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Matthew B. Brown

“Cube, Gate and Measuring Tools: A Biblical Pattern”

There is a close relationship between the ancient Israelite temple and the book of the Apocalypse in the New Testament.

The holy of holies of the temple was based on a divine pattern that was revealed to Moses. What we know of the holy of holies can be compared to what we are told about the New Jerusalem in the book of Revelation in Rev. 21. The New Jerusalem that comes down out of heaven is described as a gold cube, just as is the holy of holies of the temple.

The entrance to the New Jerusalem consisted of three gates on each side, each gate guarded by an angel. This reminds us of the veil of the temple, which was decorated with embroidered cherubim who guarded the way to the holy of holies.

The Ark of the Covenant that sat in the holy of holies represented God’s throne and was supposed to have been placed over the “foundation stone” (the “navel of creation”), which, in turn, sat over the “abyss” (the primeval chaos or flood).

This “throne” of God was associated with the divine attributes of righteousness, truth, and uprightness. These three attributes can be seen as requirements for entrance to the temple, as we see in Ps. 15:2 — compare this to Rev. 21 (my notes here don’t contain the details, but perhaps we are to compare all of Ps. 15 with Rev. 21:7–8, and that both should be considered to be requirements for entry into the respective holy place).

Psalm 24 also represents an entrance liturgy that discusses entry requirements for the temple. According to rabbinic traditions (I have no specific reference), the psalm is said to be associated with the king gaining access to the holy of holies of the temple. The psalm speaks of passing through the gates to ascend to the temple.

We are told in Luke 13:22–30 that the gate for entrance into salvation is “strait” or narrow. There is also talk of “striving” (struggling, contending) to enter through the door, and also of knocking at the door (here M. Brown gives an explanation of a Catholic “entrance liturgy” that involves knocking on a door with a mallet).

Note that Psalm 118:19 makes reference to a temple gate known as the Gate of Righteousness.  “Righteousness”, anciently, was symbolized by the plumb line (Isa. 28:17; a measuring tool) and leveling instruments.  The targum to Psalm 89:8 indicates that faithfulness/truth surrounds God like a circle or compass. Also, the Hebrew verb yashar (I don’t have any references he used, but see, e.g., Ps. 5:8) means: to make straight, right, or level. It involves creating a straight line, not deviating to the right or left. (There is much more to this discussion that is missing from my notes — generally, the attributes or requirements for entering the temple, including righteousness, uprightness, etc., are often symbolized by measuring tools, such as those used by God to create the world, or those used to build the temple.)

In Ezekiel 40:3, when Ezekiel is shown in vision the future/ideal temple, he sees an angel “with a line of flax in his hand, and a measuring reed; and he stood in the gate.” We see here again the relationship between the temple gates and the measuring tools — the line/rope and rod are tools used for building the temple. We see this same theme in Rev. 11:1 and Rev. 21:15, where a rod is used to measure the sacred precincts.

Ezekiel 46:1–2 — we get a description of the king kneeling before the temple gate. He had to “measure up” to be worthy to worship at the temple (from this point on I think I became so enthralled in the presentation that I forgot to take detailed notes, basically only taking down relevant scriptural passages — I will attempt to reconstruct what I can based on this paucity of real notes).

Going back to our temple entrance liturgy in Psalm 24, verses 1-2 make reference to God’s actions at the Creation and the conquering of Chaos. God builds the earth upon the conquered Sea. Other scriptural passages describe God as a master builder using builders’ tools.  Proverbs 8:27, 29 tells about how God set his compass upon the chaos waters and ascribed limitations that they could not pass.  Job 38:5 talks of God laying the foundations of the earth, measuring and “stretching out the line” upon it — God used builders’ tools.

In Psalm 89, verse 9 describes God’s power over the chaos waters, how He rules over the raging of the sea. This is an important symbol of God’s power.  In Ps. 89:25, we can understand that God has delegated this divine power to the Israelite king, who shall likewise rule over the sea.

Psalms 2, 110 — God anoints king, sets him on his holy hill and gives him power over his enemies.

