9373. Come up unto Jehovah. That this signifies conjunction with the Lord, is evident from the signification of “coming up,” as being to be raised toward interior things (see n. 3084, 4539, 4969, 5406, 5817, 6007), consequently also to be conjoined (n. 8760). That it denotes conjunction with the Lord, is because by “Jehovah” in the Word is meant the the Lord, (n. 1343, 1736, 1793, 2004, 2005, 2018, 2025, 2921, 3023, 3035, 5663, 6280, 6303, 6905, 8274, 8864, 9315). A secret which also lies hidden in the internal sense of these words, is that the sons of Jacob, over whom Moses was the head, were not called and chosen; but they themselves insisted that Divine worship should be instituted among them (according to wh at has been said in n. 4290, 4293); and therefore it is here said, “and He said unto Moses, Come up unto Jehovah,” as if not Jehovah, but another, had said that he should come up. For the same reason in what follows it is said that “the people should not go up” (verse 2); and that “Jehovah sent not His hand unto the sons of Israel who were set apart” (verse 11); and that “the appearance of the glory of Jehovah was like devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the eyes of the sons of Israel” (verse 17); and lastly that Moses, being called the seventh day, “entered into the midst of the cloud.” For by “the cloud” is meant the Word in the letter (n. 5922, 6343, 6752, 6832, 8106, 8443, 8781); and with the sons of Jacob the Word was separated from its internal sense, because they were in external worship without internal, as can be clearly seen from the fact that now, as before, they said, “all the words which Jehovah hath spoken we will do” (verse 3); and yet scarcely forty days afterward they worshiped a golden calf instead of Jehovah; which shows that this was hidden in their hearts while they were saying with their lips that they would serve Jehovah alone. But nevertheless those who are meant by “the called and the chosen” are those who are in internal worship, and who from internal worship are in external; that is, those who are in love to and faith in the Lord, and from this in love toward the neighbor.

3046. And sware to him concerning this word. That this signifies a sacred obligation, is evident from the signification of “swearing,” as being a binding pledge, and indeed a most holy one, because he swore by Jehovah the God of heaven and the God of the earth (see n. 3023); and thus a sacred obligation, for a sacred obligation is nothing else than a binding pledge.

40. By the “creeping things which the waters bring forth” are signified the memory-knowledges [scientifica] which belong to the external man; by “birds” in general, rational and intellectual things, of which the latter belong to the internal man. That the “creeping things of the waters” or “fishes” signify memory-knowledges, is plain from Isaiah:

I came and there was no man; at My rebuke I dry up the sea, I make the rivers a wilderness; their fish shall stink because there is no water and shall die for thirst; I clothe the heavens with blackness (Isaiah 50:2-3).

[2] But it is still plainer from Ezekiel, where the Lord describes the new temple, or a new church in general, and the man of the church, or a regenerate person; for everyone who is regenerate is a temple of the Lord:

The Lord Jehovah said unto me, These waters that shall issue to the boundary toward the east, and shall come toward the sea, being led into the sea, and the waters shall be healed; and it shall come to pass that every living soul that shall creep forth, whithersoever the water of the rivers shall come, shall live, and there shall be exceeding much fish, because those waters shall come thither, and they shall heal, and everything shall live whither the river cometh; and it shall come to pass that fishers shall stand upon it from En-gedi to En-eglaim, with the spreading of nets shall they be; their fish shall be according to its kind, as the fish of the great sea, exceeding many (Ezekiel 47:8-10).

“Fishers from En-gedi unto En-eglaim” with the “spreading of nets” signify those who shall instruct the natural man in the truths of faith.

[3] That “birds” signify things rational and intellectual, is evident from the Prophets; as in Isaiah:

Calling a bird from the east, the man of My counsel from a distant land (Isaiah 46:11).

And in Jeremiah:

I beheld and lo there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled (Jeremiah 4:25).

In Ezekiel:

I will plant a shoot of a lofty cedar, and it shall lift up a branch, and shall bear fruit, and be a magnificent cedar; and under it shall dwell every fowl of every wing, in the shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell (Ezekiel 17:22-23).

And in Hosea, speaking of a new church, or of a regenerate man:

And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the wild beast of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the moving thing of the ground (Hosea 2:18).

That “wild beast” does not signify wild beast, nor “bird” bird, must be evident to everyone, for the Lord is said to “make a new covenant” with them.