in his understanding to be so many rays of that light. The same light also illuminates the memory-knowledges, so that they confirm the truth, and moreover disposes them into order and into heavenly form. But they who are against good and truth, as are all who are in the life of evil, do not admit that heavenly light, but are delighted solely with their own fatuous light, the nature of which is to see as one who in the dark beholds spots and streaks on a wall, and out of them fancifully makes all kinds of figures, which however are not really figures, for when the light of day is let in, it is seen that they are nothing but spots and streaks.

[4] From all this we can see that memory-knowledges are a means of becoming wise, and also a means of becoming insane; that is, that they are a means of perfecting the rational, and also a means of destroying the rational. In the other life therefore they who by means of such knowledges have destroyed their rational, are much more stupid than they who have not been versed in them. That these knowledges are relatively gross, is manifest from their belonging to the natural or external man; whereas the rational, which is cultivated by their means, belongs to the spiritual or internal man. How far these differ and are distant the one from the other in regard to purity, may be known from what has been said and shown concerning the two memories (n. 2469-2494).