1 Kings 5:17 (see also Ezra 6:3) — King lays the foundation stones for the temple, following similar pattern to God in Creation

Psalm 72:1–2 — This psalm is declared, in the superscription, to be “A Song for Solomon”, and attributes to him the powers and duties of God. “Give the king thy judgments, O God, and thy righteousness unto the king’s son.  He shall judge thy people with righteousness, and thy poor with judgment.” The succeeding verses continue to demonstrate just how much divine power God has delegated to the king:

Psalm 72:4–11  4 He shall judge the poor of the people, he shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor.  5 They shall fear thee as long as the sun and moon endure, throughout all generations.  6 He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers that water the earth.  7 In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.  8 He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.  9 They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow before him; and his enemies shall lick the dust.  10 The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents: the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts.  11 Yea, all kings shall fall down before him: all nations shall serve him.

The righteousness expected of the king in order to be worthy of this trust is described in Pss. 19:13; 89:24; 101.

In 1 Kings 3:6, we are told that King David possessed the three divine throne attributes (mentioned above): truth, righteousness, and uprightness. The fact that the Davidic king was seen to sit on the very throne of Jehovah (1 Chron. 29:23) emphasizes the need for the king to possess these essential qualities.

The stories in Scripture related to the Creation, the Temple, and the End Times (Eschaton) contain a pattern of similar images and symbols.  We see the cube, the sets of three gates (veil), the cherubim (angels), the Ark of the Covenant (throne of God), the entrance requirements, and the measuring tools — these very significant symbols can be seen in biblical passages regarding the Creation, the Temple, and the New Jerusalem of the End Times.  There are significant parallels between what happens in Heaven and what happens on Earth, and God can be seen to delegate his divine power to mankind.

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For more on similar temple-related themes, please see the following papers, also presented at the Expound Symposium (the overlapping of themes was not planned):

Jeffrey M. Bradshaw, “Standing in the Holy Place: Ancient and Modern Reverberations of an Enigmatic New Testament Prophecy”

David J. Larsen, “Ascending into the Hill of the Lord: The Psalms as a Key to Understanding the Rituals of the First Temple”

My apologies to Matthew Brown for anything in my notes that may not fully or properly represent the wording or intentions of his presentation.

First, here is the abstract:

The Psalms contain many allusions and also direct references to the temple and temple ritual and are one of the few windows we have into the religious experience of the First Temple in Jerusalem. This paper will attempt to shed some light on ritual practices alluded to in the Psalms that I will argue were central to the ritual system of that Temple. Dr. Silviu Bunta, in a recent publication, argues that 1 Enoch 14 should not, as is commonly argued, be understood as the earliest example of the ascent to heaven motif in Jewish literature, but that Ezekiel’s vision in Ezekiel 1 should be seen as a temple vision and, thus, as an earlier, biblical account of an ascent to heaven.  Moving a step beyond Bunta’s conclusions, I argue that the heavenly ascent motif can be traced even further back, into the pre-exilic traditions of Solomon’s Temple, as illustrated by a number of pre-exilic Psalms and other biblical traditions, and that a ritualized ascent into heaven to see the face of God was one of the central features of the temple cult.  Descriptions of temple pilgrimages, festal processions, passage through temple gates, divine theophanies, and other religious experiences involving the temple can be seen to parallel key elements of the later heavenly ascent literature.

Ascending Into the Hill of the Lord: The Psalms as a Key to Understanding the Rituals of the First Temple

If interested, please check out the post at: http://www.millennialstar.org/psalm-24-temple-gates-and-guardians/

Sorry for the dearth of posts recently — the semester at St Andrews has now started up and I have found myself overwhelmed trying to set a new schedule and routine for myself.  Among the various things I’m doing this semester, I am very excited about sitting in on Jim Davila’s Book of Daniel course, which has been highly stimulating so far, and we haven’t really gotten into the good stuff yet!  I hope to post my notes from the class (what notes I take) here on the blog, perhaps closer to the time we are to be looking at Daniel in the Sunday School curriculum.

As I’ve been unusually busy for the past week or two (listening to General Conference was a nice change of pace), I haven’t been able to do as much as I’ve wanted with this SS lesson from Isaiah. I hope to share some few thoughts that are of some use.

