The Temple

The Temple in the Bible refers to the place of worship for God in Jerusalem. The first Temple was built by King Solomon around 969 BC. Before that, during Moses’ time, the Israelites worshipped God in the Tabernacle. King David had long wanted to build the Temple, but God did not permit him because he had shed much blood and fought many wars (1 Chronicles 22:6-7). Before his death, King David prepared a great deal of material and instructed his son, King Solomon, to build the Temple for God. Solomon began the work in the fourth year of his reign, and it was completed seven years later. The Temple was located on Mount Moriah, north of the city of Jerusalem, which was the same place where Abraham offered Isaac some 1,100 years earlier (Genesis 22:2). The Temple was twice the size of the Tabernacle, measuring 30 meters long, 10 meters high, and 15 meters wide, making it one of the most magnificent buildings in the ancient Middle East. Between 606 and 586 BC, after the kingdom of Israel had fallen, the people of Judah were taken to Babylon three times, and King Nebuchadnezzar

Around 536 BC, King Cyrus of Persia ordered Zerubbabel to lead the Jews back to Jerusalem to rebuild the Temple. The books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Haggai all describe the work of rebuilding the Temple. This is what is known as the Second Temple, which was later expanded by Herod the Great. The Second Temple was much smaller in scale than the first. In 20 BC, Herod the Great began expanding the Second Temple. He hired 10,000 workers and planned for the project to be completed in 17 years, but it took 46 years to finish. The historian Josephus provides a vivid description of the Second Temple and its surrounding areas in his book Antiquities of the Jews. In the Second Temple, Jesus drove out all those who were buying and selling, overturning the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves (Matthew 21:12; Mark 11:15; Luke 19:45), and He also taught there. In AD 70, the Roman general Titus completely burned the Temple, fulfilling Jesus’ prophecy that “not one stone will be left here upon another; every one will be thrown down” (Matthew 24:2). The Temple has not been rebuilt since.

Since the destruction of the Temple by the Romans, the sacrificial system and other forms of worship associated with the Temple have ceased, just as the prophet Hosea foretold around 746 BC. “For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods. Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God, and David their king, and shall come in fear to the Lord and to his goodness in the latter days” (Hosea 3:4-5).

In 1948, the nation of Israel was re-established, and the Jewish people were regathered and returned to their land, fulfilling the prophecy in Ezekiel 37 of the dry bones coming back to life. This reignited in the hearts of the Jewish people the longing for “the promises of God to Abraham and his descendants.” In both the Old and New Testaments, prophets saw visions of a future Temple that is different in appearance, size, and every other aspect from the First and Second Temples. We know that, like all other prophecies in the Bible, God’s will will surely be accomplished. In thanksgiving and praise, we await God’s wondrous work. Amen!

The Bible records:

1）King David, inspired by the Holy Spirit, gave Solomon the plans, saying, “All this I have in writing from the hand of the Lord, who made me understand all the work to be done” (1 Chronicles 28:11-19). King David said to the assembly, “My son Solomon, whom alone God has chosen, is young and inexperienced. The task is great, for this palace is not for man but for the Lord God” (1 Chronicles 29:1).

2）David wrote in a psalm, “The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord’s throne is in heaven; his eyes see, his eyelids test the children of man” (Psalm 11:4).

3）During Jesus’ time on earth, some people went to the Temple not to worship God but to do business. Jesus cleansed the Temple twice. “Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. ‘It is written,’ he said to them, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it ‘a den of robbers'” (Matthew 21:12-13).

4）(Ezekiel 44:4-5) Then he brought me to the front of the temple by way of the north gate. I looked, and I saw the glory of the Lord filling the temple of the Lord, and I fell facedown. The Lord said to me, “Son of man, pay careful attention, look with your eyes and listen with your ears to everything I tell you concerning all the ordinances of the temple of the Lord and all its laws. And mark well the entrance to the temple and all the exits of the sanctuary.”

5） (Revelation 11:1-2) I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, “Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, and count the worshipers there. But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months.”