Nov. 19th, ’24: Mystery of The Place

The dual typological dynamics of the Bible apply to places as well. We are instructed that there are two Places—one is the “homely” type, and the other is the “far” type; those are Jerusalem and Babylon; in the former God dwells in the Temple, while in the latter, behind Mt. Ararat, he is most withdrawn. Accordingly, the numerical value of the word for “Tabernacle”, משכן, is 410, which is identical to the value of Ararat, אררט. For this reason we situate these two Places in opposition as the anti-thetical types of “home” & “exile”, of the House and the Field.

—Jesus and the Place—

Jesus—it’s agreed between the rabbins and us—was not the type of the “home”, of “Jerusalem”; he said (Mk. 13:14): “...Let them, that be in Judaea, flee to the mountains”. Jesus is the type of the Field, of the abundant exteriority, of the forest of sensibility; he is the “world” as a state of exposure and shameless-ness, a strange novelty.

It is a famous Talmudic mystery, that when Rabbi Akiwa and his company ascended to Paradise, he said unto them (Chaggigah 14b): “...When you arrive at the Stones of that Clean-Marble, don’t you say ‘Water! Water!’”; that is, do not mistake the Stones for the Water. The grand Meggaleh Amukkot elucidates, that the word for “Marble”, שיש, is found as a Biblical acronym for desolation and lawlessness: for example, “Satyrs shall Dance There” (Isa. 13:21), in Hebrew שעירים ירקדו שם, assumes the acronym שיש, i.e., Shajisch, “Marble”. So does the phrase (Isa. 24:12) “The Gate is Smitten with Destruction”, שאיה יוכת שער, whose acronym is, also, שיש. And you should not be mistaking the Marble-Stones (which are, as we understand, the Field) for the Waters; then what are the Waters?

The Waters are the physical “dwelling” of God, as the phrase “How Amiable are thy Tabernacles!” (Ps. 84:1), in Hebrew, מה ידידות משכנותיך, upholds the acronym מים, Majim, that is, Waters. So, do not mistake the Stone (the Mountains, the vast distances of the world) for the Water (the constricted Temple). So we understand Rabbi Akiwa’s statement as parallel to Jesus’: “...Let him, that is in the Field, not turn back again for to take-up his Garment” (Mk. 13:16)—do not mistake the Field for the Garment/Home; do not mistake the Stone for the Water.

So, when the time approaches, and you are at the Field, do not fall-back unto the House. You should be inhabiting the mountains, the Ararat—the “far-place”, which is surely the “Place”, the τόπος, which Jesus had been preparing for us (John 14:2).