9062. 'And if he strikes out the tooth of his male slave or the tooth of his female slave' means if it destroys truth or the affection for it on the level of the senses. This is clear from the meaning of 'tooth' as the outer part of the understanding, and therefore truth in the natural, dealt with above in 9052, at this point truth on the lowest level of the natural, that is, the level of the senses, since it is speaking about a male slave and a female slave; from the meaning of 'female slave' as an affection for that truth, also dealt with above, in 9059; and from the meaning of 'striking out' as destroying. What the sensory level is, and what it is like, see 4009, 5077, 5081, 5084, 5089, 5094, 5125, 5128, 5580, 5767, 5774, 6183, 6201, 6310, 6311, 6313, 6315, 6316, 6564, 6598, 6612, 6614, 6622, 6624, 6948, 6949, 7693.

6598. INFLUX AND THE INTERACTION OF SOUL AND BODY - continued

It is well known that one person is endowed with a greater ability than another to understand and perceive what it is to behave honourably in private life, to be upright in public life, and to seek what is good in one's spiritual life. The reason why he has that greater ability lies in the fact that his thought has been raised towards the things of heaven and is consequently drawn away from the level of the external senses. For people whose thought does not rise above the level of the senses cannot begin to see what is honourable, upright, or good. They therefore rely on what others think, and base most of what they say on matters stored in the memory, and in doing this seem to themselves to be wiser than others. But those who can think on a level above the senses possess, if the contents of their memory are all in order, a greater ability than others to understand and perceive. Their ability depends on the height of the interior standpoint from which they look at things.