The Dividing Line

Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. 

1 Corinthians 1.10 (Spoke 2, Cycle 3)

The name of the second letter, Bet (בית), denotes a house. This arose from its ancient form which looked like a house or tent. It is familiar to Christians via the name Bethlehem, the House of Bread, where Jesus, the Bread of Life, entered the world, becoming housed in human flesh. Thus the Rabbis teach that "the house symbolizes the ultimate purpose of all reality: to become a dwelling place below for the manifestation of G-d's presence." Christians recognise this divine House as Jesus Christ in whom "all the fulness of the Godhead dwells."

Bet is one of ten letters that play a special role in the grammar of the Hebrew language. When prefixed to a word, it signifies the preposition in, by, with or within. The First Word of the Bible, Berashith, is a prime example of this, being formed from Rashith, (beginning), prefixed with the second letter Bet.

Many such examples are found in the Alphabetic Verses. For example, the last three verses corresponding to Bet in Psalm 119 each exemplifies this meaning. Note that the word order is lost in translation. In the Hebrew text, each verse begins with the letter Bet.

Symbolically, Bet encompasses the whole range of concepts found in the numerical category defined by the Number Two, such as Duality, Division, Image, and Reflection. God's use of these elements is particularly easy to trace through  Scripture. I begin with the Second Day of Creation which is characterized by Division:

And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

The Second Day (Genesis 1:6)

The next time God divided the waters is in Exodus, the Second Book of the Bible:

And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided.

The Second Book (Exodus 14.21)

The theme of Division is amplified in the Second Seal of Revelation, 

And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword. 

The Second Seal (Revelation 6.3)

The power to remove peace from the earth,  to cause the civil division called war, is here represented by a Sword, which is the great archetypal instrument of Division generated from the Line, the Second Geometric Construct. This theme of the Second Seal also coheres with the ancient Rabbinical explanation of why the phrase "it was good" is missing from the Second Day of Creation. In The Gates of Light (16th century), Rabbi Gikatilla explained that ...

" ... it was good is not mentioned on the second day because it is the essence of difference and separation ... Wherever there is distinction and separation, good is not to be found, for good comes to bring peace and connect all things."

He then linked this with Genesis 2 where God said "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him."

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