The Temple at the Time of Christ
The Temple, the Ka'aba, and the Christ
Chapters
« The Original Temple of Solomon
Even though Israel proved faithless, God remained faithful and sixty years later the Temple was rebuilt. It probably did not possess the grandeur of Solomon's Temple but was nevertheless built on the same lines. Once again the Holy of Holies - a cube-like structure -was constructed in the centre of the Temple. God continued to show his favours to the nation of Israel at this time and his presence remained in the Temple.
At this stage it will be useful to point out that God favoured no other nation as he favoured this one. From the time of Abraham, and especially from the tine of Moses until the time of Jesus, the Jews alone were the recipients of his particular providential favours. Therefore the Temple rightly became the focal point of Judaism and no other nation on earth had a "house of God" for it was here, and here alone, that the divine glory was manifested. The Bible and the Qur'an have the following to say about God's favours to this nation:
"To them belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ. Romans 9:4-5.
And verily We gave the Children of Israel the Scripture and the Command and the Prophethood, and provided them with good things and favoured them above all peoples. Quran 45.16
Accordingly the Temple was the only true "house of God" in the world. The second Temple stood for nearly five hundred years. Gradually, however, Israel forsook the path of God and apostasy again infected the nation. On this occasion they did not turn to idols hut abandoned spiritual worship and substituted it with numerous religious formalities which had the form of godliness but denied the spiritual power which these formalities were intended to represent. They had their sacrifices, ablutions, times of prayer, festival days, Temple worship and the like, but true godliness - holiness, love, truth, humility and honesty in the heart, had departed from them.
Shortly afterwards Herod, the King of Judea, decided to rebuild the Temple. This new building took at least forty-six years to complete and rivalled Solomon's in material splendour, but that is as far as the comparison goes. No cloud of divine glory filled this Temple. Once again the Holy of Holies with its veil was erected and once again it stood as a testimony to the wide separation that existed between the Holy God of the universe and sinful men on earth.
But whereas the religion of Moses had been like a rich, multi-coloured garment, being endowed with spiritual splendour, the garment had by now become worn out. It had lost its colour and Judaism had become a lifeless and colourless religion of petty religious rituals and formalities. The covenant God had made with Moses was practically obsolete and the Temple was ready to pass away. Significantly this Temple was not built by a faithful prophet of God but by a Gentile overlord who ruled over the Jewish race.
About this time Jesus was born in Bethlehem which is near Jerusalem. He lived for thirty-three years and the Temple had much significance in his life and ministry as we shall see shortly. Forty years after his ascension to heaven, however, the Temple of the Jews was destroyed by the armies of the Roman governor Titus. Not one stone was left standing upon another.
Although nineteen centuries have passed since then the Temple has never been rebuilt. It never will be. It will never again be a symbol of God's presence among men on earth. Something greater has come (Matthew 12:6). By the mercy of God men have obtained a better form of access to the divine presence and this access is now available to all nations. Judaism lost its true nature and is no longer the religion of God on earth. Both Islam and Christianity claim to possess that which has superseded it. But these two religions are so different in character and emphasis that they cannot both be the possessors of the new covenant Which one is in this age the final revelation of God to men? Let us begin by examining the equivalent of the Temple in Islam, namely the Ka'aba in Mecca, to see whether Islam offers that final, complete form of access to God which replaced the Temple of Judaism.