335. [verse 14] 'And the heaven departed as a book rolled up' signifies separation from heaven and conjunction with hell. It is said that 'the heaven departed as a book rolled up' because a man's interior understanding and the thought therefrom is like a heaven, for his understanding can be elevated into the light of heaven, and in the elevation can think equally with the angels concerning God, love and faith, and eternal life; but if his will is not at the same time elevated into the heat of heaven the man as yet is not conjoined to the angels of heaven, thus he is not like a heaven. That this is the case may be seen in ANGELIC WISDOM CONCERNING DIVINE LOVE AND WISDOM, in the Fifth Part. By means of this faculty of the understanding, the evil who are treated of here were able to be associated with angels of the ultimate heaven; bit when these were separated from them, then their heaven departed as 'a book rolled up'. By 'a book rolled up' is understood a rolled up parchment, since their books were parchments, and the comparison is made with 'a book', because the 'book' is the Word (n. 256), and therefore when it is rolled up as a parchment nothing is apparent of what is therein, and it is as if it did not exist. On this account a similar thing is said in Isaiah:-