JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXXII)

“Praise the Lord. Sing to the Lord a new song, His praise in the congregation of loving ones. May Israel rejoice in his Maker, the children of Zion joyful in their King.” (Psalms 149:1-2)

The “new song” is the expression of the new consciousness that awaits us in the Messianic era, indeed a praise of the loving ones, for love is the reigning principle that bonding with God’s love will manifest new expressions of goodness in all aspects of life.

The goodness of love has the power to unite and assemble in congregation God’s gathered tribes, which will interact as the functional harmonic unity we have mentioned before.

We will rejoice in our Creator, for we finally will fully bond with Him, whose goodness is the utmost of all joys. This is the sacredness that we will praise forever, for we will be living in it for eternity.

“Praise the Lord. Praise God in His sacredness [Temple]; praise Him in the firmament of His power.” (150:1)

King David tells us for the final time in his book of Psalms that our relationship, bond and connection with God culminates in the sacredness of His house, the Temple of Jerusalem, Zion the place of His dwelling in this world for eternity, which is the firmament of His power.

We have seen in all the verses King David writes about Jerusalem the many facets of God’s house, to realize that this awareness called Zion is our bond with Him, in which we live the final redemption He promised us; as long as we embrace goodness as our essence and true identity.

This is the primordial message we are destined to live, for goodness is the cause, the purpose and the end.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXXI)

“The Lord reigns forever, the God of Zion, forever and ever. Praise the Lord.”

(Psalms 146:10)

Eternity is the reward for bonding in God’s love through the blessings He constantly bestows in us with His goodness. Thus we realize that it is as eternal as Him, and this happiness beyond possible description is only manifest in Zion, Jerusalem; the utmost joy of all hearts. Hence we will praise Him for eternity, for this praise is as infinite as Him.

“The Lord builds up Jerusalem, He gathers together the dispersed of Israel.” (147:2)

This realization will be factual when all the dispersed children of Israel are gathered by their God. Our Sages understand this as the prelude to the rise of the Third Temple that God builds along with Jerusalem, for these are irrelevant without the entire gathering of the Jewish people in the land of their divine inheritance.

This last and eternal Temple and its city are rebuilt with spiritual materials and qualities that will reflect the new consciousness the Creator promised for the Messianic era. Hence the edifices and towers of the city are already made of light columns and beams with compartments made to last forever, as the verse suggests in regards to eternity. Likewise, human and material life will be also spiritual as it was originally created at the beginning of God’s creation in the Garden of Eden.

“Glorify the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion. For He has strengthened the bars of your gates, He has blessed your children in your midst. He established peace in your borders; He fulfills you with the best of wheat.” (147:12-14)

These verses reiterate the previous ones in regards to Jerusalem, as it was originally created by God; and as is going to be in the Jewish final redemption and the advent of the Messianic era.

The strengthening of the bars that protect Jerusalem tells us about the strong spiritual qualities that dissipate wickedness in all forms, for evil will fade before them. Goodness is the blessing that spreads out in levels, aspects, dimensions and expressions of our new future consciousness dwelling in the city of God. Hence peace is the air we will breathe in its midst. Our food will be from the best of wheat that can only be God’s love.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXX)

“Remember, O Lord, against the children of Edom the day of Jerusalem; who say, ‘Raze it, raze it, down to its foundation’.”

(Psalms 137:7)

The psalmist knows very well the enemies of Jerusalem, the children of the heathen nations descendant from Esau/Edom. They represent the lowest thoughts, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts, that prey on goodness to satisfy their insatiable materialistic fantasies and illusions, and fight to impose the rule of wickedness and the destruction of human dignity, making goodness subservient to evil. Here, the “day of Jerusalem” refers to the final redemption of the Jewish people, and the day when the Messianic era begins.

“I bow down toward Your sacredness [Temple], and give thanks to Your Name, for Your loving kindness and for Your truth. For You have magnified Your promise above all Your Name. In the day that I called, You have answered me, You have encouraged me in my soul with strength.” (138:2-3)

The Creator’s promised final redemption, to make goodness rule and prevail in the material world, is evoked again to the point that the psalmist calls it greater than His Name.

It is a clear allegory to the greatness of God’s goodness that He will reveal in the Messianic era. It will be bigger than what we already know about His goodness, which is His Name.

