No 8

(Herod’s Temple)

In our last study on the temple, we looked at the second temple that the Maccabees cleansed after Antiochus Epiphanes, the Greek had defiled it with impure sacrifices. The cleansing was completed in 164 BC and the temple actually served as a fortress against the Romans. The Jews were able to resist the siege of Pompey for 3 months in 63 BC. The building of Herod’s temple began in 19 BC and this gesture was more an attempt to reconcile the Jews to their Idumaean king than to glorify God. It was a magnificent structure made of cream-coloured stone and much gold.

The attitude of Jesus toward this temple was composed of two opposing features. On the one hand, Jesus considered it to be the house of His Father “And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves,” Matt 21:12. Jesus also preached that the temple and all that is in it was sanctified by the presence of God. “Ye fools and blind: for whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifieth the gold? And whoso shall swear by the temple, sweareth by it, and by him that dwelleth therein.” Matt 23: 17,21. On the other hand, Jesus relegated Herod’s temple to a very subordinate position in comparison to Himself. In Matthew 12:6, we read “But I say unto you, that in this place is one greater than the temple.” Jesus was by far greater than the temple because it had become the cover for the spiritual emptiness of Israel and Jesus said that His rejection by the Jews would bring about its destruction. “And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here! And Jesus answering said unto him, Seest thou these great buildings? ....there shall not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” (Mark 13 :1,2). As history records, Titus and his armies destroyed the temple by fire in 70 AD and as the fire raged, it melted the gold inside the temple and the soldiers broke every stone to get at the gold leaving only a part of the foundation. This foundation remains even until today in Israel but there is an Islamic mosque built on it called the Dome of the Rock. The only place left for the Jews today is the Wailing Wall next to the mosque where they come to pray. Today, the Lord’s real temple is in a much more sacred place.