“If the Lord does not build
the house, in vain its builders labor on it. If the Lord does not guard a city,
in vain a watchman wakes.” (Psalms 127:1)
Our Sages say that God is the place of the world, and the world is not
God’s place. This conception encompasses the purpose of God’s creation, for all
comes from Him and sustained by Him. In that regard, the place as the reason
for the world to exist is God. Hence we depend on Him and not all the way
around.
With this premise we approach the quoted verse. If God’s doesn’t give us
a reason for His creation, how can we make anything of it? The “house” here
represents what He gives us to make something out of it, and that is goodness.
We live in vain if we have a life without meaning.
If we disregard goodness as the cause and purpose of God’s creation,
what can we build with anything different from it? The “house” also means our consciousness,
and is our duty to build it from that of which the Creator also sustains us. Again,
if there is no goodness, what can we build?
We also have mentioned that “mountains” and “cities” represent strong
beliefs and ruling principles or ideas by which we conduct our thought, mind,
emotions, feelings and instincts. If these are not sustained on God’s ways and
attributes, how can we sustain them? In conclusion, we are vain, meaningless
and irrelevant passers-by in this world if we have a life absent of what really
matters.
“May the Lord bless you from Zion, and see in goodness Jerusalem all the
days of your life.” (128:5)
God’s blessings come out of our connection and bond with His ways and
attributes. As long as we keep this awareness permanently, goodness flows in
every way we approach the moments and circumstances we face every day.
Jerusalem once more is pointed out as the highest level of consciousness,
completely free from anything different from goodness. In this sense, Jerusalem
is the place in and from which we want to live in this world.
“Turned back and ashamed will be those who hate Zion.” (129:5)
Anything alien to goodness leads us to our falling down to the negative
traits and trends of ego’s fantasies and illusions. The verse can be understood
in another way. At some point, those who demise and reject goodness will realize
the destructiveness of their predicament, and in their shame eventually turn
back to it.
All the prophetic references about “returning” or “turning back”
are related to regaining the awareness that living in goodness is what truly
matters.
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