Secacah

Pronunciation: seh-KAY-kuh

The Meaning of the Name

Secacah means “a place enclosed with protection” (I Achee 6:106; Moses 15:119).

A Real Archaeological Parallel

Qumran, on the Dead Sea’s northwestern shore, has been identified by some scholars with the biblical Secacah of Joshua 15:61–62. Excavations there uncovered numerous mikva’ot — ritual immersion baths fed by an aqueduct — echoing the seven baths of lustral water the books describe at Secacah. In 1996, excavators also found what’s known as the Yahad Ostracon — a potsherd bearing a Hebrew contract in which a man named Honi bestows his property, including a building and an olive and fig orchard, connected to a group called the yahad (“community”). This closely parallels I Achee 6:105, where “a man called Honi… gave his property at Secacah, with an orchard and dwelling, to the Church.” The ostracon’s reading remains debated among scholars. (Source: Jewish Virtual Library, “Qumran”)

The Copper Scroll, a list of buried treasure found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, also names Secacah several times: “the dam of the Secacah Valley,” “the head of the aqueduct [of the] Secacah [Valley],” and “as you go from Jericho to Secacah.” Its translators note that “many scholars think that Secacah was an ancient name for the site of Qumran,” though the identification is disputed. (Source: Wise, Abegg & Cook, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation, rev. ed. 2005, pp. 217–218)

Refuge for the High Priest, and Honi’s Gift

Achab and Shelevah came secretly to Secacah by night, near the cleft of Moses, so the people’s High Priest could be kept safe near the holy places of their fathers. Some years later, Honi — father of Elizabeth, and so the grandfather of John the Baptist — gave his own property at Secacah, an orchard and dwelling, to the Church (I Achee 6:105–107). The Church fortified it against brigands, and Secacah gave them the means to be secluded and protected in their privacy, a safe place for their sacred things (Moses 15:118–119).

The Great Watch

Secacah was a place dedicated to prayer vigils and used for little else. There the Essenes kept watches day and night to call forth the birth of Christ — a watch that lasted around twenty years before Mary was born. Those in the watch took communion daily and were baptized every day in a Miqveh bath in Secacah before they entered into the watch session, and the council in Secacah was a watch council. After Christ was born, the watch became one to pray for Him up to the time of His ministry. Between Mary’s birth and Christ’s birth there was no watch (Handbook, pp. 139–140, 145).

Elijah at Secacah

It was at Secacah that Elijah called the people together to confront the priests of Baal, building two altars and calling down fire (I Achee 5:57–61).

Isaiah’s Departure

The young Isaiah left his father’s house and departed for the land of Secacah, seeking the Lord there (I Achee 5:80–81).

The Son of Simeon

On the day the son of Simeon passed into the Covenant of the Community at Secacah, the voices of the Eerkodeshoi were heard singing, and those assembled heard the Lord call him “Goker Harim, my son” (I Achee 7:18).

The Seven Pools

Goker Harim II established that the Men of Renown alone should dwell in the city of Secacah, keeping a Great Watch day and night. Seven baths of lustral water were built there, one for each of the seven dispensations of the earth, from the pool of Adam through the pool of the Second Coming (I Achee 7:20–21). Baptisms at Secacah were in water flowing through Miqveh baths, for the Essenes preferred being baptized in lustral water (Handbook, p. 271).

The Layout of the City

The Handbook includes a map of the City of Secacah and its seven pools — from Eden’s Pool, out in the open and used by large groups, to the Seventh World Pool, set outside the enclosure of the city to show that the Millennium will be outside their regular way of life. The layout was given from what was seen and felt with the Urim and Thummim, with the support of the Spirit of inspiration (Handbook, pp. 567–568).

The Men of Renown and Hannah

Fifty-two men, with a few who supported them, kept the Watch at Secacah, each serving a year in turn. It was at Secacah that Hannah entered the Covenant of the Community, and the Men of Renown, hoping she might be the mother of Messiah, directed their Watch to be a blessing upon her (I Achee 7:28–29).

Shepherds Bring Word of the Birth

Shepherds from Secacah, hearing the songs of the Eerkodeshoi, brought word of Messiah’s birth to Goker Harim II, who in his old age went to the temple, beheld and blessed Him, then returned to Secacah and gathered the Men of Renown once more (I Achee 7:39–40).

The Only Place to Enter the Covenant

Secacah was set aside as the only place in Israel where a person could enter into the Covenant. Year by year at Ingathering, all who wished to take the Covenant came before the Council of the Community in full assembly in Secacah, and the ceremony was performed on the last Sabbath of Ingathering. In this way every person in the Church had visited Secacah at least one time in their lives (Moses 16:61–62).

Shabuwa Renewed at Secacah

Because the people of the temple religion did not keep the same Sabbath day, the sounding of the Trump of Summons would cause a great uproar, so the Church renewed Shabuwa in Secacah and in other places where the people would accept the sounding of the trump (Moses 16:50; Handbook, p. 309). In His sixteenth year, Messiah heard the Trump of Summons for Shabuwa for the first time, and it pierced Him to His very center. He was sent to Secacah for the weeks of Shabuwa, so the Men of Renown could teach Him and He could learn from Zabdee all things concerning Shabuwa (Moses 16:51–52).

Messiah and John at Secacah

When the child Messiah fled for His life, word was sent to Secacah before the sun was set, and Zabdee consulted the Lord with Urim in the midst of the Men of Renown there (Moses 16:7–8). In later years Messiah and John dwelt in Secacah, and Messiah would only purify in the pool of Eden — where the lustral water first entered Secacah, the pool of novices — saying His tasks in those other dispensations would come soon enough (Moses 16:79). He had been baptized many times in Secacah before His baptism unto the world (Moses 16:99).

Joseph’s Burial

In the twenty-eighth year of Messiah, Zabdee called the councils of all the communities of Israel to assemble in Secacah to determine how Messiah should proceed. Joseph, now old and ill, asked to be carried to Secacah to be present for the decision; there he died, seventy-five years old, and was buried in Secacah (Moses 16:89–90).

The Law of the King

Should Messiah need to confront Semihazah or the forces of evil, He was to go first to Secacah and inquire, by Urim and Thummim, of the one inscribed first among the Merari there (I Achee 7:51–52). And so He did: He went to Secacah to inquire of the one inscribed first concerning how He should proceed in His challenge to the high priest of the temple, and Zabdee put the breast piece upon Messiah and affixed the Urim and Thummim, and Messiah beheld through the eyes of His Father (Moses 16:104–105).

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