2. Horses are often mentioned in the prophetic books of the Word, ¹ but until now no one has been aware that a horse means understanding and its rider means someone who is intelligent. This is perhaps because it seems strange and bewildering to say that a horse has this kind of meaning when spiritually understood, and therefore has this kind of meaning in the Word. There is support for this, however, in many passages in the Word, of which I should like here to cite only a few.

In Israel’s prophecy about Dan:

Dan will be a serpent on the way, a darting serpent on the path, that bites the horse’s heels, and its rider falls backward. (Genesis 49:17, 18)

No one will understand the meaning of this prophecy about one of the tribes of Israel who does not know the meaning of a serpent and of a horse and a rider. No one can fail to know, though, that something spiritual is involved. You may see what these particular things mean in Secrets of Heaven 6398, 6399, 6400, 6401, where this prophecy is explained.

In Habakkuk:

God, you are riding on your horses; your chariots are salvation. You walked through the sea with your horses. (Habakkuk 3:8, 15)

We can see that horses here mean something spiritual because these things are being said of God. Otherwise, what would be involved in God riding on his horses and walking through the sea with his horses?

The same holds true for Zechariah 14:20: “On that day ‘Holiness belongs to Jehovah’ will be engraved on the bells of the horses”; and for Zechariah 12:4, 5: “‘On that day,’ says Jehovah, ‘I will strike every horse with confusion and its rider with madness. I will open my eyes on the house of Judah and strike every horse of the people with blindness.’” This is about the purging of the church that happens when there is no longer any understanding of what is true, so it is described in terms of horse and rider. Otherwise, what would be involved in striking every horse with confusion and striking every horse of the people with blindness? What does this have to do with the church?

In Job:

[Because] God deprived [the ostrich] of wisdom and did not endow her with understanding, when she lifts herself up on high, she scorns the horse and its rider. (Job 39:17, 18, 19, and following)

Here it is obvious that the horse means understanding. This is also the case in David when it speaks of “riding on the word of truth” (Psalms 45:4) and in many other passages.

Further, who would know why Elijah and Elisha were called “the chariot of Israel and its cavalry” and why Elisha’s servant saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire if they did not know what a chariot and a cavalry mean and what Elijah and Elisha represent? For Elisha said to Elijah, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and its cavalry” (2 Kings 2:11, 12); and King Joash said to Elisha, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and its cavalry” (2 Kings 13:14); and it says of Elisha’s servant, “Jehovah opened the eyes of Elisha’s servant, and he saw. And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha” (2 Kings 6:17).

The reason Elijah and Elisha were called the chariot of Israel and its cavalry is that both represent the Lord as the Word, the chariot meaning a body of teaching drawn from the Word and the cavalry meaning understanding. On Elijah and Elisha as representing the Lord as the Word, see Secrets of Heaven 5247, 7643, 8029, 9372; and on a chariot as meaning a body of teaching drawn from the Word see §§5321, 8215.

Footnotes:

4534. 'The Grand Man and Correspondence' is continued at the end of the next chapter.

260. There are countless treasures hidden ¹ in the inner or spiritual meaning. In its inner meaning, the Word contains countless things that are beyond our grasp: 3085, 3086. They also cannot be explained: 1955. They are manifest only to angels and are understood only by them: 167. The inner meaning of the Word contains hidden treasures of heaven ² that have to do with the Lord and his kingdom in the heavens and on earth: 1, 2, 3, 4, 937. These treasures are not visible in the literal meaning: 937, 1502, 2161. Many of the things in the prophets that seem random come together coherently in a beautiful sequence in the inner meaning: 7153, 9022. There is not a single word in the literal meaning of the Word-not even the smallest letter ³ -that can be lost without causing a break in the inner meaning, so this is why, in the Lord's divine providence, the Word has been so completely preserved, right down to every word and the tip of every letter: 7933. There are countless things within the details of the Word (6617, 6620, 8920), and in every word (1869). There are countless things in the Lord's Prayer and in its details (6619), and in the Ten Commandments, though their outer meaning contains things that were known to every people quite apart from any revelation (8862, 8902).

[2] In the Word, especially in the prophetic books, ⁴ there are what seem to be paired expressions of the same idea, but one refers to what is good and the other to what is true-to what is heavenly, then, and to what is spiritual: 683, 707, 2516, 8339. Teachings about truth and teachings about goodness are wondrously joined to each other in the Word, but this joining is visible only to people who know about its inner meaning: 10554. Therefore in the Word as a whole and in its details there is a divine marriage and a heavenly marriage: 683, 793, 801, 2173, 2516, 2712, 5138, 7022. The divine marriage is the marriage of divine goodness and divine truth and is therefore the Lord, in whom alone this marriage exists: 3004, 3005, 3009, 4137, 5194, 5502, 6343, 7945, 8339, 9263, 9314. "Jesus" means divine goodness and "Christ" means divine truth, and together they mean the divine marriage in heaven, which is the marriage of divine goodness and divine truth: 3004, 3005, 3009. This marriage is in the details of the Word in its inner meaning, so the Lord is there with his divine goodness and divine truth: 5502. What is called the heavenly marriage is the marriage of goodness and truth that comes from the Lord in heaven and in the church: 2508, 2618, 2803, 3004, 3211, 3952, 6179. So in this respect the Word is a kind of heaven: 2173, 10126. Heaven is compared to a marriage in the Word because of the marriage of goodness and truth there: 2758, 3132, 4434, 4835.

[3] The inner meaning contains the genuine teachings of the church: 9025, 9430, 10400. People who understand the Word in its inner meaning know the true teachings of the church, because the inner meaning contains them: 9025, 9430, 10400. The inner reality of the Word is also the inner reality of the church, as well as the inner reality of worship: 10460. The Word is a body of teaching focused on love for the Lord and caring about our neighbor: 3419, 3420.

[4] The Word in its literal meaning is like a cloud, while in its inner meaning it is glory (preface to Genesis 18, §§5922, 6343, in explanation of the statement that "the Lord is going come in the clouds of heaven, with glory" [Matthew 24:30; Mark 13:26; Luke 21:27]). Further, "clouds" in the Word means the Word in its literal meaning, and "glory" means the Word in its inner meaning: preface to Genesis 18, §§4060, 4391, 5922, 6343, 6752, 8106, 8781, 9430, 10551, 10574. Compared to the contents of the inner meaning, the contents of the literal meaning are like the distorted images around a polished optical cylinder that actually present a beautiful image of a person on the cylinder: ⁵ 1871. People who want and acknowledge only the literal meaning of the Word are represented in the other life by misshapen old women, while people who want and acknowledge the inner meaning as well are represented by beautifully dressed young women: 1774. The Word in its fullness is an image of heaven because the Word is divine truth, and divine truth is what makes heaven; and since heaven is like one individual, the Word is in this respect like an image of a person: 1871. (On the fact that heaven taken as a whole is like one individual, see §§59-67 of the book Heaven and Hell, and on the fact that it is divine truth emanating from the Lord that makes heaven, see §§7-12, 126-140, 200-212.) The inner meaning of the Word is presented to angels' view in a beautiful and pleasing way: 1767, 1768. The literal meaning is like a body, and the inner meaning is like the soul of that body: 8943. The life of the Word therefore comes from its inner meaning: 1405, 4857. The Word is pure in its inner meaning, although it does not seem to be so in its literal meaning: 2362, 2395. The contents of the Word's literal meaning are holy as a result of their inner meaning: 10126, 10276.

[5] There is also an inner meaning in the historical books of the Word, ⁶ but it is deep within them: 4989. So just like the prophetic books, the historical books contain hidden treasures of heaven: 755, 1659, 1709, 2310, 2333. Angels take them spiritually rather than as history: 6884. Why the deep treasures in the historical books are less visible to us than the ones in the prophetic books: 2176, 6597.

[6] Further discussion of the nature of the inner meaning of the Word (1756, 1984, 2004, 2663, 3035, 7089, 10604, 10614), illustrated with an example (1873).

Footnotes: