1756. This is the message of the inner meaning, in its general outlines; but when every last word is explained according to its symbolism, the actual train of thought and its beauty cannot be seen as well as it would be if the whole were captured in a single mental image. When all of it is grasped in a single idea, then scattered particulars are seen to cohere and connect in a beautiful way.

The situation resembles that in which we hear someone talking and focus on the words. We do not pick up on the idea of the speaker as well as we would if we ignored the words and their definitions. Scripture's inner meaning (compared to its outer letter) is almost the same as speech whose words we only barely hear, much less pay attention to, when our mind is entirely absorbed by the ideas embodied in the speaker's words.

[2] The ancient method of writing used words and human figures to represent ideas in an entirely allegorical way. Secular writers of the day composed their histories in this way, and also [their works on] issues of public and private life. As a matter of fact, not a single written word was what it literally seemed to be; each represented another meaning. Ancient authors even presented the full range of passions as gods and goddesses, whom pagan peoples later began to worship as divine. Any literate person can see that this is so, since ancient books of the kind are still in existence.

This method of writing they inherited from the very earliest people, who lived before the Flood. The earliest people were in the habit of representing heavenly concepts and divine ones to themselves in the form of things visible in nature and in their culture. Because of this, it filled their minds and souls with pleasure and delight to observe the objects of the universe, especially those that displayed beauty of form or design. So all the books in the church of that time were written this way. Job is one such book. Solomon's Song of Songs is one that imitated them. The two books Moses mentioned in Numbers 21:14, 27 were of the same kind. ¹ And there were many more that did not survive.

[3] This writing mode was later admired for its antiquity by both Jacob's descendants and the surrounding nations — so much so that they revered nothing as divine that was not written in that mode. People inspired by the prophetic spirit spoke in a similar way: Jacob (Genesis 49:3-27); Moses (Exodus 15:1-21; Deuteronomy 33:2-29); Balaam, a "child of the east" from Syria, where the ancient church remained in existence (Numbers 23:7-10, 19-24; 24:5-9, 17-24); Deborah and Barak (Judges 5:2-end); Hannah (1 Samuel 2:2-10); and many others. They spoke this way for many hidden reasons. People did not understand their words, and only a very small number realized that the words symbolized the heavenly affairs of the Lord's kingdom and church. Even so, touched and filled with wondering awe, they sensed that something divinely sacred was present in those words.

[4] The histories of the Word are like this as well; in them too the individual names and the individual words represent and symbolize the heavenly and spiritual qualities of the Lord's kingdom. This has not yet been recognized by the scholarly world, though, which knows only that the Word was inspired down to its smallest jot and that as a whole and in every word it contains secrets of heaven. ²

Footnotes:

1659. Inner Meaning

THE contents of this chapter do not look as though they could represent anything. All the chapter talks about is the wars among a number of kings, Abram's rescue of Lot, and finally Melchizedek, so it reads as if it did not have a single heavenly secret buried inside. Still, in the inner meaning, these elements of the story (like all the others) conceal the deepest secrets possible, which follow on in an unbroken chain from those above and lead in an unbroken chain to those below.

[2] The earlier parts spoke of the Lord and his education, and of his outer self, which needed to unite with his inner self by means of knowledge both secular and religious. As noted, though, his outer self harbored obstacles to the union, as a result of his maternal heredity [§§1414, 1444, 1573, 1601-1603]. What interfered had to be thrust out through combat and times of trial before his outer self could become one with his inner, or in other words, before his human quality could become one with his divine. The present chapter therefore discusses those struggles, which the inner sense represents and symbolizes through the wars here described.

Within the church it is known that Melchizedek represented the Lord and as a result that when the subject is Melchizedek the inner sense speaks of the Lord. ¹ A further conclusion, logically, is that not only what is said of Melchizedek but everything else too has a representative meaning. After all, not a syllable could have been written in the Word which did not come down from heaven and in which angels consequently do not see heavenly dimensions.

[3] In the earliest times, too, wars represented many things. The people of those times called them Jehovah's Wars, and the sole purpose of the term was to symbolize the struggles of the church and of the people in the church, ² or in other words, to symbolize the spiritual trials of those people. Spiritual trials are nothing but our battles and wars against the evil in us, so they are fights against the Devil's crew, which stirs up the evil and tries to destroy religion and religious people.

The wars mentioned in the Word have no other meaning, as is obvious from the consideration that the Word cannot treat of anything but the Lord, his kingdom, and the church. This is because it is divine rather than human and accordingly has to do with heaven rather than the world. So the wars of the literal story can mean nothing else in an inner sense. You will be able to see this better below.

Footnotes: