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.

3128. And told her mother’s house according to these words. That this signifies toward natural good of every kind whithersoever enlightenment could reach, is evident from the signification of the “mother’s house,” as being the good of the external man, that is, natural good. (That a “house” denotes good may be seen above, n. 2233, 2234, 2559; also that man’s external or natural is from the mother, but the internal from the father, n. 1815.) The good with man is compared in the Word to a “house,” and on this account a man who is in good is called a “house of God;” but internal good is called the “father’s house,” and the good that is in the same degree is called the “house of the brethren;” but external good, which is the same as natural good, is called the “mother’s house.” Moreover all good and truth are born in this manner, namely, by the influx of internal good as of a father into external good as of a mother.

[2] As this verse treats of the origin of the truth which is to be conjoined with good in the rational, it is therefore said that Rebekah (by whom this truth is represented) ran to the house of her mother, for that was the origin of this truth. For as before said and shown, all good flows in by an internal way (that is, by the way of the soul) into man’s rational, and through this into his faculty of knowing, even into that which is of the senses; and by enlightenment there it causes truths to be seen. Truths are called forth thence, and are divested of their natural form, and are conjoined with good in the midway, that is, in the rational, and at the same time they make the man rational, and at last spiritual. But how these things are accomplished is utterly unknown to man; because at this day it is scarcely known what good is, and that it is distinct from truth; still less that man is reformed by means of the influx of good into truth, and by the conjunction of the two; neither is it known that the rational is distinct from the natural. And when these things, which are most general, are not known, it cannot possibly be known how the initiation of truth into good, and the conjunction of the two, is effected-which are the subjects treated of in this chapter in its internal sense. But whereas these arcana have been revealed, and are manifest to those who are in good, that is, who are angelic minds, therefore however obscure they may appear to others, they nevertheless are to be set forth, because they are in the internal sense.

[3] Concerning the enlightenment from good through truth in the natural man, which is here called the “mother’s house,” the case is this: Divine good with man inflows into his rational, and through the rational into his natural, and indeed into its memory-knowledges, that is, into the knowledges and doctrinal things therein, as before said; and there by a fitting of itself in, it forms truths for itself, through which it then enlightens all things that are in the natural man. But if the life of the natural man is such that it does not receive the Divine good, but either repels it, or perverts it, or suffocates it, then the Divine good cannot be fitted in, thus it cannot form for itself truths; and consequently the natural can no longer be enlightened; for enlightenment in the natural man is effected from good through truths; and when there is no longer enlightenment, there can be no reformation. This is the reason why in the internal sense the natural man also is much treated of in regard to its quality; thus whence truth is, namely, that it is from good there.

2063. Thou shalt not call her name Sarai, for Sarah is her name. That this signifies that He will put off the human, and will put on the Divine, is evident from what was said of Abraham above (verse 5), where occur the words, “thy name shall no more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham,” by which in like manner there is signified that He will put off the human, and will put on the Divine (see n. 2009). For the letter H which was added to the name “Sarah,” was taken from the name “Jehovah,” so that Sarah, like Abraham, should represent the Lord’s Divine; and that thus should be represented the Divine marriage of Good with Truth in the Lord—Abraham representing the Divine Good, and Sarah the Divine Truth—from which should be born the Divine Rational, which is Isaac.

[2] The Divine Good, which is Love, and which in regard to the whole human race is Mercy, was the Lord’s Internal, that is, Jehovah, who is itself: this is represented by Abraham. The truth that was to be conjoined with the Divine Good was represented by Sarai; and this truth when also made Divine is represented by Sarah; for the Lord advanced to union with Jehovah successively, as already said. The truth not yet Divine represented by Sarai, was such when it was not yet so united to good as to be truth from good. But when it was so united to good as to proceed from good, it was then Divine; and the truth itself was then also good, because it was the truth of good. The truth which tends to good in order that it may be united to good, is one thing; and that which is so united to good as to proceed wholly from good, is another. The truth which is tending to good still derives something from the human; but that which is wholly united to good has put off all that is human, and has put on the Divine.

[3] This may be illustrated as before, by what is similar with man. When a man is being regenerated, that is, when he is to be conjoined with the Lord, he proceeds to the conjunction by means of truth, that is, by means of the truths of faith; for no one can be regenerated except by means of the knowledges of faith, which are the truths by means of which he proceeds to conjunction. The Lord goes to meet these by means of good, that is, by means of charity, and adjusts and fits this in to the knowledges of faith, that is, to its truths; for all truths are recipient vessels of good, and therefore the more genuine the truths are, and the more they are multiplied, the more abundantly can good accept them as vessels, reduce them to order, and finally manifest itself; so that at last the truths do not appear, except insofar as good shines through them. In this way truth becomes the celestial spiritual.

As the Lord is present solely in the good which is of charity, the man is in this way conjoined with the Lord, and by means of good, that is, by means of charity, is gifted with conscience, from which he afterwards thinks what is true and does what is right; but this conscience is in accordance with the truths and right things into which the good or charity is adjusted and fitted.