900. The symbolism of the second month as all the stages that precede rebirth can be seen from the symbolism of two in the Word. Two symbolizes the same thing as six, which is the fighting and hard work that come before rebirth. So here it means all the stages we go through before becoming regenerate.

The longest and shortest intervals in the Word are generally split in three or in seven and are called days, weeks, months, years, or "ages." ¹ Three and seven are holy; two and six, being just one less, are not holy but relatively profane, as shown before (§720).

Three and seven also mean something sacrosanct, each because of its connection with the Last Judgment, predicted as coming on the third or else the seventh day. ² Every person — both collectively and individually — has a last judgment when the Lord comes. There was a last judgment when the Lord came into the world. There will be a last judgment when he enters into his glory. There is a last judgment when he comes individually to each person. There is also a last judgment for each person who dies. This last judgment is the third day and the seventh day, which is holy for those who have lived good lives but unholy for those who have lived evil lives. Consequently, a third day and a seventh is predicted for those judged worthy of death and for those judged worthy of life, so that the numbers symbolize what is unholy for those with a verdict of death but what is holy for those with a verdict of life.

Two and six, the numbers just before three and seven, bear a relationship to them and symbolize in general every preceding stage. This is the meaning of the numbers two and six, and the meaning adapts to the subject at hand and to whatever the subject applies to, which the numbers describe.

All of this will become clearer from the discussion of the number twenty-seven in the next section.

Footnotes:

728. The symbolism of in seven days here as the beginning of their inward trials can be seen from the inner meaning of all the words in the current verse, which deal with the trials of the people referred to as Noah. The general subjects are both the inward trials of the "Noah" element and the total devastation that befell some in the earliest church. As a result, in seven days symbolizes not only the start of trials but also the end of ruin.

The reason in seven days symbolizes these things is that seven is a holy number, as has been said and shown at verse 2 of this chapter [§§716-717], at Genesis 4:15 and 24 [§§395, 433], and at §§84-87. It symbolizes the Lord's arrival in the world and his entry into glory, and it specifically symbolizes every time that the Lord comes to us.

Every arrival of the Lord entails a beginning for those who are regenerating and an end for those who are being destroyed. For the people of this church, his coming was the start of adversity, because when tested, an individual begins to turn into a new person and to regenerate. At the same time it was the end for those in the earliest church who had developed in such a way that the only possible outcome was extinction. By way of a parallel, at the time of the Lord's advent into the world the church was in the final stage of its destruction and a new church was formed.

[2] This symbolism of in seven days can be seen in Daniel:

Seventy weeks have been decreed upon your people and upon your holy city, to bring an end to transgression, and to seal up their sins, and to atone for wickedness, and to introduce everlasting justice, and to seal up vision and prophet, and to anoint the Holiest One. And you will know and perceive that from the issuing of the Word to restore and rebuild Jerusalem up to the time of Messiah the prince, there will be seven weeks. (Daniel 9:24-25)

The seventy weeks and the seven weeks here symbolize the same thing as seven days: the Lord's Coming. But since this is explicitly a prophecy, the numbers involving a seven mark the period as being even more holy and certain. The use of seven to describe this period symbolizes not only the Lord's arrival but the start of a new church at the same time, as indicated by the statement that the Holiest One would be anointed and Jerusalem would be restored and rebuilt. It also symbolizes a final devastation at the same time, as indicated by the statement that those weeks were decreed upon the holy city in order to bring an end to transgression and to seal up its sin.

[3] Similar words occur elsewhere in the Word, as in Ezekiel, where the prophet says of himself:

I came to the captives at Tel-abib, who were sitting by the river Chebar, and I sat there seven days, thunderstruck among them, and it happened at the end of seven days that the word of Jehovah came to me. (Ezekiel 3:15-16)

Here too the seven days stand for the start of a divine visitation, seeing that after the seven days during which Ezekiel sat with the captives the word of Jehovah came to him. In the same author:

They will bury Gog, in order to cleanse the land for seven months. At the end of seven months, they will make a careful search. (Ezekiel 39:12, 14)

Again the period of seven stands for the final point of devastation and the start of divine visitation. In Daniel:

Nebuchadnezzar's heart will change from [that of] a human, and the heart of an animal will be given to him, and seven seasons will pass over him. (Daniel 4:16, 25, 32)

This likewise stands for the end of devastation and the start of becoming a new person.

