49. Verse 26 And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and they will have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, ¹ and over the beasts, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

To people in the Most Ancient Church with whom the Lord spoke face to face, the Lord appeared as Man. (Much can be told about those people, but this is not the time to do so.) For this reason they called nobody man except the Lord and whatever may have been His. They did not even call themselves man, but only the things which they perceived that they had from the Lord, such as every good stemming from love and every truth of faith. These things were said to be human because they were the Lord's.

[2] In the Prophets therefore, in the highest sense, 'man' and 'son of man' are used to mean the Lord. In the internal sense they are used to mean wisdom and intelligence, and so everyone who is regenerate, as in Jeremiah,

I looked to the earth, and behold, a void and an emptiness, and towards the heavens, and behold, they had no light. I looked, and behold there was no man; and all the birds of the air ¹ had fled. Jeremiah 4:23, 25.

In Isaiah where in the internal sense 'man' means a regenerate person, the Lord Himself as the One Man is meant in the highest sense,

Thus said Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, and He who formed him, It was I that made the earth and it was I that created man upon it; My hands stretched out the heavens, and I commanded all their host. Isaiah 45:11-13

[3] The Lord was therefore seen by the Prophets as Man, for example by Ezekiel,

Above the firmament in appearance like a sapphire stone there was the likeness of a throne, and above the likeness of a throne, there was a likeness, as the appearance of a Man upon it above. Ezekiel 1:26.

And the One whom Daniel saw was called 'a Son of Man', or what amounts to the same, Man,

I looked, and behold, with the clouds of heaven One like the Son of Man was coming; and He came even to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him. And to Him was given dominion and glory and kingdom; and all peoples, nations, and languages will serve Him. His dominion is the dominion of an age, which will not pass away, and His kingdom one that will not perish. Daniel 7:13-14.

[4] Moreover the Lord quite often calls Himself the Son of Man or Man, and, as is done in Daniel, foretells His entry into glory,

They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and glory. Matthew 24:23, 30.

The literal sense of the Word is called 'the clouds of heaven', its internal sense 'power and glory'. The internal sense, in every single detail, focuses exclusively on the Lord and His kingdom. Consequently it is the spiritual sense which contains power and glory.

Footnotes:

4112. 'And Jacob stole the heart of Laban the Aramean' means a change, as regards good, of the state meant by 'Laban'. This is clear from the meaning of 'stealing' as taking away that which is cherished and holy, and so changing the state, dealt with immediately above in 4111; from the meaning of 'the heart' as that which proceeds from the will, and - when the will desires good - as good, dealt with in 2930, 3313, 3888, 3889; and from the representation of 'Laban' as intermediate good which is now being separated. And because it is being separated Laban is now called the Aramean, as also in verse 24 below, for 'Laban the Aramean' means, as previously, a kind of good which does not have any Divine Good and Truth within it. The reason why this is meant is that Aram or Syria was separated from the land of Canaan by the river, namely the Euphrates, and so lay outside the land of Canaan which in the internal sense means the Lord's kingdom and in the highest sense the Lord's Divine Human, see above in 4108.

[2] Specifically 'Aram' or Syria means cognitions of truth and good, see 1232, 1234, 3051, 3249, 3664, 3680. The reason why it has this meaning is that the Ancient Church existed there also, with remnants of it remaining there for a long time, as is evident from Balaam who came from there and who was acquainted with Jehovah and also prophesied concerning the Lord. But after the growth of idolatry in that country, and after Abram had been summoned from it and the representative Church was established in the land of Canaan, 'Aram' or Syria took on the representation of a region outside the Church, that is, of a region separated from the Church and as a consequence remote from the things that constituted the Lord's kingdom. But it continued to mean cognitions of good and truth. The reason why Jacob is said to have 'stolen Laban's heart' by not giving any indication that he was fleeing is that immediately above a change of state as regards truth was spoken of, and therefore a change of state as regards good is spoken of here. For when truth is dealt with in the Word so also is good, on account of the heavenly marriage, which is the marriage of truth and good, present in every individual part of the Word, 683, 793, 801, 2516, 2712.