This is a follow up both to my post about Solomon’s Temple and the Second Temple possibly not being on the same location, and my post about The Vail of The Temple.
Christians have long wanted to view Genesis 22:14 as saying the place where Isaac was offered is the same spot as where Jesus was Crucified. The problem has been Mt Moriah being clearly identified as where Solomon's Temple was (The name Moriah appears in The Bible only twice, Genesis 22:2 and 2 Chronicles 3:1), and we know Jesus wasn't Crucified inside The Temple.
The Garden Tomb theory is based in part on saying that location is also on the same mountain as the Temple Mount, and was originally it's peak. But the Garden Tomb in question is too old, and I have long felt that location for The Crucifixion was least likely to be true.
However now that I've opened the door to the possibility that the Second Temple wasn't where the First Temple was. Where was Solomon’s Temple site in the time of Christ? Could it be where the Passover was fulfilled in 30 AD?
What if Jesus was Crucified where Animals would have been killed in Solomon's Temple? And maybe the Tomb where he was buried and rose from the dead was beneath the Holy Place or Holy of Holies, his Body laid beneath where The Ark once rested?
Now needless to say if this is true it rules out the Mount of Olives model that I had favored at one point, since that's to the East and probably where Solomon placed his Idols.
Placing Solomon's Temple to the West would happen to fit The Church of The Holy Sepulcher. In my post about Venus maybe being the Star of Bethlehem, I was interested in the implications of Hadrian building a Temple to Venus on that site. In the apocryphal Prophecy attributed to the Tiburtine Sybil, The Church of the Holy Sepulcher seems to play the role modern Futurist Christians tend to give The Temple in Bible Prophecy. The actual presumed Tomb of Jesus there is directly under its largest Dome, which is interesting.
That would place the Brazen Altar in the Katholikon, perhaps about where the Omphalos is. I recall seeing in a documentary I watched years ago, a woman saying she thinks the Crucifixion site was within The Church of the Holy Sepulcher, but not at the traditional spot. This part I may be remembering wrong, but I think she placed it in the Katholikon.
However I have seen models of the Tabernacle and Temple that interpret the Brazen Altar as being as being not directly east of the entrance to the Holy Place, but a little further south.
Also it could be that if the Tomb is the Holy of Holies and the Brazen Altar to the East of it. That the traditional Rock of Golgotha could equate to where the Red Heifer was killed, to the east of the Gate of the Tabernacle. Fitting the desire to connect Numbers 19 to Hebrews 13:11-13.
Also it could be that if the Tomb is the Holy of Holies and the Brazen Altar to the East of it. That the traditional Rock of Golgotha could equate to where the Red Heifer was killed, to the east of the Gate of the Tabernacle. Fitting the desire to connect Numbers 19 to Hebrews 13:11-13.
But I'm not quite willing to support The Church of The Holy Sepulcher being the site of either Solomon's Temple or Calvary just yet. It may be too far West (and North) given where I think Jebus proper was.
What if the real site of Jesus Crucifixion and Resurrection was where the Nea Ekklesia was built? Which in my main post on thinking Solomon’s Temple wasn’t where the second Temple was I came to favor for it’s location.
The Garden that exists by that site now happens to by sheer coincidence be called The Garden of The Resurrection, the intent being to refer to Israel's modern Resurrection as a nation. And that Armenian Church is called The Church of the Archangels, I have suggested before that Michael's actions in Daniel 12 could be tied to the events of the Crucifixion and Resurrection.
Some people have theorized Jesus was Crucified on a still standing Tree, with only part of the Cross being what he carried. Which makes me curious about the Olive Tree believed to mark the Holy of Holies in that model.
However I have come to realize that if that Armenian Church is where Ananias lived as it’s actual tradition claims, then it was within the City at Christ’s time and thus not where the Crucifixion would have been.
The people who before me argued it was the site of The Temple were basing most of their arguments on it being the Second Temple.
One more compelling argument for the possibility of Jesus burial being where the Holy of Holies was where the Ark of The Covenant rested, is in the word for Ark itself.
The Hebrew word translated Ark when referring to the Ark of the Covenant is not the same Hebrew word used for Noah’s Ark or the basket the carried Moses. It’s ‘arown Strong Number 727. This word is used almost exclusively in direct reference to the Ark of the Covenant, including I think every time the KJV translates it Ark. Of course I lean towards the theory that there were two Ark of the Covenants and this word is used of both. But still it’s almost always of an Ark containing Tablets of The Law.
Six of the exceptions to this are places where the KJV translated it “chest”, in two accounts of the same events. 2 Kings 12:9-10 and 2 Chronicles 24:8-11. This chest was also placed in The Temple, it was a chest for depositing funds for The Temple.
Coincidentally the name given to Ornan who originally owned the Threshing Floor the Temple was built on in 2 Samuel 24 is Araunah, basically this word with a Heh added at the end. Interesting but still not the exact same word, but the most similar any other word in Scripture is.
But the exact word in question does appear one other time in Scripture, in the very last verse of the Book of Genesis. Where the KJV translates it “coffin” because it describes where Joseph’s body was laid to rest. Joseph is viewed as a type of Christ, and the Tomb Jesus was buried in was originally built for another man named Joseph.
The references to Jacob and Joseph being “embalmed” in Genesis 50:2-3 and 26 are often assumed to refer to Mummification because of who/where people assume Mizraim was. But the actual etymology of the word just means to spice or anoint a body, exactly as was done with Jesus.
So perhaps the last verse of the first book of The Bible is providing us a type picture of the Burial of Jesus while at the same time providing the first usage in Scripture of a word used almost exclusively of The Ark of The Covenant?
And for further connection between Genesis 50 and this subject. Genesis 50:10-11 says the children of Jacob stopped to mourn at the Thresshingfloor of Atad on the way to burying Jacob. Now this is often assumed to be east of the Jordan, but if Mizraim was in Arabia rather then Africa, then Beyond Jordan in this context could mean west of the Jordan. Canaanites being there could be a reason to see this as west of the Jordan, as well as that they aren't described as crossing the Jordan to get from here to Hebron/Mamre. Atad isn't used as a place name anywhere else, it means "thorn", so could it be a reference to the same thorns that the Crown of Thorns was made from? And could this Thresshingfloor have later become the Thresshinglfoor of Ornan the Jebusite?
And then there is John 20:12 where after the Tomb is found empty Mary Magdalene sees two angels standing where the body of Jesus had laid, one at the Head and the other at the Feet. Could they correspond to the two Cherubim on the Atonement Covering?
Update March 20th 2018: I've abandoned this view as explained here.
And for further connection between Genesis 50 and this subject. Genesis 50:10-11 says the children of Jacob stopped to mourn at the Thresshingfloor of Atad on the way to burying Jacob. Now this is often assumed to be east of the Jordan, but if Mizraim was in Arabia rather then Africa, then Beyond Jordan in this context could mean west of the Jordan. Canaanites being there could be a reason to see this as west of the Jordan, as well as that they aren't described as crossing the Jordan to get from here to Hebron/Mamre. Atad isn't used as a place name anywhere else, it means "thorn", so could it be a reference to the same thorns that the Crown of Thorns was made from? And could this Thresshingfloor have later become the Thresshinglfoor of Ornan the Jebusite?
And then there is John 20:12 where after the Tomb is found empty Mary Magdalene sees two angels standing where the body of Jesus had laid, one at the Head and the other at the Feet. Could they correspond to the two Cherubim on the Atonement Covering?
Update March 20th 2018: I've abandoned this view as explained here.
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