Temple is a building which a god or gods is worshiped. The Old Testament describes temples as some of man's oldest buildings. The Tower of Babel - Gen. 11:4 - is the first recorded example of a structure that implies the existence of a temple, although this tower was not a temple itself. A temple was thought of as the building where the god manifested his presence, so the place the temple occupied was holy or sacred. Because the god was thought to dwell in the temple, the Old Testament had no specific word for temple. It refers instead to the 'house' of a deity.

Abraham was from Mesopotamia where each city had a temple for its patron god. The Mesopotamia believed that the god owned their land, that the king was the vassal of the god, and that the land had to be blessed by the god in order to be fruitful. Their religious practices were, in part, designed to win the god's favour. Several Canaanite temples are mentioned in the Old Testament. They include the temples of the god Berith in Shechem - Judg. 9:46 - Dagon in Ashdod - Judg. 16:23-30 -; 1Sam. 5:2-5; 1Chr. 10:10 - and Beth Shan on Mount Gilboa. - 1Sam. 31:12 -

The patriarchs such as Abraham and Jacob did not build temples because they were wandering herdsmen. However, they did have shrines and altars in places where God had revealed Himself to them, at Bethel and at Beersheba. - Gen. 12:6-7, 33:20, 21:33, 26:23-25 - Even after Solomon's Temple was completed, rival sanctuaries at Bethel and Dan competed with it. - 1Kin. 12:28-33 - Later the Samaritans had a temple on Mount Gerizim. - John 4:20 -

Solomon's Temple: Once the land was fully conquered and all the tribes were properly settled, it was important that the worship of God be centralized. David, the Israel king was a man of war, because of that he was not allowed to build the temple, but he was allowed to gather the materials for it and to organize the project. - 1Chr. 22:1-19 - The actual work began 'in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel had come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel.' - 1Kin. 6:1 - Solomon began to reign about 971B.C. so his fourth year would have been about 967B.C. The temple was completed about 960B.C., seven years later. - 1Kin. 6:37-38 -

In biblical times three temples were built on the same site: Solomon's, Zerubbabel's and Herod's. Solomon built the temple on the east side of Jerusalem on Mount Moriah "where the Lord had appeared to his father, David, at the place that David had prepared on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite." - 1Chr. 21:28; 2Chr. 3:1 - The highest part of Mount Moriah is now the site of the building called 'The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem.'

Solomon contacted Hiram, king of Tyre, to supply workmen and materials to help construct the Temple. - 2Chr. 2:3 - First Kings 5:6 calls those workmen Sidonians. Additional, Solomon 'raised up a labour force out of all Israel' of 30,000 men to assist Hiram in the forests of Lebanon. - 1Kin. 5:15 - Solomon had seventy thousand who carried burdens and eighty thousand who quarried stone in the mountains. The Gebalites also helped to quarry stones. - 1Kin. 5:18 - Those who quarried stones were overseen by 3,300 of Solomon's deputies. - 1Kin. 5:16 -

Solomon's Temple is described, though incompletely, in 1Kings 6-7 and in 2Chronicles 3-4. The description of Ezekiel's Temple, an elaborate version of Solomon's may supplement those accounts. - Ezekiel 40-43 -  Solomon's Temple was in the shape of a rectangle that ran east and west. Like Ezekiel's Temple - Ezek. 41:8 - it may have stood on a platform. The accounts in the Book of Kings and Chronicles suggest that there was an inner and an outer courtyard. Three main objects were situated in the inner courtyard. The bronze altar that was used for burnt offerings measured 20 cubits square and 10 cubits high. - 1Kin. 8:22, 64, 9:25; 2Chr. 4:1 - Between that and the porch of the Temple stood the bronze laver, or molten sea, that held water for the ritual washing. It was completely round, 5 cubits high, 10 cubits in diameter, and 30 cubits around its outer circumference. - Twelve bronze oxen, in four groups of three, faced outward toward the four points of the compass, with the bronze laver resting on their backs. - 1Kin. 7:23-26 - But Ahaz removed the bronze laver from the oxen. - 2Kin. 16:17 -

Finally, at the dedication of the Temple, Solomon is said to have stood on a 'bronze platform five cubits long, five cubits wide, and three cubits high' that stood in the middle of the courtyard. - 2Chr. 6:12-13 - The interior dimensions of the Temple were 60 cubits long, 20 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high. - 1Kin. 6;2 - The ten steps to the porch of the Temple were flanked by two bronze columns, Jachin and Boaz, each 25 cubits high and 12 cubits in circumference. - 1Kin. 7:15-16; 2Chr. 3:15 - The porch was 10 cubits high, 20 cubits wide, and supposedly 120 cubits high. - 2Chr. 3:4 -

To the west of the porch was the Holy Place, a room 40 cubits long, 20 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high where ordinary rituals took place. Windows near the ceiling provided light. In the Holy Place were the golden incense altar, the table for the show-bread, five pairs of lamp stands, and the utensils used for sacrifice. Double doors, probably opened once a year for the high priest on the Day of Atonement, led from the west end of the Holy Place to the Holy of Holy, a 20 cubits cube. In that room two wooden cherubim, each ten feet tall, stood with outstretched wings. Two of the wings met above the ark of the covenant and two of them touched the north and south walls of the room. - 1Kin. 6:27 - God's presence was manifested in the Holy of Holy as a cloud. - 1Kin. 8:10-11 -

The outside of the Temple building, excluding the porch area, consisted of side chambers or galleries that rose three stories high. - 1Kin. 6:5 - The rooms of the Temple were paneled with cedar, the floor was cypress, and the ornately carved doors and walls were overlaid with gold. - 1Kin. 6:20-22 - Not a stone could be seen.

Shishak, king of Egypt, took away the Temple treasures during the reign of Rehoboam, Solomon's son. - 1Kin. 14:26 - Asa used the Temple treasure to buy an ally and to buy off an invader. - 1Kin. 15:18; 2Kin. 16:8 - Manasseh placed Canaanite altars and a carved image of Asherah, a Canaanite goddess, in the Temple. - 2Kin. 21:4-7 - Ahaz introduced an altar patterned after one he saw in Damascus. - 2Kin. 16:10-16 - By about 640B.C. Josiah had to repair the Temple. - 2Kin. 22:3-7 - After robbing the Temple of its treasures and gold during his first attack in 587B.C. the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar looted, sacked and burned the Temple - 2Kin. 24:13, 25:9, 13-17 - but people still came to the site to offer sacrifice. - Jer. 41:5 - There are 'Ezekiel's Temple' - Ezek. 40-43 - 'The Second Temple' and 'Herod's Temple.'

The New Testament uses two words for Temple.......

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Sunday, May 24, 2009

I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!

I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.

HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -