Finding Jesus in the Life of Abraham, Part 1: Beginnings

A Sermon by Pastor Joel Christian Glenn

30 April 2017

We all know that the Word, or the Bible, is about God. That’s not hard to believe. But shortly after His resurrection Jesus pushed this idea to another level. When He appeared to two disciples on the way to Emmaus, it says, “Beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself” (Luke 24:27). From this we can gather that all of the Scriptures are not just about God, but are about Jesus Himself. That’s a concept that is harder to grasp. Yes, there are the prophecies that are clearly about Jesus. But what about, say the story of Creation? Or the Exodus from slavery in Egypt? The many kings of Israel, both good and evil? Or all the many lists of laws and genealogies, are even those about Jesus?

The truth of the matter is that the whole of the Word is not just about Jesus, it is Jesus. Listen to these verses from the opening of the Gospel of John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men…. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-4, 14)

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. That is a clear reference to Jesus Christ. Jesus is the eternal Word, the Word that is also embodied in the Word of God, our Old and New Testaments.

If you feel that it is hard to grasp how Jesus and the Word are one and the same, you are not alone. It is difficult to comprehend how a living, breathing, person and an apparently lifeless slab of paper can be one and the same. The Writings for the New Church acknowledge this difficulty and offer a way around it. This is from the Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture:

Few understand how the Lord is the Word, for it is generally supposed that the Lord, by means of the Word, can enlighten and teach people, and yet He cannot, on this account, be called the Word.

So as we’ve said, it makes sense that the Word is about the Lord, and it is the Lord’s way of teaching us, but that doesn’t mean He is the Word. The passage however continues:

It should be known, however, that every person is his own love, and consequently his own good and his own truth. A person is a person for no other reason than this, and there is nothing else in him that is a person. For the same reason that a person is his own good and his own truth, angels and spirits also are people; and for all good and truth proceeding from the Lord, is in its own form, a person. But the Lord is Divine Good itself and Divine Truth itself; thus He is Personhood Itself, from whom every person is a person. (Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture 100)

There is a lot going on in that passage. What it all boils down to is a definition of humanity that transcends having a physical body, a definition that helps us see how a book and a person can be one and the same. As the passage said, a person is a person because of his loves, and therefore because of all his good and truth that stem from that love. In short, you are what you love, and what you love makes you human. Think of it this way: if we were to transplant your brain from your body into someone else’s, and this new person loved the same things you love and in the exact same way, and so behaved as you would behave, wouldn’t we say that it is still you, even though the body is completely different? Take that a step further and think of death. Even your brain will die, but your spirit, your spirit in which resides everything of your love, will carry on. Even though there will no longer be a shred of “you” left on this earth, you will still live on. So that’s what makes a person a person: the mind, especially the love within the mind.

If a person is a person because of what he or she loves and so thinks from that love, then anything that reveals our love or our thought reveals us. We know this instinctively from other books we encounter. Have you ever read a book that you loved immensely, and felt that in some way you were connected to the author, as if you understood each other even though you’d never met? I’m not just talking about biographies either. You can read a book that never once refers directly to its author and yet still feel connected. That can happen because the book is a kind of extension of the author, since it reveals the authors loves and ideas.

We now come to the Word. The Word, more than any other book on earth, reveals the mind of its Author. This is so deeply the case that we say that the Word is one and the same with its author, the Lord. Yet unlike with some books that engross us, the Word can feel like a tangled mess that reveals little about the true character of God, much less the inner workings of the mind of Jesus. I have here two images that can help us understand this. On one side there is a brain scan. On the other, an open copy of the Word. At first glance these pictures have little to do with each other. But think about what this brain scan really is. To you and I and most other people it reveals little. But to a trained doctor it would reveal a great deal about what is going on in a person’s mind at a given time. It is a snapshot into someone’s inner life, but one that we can only read if we have the proper training to understand it.

On the other hand we have a copy of the Word. As with the brain scan it reveals what is going on in someone’s mind at a given point. In this case it is the mind of the Lord that is being revealed. And like the brain scan, even though any particular story we might open up to reveals the Lord’s mind, we need the proper training to understand it. If we read this document correctly than we will discover the loving mind of the Lord, Jesus Christ. Every page, every sentence, contains insight into how He thinks and what it is that He loves and cares about. The purpose then of exploring the stories of the Word in light of how they reflect the life and mind of Jesus Christ is that we will then be better equipped to follow His example, not only following the path He set with His words and actions, but going deeper to follow the path He set in His mind.

