737. 'Noah was a son of six hundred years' means his initial state of temptation. This is clear from the fact from here down to Eber in Chapter 11 nothing else is meant by numbers, years of age, or names than real things, as was the case also with the ages and names of all those mentioned in Chapter 5. Here 'six hundred years' means the initial state of temptation. This becomes clear from its prime factors which are ten and six multiplied again by ten. When the same factors are involved it makes no difference whether the number arrived at is large or small. As for ten, this has been shown already at 6:3 to mean remnants, while the meaning of six here as labour and conflict is clear from places throughout the Word. For the situation is this: What has gone before dealt with man's preparation for temptation, that is to say, he was supplied by the Lord with truths of the understanding and with goods of the will. These truths and goods are remnants, but they are not brought forth so as to be acknowledged until man is being regenerated. In the case of those who are being regenerated by means of temptations the remnants existing with any man are for the angels present with him. From these remnants they draw out those things with which they protect him against the evil spirits who activate falsities with him and in this way attack him. It is because remnants are meant by 'ten' and conflict by 'six' that six hundred years are spoken of, a number in which ten and six are the prime factors and which means a state of temptation.

[2] As regards conflict being the particular meaning of 'six', this is clear from Genesis 1, which describes the six days of man's regeneration prior to his becoming celestial. During those six days there was constant conflict, but on the seventh day came rest. Consequently there are six days of labour, and the seventh is the sabbath, a word which means rest. This also is why a Hebrew slave was to serve for six years and in the seventh was to go free, Exodus 21:2; Deuteronomy 15:12; Jeremiah 34:14, and why for six years they were to sow the land and gather in the produce, but in the seventh they were to leave it alone, Exodus 23:10-12. The same applied to a vineyard. It is also the reason why in the seventh year the land was to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to Jehovah, Leviticus 25:3-4. Because 'six' means labour and conflict it also means the dispersion of falsity, as in Ezekiel,

Behold, six men coming from the direction of the upper gate, which looks towards the north, every man with a weapon of dispersion in his hand. Ezekiel 9:2.

And in the same prophet, against Gog,

I will cause you to turn about, and I will split you into six, and cause you to come up from the uttermost parts of the north. Ezekiel 39:2.

Here 'six' and 'splitting into six' stand for dispersion, 'the north' for falsities, and 'Gog' for people who seize on doctrinal matters based on things of an external nature with which they destroy internal worship. From Job,

He will deliver you in six troubles, and in a seventh no evil will touch you. Job 5:19.

This stands for the conflict that constitutes temptations.

[3] 'Six' occurs in other parts of the Word where it does not mean labour, conflict, or the dispersion of falsity, but the holiness of faith. In these instances it is related to twelve, which means faith and all things of faith in their entirety, and to three which means that which is holy. Consequently there is also a genuine derivative meaning to the number six, as in Ezekiel 40:5, where the man's measuring rod with which he measured the holy city of Israel was six cubits long; and in other places. The reason for this derivative is that in the conflict of temptation the holiness of faith is present, and also that six days of labour and conflict look forward to the holy seventh day.

4234. 'Jacob went on his way' means the progression of truth so that it might be joined to spiritual and celestial good. This is clear from the representation of 'Jacob' at this point as the truth of the natural. What 'Jacob' represented has been stated already, namely the Lord's Natural. And because the subject in the internal sense where the historical narrative has to do with Jacob is the Lord and how He made His Natural Divine, Jacob therefore first represented truth within that Natural and then truth to which the parallel good meant by Laban had been allied. And once this good had been allied to it Jacob represented that kind of good. That kind of good is not however Divine good within the Natural but intermediate good by means of which He was able to receive Divine good. Jacob represented such intermediate good when he departed from Laban, though essentially that good is truth, which by virtue of being intermediate has the capacity to join itself to Divine good within the Natural. It is that kind of truth that Jacob represents now.

[2] The good however to which that truth was to be joined is represented by 'Esau' - 'Esau' being the Divine Good of the Lord's Divine Natural, see 3300, 3302, 3494, 3504, 3527, 3576, 3599, 3669, 3677. It is the actual joining together of the two - the joining of the Divine truth to the Divine good of the Lord's Divine Natural - that is the subject now in the highest sense. For once Jacob has departed from Laban and come to the Jordan, and so to the place of entry into the land of Canaan, he comes to represent that conjunction; for in the internal sense the land of Canaan means heaven, and in the highest sense the Lord's Divine Human, 3038, 3705. This explains why the words 'And Jacob went on his way' mean the progression of truth so that it might be joined to spiritual and celestial good.

[3] But these matters are such that a full and intelligible explanation of them cannot be given at all, for the reason that not even the learned in the Christian world possess the vaguest notions on the subject. For scarcely any knowledge exists of what man's natural is, or of what his rational is, or of the fact that the two are altogether distinct and separate from each other. Nor is there much knowledge of what spiritual truth is or of the good which goes with that truth, or of the fact that these likewise are distinct and separate. Still less is it known that when a person is being regenerated truth is joined to good, in one distinct and separate way in the natural, in another in the rational, and by means that are countless. In fact it is not even known that the Lord made His Human Divine according to the same order as that by which He regenerates man.

[4] Since therefore not even the vaguest notions exist about these matters, any statements made about them are bound to seem obscure. Nevertheless such statements must be made because the internal sense of the Word cannot be explained in any other way. If nothing else they will show what angelic wisdom is and the nature of it, for the internal sense of the Word is primarily for angels.