Temple Mount - and the Divine Presence

The "rock" is, according to tradition, Mount Moriah – the place where Abraham took his son Isaac to offer him as a sacrifice to the Lord. Abraham was directed not to harm the lad, and the Lord himself provided the sacrifice (Gen. 22.2-19).

For the Moslems, the Temple Mount in Jerusalem (Haram ash-Sharif, "Noble Sanctuary" in Arabic) is the third most holy site after Mecca and Medina. Mohammed is said to have been transported there from Mecca by the angel Gabriel and taken up through the seven heavens to the throne of Allah.

The Dome of the Rock was built between 688 and 691 AD. Nearby is the Al Aqsa Mosque, designed to accommodate up to 5000 worshippers at a time.

The main display behind the Holyland Hotel is a one-in-fifty scale model of Jerusalem in the time of Christ. The Temple would have dominated the landscape of Jerusalem even more that the Dome of the Rock does today.

After Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, the foundations were all that remained of the Temple – the Western Wall (formerly called the "Wailing Wall"). Jews still come there to pray and to tuck written prayers into the cracks between the massive stones.

Jews have believed that, even though the Temple is gone, the shekinah or divine Presence, still lingers on in these stones.

Issues relating to the Temple Mount loom large in the present unrest. In October 2000 Ariel Sharon (who has since become Prime Minister) entered the Temple Mount with a detachment of troops to investigate unauthorised activities that were suspected to be going on there. That sparked off the present troubles.

Within a couple of weeks of our return, word came that the "mufti" of Jerusalem (appointed by Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority) had declared that the Western Wall has no historical or religious significance to anyone but Moslems – it is nothing more than the foundation of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and should be renamed accordingly.

Then within the past month a group of ultra-orthodox Jews held a ceremony in the plaza at the base of the Western Wall to lay the foundation stone of the next Temple. This set off a further wave of unrest.

Not just Jews and Moslems, but many Christians too seem to be looking for the "divine Presence" in the Holy Land. Was that the motivation of Helena, mother of Constantine, when she went to the Holy Land in 325 AD to identify sacred sties and have chapels built on them? Certainly, there are present-day Christian tourists whose aim is to make a pilgrimage from place to place and chapel to chapel – in the belief that to be where Jesus had been is to feel his presence and be closer to him.

Jacob and Esau were twins. Esau, the first-born twin, had extra rights and privileges of inheritance. But Jacob tricked his brother into giving him his birthright (Gen. 25.29-34). Later he posed as Esau, the favourite son, before his near-blind father to receive a special blessing (Gen. 27). Esau was furious with his brother, vowing to kill him after their father Isaac died.

Jacob fled. First night out, he had a strange dream in which he saw a stairway to heaven and angels ascending and descending on it. Above the stairway was the Lord himself with a promise for this foolish young man – "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you" (28.15). He woke up and thought, "Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it… How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven" (vv. 16-17). It appears that Jacob had the idea that the divine presence was back at home, but not out here with him as he fled the anger of his brother.

When Jesus called Nathanael to follow him, he said, "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man" (Jn 1.51). In other words, through Jesus himself we know the presence of God with us, no matter where we go.

In his final commission to his followers, Jesus said, "Surely I am with you always" (Matt. 28.20). That’s a promise to be trusted – from which to receive strength day by day.

PRAYER: Lord, you are here. We don’t need to go somewhere else to find you. In the midst of our hopes and disappointments, you are here. In spite of our sins and failures, you are here. You are here too for the people we meet, the people we serve. We open our lives to your presence – to receive forgiveness, assurance, courage, hope… In Jesus’ name, Amen.

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