Understanding The Holy Temple Jesus Knew

Carta, the well-known Jerusalem publishers, offers an introductory price on our latest, and eighth, Carta book, valid until June 30, 2017 (make sure to put in the discount code: “25-off”):

This title is part of the “Understanding” series of Carta:

“This book is a companion volume to Understanding the Holy Temple of the Old Testament. Its aim is to provide a backdrop to the Gospel scenes which depict the Lord Jesus moving through the Temple Courts, a place where he performed many of his most significant acts. Although the Temple complex that Jesus knew was a very different one to that rebuilt by the returning Jewish exiles fro Babylon, the site retained the name of Second Temple. This was because its builder, the Edomite King Herod the Great, was not allowed by the religious Jewish authorities to make any substantial changes to the Temple building proper. However, in the vastly enlarged and embellished platform on which the Temple stood, Herod was able to express his passion and creative genius for building.

Beginning at the Holy of Holies, the central focus of the complex, we follow Jesus and his contemporaries through the great Sanctuary of Israel. Stopping off at many points along the way, we reflect on scenes such as the Presentation in the Temple, Jesus’ visit at age twelve and the rending of the veil between the Holy and the Most Holy at his crucifixion. Our exploration is facilitated by the richly detailed reconstructive drawings that accompany the lively text of this latest publication by the Ritmeyers.”

Inside this book you will find this new new drawing of the widow with the two mites:

Reconstruction drawing showing three of the thirteen trumpet-shaped receptacles for monetary offerings that were placed under the colonnades that surrounded the Court of the Women (Treasury). The widow, who is mentioned in Mark 12.42 and Luke 21.2, and who put in the two mites is shown next to the box in the middle.

In a previous post we showed another new drawing of the twelve-year-old Jesus in the Temple at Passover that also appears in this new book:

In Luke 2.41-52 we read of Jesus’ first visit to the Temple. In this reconstruction drawing, we see young Jesus (in blue) on the steps of the Temple Terrace (hel) with the rabbis. This terrace bounded the wall of the Temple Courts on its southern, western and northern sides. It was 10 cubits (5.25m, 17 feet) wide, and was reached by a flight of steps of half a cubit high and deep. According to Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 88b, members of the Temple Sanhedrin would come out of the Chamber of Hewn Stone on Sabbaths and festival days to teach on the hel. Young Jesus must have eagerly made use of this opportunity.

2 thoughts on “Understanding The Holy Temple Jesus Knew”

  1. The Temple was his everyday pulpit and the disciples continued to meet there, after he left this world.

    Luke 2:46 “After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers”

    Luke 19:47 “Every day he was teaching at the temple”

    Luke 21:37 “Each day Jesus was teaching at the temple, and each evening he went out to spend the night on the hill called the Mount of Olives, and all the people came early in the morning to hear him at the temple”

    Mark 14:49 “Every day I was with you, teaching in the temple courts, and you did not arrest me”

    Mark 12:35 “While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts”

    Matthew 21:23 “Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him”

    Luke 20:1 “One day as Jesus was teaching the people in the temple courts and proclaiming the good news, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, together with the elders, came up to him. “Tell us by what authority you are doing these things,” they said. “Who gave you this authority?”

    John 7:28 “Then Jesus, still teaching in the temple courts, cried out, “Yes, you know me, and you know where I am from. I am not here on my own authority, but he who sent me is true. You do not know him, but I know him because I am from him and he sent me”

    Acts 2:46 “Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts”

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