3375. 'And I will fulfil the oath which I swore to Abraham your father' means confirmation. This is clear from the meaning of 'an oath' or 'swearing' as confirmation, dealt with in 2842. Here it does not say that the covenant made with Abraham is to be fulfilled but that 'the oath' will be. The reason for this is that 'a covenant' has reference to what is celestial, which is good, whereas 'an oath' has reference to what is spiritual, namely truths, see 3037; and truths are the subject here. For the same reason also in verse 31 below it is not said of Isaac that he made a covenant with Abimelech but that 'he swore to him, a man to his brother', whereas in Genesis 21:32 it is said of Abraham that he and Abimelech 'made a covenant'; see Psalms 105:9. By the confirmation here which is meant by 'an oath' is understood the Lord's being joined to those who are in His kingdom, for an oath is the confirmation of a covenant, and by 'a covenant' is meant being joined together, 665, 666, 1023, 1038, 1864, 1996, 2003, 2021.

665. That establishing a covenant' means that he would be regenerated becomes quite clear from the fact that the only kind of covenant that can exist between the Lord and man is conjunction by virtue of love and faith. And so a covenant means conjunction; indeed it is the heavenly marriage that is the supreme covenant of all. The heavenly marriage or conjunction does not show itself however except with people who are being regenerated. Regeneration itself therefore in the broadest sense is meant by a covenant. The Lord enters into a covenant with man when He regenerates him, and consequently among men of old a covenant had no other representation. From the sense of the letter no other impression is gained than that the covenant made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and so often with their descendants, concerned just those personages. But those people were by nature such as to be incapable of being regenerated, for they focused worship exclusively on things that were external, and imagined external things to be sacred without things that are internal allied to them. Consequently the covenants made with them were no more than representations of regeneration, as were all their religious ceremonies, and as were Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob themselves who represented the things of love and faith. In a similar way priests or high priests, whatever their character, including infamous ones, could represent the heavenly and most holy priesthood. In representations no attention is paid to the person who represents but to that which is represented by him. Thus all the kings of Israel and Judah, including the worst of them, represented the Lord's kingship, and so indeed did the Pharaoh who promoted Joseph over the land of Egypt. These and many other considerations which in the Lord's Divine mercy will be dealt with later on show that the covenants made so often with the sons of Jacob were nothing more than religious ceremonies which were representative.