With this in mind, over the next three weeks we will be looking to the story of Abraham. Even though Abraham lived thousands of years before Jesus was even born, his life perfectly reflects the inner life that Jesus experienced. When we can see this connection we will be better able to not only understand the Lord, but to understand how to model our lives on His. This week we will spend a short time getting a glimpse of how this works. Over the next two weeks we will go deeper into the story of Abraham and into the mind of Jesus. We begin with the first inkling that Abraham had that God had chosen him for a special purpose. As a side note, early on Abraham was known as Abram:

Now the LORD had said to Abram:

“Get out of your country,

From your family

And from your father’s house,

To a land that I will show you.

I will make you a great nation;

I will bless you

And make your name great;

And you shall be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you,

And I will curse him who curses you;

And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

So Abram departed as the LORD had spoken to him, and Lot went with him. And Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran….

Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said, “To your descendants I will give this land.” And there he built an altar to the LORD, who had appeared to him. And he moved from there to the mountain east of Bethel, and he pitched his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east; there he built an altar to the LORD and called on the name of the LORD. So Abram journeyed, going on still toward the South. (Genesis 12:1-4, 7-9)

Prior to the moment described here Abraham did not know of Jehovah in the slightest. He was in fact an idol-worshipper like most people of His day. Yet when he heard the call from the Lord he responded and moved with his family and everything he owned into a new land. This moment may not seem significant but it is the beginning of the epic saga of the Children of Israel, and the land to which the Lord sent Abraham would one day become the Kingdom of Israel. What began as the simple travels of one man from a faraway country into the heart of the Holy Land would lead to momentous things in the future. What we see here is simply the seed being planted, but a seed that would grow to become a great nation, a nation of which the Lord said it would become a blessing for all the nations of the earth. That is the reason that God called Abraham in the first place.

What can this simple beginning tell us about the mind of Jesus? Like the Kingdom of Israel, the great works that Jesus would do needed a beginning: a seed had to be planted that would grow into something greater. That seed was planted in Jesus early childhood. Just as Abraham was called to enter into the heart of what would become the earthly Kingdom of Israel, Jesus from the very beginning was brought to the heart of His own heavenly Kingdom. That heart, the heart and soul of heaven, is childlike innocence and love. Now as with Abraham, the journey does not end there: for Abraham, many centuries would pass before his people were a great nation. And for the Lord it would take years of temptation and struggle before He could fulfill His mission. But all of it, every last bit, stemmed from that first seed planted in childhood.

It might seem odd to think that everything the Lord needed to face the hells, to put them in their place, and to conquer them was established while He was still a little boy, but it is so. It is in fact the case for each of us that something essential to our life is planted within before we are even aware. Listen to this passage from the Teachings of the New Church that speaks to how powerful our childhoods are for our later lives:

The Lord had first of all to be endowed from infancy with the heavenly things of love - the heavenly things of love consisting in love towards Jehovah and love towards the neighbour, and in innocence itself present in those loves. From these, as from the very sources of life, flows every single thing, for all other things are simply derivatives. These heavenly things are implanted in a person primarily in the state of infancy through to childhood. (Secrets of Heaven 1450)

As a child Jesus received deep stores of love and innocence. This took place before He could even talk or conceptualize these things in His mind. They were simply blessings of love that would remain with Him for the rest of His life, and indeed, to eternity.

This stage of the Lord’s life was not trivial. Without these perfectly innocent and heavenly remains sitting at the core of His being He never would have been able to face the onslaught of hell later in life. That which would later give Him strength in temptation, even on the Cross itself, had been received in childhood innocence and stored away, hidden, until such time as it would be needed. Every loving word and parable, every miracle, every demon cast out and every sickness made well, all flowed from the fountain of love, a fountain established in His youth. We all know the power of little children and their heavenly innocence. There was never a moment that that innocence of infancy dissipated. We don’t often think of the fact that while that innocence recedes and is hidden, it never leaves us.

We all have those same heavenly remnants left over from our childhood. Before we were born the Lord was with us in the womb. He has blessed us, as Jesus was blessed, so that now we have all the innocence and power of a child. As does every human being you will meet. The boss who frustrates you to no end, the spouse that drives you crazy, the acquaintance you can’t stand, all were once little children that would have been beautiful to hold and love, that were beautiful and were held and were loved. None of that goes away. It is always there, part of you, making you who you are. And any time you make an effort to show true love, you are only able to do so because love was once the only thing you knew.

