24. Verse 6 And God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let there be a distinguishing of the waters from the waters.

After the Spirit of God, which is the Lord's mercy, has brought out into the daylight cognitions of truth and good, and has shed the light of dawn to reveal that the Lord does exist, and that He is good itself and truth itself, and that no good or truth exists except from the Lord, a distinction is at that point made between the internal man and the external man, and so between cognitions which reside with the internal man and the facts which belong to the external man. The internal man is called 'an expanse, and the cognitions residing with the internal man are called 'the waters above the expanse', while the facts belonging to the external man are called 'the waters below the expanse'.

[2] Until his regeneration starts a person is not aware of even the existence of the internal man, let alone the identity of the internal man. Submerged in bodily and worldly concerns he imagines there is no difference between the two. Furthermore he has submerged in those same concerns the things that belong to the internal man and has made one thorough obscurity out of things that are distinct and separate. For this reason it is first said, 'Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters', and then, 'Let there be a distinguishing of the waters from the waters', and not a distinguishing of the waters. But this is followed immediately by the statement, Verses 7-8, And God made the expanse and He made a distinction between the waters that were under the expanse and the waters that were above the expanse; and it was so. And God called the expanse Heaven.

[3] The second thing therefore that a person notices when being regenerated is that he is starting to become aware of the existence of the internal man, or that what reside in the internal man are goods and truths which are the Lord's alone. And since the external man during regeneration is such as still imagines that he is the source of the good deeds he performs, or of the truth he utters, and since such a person, by means of them, is led by the Lord to do good and to speak truth as if they were his own, therefore the identification of those under the expanse comes first, and the identification of those above the expanse follows. It is also a heavenly arcanum that the Lord uses those things that are man's own - both his illusions of the senses and his desires - to lead and direct him towards the things that are goods and truths. Every single movement of regeneration is accordingly a progression from evening to morning - from external man to internal, that is, from earth to heaven. This is why the expanse, or internal man, is now called 'heaven'.

546. But the men only that have not the seal of God on their foreheads, signifies but only to the understanding of truth and the perception of good in those who are not in truths from good from the Lord. This is evident from the signification of "man," as being the affection of truth, and intelligence and wisdom therefrom (See above, n. 280), here the understanding of truth and the perception of good (of which presently); also from the signification of "having the seal of God on their foreheads," as being to be in truths from good from the Lord (See above, n. 427).

[2] "Man" signifies the understanding of truth and the perception of good, because it is by virtue of these that man is man, therefore when "man" is mentioned in the Word it means in the spiritual sense that by virtue of which man is man, for this is his spiritual [part]. Man has two faculties of which his whole life is made up, namely, understanding and will; therefore such as is the quality of his understanding and will such is the man. If he has the understanding of truth and the will of good he is truly a man, for truth and good are from the Lord, and it is from the Lord alone that man is man (as can be seen from what has been shown in the work on Heaven and Hell 59-102). But if he has not the understanding of truth and the will of good, but falsity in the place of truth and evil in the place of good, he is still called a man, yet he is not a man except from this alone, that he has the faculty of understanding truth and perceiving good (of which in the following article). From this it can be seen that in the Word by "men" such things as constitute them men are meant, and here the understanding of truth and the perception of good.

[3] That the understanding of truth and the perception of good are here meant by "men" can be seen from its being said that the locusts might "hurt men," but not "the grass of the earth, nor the green thing, nor the trees;" and a "locust" signifies the ultimate of man's life which is called the sensual; and when this, while man is reading or listening to the Word, is in the persuasion of falsity, it still does not hurt or do harm to anything of the Word in the sense of its letter, for this sense is for the sensual-natural man; he believes it, although he applies it to confirm his falsities; but it does hurt and do harm to the understanding of truth and the perception of good; for the sensual man is unable to raise his thought above the sense of the letter of the Word, and if he tries to do so he either falls into falsity or his persuasive faith respecting the Word perishes. From this it can now be known what is meant by these words, that the locusts should "not hurt the grass of the earth, nor any green thing, nor any tree, but those men only that have not the seal of God on their foreheads."