8886. 'The sabbath day' in the highest sense means the union of the Lord's Divine [Itself] and His Divine Human; in the internal sense it means the Divine Human joined to the heavens, and so means heaven and consequently the marriage of goodness and truth there. This is clear from what has been shown already in 8495. Since such things are meant by 'the sabbath', therefore in the representative Church it was most holy. It was that which was to be perpetually in the thoughts, that is, that which was to compose a heavenly life; for what a person thinks perpetually, that is, what reigns universally, composes his life, see 8853 8858, 8865, 8885. The Israelite nation had no thought, it is true, of the union of the Lord's Divine and His Divine Human, or of His union with heaven, or of goodness and truth joined together in heaven, which were meant by 'the sabbath', since they were concerned altogether with external things and not with anything internal. Yet they were commanded to hold the sabbath most holy, in order that Divine and heavenly realities might be represented in heaven. The situation as it was with them is evident from what has been shown already regarding that nation, and regarding a representative of the Church among them, in 3147, 3479, 3480, 3881 (end), 4208, 4281, 4288, 4289, 4293, 4307, 4444, 4580, 4680, 4825, 4844, 4847, 4899, 4912, 6304, 6306, 7048, 7051, 8301 (end).

4825. 'And yet again she bore a son' means idolatry. This is clear from the meaning of 'a son' in this case as idolatry; for those born before him meant falsity and evil, 4821, 4823. From this it follows that the third son means idolatry, for these two - falsity and evil - lead to idolatry and are contained within it. Of the three born to Judah by the Canaanite this son was the only one to survive, a third of the Jewish nation being descended from him. The meaning in the internal sense at this point is that this nation sprang from idolatry. Its very strong inclination to idolatrous practice is clear from the historical and the prophetical parts - from the sense of the letter - of the Word; and from its internal sense it is evident that this nation was constantly an idolatrous one. For idolatry consists not only in the worship of idols and graven images, and also the worship of other gods, but even in the worship of external things devoid of internal ones. This kind of idolatrous practice existed constantly among that nation, for they revered external things alone and cast internal ones completely aside, and did not even wish to know about them. They indeed had holy things - such as the Tent of Meeting containing the Ark and the Mercy seat on this, the tables with the loaves on them, the lampstand, and incenses; and outside the Tent there was the altar on which they presented burnt offerings and sacrifices. All these things were called holy, while the inmost part there was called the Holy of Holies, as well as the Sanctuary. Also, there were the vestments they had which were worn by Aaron and their high priests, which were referred to as holy vestments, for these included the ephod and the breastplate where the Urim and Thummin were, besides much else. But these things were not inherently holy; they were holy because they were representative of holy things, that is to say, they were representative of the Divine celestial and spiritual things of the Lord's kingdom, and representative of the Lord Himself. Still less was the holiness of those things due to the people among whom they existed, for those people had no affection at all for the internal things that were represented, only for external ones; and having an affection for external things alone is idolatry. This involves the worship of wood and stone, and also of gold and silver covering these, from a delusion that those objects are inherently holy. This is what the nation was like then and is also like at the present day.

[2] Yet a representative of the Church was nevertheless able to exist among such people because in that which is representative no attention is paid to the person who represents, only to whatever is represented, see 665, 1097 (end), 3670, 4208, 4281, 4288. Consequently their worship did not lead them to blessing and happiness in the next life, but merely to worldly prosperity, provided they adhered to those representatives and did not turn aside to the idols of the gentiles, and in so doing did not become openly idolatrous. For if they did it was no longer possible for that nation to represent anything at all of the Church. This then is what the idolatry, meant by Judah's third son by his Canaanite wife, is describing. This idolatry among that nation had its origin in internal idolatry, for more than all others this nation was governed by self-love and love of the world, 4459 (end), 4570. Among those governed by self-love and love of the world internal idolatry exists, for they worship themselves and they worship the world. They pay attention to holy things for the sake of personal adoration and gain; that is, they have a selfish end in view, and do not have the Lord's Church and kingdom, and so the Lord Himself, in view.

3479. The Jews who lived before the Lord's Coming, as also those who have lived since then, had no other notion regarding the religious observances of their Church than that Divine worship consisted solely in things that were external. They were quite unconcerned about what those observances represented and meant. Indeed they neither knew nor wished to know that there was any internal element in worship or in the Word, nor thus that there was any life after death, nor consequently that there was any heaven; for they were entirely sensory- and bodily-minded. Now because they were engrossed in external things separated from internal, worship in their case was nothing but idolatrous, and for this reason they were very much inclined to worship any gods at all, provided they were convinced that those gods could enable them to prosper.

[2] Yet because a sense of holiness within external things could exist with that nation, so that they were able to regard as holy the religious observances by which the heavenly things of the Lord's kingdom were represented; and because they were able to venerate Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, also Moses and Aaron, and after these David, all of whom represented the Lord; and above all because they were able to have a deep and holy respect for the Word in which every single thing was representative and a meaningful sign of Divine things, the representative Church was therefore established among that nation. But if that nation had known of internal things to the extent that they acknowledged them they would have rendered them profane and in so doing would have possessed simultaneously external holiness and internal unholiness, so that there could not have been any communication at all of representatives with heaven by means of that nation. This is why interior things were not disclosed to them, not even the truth that the Lord would come to save their souls.

[3] Because this was the case with the tribe of Judah more than with all the other tribes, and because today as in former times they regard as holy the religious observances which can be performed outside Jerusalem; because also they venerate their patriarchs, and above all have a deep and holy respect for the Old Testament Word; and because it was foreseen that Christians would virtually reject the Old Testament and also would befoul their own internals with things that are unholy, that nation has been preserved up to the present day, in accordance with the Lord's words in Matthew 24:34. With Christians it was to be different, as they were to have knowledge of internal things and were also to live as internally-minded people. If Christians had in fact done so, the Jewish nation would like others have been annihilated before many centuries had gone by. With that nation however the situation is that their external holiness, or holiness of worship, can have no affect on them internally, for internally they are defiled from filthy self-love and filthy love of the world, and also from the idolatry in which they worship external things devoid of internal. And because accordingly they have nothing of heaven within themselves, they are not able to take anything heavenly with them into the next life, with the exception of the few who are governed by mutual love and so do not live in contempt of others compared with themselves.