50. What the Most Ancient Church understood by 'the image of the Lord' exceeds everything one can say about it. Man is totally unaware of the fact that the Lord is governing him by means of angels and spirits, and that at least two spirits and two angels are present with everyone. By means of the spirits he is in communication with the world of spirits, and by means of the angels with heaven. Without this communication with the world of spirits by means of the spirits, and with heaven by means of the angels, and so by means of heaven with the Lord, a person cannot exist at all. His entire life depends upon that link, and if the spirits and angels were to withdraw he would perish instantly.

[2] As long as a person remains unregenerate he is governed in an entirely different way from when he is regenerate. As long as he is unregenerate, evil spirits reside with him, who have such dominion over him that angels, though present, can accomplish little more than simply distract him from plunging into utter evil and so divert him towards something good. Indeed they use his own unregenerate desires to divert him towards good, and his illusions of the senses to do so towards truth. At that point he is in communication with the world of spirits by means of the spirits who reside with him, but not in the same way with heaven, for the reason that evil spirits have dominion and angels simply forestall them.

[3] When however he is regenerate it is the angels who then have dominion, and they breathe into him every kind of good and truth, as well as a horror and dread of evils and falsifies. Angels do indeed lead, yet they are but servants, for it is the Lord alone who, by means of angels and spirits, governs a person. Now because this is done through the ministry of angels, it is said here, in the plural first of all, 'Let Us make man in Our image'. Yet because it is still He alone who rules and disposes, it is said in the following verse, in the singular, 'God created him in His image'. This the Lord also states plainly in Isaiah,

Thus said Jehovah, your Redeemer, He who formed you from the womb, I Jehovah make all things, stretching out the heavens Alone, spreading out the earth by Myself. Isaiah 44:24.

Angels themselves also profess that no power at all resides with themselves but that they act from the Lord alone.

9373. 'Come up to Jehovah' means being joined to the Lord. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming up' as being raised to more internal things, dealt with in 3084, 4539, 4969, 5406, 5817, 6007, and therefore also being joined to them, 8760. The reason why it is a joining to the Lord is that 'Jehovah' in the Word means the Lord, 1343, 1736, 1793, 2004, 2005, 2018, 2025, 2921, 3023, 3035, 5663, 6280, 6281, 6303, 6905, 8274, 8864, 9315. A further arcanum which lies concealed within the internal sense of these words is that the children of Jacob, over whom Moses presided as their head, were not called or elected; rather, they themselves insisted that Divine worship should be established among them, as accords with what has been stated in 4290, 4293. This is why it says, And He said to Moses, Come up to Jehovah, as though not Jehovah but another was telling him to go up. For the same reason it says in what follows that the people should not come up, verse 2, and that Jehovah did not lay a hand on the children of Israel who had been set apart, verse 11; also that the sight of Jehovah's glory was like a consuming fire on the top of the mountain in the eyes of the children of Israel, verse 17; and finally that Moses, when he was called on the seventh day, went into the middle of the cloud, [verses 16, 18.] 'The cloud' means the Word in the letter, 5922, 6343 (end), 6752, 6832, 8106, 8443, 8781; and among the children of Jacob it was the Word separated from its internal sense, since their worship was external devoid of anything internal. This becomes perfectly clear from the fact that they now said, as they had done before [at Exodus 19:8], All the words which Jehovah has spoken we will do, verse 3; yet scarcely forty days went by after this time and they were worshipping the golden calf instead of Jehovah. From this it is evident that such idolatry lay concealed in their heart when they said with their lips that they would serve Jehovah alone. However, the people who are meant by the called and the elect are those with whom internal worship exists, and also external worship springing from internal, that is, those with whom love to the Lord and faith in Him, and consequently love towards the neighbour are present.