1024. The symbolism of with you as a spiritual person who has been reborn is established by a plethora of earlier statements to the effect that Noah and his sons symbolize a spiritual church that took the place of the earliest, heavenly church [§§597-598, 605, 726, 765, 788:1, 851]. Since they symbolize a church, they symbolize every member of that church and so a spiritual person who has been reborn.
Secrets of Heaven #155
155. The words a woman was built out of a rib conceal more than anyone can ever see in the literal meaning, since the Lord's Word is such that deep down it concerns itself with the Lord himself and his kingdom. This is the source of all life in the Word. In the same vein, the inmost concern here is the heavenly marriage. 1
The heavenly marriage is something that exists in our selfhood. Moreover, it is because of the heavenly marriage that our selfhood, after being brought to life by the Lord, is called the Lord's bride and wife.
When the Lord brings it to life, our sense of self gives us the ability to perceive all the good desired by love and all the truth taught by faith. So it holds within it all wisdom and understanding, joined to an indescribable happiness.
Still, a few words will not be enough to explain the nature of this living autonomy called the Lord's bride and wife. I can offer only this much: that angels perceive that they live from the Lord, although when not reflecting, they are under the full impression that they live on their own. This living selfhood is a sensation affecting all of them, telling them something has changed whenever they depart in the least from a loving goodness and religious truth. They enjoy their customary peace and happiness, which defies description, when they share in a perception that they live from the Lord.
A living sense of self is also what Jeremiah refers to when he says,
Jehovah has created something new in the earth: a woman will encircle a man. (Jeremiah 31:22)
This too is talking about the heavenly marriage, the woman symbolizing a sense of autonomy brought to life by the Lord. She is said to encircle the man because our self-life encircles us as the fleshed-out rib encircles the heart.
Footnotes:
1. The theme of the heavenly marriage occurs frequently in the Christian tradition. The source of this metaphor lies in the Old Testament, which portrayed Israel as the bride of the Lord: Hosea 1-3 depicts Israel as a faithless wife, and the Song of Songs was from an early time regarded as an allegory of love between God and Israel (Schmithals 1997, 166-167). In the New Testament, Revelation describes "the holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of the sky, prepared as a bride dressed up for her husband" (Revelation 21:2). The "bride" is "the Lamb's wife" (Revelation 21:9; see §253). The union between Christ and the Church is thus portrayed as a heavenly marriage. In the Western esoteric tradition, this metaphor has a meaning closer to Swedenborg's, where the spiritual element is the Lord, and the physical "self" is the bride. See also note 3 in §54. [RS]
