Ariel Ben Avraham – JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (V)
“Who shall ascend to the mount of the Lord? And who shall rise in His sacred place?”
(Psalms 24:3)
Again the Psalmist brings up the common trait the Creator wants us to we share with Him in order to dwell with Him, which is sacredness. The verse indicates that our approaching to God is indeed an ascending journey or process through which we detach ourselves from anything different or opposed to goodness as what makes us sacred before Him.
In goodness we not only ascend to elevate all levels and dimensions of consciousness but also rise ourselves to what God wants us to experience in His sacredness. This we are not able to fathom, conceive, discern or assimilate, for God’s sacredness belongs to a level or dimension that we only will be able to grasp when we get there.
“He who has clean hands, and a pure heart, that has not taken My Name in vain, and has not sworn deceitfully. He shall receive a blessing from the Lord, and righteousness from the God of his redemption. Such is the generation of they that seek after Him, that seek Your countenance, Jacob, forever.” (24:4-6)
These verses teach us that God associates His Name with the cleanliness, purity and truthfulness of goodness. King David emphasizes once more that the sacredness of goodness is only experienced by living with the ethical principle that it embodies. This means that goodness does not compromise, blend, mix or cohabit with anything different from its ways, means and attributes.
In goodness we are blessed and God blesses us with the righteousness inherent in it, which by definition is our redemption. We understand the latter as the eternal state of consciousness free from the negative traits and trends of an evil approach to life.
The eternal freedom in goodness is the inheritance of those who pursue it as the way to live in God’s promised final redemption. This is the inheritance of the descendants of Jacob who seek to live in God’s goodness for eternity.
“I will wash my hands in innocence; so I may encompass Your altar, O Lord. To hear in the voice of gratefulness, and to tell all Your marvels. Lord, I love the habitation of Your house; and the place, the temple of Your glory.” (26:6-8)
The ascent King David mentioned before requires the innocence that is also inherent in goodness, as it rules all aspects and expressions of life. We must wash and clean our thoughts, emotions and feelings, along with refining our passions and instincts, in order to turn them into vessels to be filled with the goodness of love’s ways and attributes.
In goodness we enable our consciousness to encompass and embrace the highest goodness of all, depicted as the “altar” of God. This knowledge leads us to the gratefulness we owe to our Creator, and in this sublime awareness we will be able to fathom His magnificent marvels and the transcendence of His glory.
In love we also exalt the jubilation of dwelling eternally in God’s house and His glory, as the ultimate state of consciousness for which we came to this world to fulfill the destiny He wants for us when we choose to live only in the permanent awareness of goodness.
In this coming verse, the Psalmist makes us realize that indeed such destiny is what we all should yearn for and ask our Creator.
“One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the pleasantness of the Lord and to visit in His temple.” (27:4)
Once we come to this awareness, we only live to yearn with the ardent desire of being eternally close to our Creator. Hence we pray constantly to be freed from the attachments, obsessions and addictions imposed by ego’s fantasies and illusions that prevent us to embrace the freedom only goodness provides.
The lesson we learn from them is to value and appreciate goodness as the moral freedom that empower our discernment to lead our mind, thoughts, emotions, feelings and instincts with the righteousness inherent in goodness.
Ariel Ben Avraham’s book on the Jewish conception of God’s love according to the Hebrew Scriptures and Jewish theology. How we relate to God’s love as our common bond with Him. You can order the book directly from the author at godaslove@gmail.com. From the book: “Let’s be aware that we are emanated from God’ love. Whatever we are and have come from Him and it is His, including the love that we are and give. Love is our essence and identity.”
