homecoming.”
“The return of all things,” said the Oracle.
“Does ‘all things’ include more than what you just shared?”
“He departed not only from the city but from the world itself. It’s the world that is the ultimate possession . . . of him to whom it belongs.”
“What do you mean?”
“To whom does the world, the creation, belong?”
“To God?”
“And in that is the ultimate mystery and the ultimate Jubilee . . . the mystery that begins with the separation of God and the creation. It is from that separation that come all the other separations, before and beyond that of Israel.”
“What do you mean?”
“It is from the separation between the Creator and the creation. From that separation comes all loss, all sorrows, all other separations, all pains, all evils, all darkness. But . . . in the Jubilee all is restored. And so God will return to the world, and the world to God. Thus at the very end of the Bible it is written, ‘The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Messiah . . . ’” 4
“It’s the final transference,” I said, “the final transference of ownership.”
“And ‘the Lord shall reign over all the earth.’ 5 And ‘they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.’ 6 And the lion shall lay down with the calf. And peace will cover the earth. And all things will be as they were meant to be from the beginning . . . as in the Jubilee. All things will return to their own possession.”
The Oracle then lifted the stone table and the puzzle of colored glass and returned it to the place from which he had earlier retrieved it. He was silent for a few moments. Then he spoke.
“And yet . . . there is still more.”
“I don’t understand. How could there be anything more after the end?”
“But there is,” he said, “just as there’s more of Heaven above the clouds. You have yet to uncover the Jubilee’s final mystery.”
“Is that . . . ?”
“Yes,” he said, “it is that which lies behind the seventh door.”
“I don’t understand either. If he showed you the end, what could possibly come after that?”
“Only that which comes after the end.”
“But if it comes after the end, then the end isn’t the end.”
“I know. It’s a paradox. But behind the seventh door was the mystery that went beyond everything else, beyond every border, beyond the limits of the mystery . . . and to the Jubilee beyond the Jubilee.”
“I don’t understand.”
“That which transcends the Jubilee . . . and yet fulfills it . . . the last Jubilee . . . the most cosmic and yet the most personal . . . and the meaning of it all.”
“So the seventh door opened to . . . ”
“The ultimate mystery.”
THE SEVENTH DOOR
Chapter 61
THE SEVENTH DOOR
I WAS STANDING in front of the seventh door. I was more apprehensive about opening that door than all the others that had preceded it. I couldn’t imagine what was waiting on the other side or what more there could possibly be that hadn’t already been revealed. I turned the key and opened it. What I saw upon opening it surprised me more than anything I had seen upon opening the other six. There was no mountain, no wilderness, and no landscape. I found myself in a room. It was night. There was a crib against the wall, and a baby in the crib.”
“Why did that surprise you more than anything else?”
“Because it was my room.”
“Your room?”
“The room of my first home, my first room. And the baby in the crib, it was me.”
“You?”
“Yes. And the baby was crying. And then I saw the ram, a ram of pure white, standing not far from the crib and gazing at the baby. Around the ram’s neck was a chain, from which hung a pendant of pure white. On the pendant, as with all the other pendants, was a symbol that matched that which was on the seventh door. The ram turned its gaze toward me, then walked out the doorway. I followed it. Suddenly I found myself standing in a field on a warm summer day. I saw a little boy lying on the grass, looking up at the clouds. It was again me, now as a little boy.”
“Do you remember ever doing that, lying there, and what you were thinking?”
“I