Are you an EPFL student looking for a semester project?
Work with us on data science and visualisation projects, and deploy your project as an app on top of Graph Search.
Concept
Holy of Holies
Summary
The Holy of Holies (Hebrew: Qōḏeš haqQŏḏāšīm or Kodesh HaKodashim; also הַדְּבִיר haDəḇīr, 'the Sanctuary') is a term in the Hebrew Bible that refers to the inner sanctuary of the Tabernacle, where God's presence appeared. According to Hebrew tradition, the area was defined by four pillars that held up the veil of the covering, under which the Ark of the Covenant was held above the floor. According to the Hebrew scripture, the Ark contained the Ten Commandments, which were given by God to Moses on Mount Sinai. The Temple in Jerusalem was said to have been built by King Solomon for keeping the Ark.
Ancient Jewish traditions viewed the Holy of Holies as the spiritual junction of Heaven and Earth, the "axis mundi".
As a part of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, the Holy of Holies was situated somewhere on Temple Mount; its precise location in the Mount being a matter of dispute, with some classical Jewish sources identifying its location with the Foundation Stone, which sits under the Dome of the Rock. Other Jewish scholars argue that contemporary reports would place the Temple to the north or to the east of the current Dome of the Rock.
The Christian Crusaders associated the Holy of Holies with the Well of Souls, a small cave that lies underneath the Foundation Stone in the Dome of the Rock.
The construction "Holy of Holies" is a translation of the Hebrew (Tiberian Hebrew: Qṓḏeš haQŏḏāšîm), which is intended to express a superlative. Examples of similar constructions are "servant of servants" (Gen 9:25), "Sabbath of sabbaths" (Ex 31:15), "God of gods" (Deut 10:17), "Vanity of vanities" (Eccl 1:2), "Song of songs" (Song of Songs 1:1), "king of kings" (Ezra 7:12), etc. The Bible distinguishes the proper noun "Holy of Holies" from the superlative adjective by the definite article, viz. Qṓḏeš HaQŏḏāšîm is the room and qṓḏeš qāḏāšîm is used otherwise. This adds an additional level of superlativity; the only matching examples of the prior set are "God of gods" and "Song of songs.
Official source
About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.