Spiritual Meaning of Oak

Spiritual Meaning of

Oak

Oaks in a good sense signify the truths and goods which are lowest of the natural, and in the opposite sense falsities and evils, as evident from the passages in the Word where they are mentioned, when understood in the internal sense, as in Isaiah:

They who forsake Jehovah shall be consumed, for they shall be ashamed of the oaks which ye have desired; and ye shall be as an oak that casteth its leaves, and as a garden that hath no water (Isa. 1:28-30).

In the same:

The day of Jehovah Zebaoth shall be upon everyone lifted up and low, and upon all the cedars of Lebanon, and upon all the oaks of Bashan (Isa. 2:12, 13);

that the day of Jehovah will not be upon the cedars and the oaks, everyone may know, but upon those who are signified by them. Again:--

He who formeth a god heweth him down cedars, and taketh the beech and the oak, and strengtheneth for himself in the trees of the forest (Isa. 44:14).

[5] In Ezekiel:

Ye shall acknowledge that I am Jehovah when their pierced ones shall be in the midst of the idols round about their altars, upon every high hill, in all the heads of the mountains, and under every green tree, and under every tangled oak, the place where they have given an odor of rest to all their idols (Ezek. 6:13).

Moreover the ancients had worship upon hills and mountains because hills and mountains signified celestial love; but when the worship was performed by idolaters, as here, they signify the love of self and of the world (AC 795, 796, 1430, 2722, 4210); and they held it under trees, because as before said these were significative according to their species. Under the tangled oak here denotes that the worship was from falsities, which are the lowest things of the natural, for these are in an entangled state (AC 2831). In Hosea:

They sacrifice upon the heads of the mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under the oak, the poplar, and the hard oak, because the shade thereof is good; therefore your daughters commit whoredom, and your daughters-in-law commit adultery (Hosea 4:13).

To commit whoredom is to falsify truths, and to commit adultery is to pervert goods, (AC 2466, 2729, 3399). In Zechariah:

Open thy doors, O Lebanon, and let the fire devour the cedars, because the magnificent ones are laid waste; howl, ye oaks of Bashan, for the forest of Bazar is come down (Zech. 11:1, 2).

from AC 4552

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Author: E. Swedenborg (1688-1772).

Design: I.J. Thompson, Feb 2002.