ATDTDA pr 347 i, j, and k smokefoot

[David Morris]

On 7/11/07, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7/10/07, mikebailey at speakeasy.net <mikebailey at speakeasy.net> wrote:
> > It's interesting, the reference to Jachin and Boaz, and that Dally's friend Katie knows the Masonic lore;
>
> Well, actually she refers to the Old Testament Bible ("Kings somewhere"):
>
> 1Ki 7:21
> And he set up the pillars in the porch of the temple: and he set up the right pillar, and called the name thereof Jachin: and he set up the left pillar, and called the name thereof Boaz.

But, then again you focused on this aspect or the mercantile temple:

"the size of the place was not due to whims of grandiosity but rather
dictated by a need for enough floor-area to keep rigorously set a veil
separating two separate worlds"

And I'm sure you know about the very important separating veil in the temple:

First in the Old Testament:

Exd 26:33
And thou shalt hang up the vail under the taches, that thou mayest
bring in thither within the vail the ark of the testimony: and the
vail shall divide unto you between the holy [place] and the most holy.

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Wiki:
A Holy of Holies is the most sacred place within a sacred building. In
Judaism, it refers to the inner sanctuary of the Tabernacle and later
the Temple in Jerusalem which could be entered by the High Priest only
on Yom Kippur.

Although not a general rule, in certain contexts the term "Holy of
Holies" may be synonymous with "Most Holy Place." The construction
"Holy of Holies" is a literal translation of a Hebrew idiom, referring
to the inner sanctuary of the Tabernacle or Temple in Jerusalem. In
the King James Version of the Bible, this sanctuary is always referred
to as the "Most Holy Place."

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And then in the New Testament:

Matthew 27:50-51
Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.
And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to
the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

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Me:

Christians see this tearing down of the separating veil as the result
of the sacrificial death of Jesus, allowing direct communion between
man and God.

In the context of the Mercantile Temple, the hidden place is the most
profane/mundane, and the special (although illusory) space is the one
on display.

Also, where as previously the veil symbolically separated God and man,
now it separates one type of man from another.

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There is specific reference to commerce and the Temple in the New Testament:

Mar 11:17
And he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be
called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den
of thieves.

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>From Wiki:
According to the synoptics, Jesus targeted specifically the money
changers and the dove sellers and justifies his actions by quoting
from the Book of Isaiah and the Book of Jeremiah:

My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.—Isaiah 56:7

and

But you have made it a den of thieves—Jeremiah 7:11

The quote from Isaiah comes from a section which instructs that all
who obey God's will, whether Jewish or not, are to be allowed into the
Temple so that they can pray, and therefore converse with God.

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Now me again:

So, specifically, Jesus was objecting to the Temple being made an
exclusive place where money decides who can worship and who can't.
Thus it seems that Pynchon's allusions in ATD to a mercantile temple
with specific references to the Temple in Jerusalem is not just a
toss-off, but very intentionally relevant

David Morris