Israel and Humanity - Bethel and the vision of Jacob
§ 2.
BETHEL AND THE VISION OF JACOB.
In the story of Jacob's name is not Jerusalem, it is true in any way. The place where the Patriarch stopped to spend the night is not designated otherwise by this simple word makom , the place [1]. But the very name by which the Mount Moriah is indicated in the story of Abraham's test: "He saw the place far [2]. Moses is also used to discuss the future site of the Temple: "There will be the place which the LORD your God shall choose to place his name [3] ". At the end of the Song of the Red Sea, when it comes to the sanctuary of Jerusalem, is a word not only synonymous but there is etymologically identical alludes: "The place ( Nakhon ) prepared for Thy house, O Lord! [4] "
In Jewish tradition, as evidenced in particular Bereschith Rabba and the old rabbinical commentators such as Rashi, Nahmanides are unanimous in saying that the place of vision [5] Jacob n is other than Jerusalem. The criticism even tighter spot Lus Bethel or question in this passage only twelve miles from the holy city. However, if there was a religious tradition that has been told to Jacob, speaking of this town: "This is the house of God and the gate of heaven," they certainly have taken that into account when he acted to build the Temple in such a short distance. But that's not all: the story of Jacob does not say at what exact spot was placed on the ground level he saw in his vision, assuming that he himself was not held that the sanctuary was to occupy later.
The Bible is not without mentioning the identity between Jerusalem and this mysterious place. Kimchi, in turn, one sees in this passage from the Psalms, where, speaking of the oath taken by David to erect a temple to the Lord, the sacred bard said: "He swore to the Lord, he made this vow to powerful Jacob: I will not go into the tent where I live ... until I found a place for the Lord, a dwelling for the Mighty One of Jacob Psalm [6] ".
The statement that the text is here twice, Jacob, is, says Kimchi, a souvenir of the dedication that the patriarch had made to this holy mountain, where David was later placed the seat of divine worship.
Jacob was also the first to recognize this place as a sacred place. On his return from Padan Aram, he visited New Bethel on the order of God and such is the veneration he feels for this place, before it move, he ordered all those who accompanied him to stripped of their idols, to purify themselves and change their clothes, just as Moses ordered the Israelites to the foot of Sinai, just days before the promulgation of the Act [7]. There God appears to him and changed his name to Israel, and what is particularly remarkable is that the story ends with these words: "God went up above him in the place where he had spoken." This phrase, seemingly redundant, has been told with enough reason to Rashi: "I do not know what these words are intended to teach us." Their meaning, in our opinion, is that Scripture designates this location as the junction point between heaven and earth and the means of passage from one to another, which agrees we can not [8] best with his future destination. When Shekina , the glory of God, goes to heaven after the revelation that Jacob was favored, it is in the same direction of Bethel, above the patriarch in the place where God had spoken as expressly stated in the text which is the surprise of Rashi and, in our view, is an allusion to the glorious destiny of the location of the famous vision.
Now let's see what happens at the time of Moses, Abraham and Jacob, there have successively focused by their worship of the true God.
