Swedenborg Arcana Caelestia Vol. IV (1750)

obscure: and he said, lift up I pray your eyes, signifies attention from one's own [self]: and see all the he-goats ascending upon the flock, speckled, ring-streaked, and grisled, signifies that such things were being introduced: for I have seen all that Laban does to you, signifies the selfhood of the good signified by Laban, not such as if from himself: I am the God of Bethel, signifies the Divine in the natural: where you anointed the pillar, signifies where the good of truth is, and the boundary: where you vowed a vow to me, signifies the holy: now arise, signifies elevation: go forth from this land, signifies separation from that good; and return to the land of your birth, signifies conjunction with the Divine good of truth.

4073. "And Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah to the field to his flock," signifies the adjunction of the affections of truth from good by Jacob (now understood) and the application at the time he was departing. This is evident from the representation of Jacob as the good of the natural, discussed often before; and from the representation of Rachel and Leah as the affections of truth adjoined to that good—Rachel being the affection of interior truth and Leah the affection of exterior truth, discussed in n. 3758, 3782, 3793, 3819. That "to send to them and call to the field to his flock" means to adjoin to oneself is clear. A field signifies those things which belong to good and where good is, n. 2971, 3196, 3310, 3317; and the flock signifies the very goods and truths that have now been acquired, to which the affections of truth understood by Rachel and Leah would be applied when he departed. In this chapter, Jacob represents the good of the Natural, which was approaching conjunction with the Divine (n. 4069) because it was in preparation to separate from the good signified by Laban. (See n. 3775 regarding Jacob.) Representations change according to changes of state in regard to good and truth, and these changes of state follow the changes of the spirits and angels who are in such good and truth, according to what was said above in n. 4067. When societies of spirits and angels who are in mediate good recede, then new societies approach that are in more perfect good. A person's state is entirely according to the societies of spirits and angels in the midst of whom he is; such is his will and such is his thought. However, the changes of his state are entirely different when he himself gathers these societies to himself (or joins himself to them) than when those societies are joined to him by the Lord. When he joins himself to them, he is in evil; but when they are joined to him by the Lord, he is in good. When he is in good, such good as serves the reformation of his life flows in through those societies. What is said here in the internal sense concerning the good represented by Jacob, the affections of truth which are Rachel and Leah, and the application of these when he departed from the good signified by Laban, reflects exactly—and vividly—these societies and their changes. From these things, angels perceive the states that are with a person, thus what his goods and truths are like—things so numerous that they appear to a person as hardly a single common thing. Therefore, the angels are in the causes themselves, for they see and perceive those societies, whereas a person is only in the effects and does not see them, but can only perceive them obscurely through certain changes of state that arise from them. He perceives nothing regarding good and truth unless he is enlightened by the angels from the Lord.