7967. 'Their kneading bowls bound up in their clothes' means delights that belong to affections and cling to truths. This is clear from the meaning of 'kneading bowls' as delights belonging to affections, dealt with in 7356; from the meaning of 'being bound' as clinging to; and from the meaning of 'clothes' as truths, dealt with in 1073, 2576, 4545, 4763, 5248, 5319, 5954, 6914, 6918. What delights that belong to affections and cling to truths are must be stated. All the truths that enter and reside with a person have become linked to some delight; for without delight truths have no vitality. The delights that have become linked to the truths residing with a person reveal what the situation is with those truths. If his delights belong to evil affections the situation is bad, but if his delights belong to good affections it is good. For the angels present with a person enter in constantly with good affections and stir to life the truths that have become linked to them. On the other hand if truths have not become linked to good affections the angels strive in vain to arouse any stirrings of matters of faith and charity. These considerations show what one is to understand by delights that belong to affections and cling to truths, meant by 'kneading bowls bound up in their clothes'.

7356. 'And into your ovens, and into your kneading bowls' means into delights belonging to evil desires. This is clear from the meaning of 'ovens', since they are what bread is baked in, as forms of exterior good (forms of exterior good being those which exist in the natural and are as a general rule called delights; for when forms of interior good, which are offshoots of [heavenly] kinds of love and resulting affections, pass into the natural they are experienced as delights there, and these delights are meant in a good sense by 'ovens') or in the contrary sense, in which 'ovens' is used here, as delights belonging to evil desires, that is, delights springing from hellish kinds of love, which are self-love and love of the world; and from the meaning of 'kneading bowls' too as delights belonging to evil desires in the natural, but even more external ones since kneading bowls are the vessels in which the dough is prepared when bread is made. Another way of saying that reasonings will enter into delights belonging to evil desires is to say that it will be the delight of their life to use reasonings arising from falsities to deceive others and lead them astray. Indeed the evil take very great delight in spreading falsities around, proving that they are well-founded, mocking truths, and especially leading others astray.

[2] The fact that 'an oven' means delight belonging to affections that go with charity and faith, and in the contrary sense delight belonging to evil desires that go with selfish and worldly love, is evident in Hosea,

They are all committing adultery, like an oven heated by a baker; the raiser ¹ ceases from kneading his dough. When like an oven they transform ² their desire (animus) while they lie in wait, their baker being sleepy all night, in the morning it is burning, like a flaming fire. All become hot, like an oven, and devour their judges; all their kings fall. Hosea 7:4, 6-7.

'Oven' stands for delight belonging to evil desires, which are evil people's desires. 'Burning', 'becoming hot', and 'flaming fire' stand for the desires themselves, 'fire being the desire for evil, see 1297, 1861, 2446, 5071, 5215, 6314, 6832, 7324 (end). 'They devour their judges; all their kings fall' stands for the fact that they destroy forms of good and truths. Anyone may see that without the internal sense in which such things are meant nobody can know what 'they are all committing adultery, like an oven heated by a baker' is, or 'all become hot, like an oven, and devour their judges', and 'their kings fall'.

[3] 'Oven' is used in the good sense in Isaiah,

The saying of Jehovah, whose hearth is in Zion, and His oven in Jerusalem. Isaiah 31:9.

'Zion' stands for the celestial Church, thus for the good of love, which is the good of this Church, 'Jerusalem' for the spiritual Church, thus for the good of love in this Church, which is the good of charity and consequently of faith, while 'oven' here stands for more internal delight belonging to affections for goodness and truth. 'Oven' has this meaning because the bread which is baked in an oven means the good of celestial and spiritual love, for which meaning of 'bread' see 276, 680, 2165, 2177, 3464, 3478, 3775, 3813, 4211, 4217, 4735, 4976, 5915. And as 'oven' receives its meaning from this, the bread called a minchah that was baked for sacrifices in an oven was distinguished from the minchah baked on a griddle, and from the minchah baked in a covered pan, Leviticus 2:4-5, 7. Different forms of the good of love were meant by these varieties of minchah.

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