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| Model of the Jewish Temple at the time of Jesus. |
“Destroy
this Temple and in three days I will raise it up.” But he spoke of the temple
of his body.
During the long period of time between
the Exodus and the time the Jews entered their Promised Land Israel was, as in
the days of Abraham their father in faith, a nomadic people. Its homes were
tents. As it moved from place to place, the action of “pitching one’s tent” was
a common one. In the midst of the camp of Israel was the biggest and most
important tent of all, the “Tent of Meeting”, where the Ark of the Covenant was
kept, and where the altar was raised for the purpose of offering sacrifice. The
Tent of Meeting was the place where God made his presence specially known, the
place where Israel went to seek counsel. If one sought to be especially close
to God, it was to the Tent of Meeting that one made one’s way.
The tent became a symbol of human life itself. To unpitch one’s tent meant to die. To pitch one’s tent meant to be born, to take up residence, so to speak, in the community. Even after David the king had built himself a magnificent palace in Jerusalem, the Ark of God continued to be kept in a tent. The Temple, when first built in Jerusalem, was based upon the design of the Tent of Meeting. The nomadic image of a tent being put up and struck, also represented the transience of human life. It reminded Israel that human life was but a temporary thing, that our real life lay hidden with God.
This idea persisted into the New Testament. Paul, a former Jewish rabbi converted to Christianity, was by profession a tent-maker, and refers to the human body as a tent in 2 Corinthians, the passing flesh which will be replaced by a glorious body at the Resurrection. And the profoundest and most powerful reference to the human body in this way comes in the Prologue to the Gospel of John, words we know as, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”, literally “he pitched his tent among us.” For we are a nomadic people on a journey to our Promised Land, to eternal life with God, and in this image Jesus, like us, took on flesh and became one of us. He not only lived amongst us; he became, in the fullest sense possible, one of us.
And now, Jesus’ words, “Destroy this Temple and in three days I will raise it up,” reveal their true meaning. Jesus the Son of God has, like the Tent of Meeting, pitched his tent amongst us. He has become present amongst us in the fullest sense, as one of us. He has become, amongst us, “veiled in flesh”, transient flesh that, like ours, must die, to be raised from the dead in glorious form. He has assumed to himself the very Temple of the Lord for, as he tells the woman at the well in Samaria in today’s gospel reading, the time is coming when we will worship him “in Spirit and truth”, that is, wherever his presence is to be found. His glorious body is to replace the Temple in Jerusalem.
The Greek word luo, which he uses when he speaks of destroying the Temple, is also the word used to describe the decaying of a body in the grave, ontbinding, as it translates so neatly into Afrikaans. But even here it says more than the English reveals. For the sense of the statement, “Destroy the Temple, and in three days I will rebuild it”, is not a statement, but a command. “Destroy this Temple!” he commands them, as though that is what they have been doing all along by turning it into a “den of thieves” with their crooked market. Destroy this Temple – it doesn’t matter. It is in my resurrection that it will be raised up, and the new Temple will be my Body.
The tent became a symbol of human life itself. To unpitch one’s tent meant to die. To pitch one’s tent meant to be born, to take up residence, so to speak, in the community. Even after David the king had built himself a magnificent palace in Jerusalem, the Ark of God continued to be kept in a tent. The Temple, when first built in Jerusalem, was based upon the design of the Tent of Meeting. The nomadic image of a tent being put up and struck, also represented the transience of human life. It reminded Israel that human life was but a temporary thing, that our real life lay hidden with God.
This idea persisted into the New Testament. Paul, a former Jewish rabbi converted to Christianity, was by profession a tent-maker, and refers to the human body as a tent in 2 Corinthians, the passing flesh which will be replaced by a glorious body at the Resurrection. And the profoundest and most powerful reference to the human body in this way comes in the Prologue to the Gospel of John, words we know as, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”, literally “he pitched his tent among us.” For we are a nomadic people on a journey to our Promised Land, to eternal life with God, and in this image Jesus, like us, took on flesh and became one of us. He not only lived amongst us; he became, in the fullest sense possible, one of us.
And now, Jesus’ words, “Destroy this Temple and in three days I will raise it up,” reveal their true meaning. Jesus the Son of God has, like the Tent of Meeting, pitched his tent amongst us. He has become present amongst us in the fullest sense, as one of us. He has become, amongst us, “veiled in flesh”, transient flesh that, like ours, must die, to be raised from the dead in glorious form. He has assumed to himself the very Temple of the Lord for, as he tells the woman at the well in Samaria in today’s gospel reading, the time is coming when we will worship him “in Spirit and truth”, that is, wherever his presence is to be found. His glorious body is to replace the Temple in Jerusalem.
The Greek word luo, which he uses when he speaks of destroying the Temple, is also the word used to describe the decaying of a body in the grave, ontbinding, as it translates so neatly into Afrikaans. But even here it says more than the English reveals. For the sense of the statement, “Destroy the Temple, and in three days I will rebuild it”, is not a statement, but a command. “Destroy this Temple!” he commands them, as though that is what they have been doing all along by turning it into a “den of thieves” with their crooked market. Destroy this Temple – it doesn’t matter. It is in my resurrection that it will be raised up, and the new Temple will be my Body.
This is a great warning and a promise to us. It is not the stone Temple of Israel that will be raised up, but the temple of glorious flesh that will be our resurrected bodies. Do we want to be raised to live with God for ever in glory? Because if so, we must live as though our very beings are a “house of prayer.” If we turn ourselves into a “den of thieves” through unrighteous living, through immorality, through abuse of substances, be they alcohol or drugs, through crooked dealings and dishonest living, then we can expect his righteous anger over us as well. We cannot turn ourselves as human beings into such a thing and still expect God to accept us as one of his own.
“My house shall be called a house of prayer,” he says. In other words, we must allow him, through the power of his Spirit welling up within us, to make of each one of us a place where he is worshipped in Spirit and truth. We must become living stones in the building of his living Temple. Where two or three are gathered in his name, he must truly be present in us, in Spirit and in truth. Can we truly and honestly say that each one of us is serving him like this? If not, it is time for us to make some major changes in the way in which we live.
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