hear
Thanks to modern science, we now understand that hearing actually happens in the brain, not the ears. The ears collect vibrations in the air and...
right
He is said to be 'just' in a spiritual sense, who lives according to divine laws. They on the right hand being called 'just,' as...
lord
The Lord, in the simplest terms, is love itself expressed as wisdom itself. In philosophic terms, love is the Lord's substance and wisdom is His...
goeth
In the physical world, the places we inhabit and the distances between them are physical realities, and we have to get our physical bodies through...
lips
'A lip' signifies doctrine. A lip,' as in Isaiah 6:3, 7, signifies the interior parts of a person, consequently, internal worship, where adoration is grounded....
eyes
It’s common to say “I see” when we understand something. And indeed, “seeing” in the Bible represents grasping and understanding spiritual things. So it makes...
heart
The heart means love. A good heart means love to the Lord and to the neighbor while a hard or stony heart means the love...
visited
There is a long history of using travel to round out an education, from the 19th-century “world tours” taken by Oxford and Cambridge graduates to...
night
The sun in the Bible represents the Lord, with its heat representing His love and its light representing His wisdom. “Daytime,” then, represents a state...
find
Finding, or being found, can have different meanings in the Word, depending on the context. Here are two examples, From Arcana Coelestia 5756, 'Behold, the...
mouth
In most cases, "mouth" in the Bible represents thought and logic, especially the kind of active, concrete thought that is connected with speech. The reason...
the Word
In general, we tend to be very aware of how knowing what's true leads to doing what is good. That starts as children, with parents...
word
'Word,' as in Psalms 119:6-17, stands for doctrine in general. 'The Word,' as in Psalms 147:18, signifies divine good united with divine truth. 'Word,' as...
kept
"Keeping" in the Bible generally has to do with controlling the actual actions of life, though in some cases it can mean holding something away...
paths
These days we tend to think of "roads" as smooth swaths of pavement, and judge them by how fast we can drive cars on them....
called
'To proclaim' signifies exploration from influx of the Lord.
shew
'Shew' signifies instruction to the life.
Right hand
'The right hand' signifies the whole of a person regarding intellectual power, and so, regarding faith. 'To place the right hand on the head,' signifies...
Put
'To put' has reference to order, arrangement, application, and influx.
rise up
It is common in the Bible for people to "rise up," and it would be easy to pass over the phrase as simply describing a...
rise
It is common in the Bible for people to "rise up," and it would be easy to pass over the phrase as simply describing a...
keep
"Keeping" in the Bible generally has to do with controlling the actual actions of life, though in some cases it can mean holding something away...
Apple of the eye
"He kept him as the apple of his eye," (Deuteronomy 32:10), signifies that the Lord fights (together with man) against evils and falsities from hell.
apple
'An apple', as in Joel 1:12, signifies joy of heart from natural good derived from spiritual good.
hide
'To hide themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains,' as mentioned in Revelation 6:15, signifies being in evils and in falsities...
under
In the Bible, things that are lower down, or under, physically, generally represent things that are lower or more external spiritually. In some cases, the...
shadow
'The shadow is good' of the oak, poplar and elm means complacence.
wings
'Wings' signify spiritual truths. 'Wings,' when related to the Lord, signify the divine spiritual. In the opposite sense, 'wings' relate to falsities and rationalizations from...
Wicked
Swedenborg several times associates the “wicked” with “malevolence,” defines “malevolence” as “destroying good, interior and exterior,” and says that the wicked do this by disowning...
enemies
An enemy in the Bible refers to people who are in the love of evil and the false thinking that springs from evil. On a...
fat
Fat signifies the celestial principle. Fat things, full of marrow, signify goodnesses. Fat and blood signify interior goods and truths, and hence the Israelites, prior...
speak
Like "say," the word "speak" refers to thoughts and feelings moving from our more internal spiritual levels to our more external ones – and ultimately...
compassed
To encompass, as in Genesis 19:4, signifies to be contrary, or to attack and assault with a hostile intention.
us
Angels do give us guidance, but they are mere helpers; the Lord alone governs us, through angels and spirits. Since angels have their assisting role,...
bowing down
To bow in prayer is common in most religious practices, so it's not surprising that “to bow” in the Bible represents humility and worship in...
bowing
To bow in prayer is common in most religious practices, so it's not surprising that “to bow” in the Bible represents humility and worship in...
earth
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...
lion
'A lion' signifies the good of celestial love and the truth from that good.
young lion
'Whelp of a lion,' as in Genesis 49:9, denotes innocence with might. 'Whelp of a lion,' as in Deuteronomy 32:22, signifies the first part of...
soul
The nature of the soul is a deep and complicated topic, but it can be summarized as "spiritual life," who we are in terms of...
sword
The three words, sword, famine and pestilence, appear in a group in 26 different Bible verses. That's not an accident. Sword, famine and pestilence describe...
hand
In Genesis 27:22, 'voice' relates to truth, and 'hand,' to good.
world
The term "world" has both general and more specific meanings in the Bible, including the relatively literal sense of the natural, physical world. In more...
life
'Lives' is used in the plural, because of the will and understanding, and because these two lives make one.
belly
The belly (Psalms 16:4) signifies the interior understanding.
Full
'To satiate' relates to the extent of a person's will, for good or evil.
children
A child is a young boy or girl in the care of parents, older than a suckling or an infant, but not yet an adolescent....
face
“The eyes are the windows of the soul.” That’s a sentiment with roots somewhere in murky antiquity, but one that has become hopelessly cliché because...
righteousness
The word "righteous" has taken on a bit of negative shading in modern language. That may be because we hear it most often as part...
satisfied
'What satisfies' is what nourishes the soul.