Ps. 14, Part 2, conclusion

All of that said, why is this ‘third option’ appear to be a valid choice? Why is earth allowed to at least appear to be self-sufficient? In asking this we should glimpse that the heart of these fools is the heart of Adam. When he succumbed to the lie of the Tempter, he was not engaging in idolatry; he was not explicitly acting in rebellion against Yhwh. He was, instead, choosing himself. For the Scripture writers, it this primal choice that stands at the heart of every other choice against Yhwh. And, in this choice, he became, at least for a time, the atheistic fool of Psalm 14. What we see then is that creation itself allows for this ‘space’ to be created, where man can inhabit the lie that he is his own measure. It is not immediately met with rectifying justice. In Psalm 14, we see that this ‘space’ can actually persist for quite some time. Long enough in fact that those who should possess the ‘fortunes’ of the world have actually had those fortunes consumed by the wicked. In other words, things can become completely inverted, with the fools on top and the wise on the bottom, much like the exodus and much like the various captivities.

 It is because this inversion is possible that the psalmist, towards the end, looks forward to the time when heaven will again assert itself and reorder everything. When the ‘captivity’ of the righteous will end and their fortunes be restored. When appearance and reality will once again coincide (in many ways what Adam accomplished was the severing of appearance and reality). Importantly, however, even within this inversion, Yhwh tends to maintain a realm where appearance and reality, where earth and heaven, still coincide—and he does so on Zion and in the Temple. It is there where earth and heaven meet. It is there where Yhwh, the king of heaven, dwells. And this is why, at least in part, the psalmist sees deliverance coming ‘from Zion’. Against all of the folly of the ‘sons of men’, who think that the earth has either been abandoned or severed from heaven, there remains a place that Yhwh claimed particularly for himself. And throughout the prophets, it this place that becomes ‘ground zero’ for his redemption. Constantly, Zion is understood as the place from which ‘living water’ will flow and cover the earth in life-abounding prodigality. The beginning of the end of exile will start in Zion.

Notably, this is why, when Jesus is crucified, ‘blood and water’ flow from his side. Jesus, as the new Temple, became that source of sacrificial blood and cleansing water that was to issue from the Temple at the end of time.