The 23rd Psalm is one of the best-known and most-loved literary works in the world, and it may well be the best poem ever written. It is also a fine example of the power of figurative language: We read deep things into the vision of ourselves as sheep, led to green pastures and good water by a kind shepherd. It’s empowering to feel the confidence to go fearlessly into the valley of the shadow of death, and to feel the love and caring of a table prepared by the Lord and a cup so full it overflows.

What people don’t know, however, is that this language actually has precise internal meanings, and that when we see them there is an even deeper beauty in the poem. That’s because what it actually describes is the path to heaven, and the fierce desire the Lord has to lead us there.

The first step is to let the Lord be our shepherd – to accept His teaching and His leadership. The green pastures and the still waters represent the things He will teach us for the journey. Then He begins working inside is, setting our spiritual lives in order, so that we desire to do what’s good and to love one another. That’s represented by restoring our souls and leading us in the paths of righteousness.

But we will still face challenges. We still live external lives, out in the world, and we are subject to desires that arise in those externals, in our bodily lives. That’s the valley of the shadow of death. But the rod and staff represent truth from the Lord on both external and internal levels, ideas that can defend us against those desires.

And if we keep following, the Lord will prepare a table for us – a place inside us that he can fill with love (the anointing oil) and wisdom (the overflowing cup). Thus transformed, we can enter heaven, with love for others (“goodness”) and love from the Lord (“mercy”) and can love and be loved to eternity.

One of many beautiful things about this is the fact that it is the Lord who really does all the work. In the whole text, the only action taken by the sheep is walking through the valley of the shadow of death. Other than that, they follow the Lord, trust the Lord, accept the blessings of the Lord. And that is really true! In external states (in the valley) we might seem to be doing the work ourselves, but internally, spiritually, we simply need to give ourselves to the Lord and let Him bless us.

The underlying idea here is that the Lord created us so that He could love us, in loving us wants us to be happy, knows that our greatest happiness will come from being conjoined to Him in heaven, and Himself wants nothing more than to be conjoined to us. So everything He does, in every moment of every day for every person on the face of the planet, is centered on the goal of getting that person to heaven. He wants each and every one of us in heaven more than we are capable of imagining. We just need to cooperate.

(References: Apocalypse Explained 375 [34], 727 [2]; The Inner Meaning of the Prophets and Psalms 273)

4680. 'That their father loved him more than all his brothers' means that [the Lord's Divine Spiritual or Divine Truth] was joined to the Divine Natural - in the proximate sense, to the Ancient Church meant by 'father'. This is clear from the explanations given above in 4675, where similar words occur. The reason why in the proximate sense the meaning is that [the Lord's Divine Spiritual or Divine Truth] was joined to the Ancient Church, and why in that sense 'father' is used to mean that Church, is that in the proximate sense, as stated immediately above in 4679, the descendants of Jacob and therefore the Church that was represented among them are meant by 'Joseph's brothers'. This whole matter has been discussed several times already, but in view of the train of thought that occurs in what follows the main points will be restated briefly here.

[2] The Ancient Church established by the Lord after the Flood was a representative Church. It was the kind of Church in which the external features of its worship, every single one, represented the celestial and spiritual things belonging to the Lord's kingdom, and in the highest sense represented those Divine things which are the Lord's own. Every single internal aspect of its worship however had to do with charity. This Church was widespread in much of the Asiatic world and in many kingdoms there. And although differences existed among them so far as teachings about matters of faith were concerned, there was nevertheless one Church because all people everywhere made charity the essential element of the Church. People at that time who separated faith from charity and made faith the essential element of the Church were called Ham. But in process of time this Church turned aside to idolatrous practices, and in Egypt, Babylon, and other places to magical ones; for they began to worship external things devoid of anything internal. So because they departed from charity, heaven departed from them, and in its place spirits from hell came and led them.

[3] Once this Church had been laid in ruins a new Church originating in Eber came into being, which was called the Hebrew Church. This existed in Syria and Mesopotamia, and also among other nations in the land of Canaan. But it differed from the Ancient Church in that it made sacrifices the essential requirement of external worship. It did, it is true, acknowledge charity as the inner substance of worship, but not so much with the heart as the Ancient Church had done. This Church too became idolatrous.

[4] At length the Lord was pleased to establish a new type of Church among Abraham's descendants through Jacob and to introduce among that nation the external features of the worship of the Ancient Church. But that nation was the kind that could not accept anything internal constituting the Church because their hearts were utterly opposed to charity. For this reason no more than what was representative of the Church was set up among that nation. From this it is now clear that 'Jacob's sons' or 'Joseph's brothers' in the proximate sense means that kind of Church, and that 'Jacob their father' means the Ancient Church. Furthermore, in many other places in the Word, especially the prophetical part, 'Jacob' is used to mean the Ancient Church, in addition to which this Church - the Ancient - is frequently called 'father' or 'mother', 'father' to refer to its good and 'mother' to its truth. From this it is now evident that 'their father loved Joseph more than all his brothers' means that the Lord's Divine Truth was joined to the Ancient Church.