Each of the four gospels contains a story about Jesus appearing to His disciples after the Sunday morning when they had found the sepulcher empty. For example, see Matthew 28:16-20; Mark 16:14-19; Luke 24:13-33; John 20:19-31, and John 21.

In Luke, there’s a story of two disciples walking from Jerusalem to the village of Emmaus, a walk of about seven miles. Shortly after they leave the city they are approached by another traveler who has noticed their troubled faces and serious talk and asks them what is troubling them. Walking along together, they ask the stranger, “Haven’t you heard of the troubles in Jerusalem, how the prophet from Galilee, who we hoped would be the one to save Israel, was given up to be crucified? And strange to say, when some of the women went on the third day to anoint His body, they saw angels who told them that he was not there but was risen from the dead.”

On hearing this, the traveler chides them for not believing, and says “Don’t you see that Christ had to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?” The stranger then tells the two disciples many things concerning Jesus, from the books of Moses, and the prophets, in the Old Testament. The two disciples listen with awe, but do not recognize the stranger. At length they arrive at Emmaus. The stranger appears to want to go on when the two stop, but they beg him to stop also, because it’s getting late in the day, and they want to hear more. So they all sit down to share the evening meal, and when the stranger takes up the loaf of bread and breaks it and gives them pieces, their eyes are opened and they recognize Him, and He vanishes.

One can imagine the stunned awe that came over them both as they realized that this was Jesus. They knew He was crucified, and yet He had walked and talked to them for several hours. The women were right! The angels were right! He was alive!

The New Church believes that there are internal meanings to all the stories in the Word of the Lord, the sacred scriptures, and that this internal meaning, within the literal stories about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Joshua, Samuel, David, and the rest, and all the sayings of the prophets from Isaiah to Malachi, and the four gospels… this meaning is what makes the Word holy.

So what can we see here in this story? Well, that internal meaning in “Moses and the prophets” is the story of Jesus’ life in the world, from His birth in Bethlehem through all His growing years until His “death” and then His rising. Because Jesus knew that, and had certainly read the Scriptures and understood them internally, He knew for a long time how His earthly life was going to close, and that it was necessary for it to close as had been “written”, in order to save the human race. So He told the two disciples that story as they walked toward Emmaus.

More about that walk... In the Word, any mention of walking is really referring to how we live our lives from day to day. In many stories of the Word, it is said that someone walked with God. It is said that we should walk in His ways and that we should walk the straight and narrow path.

Also in this story we are told that this was a journey of sixty stadia (in the original Greek). Sixty (or other multiples of "six") represents the lifelong work of rejecting the temptations that come from our inborn selfishness. Apocalypse Explained 648. So, this journey to Emmaus means our life’s journey - as a person that is trying to follow the Lord’s teachings and become an angel.

The destination was Emmaus. In the Word any city represents a doctrine, an organized set of truths that we have put in order so that we can live according to them -- our rules of life. See Arcana Coelestia 402. They are not necessarily good, as with Jerusalem or Bethlehem, but can also be evil doctrines, e.g. Sodom or Babylon. My dictionary tells me that the name Emmaus means “hot springs”. Another universal meaning in the Word is that water means truth in its beneficial uses, but can also mean truth twisted into falsity by those in hell, in an opposite sense. See, for example, Arcana Coelestia 790. Think of the wells that Abraham dug, or the waters that Jesus promised to the woman of Samaria as they talked by Jacob’s well, or the pure river of water flowing out from under the throne in the New Jerusalem in the book of Revelation. In its converse sense, where water is destructive, think of the flood that destroyed all but Noah and his family, or the Red Sea that had to be parted so that the children of Israel could cross. The springs represented by Emmaus were holy truths bubbling up from the Word for us to use. And these are hot springs, and heat means love. So that's our destination, where truth and love together are flowing out for us to use, in a continual stream from the Lord.

This plain little anecdote about the disciples meeting the Lord on the road to Emmaus isn't just a story about Jesus's resurrection with a spiritual body. It is also a story of how we should be living our lives. We can be traveling toward heaven, listening to the Lord, walking in the way with him, and at the end He will break bread and have supper with us.

