Arcana Coelestia volume 7 - Swedenborg Foundation

ARCANA COELESTIA 3674“dream” as being foresight and hence the event (of which above, n.5091, 5092, 5104), thus the event that was foreseen or perceived;and from the signification of the “prince of the butlers” as being thesensuous subject to the intellectual part in general (n. 5077, 5082).That it was rejected is meant by his being in custody (n. 5083,5101). From these things it is plain that such is the internal sense ofthese words. Moreover that Joseph, by whom is represented thecelestial of the spiritual, perceived the event is evident from theverses that follow.[2] It is said, “the celestial of the spiritual” and thereby is meantthe Lord; the same may also be said abstractedly of him, because heis the celestial itself and the spiritual itself, that is, good itself andtruth itself. As regards man, these cannot indeed be conceived ofabstractedly from person, because what is natural is adjoined toeverything of his thought; nevertheless, when we consider thateverything in the Lord is Divine, and that the Divine is above allthought, and altogether incomprehensible even to the angels,consequently if we then abstract that which is comprehensible,there remains being and coming-forth itself, which is the celestialitself and the spiritual itself, that is, good itself and truth itself.[3] Nevertheless, as man is such that he can have no idea ofthought whatever about abstract things unless he adjoins somethingnatural which has entered from the world through the senses (forwithout some such natural thing his thought perishes as in an abyssand is dissipated), therefore lest what is Divine should perish inman when he is wholly immersed in bodily and earthly things, andwith whomsoever it remained it should be defiled by an uncleanidea, and together with what is Divine everything celestial andspiritual thence derived should also perish, it pleased Jehovah topresent himself such as he actually is, and such as he appears inheaven, namely, as a Divine man. For everything of heavenconspires to the human form, as may be seen from what has beenshown at the end of the chapters concerning the correspondence ofall things of man with the grand man, which is heaven. ThisDivine, or this of Jehovah in heaven, is the Lord from eternity. Thesame the Lord took also upon him when he glorified or made