Throughout the bible and specifically the Haftarah scriptures, there are various verses that relate to feet.
There are references to washing each other’s feet, fastening one’s feet in shackles, talking about the feet of the oppressed, someone falling at another’s feet, pouring perfume on Yeshua’s feet and God’s word being a lamp unto our feet.
Feet were important in ancient times, because they were the primary means of transportation for people. With so many transportation options available today, we generally walk less and don’t pay as much attention to our feet.
If we think about the foot, it is completely submissive to the mind’s will, and the mind is connected to the heart. We know that when a person has the thought-impulse to move their foot, it instantly obeys and the foot moves.
Holy Soles
When many people imagine God, they often picture something similar to Michelangelo’s depiction in the Sistine Chapel, where God is seen floating in the heaven, looking down on man and reaching out with pointed hand. However, this is not how scripture describes Him.
We are instead given a (anthropomorphic) picture of God sittng on the throne in all His splendour, with hints of body parts including His feet.
We see this firstly mentioned in Exodus 24:10 when Moses, Nadab, Abihu and the seventy elders of Israel went up Mount Sinai. The scripture says they saw God and under His feet was a pavement of sapphire stone, as clear as the bright blue sky itself.
Throughout the bible, we see the temple and Jerusalem referred to as God’s footstool. In 1st Chronicles, King David confirms this and it seems to become this connecting point between heaven and earth, where God’s feet touches earth.
1 Chronicles 28:2 (NKJV):
Then King David rose to his feet and said, “Hear me, my brethren and my people: I had it in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD, and for the footstool of our God, and had made preparations to build it.
In Lamentations, the scripture talks about the destruction of the First Temple (His footstool) because of Israel’s great sin.
Lamentations 2:1 (NKJV):
How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion With a cloud in His anger!
He cast down from heaven to the earth
The beauty of Israel,
And did not remember His footstool
In the day of His anger.
In Ezekiel, it speaks into the future messianic era and the Third Temple when Messiah is ruling and reigning on earth and where the soles of God’s feet will be in the Temple once again on the mountain where His name has been placed.
Ezekiel 43:7 (NKJV):
And He said to me, “Son of man, this is the place of My throne and the place of the soles of My feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel forever. No more shall the house of Israel defile My holy name, they nor their kings, by their harlotry or with the carcasses of their kings on their high places.
The Sacred Ascent
Three Times a year the Jewish men (representing their families) were commanded by God to travel to Jerusalem for three festivals – Passover, Shavuot (Pentecost) and Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles). There they ascend to the mountain and by bringing their sacrifices, they were drawing near to Him – where God’s Shekinah resided.
In Proverbs 4:25-27 (NKJV) it says:
Let your eyes look straight ahead,
And your eyelids look right before you.
Ponder the path of your feet,
And let all your ways be established.
Do not turn to the right or the left;
Remove your foot from evil.
I’d like to believe that every time an Israelite ascended the mountain of the Lord, that they pondered and ‘weighed out in their heart’ the path they were choosing, every step they were taking. That they resolved in their heart they were ascending to commune with the God of Israel, to worship at this footstool. To choose with their heart and then their feet His covenant and instructions to be holy and set apart.
This pilgrimage to the temple mount by many Jews is called Aliyah Le’Regal – ‘Ascend with your foot’. But it actuality means ‘Ascend to the foot’ or “to the footstool of God”.
As Psalm 132:7-8 (NKJV) says:
Let us go into His tabernacle;
Let us worship at His footstool.
Arise, O Lord, to Your resGng place,
You and the ark of Your strength.
On What Ground Are Both Your Feet Anchored?
In some of the Haftarah readings, we see a recurring image of the Israelites making Aliyah Le’Regal and offering their sacrifices at the temple, but without the heart.
They thought it was acceptable to have one foot placed with the God of Israel, and the other foot camped with the gods and idols of the surrounding nations. They were double minded.
After ascending the mountain of God, they would descend down the same mountain and find themselves at the bottom of Jerusalem at the Ben Hinnom Valley. Jeremiah talks about this specific place in Jeremiah 32:35 (NKJV):
‘And they built the high places of Baal which are in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech, which I did not command them, nor did it come into My mind that they should do this abominaGon, to cause Judah to sin.’
The Hinnom Valley is representative of Gehenna, or what Christians term today as hell, because of the abhorrent, deathly, evil things that happened down there. So, on this preeminent mountain in Jerusalem, we see a visible contrast – ascend to life or descend to death.
In our physical world, oil and water do not mix. Likewise, nor does having one foot placed with the holy God – the giver of life – and one foot in the camp of death.
We may have repented and invited Yeshua into our lives, but are there residual things lurking in our cupboards we still need to deal with? Are we willing to humble ourselves before Him and address these things now? To repent and turn back to Him? To choose to ascend the mountain to eternal life?
There is soon coming a day, when Yeshua will return to rule and reign on earth and the teaching of the Torah will flow from Israel. Where both Jew and Gentile will Aliyah Le’Regal the mountain of the Lord, to keep His New Moons, Sabbaths and Festivals.
Isaiah 66:23 (NKJV):
And it shall come to pass
That from one New Moon to another,
And from one Sabbath to another,
All flesh shall come to worship before Me,” says the LORD.
Micah 4:2 (NKJV):
Many nations shall come and say, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, And we shall walk in His paths.” For out of Zion the law shall go forth, And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
If you would like to study the Haftarah, join Kelly Clancy every second Friday from 12.30pm to 1.30pm AEST (Brisbane) at https://thetorahportion.org
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