2177. Flour-meal is the heavenly and spiritual qualities the Lord then had, and cakes are both of these when they are joined together. This is obvious from the sacrifices of the representative church and from the minha used in them, which consisted of flour mixed with oil and made into cakes.
The main activity of representative worship was burnt offerings and sacrifices. The discussion of bread above at §2165 explains what these represented. They represented what is heavenly in the Lord's kingdom in the heavens, in his kingdom on earth (the church), and in his kingdom (or church) in each individual. In general, they represented every facet of love and charity, because these are heavenly, and at that time they were all called "bread."" To these sacrifices were also added the minha (made of flour mixed with oil, as I said, with the addition of frankincense) and libations of wine as well.
[2] It is also possible to see the representation of the last two; they represented approximately the same thing as the [animal] sacrifices, though at a lower level. So they represented qualities of the spiritual church and also of outward religion. Anyone can see that such rituals would never have been commanded had they not represented something divine, and that each of them represents something particular. If they had not represented something divine, they would not have differed from similar activities among non-Jewish nations, which also had their sacrifices, minhas, libations, offerings of frankincense, eternal flames, and so on. These they inherited from the ancient church, and especially from the Hebrew church. Because the inner, divine dimensions represented in them were stripped from the rituals, however, they were simply idolatrous. Such rituals also became so among the Jews, which is why the Jews fell into all kinds of idolatry.
From this anyone can clearly see that heavenly secrets lay behind every ritual, especially the sacrifices, and behind every element of every ritual.
[3] As for the minha, one whole chapter in Moses describes it and explains how it was made into cakes (Leviticus 2, as well as Numbers 15 and other places). The law of the minha is described in these words in Leviticus:
Fire shall always be kindled on the altar; it shall not be put out. And this is the law of the minha: that the sons of Aaron bring it before Jehovah at the face of the altar, and [one of them] shall take up from it by his fistful some of the flour of the minha, and some of its oil, and all the frankincense that is on the minha, and he shall burn it on the altar. It is a restful smell, as a memorial to Jehovah. And the remainder of it Aaron and his sons shall eat; unleavened loaves shall be eaten in a holy place; in the courtyard of the meeting tent they shall eat [the minha]. It shall not be cooked with yeast. I have given it as their portion out of my fire offerings. It is most holy. (Leviticus 6:13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
[4] The fire that "shall always be kindled on the altar" represented love, or in other words, the Lord's mercy, perpetual and eternal. In the Word, fire symbolizes love (see §934), so fire offerings for a restful smell symbolize the pleasure the Lord takes in anything involving love or charity. (For the symbolism of a smell as good pleasure, or something pleasing, see §§925, 1519.) The requirement that they take the minha by the fistful represented the fact that they should love [the Lord] with all their might, that is, with all their soul. The hand, or its palm, symbolizes power, as shown in §878, so a fistful does too. Flour with oil and frankincense represented every aspect of charity; flour was its spiritual side, but oil was its heavenly side, and frankincense, the fact that it was therefore pleasing. (These remarks and others to follow show that flour represented something spiritual. For the representation of oil as something heavenly, or the good that charity inspires, see §886. For that of frankincense, with its good fragrance, as something pleasing and welcome, see §925.)
[5] The unleavened nature of the minha, or its lack of yeast, means that it should be sincere; it should be offered from a sincere heart, without impurities. The fact that Aaron and his sons ate the remainder represented what we give back, and what we make our own, so it represented being bound together by love and charity. That is the reason for the command that they eat it in a holy place, which is why it is called most holy. This is what the minha represented, and this is how the representative items themselves were perceived in heaven. When people in the church understood them this way, their thoughts mirrored the angels' perceptions; although still on the earth, the people were actually in the Lord's kingdom in the heavens.
[6] Further instructions concerning the minha tell how it had to be used in each type of sacrifice, how it was to be cooked into cakes, and how it was to be offered by people who were being purified, as well as on other occasions. Listing and explaining them all would take too long. See the treatment of these subjects at Exodus 29:39, 40, 41; Leviticus 5:11, 12, 13; 6:16, 17, 19, 20, 21; 10:12, 13; 23:10, 11, 12, 13, 16, 17; Numbers 5:15 and following verses; 6:15, 16, 17, 19, 20; throughout chapter 7; 28:5, 8, 9, 12, 13, 20, 21, 28, 29; 29:3, 4, 9, 10, 14, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 37.
[7] Flour made into cakes generally represented the same thing as bread, or in other words, the heavenly aspect of love, while meal represented its spiritual aspect, as can be seen in the passages referred to above.
The loaves called the bread of presence, or showbread, were made of flour, which was prepared as cakes that were then placed on the table. They served as a constant representation of the Lord's love or mercy toward the whole human race, and of the love we return. Moses says this of them:
You shall take flour and cook it into twelve cakes. One cake shall be of two tenths [of an ephah]. And you shall put them in two rows, six in each row, on the clean table, before Jehovah. And you shall put pure frankincense on the row. And it shall serve as loaves for a memorial, a fire offering to Jehovah. On each Sabbath day [Aaron] shall arrange it before Jehovah continually, [an offering] from the children of Israel, by an eternal pact, and it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place, because it is most holy to him from the fire offerings to Jehovah by an eternal statute. (Leviticus 24:5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
The individual elements of these preparations, down to the most minute facets, represented the holy quality of love and charity. The flour represented the same thing as flour-meal–heavenliness and the spirituality that goes with it–and a cake represented both of these united.
[8] This shows what kind of holiness the Word holds for people who think heavenly thoughts; in fact it shows what kind of holiness lay at the heart of this representative ritual itself. That is why the ritual is called most holy. By the same token, it shows what kind of holiness is lacking for people who imagine there is nothing heavenly in the passage and who remain strictly on the surface; for example, those who take the meal mentioned in the current verse simply as meal, the flour as flour, and the cake as a cake, and suppose that these things would have been mentioned without each of them involving something divine. They make the same mistake as those who think of the Holy Supper with its bread and wine as nothing more than a kind of ritual, with no sacred content. In reality its holiness is such that it unites human minds to heavenly minds, as long as they think with deep affection about the bread and wine as symbols of the Lord's love and of the love we give back to him. When human minds do this, they have a holiness from within.
[9] When the children of Israel came into the land, they were to give a cake from the first fruits of their dough as a raised offering to Jehovah (Numbers 15:20), which involved a similar meaning. The same symbolism can also be seen in the Prophets, though for the time being let me quote just one passage in Ezekiel:
You were adorned in gold and silver, and your clothing was fine linen and silk and embroidery. Flour, honey, and oil you ate, and you became very, very beautiful and succeeded to royalty. (Ezekiel 16:13)
This is about Jerusalem, which symbolizes the church. This is the kind of finery it had in its first era, which was that of the ancient church and which is portrayed by the clothes and other forms of elegance. The flour, honey, and oil portray its desire for truth and goodness. Anyone can see that all these details mean something completely different in an inner sense than they do in the literal sense. So too, then, for the current words, which Abraham said to Sarah: "Bring three pecks of flour-meal in a hurry, knead it, and make cakes." The symbolism of three as what is holy was shown above in §§720, 901.
