In general, men are driven by intellect and women by affections, and because of this men in the Bible generally represent knowledge and truth and women generally represent love and the desire for good. This generally carries over into marriage, where the man's growing knowledge and understanding and the woman's desire to be good and useful are a powerful combination. In many cases in the Bible, then, "husband" refers to things of truth and understanding, much as "man" does. Magnificent things can happen in a true marriage, though, when both partners are looking to the Lord. If a husband opens his heart to his wife, it's as though she can implant her loves inside him, transforming his intellectual urges into a love of growing wise. She in turn can grow in her love of that blooming wisdom, and use it for joy in their married life and in their caring for children and others in their life. Many couples, even in heaven, stay in that state -- called "Spiritual" -- growing deeper and deeper to eternity. There is the potential, though, for the couple to be transformed: through the nurturing love of his wife the husband can pass from a love of growing wise to an actual love of wisdom itself, and the wife can be transformed from the love of her husband's wisdom into the wisdom of that love -- the actual expression of the love of the Lord they have built together. In that state -- called "Celestial" -- the husband represents love and the desire for good, and the wife represents truth and knowledge.

5216. 'Were sprouting after them' means appearing next to them. This is clear from the meaning of 'sprouting' here as appearing, and from the meaning of 'after them' as next to or at the boundary, which is the same meaning as that in the reference to the bad or thin cows coming up 'after them', that is, after the beautiful and fat ones, 5202. The reason 'after them' means next to them is that 'after' describes a subsequent point of time; and in the spiritual world, consequently in the spiritual sense, no notion of time exists, but instead of this the kind of state that corresponds to it.