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.

491. The same things are signified by “sons” and “daughters” in this chapter (verses 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, 19, 26, 30), but such as is the church, such are the “sons and daughters” that is, such are the goods and truths; the truths and goods here spoken of are such as were distinctly perceived, because they are predicated of the Most Ancient Church, the principal and parent of all the other and succeeding churches.

8094. 'Although that was near' means that this is the first to present itself. This is clear from the meaning of 'being near', when said in reference to separated faith, as the fact that it is the first to present itself. A brief statement needs to be made about how one should understand this explanation, that the particular belief regarding separated faith or faith alone is the first to present itself. Evil in life is accompanied by its own falsity, and a person subject to evil in life has this falsity hidden away inside himself. Sometimes he does not even know that it is there. But the moment he thinks about the Church's truths, and in particular about salvation, that falsity emerges and reveals itself; and if he is unable to deny the truth itself, the general aspects of it, he explains it in a way to suit his evil, and in so doing falsifies it. When therefore he thinks about faith and charity, which are the indispensable elements of the Church and of salvation, faith instantly presents itself, but not charity since this is opposed to evil in life. As a consequence too he sets aside charity and gives preference to faith alone. From this it is evident that the truths of faith are 'near', but not forms of the good of faith; that is, those truths are the first to present themselves, but not these forms of good.

[2] From this incorrect and false starting-point many more ideas that are false and incorrect then follow, such as the ideas that good works contribute nothing to salvation; that a person's life does not follow him after death; that a person is then saved by mercy alone through faith, irrespective of the life he has been leading in the world; that the worst criminal is saved through faith in the final hour of his life; and that evils are wiped away in an instant. These and others like them are the ideas that enter human thought and establish themselves from that false starting-point; they extend from it in a continuous chain. But the way in which these ideas are seen would be altogether different if charity and life were the starting-point.