5300. 'For the seven years of famine' means as need arises when there is an absence [of truth]. This is clear from the meaning of 'famine' as an absence of truth, dealt with above in 5277, 5278. The fact that the time when truth is absent is a time of need is self-evident; for in the internal sense 'years' are states, as has frequently been shown above, and therefore 'for those [seven] years' means for those states when need arises.