4494. Verses 25-29 And it happened on the third day, when they were in pain, that two of Jacob's sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah's brothers, each took his sword, and came with confidence upon the city, and killed every male. And they killed Hamor and Shechem his son with the edge of the sword, and they took Dinah from Shechem's house, and went away. The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and plundered the city, because they had defiled their sister. Their flocks, and their herds, and their asses, and whatever was in the city, and whatever was in the field, they took. And all their wealth, and all their young children, and their women, they took captive and plundered, and everything that was in the house.

'It happened on the third day' means that which is continuous even to the end. 'When they were in pain' means evil desires. 'That two of Jacob's sons, Simeon and Levi' means faith and love. 'Dinah's brothers' means the truths and goods of that Church. 'Each took his sword' means falsity and evil. 'And came with confidence upon the city, and killed every male' means that they utterly destroyed the truths of doctrine of the Church among the Ancients. 'And [they killed] Hamor and Shechem his son with the edge of the sword' means the Church itself. 'And they took Dinah from Shechem's house, and went away' means that they took away the affection for truth. 'The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and plundered the city' means that all his descendants destroyed that doctrine. 'Because they had defiled their sister' means that they had violated the truth of faith. 'Their flocks, and their herds' means that they destroyed rational good and natural good. 'And their asses' means the truths derived from these. 'And whatever was in the city, and whatever was in the field, they took' means every truth and good of the Church. 'And all their wealth' means all factual knowledge which they had acquired for themselves. 'And all their young children' means all innocence. 'And their women' means charity. 'They took captive and plundered' means that they seized them and perverted them. 'And everything that was in the house' means everything of the Church.

4653. The spirits who correspond to hearing, that is, those who constitute the province of the ear, are ones who lead lives of simple obedience; that is to say, they do not use reason to establish whether a thing is true but believe it to be so because others say it is. They may therefore be called 'obediences'. The reason why they are as they are is that the relationship of hearing to speech is like what is passive to what is active, and so like a person who hears and acquiesces in what another says. This also explains why in everyday speech hearing someone may mean being obedient to him, and to hearken to his voice to obey him. For the deeper meanings which human utterances possess have their origin for the most part in correspondence, the reason being that man's spirit exists among spirits in the next life, and exercises its power of thought there, though man himself has no knowledge at all of this and one interested solely in the body has no wish to know it.

[4653a] There are many different kinds of spirits who correspond to the ear, that is, to its functions and duties. There are those who correlate with the specific parts of that organ - those who correlate with the outer ear; those who do so with the membrane there which is called the ear-drum, the interior membranes termed fenestrae; and those who correlate with the malleus, the stapes, the incus, the cylinders, and the cochlea. There are also those who correlate with parts more interior still, including those immaterial or insubstantial parts that are closer to the spirit. Lastly there are those spirits, within the spirit itself, who are linked ultimately - at the most internal point - to spirits belonging to internal sight, from whom they differ in that they themselves are not so discerning, yet, like those who are passively obedient, support them.