Then the second angel sounded:
And something like a great mountain burning with fire
was cast into the sea,
and a third of the sea became blood.
And a third of the living creatures in the sea died,
and the ships were destroyed.
(Revelation 8:8-9)
AR 402
What is said here concerns people
caught up externally in that faith (faith alone)
because the subject now is people who are at sea,
whereas previously it was people upon the earth;
and those on the earth mean people
concerned with the internal elements of the church,
namely the clergy,
while those at sea mean people concerned with
the external elements of the church,
namely the laity.
These people in the spiritual world
are seemingly at sea.
AR 405
Creatures mean people who can be reformed.
The reason is that to create
means, symbolically, to reform.
Their living means, symbolically,
to be able by reformation to receive life.
That they died means, symbolically,
that people who live that faith alone
cannot receive life.
They cannot, because people are all reformed
by a faith united to charity,
thus by a faith accompanying charity,
and none by faith alone;
for charity is the life of faith.
AR 406
Ships symbolize concepts
of goodness and truth from the Word
that are serviceable for application to life.
Ships have this symbolism
because ships travel the sea
and bring back the necessities
that the natural self needs for its every endeavor,
and concepts of goodness and truth
are the necessities that the spiritual self needs
for its every endeavor.
For out of them
is formed the doctrine of the church,
and in accordance with that a person's life.
Ships symbolize these concepts
because they are vessels,
and in many places in the Word
a vessel is used to express what it contains,
as a cup for wine, a dish for food,
the Tabernacle or Temple
for the sacred objects in it,
the Ark for the Law,
altars for worship, and so on.
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