4802. There are also spirits who, even though they are evil ones, do to some extent allow the light of heaven to come in and who accept the truths of faith, so that they have some perception of truth. They accept the truths enthusiastically, yet not so that they may live according to them, but so that they may boast about being seen to have more understanding and keen-sightedness than others. For the human understanding is such that it can accept truths, even though none make truths their own except those people who live according to them. Unless the human understanding was like this no one could be reformed.

[2] Those who have been like this in the world, that is to say, have understood truths and yet have led a life of evil, remain the same in the next life. But there they put their ability to understand truths to the misuse of gaining dominion over others; for there they know that in truths they have a means of communication with some communities of heaven, and consequently that they can exist among the evil and be strong; for truths in the next life have power within them. But because their life is one of evil they are in hell.

[3] I have talked to two who during their lifetime were like this. They were amazed they should be in hell even though they had believed very strongly in the truths of faith. But I told them that the light in them by which they understood truths was like that of winter in the world. I said that objects in all their beauty and colours were no less visible than in the light of summer; yet in that winter light everything died off and nothing at all pleasant and delightful showed itself. Then I told those two spirits that because the end they had in view to understanding truths had been their own exaltation and consequently had been a selfish end, the sphere emanating from their ends in view when these rose towards the interior heavens, to the angels there, who perceived solely people's ends, could not be tolerated and were cast aside. This is why they were in hell.

[4] I went on to say that in former times people of this kind, more than any others, were called serpents of the tree of knowledge; for when life is the subject of their reasoning they speak against truths. They are, what is more, like a woman who has a lovely face but a foul stench, and who is therefore an outcast from society wherever she goes. Like her, when such people in the next life move towards angelic communities they are in actual fact emitting a stench, which even they themselves are aware of when they approach those communities. From this also one may see what faith is when devoid of the life of faith.

6753. 'And said, Because I drew him out of the water' means a deliverance from falsities. This is clear from the meaning of 'the water', here the water of the river of Egypt, as falsities, dealt with in 6693; and from the meaning of 'drawing out' as a deliverance. These words contain the essential nature of the state meant by Moses' name; and the meaning in the highest sense is this: The nature of the state was such that, in order to make His Human the law of God the Lord delivered it from all falsity that clung to the Human He received from His mother. He continued doing this until He became the Divine Law, which is Divine Truth itself, and after that, having been glorified, became Divine Goodness, which is the Essential Being (Esse) of Divine Truth, that is, Jehovah.

260. The internal or spiritual sense of the Word contains innumerable arcana.

The Word in its internal sense contains innumerable things, which exceed human comprehension (n. 3085-3086). It also contains inexplicable things (n. 1965). Which are represented only to angels, and understood by them (n. 167). The internal sense of the Word contains arcana of heaven, which relate to the Lord and His kingdom in the heavens and on earth (n. 1-4, 937). Those arcana do not appear in the sense of the letter (n. 937, 1502, 2161). Many things in the prophets appear to be disconnected, when yet in their internal sense they cohere in a regular and beautiful series (n. 7153, 9022). Not a single word, nor even a single iota can be omitted in the sense of the letter of the Word, without an interruption in the internal sense, and therefore, by the Divine Providence of the Lord, the Word has been preserved so entire as to every word and every point (n. 7933). Innumerable things are contained in every particular of the Word (n. 6617, 6620, 8920); and in every expression (n. 1689). There are innumerable things contained in the Lord's prayer, and in every part thereof (n. 6619). And in the precepts of the Decalogue; in the external sense of which, notwithstanding, some things are such as are known to every nation without revelation (n. 8867, 8900).

In the Word, and particularly in the prophetical parts of it, two expressions are used that seem to signify the same thing, but one expression has relation to good, and the other to truth; thus one relates to what is spiritual, the other to what is celestial (n. 683, 707, 2516, 8339). Goods and truths are conjoined in a wonderful manner in the Word, and that conjunction is apparent only to him who knows the internal sense (n. 10554). And thus there is a Divine marriage and a heavenly marriage in the Word, and in every part thereof (n. 683, 793, 801, 2173, 2516, 2712, 5138, 7022). The Divine marriage is the marriage of Divine good and Divine truth, thus it is the Lord, in whom alone that marriage exists (n. 3004-3005, 3009, 5138, 5194[1-2], 5502, 6343, 7945, 8339, 9263, 9314). "Jesus" signifies the Divine good, and "Christ" the Divine truth; and both the Divine marriage in heaven, which is the marriage of the Divine good and the Divine truth (n. 3004-3005, 3009). This marriage is in every part of the Word, in its internal sense; thus the Lord, as to the Divine good and the Divine truth, is in every part of the Word (n. 5502). The marriage of good and truth from the Lord in heaven and the church, is called the heavenly marriage (n. 2508, 2618, 2803, 3004, 3211, 3952, 6179). Therefore in this respect the Word is a kind of heaven (n. 2173, 10126). Heaven is compared in the Word to a marriage, on account of the marriage of good and truth therein (n. 2758, 3132, 4434[1-10], 4835).

The internal sense is the very doctrine of the church (n. 9025, 9430, 10400). They who understand the Word according to the internal sense, know the essential true doctrine of the church, inasmuch as the internal sense contains it (n. 9025 , 9430, 10400). The internal of the Word is also the internal of the church, and likewise the internal of worship (n. 10460). The Word is the doctrine of love to the Lord, and of charity towards the neighbor (n. 3419-3420).

The Word in the letter is as a cloud, and in the internal sense it is glory, see the Preface to the 18th chapter of Genesis (n. 5922 , 6343), where the words, "The Lord shall come in the clouds of heaven with glory," are explained. "A cloud" in the Word signifies the Word in the sense of the letter, and "glory" signifies the Word in the internal sense, see the Preface to the 18th chapter of Genesis (n. 4060, 4391, 5922, 6343, 6752, 8106, 8781, 9430, 10551, 10574). Those things which are in the sense of the letter, respectively to those which are in the internal sense, are like rude projections round a polished optical cylinder, by which nevertheless is exhibited in the cylinder a beautiful image of a man (n. 1871). In the other life, they who only allow and acknowledge the sense of the letter of the Word, are represented by a deformed old woman; but they who allow and acknowledge the internal sense, together with the literal sense, are represented by a virgin beautifully clothed (n. 1774). The Word in its whole complex is an image of heaven, since the Word is the Divine truth, and the Divine truth makes heaven; and as heaven relates to one man, therefore the Word is in that respect as an image of man (n. 1871). Heaven in one complex relates to one man, may be seen in the work on Heaven and Hell (n. 59-67). And the Divine truth proceeding from the Lord makes heaven (n. 126-140, 200-212). The Word is beautifully and agreeably exhibited before the angels (n. 1767-1768). The sense of the letter is as the body, and the internal sense, as the soul of that body (n. 8943). Thence the life of the Word is from its internal sense (n. 1405, 4857). The Word is pure in the internal sense, and does not appear so in the literal sense (n. 2362, 2395). The things which are in the sense of the letter of the Word are holy from the internal (n. 10126, 10728).

In the historical parts of the Word there is also an internal sense, but within them (n. 4989). Thus the historical as well as the prophetic parts of the Word contain arcana of heaven (n. 755, 1659, 1709, 2310, 2333). The angels do not perceive those historical things, but spiritually (n. 6884). The reason why the interior arcana which are in the historicals, are less evident to man than those that are in the propheticals (n. 2176, 6597).

The quality of the internal sense of the Word further shown (n. 1756, 1984, 2004, 2663, 3035, 7089, 10604, 10614). And illustrated by comparisons (n. 1873).