572. That they should kill the third part of men, signifies of depriving themselves of all understanding of truth, and thus of spiritual life. This is evident from the signification of "to kill," as being to deprive of spiritual life (See above, n. 547); and from the signification of "men," as being the understanding of truth (See also above, n. 546, 547); "the third part," in reference to truths, means all (See above, n. 506); so here "to kill the third part of men" signifies the deprivation of all understanding of truth. It means to deprive themselves, because those who become sensual through evils of life and falsities of doctrine deprive ¹ themselves, by reasonings from fallacies, of the understanding of truth, but not others, except such as are sensual. They thus deprive themselves of spiritual life, because man has spiritual life through his understanding, for he becomes a spiritual man in the measure in which his understanding is opened and permits itself to be enlightened by means of truths. But it is by means of truths from good that the understanding is opened, not by means of truths without good; for man thinks truth so far as he lives in the good of love and charity. Truth indeed is the form of good, and all good with man is of his will, and all truth is of his understanding; therefore the good of the will presents its form in the understanding, and the form itself is thought from the understanding which is from the will.

Фусноте:

123. Since the Lord does appear in heaven as a sun because of the divine love that is in him and from him, all the people there constantly turn toward him. The inhabitants of the heavenly kingdom turn toward him as the sun, while the inhabitants of the spiritual kingdom turn toward him as the moon. In contrast, the inhabitants of hell turn toward the darkness and dimness that are on the opposite side, and therefore turn away from the Lord. This is because all the people who are in the hells are caught up in love for themselves and the world and are therefore opposed to the Lord. The ones who turn toward the darkness that stands for our world's sun are at the back of the hells and are called "demons," while the ones who turn toward the dimness that stands for our moon are in the front of hell and are called "spirits." This is why people in the hells are described as being in darkness and people in the heavens as being in light. "Darkness" means falsity arising from evil, and "light" means truth arising from good.

The reason people turn in this way is that in the other life we all look toward what rules in our deeper natures - toward our own loves, then; and these deeper natures form the faces of angels and spirits. Further, in a spiritual world the cardinal points are not fixed the way they are in a natural world. Instead, they are determined by the way people face.

We ourselves, in spirit, are also turning in the same fashion - away from the Lord if we are caught up in self-love and love of the world, and toward him if we are in a love for him and for our neighbor. We are unaware of this, though, because we are in a natural world where the cardinal points are determined by the sun's rising and setting. Since it is hard for people to grasp this, examples will be given below where we deal with the cardinal points and with space and time in heaven.