So what do we do with this information? Abraham heard the call of God and left his home to dwell in a new land. Jesus felt a call from deep within His soul and left his own desires to accept the heavenly love that was welling like a fountain within Him. Can we follow the example of both Abraham and Jesus? Will you answer the call? Will you remember when times are hard that once in this life all you knew was love? That deep within your heart beats the love and innocence of childhood? That every human you ever meet has that same source of love and innocence within them? And finally will you use that love to become a blessing to those around you? Jesus answered this call. He continues to answer this call. And He calls on us to do the same. Will you answer? Amen.
(Read the next sermon in this 3-part series, about Bargaining)

434. Of the tribe of Reuben were sealed twelve thousand.- That this signifies the light of truth from that love, and that all who are therein are in heaven and come into heaven, is plain from the signification of the tribe of Reuben, which denotes those who are in the light of truth, of which we shall speak presently; and from the signification of twelve thousand, as denoting, all things and all persons, concerning which see above (n. 430); here all who are in the light of truth from the good of love to the Lord, and this love is signified by the tribe of Judah, as shown just above (n. 433:1); and from the signification of the sealed, as denoting, those who are in heaven and come into heaven, concerning also which see above (n. [427:2], 433). It has been previously shown, that the twelve tribes of Israel represented, and thence signify in the Word, all things of the church, that each tribe signifies some universal essential of it, and that Judah signifies love to the Lord, but Reuben light from that love, will be seen in what follows.

[2] Reuben, and therefore the tribe named from him, in the highest sense, signifies the Lord as to foresight or foreknowledge; in the internal sense, spiritual faith and the understanding of truth; and in the external sense, sight. And because Reuben in the internal sense, signifies faith and the understanding, he also signifies the light of truth, for faith exists from the light of truth, from which the understanding is enlightened; for where the light of truth is, there are understanding and faith.

[3] Reuben or his tribe has a signification similar to that of the apostle Peter. For the twelve apostles, like the twelve tribes of Israel, represented all things of the church, and each apostle some universal essential of it. And because Peter has a representation similar to that of Reuben, he was therefore the first of the apostles, as Reuben was the first of the sons of Jacob. That Peter signifies truth in the light, and also faith, may be seen above (n. 9, 411:12-15).

[4] Reuben was the first of the sons of Jacob, and the tribe called after him is therefore named first in many passages of the Word, because he was the first-begotten, and the first-begotten in the Word signifies truth from good, or, what is the same thing, truth in the light, and therefore faith from charity. For truth, and that which pertains to faith, appears to man to be first, for it enters by the hearing into the memory, and is called forth thence into the thought; and what a man thinks, this he sees and perceives by interior sight, and that which is first perceived and seen is first, but only apparently, not actually. Good is actually the first-begotten, or the first thing of the church, because truth exists from good, for good forms itself in truths, and by means of truths renders itself visible, therefore truth is good in form. Truth is consequently said to be from good, and faith from charity, for that which is from anything is that thing in an image, and viewed in itself it is good formed and born; this therefore in the spiritual sense of the Word is the first-begotten. Moreover, with infants, the good of innocence is the first thing imparted by the Lord, and from this a man first becomes man. And because good is of love, and because man does not reflect upon his love, but upon his thought from the memory, and since good possesses no quality until formed into truths, and as apart from quality nothing is perceived, therefore it is not known that good is the first, and the first-begotten. For good is first formed by the Lord in man, and is brought forth by means of truths, in which good is in its own form and effigy.

[5] Moreover it must be known that the truths which a man receives from the Word, and from doctrine and preaching from it, during his infancy and childhood, appear indeed to be truths, yet are not truths with him; they are only like shells without kernels; or like the form of body and face without soul and life. They do not become truths before they are received in the will, for then they are first received by a man, and begin to live in him. For the will is the man himself, and all good is of the will, and all truth is of the understanding thence. From these things the reason is clear why the tribe of Judah, which signifies the good of love to the Lord, is named first, and afterwards the tribe of Reuben, which signifies truth in the light, from that good.

