*Question about the text as a whole: In this vision, is "Zion" a place? A religious symbol? Something else?* 1\. **Sometimes this attribute is called Zion, and the relationship between Zion and Jerusalem...** This attribute is the sefirah of Yesod, which symbolizes the conduit through which divine abundance flows into the world. The world is symbolized by Malkhut and Jerusalem. **The relationship** between Zion/Yesod and Jerusalem/Malkhut is that Yesod is the canal through which flows divine abundance from the upper sefirot into the world (Jerusalem/Malkhut). Jerusalem/the world/Malkhut is the vessel that receives the flow The flow takes the forms of existence, life, creativity, love, relationality, pleasure, and all other good things.  _Zachor_ (You shall Remember) _and Shamor_ (You shall keep) both refer to the Sabbath. There are two versions of the Ten Commandments. In one (Exodus 20) it says _you will remember the Sabbath_, and in the other (Deuteronomy 5), it says _you will keep the Sabbath_. The two words are understood to symbolize the two sefirot Yesod and Malkhut. Remembering and keeping the shabbat brings them together, and their union facilitates the flow of divine abundance. *Check out the verses quoted in the text in your favorite Tanakh and commentaries. We will pay special attention to both the simple meaning and the Kabbalistic interpretations of these and the other verses quoted.* 2\. **Righteous people** are an embodiment of Zion/Yesod, which is called Tsaddik, and n notice that the Hebrew for “righteous people” is *tsaddikim*. Since it is through Tsaddik/Zion/Yesod that the divine abundance flows, when people do the right thing – that is, when they are righteous - they make the divine abundance flow into the world. Interpretative note: Think of how humans flourish when all their needs – as conceived for example in the international covenants of civil, political, economic, cultural and social rights – are met. A world where human rights are a reality for all people is a world in the presence of “the righteous one”, and the energies that manifest in the form of human flourishing (when people are protected and nourished) constitute the divine overflow as it manifests in the world. ***From Zion, from the totality of beauty, divinity emerges***. The Steinsaltz Tanakh: > **מִצִּיּוֹן**, ירושלים **מִכְלַל יֹפִי**, המושלמת ביופיה **אֱלֹהִים הוֹפִיעַ.** בית המקדש שבציון הוא מוקד ההתגלות. > **Out of Zion,** the Temple Mount, **the perfection of beauty, God shines forth.** The focal point of God’s revelation is the Temple in Jerusalem. The text so far is presenting a symbolic picture of existence in its perfect mended state, in which divine overflow flows through the sefirotic system (symbolized here by the dew from the heavens, Mount Zion, Jerusalem etc.) into the world. Take a look at the map of the sefirot that appears after this commentary. This also is a map of the whole intact system. Sometimes it is imagined in the shape of a tree sometimes a person. The whole thing is contained in symbols such as יהו"ה, *adam* / אדם. In the next section, we will begin to address what happens when the whole thing falls apart. 3\. **And if, God forbid, Israel acts unjustly.** Kabbalistic tradition often ethnocentrically focuses on Israel, attributing to Jews qualities and significance that in truth are shared by all people. I suggest that we interpret “Israel” here as referring to the human species (and all other sentient beings). Sometimes Israel does symbolize humanity in Kabbalistic texts, but I don’t know if that is the author’s intention here.  Evil behavior on the part of Israel/humanity causes the righteous one to be absent, cutting off the divine flow of the upper nine sefirot from Jerusalem/Malchut/the world and sending Israel/humanity into exile. Said again: since the divine abundance flows through justice and righteousness, when these are absent, the divine flow is cut off. In this state, YHVH is torn apart, leaving the final Heh, symbolizing Jerusalem/Malchut, cut off from the Vav, symbolizing Zion/Yesod. Interpretative note: We might say that the world loses its human image; Where there was ADAM – humanity – there is instead the negation of ADAM: inhumanity. The inhumanity takes the form of “impure forces”, “jackals”, which are what we become when we desecrate ADAM in a cycle of oppression and poverty: The process through which we human beings destroy ourselves.   **And when the attribute of the righteous one is absent, then Mount Zion is destroyed**. This brokenness is the true meaning of _horban habayit_, the destruction of the House of YHVH. It is not (only) the destruction of the Temple way back when that is _horban habayit_, it is dismemberment of YHVH / ADAM.   4\. **But in the future, what does it say? (Ovadia 1:21), *The redeemers will rise on Mount Zion.*** *The redeemers* are those that act to end the brokenness and return Zion and Jerusalem to each other, thus reconfiguring YHV and H. This is expressed in the verse by Mount Zion (symbolizing goodness) judging Mount Esau (symbolizing evil). Mount Esau is named after Esau, Jacob’s brother, who in Jewish tradition often symbolizes Christianity, and, more generally, the non-Jewish Other. Edom is particularly important for Ovadia (see below under biblical visions) Interpretative Note: I think its clear that using the name Esau to symbolize evil reflects a stream of ethnocentrism and xenophobia in Jewish tradition. So, from this angle, paradoxically, Mount Esau symbolizes calling evil Mount Esau. In the same spirit, we might interpret "Amalek" as the evil that is manifest when we use the name of a particular ethnic group as a symbol for evil. 5\. **And when the sefirot return to their proper constellation, what does it say? (Isaiah 27:13) _And the ones lost in Assyria_...** As we will see below, "the lost ones" are here understood to be the sefirot themselves; it is the divine powers/attributes that are lost. **...the city of God’s reign \[Malkhut\].** The word for _will reign_ is based on the same Hebrew root as Malkhut, and symbolizes that sefirah. 6\. The term justice, צדק  in Hebrew, is one of the names of the sefirah of Malkhut. Yesod/Zion/the righteous one, lost justice/Malkhut, rending the tenth sefirah from the ninth, and causing the divine flow to be cut off so that the evil forces take over. Thus the _Shekhinah_ (Malkhut) is exiled, and is lost to hir lover Yesod/Zion, and Yesod/Zion is also lost, bereft of hir beloved Jerusalem, and so they  are _the lost ones_ who one day will be redeemed when they return together in justice (*tsedek*) and righteousness (*tsaddik*) in the city, and through their union the divine spring will once again overflow and the forces of evil will be banished. **...and this is the secret of the saying of the sages *blessed is one who returns a lost thing to its owner**.* This refers to the _mitsvah_ of returning a lost item to the one who lost it. Interpretive Note: Rabbi Gikatilla is primarily concerned with Kabbalistic symbolism, and may not be thinking about justice and injustice in a moral or political manner. However, the concepts of justice and righteousness in Jewish tradition are involved with moral and political meanings. Thus we might interpret the division created between Yesod/Tsaddik and Malkhut/Tsedek which is the essence of the destruction of Zion and God's House, as caused by the introduction of injustice into Jerusalem - tearing off the final Heh from the divine name and destroying the constellation of ADAM through anti-ADAM / inhumanity. If so, it is the forces of injustice that unleash the evil powers which then emerge from destroyed Mount Zion to terrorize the civilian population around the Temple Mount and throughout the Land of Israel.