5323. 'And they cried out before him, Abrek!' means acknowledgement coming through faith, and homage. This is clear from the meaning of 'crying out' as acknowledgement coming through faith, dealt with below, and from the meaning of 'Abrek!' as homage, because Abrek in the original language means 'bend your knees', and the bending of knees is homage. For every inward impulse of a person's will, thus of his love and affection, and consequently of his life, has corresponding outward actions and gestures. Those actions and gestures flow from the actual correspondence of exterior things with interior ones. Holy fear that leads to humility, and from this to homage, has corresponding actions or gestures, which are bending the knees, falling forward on the knees, and also prostration of the body flat on the ground. If in that state homage is a product of genuine humility, and if humility is the product of genuine holy fear, there is an absence of spirits, which leads to a falling downwards of the joints at the border or intermediate area where the spiritual is joined to the natural, and so where the knees are. For the parts below the knee correspond to natural things, while the parts above the knee correspond to spiritual ones. These are the reasons why bending the knees is a sign representative of homage. Among celestial people this action comes quite spontaneously, but in the case of spiritual people it is a deliberate act of their will.

[2] In former times people bent their knees before kings when they rode by in a chariot. They bent them because kings represented the Lord's Divine Truth, while 'a chariot' meant His Word. This customary act of homage came into being when people knew what was represented by it, at which time kings did not think that such homage was paid to themselves but to their kingly authority, which was distinct from yet invested in their own persons. That authority invested in them was the law, and because this law had its origin in Divine Truth, it was the law invested in the person of the king, inasmuch as he was the guardian of the law, to which homage had to be paid. Thus a king did not attribute any royal authority to himself other than guardianship of the law. Insofar as he relinquished that guardianship he relinquished his royal authority; for he knew that homage arising from any other source than the law, that is, any other homage than that paid to the law itself, was idolatry. By royal authority is meant Divine Truth - see 1672, 1728, 2015, 2069, 3009, 3670, 4581, 4966, 5044, 5068 - and therefore that authority is the law, which essentially is truth reigning in that kingdom, in accordance with which its inhabitants conduct their lives. From all this it may be seen that 'Abrek!' or 'bend your knees' means homage.

[3] Since 'a cry' is in a similar way an action which corresponds to a living confession or an acknowledgement that is a product of faith, crying out was also the custom followed by the ancients when an outward sign of such confession or acknowledgement needed to be made. The expression 'crying out' is therefore used in various places in the Word when confession and acknowledgement that are the product of faith are referred to, as in the description involving John the Baptist in John,

He bore witness to Jesus and he cried out, saying, This was He of whom I spoke, He who, though coming after me, was before me, for He was before me. I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord. John 1:15, 23.

In the same gospel,

They took branches of palm trees, and went to meet Jesus, and cried, Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel! John 12:13.

In Luke,

Jesus said to the Pharisees that if [the disciples] kept silent, the stones would cry out. Luke 19:40.

Because 'crying out' meant an acknowledgement that was the product of faith and consequently acceptance rising out of the acknowledgement, one therefore reads several times of the Lord's crying out, as in John 7:28, 37; 12:44-45. Also in Isaiah,

Jehovah will go forth as a Mighty Man, as a Man of Wars He will arouse zeal; He will shout aloud, and also will cry out. Isaiah 42:13.

In the contrary sense 'crying out' means lack of acknowledgement and so aversion, see 5016, 5018, 5027. This usage has reference to falsity, 2240.

2069. 'Kings of peoples will be from her' means truths that are the product of truths and goods joined together, meant by 'kings of peoples'. This is clear from the meaning of 'kings' as all truths in general, dealt with above in 2015, and from the meaning of 'peoples' also as truths, in general all things that are spiritual. For 'kings' are spoken of in reference to peoples, and not so much in reference to nations except when the nations mean evils, dealt with in 1259, 1260. In the prophetical part of the Word kings and peoples are mentioned many times, but nowhere are they used to mean kings and peoples, for at no point are kings and peoples the subject in the Word proper, which is the internal sense, but the celestial and spiritual things comprising the Lord's kingdom, and so goods and truths. The sense of the letter expresses itself by means of perceivable objects, as anyone does with words, merely to enable understanding.

[2] Since the subject here is Sarah and the promise that 'kings of peoples will be from her', and since 'Sarah' means Divine Truth which was the Lord's, 'kings of peoples' clearly means truths that are the product of truths and goods joined together, which are all the truths of the internal Church, that is, the interior truths of faith. Because these truths come from the Lord, they are frequently called 'kings' in the Word, and also 'a king's sons', as shown above in 2015.

[3] Anyone may see that some internal Divine matter lies concealed in the words that 'kings of peoples will be from her'. For the subject in this verse is Isaac, of whom it is said, 'I will bless him, and he will become nations', but of Sarah that 'kings of peoples will be from her'. Almost the same was also said of Abraham in verse 6 above, that 'kings will go out of him'; but it did not say as it does of Sarah, 'kings of peoples'. The arcanum within this lies too deep to allow it to be uncovered and described in a few words. From the representation and meaning of 'Abraham' as Divine Good and from the representation and meaning of 'Sarah' as Divine Truth the arcanum is to some extent evident, namely that from the Lord's Divine Good meant by 'Abraham' all celestial truth will come forth and have its being, and from the Lord's Divine Truth meant by 'Sarah' all spiritual truth will do so. Celestial truth is the truth which exists with celestial angels, and spiritual truth that which exists with spiritual angels. Or what amounts to the same, celestial truth was the truth which existed with members of the Most Ancient Church which came before the Flood and which was a celestial Church, spiritual truth that which existed with members of the Ancient Church which came after the Flood and was a spiritual Church. For angels, as also members of the Church, are distinguished into celestial and spiritual. That which distinguishes the celestial from the spiritual is love to the Lord, and that which distinguishes spiritual from celestial is love towards the neighbour.

[4] No more can be said about celestial truth and spiritual truth however until the difference between the celestial and the spiritual is known, or what amounts to the same, the difference between the celestial Church and the spiritual. For this see Volume One, in 202, 337, 1577; then concerning the nature of the Most Ancient Church and the nature of the Ancient Church, in 597, 607, 640, 765, 1114-1125, and in many other places. On the point that possessing love to the Lord constitutes the celestial, and possessing love towards the neighbour the spiritual, see 2023.

[5] These considerations now show what the arcanum is, namely that 'the kings who will go out of Abraham', referred to in verse 6, mean celestial truths that flow in from the Lord's Divine Good, while 'the kings of peoples who will be from Sarah', referred to in the present verse, mean spiritual truths that flow in from the Lord's Divine Truth. For the Lord's Divine Good is unable to flow in except with the celestial man since it is an influx into the will part of his mind, as was the case with the Most Ancient Church, whereas with the spiritual man the Lord's Divine Truth is flowing in since the influx is solely into the understanding part, which in him has been separated from the will part, 2053 (end). Or what amounts to the same, celestial good is flowing in with the celestial man, and spiritual good with the spiritual man. As a consequence the Lord is seen by celestial angels as the Sun, but by spiritual angels as the Moon, 1529, 1530.