[6] It is to be noted, that all the light in which truth appears is from the light of heaven and this is from the Lord. The light of heaven is from the Divine Good of His Divine Love. The light of heaven is the Divine Good in form. These two in heaven are one, and are received by the angels as one. They must also be received by man as one, in order that he may have communion with angels. But these things are fully explained in the Arcana Coelestia, to this effect, that when man is being regenerated, truth is in the first place and good in the second, not actually but apparently, but that when he is regenerated, good is in the first place and truth in the second, actually and perceptibly (n. 3324, 3325, 3330, 3336, 3494, 3539, 3548, 3556, 3563, 3570, 3576, 3603, 3701, 4243, 4245, 4247, 4337, 4925, 4926, 4928, 4930, 4977, 5351, 6256, 6269, 6273, 8516, 10110); consequently good is the first and last of regeneration (n. 9337). Because truth appears to be in the first place, and good in the second, when man is being regenerated, or what is the same, when he is becoming a church, therefore it was a matter of controversy among the ancients, whether the truth of faith or the good of charity is the first-begotten of the church (n. 367, 2435). The good of charity is the first-begotten of the church actually, but the truth of faith only apparently (n. 3325, 3494, 4925, 4926, 4928, 4930, 8042, 8080). The first-begotten, in the Word, also signifies that primary thing of the church, to which is attributed priority and superiority (n. 3325). The Lord is therefore called the First-begotten, because in Him and from Him is all the good of love, of charity, and of faith (n. 3325).

[7] Because truth is apparently in the first place, therefore Reuben was the first-begotten, and was named from "sight" (visus), as is evident in Moses:

"Leah conceived, and bare a son, and she called his name Reuben; for she said, because Jehovah hath seen my affliction; now therefore my man (vir) ¹ will love me" (Genesis 29:32).

Although these are historical facts, they nevertheless contain a spiritual sense. For each and all things in the Word are from the spiritual world, because from the Lord, and when these things were sent down out of heaven into the natural world, they were clothed with a corresponding natural sense, such as is the sense of the letter of the Word. Therefore the nativities of the sons of Jacob signify spiritual nativities, which describe how good and truth are born with man while he is being regenerated by the Lord. Hence by "Leah conceived and bare a son," is signified spiritual conception and birth; she called his name Reuben, signifies its quality; by she said, Jehovah hath seen, is signified in the highest sense, foresight, in the internal sense, faith, in the interior sense, understanding, and in the external sense, sight, in the present case, faith from the Lord; by "my affliction," is signified the state of arriving at good; now therefore my man (vir) will love me, signifies good of truth thence. But these words are explained in the Arcana Coelestia 3860-3866).

In the original tongue, Reuben signifies sight, and sight, in the spiritual sense, signifies faith and the understanding of truth, and, in the highest sense, the Divine foresight. This is evident from what is said in the Arcana Coelestia concerning the signification of seeing and sight, where it is shown that sight in the highest sense, which treats of the Lord, signifies foresight (n. 2807, 2837, 2839, 3686, 3854, 3863, 10428). Sight in the internal sense signifies faith, because spiritual sight is sight from faith, and those things which pertain to faith are seen in the spiritual world (n. 897, 2325, 2807, 3863, 3869, 5400, 10705). To see also signifies to understand and perceive truth (n. 2150, 2325, 2807, 3764, 3863, 3869, 10705). Internal sight is the understanding, and this sees by means of the eyes of the body; the sight of the understanding is from the light of heaven (n. 1524, 3138, 3167, 4408, 5114, 6608, 8707, 9128, 9399, 10569).

[8] That Reuben signifies truth from good, or faith from charity, is evident from the mandrakes which he found in the field, and gave to his mother, concerning which it is thus written in Moses:

"And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes in the field, and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, Give me, I pray, of thy son's mandrakes. And she said unto her, Is it a small matter that thou hast taken my man (vir)? and wilt thou take away my son's mandrakes also? And Rachel said, Therefore he shall lie with thee this night for thy son's mandrakes. And Jacob came out of the field in the evening, and Leah went out to meet him, and said, Thou must come in unto me; because hiring, I have hired thee with my son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night, and she conceived, and bare Jacob a son" Issachar (Genesis 30:14-18).

