Monday: A Savior Who Overturns Tables

In its splendor, the second temple in Jerusalem that Jesus would have seen was far more magnificent than the more modest edifice—however miraculous in provenance—constructed by those Jewish exiles whose return to Jerusalem from Babylon is retold in the closing chapters of Second Chronicles and in Ezra and Nehemiah. The temple of Jesus’ day was one element of a reconstruction plan of astonishing ambition undertaken by Herod the Great, the polarizing—at least some think his monstrous rule was offset by positives—client king of Rome. Herod’s expansion of the temple wasn’t exactly a study in pious magnanimity. Rather, he wanted to possess a capital city worthy, as he said, of his own “dignity and grandeur.” Apparently the significance of even the modest temple being the dwelling place of God was lost on him. Read Full Article »