863. And fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them. This symbolically means that they were destroyed by the lusts of their hellish love.
The fire that came down out of heaven and devoured them symbolizes lusts for evil, or the lusts of a hellish love, as in nos. 494, 748 above, since people who engage in external worship divorced from any internal worship are caught up in evils of every kind and in lusts for them, because the evils in them have not been removed by any actual repentance (no. 859).
We are told that the fire came down from God out of heaven. This occurred in ancient times when everything connected with the church was represented before their eyes, thus when the church was a representational one. But today, now that representations have ceased, similar imagery is used, and it has the same symbolic meaning as before when the meaning was represented.
That fire came down out of heaven on those who profaned sacred things may be seen in nos. 494, 748 above.
Something similar is said of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel:
I will cause... fire and brimstone to rain down on him, and on his troops, and on the many peoples who are with him. (Ezekiel 38:22)
I will send fire on Magog... (Ezekiel 39:6)
