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Torah obligates the Jewish Nation to rebuild the Temple whenever it Build Your house as at the ~rst,
becomes possible to do so. Therefore, the reason Israel, and even set Your Temple on its foundations,
the whole world, has national problems is that Israel has failed to allow us to see it Built and make us joyous in
rebuild. its establishment, return Priests to ~heir
service and Levites to their sqngs and .music, The Place for the Temple
and return Israel to their pleasant places,
In order to build the Temple, it is believed the exact location of the and there we will ascend and be seen and
former two Temples must be correctly identified. One reason is bow down before You. - Jewish Holiday Prayer
because the site for the Temple was divinely appointed. Another is
he most volatile 35 acres on earth are undoubtedly those because there appears to be a continuity between Temples - each
comprising a rectangular platform in East Jerusalem, known being built with its Holy of Holies enclosing the same protrusion of T
as the Temple Mount, on which the ancient Jewish Temple Mount Moriah known as Even ha-Shetiyah ("The Foundation
once stood. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament togeth- Stone"). Since it was upon this stone that the Ark of the Covenant
er affirm that a new Temple will once again occupy this platform as had been set and the Shekinah (Divine Presence) had descended,
part of God's end time program for the Nation of Israel. departed, and promised to return, it is thought that no other place can
be substituted. Since the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans in A.D.
70, Jewish prayers have been made for its rebuilding. Such a prece- The Temple Mount platform, built to support the Temple and its
dent was set by the Prophet Daniel while in Babylonian exile (Dan. courts, has been preserved down through the centuries. While this
6:10), and Orthodox Jews, the denomination most desirous for a has limited the area for the search for the original site, it is impossi-
Third Temple, who today recite three times daily the words: "May it ble to resolve the matter due to the lack of complete access to the
be Thy will that the Temple be speedily rebuilt in our own time." Even site. Nevertheless, based on many evidences that can be discerned
so, almost 2,000 years have passed. Today Israel is largely a secu- without archaeological investigation, three major theories of location
lar state, and many understand this prayer only metaphorically. have been advanced.
What evidence is there in Israel today that this predicted rebuilding One theory put forth by Tel Aviv architect Tuvia Sagiv, based on
is close to becoming reality? accounts in ancient sources and topographical elevations, argues
that the Temple was situated at the southwestern corner of the plat- The Protocol for the Temple
form near to where the AI Aqsa Mosque is today.
Orthodox Jews differ as to when and how the Third Temple should Another theory, with both traditional support and the consensus of
be rebuilt. One school of thought believes that the Temple will Israeli archaeologists, is that the Temple stood exactly where the
descend in fire from heaven completely built after a religious gov- Dome of the Rock is today.
ernment is established as the Messiah arrives in the Age of
Redemption. The predominate school of thought, however, is that the A more popular theory is that of Hebrew University physicist Asher
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2004 JEWISH VOICE TODAY PAGE 4
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