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Section 10 of “Shekhinah: The Presence” by Joseph Zitt
This is an unedited scan of the text, courtesy of Josh Ronsen
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In hushes close to silence
the prayers dissolve, transmute.
Those who follow minority traditions [NOTE FROM JOSH:
minority sounds too clinical; how bout other
traditions]
continue, reading psalms
commandments
structures of principles
a daily page of learning
together, apart,
in pairs, in silence.
Others,
prayers finished for the morning,
prepare to leave.
The murmur of the congregants
slowly shifts
from the magical to the mundane
from sacred texts to software systems
from Bible study to business plans.
There is no prayer
to mark the end of prayer,
no verbal separation between
the sacred and the secular.
Worshippers reach for the velvet bags
placed earlier on the shelf
and gradually remove from themselves
the boxes of prayers
the leather straps
the prayers shawls,
black and white and blue,
fringes of white and blue.
But the sense of the Presence
the holiness of the articles
in which the congregants
have clothed themselves to pray
is not removed;
a coating of the sacred
stays with each soul,
to be preserved,
enhanced, or
dissipated
by the actions of the day.
Listen now:
the last of the prayers is complete,
the sounds of the service replaced by
traffic
banter
telephone calls.
This hall of prayers is now again
a room
with sacred books
and the Ark, with its scrolls within,
mute,
yet bearing silent testimony
to the purpose that they will
once again
serve.
Look now,
touch the textures of the wooden
walls
seats
floors,
inhale,
taste,
the air of this room,
now mundane
but retaining some strange sacredness,
feel,
with senses that have no human name,
the Presence
who waits forever in this hall
who looks down from heaven
and ahead and back
at ancestors and children
across the plains of space
along the rivers of time
who follows those who move
within this apparently real world.
The leather straps unwind
unspelling the Holy Name
encrypted in their twists.
(No golem now could be enlivened
by these items
as they lie, dark, inert,
within their cases;
a human touch must warm them,
give them form, before
any sacred power can
course along their lines.)
The prayer shawls fold,
in half,
quarters,
then in eighths,
gently, solemnly, like honored flags,
and join the others in their cases.
It's time to go home now.
Yet the Presence reaches out once more
all moments crystallized within her gaze.
Invisible, in silence,
she moves along,
around the time-encrusted congregants,
to grace the hall, the walls, the doorways
through which all who leave must pass.
One final kiss, then,
for those who leave
to greet the warmth of the morning.
Her spirit fills the box of memories
that stands sentry
on the doorposts of the hall.
One kiss then,
as she stands there
in her gentle light.
Sister to the scrolls,
she touches lips to hands,
as those who pass her
have touched theirs to theirs,
then touches hands to loving hands
and her fingers whisper messages
to the listening palms
of those who sense her there:
I am with you now, forever,
as you venture out,
into the harsher rush of morning.
I have always been with you,
in righteousness and justice,
kindness, mercy,
with you who knew of me and loved me,
even with each of you
who may or may not have known
that I was there,
who may or may not have cared,
have listened,
have believed.
I will always be with you,
in faithfulness,
and you will know my love
as you wander onward
through this world,
as you pass beyond this life
to the unknown,
as you, within the mist, await the day
that all times will again be one,
that all of space will come together,
that the river of life will flow
beyond the pillars
beyond the walls between the worlds
and what was once the Earth
will be once again a garden
and all pain will forever be banished
and all people will be clothed
in the flesh of truth and honest love
and all will eat without shame
of the firm, sweet fruit of life
digesting the knowledge of good and evil
and the serpents
will again wlak proudly,
will walk straight-legged, tall and wise,
and all creatures
will discover their true names
as whispered in their ears by Adam
but forgotten for an endless moment
when first the garden was concealed.
I am with you,
was,
will be with you
in all my hidden forms:
Rachel,
tears about to turn to joy
at the transformation of her children
the Sacred Scrolls,
the ink and parchment gaining life
and dancing free, a skin of comfort
the Moon,
her cycles shown to be
illusions framed by the tides of Earth,
forever full, forever shining,
with glory equal to the sun
the Sabbath,
Queen of Comfort, mystic day
that all days will soon become.
Listen:
the daughter of a voice
you hear within
as you catch your breath
before you say
each one of your passing prayers
is the modulation
the harmony
of my voice with your own.
Listen:
Here till the end of days
we together as one
now
stand.
Listen:
I will be with you,
remaining here in my hall to dream
as in my dreams I enter yours
and guide you onward
through the world of life
through the world of dreams
through the greater world
within your souls.
(return to Shekhinah: the Presence)
