In the first reading, Jacob, having fled from his brother Esau’s wrath, finds himself at a shrine, where he rests for the night, using a stone for a pillow. It is here that a divine revelation comes to Jacob in a dream. Jacob sees a stairway going from earth to the heavens. It was believed in the ancient world that there were certain places on earth where the divine and earthly realms met. One such place was Bethel.
Jacob recognizes the sacredness of the place; the stone itself he calls Bethel, meaning house of God. Jacob consecrates the stone and sets it up as a memorial stone. Such memorial stones were Canaanite cult symbols of fertility. In this case, they weren’t wrong. Repeating the promise to Abraham, God tells Jacob: “…you and your descendants. These shall be as plentiful as the dust of the earth, and through them you shall spread out east and west, north and south. In you and your descendants all the nations of the earth shall find blessing.” (Gen 10:13-15)
We are people that keep, set aside objects that are symbols of important memories and events in our lives. In the Christian tradition we mark the moments of a blessing with items we have repurposed, so to speak, to mark the occasion, e.g., a simple candle becomes a baptismal candle, a ring becomes a sign of permanent love and fidelity. These mark significant moments when the divine and earthly realms meet, what the Irish call the thin places – a place and time when we catch glimpses of God’s love, majesty, and power as it pours into the world.
Perhaps the thinnest of all places is on Calvary when Jesus repurposed the cross of crucifixion from an instrument of death to the singular instrument of eternal life for all the spiritual descendants of Jacob – for all who believe.
Image credit: Jacob’s Dream (1639) by José de Ribera, at the Museo del Prado, Madrid | Public Domain