Isaiah 40

Chapter 40 of Isaiah begins a section of the book (chapters 40-55) labeled by scholars as “Deutero-Isaiah” or “Second Isaiah” because, according to popular theory, this section was not written by the original prophet Isaiah, but by an author that wrote during the Babylonian captivity.  Although there are a number of reasonable arguments for this perspective (see some of them here on Wikipedia), we can perhaps assume that one of the main reasons behind this designation is the fact that so many modern biblical scholars do not accept a traditional faith-based view of prophecy — that prophets could accurately predict (see in vision) future events.  Of course this point of view does not sit well with most Latter-day Saints, whose theology takes this traditional view for granted.  Furthermore, the Book of Mormon cites chapters from “Deutero-Isaiah” with the assumption that this were written by the original Isaiah, or at least that they were written before the time Lehi left Jerusalem, which was before the Babylonian Exile.  I’m afraid I’m not going to have time to go into this topic further, but I encourage you to look at the following articles, both of which give possible solutions to this apparent discrepancy.

Marc Schindler, “Deutero-Isaiah in the Book of Mormon”: http://www.fairlds.org/Book_of_Mormon/Deutero-Isaiah_in_the_Book_of_Mormon.html

Keven Christensen, “Open Questions and Suggestions Regarding Isaiah in the Book of Mormon”: http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/papers/?paperID=6&chapterID=53

On to the content of the Ch. 40…

As inferred by the title of this lesson, we can expect to see in these chapters many passages that can be interpreted as being Messianic — descriptive of the expected  life and mission of Jesus Christ. They also emphasize the idea that Israel saw Yahweh as their Redeemer and incomparable Savior.

If you are a fan of Handel’s timeless work, The Messiah, several of the verses here will be familiar to you. I have taken the liberty of posting a YouTube video here of Jerry Hadley singing “Comfort Ye My People” and “Every Valley” — it is very inspiring.

I would also mention, on this aesthetical note, that many verses from this chapter are quoted by Eric Liddell in the film Chariots of Fire. I post a video from that film as well.  Liddell teaches a great lesson here about keeping the Sabbath Day holy and the film clip shows Liddell preaching in church on Sunday while his teammates in the Olympics are out competing (and largely failing) in their Sunday races. The verses he quotes from Isaiah 40 emphasize God’s power over all mankind and the fact that he will support those who are faithful to him.

31 But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

Chapter 41

This chapter starts off with a description that has always given scholars problems.

2 Who raised up the righteous man from the east, called him to his foot, gave the nations before him, and made him rule over kings? he gave them as the dust to his sword, and as driven stubble to his bow.

3 He pursued them, and passed safely; even by the way that he had not gone with his feet.

The question is: who is this passage talking about? There has been much debate over this, and the usual candidates are Abraham, Cyrus of Persia, and Christ. Let’s look at these three possibilities.

• Abraham — Many ancient and early modern commentators saw the “righteous man from the east” as Abraham. The verses do seem to be referring to a historical character.  The idea is that Abraham could be seen as being called from the east and led by God to the land of Canaan and that he was given power to conquer foes (he defeated the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah to save Lot — Gen. 14).  Furthermore, starting in verse 8, the Lord mentions specifically Abraham and his chosen descendants in Israel. The problems commonly cited with this interpretation are that Abraham didn’t really come from the “east” of Canaan (he came more from the north-east); it is a bit of a stretch to consider Abraham’s military victories a fulfillment of v. 2′s “gave the nations before him, and made him rule over kings.”
• Cyrus — By far the most popular modern scholarly opinion is that this verse refers to the Persian king Cyrus who conquered Babylon and freed the Jews.  Cyrus certainly came from the east (see Isa. 46:11, which is understood to refer to Cyrus); the Jews saw him as being called of God — a messianic (anointed of God) figure; Isaiah mentions Cyrus by name only a few chapters later (see Isa. 44:28; 45:1). In my opinion, Cyrus fits the bill very well, being a righteous man (he must have been — he freed God’s people!) from the east who was brought by God to Palestine, conquering nations and ruling kings.
• Christ — There are some who see this passage as a messianic prophecy of Christ. The passage does have messianic overtones in line with what many Jews may have expected in a Messiah-Savior.  Parry, Parry, and Peterson argue for this view, noting: “Jesus Christ, who is righteous, will come from the east at his second coming and will rule over kings and nations.”¹ Although not necessarily, the term “raised up” in v. 2 can be interpreted as a reference to resurrection.  Many early Christian thinkers, such as Jerome, Eusebius, and Theodoret believed that this passage referred to Christ. However, many modern critics have argued that the description doesn’t fit Jesus of Nazareth well — he was born in Bethlehem, not the East; he was a pacifist, not a great warrior; the prophecy expected an imminent savior, not a future one.
• I tend to agree with the authors of Understanding Isaiah on this — that the verse can be interpreted as referring to both Cyrus and to Jesus Christ.  We can see this as an example of the frequently observed “dual” or “multiple” fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecies.  It seems quite clear that Cyrus could be the realization of the given description, but I think we can just as easily see a “type” or “expectation” of Christ here, when his Second Coming instead of his First is considered — He will come from the East with great power and glory to subdue the nations and rule over the earth’s kings.

