387. And with death, signifies the consequent extinction of spiritual life. This is evident from the signification of "death," as being the extinction of spiritual life (See above, n. 78, 186). That this is what "death" here signifies is evident from the series of things in the internal sense; for it is said that "there was given unto them power to kill with sword, with famine, and with death;" and "sword" signifies falsity destroying truth, "famine" the deprivation of the knowledges of truth and good; thence "death" signifies the extinction of spiritual life; for where falsity reigns, and where there are no knowledges of truth and good, there is no spiritual life, for spiritual life is acquired by means of the knowledges of truth and good applied to the uses of life. For man is born into all evil and falsity from evil; he is therefore born also into an entire ignorance of all spiritual knowledges; therefore in order that he may be led away from the evils and consequent falsities into which he is born, and be led into the life of heaven and be saved, he must needs acquire the knowledges of truth and good, by means of which he can be led into spiritual life and become spiritual. From this series of things in the internal sense it is evident that "death" here signifies the extinction of spiritual life; this is meant, too, by spiritual death.

1864. That 'on that day Jehovah made a covenant with Abram' means the joining together of the Lord's Interior Man and His Internal Man is clear from the meaning of 'a covenant' as a joining together, dealt with already in 665, 666, 1023, 1038. Here, because in the internal sense the Lord is the subject, it means an interior conjunction. For the Lord advanced more and more towards conjunction and union with Jehovah His Father, till at length He became one, that is, the Human Essence itself also became Jehovah, who was the Lord's Internal itself. These things were represented by 'the covenant which Jehovah made with Abram'. Anyone may see that Jehovah never makes a covenant with man, for such would be contrary to the Divine. What is man but something base and filthy, which of itself thinks and does nothing but evil? All the good that he does comes from Jehovah. From this it becomes clear that this covenant, like every other covenant made with Abram's descendants, was nothing else than a representative of the Divine and of the heavenly things of the kingdom of God. This particular covenant made with Abram was a representative of the joining together of the Lord's Human Essence and His Divine Essence, that is, Jehovah. That it was a representative of the joining together of the Lord's Interior Man and His Internal Man, that is, Jehovah, is clear from what has gone before - that the Lord joined and united Himself more and more through the conflicts brought about by temptations and through victories. What the Interior Man was has been stated already, namely that which was between the Internal and the External.