In the Bible (and in life), the idea of withering is usually connected to plants, and plants generally wither if they don’t get enough water. Plants, according to Swedenborg, represent individual facts and thoughts, and water represents natural truth, or true concepts about life on an external level. To wither, then, generally means that disconnected ideas will not be remembered and will be useless if they are not sustained by deeper concepts that lead to good actions in life.
Passages from Swedenborg
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 8699
- ‘You will surely wither away, both you and this people who are with you’ means that if it carries on as before the truth which has been implanted is going to perish. This is clear from the meaning of ‘withering away’ as being consumed little by little, and so perishing. The reason why it is the truth that has been implanted is that ‘Moses’ is used to mean the truth from God, and ‘people’ those who receive it. More about all this will be stated in what follows below.
Arcana Coelestia (Elliott) n. 6726
- ‘And put him in the weed at the bank of the river’ means that at first it was among false factual knowledge. This is clear from the meaning of ‘the weed’ as factual knowledge, dealt with below; and from the meaning of ‘the river of Egypt’ as falsity, dealt with in 6697. For what this really means, that those who are introduced into God’s truth are at first put among falsities, see just above in 6724. The reason why ‘the weed’ means factual knowledge is that every small plant mentioned in the Word means some type of factual knowledge. ‘The weed’ which grows at the bank of a river is inferior factual knowledge, as also in Isaiah,
The rivers will recede, and the streams of Egypt will dry up; reed and weed will wither. Isa. 19:6.
‘The rivers’ stands for matters of intelligence, 2702, 3051; ‘the streams of Egypt will dry up’ stands for matters of knowledge; ‘reed and weed’ stands for the lowest forms of factual knowledge, which are sensory impressions.
AC 6693
[2] The meaning of ‘the river of Egypt’ as the opposite of intelligence, which is falsity, is also clear in Isaiah,
The rivers will recede, the streams of Egypt will diminish and dry up. The papyrus plants next to the river, next to the mouth of the river, and everything sown in the river will wither, be driven away, and be no more. Therefore the fishermen will mourn, and all who cast a hook into the river will be sad, and those who spread nets over the face of the waters will anguish. Isa. 19:6-8.
Here one should not understand a river by ‘the river of Egypt’ or fishermen by ‘the fishermen’ but other things which are not apparent unless one knows how ‘Egypt’, ‘the river’ there, and ‘the fishermen’ are to be understood. If one does know, then the meaning of these verses is apparent. The fact that ‘the river of Egypt’ means falsity is evident from every detail mentioned in them.
AC 8902
[6] In Jeremiah,
Drag them away like sheep for the slaughter, and destine them to the day of killing. How long will the land mourn and the plant of every field wither, on account of the wickedness of those who dwell in it? The beasts and the birds will be devoured. Jer. 12:3, 4.
‘The day of killing’ stands for the time when the Church has been laid waste, which is its final period when faith no longer exists because there is no charity. ‘The land will mourn’ stands for the Church; ‘the plant of every field will wither’ stands for the withering of every truth of the Church; and ‘the beasts and the birds will be devoured’ stands for the devourment of forms of good and truths.
AE 627
[9] Again:
“The streams shall recede, the rivers of Egypt shall be diminished and dried up, the reed and the flag shall wither” (xix. 6).
These words, in the spiritual sense, mean that all understanding of Divine Truth will perish. The streams shall recede, signifies that everything connected with spiritual intelligence will depart. The rivers of Egypt shall be diminished and dried up, signifies that everything of natural intelligence shall perish. The reed and the flag shall wither, signifies that ultimate truth, called sensual and which is merely scientific, will vanish. Streams and rivers denote those things that pertain to intelligence, Egypt denotes the Natural, reed and flag, denote truth or the sensual-Scientific, and to recede, to be diminished, to be dried up, and to wither, denote to perish and disappear.
AE 518 [12]
Where gardens and trees are treated of in the Word, there also irrigating waters and rivers are mentioned, and for this reason, that trees signify perceptions and cognitions; while waters and rivers denote truths, and thence the understanding [of them]. For without the understanding of truths man is like a garden where there is no water, whose trees wither away.