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.

3148. And the feet of the men that were with him. That this signifies the purification of all things belonging to Him, in the natural man, is evident from the signification of “feet,” as being the things of the natural man (see n. 2162); and from the signification of “the men that were with him,” as being all things there. It was the custom for travelers, when they came into any house, to wash their feet; as when the brethren of Joseph were introduced into Joseph’s house (Genesis 43:24); and when the Levite and his attendant were received into the house of the old man (Judges 19:21); and when Uriah on his return home was commanded by David to go down to his house and to wash his feet (2 Samuel 11:8). The reason was that traveling and journeying signified what relates to instruction, and thence to life (see n. 1293, 1457, 1463, 2025); and that these were to be purified was shown above; and further, lest the impurity understood in the spiritual sense should adhere, and defile the house, that is, the man; as is also evident from the fact that the disciples were to shake off the dust of the feet, if the city or the house would not receive peace (Matthew 10:14).

2547. That thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin. That this signifies that thereby the doctrine of faith and all doctrinal things would be in danger, is evident from the signification of “Abimelech,” here meant by “me,” as being the doctrine of faith; and from the signification of “kingdom,” as being the truth of doctrine or that which is doctrinal. That in the internal sense “kingdom” signifies the truths of doctrine; and in the opposite sense, falsities of doctrine, is evident from the Word; as in Jeremiah:

He is the Former of all things, and the scepter of His inheritance Jehovah Zebaoth is His name. Thou art My hammer, weapons of war; and I will scatter nations in thee, and destroy kingdoms in thee (Jeremiah 51:19-20),

where the Lord is treated of, who evidently will not scatter nations nor destroy kingdoms, but will scatter and destroy the things signified by nations and kingdoms, namely, the evils and falsities of doctrine.

[2] In Ezekiel:

Behold, I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations whither they be gone, and will gather them from every side, and bring them into their own land; I will make them one nation in the land in the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king to them all; and they shall no more be two nations, neither shall they any more be divided into two kingdoms (Ezekiel 37:21-22);

here “Israel” denotes the spiritual church; and “nation” the good of that church or of doctrine. (That “nations” denote goods may be seen above, n. 1259, 1260, 1416, 1849.) “Kingdom” denotes its truths. It is evident that something else than nations and kingdoms is here meant by “nations and kingdoms,” for it is said of the sons of Israel or of the Israelites that they are to be “gathered and brought back into the land,” the fact being that when dispersed among the nations they were transformed into Gentiles.

[3] In Isaiah:

I will confound Egypt with Egypt, and they shall fight every man against his brother, and every man against his companion, city against city, kingdom against kingdom (Isaiah 19:2),

where “Egypt” denotes reasonings from memory-knowledges concerning the truths of faith (n. 1164, 1165, 1186); “city” denotes doctrine, here one that is heretical (n. 402, 2268, 2449); “kingdom” denotes the falsity of doctrine; so that “city against city, and kingdom against kingdom” denotes that heresies and falsities will fight among themselves; in like manner as is denoted by what the Lord said in regard to the consummation of the age, in Matthew:

Nation shall rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom (Matthew 24:7);

denoting evils against evils, and falsities against falsities.

[4] That which Daniel prophesied in regard to the four kingdoms (Daniel 2:37-46; 7:17); and concerning the kingdoms of Media and Persia (Daniel 8:20); and concerning the kingdoms of the king of the south and the king of the north (Daniel 11:1 and that which John prophesied in the Revelation concerning kings and kingdoms, have no other signification: “kingdoms” there merely mean the states of the church in respect to truths and falsities. States of monarchs and of the kingdoms of the earth in the sense of the letter, are in the internal sense states of the church and of the Lord’s kingdom; in which sense there are none other than spiritual and celestial things; for regarded in itself the Lord’s Word is solely spiritual and celestial; but in order that it may be read and apprehended by every man whatever, the things of heaven are set forth by such things as are on earth.