The Process of Jerusalem becoming a Sacred Space
Ancient Jerusalem was a holy center for the Hebrew people. (And it is a home of three religions, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity nowadays.) Jerusalem establishment as a holy space is depicted in the Bible. According to the Hebrew Bible, the ancient Israelites lived in Jerusalem because this city represents the center of the world. This city comes the connection point between the people and their God. The existence of theophanies, hierophanies and the “imago mundi” in the city make the city holy and becomes a sacred space. (And all of these signs appear in Jerusalem, so Jerusalem is one of the most recognized sacred spaces in the world.) This essay will provide evidence of God choosing Abraham
…show more content…
(64 Eliade) Eliade defines the theophany as the moment when God, or the angel, appear and get in contact with people; hierophany as the symbol of the God such as a tree or stone. (12, 25 Eliade) Jerusalem is the “axis mundi” of the world, which is the orientation of the cosmos and the middle of the universe, can communicate with heaven, earth and underground, named universal pillar. The “imago mundi”, is the constructors, builds like the middle of the universe by the human. Thus appearing of the “imago mundi” represents the creation of the universe. (37-43 Eliade) People use the same idea of axis mundi and imago mundi to design and build villages, houses, and temples in Jerusalem because they want to always be the center of the world and to be in close contact with …show more content…
The coming of this hierophany makes Jerusalem represent the axis-mundi, again. The process of transporting the Ark by David was not smooth. God killed Uzzah, one of the people who driving the Ark cart. God killed Uzzah because he touched the ark not intentionally. David was angry and afraid of God because of Uzzah’s death. It is also the theophany of God on Ark. After that, David was unwilling to take the Ark of God to the city of David. David stayed the Ark of God in Obes-edom’s house for three months. Something unbelievable thing happened - God blessed all his family members. The evidence of the Ark is a real hierophany of God. After David heard about that event, he brought up the ark from the house to Jerusalem with joy. All the people of Israel celebrated the coming of the Ark, the hierophany. The place where the ark arrived will be blessed by God. The reason for the blessing of the ark of God is that is the hierophany, manifests itself as the symbol of God. The Ark of the God is the commandment for God’ people. If the people follow the rules clearly, God will promise to protect them forever. “The man of the archaic societies tends to live as much as possible in the sacred or in close proximity to consecrated objects.”(13 Eliade) Since the Ark of god, Jerusalem comes to be the closest place for God contacts his people. And the people lived in
Have you ever seen Indiana Jones and Raiders of the Lost Ark? In that movie if you’re paying attention you can see a faithful reproduction of the biblical account of the Ark of the Covenant – the most sacred of all objects from the Bible. It is gilded with Gold, with fine woods and carvings – with the figures of two cherubs (keruvim – those who bring God close) on top – wings outstretched and barely touching at the point where God’s presence might one day descend and perhaps glow brightly like a metaphoric shining light of truth and knowledge.
Much of the religious practice of the ancient world was polytheistic. The Hebrews embrace of monotheism is noteworthy, because it distinguishes Judaism from the ...
This amazement continues when one ponders why the similarities are rarely, if ever, discussed when the topic of Judaism or Christianity comes up in an academic setting. It would seem as if the shared beliefs between the two are not simply a product of chance, but rather the opposite. It is clear that Zoroastrian theology had an enormous effect on the formation and rise of Christianity.
For Jews, it is the supposed Jewish site of the near sacrifice of Isaac, which the third image aids in visualizing. The Akedah, or"Binding of Isaac", is the account in the book of Genesis (22: 1-19)of Abraham, at the command of God, taking his son, Isaac, to be offered as a sacrifice in the land of Moriah. Abraham binds his son (hence "the Binding of Isaac") to the altar and is ready to perform the dreadful deed when an angel appears to tell him to stay his hand and to promise him that his seed will increase. This story is the reason that Mount Moriah, or the location of the Dome of the Rock, has retained its Jewish spiritual magnitude through the years. There are two reasons that Jews believe the Dome of the Rock to be the location of the sacrifice of Isaac: a)The sacrifice of ...