[4] Seventy years of captivity in Babylon represented the same thing. Whether it is seventy or seven, it involves the same meaning — seven days or seven years or the seven "ages" or decades that make up seventy years. The process of devastation was represented by the years of captivity; the beginning of a new church was represented by the liberation and rebuilding of the Temple.

Similar things were represented by Jacob's service with Laban, described in these words:

"I will serve you seven years for Rachel," and he served seven years. Laban said, "Fill out this week and we will give you her as well for the service that you serve with me yet another seven years." And Jacob did so and filled out this week. (Genesis 29:18, 20, 27-28)

The seven years of servitude here involve a similar meaning, as does the fact that marriage and liberty followed the days of the seven years. This span of seven years was called a week, as it also was in Daniel [9:24-25].

[5] The command that the people circle Jericho seven times to make the wall fall represented the same thing. It says that on the seventh day they got up at dawn and circled the city in the customary way, seven times, "and it happened on the seventh time that the seven priests blew their seven horns and the wall fell" (Joshua 6:1-20). Had such details been devoid of symbolic meaning, it never would have been ordered that they circle seven times or that there be seven priests and seven horns.

These and many other passages (such as Job 2:13; Revelation 15:1, 6-7; 21:9) show that in seven days symbolizes the beginning of a new church and the end of the old. Since the present verse deals both with the people of the church called Noah and their trials and with the last descendants of the earliest church, who destroyed themselves, the seven days more cannot symbolize anything else than the start of Noah's trials and the end of the earliest church, or its final ruination and death.

931. The symbolism of throughout all the days of the earth to come as all time, is established by the symbolism of a day as the times; see §§23, 487, 488, 493. So a day of the earth here is all time, as long as the earth lasts — that is to say, as long as an inhabitant remains on the planet. Inhabitants first come to an end when the church ceases to exist, because when the church is gone, humankind loses contact with heaven, and when that contact ends, every earth-dweller dies out.

The church is like a person's heart and lungs, as already mentioned. ¹ As long we have a heart that is sound, and lungs, too, we are alive. The same is true of the church in relation to the universal human, which is the whole of heaven. ² That is why the present verse says, "Throughout all the days of the earth, sowing and reaping and cold and heat and summer and winter and day and night will not end."

This also indicates that the planet will not last forever but will have its end as well, since it says, "throughout all the days of the earth," that is, as long as the earth exists.

[2] People believe, though, that the end of the earth is the same as the Last Judgment mentioned in the Word, where the culmination of the age, the day of divine visitation, and the Last Judgment are dealt with. ³ They are wrong. A last judgment comes to every church when it goes through the process of devastation, which is the stage at which there is no longer any faith in it.

The earliest church had its last judgment when it perished, as it did among its final descendants, just before the Flood. The Jewish church had its last judgment when the Lord came into the world. A last judgment has yet to come, too, when the Lord comes into his glory. Not that the earth and the world will then be destroyed but that the church will. ⁴ Afterward, however, the Lord always brings a new church back to life. So at the time of the Flood, he raised up the ancient church, and at the time of his Coming, he raised up the early [Christian] church among non-Jews. It will be the same when the Lord comes into his glory.

This is also what "the new heaven and the new earth" means [Isaiah 65:17; 66:22; Revelation 21:1].

[3] The case resembles that of every regenerate person, who becomes a part of the church — becomes a church, in fact — after being created anew. The inner self of such people is called a new heaven and their outer self a new earth.

In addition, every individual also has a last judgment at death, because at that time, depending on how we behaved in the body, we receive a verdict of either death or life. ⁵

An indication that the end of the age, the cataclysm, and the Last Judgment have no other meaning and therefore do not imply the world's obliteration is clear from the Lord's words in Luke:

On that night there will be two in one bed; one will be taken, the other left. Two will be grinding together; one will be taken and the other left. Two will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. (Luke 17:34, 35, 36)

The last stage is called the night here because there will be no faith, that is, no charity. It says that some people will be left, which clearly indicates that the world will not be annihilated at that time.

Footnotes: