7668. 'Go now, you young men, and serve Jehovah' means that those guided by truths that have been corroborated will be left alone, in order that they may worship the Lord. This is clear from the meaning of the command 'go' as the intimation that they will be left alone, as above in 7658; from the meaning of 'young men' as corroborated truths, dealt with below; and from the meaning of 'serving Jehovah' as worshipping the Lord, as above in 7654, 7664. The reason why 'young men' means those guided by truths that have been corroborated is that by sons, boys, young men, men, and old men' are meant aspects of intelligence and wisdom in their true order. Such aspects instead of those male persons are understood in heaven; for those in heaven possess spiritual ideas which are such that images from the purely natural order or the world cannot enter them without being instantly sloughed off and transformed into the kinds of images that are more in keeping with the wisdom of heaven and with angelic thought. This is why 'sons, boys, young men, men, and old men' cannot in the spiritual sense mean those male persons, only corresponding spiritual realities, which are aspects of intelligence and wisdom. The fact that these are meant is plainly evident from the internal sense of the places in the Word where they are mentioned.

[2] In the Word 'young men' is used to mean those who have intelligence, or - on the level of abstract ideas on which angels think - intelligence itself. And since intelligence is meant by them, so is firmly established truth since this belongs to intelligence. Also the expression which is used here in the original language to denote young men is derived from strength and power, which truth receives from good, and so which firmly established truth receives. And this name is therefore applied to the Lord in Zechariah,

O sword, rise up against My shepherd, and against the (young) man, My neighbour. Strike the shepherd, and the sheep are scattered. Zechariah 13:7.

These words were spoken in reference to the Lord, see Matthew 26:31. And also in Jeremiah,

How long do you wander around, O estranged daughter? Jehovah has created a new thing on the earth, a woman has surrounded a (young) man. Jeremiah 31:22.

[3] Another word for 'young men in the original language stands for intelligence, and so for the truth that belongs to it, in Amos,

I have sent the pestilence upon you in the way of Egypt, I have killed your young men with the sword, along with captured horses. ¹ Amos 4:10.

'The way of Egypt' stands for perverted factual knowledge, young men who have been killed' for truths which have as a result been destroyed, and 'captured horses' for an understanding that has been led into error.

[4] In the same prophet,

They will wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east; they will run to and fro to seek the Word of Jehovah, and will not find it. On that day the beautiful virgins and the young men will faint from thirst. Amos 8:12-13.

'The beautiful virgins' stands for the affection for truth, 'the young men' for intelligence, and 'fainting from thirst' for being deprived of truth; and this is why it says 'they will run to and fro to seek the Word of Jehovah, and will not find it'. The fact that neither beautiful virgins, nor young men, nor fainting because of thirst are meant here is self-evident.

In Jeremiah,

Death has come up through our windows, it has entered our palaces, cutting off the young child from the street, young men from the lanes. Jeremiah 9:11.

In the same prophet,

How is the city of glory not forsaken, the city of My joy? Therefore her young men will fall in her streets. Jeremiah 49:25-26; 50:30.

In the same prophet,

Hear now, all peoples, see my sorrow; my virgins and my young men have gone into captivity. Lamentations 1:18.

In these places 'young men' stands for the truths that belong to intelligence.

Mga talababa:

5663. 'Your God and the God of your father' means the Lord's Divine Human. This becomes clear from the fact that where the name God or the name Jehovah is used in the Word, the Lord and no one else is meant, 1343, 1736, 2921, 3035. And when the words 'your God and the God of your father' are used - that is, the God of Israel and Jacob and of his sons - the Lord's Divine Human is meant, in particular His Divine Natural, 3305, 4286, 4570; for 'Israel' represented the Lord's interior Natural, 'Jacob' His exterior Natural, and 'his sons' the truths present in that Natural.

[2] The truth that the Lord was meant by God and Jehovah in the Word was unknown to the Jewish Church; and the Christian Church at the present day does not know it, the reason for its ignorance of this truth being that it has distinguished the Divine into three separate persons. But the Ancient Church which existed after the Flood, and especially the Most Ancient Church which existed before the Flood, did not understand by Jehovah and God anyone else than the Lord, in particular His Divine Human. They did know about the Divine Himself who dwells within the Lord, and whom the Lord calls His Father; but they could not engage in any thought about the Divine Himself who dwells within the Lord, only about His Divine Human, and consequently could not be joined to any other that is Divine. For that linking together is effected through thought which is the activity of the understanding and through affection which is the activity of the will, thus through faith and love. When anyone thinks about the Divine Himself his thought becomes lost so to speak in boundless space and so is dissipated. As a consequence no joining together can result. But it is different when anyone thinks about the Divine Himself as the Divine Human. Those people living in former times also knew that unless they were joined to the Divine they could not be saved.

[3] It was therefore a Divine Human that the Ancient Churches worshipped, and it was Jehovah in this Divine Human that revealed Himself among them. That Divine Human was also the Divine Himself in heaven, for heaven consists of a single human being called the Grand Man, dealt with at the ends of chapters up to this point. The Divine in heaven is essentially the Divine Himself; but He exists in heaven as a Divine Man. This Man is the one the Lord took upon Himself, made Divine within Himself, and made one with the Divine Himself, even as He had from eternity been made one with Him; for He has from eternity been one. He acted in that way because the human race could not otherwise be saved. The channel formed by heaven, and so by the Divine Human there, by means of which the Divine Himself came into people's minds was no longer adequate; therefore the Divine Himself was willing to make the Divine Human one with Himself through the Human He actually took upon Himself in the world. This Divine Human and that Divine Himself are the Lord.