Torah as Movable Territory

Territorial behavior in humans, if it is to be considered analogous to similar behavior in animals, must be deeply rooted in the regions of the human unconscious that appear to control instinctive behavior. The ethological concept of “movable territory'’may be applicable to Jewish mythological symbolism collected about the Torah. Torah as movable territory may have developed as a symbolic substitute for the loss of real territory. After the Age of Reason had dissolved the mystic ties of Torah and people, real territory once again became central to the survival of the Jews.