When the Bible speaks of "Jehovah," it is representing love itself, the inmost love that is the essence of the Lord. That divine love is one, whole and complete in itself, and Jehovah also is one, a name applied only to the Lord. The divine love expresses itself in the form of wisdom. Love, then, is the essence of God -- His inmost. Wisdom -- the loving understanding of how to put love into action -- is slightly more external, giving love a way to express itself. Wisdom, however, is expressed in a great variety of thoughts and ideas, what the Writings collectively call divine truth. There are also many imaginary gods, and sometimes angels and people can be called gods (the Lord said Moses would be as a god to Aaron). So when the Bible calls the Lord "God," it is in most cases referring to divine truth. In other cases, "God" has reference to what is called the divine human. The case there is this: As human beings, we cannot engage the Lord directly as divine love. It is too powerful and too pure. Instead, we have to approach Him by understanding Him through divine truth. Divine truth, then, is the Lord in human form, a form we can approach and understand. Thus "God" is also used in reference to this human aspect, because it is an expression of truth.

1172. 'Dedan' means cognitions of lower celestial things that exist in ritual forms. This is clear from the following places in the Word: In Ezekiel,

The sons of Dedan were your traders, many islands were the merchandise of your hand; horns of ivory, and ebony they brought as your present. Ezekiel 27:15

'Horns of ivory, and ebony' in the internal sense means the exterior goods that constitute forms of worship or ritual. In the same prophet,

Dedan, she was your trader in chariot-cloaks, ¹ Arabia and all the princes of Kedar Ezekiel 27:20-21.

Here 'chariot-cloaks' ¹ in like manner means exterior goods, or those that constitute forms of ritual. In Jeremiah,

Their wisdom has become rotten. Flee! they have turned themselves away, they have taken themselves down to dwell in the deep, O inhabitants of Dedan. Jeremiah 49:7-8.

Here 'Dedan' in the proper sense stands for forms of ritual which have no internal worship, that is, no worship of the Lord from the heart within them, and which are spoken of as 'turning themselves back, and taking themselves down to dwell in the deep'. From the quotations above it is now clear that 'the sons of Cush' means cognitions of spiritual things, and 'the sons of Raamah' cognitions of celestial.

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