487. 'Days means periods of time and states in general. This has been shown in Chapter 1, where the 'days of creation' have no other meaning. In the Word it is very common for a whole period of time to be called 'a day', as it clearly is in the present verse and in verses 5, 8, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, 27, 31, below; and therefore the states that belong to periods of time in general are meant by 'days' as well. And when 'years' is attached, then periods of years mean the natures of those states, and so the states in particular.

[2] The most ancient people had their own particular numbers which they would use to mean different aspects of the Church - for instance, the numbers three, seven, ten, twelve, and many which they obtained from these and other numbers - and in so doing incorporated states of the Church. These numbers therefore contain arcana that would require considerable effort to unravel. Really a number was an evaluation of the states of the Church. The same feature occurs throughout the Word, especially in the prophetical. And the religious ceremonies of the Jewish Church also entail numbers specifying periods of time as well as quantities; for example, in connection with sacrifices, minchahs, oblations, and other practices, which in every case have special reference to holy things. Consequently eight hundred in this verse, nine hundred and thirty in the next, and the numbers of years mentioned in the verses that follow after that, embody in particular more matters than can possibly be retold; matters, that is to say, which have to do with changes in the state of their Church in relationship to their own general state. Later on, in the Lord's Divine mercy, the meaning of the simple numbers up to twelve will be given, for without knowing these first of all no one can grasp what compound numbers mean.

7112. 'You shall no longer give the people straw' means factual knowledge, the basest and most general kind of all. This is clear from the meaning of 'straw' as factual truths, dealt with in 3114, in particular the basest and most general kind of factual knowledge, for since 'straw' is the food of beasts 'straw' means the basest kind of food in the spiritual sense. Factual knowledge is said to be the basest when it is full of the illusions of the senses. It is what the evil misuse to pervert forms of good and truth and so lend support to evils and falsities; for on account of the illusions it contains that knowledge can be twisted round in favour of false suppositions and evil desires. That kind of factual knowledge is also the most general of all, and unless it is filled out with less general and more specific truths it can be of use to evils and falsities. But the more it is filled out with truths, the less it can have that kind of use. Such knowledge is the means by which the upright in the next life are molested by those who, when they were in the world, proclaimed belief in faith alone and yet led a life of evil. But because it is banished by the angels the narrative says at this point that they should no longer give the people straw to make bricks, that is, no longer provide such knowledge for producing fabrications and falsities which are to be introduced. This is the internal sense of these words, which does indeed seem remote from the sense of the letter; but it should be recognized that there is nothing in the natural world that does not correspond to some reality in the spiritual world. The angels present with a person understand in a spiritual way everything understood by the person in a natural way. They do not know what straw is, or what bricks are either. Such things were well known to those angels when they were in the world, but they forgot about them when they entered heaven, because there they moved on to spiritual things. This explains why when a person's ideas of such things in the natural world are perceived by angels they convert them into the corresponding spiritual realities. The fact that 'straw' or 'grass' means the basest kind of factual knowledge, and 'bricks' fabrications and falsities, may be seen from a number of considerations; for herbaceous plants, and also those that produce straw, are nothing else than such knowledge. But seeds, barley-grains, wheat-grains, and the like are interior truths and forms of good; and stones that are not man-made are truths.