Spiritual Meaning of

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The signification of a boy and of an old man, when predicated of falsities and evils; namely, that boys denote those not yet matured, thus recent ones; and old men, those which have attained to considerable age, thus those confirmed. Boy and old man occur elsewhere in the Word in a similar sense, as in Zechariah:--

where Jerusalem denotes the Lord's kingdom and church (AC 402, 2117); the streets, truths therein (AC 2336); thus old men, confirmed truths; and old women, confirmed goods; boys playing in the streets, recent truths; and girls, recent goods and their affections and the derivative gladnesses. It is evident from this how celestial and spiritual things are changed into things historic, in their descent into the worldly things of the sense of the letter, in which sense it scarcely appears otherwise than that old men, boys, women, and girls, are meant.

[2] In Jeremiah:--

here the street of Jerusalem denotes the falsities that reign in the church (AC 2336), of which the recent and the maturing are called the child and the young men, and the old and the confirmed are called the old man and him that is full of days. Again:--

where in like manner the old man and the boy denote confirmed truth and recent truth.

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