He who does not know what mandrakes signify, also what Reuben, Jacob, Leah, and Rachel represented, cannot possibly understand why such things happened, and are recorded in the Word. But that in the sense of the letter the Divine does not appear is evident for the reason that it is in the Word where everything is Divine. The Divine contained in these words is plain from the spiritual sense, in which mandrakes signify the marriage of good and truth. Reuben represents truth from good; Jacob, the church as to truth. Leah and Rachel represent the church as to good, but Leah represents the external church, and Rachel, the internal. By the mandrakes, found by Reuben, is therefore signified the marriage (conjugiale) which exists between truth and good. It is this marriage between truth and good in the internal or spiritual man which makes the internal church, and because that truth which makes the external church is the first in the external or natural man, therefore the mandrakes were found by Reuben, who represented truth from good. They were first given to his mother, Leah, who represented the external church, but they were given by Leah to Rachel, who represented the internal church, in order that Leah might lie with Jacob. These things are more fully explained in the Arcana Coelestia 3940-3952).

[9] Because Reuben represented truth from good, or faith from charity, therefore, also, he exhorted his brethren not to kill Joseph, wishing to deliver him out of their hand; and he grieved exceedingly when Joseph was not found in the pit (Genesis 37:21, 22, 29, 30). This is explained in the Arcana Coelestia 4731-4738, and n. 4761-4766).

[10] Because Reuben or his tribe signified truth from good, or faith from charity, therefore the camp of that tribe in the wilderness was towards the south, and the camp towards the south was called the camp of Reuben (Num. 2:10-16). For the encampments of the tribes of Israel represented the arrangement of the angelic societies in heaven; and the angelic societies dwell in the quarters according to their states as to good and truth (see above, 422:1-4). In the southern quarter dwell those who are in the light of truth from good; and as the tribe of Reuben represented truth from good or truth in light, therefore it encamped on the south.

[11] Because truth from good, which the tribe of Reuben represented, is in the natural man, therefore an inheritance beyond Jordan was given to the tribe of Reuben (Num. 32:1 to end; Deuteronomy 3:12-20; Joshua 13:1 to end, and chap. 18:7). For the land of Canaan represented, and thence signifies the church in the Word. The region beyond Jordan signified the external church, the region on this side Jordan, the internal church, and the river Jordan the limit between them. And truth from good, or faith from charity, makes the church; truth from good in the natural man, the external church; and because the tribe of Reuben represented this attribute of the church, therefore an inheritance beyond Jordan was allotted to this tribe. Why inheritances beyond Jordan were also given to the tribe of Gad, and to the half tribe of Manasseh, will be explained in what follows.

[12] The conjunction of each church, that is to say the external and internal, which is like the conjunction of the natural and spiritual man, was represented, and, in the spiritual sense, is described by the altar which the sons of Reuben, of Gad, and of Manasseh built near the Jordan, and about which there was a strife between these tribes and the rest; but it was said that that altar should be for a witness that, although they dwelt beyond Jordan, they should still serve Jehovah in common with the rest; therefore they called the altar "A witness between us that Jehovah is God" (Josh. 22:9 to end). For Jordan signified the medium between the external and internal of the church. The land of Canaan on this side Jordan, signified the internal church, and the land beyond Jordan, the external church which was also represented by the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh, whose inheritances were allotted there; and that altar signified the common worship of each church, and thus conjunction.

[13] That Reuben signifies truth in the natural man is evident also from the prophecy of Deborah and Barak in the Book of Judges:

"In the divisions of Reuben they are great, statutes of the heart; Wherefore sittest thou among the baggage to hear the shrill bleatings of the flocks? In the divisions of Reuben, where there are great searchings of heart, Gilead thou dwellest in the passage of Jordan" (5:15-17).

No one can understand these words unless what the prophecy treats of be known, and also the signification of the divisions of Reuben, of baggage, of the bleatings of the flocks, and of Gilead. The subject is the church among the Israelites, in a state of vastation. The divisions of Reuben signify all things, both truths and goods, in the natural man; baggage signifies the cognitions and scientifics there; the bleatings of the flocks signify the perceptions and thoughts thereof; and Gilead signifies the natural man. When these things are known it will be evident that the meaning in the spiritual sense is, that when the church is destroyed, the natural man, with that which is contained therein, is separated from the spiritual man, although it ought on the contrary to be conjoined with it; and when it is conjoined, then truths from good exist there, by means of which a combat against falsities from evil takes place; for the natural man must fight against these from the spiritual man. Statutes of the heart and searchings of heart, signify those truths from good, which are in the natural man from the spiritual. For the heart signifies the good of love, while statutes and searchings of the heart denote all those things that are determined and arranged in the natural man from good in the spiritual. These things are said of Reuben, because his tribe dwelt beyond Jordan in Gilead, and did not join with Deborah and Barak when they fought against Sisera, but only the tribes of Issachar and Zebulun; for Sisera, in the spiritual sense, means falsity from evil destroying the church.

