{"id":64976,"date":"2019-10-30T17:22:31","date_gmt":"2019-10-30T15:22:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=64976"},"modified":"2023-05-25T12:28:32","modified_gmt":"2023-05-25T09:28:32","slug":"terrifying-holiness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/terrifying-holiness\/","title":{"rendered":"Terrifying Holiness"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[954,502,480,541],"acf":{"old_id":"64976","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":64460,"related_cahpter":"340","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"A vision of hell: contra Buber on the nature of the God encounter","content":"

The philosopher Martin Buber described the encounter with God as an experience which, though impossible to express in words, conferred meaning on every aspect of one\u2019s life. This encounter with the \u2018Eternal Thou\u2019 seems to be a profoundly comforting one. It is also an experience of being commanded: although no propositional content is delivered, no one who encounters the Eternal Thou can remain unchanged; she is obliged to reorient her life, and especially her relations to others, in light of this moment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Finally, this revelation is a \u2018primordial\u2019 one \u2014 available at all times and places, always present in the here and now. This account of revelation is one which has proven very attractive to modern Jewish thinkers: it affirms the reality of a personal God to whom we can relate, it offers some kind of grounding for the idea of commandedness (especially in ethics), and, perhaps most importantly, it speaks of revelation as love and comfort.<\/span><\/p>\n

We are presented with a very different picture of revelation in the sixth chapter of Isaiah. Rather than being primordial, the theophany is tied to a very specific historical context, and bespeaks a God who acts in the details of history. Rather than gentle consolation, Isaiah\u2019s revelation takes place in an atmosphere of terror and despair. The scene, in which the Temple is filled with fire and smoke produced by the apparently monstrous seraphim, seems almost like a vision of hell. And, while the prophet does emerge from his encounter with God with a new sense of commandedness, his mission is a terrible one: he is not to induce the people to repent, but, it seems, actually to prevent them from doing so, such that God\u2019s vengeance might be wrought.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It is more than a little jarring to see the beloved line \u201cHoly, holy, holy! The LORD of Hosts! His presence fills all the earth!\u201d in this, its original context.<\/span><\/p>\n

While the kind of revelation which Isaiah received might seem foreign, perhaps even repulsive, to modern Jewish sensibilities, we are ill-served by simply dismissing it. There is a danger in identifying holiness <\/span>entirely<\/span><\/em> with sweetness and light. For, despite Buber\u2019s insistence that the encounter with God is commanding, a God who does not seem to <\/span>do <\/span><\/i>much other than confirm the meaning of our lives might well serve merely to make us feel good about ourselves. In <\/span>The Idea of the Holy<\/span><\/em>, the theologian Rudolph Otto identified holiness precisely with the kind of experience which Isaiah has in this chapter, as a mystery which is at once attractive (despite it all, Isaiah is eager to take on the mission) and terrifying.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If God really does stand in judgement of all the evil in the world, then there are times when we really<\/span> ought <\/span><\/em>to <\/em>experience Isaiah\u2019s terror, for it does not take more than a glance at a history book or for that matter a newspaper, to confirm that we have surely earned it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Image: Isaiah, A statue by Aleijadinho (1800-1805), photo by Einar Einarsson Kvaran \/ wikimedia<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":64977,"id":64977,"title":"is6-Aleijadinho-statue","filename":"is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/terrifying-holiness\/is6-aleijadinho-statue\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"is6-aleijadinho-statue","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":64976,"date":"2019-10-30 15:22:15","modified":"2019-10-30 15:22:26","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":365,"height":533,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-205x300.jpg","medium-width":205,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","medium_large-width":365,"medium_large-height":533,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","large-width":365,"large-height":533,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","1536x1536-width":365,"1536x1536-height":533,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","2048x2048-width":365,"2048x2048-height":533,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","post_full_size-width":365,"post_full_size-height":533,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-288x420.jpg","home_baner-width":288,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"Terrifying Holiness","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"A vision of hell: contra Buber on the nature of the God encounter","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":64977,"id":64977,"title":"is6-Aleijadinho-statue","filename":"is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/terrifying-holiness\/is6-aleijadinho-statue\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"is6-aleijadinho-statue","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":64976,"date":"2019-10-30 15:22:15","modified":"2019-10-30 15:22:26","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":365,"height":533,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-205x300.jpg","medium-width":205,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","medium_large-width":365,"medium_large-height":533,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","large-width":365,"large-height":533,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","1536x1536-width":365,"1536x1536-height":533,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","2048x2048-width":365,"2048x2048-height":533,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue.jpg","post_full_size-width":365,"post_full_size-height":533,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-Aleijadinho-statue-288x420.jpg","home_baner-width":288,"home_baner-height":420}},"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false,"send_noty":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64976"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64976"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":115486,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64976\/revisions\/115486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}