97. He that walketh in the midst of the seven golden lampstands, signifies from whom is life to all in the new heaven and in the new church. This is evident from the signification of "walking" as being to live, and in reference to the Lord, Life itself (of which more will be said in what follows); and from the signification of "seven golden lampstands," as being all in the new heaven and in the new church (See above, n. 62). From this it is clear that the Lord was seen "in the midst of the lampstands," because "midst" signifies inmost; "lampstands" signify heaven and the church, and "walking" signifies life; and to be "in the midst" signifies, in reference to the Lord, to be in all that are round about Him. By this, therefore, it was represented that all the life of faith and of love in heaven and in the church is from Him (See above, n. 84). (That "midst" denotes the inmost and the center from which, see Arcana Coelestia 1074, 2940, 2973, 7777. That the Lord is the common center from whom is all direction and determination in heaven, see in the work on Heaven and Hell 123-124. That the extension of the light of heaven, which is Divine truth proceeding from the Lord, from which angels have intelligence and wisdom, is effected also from the midst into those who are round about, see the same, n. 43, 50, 189.) That "walking" signifies living, and in reference to the Lord, Life itself, is from appearances in the spiritual world, where all walk according to their life, the evil in no other ways than those that lead to hell, but the good in no other ways than those that lead to heaven; consequently all spirits are known there from the ways wherein they are walking. Moreover, ways actually appear there; but to the evil, the ways towards hell only, and to the good, the ways towards heaven only; and thus everyone is brought to his own society. From this it is that "walking" signifies living. (Of these ways, and walking therein, in the spiritual world, see what is shown in the work on Heaven and Hell 195, 479, 534, 590; and in the small work on The Last Judgment 48.) That in the Word "ways" signify truths or falsities, and "walking" signifies living, may be seen from many passages therein; I will cite only a few here by way of confirmation.

In Isaiah:

We have sinned against Jehovah; they would not walk in His ways, neither have they heard His law (Isaiah 42:24).

In Moses:

If ye shall keep the commandments, by loving Jehovah your God, by walking in all His ways (Deuteronomy 11:22).

In the same:

Thou shalt keep all this commandment to do it, by loving Jehovah thy God, and walking in His ways all the days (Deuteronomy 19:9; 26:17).

In the same:

I will set My tabernacle in the midst of them, ¹ and I will walk in the midst of you, and I will be to you for a God (Leviticus 26:11, 12).

In the same:

Jehovah thy God walketh in the midst of your ² camp, and therefore shall your ² camp be holy (Deuteronomy 23:14).

In Isaiah:

Remember, O Jehovah, how I have walked before Thee in truth (Isaiah 38:3).

In the same:

He entereth into peace, walking in uprightness (Isaiah 57:2).

In Malachi:

He walked with Me in peace and in uprightness (Malachi 2:6).

In David:

Thou hast delivered my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living (Psalms 56:13).

In John:

Jesus said, I am the light of the world; he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life (John 8:12).

In the same:

Yet a little while is the light with you; walk while ye have the light, that darkness overtake you not; and he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. While ye have the light believe on the light (John 12:35, 36).

In Mark:

The Pharisees and Scribes ask Him, Why walk not Thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders? (Mark 7:5).

In Moses:

If ye walk contrary to Me, and will not hearken to My voices, I will also walk contrary to you (Leviticus 26:21, 26:23-24, 26:27).

In Isaiah:

This people that walk in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow, upon them hath the light shined (Isaiah 9:2).

In Micah:

All the peoples walk in the name of their god, and we will walk in the name of Jehovah our God (Micah 4:5).

In Isaiah:

Who among you feareth Jehovah? He that walketh in darkness, who hath no brightness (Isaiah 50:10);

besides many other passages (as in Jeremiah 26:4; Ezekiel 5:6; 20:13, 20:16; Zechariah 10:12; Micah 4:5; Luke 1:6). From these passages it can be seen that "walking," in the spiritual sense, signifies living; and as it signifies living, so in reference to the Lord, as in this passage, it signifies Life itself, for the Lord is Life itself, and the rest are recipients of life from Him (See above, n. 82, 84).

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