[14] Reuben signifies the light of truth, and therefore the understanding of the Word, in Moses,

"Let Reuben live, and not die; yet shall his men be a number" (Deuteronomy 33:6).

Reuben here means the understanding of the Word, enlightened by light from heaven; and because there are few who receive enlightenment, it is therefore said, "Yet shall his men be a number," number signifying, fewness and a few.

[15] That Reuben signifies truth from good, or faith from charity, is evident from the opposite sense, in which he is also mentioned. In that sense, Reuben signifies truth separated from good, or faith separated from charity. And truth apart from good is not truth, except merely in regard to the expression and sound, for it is a scientific residing in the memory of the natural man, that is to say, only in the entrance to the man, and not within him in his life. The memory of the natural man is merely the entrance to him, nor does truth become truth with him until he wills it and does it, for then it first enters and receives life; previous to this, light from heaven does not flow in and enlighten. The case is similar with faith separated from charity, for truth is of faith, and good is of charity.

[16] That Reuben, in the opposite sense, signifies faith separated from charity, is evident from his adultery with Bilhah his father's concubine; concerning this it is written as follows in Moses:

"And it came to pass, when Israel dwelt in the land" Ephrath-Bethlehem, "that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine; and Israel heard of it" (Genesis 35:22).

Ephrath-Bethlehem signifies the spiritual church, which is in truths from good, or in faith from charity. To separate the good of charity from the truths of faith, is signified by the adultery of Reuben. For truth is profaned when it is not united with its own good, which is the good of charity, since it is then united with the love of self and of the world, which is adulteration. All adulteries also, of which many kinds are recounted in Leviticus (18:6-23), correspond to the adulterations of good and truth. That the adultery committed by Reuben corresponds to faith separated from charity, has been made known and testified to me from things heard and seen in the spiritual world, where such a sphere of adultery is perceived to go forth from those who have separated charity from faith in doctrine and in life.

[17] Because this also was signified by Reuben, therefore the primogeniture was taken away from him by his father, and given to Joseph and his sons. That it was taken from Reuben is evident from these words of his father:

"Reuben my first-born, thou art my strength and the beginning of my might, excellent in eminence and excellent in worth. Unstable as water thou shalt not excel, because thou wentest up to thy father's bed, then thou profanedst [it]; he went up to my couch" (Genesis 49:4).

Here, by Reuben my first-born, is signified faith, which is apparently in the first place, or truth born from good. Thou art my strength, and the beginning of my might, signifies that good has power (potentia) by means of it and truth its primary power. By excellent in eminence and excellent in worth, is signified that glory and authority (potestas) are therefrom. By unstable as water, is signified that it is not so with faith separated from charity, and by thou shalt not excel, is signified that such faith has neither glory nor authority. Because thou wentest up to thy father's bed, signifies because the truth of faith separated from the good of charity forms a filthy union; then thou profanedst [it], signifies conjunction with the love of self and of the world, and consequently with evil, which is profane. He went up to my couch, signifies the contamination of spiritual good in the Natural. But these things are fully explained in the Arcana Coelestia 6341-6350).

[18] That the primogeniture was therefore given to the two sons of Joseph, Ephraim and Manasseh, is meant by these words of his father Israel to Joseph:

"Now thy two sons, born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came to thee into Egypt, are mine, Ephraim and Manasseh, even as Reuben and Simeon shall be mine" (Genesis 48:5).

And in the [First] Book of Chronicles:

Reuben "is the first-born, but because he polluted his father's bed, his primogeniture was given to the sons of Joseph the son of Israel" (5:1, 2).

For Ephraim in the Word has a signification similar to that of Reuben, namely, the understanding of truth, and truth in light. It is said Ephraim and Manasseh shall be the sons of Israel, even as Reuben and Simeon, because Reuben signifies the understanding of truth, and Simeon, the will of truth; and Ephraim and Manasseh signify similar things. From these things it is now evident, what universal essential of the church is signified in the Word by Reuben.

Footnotes: