414. So that a third of the day did not shine, and likewise the night. This symbolically means that they no longer have in them any spiritual truth or natural truth from the Word serviceable for doctrine and life.

The day's not shining means that they had no light from the sun, and "likewise the night" means that they had no light from the moon and stars. Light in general symbolizes Divine truth, which is truth from the Word. The light of the sun symbolizes spiritual Divine truth, and the light of the moon and stars symbolizes natural Divine truth, both acquired from the Word. Divine truth in the spiritual sense of the Word is like the light of the sun during the day, and Divine truth in the natural sense of the Word is like the light of the moon and stars at night. The spiritual sense of the Word, moreover, flows into its natural sense, as the sun does with its light to the moon, and this reflects the light of the sun indirectly.

In this way also does the spiritual sense of the Word enlighten people, even people who know nothing of that sense, when they read the Word in its natural sense. However, it enlightens a spiritual person as light from the sun does his eye, but a natural person as light from the moon and stars does his eye. Everyone is enlightened in accordance with his spiritual affection for truth and goodness, and at the same time in accordance with the genuine truths by which he has opened his rational faculty.

[2] Day and night also have this meaning in the following places:

God said, "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night...." Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule by day, and the lesser light to rule by night. He made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to rule by day and by night, and to divide the light from the darkness. (Genesis 1:14-19)

(Jehovah) made great lights..., the sun to rule by day..., the moon and stars to rule by night... (Psalms 136:7-9)

The day is Yours, (O Jehovah,) the night also is Yours; You have prepared the light and the sun. (Psalms 74:16)

...Jehovah... gives the sun for a light by day, the ordinances of the moon and the stars for a light by night... (Jeremiah 31:35)

If you can break My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night, so that there will not be day and night in their season, then My covenant also may be broken with David My servant... If I have not appointed My covenant with day and night, the ordinances of heaven and earth, I also will reject the offspring of Jacob and David... (Jeremiah 33:20-21, 25-26)

I cite these passages to make known that the darkening of both kinds of light is meant.

4609. 'And the sons of Zilpah, Leah's servant-girl: Gad and Asher' means those that serve the exterior ones. This is clear from the representation of 'Zilpah, Leah's servant-girl' as a secondary affection which, as a means, serves the affection for exterior truth, dealt with in 3835, 'a servant-girl' being a means that serves to effect a joining together, as immediately above in 4608. Her 'sons' are the same kinds of means, the essential characteristics of which are represented by 'Gad and Asher'. In the highest sense 'Gad' means Omnipotence and Omniscience, in the internal sense the good of faith, and in the external sense works, 3934, while 'Asher' in the highest sense means eternity, in the internal sense the happiness of eternal life, and in the external sense the delight that belongs to affection, 3938, 3939. These are the matters implied in the listing of Jacob's sons at this point. But how they all fit together, one following another and one included within another, cannot be seen in the light of the world unless this light is brightened by the light of heaven. Yet even then the things that can be seen are such that no words are adequate to express them. This is because human words are the product of ideas formed from things that exist within the light of the world. But ideas that are formed from the light of heaven are so superior to those worldly ideas that no words exist to express them, though they do to a small extent find a place in the thinking of people who are enabled to separate their minds from ideas formed from the senses.