'Land' in the Word, denotes the church, for the things which signify the church also signify the things relating to the church, for these constitute the church. The reason why 'land' denotes the church in the Word is because the land of Canaan was the land in which the church had been since the most ancient times. Hence, when 'land' is named in the Word, it means the land of Canaan, which then means the church. For when the expression 'the land' appears there, people in the spiritual world do not concern themselves with the idea of a land, only with the idea of the nation inhabiting it. And yet not with an idea of that nation but with an idea of the essential nature of it.

'Land' or 'earth,' as in Genesis 20:15, signifies the doctrine of love and charity.

'Land' signifies the celestial principle of love in Genesis 24:4.

In Genesis 26:12, 'land' signifies rational things.

In Genesis 28:13, this signifies the good of the natural.

The 'land' represents the divine of the rational principle in Genesis 30:25.

(References: Arcana Coelestia 5577)

3040. 'And you shall take a wife for my son from there' means that the affection for truth came indeed from there, yet from a new source. This is clear from the meaning of 'a wife' as the affection for truth, dealt with above. For 'Rebekah' who is referred to in this present chapter represents Divine Truth that was to be joined to the Divine Good of the Rational, which is Isaac. That the affection for truth comes from there, that is to say, from the things meant by 'father's house' and 'land of nativity', yet from a new source, cannot as yet be fully explained, though the matter is dealt with extensively in what follows. Let just a brief explanation be given here. Every affection for truth in the natural man comes into being through an influx from the affection for good from the rational, that is, from the Divine by way of the rational. The affection for truth which through that influx comes into being in the natural man is at first not an affection for genuine truth, for genuine truth arrives gradually. It gradually takes the place of those things previously there which were not truths in themselves, but only means leading on to genuine truth. This brief explanation shows what is meant by the statement that the affection for truth comes indeed from there, yet from a new source.