5650. 'So that he may come down on us and fall on us' means that for this reason they were subjected to its absolute power and control. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming down on someone' as considering him blameworthy; and from the meaning of 'falling on someone' as making him subject to one's own power and control, which in this case is absolute since the statement 'take us as slaves, and our asses' follows after this. The implications of all this are as follows: Before the natural man is joined to the spiritual, or the external man to the internal, he is left to consider whether he wants the strong desires that spring from self-love and love of the world, also such ideas as he has used to defend those desires, to be done away with, and whether he wants to surrender dominion to the spiritual or internal man. He is left to consider this so that he may choose in freedom what he pleases. When the natural man without the spiritual contemplates this possibility he rejects it; for he loves his strong evil desires for the reason that he loves himself and the world. Such a contemplation fills him with anxiety and he imagines that if those desires are done away with his life would be finished; for he locates everything in the natural or external man. Alternatively he imagines that after they have been done away with he will be left with no power of his own and that all his thought, will, and action will come to him through heaven, so that he will no longer have any responsibility for these. Once the natural man has been left to himself in this condition, he draws back and becomes resistant. But when some light flows from the Lord through heaven into his natural he starts to think differently. That is to say, he now refers the spiritual man to have dominion, for then he is able to think what is true and to will what is good and so is able to enter heaven, which is not possible if the natural man has dominion. And when he considers that all the angels in the whole of heaven are like this and as a consequence experience joy defying description, he goes to war with the natural man and at length wishes to make the same subject to the spiritual. This is the condition into which someone who is to be regenerated is brought, so that he can in freedom turn where he wills; and insofar as he does in freedom turn in that direction he is being regenerated. All these matters are the things under consideration here in the internal sense.

4723. 'They saw him from a distance' means the Lord's Divine Human perceived remotely. This is clear from the meaning of 'seeing' as perception, dealt with in 2150, 3764; from the meaning of 'from a distance' as remotely; and from the representation of 'Joseph' - the one they saw from a distance - as the Lord as regards Divine Truth, dealt with in 4669. The reason the Lord's Divine Human is what 'Joseph' is used to mean here is that His Divine Human is the highest aspect of Divine Truth. There are two essentials which constitute the Church and as a consequence it has two main teachings, the first being that the Lord's Human is Divine, the second that love to the Lord and charity towards the neighbour constitute the Church, not faith separated from these. Being the primary aspects of Divine Truth, these too are represented by 'Joseph'. Anyone who represents Divine Truth in general also represents the specific aspects of Divine Truth. But which specific aspect is represented at any point is evident from the train of thought.