For some it's the passion of reading the Aeneid or Paradise Lost, awed at how mere language narrows the divide between the finite and the infinite. Others grow rapturous listening to Mozart's angelic sounds plucked from the heavens. And yet others may be blind to the humanity of their neighbors, but viewing a Rembrandt canvas allows them to see how that Dutch master imbued his painted figures with their heavenly souls visible and accessible to all. Still others put aside the conventional arts and seek G-d in the wonders of nature, the still starry nights, the Herculean ocean waves, the lure of lava and other volcanic explosions. A sizable proportion of Israel's post-army youth spend a year in the vast unknown parts of the world, the Himalayas, the Andes, the jungles of Brazil.
Space has boundaries, time is boundless.
El' means to move toward a relationship, and what's significant about relationships is not the amount of space covered, but the intensity of the duration. The fact is that the underlying spine of this passage deals with the historical fate of the Jewish people. We read in v. 3 of the in gathering from amongst the nations. No matter how far off the Jews have wandered , G-d will fetch them, bring them back to the land of Israel. This is G-d's promise, the background for our own repentance.