On his way to Charan, Yaakov stopped for the night and lay down to sleep at “the place”—precisely the spot where the Beis Hamikdash, our Holy Temple, would be built.
According to the Midrash, the Torah emphasizes that “at that place” he lay down, because “here he lay down to sleep, but during the 14 years when he studied under Eiver he did not lie down... Here he lay down, but during the 20 years he spent in Lavan’s house he did not lie down.” Meaning that over a period of 34 years, the only place that Yaakov lay down for a good night’s sleep was the site of the Beis Hamikdash! How could it be that Yaakov lay down for a relaxing and peaceful sleep specifically here, the holiest spot in the world?
The Torah’s account of Yaakov’s rest on the Temple Mount alludes to the great revelation of G‑dliness that would one day take place there.
The structure of the human body reflects the superiority of a person’s spiritual identity (represented by the spiritual faculties found in his brain) over the physical aspects of his life (represented by his feet). When we stand, our feet and lower faculties are lower than—beneath and subject to—our minds, the seat of our spiritual awareness.
When we lie down, however, the head and feet are level. On the one hand, this represents a compromise of the “head’s” superiority; on the other hand, it reflects the reality that before G‑d, Who transcends all, physicality and spirituality are equal. This recognition reminds us that although our spiritual lives must obviously dominate our physical lives, ultimately both can and must be used to reveal G‑d’s transcendent essence.
It therefore came to be that Yaakov lay down to sleep specifically at the future site of the Beis Hamikdash, his feet level with his head. For in the presence of G‑d, the height of spirituality is on equal footing with the lowly material world that it must guide and uplift.
—Sefer Hasichos 5752, vol. 1, pp. 140–142
