Ps 114 (Israel the Vessel)

When Israel / came out of Egypt

The community of Jacob / from a people of incoherent speech

Judah / became his sanctuary

Israel / his royal dominion

Adam was both a priest of Eden and king. He was both a cultic being and royal image of God. In his removal from Eden, what was united him became scattered. And through Yhwh’s dealing with Israel he begins to stitch together the fabric that was torn. Here, we are given a vision of Israel moving into this Unity. Israel, here, is not “freed” from Egypt so much as he is “made” into Yhwh—for this psalmist, that is the point of the exodus. It is not freedom. It is Israel’s becoming the sacred vessel of Yhwh and exercising his royal dominion over the cosmos.

Israel “comes out” to “become”. He comes out of Egypt, the place of degradation and slavery, in order to become the opposite—Yhwh’s sanctuary and “royal dominion”. This is not the psalmist’s way of saying the same thing twice. To be Yhwh’s sanctuary is to be the place of his Presence. To be Yhwh’s vehicle, his ‘rolling chariot’, across the wilderness as it moves toward the Land. As Yhwh incarnates himself within their camp, he thereby brings them up into his sacred sphere, making them sacred, liturgical objects. Note, that in this psalm Yhwh does not move into the sanctuary building. Judah, the people themselves, are Yhwh’s sanctuary-Presence. They are a divine glory-people, irradiated with Yhwh’s Presence. In Egypt, they were the opposite. A people without Presence, without Glory, without Authority, without heavenly Power. They were, therefore, easily exploited because they did not really exist. This is Yhwh’s “lifting up the lowly” and his “seating them in power”. This imagery does bleed over into that of Israel being Yhwh’s “royal dominion”. While Judah being his sanctuary portrays them as sacred liturgical objects—as they sacred object—the psalmist also sees them as inhabiting Yhwh’s authority as Sovereign. They exhibit, they display, they show forth not a type of worldly power and dominion, but one that has its roots in heavenly authority and dominion. Not a place, but a people—that is Yhwh’s “royal dominion”.

This relocation of ‘sanctuary’ and ‘dominion’ into Judah and Israel is significant. They are not in the Land yet, where the Temple will be made permanent and the Kingdom will begin to grow. When they come out of Egypt, Judah and Israel become, themselves, what the Land will make permanent. In this way, they show how Yhwh is bound, first, to a people, and then to a place. Where they go, Yhwh goes. It is terribly important for several reasons. First, when and if they ever leave the Land, it does not mean that Yhwh leaves them. He first inhabited them as a people so he can take his Presence with and to them, even when they are not in the Land. Ezekiel will have a vision of the thundering mobility of Yhwh as he comes to Israel in Babylon. Second, the life of the people, lived in Torah, is what makes them a ‘fitting receptacle’ for Yhwh. The people themselves, in the Adam-like obedience to Yhwh, are a type of Land, an Eden where Yhwh can “walk about”. This places a tremendous importance on obedience, not for the sake of obedience, but for the sake of Presence.