Moving on through the chapter, you may note that verse 10 is used in a verse of the hymn “How Firm a Foundation.” In keeping with the media-friendly tone of this post, I wanted to put up another video. This is the choir and congregation at LDS General Conference singing.

From verse 10 through the rest of the chapter, we see themes from the ancient Israelite New Year Festival pop up again.  The idea that God would come to save Israel from their powerful enemies at the last moment when hope is waning; the idea of God saving by his right hand or taking the redeemed by the right hand (Isa. 41:13) comes up a number of times in the psalms, some of which may have been part of the festival (see Pss. 17:7; 18:35; 20:6; 48:10; 60:5; 63:8; 73:23; 108:6; 138:7; 139:10); also the motif of water/fertility (Isa. 41:17–20) is important, as the festival took place at the end of the dry season when all were anxiously awaiting the coming of rain from the Lord; we also see the common festival elements of the care of the poor and needy and judgment of the wicked nations — all of these themes were well known to the Judahite people through the rituals and traditions of the New Year/Harvest Festival. These ideas were repeated annually representing not only God’s salvific acts of the past, but also what He would do for his people in the future.  The prophet and people knew that Yahweh would come to save them after this miraculous fashion described in these verses — even if they didn’t know when it would finally occur.

In verse 25 we have a prophecy that is similar to that in verse 2. The main difference is that this deliverer is described as coming from the North. Again, we should probably see a reference here to Cyrus, who although he was from the East, came conquering from Media, which was to the North of Babylon. The “rising of the sun” is probably a reference to his coming from the East. Some have argued that Cyrus was pagan and therefore doesn’t meet the description “shall he call upon my name”, but in Ezra 1:2 Cyrus does express the idea that he was called by the God of Israel to liberate the Jews.

To Be Continued…

1. Understanding Isaiah, 352

Isaiah Chapter 25

This chapter begins like many of the psalms, praising the Lord for the great salvific deeds he has performed for the redemption of the house of Israel.

Isaiah 25:1 O LORD, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth.

Just as, according to some theories, some of the psalms were used in a great New Year Festival that celebrated the kingship of Yahweh and his redemption of the people, Isaiah seems to foresee the elements of the festival as a future reality.  The events that were represented — perhaps acted out dramatically — in the festival, such as the coming of Yahweh to Mount Zion to save his people who were under attack, defeating enemies combined from all nations, were envisioned by Isaiah to one day be a reality.

The foreigners who were proud enough to imagine that they could destroy the Lord’s people will be destroyed.  While the people of God once rejoiced when they should have sorrowed for their sins, and were conquered by foreign armies, the time will come (after their repentance) when the Lord will give them true reason to rejoice (Isa. 25:6).

The Lord will come and appear on the scene. To do so, he will have to remove the “vail” that is covering the Earth, preventing them from seeing God clearly.  This, of course, can be taken both figuratively and literally.

Isaiah 25:7 7 And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations.

The people will finally see and recognize their Savior and their God and what he has done and will imminently do for them.

Isaiah 25:9 9 And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

Besides (but perhaps thematically related to) his victory over the earthly enemies of Israel, the great and wonderful accomplishment of Yahweh that Isaiah declares will cause this recognition is his victory over Death — another motif found in the psalms of the New Year Festival.

Isaiah 25:8 He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the LORD hath spoken it.

This is, in my opinion, one of the most comforting verses in all of Scripture (see also Rev. 21:4). What a beautiful and hope-filled declaration!  Death will be swallowed up and God will wipe the tears from off all faces!! This truly is a God of love and mercy, who has tender feelings for the needs of his children.

As I mentioned, this was one of the principal features of the New Year Festival. Compare chapter 25 of Isaiah and what we’ve discussed with Psalm 68:

Psalm 68:1–20 (RSV)  Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered; let those who hate him flee before him! 2 As smoke is driven away, so drive them away; as wax melts before fire, let the wicked perish before God! 3 But let the righteous be joyful; let them exult before God; let them be jubilant with joy! 4 Sing to God, sing praises to his name; lift up a song to him who rides upon the clouds; his name is the LORD, exult before him! 5 Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. 6 God gives the desolate a home to dwell in; he leads out the prisoners to prosperity; but the rebellious dwell in a parched land. 7 O God, when thou didst go forth before thy people, when thou didst march through the wilderness, Selah 8 the earth quaked, the heavens poured down rain, at the presence of God; yon Sinai quaked at the presence of God, the God of Israel.

