The Children of Israel were told to keep three feasts each year - the feast of unleavened bread, the feast of first fruits, and the feast of ingathering. Should we still do that?

In Exodus 23:14-16, Moses receives the instructions about these feasts. Those three verses in Exodus comprise our brief story. Their inner meaning is explained in Arcana Coelestia 9286-9296.

There are three feasts. In the Word, the number three represents a completeness, a sense of things being covered from beginning to end. Our thankfulness to the Lord is supposed to keep going - to endure.

The first feast, of unleavened bread, stands for worship, for our thankfulness for the Lord's action in our minds to get rid of false ideas. That enables us to start to receive good loves.

The second feast, of first fruits, relates to the planting of true ideas in that "soil" of initial loves for doing good.

The third feast, of harvest, or ingathering, stands for the time when, by applying our true ideas, we receive real good - loves of the neighbor and of the Lord - that become the middle of our lives. This is the state of rebirth, where we have - by working through the year (our lives), and enduring in thankfulness, allowed the Lord to get rid of our false ideas, and push our evil loves to the periphery, so that good can work, and be fruitful.

These feasts, then, represent the progress of our spiritual lives. In some manner, we need to keep them.

10413. 'And they rose up in the morning of the next day' means arousal by the loves that are their own. This is clear from the meaning of 'rising up in the morning' as arousal by the loves that are their own; for 'the morning' means a state of love, and 'rising up' being raised to that state.

'The morning' means a state of love, see 5962, 8426, 8812, 10114, 10134.

'Rising up' means being raised, 2401, 2785, 2912, 2927, 3171, 4103.

But when the words 'rising up in the morning' apply to those whose interest lies in external things devoid of what is internal, and so when they apply to the evil, 'rising up' does not mean being raised but an arousal, and 'the morning' does not mean a state of heavenly love but a state of hellish love. When the evil enter that state it is morning for them, for then they enter into the delight of their life because now the loves that are truly theirs take charge of them. The difference between the good and the evil being raised to the state in which their own loves take charge is that the good do then go up whereas the evil go down. For the loves that govern the good are heavenly ones which raise those people and increase as they ascend to heaven, whereas the loves ruling the evil are hellish ones which pull these people down and increase as they descend into hell. From this it is evident that the words 'rising up in the morning' have a contrary meaning when they apply to the evil from what they do when they apply to the good. Also in the next life spirits and angels' states of love and faith change from one to another, just as the heat and light of times of day and seasons of the year do. When morning dawns on those in heaven a state exists which arouses heavenly loves and consequently brings them joy; but when it dawns on those in hell a state exists which arouses hellish loves and consequently brings them torment. For each of the latter then wishes to be the greatest and to possess all that belongs to another; and this gives rise to deep-seated hatred, savagery, and cruelty, which are meant by the fires of hell.