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.

7439. Let My people go, that they may serve Me. That this signifies that they should release those who are of the spiritual church in order that they may worship their God in freedom, is evident from the signification of “letting go,” as being to release; from the representation of the sons of Israel, here “My people,” as being those who are of the spiritual church (n. 6426, 6637, 6862, 6868, 7035, 7062, 7198, 7201, 7215, 7223); and from the signification of “serving Jehovah,” as being to worship. That they should worship in freedom is plain from what follows (verses 21-23), and also from the fact that all worship which is truly worship must be in freedom.

[2] The sons of Israel being called “the people of Jehovah” was not because they were better than other nations, but because they represented the people of Jehovah, that is, those who are of the Lord’s spiritual kingdom. That they were not better than other nations is plain from their life in the wilderness, in that they did not at all believe in Jehovah, but in their hearts believed in the gods of the Egyptians, as is evident from the golden calf which they made for themselves, and which they called their gods who had brought them forth out of the land of Egypt (Exodus 32:8). The same is evident also from their subsequent life in the land of Canaan, as described in the historicals of the Word, and from what was said of them by the prophets, and finally from what was said of them by the Lord.

[3] For this reason also few of them are in heaven, for they have received their lot in the other life according to their life. Therefore do not believe that they were elected to heaven in preference to others; for whoever so believes, does not believe that everyone’s life remains with him after death, nor that man must be prepared for heaven by his whole life in the world, and that this is done of the Lord’s mercy, and that none are admitted into heaven from mercy alone, regardless of how they have lived in the world. Such an opinion about heaven and the Lord’s mercy is induced by the doctrine of faith alone, and of salvation by faith alone without good works; for those who hold this doctrine have no concern about the life, and so believe that evils can be washed away like dirt by water, and thus that man can in a moment pass into the life of good, and consequently be admitted into heaven. For they do not know that if the life of evil were taken away from the evil, they would have no life whatever, and that if they who are in a life of evil were admitted into heaven, they would feel hell in themselves, and this the more grievously, the more interiorly they were admitted into heaven.

[4] From all this it can now be seen that the Israelites and Jews were by no means elected, but only accepted to represent the things that belong to heaven; and that this must needs be done in the land of Canaan, because the Lord’s church had been there from the most ancient times, and from this all the places there became representative of heavenly and Divine things. In this way also the Word could be written, and the names in it could signify such things as belong to the Lord and His kingdom.

10449. Verses 15-20 And Moses looked back and went down from the mountain, and the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand; the tablets were written on across them both, from the edge of one and from the edge of the other they were written on ¹ . And the tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. And Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted ² , and he said to Moses, There is the noise of war in the camp. And he said, It is not the noise of the cry in victory, and it is not the noise of the cry in defeat; the noise of a wretched cry I hear. And it happened, as he came near the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dances; and Moses grew hot with anger, and threw the tablets out of his hand and broke them beneath the mountain. And he took the calf which they had made, and burned it in the fire, and ground it up till it was powder, and sprinkled it on the face of the water, and made the children of Israel drink it.

'And Moses looked back and went down from the mountain' means the Word sent down from heaven. 'And the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand' means the Lord's Word specifically and generally. 'The tablets were written on across them both, from the edge of one and from the edge of the other they were written on' means through which the Lord was joined to the human race, or heaven to the world. 'And the tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets' means the outward sense of the Word and the inward - which come from the Divine - and Divine Truth. 'And Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted' means contemplating and discerning what the interiors of that nation were like. 'And he said to Moses, There is the noise of war in the camp' means an assault on the truth and good which are heaven and the Church's by falsities and evils which come from hell. 'And he said, It is not the noise of the cry in victory, and it is not the noise of the cry in defeat' means heaven acting from one side and hell from the other, thus falsity acting against truth, and truth against falsity. 'The noise of a wretched cry I hear' means the lamentable state of their interiors. 'And it happened, as he came near the camp' means near to hell, in which that nation was then. 'That he saw the calf, and the dances' means the hellish worship, which was in keeping with the delight belonging to that nation's external kinds of love, and the desire of their interiors to celebrate. 'And Moses grew hot with anger' means that nation's turning away from the internal side of the Word, the Church, and worship. 'And threw the tablets out of his hand and broke them beneath the mountain' means that the outward sense of the Word was altered and made different on account of that nation. 'And he took the calf which they had made' means the delight which that nation took in idolatrous worship. 'And burned it in the fire' means arising completely from self-love and love of the world, which are condemned to hell. 'And ground it up till it was powder' means the hellish falsity resulting from it. ['And sprinkled it on the face of the water' means a mixing together with truths.] 'And made the children of Israel drink it' means joined to that nation and made their own.

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