6971. 'And do not hear the voice of the former sign' means that if they did not obey what was declared by the Word, then instead of being spiritual and rational they would become people who were not spiritual or rational. This is clear from the meaning of 'hearing' as obeying, dealt with in 2542, 3869, 5017; from the meaning of 'the voice' as what is declared by the Word, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'the former sign' as an indication that instead of being spiritual and rational they would become people who were not spiritual or rational. The truth of this may be seen from the meaning of 'the serpent' that was made out of Moses' rod when it was thrown onto the earth - the event to which 'the first sign' refers here - as a person who thinks on a sensory and bodily level, 6949, and so is not spiritual or rational. For a person who is sensory- and bodily-minded is not rational, and so is not spiritual either, because he thinks things that are false and desires those that are evil. One who behaves like this is not rational, still less spiritual, for an acceptance of and belief in what is true, together with a life of goodness, since these two come from the Divine, constitute true spirituality within rationality, whereas an acceptance of and belief in what is false, together with a life of evil, are the opposite. For the fact that wholly sensory- and bodily-minded people are like this, see 6844, 6845, 6948, 6949.

[2] Those people become wholly sensory- and bodily-minded who have first had a knowledge of things that belong to the spiritual world but after that have rejected them, and then have adopted fundamental ideas of falsity that are contrary to truths and focused their lives solely on worldly, bodily, and earthly values. They have consequently come to believe that life is meant to be filled with pleasures of every kind, saying, 'What more does a person have while he is alive? When we die, we die; as for the possibility of life after death, has anyone ever come back to talk about it? We have no knowledge of anything that will go on living when the life goes out of a person.' If anyone using rational arguments induces those people to give any thought to eternal life, they think that nothing worse will happen to them than to anyone else, and they immediately go back to living in the way they had done previously. With such people the passageway for the light of heaven to flow in is closed, and at the natural level of their minds the light of heaven is turned into thick darkness, while the light of the world there becomes brightness, 6907, a brightness that shines ever more brilliantly, the more that the light of heaven is darkened. This is why such people do not see the evil in their lives as anything other than goodness, or consequently the false ideas as anything other than true. Here then is the reason why a person becomes sensory- and bodily-minded. In short, once the way is opened for the light of heaven to flow in and then closed, a person is impelled to look downwards, and not upwards. This is done in keeping with Divine order so as to prevent truths once accepted and remaining in a person's inner self from being contaminated by falsities and thereby rendered profane.

[3] The same applies to gentiles who fall away from their religion, though their lot is better than that of people within the Church since what they possess are not truths from the Word, not genuine truths therefore but truths coupled with many misconceptions, which cannot be profaned in the way genuine ones can.

As regards the meaning of 'the voice' as that which is declared by the Word, it should be recognized that frequent use is made of the expression 'the voice'. It is also linked to other things that have nothing to do with a voice, such as the linking of it here to 'the sign' - 'If they do not hear the voice of the former sign they will believe the voice of the latter sign' - and also elsewhere, for example in Nahum,

The voice of the whip and the voice of the sound of the wheel. Nahum 3:2.

And in David,

The rivers have lifted up their voice, more than the voices of many mighty waters. Psalms 93:3-4.

[4] The fact that 'the voice' means a declaration, in the good sense a declaration by the Word, when it is called 'the voice of Jehovah', is clear in David,

The voice of Jehovah is powerful; the voice of Jehovah is glorious; the voice of Jehovah breaks the cedars; the voice of Jehovah flashes forth flames of fire; the voice of Jehovah causes the wilderness to shake; the voice of Jehovah causes the hinds to calve, and strips the forests bare. Psalms 29:3-5; Psalms 7-9.

And elsewhere in the same author,

. . . to Him who rides above the heavens of heavens of old. Behold, He will put forth His voice, a mighty voice. Psalms 68:33.

Here 'voice' stands for Divine Truth, and so for the Word and a declaration made by it. For what more is meant by 'voice', see 219; and for its use in reference to truth, 3563.

5126. 'And you will put Pharaoh's cup into his hand' means in order that they might consequently serve the interior natural. This is clear from the meaning of 'putting the cup to drink' as making one's own, dealt with above in 5120, besides the obvious meaning of serving; and from the representation of 'Pharaoh' as the interior natural, dealt with in 5080, 5095, 5118. For there is an interior natural and there is an exterior natural, the exterior natural being made up of impressions which enter in directly from the world by way of the senses into the natural mind, that is to say, they enter the memory belonging to that mind and therefore enter the place where mental images are formed, see 5118.

[2] So that people can know what the exterior natural and what the interior natural are like, which make up the exterior man, and from this can know what the rational is which makes up the interior man, a brief reference to them must be made here. From infancy to childhood a person relies solely on his senses, for during those years he is receiving, through his bodily senses, nothing but earthly, bodily, and worldly impressions, which during those years are also the raw material from which he forms his ideas and thoughts. Communication with the interior man has not yet been opened up, except insofar as he is able to take in and hold on to those impressions. The innocence which exists in him at this time is solely external, not internal, because true innocence resides within wisdom. But the Lord uses this - his external innocence - to bring order into what enters through the senses. If innocence did not come to him from the Lord in that first period no foundation would ever be laid down on which the intellectual or rational degree of the mind proper to a human being could be established.

[3] From childhood to early youth communication is opened up with the interior natural, by the person's learning about what is decent, public-spirited, and honourable, both through what parents and teachers tell him and through his own efforts to find out about such matters. During early youth to later youth however communication is opened up between the natural and the rational, by his learning about what is true and what is good so far as his public life and private life are concerned, and above all about what is good and what is true so far as his spiritual life is concerned, all of which he learns about through listening to and reading the Word. Indeed insofar as he uses truths to immerse himself in good deeds, that is, insofar as he puts the truths he learns into practice, the rational is opened up; but insofar as he does not use truths to immerse himself in good deeds, or does not put truths into practice, the rational is not opened up. Nevertheless the things he has come to know remain within the natural; that is to say, they remain in his memory, left on the doorstep so to speak outside the house.

[4] But insofar - during these years and the next period of life - as he impairs the things he knows, refuses to accept them, and acts contrary to them, that is, insofar as he believes falsities and practises evils instead, the rational is closed, as is the interior natural also. But in spite of that, the Lord's Divine Providence enables communication to remain open enough to give him the ability to understand the good or truth he knows about. But he does not make these his own unless he truly repents and for a long while after that wrestles with falsities and evils. With people however who allow themselves to be regenerated the opposite takes place; for gradually, that is, in consecutive stages, their rational is opened up, the interior natural then becoming ranged in order beneath it, and the exterior natural beneath that. This occurs especially in the period from late youth to adulthood; it also continues in progressive stages to the final period of those regenerating people's lives, and after that in heaven for ever. From all this one may know what constitutes a person's interior natural and what his exterior natural.