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 |  Subject: Temple Springs  Tue Jul 07, 2015 1:02 pm | |
| Temple Springs
Witnessing Tools
Tuesday, July 07, 2015
Wendy Wippel
Paul records that the antichrist will someday proclaim himself God in The Temple ( II Thess. 2:3- 4), which means that someday The Temple will be reconstructed. Eighteen million Jews/year, in fact, at the Western Wall (sole remnant of said temple) beseech Yahweh for just that. Recent research, however, says they might be praying up the wrong tree.If you read pretty much anything on the history of the Western Wall you’ll get the same explanation: it represents all that is left standing of the area in ancient Jerusalem then known as the Temple Mount, i.e., the raised area on which the Temple stood. And that’s a problem, because that particular slab of jutting rock is currently home to two Moslem landmarks—the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aksah Mosque. And as long as the site of the temple is now occupied (as is the consensus) by Moslem holy places, chances are slim to none that any temple is going to be built.The last incarnation of the temple was the House that Herod Built. The one in which Jesus taught and drove out the money lenders before He died. And there is nearly complete consensus that the last remnant of this temple consists of the Western Wall. The problem with complete consensus is that smells like sacred cow. Something that is considered a truth beyond questioning.But as archaeological and textual evidence to the contrary mount, begging reanalysis of this particular cow'sineage, it may be, actually, that no barrier to reconstruction of the Temple exists. The rebuilding of the temple could start tomorrow. But first, how did this sacred cow come to be?Written records contemporary to the events accounts consistently describe the Temple Mount as being completely destroyed just as Jesus prophesied in Matthew 24: not one stone would be left upon another. Josephus recorded that the whole temple was completely destroyed and that if he hadn’t personally been in Jerusalem--making him an eyewitness to the demolition of the temple by Titus and his armies-- he wouldn’t have believed that the temple had ever actually existed. Eleazar Bin Jari, later leader of the Jewish forces at Masada, wrote that Jerusalem was “demolished to its very foundation, and hath nothing left but the camp of those that destroyed it (meaning the Romans) which still stands upon its ruins”. The Brervarius Pilogrim wrote of the temple site that “there is nothing there left apart from a single cave. “Eusebius said that all traces of the Temple at Zion had been removed. And it didn’t get better.The massacre at Masada, in 74 AD, was followed by three major Jewish-Roman wars, culminating, in 135 A.D., in Roman Emperor Hadrian plowing Jerusalem under, building a new Roman capitol(Aelia Capitolino), and simultaneously eradicating the remaining Jewish population.Roman historian Dassus Dio records, in fact, that nearly 600,000 Jewish inhabitants were killed, with the rest sold into slavery. Rome ruled the now virtually Jew-free Jerusalem until Emperor Constantine transferred the empire’s capitol to Constantinople in 313 AD. With the seat of power across the Mediterranean Sea, Rome soon fell to Barbarian tribes, leaving Jerusalem barren and empty. Then came the Moslems. Umar Farooq conquered Jerusalem in 638 BC., and Ummayyad Caliphs, in 687, built the Dome of the Rock on the site. A brief conquest by crusaders was followed by a nearly thousand years in which the land lay desolate, its people scattered.Again, prophesied: - Quote :
- For the children of Israel shall abide many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, without ephod or teraphim. Hosea 3:4
My point? They also lived a long time without historians. At least, in the land. And therein lies the rub. They weren’t there to document anything.But there were other historians that did visit Jerusalem, and they did. And they agree with respect to what remained in the desolation that was Jerusalem, after Rome’s destruction of the city in 70 AD.Basically, only one thing. The Roman fort called the Antonio Fortress.
- The pilgrim of Bordeux , for instance, who traveled through in 333, and described the rocky outcropping (on which the Dome of the rock now stands) as being the praetorium, or Roman fort.
- The Piacenza pilgrim, who, on his way through in the 500s, described a large oblong stone on which a Roman praetorium stood. And named the fort as the spot where Pilate heard the case against Christ.
- Eusebius, (who recorded that the Temple was completely obliterated) who testified that the Roman Fort was still there.
None mention by any one of these, moreover, of seeing any remnant of the Jewish Temple. Ditto with the flood of Byzantine visitors to Jerusalem upon it coming under Byzantine Control in 313. Despite the Temple being the biggest edifice that existed in that ancient world.Still skeptical? You’re in good company. I admit I was plenty skeptical till I got the rest of the story. Many are, because the tradition that the Dome of the Rock is the Temple Mount is so strong.But Scripture is stronger. And there’s a very interesting piece of Scripture in I Kings 1:33-39: - Quote :
- The king also said to them, “Take with you the servants of your lord, and have Solomon my son ride on my own mule, and take him down to Gihon. There let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him king over Israel; and blow the horn, and say, ‘Long live King Solomon!’ Then you shall come up after him, and he shall come and sit on my throne, and he shall be king in my place. For I have appointed him to be ruler over Israel and Judah.”
Benaiah the son of Jehoiada answered the king and said, “Amen! May the Lord God of my lord the king say so too. As the Lord has been with my lord the king, even so may He be with Solomon, and make his throne greater than the throne of my lord King David.”So Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet, Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, the Cherethites, and the Pelethites went down and had Solomon ride on King David’s mule, and took him to Gihon. Then Zadok the priest took a horn of oil from the tabernacle and anointed Solomon. Solomon was anointed King at Gihon, with oil from the tabernacle that was there. And according to Second Chronicles, the Temple was eventually built where the Tabernacle stood, on the threshing floor that God pointed out to David as the place that the temple should be built. (2 Chronicles 3:1)The Tabernacle was built on the threshing floor at the Spring of Gihon.Roman historian Tacitus, in fact, recorded that the Jerusalem temple included a spring of water that welled up inside of it. And the Psalms themselves confirm the ancient accounts:. - Quote :
- The Lord loves the gates of Zion More than all the dwellings of Jacob. Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God! Selah… Both the singers and the players on instruments say, “All my springs are in you.” Psalm 87:2-3,7
Last but not least, the 313 Edict of Milan, issued by the Emperor Constantine, gave the nation of Israel the right to rebuild the Lord’s houses. Specifically, the Gihon Spring.Police Detective and researcher Bob Cornuke was recently taken on a tour of a Gihon excavation by an Israeli archaeologist named Eli Shukron. The site dates from the first temple period, and is the only known worship site within the actual city of David, (where the first temple was built).It contains an olive press, carved in the floor, to make oil, and an altar for sacrifice, with rings that would allow the animal to be tied down. Also a channel that would have carried the blood out to the Gihon spring. Excavations near the Gihon Spring, moreover, recently yielded an ancient stone with the name “Temech” inscribed on it. Temech, according to Nehemiah, was the name of the family that served as the temple servants.The Al Aqsa Mosque rests on the far southern side of the mount, facing Mecca. The dome of the rock currently sits in the middle. According to consensus, either occupying or very close to the area where the temple previously stood.The Gihon Spring, however, is actually in the city of David (as Scripture demands) but almost a mile from the Dome of the Rock.A mile’s plenty of room, right?Keep watching!Note: the source of this information is a recent book by Bob Cornuke called TEMPLE.I think he has me convinced. I highly recommend it. (And let me know what you think!) |
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