2. The following are some passages in the Word where it speaks of the end of heaven and earth:

Lift up your eyes to heaven and look on the earth beneath. The heavens will vanish away like smoke and the earth will grow old like a garment. (Isaiah 51:6)

Behold, I am going to create new heavens and a new earth, and the former ones will not be remembered. (Isaiah 65:17)

I will make new heavens and a new earth. (Isaiah 66:22)

The stars of heaven fell to the earth, and heaven receded like a scroll that is rolled up. (Revelation 6:13, 14)

I saw a great throne and the one who sat on it, from whose face earth and heaven fled away. And no place was found for them. (Revelation 20:11)

I saw a new heaven and a new earth; the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. (Revelation 21:1)

In these passages the “new heaven” does not mean the sky that we see with our eyes but heaven itself, where humankind is gathered in. Ever since the beginning of the Christian church a heaven has been gathered from the whole of humankind. The people in it were not angels, though, but spirits, ¹ of various religions. This is the heaven meant by the first heaven that would pass away. There will be further detail about their situation in what follows [§§65-72]. I mention it here only so that the reader may know what is meant by the first heaven that would pass away.

Anyone who thinks with any rational enlightenment can perceive that this is not referring to the sky that has stars in it, the vast firmament of creation, but to heaven spiritually understood, where angels and spirits live.

Footnotes:

9. In the Word there is a spiritual sense which is called its internal sense.

No one can know what is the spiritual or internal sense of the Word unless he knows what correspondence is: 2895, 4322. Every single thing which is in the natural world, right down to the very least thing, corresponds to something spiritual, and so signifies it: 1886-1889, 2987-3003, 3213-3227. Spiritual things, to which the natural things correspond, appear in nature under another guise, with the result that they are not recognized: 1887, 2395, 8920. Hardly anyone knows where divine quality is in the Word, though it is there in its internal or spiritual sense, the existence of which is not known today: 2899, 4989.

What lies hidden in the Word is nothing other than what its internal or spiritual sense contains, in which the Lord, the glorification of His human form, His kingdom, and His Church are dealt with, and not natural things, which are of the world: 4923. In very many places the prophetical elements are not understood, and so are of no benefit, without the internal sensefrom examples in 2608, 8020, 8398 just as what is signified by the White Horse in the Book of Revelation, from 2760. What is meant by the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven given to Peter: Preface to Genesis 22 and 9410. What is meant by flesh, blood, bread, and wine in the Holy Supper: 8682. What is meant by the prophecies of Jacob concerning his sons: Genesis 49 and 6306, 6333-6465. What is meant by many other prophecies about Judah and Israel which do not match with [aspects of] that nation, and do not coincide with one another in their literal sense: 6333, 6361, 6415, 6438, 6444. In addition there are very many others: 2608. Further, what is said about correspondence may be seen in the work Heaven and Hell, 87-115, 303-310.

Concerning the internal or spiritual sense of the Word in general: 1767-1777, 1869-1879. There is an internal sense in every single part of the Word: 1143, 1984, 2135, 2333, 2395, 2495, 2619. These ideas do not appear in the literal sense but still they are in it: 4442.

6361. 'And will scatter them in Israel' means that they are to be banished from the spiritual man. This is clear from the meaning of 'scattering' too as a banishment; but 'scattering' is distinguished from 'dividing' by the fact that the latter is used in reference to the external man and to truth, whereas the former is used in reference to the internal man and to good - 'Jacob' represents the natural or external man, and 'Israel' the spiritual or internal man, see 4286, 4291, 4570.

These things that Israel stated regarding Simeon and Levi, and also those regarding Reuben, do not mean such things as would happen, as verse 1 says, to their descendants at the end of days. This can be recognized from the fact that those descended from Simeon and from Levi were not cursed; nor were they divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel. The tribe of Simeon existed among the rest of the tribes as one of their number, while the tribe of Levi became the priesthood and so was blessed rather than cursed. Nor likewise was the tribe of Reuben inferior to any other tribe. From this it is quite evident that the things stated in this chapter about what would happen to the sons of Jacob at the end of days refer to what would happen not to those actual descendants but to people who are meant by them in the internal sense. At this point what would happen to those with faith separated from charity is meant, for they are the ones who are meant at this point in the internal sense by Reuben, Simeon, and Levi. From this it becomes perfectly clear that the internal sense of the Word is not that which shows itself in the letter; nor can that sense be seen by anyone unless he has a knowledge of the correspondences of natural things with spiritual ones. Indeed it is not seen at all by anyone who does not know what the spiritual is or what the celestial is.