He hears David’s prayer and answers him with the assurance that encourages him to live with a strengthened soul for the Messianic era, when we will see the magnificence of unfathomable qualities of His goodness. Being the Jewish people the inheritors of this divine promise, led the psalmist to exalt this sublime reality.

“Happy are the people whose destiny is this, happy are the people whose God is the Lord.” (144:15)

This verse summarizes the origin, essence, purpose and fate of Israel, with the exact words in their exact meaning. In this awareness we only have words of thankfulness and praise, also stated in the next verse.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXIX)

“Blessed is the Lord from Zion that dwells in Jerusalem, praise the Lord.” (Psalms 135:21)

Once again, the psalmist proclaims God’s presence in Jerusalem. He blesses Him, for He is the Source of all blessings. In this awareness we praise Him forever.

“By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and also wept when we remembered Zion.” (137:1)

In prophecy, the psalmist evokes the children of Israel’s exile in Babylon, where they lamented their estrangement from the house of their God. The remembrance of Zion was all they had, hoping to return to their permanent bond that will be fully fulfilled in the Messianic era.

“For there [in Babylon], our captors requested from us words of song. ‘Sing for us the songs of Zion’.” (137:3)

The captors of the Jewish people are aware of the qualities inherent in Israel’s spirituality. The nations can recognize them in the praises to their God. They know that these songs are a soothing balm that harmonizes thoughts, emotions and feelings, something unique to the traits of goodness all the nations covet. Yet, to subject them to their materialistic attachments, obsessions and addictions.

Ultimately, in Israel’s final redemption, they will appreciate goodness in its ethical and moral principles, aimed to elevate the dignity they owe to the human condition in this world. The fact that they recognize the beauty of the “songs of Zion” is a first step to later embrace the essence that makes these songs the way they are.

The “songs” that Israel sings are pure praise of the traits and attributes of goodness, when it manifests in life, making it an exultation of God’s love.

“How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign soil? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her skill. Let my tongue cleave to my palate, if I don’t remember you; if I set not Jerusalem above my greatest joy.” (137:4-6)

God’s song is also Israel’s, therefore it must be sung for each other, and no one else; neither in a place other than His house. In the name of the children of Israel, King David wonders about the aberration of trying to bond with God’s love out of His Promised Land, Jerusalem, and the Temple, the place of His dwelling.

This bond is referred here as God’s “song”. Hence forgetting Jerusalem is equivalent to forget our Father in Heaven, which means to live without the goodness represented by the ‘skill” of the right hand. The same goes for our speech, for without God’s goodness in our thoughts, words are meaningless. These verses reveal why Jerusalem is the greatest joy, for His loving kindness dwells in her.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXVII)

“We come to His sanctuaries, we bow at His footstool. Arise, O Lord, to Your sanctuaries, You and the ark of Your might. Your priests clothed with righteousness and Your loving ones singing of joy.” (Psalms 132:7-9)

Our Sages refer to the Temple of Jerusalem as God’s footstool, where the majesty of His goodness rests and touches the world. In this context, the Temple is where His “sanctuaries” are, and these are indeed His ways and attributes. Their sacredness is such that they are actually sanctuaries for us to meditate, contemplate and to dwell in.

When we allow God’s ways to inspire us in every mode, we pray to Him to take charge and turn us into vessels, worthy enough to keep up to His goodness, in order to make it ours to be, to have and to manifest it. This is the way God “arises” in us.

We have to call our Creator to dwell again in the sanctuaries of the Temple He once built in us, and for us to bond permanently with Him. This bond is the “ark of God’s might”, understood as the covenant that He sealed forever with His people.

The priests represent our connecting good traits that establish the bond, and these are good as long as they remain loyal to their ethical ways, mentioned here as righteousness, for they must be righteous as part of what goodness is.

God’s “loving ones” (the term is usually translated from the original Hebrew as “pious”) are the complementary qualities for being righteous, for they go hand in hand when true love is given. A loving action is expressed in the same way a joyful song is chanted, as we will see it in the next verses.

“For the Lord, He has chosen Zion for a seat for Him: ‘This one of My eternal rest, here I shall dwell because I desired it. Her provision I have blessed and shall bless. Her needy ones I satisfy with bread. And her priests dressed of redemption, and her loving ones singing of praise. There shall soot the vine for David, I have prepared a lamp for My anointed one’.” (132:13-17)

These verses reaffirm what Jerusalem and its Temple are for the Creator in relation to His eternal bond with Israel. The psalmist remarks the city of God as the vessel where He bestows His sustenance for the world.

