[Avodah] schechinah in the west

[Zev Sero]

Eli Turkel wrote:
> There is one opinion in the gemara that the schechina is in the west

One opinion?  Is there another one?

 
> 1. What does that mean versus the opinion that the schechina is everywhere
> which seems to be more obvious

Is this a contradictory opinion, or something entirely different?  I've
never heard of them contrasted.

 
> 2. What is west for me is east (or north or south) for someone else.
> Thus, not putting certain types of activities to the west of the city may be
> to the east of some other city and vice-versa

It's the direction, not some particular location.  The only specific
location where the shechinah can be said to be in a way that it isn't
elsewhere is the BHMK.  Which is indeed west of Bavel, where the gemara
was written.  That is *part* of what that idea meant, for the inhabitants
of Bavel.  In Bavel the sun-worshipping pagans all prayed to the east,
while Jews turned our backs on their AZ and prayed towards the shechinah,
which is stronger than the sun (see below).

But it's not restricted to that meaning; long before Jews came
to Bavel, in the BHMK itself and in the Mishkan before it, the heichal
and kodesh hakodashim were in the west.

Ultimately it's got to do with the fact that even though the natural
direction in which all the stars and planets rotate is to the east (i.e.
both the general movement of the universe through the night sky, and the
individual movement of the planets, except for a very few "retrograde"
ones that go west), they are forced (by the daily rotation of the earth)
to move west and bow to the shechinah.  

-- 
Zev Sero                    A mathemetician is a device for turning coffee
zev at sero.name               into theorems.                   - Paul Erdos