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In Isaiah 6, the seraphim sing that God's glory fills the whole earth. In the Ladder of Jacob, the seraphim's song says God fills heaven and earth, as in other Christian and Hellenistic Jewish versions of the song.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Isaiah 6:3
Hebrew Bible
1 In the year of King Uzziah’s death, I saw the Lord seated on a high, elevated throne. The hem of his robe filled the temple. 2 Seraphs stood over him; each one had six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and they used the remaining two to fly. 3 They called out to one another, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! His majestic splendor fills the entire earth!” 4 The sound of their voices shook the door frames, and the temple was filled with smoke. 5 I said, “Woe to me! I am destroyed, for my lips are contaminated by sin, and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin. My eyes have seen the king, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.”
Ladder of Jacob 2:8
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
7 Before the face of your majesty the six-winged Seraphim fear, and hide their feet and their face with their wings, and with the others they fly, and sing: […] Highest, with twelve faces, many-named, fiery, lightning-formed, holy one! 8 Holy, Holy, Holy, Jao Jaova, Jaoel, Sabakdos, Chabod, Sabaoth, Omlelech, Elaber, S'me Barech, eternal king, strong, mighty, very great, patient. 9 Blessed One, who fill heaven and earth and the sea and the abyss and all aeons with your glory. 10 Hear my song, with which I have praised you, and grant me my petition for which I pray to you, and show me the interpretation of my dream.
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Notes and References
“... Note that the phrase “the whole earth” of Isa 6:3 is often rendered “heaven and earth” in Christian versions of the Qĕduššah, though the same change is sometimes found in Hellenistic Jewish sources (E. R. Goodenough, By Light, Light: The Mystic Gospel of Hellenistic Judaism [New Haven: Yale UP, 1935] 307, 324). [...] Ladder of Jacob 2:6–22 has what resembles a magical hymn in which the Qĕduššah in 2:18–19 is followed by seven divine names followed by a string of transliterated Hebrew words resembling voces magicae (tr. H. G. Lunt in Charlesworth, OTP 2:408): Holy, Holy, Holy, Yao, Yaova, Yaoil, Yao, Kados, Chavod, Savaoth, Omlemlech il avir amismi varich, eternal king, mighty, powerful, most great, patient, blessed one! ...”
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