31. That 'the great lights' mean love and faith, and are also mentioned as the sun, the moon, and the stars, is clear from various places in the Prophets, as in Ezekiel,

When I have blotted you out, I will cover the heavens and darken their stars, I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon will not give its light. All the bright lights in the heavens I will make dark over you, and I will put darkness over your land. Ezekiel 32:7-8.

This refers to Pharaoh and the Egyptians, who are used in the Word to mean the sensory and the factual. The meaning here is that they will have blotted out love and faith by means of sensory evidence and factual knowledge. In Isaiah,

The day of Jehovah for making the earth a desolation; for the stars of the heavens and their constellations ¹ will not give their light; the sun will be darkened in its rising, and the moon will not shed its light. Isaiah 13:9-10.

In Joel,

The day of Jehovah is coming, a day of darkness and thick darkness. The earth quakes before Him, the heavens tremble, the sun and moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. Joel 2:10.

[2] In Isaiah, in reference to the Lord's Coming and the enlightenment of gentiles, and so to a new Church, in particular to individuals who are in darkness but who are beginning to receive the light and be regenerated,

Arise, shine, for your light has come. Behold, darkness is covering the earth, and thick darkness the peoples, but Jehovah will arise upon you, and nations will walk towards your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising. Jehovah will be for you an everlasting light; your sun will no more go down nor your moon be withdrawn, for Jehovah will be for you an everlasting light. Isaiah 60:1-3, 19-20.

In David,

Jehovah makes the heavens by intelligence, He spreads out the earth upon the waters, He makes the great lights, the sun to have dominion over the day, and the moon and stars to have dominion over the night. Psalms 136:5-9.

And in the same author,

Praise Jehovah, sun and moon, praise Him, all stars of light! Praise Him, heaven of heavens, and waters that are above the heavens! Psalms 148:3-4.

[3] In all of these places 'the lights' mean love and faith. Because the lights represented and meant love and faith in the Lord, the Jewish Church was commanded to keep a light burning all the time from evening till morning, for every command which that Church received was representative of the Lord. Concerning this light it is said,

Command the sons of Israel that they take oil for the light, to cause a lamp to burn continually. In the Tent of Meeting outside the veil which is before the testimony Aaron and his sons shall tend it from evening to morning before Jehovah. [Exodus 27:20-21]

That this means the love and faith which the Lord kindles and causes to shine in the internal man, and by means of the internal man in the external man, will in the Lord's Divine mercy be shown at that point in Exodus.

Footnotes:

8778. 'And Moses brought back the people's words to Jehovah' means correspondence and being joined together. This is clear from the meaning of 'bringing words back to Jehovah' as correspondence and consequently being joined together. For the subject is the covenant that is to be made with the people; and since covenants are made through agreement on both sides, something that resembles the making of a covenant takes place here. That is to say, Jehovah proposes and the people respond, at this point through Moses, who represents the truth from God when it has been joined to Divine Truth as it exists in heaven, 8760, which is intermediary. But the only way that the covenant is made with mankind is through being receptive of the influx of truth from the Divine, and through correspondence at that time; for when higher things flow into lower they are not received in any other way.

[2] What correspondence and receptivity through correspondence are becomes clear from what has been shown at the ends of quite a number of chapters regarding the correspondence of all things present in the human being with the things that exist in heaven. It has also been shown in those places that all joining of natural things to spiritual ones, and in general of lower things to higher ones, is accomplished through correspondence. Such correspondence does not exist unless the lower things are placed in subordinate positions and made subject to the higher ones; and when the lower have been made subject, the higher ones act on them altogether as a cause does on its effect. From all this one may see what reciprocity on man's side is when the Divine flows in, and what the consequent joining together is, which is described in the sense of the letter here by the method used to make covenants, which is that Jehovah speaks to the people through a messenger, and the messenger brings their reply back to Jehovah. For this is how a person can grasp the concept of being joined to the Divine.