788. [verse 19] 'And they cast dust upon their heads, and cried out weeping and mourning, saying, Woe, woe, that great city' signifies their interior and exterior grief and mourning, which is a lamentation that such an eminent form of religion has been altogether destroyed and damned. By 'to cast dust upon heads 'is signified interior grief and mourning on account of the destruction and damnation, concerning which [something] follows. By 'to cry out weeping and mourning' is signified exterior grief and mourning; by 'to weep' is signified mourning of the soul, and by' to mourn 'grief of the heart. By 'Woe, woe, that city' is signified the grievous lamentation over the destruction and damnation. That 'woe' signifies lamentation over misfortune, unhappiness and damnation, and consequently 'woe, woe' grievous lamentation, may be seen (n. 416, 769, 785); and that 'the city' signifies that form of religion (n. 785; and elsewhere). That by 'to cast dust upon the head' is signified interior grief and mourning on account of destruction and damnation is established from the following passages:-
They shall cry bitterly and shall cast up dust upon their head, and shall roll in ashes Ezek. xxvii 30.
The daughters of Zion sit on the earth, they have cast up dust upon their head Lam. ii 10.
Job's friends rent their coats (tunica), and sprinkled dust upon their heads Job ii 12.
Go down and sit upon the dust, O daughter of Babel, sit on the earth, there is no throne for thee Isa. xlvii 1;
besides elsewhere. The reason why they put dust upon their heads when they were inmostly grieving was because 'dust' used to signify what was damned, as is plain from Gen. iii 14; Matt. x 14; Mark vi 11; Luke x 10-12; and 'dust upon the head' used to represent the acknowledgment that of themselves they were damned, and thus repentance (as in Matt. xi 21; Luke x 13). The reason why 'dust' signifies damnation is because the land over the hells in the spiritual world consists of pure dust without grass and herbage.
This page is part of 
© 2000-2001 The Academy of the New Church