This is the reason for His continuous blessings to her, and those who keep it sacred for Him. These are the priests that represent our best traits and qualities in the highest level of our consciousness, for these are the means through which we find our redemption.

Here redemption is called the vine of David, which represents the Messianic consciousness, destined to prevail for eternity. It is also the lamp that will enlighten all aspects and expressions of life, all dedicate to pursue the endless knowledge of our Creator.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XXV)

“In the return of the Lord with the tribes of Zion, we would be like dreamers. Then our mouth would be filled of laughter and our language a song of joy. And in the nations they would say, ‘greatness the Lord has made for them’.” (Psalms 126:1-2)

King David writes again about the Jewish final redemption and the Messianic era. Let’s note that all Jewish prophecies are written in the past tense for two reasons.

Once the Jewish prophets receive their messages from God, they narrate them as something revealed to them. Therefore they refer to them as what already took place, yet will be fully manifested in the future.

The other reason is that God already declared the purpose of His creation since He made it. Hence the final redemption is at our reach as soon as we become fully aware of it.

This total awareness is achieved by allowing goodness to conduct our discernment, mind, thoughts, emotions, feelings, speech and action, for goodness is the ruling principle in God’s creation, and it is destined to prevail in human consciousness. However, it is up to us to initiate the constant awareness of goodness in what we are, have and do.

Let’s reflect on the first sentence of these two verses. God and the tribes are returning together, and that action implies a time and space that once existed. They left with the dispersion of the children of Israel in exile among the nations. The psalmist is referring to the return of the lost tribes by the will of God as the Jewish prophets later confirm.

We have pointed out often that Zion is the bond that unites the Creator with the people of Israel as the tribes of this connection. Also that the tribes of Israel represent the positive creative potentials in all aspects, dimensions, facets and expressions of human consciousness. These are the talents and skills inherent in the diversity of our individual potential.

We can be artists, builders, merchants, farmers, shepherds, warriors, gardeners, judges, healers, teachers, scientists, spiritual guides, care givers, cleaners, writers, wood gatherers, facilitators, administrators, etc., whose lives are ruled by positive creative expressions in whatever we do. The common denominator of our diversity must always be goodness.

The tribes of Zion are certainly the tribes of Israel gathered together by God in their return with Him, with a new consciousness to be manifest in the Messianic times. We call it the Messianic consciousness because it is a collective quality that will be shared by the people of Israel with the rest of the nations, when the latter fully accept that Israel is the chosen people to fulfill God’s will in the world.

King David characterizes this new consciousness where only goodness reigns with its typical qualities, “laughter” and “joy”, for it can’t be less than that. Actually, these are more effects of goodness than its causes.

It’s relevant to remark the participation of the nations in the advent of the Messianic times. As we indicated before, they must recognize the goodness of Israel’s contributions to the world as their first step to partake in the coming final redemption. The last sentence of the second verse confirms this premise.

In this context, the “greatness” mentioned by the psalmist is the goodness the Creator commanded the children of Israel to share with the rest of the world.

It is the same goodness that in the final redemption all humankind will share by the hand of Israel, as the Creator established in His Torah and through His prophets.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (XIX)

“You [God] have risen, You have had compassion for Zion for it is the time to grace her, for the appointed time has come. Because Your servants desire her stones, and in her dust they grace themselves.”

(Psalms 102:13-14)

The allegory of God’s “rising” suggests the culmination of His will, as a lengthy process through which we learn how to integrate in our individual and collective consciousness His ways and attributes. The ways God relates to His creation are indeed His will. Hence rising implies a dynamic action in contrast to the apparent stillness of sitting.

We mention often the reason why the Hebrew prophets present their visions or revelations in past tense, because they speak about what already happened in their perception. As they witness the Jewish final redemption, they foretell it as an already accomplished prophecy.

For us is just a matter of assimilating the aspects and conditions for their prophecies to happen, and from them we begin to live the foretold “end of the times”, in regards to the transformation needed to acquire the new consciousness where only goodness reigns in all facets and expressions of life.

This transformation can only take place in Zion as the full awareness of our permanent connection with the Creator of all. At some point in time, hopefully in our times, by His compassion He puts an end to the dual “good and evil” approach of human consciousness, and makes Zion to rise with Him towards new heights where only goodness rules us to engage in new paths unfathomable in our long standing conditioned understanding of life.

