Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 5133

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5133. 'And make mention of me to Pharaoh' means communication with the interior natural. This is clear from the meaning of 'making mention to someone' as communicating, and from the representation of 'Pharaoh' as the interior natural, dealt with 5080, 5095. By communication with the interior natural one means a joining together with it that has been effected through correspondence. The interior natural is that which receives ideas of truth and good from the rational and stores these away for the use they may serve, and is consequently that which communicates directly with the rational. The exterior natural however is that which receives images, and from these the ideas of things coming from the world by way of the senses.

[2] Unless these latter ideas receive light from ideas present in the interior natural they give rise to illusions, which are called the illusions of the senses. When subject to such illusions a person believes nothing apart from that which is in agreement with them or to which they lend support, as is the situation if no correspondence exists. Nor does any correspondence exist if that person is not endowed with charity, for charity is the means which brings about union because the good of charity contains life from the Lord. That life arranges truths into order, thereby giving charity an outward form, that is, an image in which it can present itself. This form is manifested visually in the next life and is the angelic form itself. All the angels consequently are forms of charity, the beauty of this charity being received from the truths of faith, and the life within the beauty being received from the good of charity.


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