Making Jerusalem the Center of the World

If there arise a matter to hard for you in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, even matters of controversy within your gates; then you shall arise and go up to the place which the Lord your God shall choose.                                                            Deuteronomy 17:8

“You shall arise …” teaches that the Temple is higher than all other places.                                    Rashi

Ḥatam Sofer raises two questions: if the Temple is the highest place in the world, why do our Sages say that King David had to search for the location of the Temple Mount? Further, since one can observe that the reality is that the Temple is not the highest point in the world, what does Rashi mean?

The Talmud tells us that Jerusalem is the center of the world. Maharal of Prague notes that the planet earth is essentially a sphere, and on a sphere, any point can be its center, depending upon how it is held. This, explains Maharal, is exactly our Sages’ intention: we must make Jerusalem the center of our world.

Similarly, Ḥatam Sofer explains in answer to his questions, that on a sphere, no given point can be said to be the highest, since a simple rotation of the sphere will change its high point. However, this is true only if the sphere has no natural starting point. Since our Sages taught that the world was created from the Foundation Stone, which is the floor of the Holy of Holies, it follows that the Temple is the center of the world and the Temple Mount the world’s highest point.