King David tells us that the appointed time for our final redemption is already established for us to also rise and elevate our thoughts, emotions and feelings to the highest expressions of goodness, as God commands us to be, to have and do.

Those who serve goodness desire is stones as its foundations, which are the ethical ruling principles that define its nature. As we live by them, gracefulness is their outcome. The more we live in goodness, the more we are graced with it as the permanent blessing bestowed by the Creator in His creation.

“So the nations shall revere the name of the Lord, and all the kings of the earth Your glory. For the Lord has built Zion, He has been seen in His glory.” (102:15-16)

Jerusalem again is reaffirmed as the place where God is acknowledged as the only ruler in our consciousness. We have said that His “name” is how He relates to His creation. This name encompasses His ways and attributes by which we also relate to Him, as the ways in which we “revere” Him.

“Nations”, “peoples” and “kings” represent our human traits, trends, qualities, talents, skills, along with intellect, mind, thoughts, emotions, feelings, passion and instinct. All are destined to honor God’s “glory” by fully living in His will, for this is His glory.

We accomplished His will in complete awareness of the goodness that we “see” in Zion as the highest level of consciousness from which we bond with the goodness that emanates from Him.

“[In order] To declare in Zion the name of the Lord and His praise in Jerusalem. In the peoples gathered together and the kingdoms to serve the Lord.” (102:21-22)

We praise and honor God by the way we relate to Him, which as we said is by emulating the goodness He bestows in His creation, for this is how we “serve” Him.

We are destined to gather together all that our consciousness encompasses (“the nations”) in order to be manifested as a functioning harmonic unity ruled by goodness for the sake of goodness.

JERUSALEM IN THE BOOK OF PSALMS (III)

“That I tell all Your praise in the gates of the daughter of Zion, that I rejoice in Your redemption.” (Psalms 9:15)

Telling here “all” the praising for our Creator is a major statement that implies the pursuing of not a simple but eternal redemption.

“To tell all” is not a matter of elaborating the endless inventory of God’s deeds and actions, for which we praise Him, but an encompassing approach of God in all levels, aspects and dimensions of human consciousness.

In other words, if we ask for God’s redemption, this has to be done will “all” in us. “To tell all” also means to express entirely all that is in our heart, mind and soul, in a genuine manifestation of what occupies our discernment, thoughts, emotions, feelings and actions. In this awareness we “tell” all the praises to entreat God’s grace and compassion to show us His complete redemption.

This must happen in the “gates” of the “daughter” of Zion, which is another name for Jerusalem. Our oral tradition tells us that the city of God reflects the head of the body; hence “capital” means “head”.

The “gates” are the seven openings in the head, which are the eyes, ears, nostrils and mouth. This means that the awareness we just mentioned must encompass what we see, hear, smell, say and swallow. All our senses and awareness must be in alignment with the sacredness God demands from us to give us His complete redemption.

Jerusalem as the “daughter of Zion” is the highest awareness of God in our consciousness. This highest level of consciousness is the sacredness God wants us to share with Him in the world, and from where He wants to bond with us. This awareness is the prelude to delighting in the jubilation inherent in God’s redemption.

“Who shall give from Zion the redemption of Israel? The Lord will turn the captivity of His people. Jacob will be glad, Israel will rejoice.” (14:7)

In Judaism, the final redemption requires and implies a change in human consciousness. This change is dictated and determined by goodness in order make it prevail in all facets and expressions of life, in total absence of evil.

Thus we assimilate goodness free from any form of evil, for it is the sacredness by which we are redeemed. This sacred goodness that dwells in Zion is from which the captivity of Jacob ends, and the redemption of Israel comes.

Our “captivity” means living in the negative traits and trends we choose as the dwelling fields of our consciousness. God will “turn” our captivity under materialistic fantasies and illusions into the freedom of the positive traits and trends of goodness.

Jacob and Israel are here the innocence, purity and integrity, combined with the self-realization, strength and determination needed to approach and enter the celebration of redemption. This verse introduces the foundation of Hebrew prophecy.

“And many peoples have said, ‘Come and let us go to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths’. For from Zion the Torah [lit. Instruction] has come, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 2:3)

In this primordial principle lies the foundation of the knowledge we must acquire to bind with our Creator. Thus we realize that the Torah as the instruction needed to experience God in all aspects and expressions of life comes precisely from the connecting place that Zion/Jerusalem is.

“Who shall sojourn in Your temple? Who’s presence in the mount of sacredness?” (Psalms 15:1)

Again the answer is the sacredness of goodness that God wants us to live and manifest in the world, for God’s presence also dwells in goodness.

This is the ethical foundation that makes us act according with what is just, correct and constructive, for the sake of our individual and collective well being as answered by the next upcoming verses.

“He who walks upright, and labors righteousness, and speaks truth in his heart; that has no slander in his tongue, nor does evil to his fellow, nor takes up a reproach against his neighbor. In whose eyes a vile person is despised, but he honors they that revere the Lord; he that despises evil and changes not.” (15:2-4)

These qualities embrace the positive means, ways and ends of goodness, completely free from the negative and destructive traits and trends of an egocentric or evil approach to life.

The Song of Songs: The Love Story of God and Israel (XXXIV)

“Many waters can’t quench the love, and rivers can’t drown it. If a man would give all the wealth of his house in exchange for love, he would be laughed to scorn.” (Song of Songs 8:7)

This ardent sacred love can’t be destroyed by anything, no matter how great or overwhelming it may be. Neither can it be conditioned, acquired or exchanged by material possessions, for the goodness of love does not cohabit with anything different from its ways and attributes.

“Can a throne of evil be associated with You, a framer of wickedness turned into decree?” (Psalms 94:20)

“Also the Lord gives goodness, and our land yields its produce.” (Ibid. 85:12)

Thus we realize that the goodness of God’s love is its own harvest, and we must assimilate that our complete redemption is goodness as the cause and end of His creation. The more we live in love’s ways and attributes, the more we live in God’s final redemption.

“Our sister is little, and she has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister on the day she is spoken for? If she be a wall, we build by her a palace of silver. And if she be a door, we will enclose her with panels of cedar.” (Song of Songs 8:8-9)

These verses and the remaining ones of this poem refer to the new consciousness that awaits us in the upcoming Messianic times. It will be a new companion as a “little sister” for God and Israel that will unfold when our final redemption is completed. It will be revealed either as a new paradigm, “a wall” as a walled-protected “palace of silver”; or a new ruling principle, “a door” as an opening, to enter the Messianic era. The “panels of cedar” are an allusion to the Tabernacle or Temple of Jerusalem.

The Song of Songs: The Love Story of God and Israel (XXXIII)

“Set Me as a seal upon your heart, and as a seal upon your arm. For love is strong as death, jealousy is hard as the grave. Its flames are flames of fire that is the flame of God.” (Song of Songs 8:6)

God continues addressing Israel, asking her to seal their mutual love. First in her heart, for it encompasses love expression, good judgment, good feelings, and passionate intensity that invite positive thinking. Second in her arm, for it is the means to bring love into concrete actions and deeds. Thus we realize that thought, feeling, emotion, passion and deeds encompass the fulfillment of one single principle that is love.

The second sentence of this verse is intricate, yet one of the most profound principles revealed in the Song of Songs. Its complexity comes from introducing love “as strong as death”, both with equal powers by virtue of the comparative “as”. Although, in spite of this, it wants to tell us that indeed love is stronger than death as we will see in the culmination and end of the poem.

The statement evokes in our imagination two equally strong contenders in a long lasting fight in which one defeats the other and prevails forever. Here we recall Jacob’s all night-long fight with the angel of Esau (Genesis 32:24-29), ending up overcoming and emerging as Israel, the one who fights with and for God. We see Jacob/Israel as the embodiment of love and life who defeated Esau as the embodiment of evil and death.

“He has swallowed up death in victory, and has wiped the Lord God the tear from off all faces. And the reproach of His people He has turned aside from off all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.” (Isaiah 25:8)

Thus we see that after a long confrontation of thousands of years, God will make love prevail as our final redemption to reign forever in His promised Messianic era. After this statement turned into prophecy, the verse reaffirms the bonding love of God and Israel echoing the fundamental declaration of Judaism.

“Hear [understand] Israel, the Lord is your God, the Lord is One [and Unique].” (Deuteronomy 6:4)

This declaration is a sealing kiss that makes “love as strong as death”, for we recite it from the moment we return to life in our awakening in the morning and in the moment after closing our eyes to sleep. These two moments also reflect life and death in the Jewish tradition; hence we thank God when we wake up, for bringing us back to life.

