The Sacred Other

When reading chapters 1 and 2 of Karen Armstrong’s book Jerusalem One City, Three Faiths I found myself often referring back to the ideals Eliade talks about in The Sacred and the Profane. Armstrong goes over some of the history of Jerusalem, and explains why people wanted to live there. She focuses on the geography of the city and connects some of Jerusalem’s earthly features to humans connections with the divine.

Something that stuck out to me was Armstrong’s idea of a “sacred other” (Armstrong). Like Eliade, she states that people are drawn to a place because of the areas spiritual position. Eliade thinks that these divine spaces are founded through human repetition of creation, or the guidance of God (Eliade). Armstrong expands this theory to explain that people are drawn to a place because of its “otherness” (Armstrong). Take Mount Zion for example. Both Eliade and Armstrong agree that mountains hold religious significance because of the belief that they are a way to literally become closer to God. However, according to Eliade Mount Zion is important simply because it is a mountain. Eliade does not go into detail about why a specific mountain has more religious meaning than others. Using Eliade’s premise Armstrong expands on why certain areas hold more importance. She says that a place is seen as religious when it has a quality of “otherness” (Armstrong). When referring to Mount Zion she says it was the mountains ability to “stand out dramatically from the surrounding hills” that made people believe it was holy (Armstrong). Zions ability to stand out separated it from the profane world. The mountains’ distinction made people believe it was the “highest place in the world” in the sense that it was the place where you could get the closest to God (Armstrong). People would have known that a taller mountain existed but the sacred otherness of Mount Zion allowed it to have the greatest religious significance (Armstrong).

People search for this “sacred other” because of their desire to feel a connection to the divine (Armstrong). While Armstrong specifically looks at Mount Zion as an example she clarifies that anything that appeared to be “of something else” can hold religious importance (Armstrong).