50. What the Most Ancient Church understood by 'the image of the Lord' exceeds everything one can say about it. Man is totally unaware of the fact that the Lord is governing him by means of angels and spirits, and that at least two spirits and two angels are present with everyone. By means of the spirits he is in communication with the world of spirits, and by means of the angels with heaven. Without this communication with the world of spirits by means of the spirits, and with heaven by means of the angels, and so by means of heaven with the Lord, a person cannot exist at all. His entire life depends upon that link, and if the spirits and angels were to withdraw he would perish instantly.

[2] As long as a person remains unregenerate he is governed in an entirely different way from when he is regenerate. As long as he is unregenerate, evil spirits reside with him, who have such dominion over him that angels, though present, can accomplish little more than simply distract him from plunging into utter evil and so divert him towards something good. Indeed they use his own unregenerate desires to divert him towards good, and his illusions of the senses to do so towards truth. At that point he is in communication with the world of spirits by means of the spirits who reside with him, but not in the same way with heaven, for the reason that evil spirits have dominion and angels simply forestall them.

[3] When however he is regenerate it is the angels who then have dominion, and they breathe into him every kind of good and truth, as well as a horror and dread of evils and falsifies. Angels do indeed lead, yet they are but servants, for it is the Lord alone who, by means of angels and spirits, governs a person. Now because this is done through the ministry of angels, it is said here, in the plural first of all, 'Let Us make man in Our image'. Yet because it is still He alone who rules and disposes, it is said in the following verse, in the singular, 'God created him in His image'. This the Lord also states plainly in Isaiah,

Thus said Jehovah, your Redeemer, He who formed you from the womb, I Jehovah make all things, stretching out the heavens Alone, spreading out the earth by Myself. Isaiah 44:24.

Angels themselves also profess that no power at all resides with themselves but that they act from the Lord alone.

6716. 'A man from the house of Levi went' means truth which has its origin in good. This is clear from the meaning of 'a man as truth, dealt with in 3134; from the meaning of being 'from the house' as the origin; and from the representation of 'Levi' as good. In the highest sense 'Levi' represents Divine Love, dealt with in 3875, and in the internal sense spiritual love, 3875, 4497, 4502, 4503; and since he represents love, he represents good, because all good comes from love. As regards truth which has its origin in good, meant here by 'a man from the house of Levi', it should be recognized that the verses which follow deal in the highest sense with the Lord, with the way in which His Human became the law of God, that is, real Truth. It is well known that the Lord was born like anyone else and that when He was a young child he learned to talk like any other young child, after which He grew in knowledge, and also in intelligence and wisdom.

[2] From this it is evident that His Human was not Divine when He was born but that He made it Divine by His own power. He made it Divine by His own power because He had been conceived from Jehovah, as a result of which the inmost core of His life was Jehovah Himself. For the inmost core of anyone's life, called the soul, is derived from the father, whereas that which clothes what is inmost, called the body, is derived from the mother. The inmost core of life derived from the father is constantly flowing into and having an effect on the external derived from the mother, endeavouring even in the womb to make it similar to itself. This may be recognized in the fact that children are born with their father's disposition, and sometimes grandchildren and great grandchildren with their grandfather's and great grandfather's disposition. The reason for this is that the soul, which is derived from the father, constantly wishes to make the external derived from the mother similar to itself and an image of itself.

[3] Seeing that this is what goes on with man, one may recognize that it was what went on especially with the Lord. The inmost part of Him was the Divine Itself because it was Jehovah Himself, for He was Jehovah's only-begotten Son. And since that inmost part was the Divine Itself, how, more so than with any man, could the Divine fail to make the external derived from the mother an image of itself, that is, similar to itself, so that the Human - the external, derived from the mother - would be made Divine? This He accomplished by His own power because the Divine, which was the Inmost by which He had an effect on His Human, was His in the same way as a person's soul, which is the inmost part of him, belongs to that person. And because the progress which the Lord made conformed to Divine order, He made His Human, while He was in the world, to be Divine Truth; but after that, when He was fully glorified, He made it to be Divine Good, and so one with Jehovah.

[4] How this was accomplished is what is described in the highest sense of the present chapter. But since the contents of the highest sense, which all have to do with the Lord, surpass human understanding, let what follows be an explanation of the things contained in the internal sense of the chapter. These have to do with the beginnings and the succeeding states of God's truth with a member of the Church, that is, with a person who is being regenerated, 6713, 6714. The reason why these are the things contained in the internal sense is that human regeneration is an image of the glorification of the Lord's Human, see 3138, 3212, 3245, 3246, 3296, 3490, 4402, 5688.