9371. THE INTERNAL SENSE.

Verses 1-2. And He said unto Moses, Come up unto Jehovah, thou and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and bow yourselves afar off; and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah; and they shall not come near; and the people shall not come up with him. “And He said unto Moses,” signifies that which concerns the Word in general; “come up unto Jehovah,” signifies conjunction with the Lord; “thou and Aaron,” signifies the Word in the internal sense and the external sense; “Nadab and Abihu,” signifies doctrine from both senses; “and seventy of the elders of Israel,” signifies the chief truths of the church which are of the Word, or of doctrine, and which agree with good; “and bow yourselves afar off,” signifies humiliation and adoration from the heart, and then the influx of the Lord; “and Moses, he alone, shall come near unto Jehovah,” signifies the conjunction and presence of the Lord through the Word in general; “and they shall not come near,” signifies no separate conjunction and presence; “and the people shall not come up with him,” signifies no conjunction whatever with the external apart from the internal.

1672. And the kings that were with him. That this signifies the apparent truth which is of that good, is evident from the signification of “kings” in the Word. “Kings,” “kingdoms,” and “peoples,” in the historical and the prophetical parts of the Word, signify truths and the things which are of truths, as may be abundantly confirmed. In the Word an accurate distinction is made between a “people” and a “nation;” by a “people” are signified truths, and by a “nation” goods, as before shown (n. 1259, 1260). “Kings” are predicated of peoples, but not so much of nations. Before the sons of Israel sought for kings, they were a nation, and represented good, or the celestial; but after they desired a king, and received one, they became a people, and did not represent good or the celestial, but truth or the spiritual; which was the reason why this was imputed to them as a fault (see 1 Samuel 8:7-22, concerning which subject, of the Lord’s Divine mercy elsewhere). As Chedorlaomer is named here, and it is added, “the kings that were with him,” both good and truth are signified; by “Chedorlaomer,” good, and by “the kings,” truth. But what was the quality of the good and truth at the beginning of the Lord’s temptations has already been stated.

7780. 'Even to the firstborn of the servant-girl who is behind the mill' means falsified truths of faith that occupy the very last place. This is clear from the meaning of 'the firstborn' as faith, dealt with immediately above in 7779, and since faith is meant, so is truth in its entirety because truth, being that which one ought to believe, is the component of faith; and from the meaning of 'a servant-girl' as a rather external affection for truth, or an affection for knowledge, dealt with in 1895, 2567, 3835, 3849, and 'the servant-girl behind the mill' as the most external affection for knowledge since 'behind the mill' means that which occupies the very last place. The expression 'behind the mill' is used because 'the mill' has reference to matters of faith. For by means of a mill grain is ground into flour and so prepared for making bread, and 'flour' means truth which results in good, 'bread' the actual good that results from it. Thus 'sitting at the mill' is acquiring and learning the kinds of things that will be of service to faith, and through faith of service to charity. This is why when the ancients described learning the basic elements of faith they described it as 'sitting at the mill', or learning elements even more basic as 'sitting behind the mill'. It is because such things were meant that in His teachings about the final period of the Church the Lord says,

Two women grinding at the mill; one will be taken and the other will be left behind. Matthew 24:41.

These words would never have been used if 'the mill' had not meant matters of faith. For what 'the mill' and 'grinding' mean in the internal sense, see 4335. With regard to the truths of faith that occupy the first place and those that occupy the very last, it should be recognized that the truths of faith which emanate directly from the good of charity occupy the first place, for they are the outward form taken by good, whereas the truths which occupy the last place are bare truths. For when truths derive in succession from good, each degree of them departs further away from it, till at length they become bare truths. This is the kind of truths meant by 'servant-girls behind mills'.