2008. Verse 5. And thy name shall no more be called Abram; and thy name shall be Abraham, for a father of a multitude of nations have I made thee. “Thy name shall no more be called Abram,” signifies that He will put off the human; “and thy name shall be Abraham,” signifies that He will put on the Divine; “for a father of a multitude of nations have I made thee,” signifies here, as before, that all truth and the good thence derived come from Him.

932. That “seed-time and harvest” signify man who is to be regenerated, and thus the church, there is no need to confirm from the Word, because it occurs so often that man is compared and likened to a field, and thus to a sowing or seed-time, and the Word of the Lord to seed, and the effect to the produce or harvest, as everyone comprehends from the forms of speech thus made familiar. In general every man is here treated of-that there never will be lacking to him the sowing of seed from the Lord, whether he be within the church or without; that is, whether he be acquainted with the Word of the Lord, or be not acquainted with it. Without seed sown by the Lord, man can do nothing of good. All the good of charity, even with the Gentiles, is seed from the Lord; and although with these there is not the good of faith, as there may be within the church, yet there may come the good of faith; for in the other life those Gentiles who have lived in charity, as Gentiles are wont to do in this world, when instructed by angels, embrace and receive the doctrine of true faith and the faith of charity much more easily than do Christians; concerning which, of the Lord’s Divine mercy hereafter. Specifically, however, the subject treated of here is the man who is to be regenerated, that is to say that there will be no such thing as a failure of the church to come forth somewhere on the earth, which is here signified by there being seed-time and harvest all the days of the earth. That seed-time and harvest, or the church, will always come into existence, has regard to what was said in the preceding verse, namely, that man will no more be able so to destroy himself as was done by the last posterity of the Most Ancient Church.