AC 7378 - Exodus Chap. 8 - Frogs Con't, Lice, Noisome Fly; AC 7381 - Internal & External Law

AC 7378 - Exodus Chap. 8 - Frogs Con't, Lice, Noisome Fly

Reasonings from mere falsities are meant by "the frogs;"
which subject is continued in this chapter . . ..
The fourth degree is
that they were in evils
which destroyed every good with them,
also whatever they had from natural good;
these are meant by the lice from the dust of the land.
The fifth degree is
that they were in falsities from these evils,
whereby every truth would be destroyed;
these are signified by the noisome fly.

AC 7381 [2-3]

As the internal law which Moses represents
is truth accommodated to angels,
and the external law which Aaron represents
is truth accommodated to people,
I may here say something about them.
Truth accommodated to angels
is for the most part incomprehensible to people,
as is evident from the fact
that things are seen and said in heaven
such as eye has never seen, nor ear has ever heard.
The reason is that the things said among the angels
are spiritual things
which have been abstracted from natural things,
and consequently are remote from
the ideas and expressions of human speech;
for a person has formed his ideas
from the things in nature, and indeed in grosser nature,
that is, from those
which he has seen in the world and upon the earth,
and has touched by sense,
which things are material.
The ideas of interior thought with a person,
although they are above material things,
nevertheless terminate in material things,
and where they terminate, there they appear to be,
and from this he perceives that which he is thinking.
From this it is evident how the case is
with that truth of faith, and what is its quality,
which falls into the thought of a person,
and is called the external law,
and is represented by Aaron.

To illustrate this by an example:
A person cannot possibly think
without the idea of time and space,
which idea adheres
to almost everything which he thinks;
if ideas from time and space
were taken away from a person,
he would not know what he is thinking;
and scarcely whether he is thinking.
But in the ideas of the angels
there is nothing from time and space,
but instead of these there are states . . ..