17 With mighty chariotry, twice ten thousand, thousands upon thousands, the Lord came from Sinai into the holy place. 18 Thou didst ascend the high mount, leading captives in thy train, and receiving gifts among men, even among the rebellious, that the LORD God may dwell there. 19 Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears us up; God is our salvation. Selah 20 Our God is a God of salvation; and to GOD, the Lord, belongs escape from death.

It almost seems as if Isaiah used this psalm as a template for his vision in chapter 25!  But these themes were part of an ancient tradition that was repeated over and over again in Israel/Judah (also in the New Testament, see especially Revelation).  There is evidence that all of this was based on a visionary pattern that was given to Israel’s prophets from the most ancient times — they were shown in vision the mighty works that Yahweh would perform for the salvation of mankind, in the past, present, and future.

Another example (among many) of this imagery from the psalms is Psalm 48:

Psalm 48:1 (RSV) Great is the LORD and greatly to be praised in the city of our God! His holy mountain, 2 beautiful in elevation, is the joy of all the earth, Mount Zion, in the far north, the city of the great King. 3 Within her citadels God has shown himself a sure defense. 4 For lo, the kings assembled, they came on together. 5 As soon as they saw it, they were astounded, they were in panic, they took to flight; 6 trembling took hold of them there, anguish as of a woman in travail. 7 By the east wind thou didst shatter the ships of Tarshish. 8 As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the LORD of hosts, in the city of our God, which God establishes for ever. Selah 9 We have thought on thy steadfast love, O God, in the midst of thy temple. 10 As thy name, O God, so thy praise reaches to the ends of the earth. Thy right hand is filled with victory; 11 let Mount Zion be glad! Let the daughters of Judah rejoice because of thy judgments! 12 Walk about Zion, go round about her, number her towers, 13 consider well her ramparts, go through her citadels; that you may tell the next generation 14 that this is God, our God for ever and ever. He will be our guide for ever.

Following an alternative interpretation of the Hebrew, A.R. Johnson argued that the last verse should read: “Our God, who abideth for ever, Is our leader against Death.”¹

There are many other examples of this motif elsewhere in the Psalms and also in the writings of other biblical prophets — one of Yawheh’s most “wonderful things” that he has done is to save us from the grasp of Death.

Chapter 26

This chapter basically repeats, in psalmic fashion, the themes of the last chapter.  Verse 1 says that it is a song that will be sung at that day in the land of Judah.  It seems to me that this song is to be sung liturgically by a congregation in response to the previous chapter’s song by the lone singer (the prophet). This is also very reminiscent of many of the biblical psalms.  Again, this is very much the picture that was presented in the above cited psalms (68 and 48). Compare the end of Psalm 48 (Ps. 48:12) to the first verse of Isaiah 26:

Isaiah 26:1 In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah; We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks.

Some scholars suggest that the psalm depicts a procession of worshipers marching around the walls of the city and surveying its new (or restored) strength and impregnability.²  The idea is that part of the aid that the Lord gives at his coming is the rebuilding and repair of Jerusalem/Zion and its temple after the defeat of the foreign attackers.  The Holy City becomes the stronghold of God, protected by his salvific power.

The procession around the walls then reaches the gates of the city (or temple — they may be virtually the same here). Verse 2 says:

Isaiah 26:2 Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.

Again, this is imagery that we can find in the Psalms.  For example, Psalm 24 has a similar plea for the gates to be opened so that Yahweh and his procession of followers can enter in:

Psalm 24:7–8 Lift up your heads, O gates! and be lifted up, O ancient doors! that the King of glory may come in. 8 Who is the King of glory? The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle!

Who would be worthy to enter in through the gate with the Lord?

Psalm 24:3–4 Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD? And who shall stand in his holy place? 4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false, and does not swear deceitfully.

The similarity to Isaiah 26 is clear. The vision is the same. Only those who speak and keep the truth will be allowed to ascend the hill and enter the gates (representing entering heaven) with the Lord.

