When 'islands' are contrasted to 'earth' or 'mountains,' they signify the truths of faith, because they are in the sea. They signify doctrinal things which are rituals. 'Islands' signify peoples who are more remote from the worship of God. People who are steeped in the internal sense of the Word, such as angels, do not know what islands are, because they no longer have any concept of such places. Instead they have a perception of more remote worship, like the gentiles outside the church.

'Islands,' in Ezekiel 27:6, signify people in the church in a natural, materially-oriented state but still rational.

(참조: Apocalypse Explained 406; Isaiah 1, Isaiah 49, 49:1)

1247. That those nations mean just so many types of ritual forms is clear from the consideration that names in the Word never mean anything other than real things, for the Word in the internal sense has regard solely to the Lord, His kingdom in heaven and on earth, and consequently to the Church and the things that constitute the Church. And so it is with the names involved here. And because 'Eber's son Joktan' means the external worship of this new Church, as stated already, 'his sons' cannot mean anything other than the things that constitute external worship, which are forms of ritual, and indeed just so many types of these. But what those forms were cannot be stated because their nature is determined by the actual kind of worship to which they belong, and until that is known, nothing can be said about the forms of ritual that belong to it. Neither would any use be served in knowing them. Nor do any of these names recur in the Word, apart from Sheba, Ophir, and Havilah, and even then they do not belong to this line of descent. For the Sheba and Havilah that are mentioned elsewhere in the Word descend from those who are called the sons of Ham, as is clear from verse 7 of this chapter. And the same applies to Ophir.