58. Verse 30 And to every wild animal of the earth and to every bird of the air, ¹ and to everything creeping over the earth in which there is a living soul [I give] every plant for food; and it was so.

The natural food of this same [spiritual man] is being described here. His natural level is here meant by 'wild animal of the earth' and by 'bird of the air, to which 'the edible and green plant ² has been given for food'. Both kinds of food, natural and spiritual, are referred to in David as follows,

Jehovah causes the grass to grow for the beast, and the plant for man's service, that he may bring forth bread from the earth. Psalms 104:14.

Here 'beast' stands for both wild animals of the earth and birds of the air, ¹ both being mentioned in verses 11-12 of that Psalm.

Footnotes:

8622. 'That I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven' means that that falsity is to be completely removed, so that it may no longer engage in conflict. This is clear from the meaning of 'blotting out the memory' as removing, dealt with below; and from the representation of 'Amalek' as those who are steeped in falsity arising from interior evil, dealt with in 8593.

[2] The reason why 'blotting out the memory of Amalek' means removing the falsity that arises from interior evil is that it can be removed, but cannot be blotted out, since it is the falsity residing with hellish genii who live forever, 8593. These genii are however removed by the Lord so that they do not flow into those who belong to the spiritual Church, the reason for this being that they do not flow, as hellish spirits do, into thoughts belonging to the understanding, nor thus into ideas belonging to faith, but into affections belonging to the will, consequently into feelings belonging to charity. And they do this so secretively that not a trace of what comes from them is ever apparent. If therefore they were to flow into a member of the spiritual Church he could not possibly be saved, because they would pervert and utterly warp his affections for what is true and good. This is why those hellish genii are removed so that they do not have any contact with those who belong to the Lord's spiritual kingdom.

[3] Furthermore it should be recognized that a member of the spiritual Church has a new will implanted in the understanding part of his mind, 895, 927, 1023, 1043, 1044, 2256, 4328, 4493, 5113. This will would be completely destroyed by those genii if they were allowed to flow in. They would also enter into and open up again the hereditary evils of the old will, even though they have been closed off. Regarding the closing off of them, see 986, 1667, 2308. Those hellish genii are removed in this way to prevent them from flowing in. Their falsity, which is falsity arising from interior evil, is evil - evil whose nature is such that it cannot flow into the understanding part of the mind, only into the will part. This being so, and because the new will of a member of the spiritual Church has been planted in the understanding part, as stated above, they have consequently been removed from flowing into it. To this end the Lord also controls things in such a way that the entire power of understanding in these genii is laid waste.

[4] After death people become genii like these if they have had doing harm to their neighbour constantly in mind, allowing such ideas to delight their thinking, and have also inflicted harm, but secretively and through others, taking the utmost care to prevent anyone from knowing that they had initiated it. In other respects they were to outward appearances unassuming, polite, and seemingly friendly; they were also seemingly Christian in speech, and in life too. They were however hypocrites, and inwardly were treacherous tigers.