3. Without such life the Word as regards the letter is dead, for it is the same with the Word as it is with man, who, as the Christian world knows, is internal as well as external. The external man if parted from the internal man is just a body and therefore dead. It is the internal man which lives and imparts life to the external. The internal man is the soul of the external man. The same applies to the Word which as to the letter alone is like the body without a soul.

9162. 'When a man delivers to his companion an ass, or an ox, or a member of the flock, or any beast for safe keeping' means truth and good, exterior and interior, in the memory, and anything there belonging to an affection for them. This is clear from the meaning of 'ass', 'ox', and 'member of the flock' as truth, exterior and interior, dealt with above in 9135; from the meaning of 'beast' as an affection for good and truth, dealt with in 45, 46, 142, 143, 246, 714-716, 719, 1823, 2179, 2180, 2781, 3218, 3519, 5198, 7424, 7523, 9090; and from the meaning of 'being delivered for safe keeping' as being stored and held in the memory, dealt with above in 9149, 'man' [and] 'companion' being not two different persons but two [forms of truth] within a single person, 9149.