And on the third day a marriage took place in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. And Jesus and His disciples also were invited to the marriage. And being short of wine, the mother of Jesus said to Him, They have no wine. Jesus said to her, What is that to Me and to you, woman? My hour has not yet come. His mother said to the servants, Whatever He says to you, do. And there were six stone waterpots standing, according to the purification of the Jews, each containing two or three measures. Jesus said to them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them to the top. And He said to them, Now draw out and carry to the master of the feast. And they carried it. But when the master of the feast tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know from where it was (but the servants drawing the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom, and he said to him, Every man first sets on the good wine, and when they have drunk freely, then the worse. You have kept the good wine until now. This beginning of the miraculous signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee. And it revealed His glory, and His disciples believed into Him. (John 2:1-11)
It should be known that all the miracles performed by the Lord, as well as all the miracles of Him recorded in the Old Testament, signified such things as pertain to heaven and the church, that is, that they contained such things within them, and that hence His miracles were Divine (see the Arcana Coelestia 7337, 8364, 9051), this miracle similarly. By a marriage here, as elsewhere in the Word throughout, is signified the church; in Cana of Galilee that amongst the Gentiles; and by water is signified the truth of the external church, such as was the truth of the Jewish Church from the sense of the letter of the Word; and by wine is signified the truth of the internal church, such as is the truth of the Christian Church. Hence the Lord’s making the water wine, signifies that He would make the truths of the external church truths of the internal church, by opening the internal things that lay concealed in them. By the six water-pots of stone, set after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, are signified all those things in the Word, and thence in the Jewish Church and its worship, all of which were representative and significative of things Divine in the Lord, and from the Lord, which contained things internal. Therefore also, there were six of stone, set for the purifying of the Jews, the number six signifying all, and being said of truths, stone signifies truth, and the purification of the Jews purification from sins, thus all things of the Jewish Church. For the church regards purification from sins as its all, for in proportion as any one is purified therefrom, in the same proportion he becomes a church. By the ruler of the feast are meant those who are in the knowledges of truth; his saying to the bridegroom, “Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have had enough, that which is worse; thou hast kept the good wine until now,” signifies that every church commences by truths from good, but afterwards ends in truths not from good, and that still, at the end of the church, truth from good, or genuine truth, is given from the Lord.(Apocalypse Explained 376{29})
In part one we looked at how when we feel a sense of lack in our life we are to go to the Word. And that when we go the Word looking for answers we will be challenged by it. It asks us, as Jesus here asked his mother,
What does your concern have to do with me?
This is the constant question the Word keeps asking of us. It is present within our minds as we actively seek to become more loving and understanding in our responses to what life brings up for us. When we are taking the Word into our life, we will find this question becoming more and more prominent as we look to find how our concerns are related to the Word. It seems as if it is us who is doing the asking but this is an appearance. It is the Word in us that is asking this question to inspire us to keep searching and responding in such a way that we can be led by the Lord. We also saw that our states are such that we need to become well versed in the principle that in spiritual matters, the answers can only come when we are ready for them. The Lord can’t provide answers if we are not ready to receive them. So there is a lot of inner work that has to be done as preparation before we are ready to receive. The answers will always come but not necessarily when we want them or in the way we expect them. They come when we are ready to receive them.
If things are to progress then we need to learn to respond like Jesus’s mother who on hearing the question immediately handed her authority over the servants to Jesus, telling them to do whatever He says. The mother of Jesus is that affection for truth which looks to nurture and develop our understanding of the Word. The servants are the truths of the Word that can assist us to live a spiritual life. Jesus’s mother giving Him authority over these servants, is like us being willing to hand our situations and circumstances over to the Word so that we can be guided and directed by the Lord, and so have less of the self active in how we live our lives.
The process of preparation for the acceptance of what is spiritual into what is natural begins with six stone waterpots of two to three measures each. These waterpots we are told are for the purification of the Jews.
And there were six stone waterpots standing, according to the purification of the Jews, each containing two or three measures.
Now all the details here have a spiritual application which is where their real value lies. Stone pots of course are containers, and in this case they are containers designed to hold water for a particular purpose, that being bodily purification or cleansing in accordance with the requirements of Jewish ceremonial laws. If we lift our thoughts to consider what these things represent on a spiritual level, on the level to do with the inner world of our thoughts and affections, we can see that we are working with ideas that have to do with cleansing or purification. Now cleansing or purification in the inner world involves working to have the influences of the loves of self and the world and the false ideas that these loves generate, removed from within our thought processes. From this story we can see that we need two things for this work to begin. We need a cleansing agent, and we need suitable vessels within which this cleansing agent can be held and made available for our spiritual growth.
