[2] The details contained here in the highest sense concerning the Lord and how He Himself by His own power made Divine His Natural are such that they go beyond even that which angels can understand. Something of what they are may be seen in the regeneration of man, for the regeneration of man is an image of the Glorification of the Lord, 3138, 3212, 3296, 3490. Some idea of this subject may indeed be had by man, but not by anyone other than a regenerate person, and even then only an obscure idea as long as he is living in the body. For bodily and worldly matters which occupy his attention constantly cloud his mind and confine it to lower things. But those who are not regenerate are not able to grasp anything at all of the subject; they are devoid of all knowledge of it because they are devoid of any perception of it. Indeed they are totally unaware of what regeneration is, and do not believe in the possibility of it. They do not even know what the affection belonging to charity is by which regeneration is accomplished, nor consequently what conscience is, still less what the internal man is, and least of all what the correspondence of the internal man with the external is. They may, it is true, know - and many do know - the words that are used, but they know nothing of the subject itself. Consequently when they lack even some notion of these, then no matter how clearly the arcana contained in the internal sense at this point are presented to them, such a presentation would be like something displayed in the dark or like something spoken to the deaf. What is more, the affections belonging to self-love and love of the world which reign with them do not allow them to know or even to hear of such arcana, for they instantly reject them; indeed they loathe them. It is different with people who are stirred by the affection belonging to charity. They are delighted with such things; for the angels present with those people experience their own angelic happiness when a person is conscious of such arcana, the reason being that they too are then conscious of things to do with the Lord in whom they abide, and of things to do with the neighbour and his regeneration. From the angels, that is, from the Lord by way of the angels, joy and blessing flow in when anyone who is stirred by the affection belonging to charity reads those things, more so when he believes that holiness lies within them, and more so still when he grasps something contained in the internal sense.

[3] The matter under consideration at this point is the influx of the Lord into the good of the internal man, and indeed through the good into the truth there. Also under consideration are: the influx from there into the external or natural man; the affection for good and truth, into which affection the influx takes place; the reception of truth and the joining of it to the good there; and in addition, the good which serves as a means and is meant here by 'Laban and his flock'. Of these matters the angels, who are aware of the internal sense of the Word - that is, for whom the internal sense is the Word - see and perceive countless details. But scarcely any of those details come within the range of man's understanding, and those which do come within it pass into the unlit part, which is why these matters are not being explained in any greater detail.