Chapter 26 also gives us some additional insight into the victory of Yahweh over death.  In what would seem to be a rather odd transition (but not if you think liturgically), the voice of the people gives way to the voice of an individual, who states:

Isaiah 26:19 (KJV) Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.

This is a great verse that we often use to show that Yahweh himself would be resurrected and that he would raise other dead souls with him.  There are a few problems, however, with this reading of the verse.  First of all, it is difficult to tell who is speaking here.  If we follow the liturgical pattern of lone singer and choral response, it would seem that Isaiah would be the one to sing these words. However, because the people are singing to the Lord, and they are called “my people” by the singer in the next verse, one could argue that it is the Lord himself that is responding (very likely through the prophet).  Another problem is the KJV translation of the verse. I couldn’t find any other translation that reads “together with my dead body” in this verse.  The usual translation is “their/your corpses shall rise.”

The problem is in the Hebrew text itself.  I would really have to do a more in-depth study to figure this out and see what others have said about it, but the Hebrew seems to say “my dead body (1st person sing.) they will arise (3rd person pl.).” There is nothing that could give the sense of “together with my dead body…”  It would seem that there is some error here in the Hebrew text.  It seems clear that most translations would prefer to avoid the idea that the Lord Yahweh is being resurrected here, as the KJV infers.  I see no problem, however, theologically, with interpreting this to be Yahweh speaking, saying that the dead of his people would arise, just as he would also be resurrected.  This may not be the mainstream interpretation of the text, but I think that it is one that fits well with the ancient concepts of the New Year Festival, where there was likely a representation of the king (playing the role of Yahweh) dying and being brought back to life. The death and resurrection of the king brought new life to the people as well.

Another interesting element of verse 19 is this talk of dew and resurrection:

Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead.

This section is also tough to translate.  The KJV chose to translate the Hebrew ‘orot as “herbs”. While this is a possible translation, the far more common rendering is “light(s)”.  For example, the translation the RSV gives is:

For thy dew is a dew of light, and on the land of the shades thou wilt let it fall.

Or the NAS:

For your dew is as the dew of the dawn, And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits.

Anciently, the anointing oil that was used in the temple was associated with the dew of the dawn/early morning.  As the dew gave life to the plants, so the “dew” of the anointing oil (which was supposed to have come from the Tree of Life) gave new life to the dead.  We can see this imagery in play in Psalm 110:

KJV Psalm 110:3 Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth.

NIV Psalm 110:3 Your troops will be willing on your day of battle. Arrayed in holy majesty, from the womb of the dawn you will receive the dew of your youth.

NRS Psalm 110:3 Your people will offer themselves willingly on the day you lead your forces on the holy mountains. From the womb of the morning, like dew, your youth will come to you.

Again I give multiple translations here because this verse is notoriously difficult to translate. The context of this verse is the coronation of the Davidic king and his anointing as “a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek” (Ps. 110:4).  I could write several posts on this one subject, but what verse 3 is apparently inferring is that the king was anointed with dew/oil and that this gave him new life.  In the context of the aforementioned New Year Festival, some scholars argue that the king had just gone through a ritual that represented his death and the anointing would then be a part of his “resurrection.”  That the oil represents light is an ancient concept — but the idea of it being a “dew of herbs” is not strange either, as the ancient anointing oil of the temple was mixed with myrrh and diverse herbs.³

Chapter 27

The lesson skips this chapter, so I won’t make much comment on it here.  I would note that this chapter, too, contains many elements from the New Year Festival, such as the defeat of the waters/Chaos monsters:

Isaiah 27:1 that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.

For references to this imagery in the Psalms, see, for example Ps. 74:13–14 and Ps. 89:9–10.

The last verse of this chapter also contains images from the festival (If you think I’m talking too much about this New Year Festival, I apologize, but you’ll have to bear with me as part of my PhD dissertation involves an analysis of the theories for it).

Isaiah 27:13 13 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall worship the LORD in the holy mount at Jerusalem.

The blowing of a trumpet (see the relevant part of my Rosh Hashanah post) and the gathering of Israel from foreign lands (pilgrimage) to Jerusalem to worship at the temple were significant features of the festival.

To be continued…

1. A.R. Johnson, Sacral Kingship in Ancient Israel, 89
2. See John Eaton, Festal-Drama in Deutero-Isaiah, 21
3. For more on the topic of the anointing oil, see Margaret Barker’s paper here.