Shekinah Glory in the Hebrew Bible

Shekinah Glory in the Hebrew Bible.

“Bless the Lord, oh my soul! Lord, my God, you are very great; You are clothed with glory and majesty, and You are wrapped in light as with a robe!” (Psalm 104:1-2).

GLORY: the biblical meaning of God’s glory tends to emphasize the weighty splendor of God’s personal presence; God’s supreme worthiness to be honored and praised; the overwhelming greatness of God’s beauty and power; the eternal weight of God’s substance; the heaviness of God’s inherent majesty.  The weight of God’s presence outweighs the world; His presence is more substantive and heavier than the universe. God’s profound glory is independent of His Shekinah glory on earth. His eternal glory remains constant, whether or not He decides to reveal Himself to us. God’s essential glory is forever Real in the heavens, whether or not we experience Him here with our senses on earth.

SHEKINAH: A word not found in the Hebrew Bible, but was used by the Jewish authorities between the Testaments and in the Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Bible to be equivalent to the Hebrew word “Kavod,” which means “glory.”

. Shekinah is a word that combines “shakan” (Dwells) and “mishkan” (tabernacle), and so literally means “the One who dwells, settles in, resides, makes Himself at home.”

. Shekinah is defined as the Divine Presence, the glory of God that dwells on earth, and implies God’s nearness, closeness, God’s with-ness to us.

. Shekinah was often used as a word that represents God’s holy name Yahweh, which was not to be pronounced.

. Shekinah is understood in Judaism, and then adopted by Christianity, to be the “uncreated light, fire and luminous cloud” that became visible when God made an appearance on the earth. God’s Shekinah glory announced His presence.

. Shekinah glory is not the full inner essence of God’s Being, since God is an invisible Spirit who “dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tim. 6:16).  But instead, God’s Shekinah is the “out-raying” of that source of Light, like the sunbeams coming directly from the sun. We can’t even look directly at the sun, but we can see and feel and get the benefits of the sun though its rays. The Shekinah is the sunbeam from the “Father of Lights.” Isn’t it wonderful that the palmist exclaims that “Yahweh God is the sun!” (Ps. 84:11).

. Shekinah has been described as when the Omnipresent One becomes localized, when the Invisible One becomes visible.

. Shekinah is God’s visible glory pulsating outwards from the spiritual energy of God’s Being, the flowing out of light from the “consuming fire” of God’s essence . (Ex. 24;17).

. Shekinah is also equivalent to the Biblical terms “My Glory,”  “The Cloud,” “The Pillar of Cloud,” “My Presence,” and “the Cloud of Yahweh” in the eyes of rabbinic authorities.

. By the time of Jesus, Shekinah was understood to be the Divine Presence made visible on earth, and so whenever we read of God’s glory in the Hebrew Bible, we can understand God’s glory to be another way of reading about Shekinah glory. According to rabbinic teachings, examples of Shekinah glory in the Hebrew Bible include:

1. Shekinah glory illuminated the uncreated world with God’s presence, before there was any natural light from the sun or moon (Gen. 1);
2. Shekinah glory lit the flaming sword of the cherubim that miraculously turned in every direction,  guarding the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3);
3. Shekinah glory was there at Yahweh’s “signing” of the Abrahamic Covenant, with a flaming torch and smoking oven from heaven (Gen. 15:17-18);
4. Shekinah glory was there at the burning bush with Moses, and the Angel of Yahweh speaking from within the bush which was never consumed ((Ex. 3);
5. Shekinah glory was present with Moses when Moses asked to see God’s glory, “I beg you to show me your glory, Lord!’ and Yahweh replied, ‘I will cause all my goodness to pass before you…” And sure enough, the Lord passed before Moses and revealed His character and essence, thus equating His own glory with His goodness. (Ex. 33-34);
6. Shekinah was experienced on Mt. Sinai, “Mt. Sinai was enveloped in smoke, because Yahweh descended onto it in fire. The smoke went up like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain shook violently, as the sound of the heavenly shofar grew louder and louder; All the people experienced the thunder, the lightning, the sound of the shofar, and the smoking on the mountain; To the people of Israel, the glory of the Lord looked like a raging, devouring fire on the top of the mountain.” (Ex.19:18 and 24:17).
7. Shekinah was the pillar of cloud and fire that guided and protected Israel through the wilderness, “For the cloud of Yahweh was above the tabernacle by day, and fire was over it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.” (Exodus 40:38);
8. Shekinah filled the Tabernacle with His Presence of smoke and fire, “Moses and Aaron went into the tent of meeting, and when they came out they blessed the people, and the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. Then there came a fire out from before the Lord, and consumed the burnt offering and the fat on the altar, and when all the people saw it, they cheered loudly and fell on their faces in awe.”  (Leviticus 9:23-24). 
9. Shekinah has long been accepted as the eternal light-filled cloud between the cherubim over the Mercy Seat in the Holy of Holies, where God’s glory rested and interacted on a personal level with Moses, “There will I meet with you. I will speak with you from above the ark-cover which is the Mercy Seat. I will speak with you there about all the orders I am giving you for the people of Israel.” (Ex. 25:22, 40:34). This is a profound statement about God’s glory… His glory is His mercy! God’s glory and His mercy are so closely identified together that they are one and the same!  God’s glory is most clearly seen when He demonstrates His mercy!
10. Shekinah filled Solomon’s Temple at the dedication in 2 Chronicles 5:13-14, “Then, when the trumpeters and singers were playing in concord, to be heard harmoniously praising and thanking the Lord, and they lifted  their voices together with the trumpets, cymbals and other musical instruments to praise the Lord, ‘For He is good, for His mercy continues forever’ – Then, the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud; so that because of the cloud the priests could not stand up to perform their service, for the glory of the Lord filled the House of God.”
11. Shekinah was what Isaiah witnessed in Isaiah 6:3-4, “More holy than the holiest holiest is the Lord of Hosts! The whole earth is filled with His Shekinah glory! And the doorposts shook with the sounds of the angels’ shouting, and the house was filled with smoke.” To this day, the Jewish prayer liturgy includes “Holy in the highest heavens; His Shekinah’s dwelling place! Holy on the earth is the work of His might. Holy forever and ever is the Lord of Hosts.”
12. Shekinah glory was mentioned in many heavenly visions throughout the Hebrew Bible, including the vision of Isaiah 4:5 in which the heavenly fire of God’s presence will protect and illuminate Jerusalem with a canopy of heavenly fire; and Daniel’s vision in Dan. 7 in which he witnessed the Ancient of Days sitting on a throne of fiery flames and wheels of burning fire, and a stream of fire flowed from the Ancient One’s presence.
13. Shekinah glory is what Ezekiel experienced in his vision in 1:4,13, “I looked and saw a windy storm approaching from the north and a huge cloud with flashing fire, glowing brightly all around with the color of gleaming amber from within the fire…With them was something that looked like fiery coals burning the way torches do, with the fire flashing here and there between the living creatures; the fire had a brilliance, and out of the fire went lightning… Above this surface was something that looked like a throne made of blue lapis lazuli. And on this throne high above was a figure whose appearance resembled a man. From what appeared to be his waist up, he looked like gleaming amber, flickering like a fire. And from his waist down, he looked like a burning flame, shining with splendor. All around Him was a glowing halo, like a rainbow shining in the clouds on a rainy day. This is what the glory of the Lord looked like to me.” (Ezekiel 1:26-28, NLT).”
14. Shekinah also was seen in Ezekiel’s vision in chapter 43, “There I saw the glory of the God of Israel approaching from the east. His voice was like the sound of rushing water, and the earth shone with His glory… The Lord’s glory entered the House through the gate facing east. And I saw the Lord’s glory filling the House. He said, ‘son of man, this is the place for my throne, the place for the soles of my feet, where I will live among the people of Israel forever.”
15. Shekinah was understood to be the “wall of fire” in Zechariah’s vision of 2:5, “The Lord says, I will be for Jerusalem a wall of fire surrounding her, and I will be the glory within her.”  

Shekinah literally means “the One who dwells and makes Himself at home.” God has made His intentions known right from the start in the Garden of Eden… When He exiled Adam and Eve, God exiled Himself and stayed with them. There are too many passages to count that discuss how God wants to be in our midst, to live among us, to walk with us. The prophetic word in Leviticus 26:12 is straight from the heart of the Lord… “I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be my people.” One of the important prophetic titles of Messiah Jesus is Emmanuel (Greek spelling of the Hebrew Immanuel): Emmanu-El; literal meaning in Hebrew is “With us, God;” it is often translated as “With us is God,” “God with us,” or “God is with us.” The name Emmanuel speaks of the eternal reality that our Creator has a strong desire to be in our midst, dwelling with us. Emmanuel is a promise that implies the ongoing, permanent presence of God with us. Miraculously, our heavenly God is with us, His earthly people. God the Father is the first Emmanuel, exiling Himself from the Garden after they sinned against Him. Creator God hasn’t left the side of humanity ever since. God the Son continued the same quality of the Godhead, the next Emmanuel in line, when he took on flesh and became incarnate and was with us through thick and thin, through life and death and then life again. The third and final divine Emmanel is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of love shared by the Father and the Son. The Holy Spirit was called the “paraclete” by Jesus, that Greek term meaning “called to come alongside” us. Thus, there is this astounding with-ness to the Trinity that assures us of God’s everlasting presence with us. We need never feel alone as we have believers with us who extend God’s presence through their ministries to us.

So how have believers in the Lord Emmanuel best responded down through the ages when recognizing God’s Shekinah glory? We glorify Him!

GLORIFY: to acknowledge and applaud the awesome reality of God’s presence in the world; to make His presence heavier and more obvious; to magnify Him by enlarging His name and reputation in the world; to live in a way that strengthens God’s credibility; to honor God in a way that reveals His truth and makes Him less hidden; to live in a way that preserves God’s glorious Name and Personhood; to follow God in a way that helps others to recognize God as the ultimate Person of Substance; to publicize and promote His glorious name by demonstrating His character; to be a guardian of God’s goodness and spiritual power in the world; to recognize the true and eternal status of God in a life-changing way.

Charity Gayle – You Are Glorious (Live) (youtube.com)