Friday, May 31, 2013

What is the significance of “wheels” in Scripture? 521-1 - 1-5

Ezekiel 1:1, “In my thirtieth year, in the fourth month on the fifth day, while I was among the exiles by the Kebar River, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God.” With these words Ezekiel begins his description of his vision of the “Throne of God.” Ezekiel's vision was of the throne of God and not a UFO as is often alluded to.

It sounds like the throne on the wheels was possibly using something like an anti-gravitational effect to move around it was always facing forward and could go from side to side without turning. Either the wheels within wheels engaged independently depending on direction or the throne was hovering. When I was working for the McDonald Douglas Helicopter Company I observed that the Apache helicopter always seem to be pointed forward when flying. Unlike fixed wing aircraft, the helicopter's rotor blades can be tilted side to side or front to back relative to the helicopter. As the blades would be tilted up in front the helicopter would move back even while appearing to be aimed straight ahead.

Wheels are interesting things. The wheel is a circle and analogous to a ring that has no beginning and no end and are exchanged when pledging eternal devotion one to another. Just as a ring/ circle or wheel has no beginning or end, God always was and is and always will be; no beginning and no end.

There are other mentions of the Throne of God in the Bible. Daniel 7:9, “I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire.”

Wheels and cherubim’s are often seen together such as in the temple’s furnishings. 1 Kings 7:27-30, “And he made ten bases of brass; four cubits was the length of one base, and four cubits the breadth thereof, and three cubits the height of it. And the work of the bases was on this manner: they had borders, and the borders were between the ledges: And on the borders that were between the ledges were lions, oxen, and cherubim’s: and upon the ledges there was a base above: and beneath the lions and oxen were certain additions made of thin work. And every base had four brasen wheels, and plates of brass: and the four corners thereof had undersetters: under the laver were undersetters molten, at the side of every addition.”
Ezekiel 1:24, "When the creatures moved, they also moved; when the creatures stood still, they also stood still; and when the creatures rose from the ground, the wheels rose along with them, because the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels." What the relationship was between the cherubims and the wheels moving I cannot begin to imagine; a dimension too far for my limited mind. 

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