Main Events in the history of Jerusalem. (n.d.). Retrieved May 8, 2011, from Century One Educational Bookstore: http://www.centuryone.com/hstjrslm.html
King David secured the beginnings of a prosperous Israelite empire; he made Jerusalem its capital and brought the Ark of the Covenant there with the hopes of building the First Great Temple for his people. However, it would be his son, King Solomon who would be the one to accomplish this. The Great Temple housed the Ark of the Covenant and also had places to make offerings. Having been nomadic, this temple finally gave the Israelites a stabile place to worship. In fact, the text World Religions by Mary Pat Fisher says that the Israelites looked at this Great Temple as “a central stationary place where God would be most present to them” (Fisher 250). This Temple was a beacon of hope and a place to go where they knew that they would be closer to God.
Judaism is more than just a religion; it is a culture and can even be considered an ethnicity. The faith, beliefs, traditions, and even holidays recognized by the Jewish people all have a strong foundation in reconnecting with history and the ancestors of the past. Isaac Kalimi writes in Jewish Bible Theology: Perspectives and Case Studies, that The Bible is widely recognized as central to Judaism. It is to a book, the Book, that we owe our survival” (Kalimi 13). In order to even begin to understand Judaism, one must explore the biblical history of the religion. The natural starting point for this exploration would need to begin with Abraham.
The code of Hammurabi was one of the most important documents in Babylon history. It was adopted from many Sumerian customs that had been around for a while before the Babylonians. Though many of the Laws were adopted from Sumeria they were published by Hammurabi and thus known as the code of Hammurabi. This code had four main parts to it. They were: Civil Laws, Commercial Laws, Penal Laws, and the Law of procedures.
Millions of years ago the procreant low lands in the river basins of Euphrates and Tigris was probably the home of some animal life, but no great civilizations. However, things change over time, and just a few thousand years ago the same fertile low lands in the river basins of Euphrates and Tigris became the home of a very rich and complex society. This first high society of man was located in what some still call "Mesopotamia". The word "Mesopotamia" is in origin a Greek name meaning "land between the rivers." The name is used for the area watered by the Euphrates and Tigris and its tributaries, roughly comprising modern Iraq and part of Syria. South of modern Bagdad, this alluvial plain was called the land of Sumer and Akkad. Sumer is the most southern part, while the land of Akkad is the area around modern Bagdad, where the Euphrates and Tigris are closest to each other. This first high, Mesopotamian society arose as a combined result of various historical, institutional, and religious factors. The reality of these factors occurring at a specific place within the fabric of space / time indeed established the basis for this first high civilization. Items like irrigation, topography, and bronze-age technical innovations played a big part along with the advent of writing and the practice of social conditioning (through the use of organized religion) in this relatively early achievement of man.
... star” Encyclopedia of Judaism, Encyclopedia of World Religions. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Modern World History Online. Facts On File, Inc. Web. 13 Apr. 2014.
Ancient Egypt was a very important time in our time period. They had their own way of life. Egyptians had their own writing, burials, government, religion, cooking, and games. They were educated people with many talents. They were good with their hands and brains. Ancient Egyptians were a magnificent race of people.
The book “The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion”, written by Mircea Eliade, investigates four aspects of the sacred universe: space, time, nature, and self. Eliade splits each aspect into two forms of perception, the sacred and profane. Religious men, specifically the ancient, traditional men, view the universe as sacred. In other words, they acknowledge a distinct qualitative difference between a sacred and profane (non-sacred) universe; whereas, nonreligious, specifically modern men, are unable to understand such differences in the world. This claim rests on the on the concept of heirophanies or manifestations of the sacred. A hierophany is the religious man’s source of absolute reality and it illuminates the glory and power of God. This manifestation of divine glory charges a site with special significance, thereby losing a sense of homogeneity throughout the universe. Eliade’s underlying thesis is that due to the human experience of both the sacred and profane in day to day life, the transitional zones between the two are exceptionally illuminated and charged with the divine glory of the sacred.
Kohn, Risa Levitt, and Rebecca Moore. A Portable God: The Origin of Judaism and Christianity. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Print.
Levine, Amy –Jill and Douglas Knight. The Meaning of the Bible: What Jewish and Christian Old Testament Can Teach Us. New York: HarperOne, 2011
One of the most valuable information that we bear in our life as we grow old is our birthplace. It is the place where we had our first breathe and even our first glimpse to the world. As important on how we value where we came from, one of the thoughts that is considered is which of the colliding religions originated from Jerusalem.