Ps 114 (Combative Dread)

The sea looked / and ran away

The Jordan / turned back

The mountains / jumped like rams

The hills / like lambs

What is the matter with you / sea / that you ran away

And Jordan / that you turned back

Mountains / that you jump like rams

Hills / like lambs?

When Yhwh appears to the cosmos, it often results in a ‘melting’, or a ‘running away’, a ‘rolling up’. The cosmos reacts in a way similar to an army that is overwhelmed and retreats from a threatening enemy. Creation itself trembles in the Presence. We must see something important here—that to “see” Yhwh in his appearing is also to see how he affects the cosmos. In other words, the reaction of the cosmos to Yhwh’s unveiling is itself a part of his unveiling. We see more of who Yhwh is, when we see the effect his Presence has on those around him.

Here, the psalmist does something rather profound—what causes the cosmos to retreat is when it sees not Yhwh but Yhwh-In-Israel. Israel here moves, literally, within the sphere of Yhwh’s appearing, within the sphere of his divine Unveiling, within the sphere of his Presence. And they, they themselves, become an object of dread, authority and majesty and they inhabit this realm. Yhwh is stitching himself into Israel in a way that he will later stitch himself into the stones of the Temple (and, ultimately, in Jesus’ flesh and then the Bride). In Christ, God became man that man might become God. Here, we are witnessing one of the initial steps down that stairway—and, simultaneously, a step for man up the stairway to becoming God. We see this throughout Scripture—the Presence makes things around into the Presence. Moses’ face literally shines with radiated, divine Glory. The Church will later view the “unveiled” face of God in Christ.

There is something else to this—while the cosmos runs, Israel becomes the new burning bush. They are consumed, but not destroyed. They are enflamed but not destroyed. They are the burning bush travelling through the dessert. So, while the cosmos turns in terror, within the flame of Yhwh’s Presence, Israel moves in peace and security, as “with a third”. The cosmos runs. Israel abides.

Lastly, this is a cosmos in dread as the people come out of Egypt—the “sea” looked and ran away—and as they enter the Land—the Jordan turned back (the Sea was the beginning, the Jordan, the end). What we should glimpse here is that this the reaction of the cosmos as Yhwh’s people are in transit, or pilgrimage to, the Land that will be His, and their, resting place. When they enter the Land, this “time of combative dread” will cease. Yhwh and Israel will be home. And they will, from the Land, begin to remake the cosmos. Everything the prophets envision regarding the divine life that will flood the cosmos, begins in Zion and rushes out the Temple. Paul will look out the cosmos from this vantage point and, in Romans 8, will say that the entire cosmos is groaning as if in child birthing pains—but it will be doing because of something that is arriving—the “revelation of the children of God”. Revelation will envision this as heaven descending to Earth. For both Paul and John, this ‘time of the Bride’ is a time of ‘combative dread’—from the top down—and it is a time when the Glory of God has become almost infinitely wed to his people such that they become the Light, the City, the Temple, the Bride and the Chariot Throne of God, on its way to the Land.