Temple

Use in the book

The world is a temple because it makes God’s gifts and attributes available to acknowledgment and praise. It is not merely a neutral container in which religious activity happens: its beings supply the matter and occasions of worship. The soul is likewise a living temple, capable of receiving the Trinity through knowledge and love.

These enlarged senses remain connected to scriptural worship. Traherne reads the Psalms as bringing visible works into the tabernacle, so that their apprehended goodness becomes the richness of God’s house. In the final meditations, omnipresence itself is a transparent temple. The succession does not simply discard buildings for metaphors; it teaches the reader to recognize how worship, created gifts, inward life, and divine presence belong together.

Places to read

1. II.1The world is a temple and visible entrance into eternity.
2. II.92The soul is a living temple and throne of the Trinity.
3. III.86The visible works of God are brought into the psalmic temple.
4. V.9Omnipresence is figured as a transparent temple of infinite lustre.

In this edition

The Holy Temple in a quoted psalm and the soul as temple occupy different levels of reference. Traherne’s exposition links them; it does not make every literal building disappear from the text.