Rescued From Foreign Subjugation (part 82)

Why did Solomon undertake the building of a Temple?  Was it his idea?  No, but rather, it was his father’s idea.  In a communication to King Hiram of Tyre, whose assistance Solomon was going to enlist in obtaining the materials for the Temple, Solomon wrote, “You know that my father David was unable to build a temple to honor the Lord his God, for he was busy fighting battles on all fronts while the Lord subdued his enemies.  But now the Lord my God has made me secure on all fronts; there is no adversary or dangerous threat.  So I have decided to build a temple to honor the Lord my God, as the Lord instructed my father David, ‘Your son, whom I will put on your throne in your place, is the one who will build a temple to honor Me.’” (1 Kings 5:3-5).  It was the security that was provided by God’s putting down of all of Israel’s enemies that provided the impetus to build the Temple. 

This prompts us to make a brief return to the portion of Scripture that has provided us with the title of our study, which is Jeremiah thirty, verse eight, simply to make a point about the symmetry of Scripture and the ebb and flow of the underlying narrative structure of exile and exodus.  Jeremiah, as we have read numerous times, writes on behalf of Israel’s God that “When the time for them to be rescued comes… I will rescue you from foreign subjugation. I will deliver you from captivity.  Foreigners will no longer subjugate them.”  The ninth verse then goes on to make reference to a throne that will be occupied by a Davidic ruler.  Remember, Jeremiah writes in the context of the Babylonian conquest of Judah.  It is in that conquest of Judah and Jerusalem that the Temple that Solomon built was destroyed, along with the walls of Jerusalem.  It is no coincidence that the very first act of those that would return from their exile in Babylon---acting upon the decree from the Persian King Cyrus the Great---would be to rebuild the Temple. 

Solomon, in a sense, could be thought of as the first “Davidic ruler,” in that he was the first to follow in the line of David; and if part of Solomon’s motivation to build the Temple was the fact that there were no adversaries or dangerous threats to Israel, then part of the motivation to rebuild that Temple would be the opportunity to make the same type of declaration, and to make a claim upon the promise of a Davidic ruler to be raised up as their king.  The re-constructed Temple then would be the symbol of rescue from a faraway land where they were captives (30:10a), and a daring venture upon the faithfulness of their covenant God that “the descendants of Jacob will return to their land and enjoy peace” (30:10b).  The returnees from Babylon would do such things, however, in spite of the fact that there were adversaries, threats, and danger on all sides (as seen in the histories of Ezra and Nehemiah).  They would do this in spite of the fact that there was still a subjugating foreign presence, and even though they still considered themselves to be slaves (as also seen in the histories of Ezra and Nehemiah), with the place of their captivity merely moved from Babylon to Judah.  

The security provided by God, which would be seen as part and parcel of the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant, is only part of the answer as to why Solomon would build a Temple.  The reason that we returned to Jeremiah, and from there made what may seem at first glance to be an unrelated digression to a consideration of those that made a return to Judah from Babylon for the expressed purpose of building a Temple, is that doing so aids us in forming a further and deeper answer as to the “why” of building the Temple of Jerusalem.  The original Temple was established after Israel had finally, after so many years within its promised land, been rescued from foreign subjugation.  However, it was not an original idea.  In fact, it wasn’t even the first Temple.  Solomon was simply following a pattern that had already been established, and which had been established on what was essentially the same basis.  The Temple, of course, was simply a more glorious version of the tabernacle, and it was constructed for the same reasons that we can find for the construction of the tabernacle.