19. The Word contains a still more interior sense, called celestial, which we said something about in no. 6 above. But this sense is almost impossible to explicate, as it does not fall so much within the scope of the thought of the intellect as into the affection of the will.

The Word contains this still more interior sense, called celestial, because there emanates from the Lord Divine goodness and Divine truth — Divine goodness from His Divine love, and Divine truth from His Divine wisdom. Both are present in the Word, for the Word is a Divine emanation. And because both are present, therefore the Word gives life to people who read it reverently. However, we will say more on this subject in the section where we show that the constituents of the Word all contain a marriage of the Lord and the church, and so a marriage of goodness and truth.

62. The Word’s Literal Sense Makes Possible a Conjunction with the Lord and Affiliation with Angels

The Word makes possible a conjunction with the Lord because the Word has the Lord as its only subject, and the Lord is as a consequence the totality of it, and is called the Word, as we showed in The Doctrine Regarding the Lord.

Conjunction lies in the literal sense because in that sense the Word is in its fullness, in its holiness, and in its power, as we showed in its own section above.

The conjunction is not apparent to a person, but it is present in his affection for truth and in his perception of truth, thus in the love of Divine truth and faith in that truth that he possesses.