Seven Heaven

Understanding the significance of seven

02/16/2021

Mark 8:14-21 The disciples had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. Jesus enjoined them, “Watch out, guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.” They concluded among themselves that it was because they had no bread. When he became aware of this he said to them, “Why do you conclude that it is because you have no bread? Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear? And do you not remember, when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many wicker baskets full of fragments you picked up?” They answered him, “Twelve.” “When I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many full baskets of fragments did you pick up?” They answered him, “Seven.” He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”

Arguably, the most symbolic and significant number in scripture is the number seven. But seven was not chosen arbitrarily, nor is it significant only because “seven” rhymes with “heaven.” Its value and virtue goes much deeper than that. Here it helps to know a little Hebrew. The word “seven” in Hebrew is “shiva” or “sheva.” That is also the term used to swear an oath, or to enter into a covenant. Now, a covenant is much more than a promise because it is based on a solemn oath, like a marriage. At his 50th wedding anniversary two weeks ago, Bill Buergler could barely repeat his wedding vows because he understood how sacred they were.

When we take a loan from a bank, we sign a promissory note because we promise to payback the loan. But an oath – based on seven – is far greater than a promise. How so? Well, a promise creates a contract whereby we exchange goods and services, but an oath creates a covenant wherein we exchange persons. In an oath, we say: “I give you myself and you give me yourself.” A promise differs from an oath like prostitution differs from marriage.

When God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh day, he was not just tired after six long, hard days, and feeling exhausted and needing a break to catch his breath and recharge his batteries. He rested on the seventh day because he was making a “covenant” with creation; indeed, he wanted to marry his creation. If that sounds preposterous, Isaiah would say the same thing in Isaiah 62:5 (one of the most sublime passages of the Old Testament): “For as a young man marries a virgin, so your Builder shall marry you; And as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride, so shall your God rejoice in you.” As audacious as that sounds, the number seven signifies marriage, and ultimately, it means marriage with God. That is the deepest dimension of the number seven, which means marriage.

We see the number seven in both scripture readings today. In Gn. 6, God orders Noah to take “seven pairs” of clean animals and “seven pairs” of clean birds into the Ark. Furthermore, God would wait seven days before sending rain upon the earth to cause the Flood. These sevens are not arbitrary or isolated numbers and time periods. They signify a covenant that God makes with Noah; indeed, God swears an oath to protect Noah and his Ark, the new creation, like a husband promises to provide and protect his bride and their future family.

In the gospel Jesus reminds his apostles how he broke “seven loaves” of bread and fed the four thousand. When he asks, “How many full baskets of fragments did you pick up?” they answer, “Seven.” Then our Lord asks exasperated: “Do you still not understand?” Jesus might ask us the same question, “Do we still not understand the significance of seven?” We answer: "Uh, no." In other words, just as God employed the number seven in the Old Testament to symbolize his desire to marry his people, so Jesus uses seven in the New Testament to signify that he, too, is the Bridegroom who wants to marry his bride, the Church, to provide bread aplenty (the Eucharist) and to protect her.

John the Baptist saw the significance of seven when he said about Jesus: “The one who has the bride is the bridegroom [meaning Jesus]; the best man [meaning John], who stands and listens to him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. So this joy of mine has been made complete” (Jn. 3:29). The deepest dimension of the number seven in scripture is the desire of our loving God to marry us and to take us home to heaven. So, maybe seven and heaven do have a connection.

My friends, we experience the significance of the number seven in our work-week. We work for five days and rest for two days. That may seem like an arbitrary arrangement inherited from our Judeo-Christian history, and so it’s easily exchangeable. Why not adopt a 5-day week, or a 10-day week, and so forth? I suppose we could, and if atheism’s influence increases in our culture, we may well change the work-week. But we would also “divorce” ourselves (pun intended) from the deepest dimension of the significance of seven, namely, our marriage with God, and his desire to take us home to heaven. And what would happen if we did away with the significance of seven as marriage with God? We would be left only with promises. And promises are little more than prostitution.

Praised be Jesus Christ!