So, what is the meaning of the vessels being made of stone and of there being six of them? Vessels that hold things or liquids in Scripture correspond to truths because truths are spiritual vessels that contain goods. So the stone pots as vessels correspond to spiritual vessels which are truths and being made of stone they relate to solid basic foundational truths. From the perspective of the Word, these basic truths are the truths of the literal sense on which everything else rests. A good example is the Ten Commandments. These you will recall, were written upon, and so contained within, stone tablets. This represents the same idea found here, where in the place of water we have the actual words that the Lord spoke to Moses written in stone. So, both the words spoken by God and the water, correspond to Divine truths. Both are images of purification. Water is obviously this. The Ten Commandments are instructions for living our lives, which if used for this purpose, are able to cleanse our life from those things that are opposed to the heavenly life.
The reason we have six stone pots is to convey the importance of the whole of the Word as to its literal sense. Six, as we see in the reading from Apocalypse Explained, signifies all and so six stone containers means all the truths of the literal sense of the Word. So we are presented with this powerful image which shows that all the truths of the Word are designed to support our spiritual growth and development and that we need to acknowledge this as their use in our responses if we are to experience the heavenly joy of marriage in relation to the things of the Word.
First and foremost, what we see is that the Lord works by means of these stone vessels, that they form the foundation for the miracle of spiritual transformation. So if we want this inner transformation then we need to be taking these stone vessels into our minds, that is, the elements of the literal sense of the Word, and we do this by reading and studying it just like we are doing now. To understand the spiritual applications contained in this story then we must first look at the literal story and all its elements. From this, we can then move into understanding it spiritually as we seek to apply the principles of Spiritual Christianity so that the literal elements of the story begin to into describe the Word’s operation in the life of our mind. And as we examine our life and behaviour against the teachings of the Word and respond to where we perceive there is a need, then the servants will begin filling these vessels with water.
Jesus said to them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them to the top.
These servants are those truths that look to the practical life aspects of the application of truth. The filling of the stone vessels with water represents the infilling of the literal sense of the Word with natural truths which can bring about a cleansing within the external man. For as we do what the Word commands us, so the literal truths of the Word become the source of something that can bring about a cleansing, albeit on the external plane of life. So what we have reemphasised in this story are the same principles associated with what’s involved with the baptism of John in the previous chapter. When this state is fulfilled, that is, when the water pots are filled to the brim, the command goes forth to draw out the water and take it to the master of the feast.
And He said to them, Now draw out and carry to the master of the feast. And they carried it. But when the master of the feast tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know from where it was (but the servants drawing the water knew),
It is the master of the feast now who discerns the quality of this new wine against the old for he is representative of our knowledge of truths on a lower level of the mind by which we make judgments according to taste or affection as a matter of what we like and dislike. And while he is at a loss as to the origin of this new wine, he knows that it is better than what was on offer previously.
the master of the feast called the bridegroom, and he said to him, Every man first sets on the good wine, and when they have drunk freely, then the worse. You have kept the good wine until now.
Here in this image of the master of the feast tasting the water that had become wine and giving his approval, we see that what has taken place on a higher level in connection with the Lord makes its way down where it is perceived on a lower level and recognised as something good. Before the love that flows from wisdom, the good of truth, can be realised on every level of our life each of these steps has to be passed through. Stone, water, and wine are all symbols related to truth, each being truth on a different level. Each form of truth here represents a progression in our spiritual states of life. In stone we have the literal truths of the Word. Water is what is within the stone which are natural truths that can be applied to cleanse the outer life. And wine is the spiritual good that comes from applying the truths of the Word to life.
The transformation of water into wine speaks of the transformation of a our understanding of the Word. When we live from the natural truths of the Word we are spiritually in touch with the Word as water. But these truths are transformed according to the level of our affection for spiritual things. As our affection grows, so we use the Word more and more until it fills the vessels in our minds to the brim. This is what is meant by the stone pots being filled. When this state has reached its fulfilment then we enter a new state of spiritual life where the water is transformed into wine. This is when spiritual good eventually begins to flow down into the lowest level of life where it invigorates all the knowledges of truth, and we are blessed with seeing how they can be used in the service of all. It is only as we live from the Word that the Lord can create new tastes or new affections for spiritual things. This shift in our tastes in the lowest level of life can only occur as we willingly take the truths of stone and apply the water within them to the cleansing of our affections. Then, and only then, will the transformation come. For it is then that we will truly know what is meant by the words of the master of the feast when he says…
…. Every man first sets on the good wine, and when they have drunk freely, then the worse. You have kept the good wine until now.
This good wine is the Word Itself, opened up as to its spiritual sense and it is this that is,
…the beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee. And it revealed His glory, and His disciples believed into Him.