55. Verse 28 And God blessed them, and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, ¹ and over every living thing that creeps upon the earth.

Because the most ancient people applied the term Marriage to understanding and will, or faith and love, when joined together, they gave the name Fruitfulness to any good resulting from that marriage, and Multiplication to any truth. For this reason similar expressions occur in the Prophets, as in Ezekiel,

I will multiply upon you man and beast, and they will multiply and be fruitful, and I will resettle you ² to be as in your ancient times, and I will bless you more than in your former times, and you will know that I am Jehovah, and I will cause man to walk upon you, even My people Israel. Ezekiel 36:8-11.

Here 'man' is used to mean the spiritual man, who is also called Israel, 'ancient times' the Most Ancient Church, 'former times' the Ancient Church which came after the Flood. The reason why 'multiplying', which relates to truth, comes first and why 'being fruitful', which relates to good, follows is that the subject is the person who is to be regenerated, not one who has been regenerated.

[2] When the understanding is coupled to the will, or faith to love, the individual is called by the Lord in Isaiah 'a married land',

Your land will no more be called Desolate, but you will be named My-good-pleasure-is-in-her, and your land, Married; for Jehovah will take His pleasure in you, and your land will be married. Isaiah 62:4.

The resulting fruits which are matters of truth are called 'sons', and the fruits which are matters of good are called 'daughters'. This recurs very frequently in the Word.

[3] The earth is 'being filled' when there are many goods and truths, for when the Lord is 'blessing' and 'saying' - that is, when He is at work - the increase of good and truth is limitless, as the Lord says,

The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field; it is indeed the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of all plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air ³ come and nest in its branches. Matthew 13:31-32.

'A grain of mustard seed' is the good a person has before he becomes spiritual. It is 'the smallest of all seeds' because he imagines that he himself is the source of the good he does. In reality what he does of himself is nothing but evil, yet because he is in a state of being regenerated there is some element of good, though it is quite 'the smallest of all'. Later on when faith is being joined to love it grows larger and becomes 'a plant'. Once it has finally been joined to love it develops into a tree, and at that point 'the birds of the air, ³ which here are truths or intellectual concepts, 'nest in its branches', which are facts.

[4] A person is involved in conflict not only when becoming spiritual, but also when he is spiritual. Hence the statement, 'Subdue the earth, and have dominion over it'.

Footnotes:

4955. What these words hold within them in the internal sense will be evident from what is presented below. But first of all one needs to know that by these works listed one after another the essential ingredients of charity in their own ordered sequence are meant. This cannot be seen by anyone if he is unacquainted with the internal sense of the Word, that is, unless he knows what is really meant by giving food to the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, taking in a stranger, clothing the naked, visiting the sick, and coming to those in prison. Anyone who restricts himself to the sense of the letter when thinking about these actions assumes that good works in the outward form these take are meant by them and that nothing deeper lies concealed within them, when in fact each action that is described contains some deeper reality, which is of a Divine nature because it has its origin in the Lord. But at the present day no understanding of any deeper reality exists because at the present day nothing is taught about charity. For after people separated charity from faith, teachings to do with charity perished, and in place of these, teachings to do with faith were accepted and invented, that is, teachings which provide no information at all about what is meant by charity or by the neighbour.

[2] Teachings that existed among the Ancients specified all the genera and species of charity. They also taught who the neighbour was towards whom charity should be exercised, and how one person was the neighbour in a different degree and different respect from another, and consequently how charity was to be exercised in different ways according to the individual needs of the neighbour. The Ancients also made classifications of the neighbour and gave names to each of these. Some people they called the poor, the needy, the wretched, and the afflicted; some they called the blind, the lame, the maimed, as well as orphans and widows; and others they called the hungry, the thirsty, strangers, the naked, the sick, the bound, and so on. From these classifications they knew what they ought to do for one person and what for another. But, as stated, such teachings have perished, and with them any understanding of the Word too. They have perished so completely that no one at the present day knows anything else than this, that when the poor, widows, and orphans are mentioned in the Word none but those who are literally called such are meant. The same applies whenever mention is made of the hungry, the thirsty, strangers, the naked, the sick, and those in prison. But the truth of the matter is that these names are used to describe charity - what it is like in its essence and what the exercise of charity ought to be like in a charitable life.