The third sentence of the verse tells us that “jealousy” is part of love, for it shields and protects from anything threatening or harmful to whom or what we love. Thus we also realize that estrangement is as painful (“hard”) as death (“the grave”), for it ends the reason and purpose of love.

The fire of God’s love makes the bonding eternal as His flame that gives life and sustenance to His entire creation. We understand this “jealousy” as the burning exclusivity God’s love demands from our love for Him.

“And those who love Him are as the going out of the sun in its might.” (Judges 5:31)

Jealousy does not allow anything to meddle or interfere with whom or what we love, and its “fire” burns whatever is different or against the purpose of God’s love and the love He wants us to live. Thus we understand how He reveals Himself to us, and we ask Him so in our Jewish daily prayers to be with Him in love.

“(…) and give us an understanding heart to comprehend and to discern, to perceive, to learn and to teach, to observe, to practice, and to fulfill all the instructions of Your Torah in love.”

“(…) For You have chosen us from among all the nations and languages, and have brought us our King to the greatness of Your Name in love, to thank You and to proclaim Your Oneness, and to love Your Name. Blessed You are Lord, who chooses His people Israel in love.

It is so, because the goodness of love is the context of God’s creation, and the purpose of life is to exist in it. As the essence and destiny of our life, love is the freedom that leads us to make it prevail in all facets, aspects and dimensions of life.

The Song of Songs: The Love Story of God and Israel (XXXII)

We define this kind of love as the one that yearns not only for a complete redemption from exile among the nations, but also from what these represent as addictions, obsessions and attachments to the negative traits and trends of ego’s materialistic fantasies and illusions.

This kind of profound passionate love must have indeed a powerful spiritual essence that also strongly yearns and aspires to come up to the realms of divine consciousness, as God promised Israel in her final redemption in order to fully realize that He is the reality of all existence.

“‘Return, backsliding sons’, says the Lord; ‘for I am a husband to you. I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion. I will give you shepherds as for My heart, who shall feed you with knowledge and understanding’.” (Jeremiah 3:14-15)

“Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. And let him return to the Lord and He will have compassion for him and [he] to our God, for He abundantly pardons.” (Isaiah 55:7)

This calling culminates with the final and eternal encounter in the Temple of Jerusalem at Zion, as the “apple” tree (which is another reference of the Torah as the tree of life) where the Creator arouses us to who we truly are.

“So that I tell all Your praise; in the gates of the daughter of Zion I rejoice in Your redemption.” (Psalms 9:14)

Here we see again that God and Israel are bound by the Torah and the Temple of Jerusalem, the daughter of Zion, as the sources of our redemption, and unified means of connection between God and Israel.

“Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God, forever.” (Ibid. 87:3)

Let’s be aware that Jerusalem is the heart of the world from which all is nurtured and sustained, as the one that beats in our body. Jerusalem is our heart of love that spreads the goodness of God’s love in every aspect and dimension of life.

“Extol the Lord, Jerusalem; praise your God, Zion, for He strengthens the bars of your gates, and blesses your people within you. He grants peace to your borders, and satiates you with the finest of wheat.” (Psalms 147:12-14)

This is the heart of goodness, for we praise God whose loving kindness fills all. In this awareness of being, having and doing goodness with its ways and attributes we come to love God “with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our resources”. Thus we also return to Him to come up to the new consciousness in His promised Messianic era.

“(…) O Zion, bearer of good tidings; lift up your voice mightily, O Jerusalem, bearer of good deeds. Lift it up, do not fear, say to the cities of Judah, ‘Here is your God’!” (Isaiah 40:9)

“(…) How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring goodness, who proclaim peace, who bring good deeds, who proclaim redemption, who say to Zion, ‘Your God reigns’!”

(Ibid 52:7)

The Torah and the Temple of Jerusalem united as the mother from which God’s love was revealed in His Creation. In this metaphor the revelation of His presence in the world happens by the birth of Israel. The triple emphasis of her birth in this verse is to make Israel fully aware that her origin, identity and purpose, all come from her connection with God.

“Because part of the Lord is His people, Jacob is the line of His legacy.” (Deuteronomy 32:9)

Also the “apple” (usually considered a citrus fruit by our sages in the Talmud) symbolizes the Garden of Eden. Thus we understand that God’s love awakens Israel’s love in the highest level of spiritual awareness, also represented by the Garden of Eden.