What are the symbols that help us find grounding when all around is shifting fast?
Even in the midst of displacement, and especially at times when the familiar floor no longer seems to hold, the images and longings of the soul are of enduring safety, something ‘solid like a rock.’
Maybe that’s why mountains feature in so many myths and traditions as the spiritual center, the Axis Mundi - the pillar that empowers presence and permanent stability.
What happens when the nation is exiled and its sacred mountains stay behind? It’s becomes about the imagination.
The 6th of the 15 psalms of Ascent brings us back to the topography of Jerusalem, but with a surprising twist:
שִׁ֗יר הַֽמַּ֫עֲל֥וֹת הַבֹּטְחִ֥ים בַּיהֹוָ֑ה כְּֽהַר־צִיּ֥וֹן לֹא־יִ֝מּ֗וֹט לְעוֹלָ֥ם יֵשֵֽׁב׃
A song of ascents.
Those who trust in YHWH
are like Mount Zion
that cannot be moved,
enduring forever.
יְֽרוּשָׁלַ֗͏ִם הָרִים֮ סָבִ֢יב לָ֥֫הּ וַ֭יהֹוָה סָבִ֣יב לְעַמּ֑וֹ מֵ֝עַתָּ֗ה וְעַד־עוֹלָֽם׃
Jerusalem, mountains encircle it,
and YHWH encircles His people
now and forever.
Ps.125:1-2
The authors of this psalm, likely responding to the trauma of the Judean exile in the 6th century BCE, insist on describing the sacred mountain of Zion, the original hilltop of Jerusalem, as the enduring symbol of survival. Even when they are not able to see it or live on it anymore. What does it mean to imagine the nation surrounded by the divine - as Jerusalem was surrounded by hills - that are now part of the city plan?
The mountain and the hills are more than their physical presence.
What’s the meaning and the secret of this symbol’s endurance beyond the contested geo-political dimension?
Robert Alter unpacks some of the history:
“This psalm, which, like the other songs of ascents, appears to have been composed in the exile or immediately post-exilic period, expresses a national sense of trust in God despite the domination of an oppressive foreign power…Jerusalem and the Temple may have been laid waste by the Babylonian invaders, but the solid persistence of the mountain on which the city was built is a token of the perdurability of the people that made its capital on this mountain.
The point is that Mount Zion not only will stand solid forever, but will continue to be a place of habitation, despite the exile of some of its population. The reference of this verb to those who trust in God is that they will dwell, be securely settled, forever.”
The echoes of the exiles of Jerusalem, dreaming of durability, recreating their sacred mountain in their poetic imagination as an eternal safe home - are both painful and inspiring. At a time of so much turmoil and displacement, violence and shifts - what is solid? What can be the mountains that matter and help us nest, and rest, and feel at home? For the ancients, and for us, the image of the sacred mountain is a recurrent relief, and perhaps a helpful aspiration. Mount Zion, at the heart of the sacred city and the middle of the hurting holy land is both a lofty symbol of Jewish hope for endurance - and a site populated by at least three different religions and many who all consider this sacred mountain as their holy home.
Somehow the vision will be, must be, reconciled with realities. That future hope for many of us is as solid as a mountain even though it seems so far on the horizon.
We look out towards the mountains for help, for hope and support.
Looking out at nature and within ourselves to find solid support is what pious poetry like these psalms helps to do. We can be grateful words, as e-e-cummings suggests- “for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes.”
Image: Ephraim Moses Lilien, Zion, 1903
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