Lessons from the Sanctuary
Stephen Terry
Commentary for the October 26, 2013
Sabbath School Lesson
“The law is only a shadow of the good
things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can
never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect
those who draw near to worship. Otherwise, would they not have stopped being
offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no
longer have felt guilty for their sins. But those sacrifices are an annual
reminder of sins. It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take
away sins.” Hebrews 10:1-4, NIV
During the
Exodus, Moses told the people that God had ordered him to construct a sanctuary
as a place where He would dwell among his people. According to the biblical
text, Moses was shown a pattern of how it should look.[i]
While the writer of Hebrews asserts that this pattern was a heavenly sanctuary,[ii]
this may be speculative in the same way that assuming because a contractor shows
you the plans for a particular type of home, he lives in the same type of home.
But be that as it may, there were also similar models for the sanctuary in
Egypt where the Israelites had resided for 430 years. Moses, who was raised in
the royal household, may have been familiar with that architecture.
Just like
the Sanctuary, Egyptian temples would often be built around the idea of having a
courtyard that would be traversed while worshipping at the temple. As the
worship progressed it would move from the courtyard through a colonnade into a
holy area, and ultimately into the most holy area. These two areas are commonly
known as the pronaos and the naos respectively.[iii]
This does not mean Moses was not actually shown a pattern is some sort of
heavenly encounter. It simply means such an encounter may not have been
necessary. Perhaps Moses simply interpreted his life as being directed by God and
any experience that served to further the liberation of the Israelites and to
increase their cohesiveness as a nation was therefore from God. We do much the
same, today, when we look back over our lives and determine that this or that
moment was God’s direct influence on our future direction.
We would
like to think that the Israelites came out of Egypt with a pure Hebrew culture,
but this is inconsistent with their behavior throughout history. We see for
example that during the Greek era that Hellenic influences pervaded the entire
culture of Israel, even to their synagogues. While we might expect these houses
of worship to somehow reflect a pure Hebrew faith, they sometimes contained
signs of the zodiac and other pagan Greek imagery.[iv]
The word “synagogue” itself is Hellenic koine Greek. It is not specifically the
use of alternative cultural decorations for worship that I am drawing our
attention to but rather an overall willingness to adapt architectural features
from other cultures. Another example would be the Roman Amphitheaters that
became a part of the Jewish cultural package. An excellent example is the one
at Caesarea.[v] This
perhaps was where Herod, who had it built, was reported to have accepted the
accolades of a crowd that proclaimed him a god, and thereafter, according to
the Bible, he promptly died.[vi]
Perhaps we
should not overlook that there was an element in Israel opposed to these
borrowings from other cultures, especially when it came to religious
architecture. When Ahaz was king of Judah, he went so far as to redesign the
altar for the temple in Jerusalem based on a design he saw in Damascus.[vii]
The temple priest readily acquiesced. Although the writer of 2 Kings where the
account is written does not speak specifically against the new altar, his
opinion of the king is made clear in his statement, “Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned in
Jerusalem sixteen years. Unlike David his father, he did not do what was right
in the eyes of the Lord his God. He followed the ways of the kings of Israel
and even sacrificed his son in the fire, engaging in the detestable practices
of the nations the Lord had driven out before the Israelites. He offered
sacrifices and burned incense at the high places, on the hilltops and under
every spreading tree.”[viii]
In view of
the tensions that appear to have existed over worship styles and architecture,
it may beg the question of why there was no tension over the similarities
between the sanctuary and the Egyptian temple designs. This may be for several
reasons. One reason might be that Moses was such a powerful personality and had
the backing of his tribe, the Levites, who were given positions of power and
influence in relation to the new sanctuary structure, and no one was powerful
enough to resist him. However, his hold on power did not go unchallenged, even
by his sister Miriam and his rather wishy-washy brother, Aaron,[ix]
but Moses and the loyal Levites always seemed to come out on top. An
interesting sidelight is that in spite of his repeated involvement with those
who were rebellious toward Moses, even to the extent of lying to Moses,[x]
Aaron never seemed to face punishment for his actions. Perhaps, Moses felt he
was too important a link to Levite loyalty to do so. However, per the text, Miriam
was punished harshly for her role in rebellion. Of course this might only
reflect a gender bias by the author.
Another
possible reason that Moses was not challenged over the design of the sanctuary
and its similarity to Egyptian temples is that some if not all of the miracles,
the ten plagues, the crossing of the sea on dry land, and the pillar of cloud
and fire, actually took place and cemented him by divine endorsement in a position
of unassailable authority. After all, who in their right mind would challenge
someone able to wield that kind of power? Strangely the Bible maintains that
some did. Korah, Dathan and Abiram from the tribe of Reuben rose up to
challenge the authority of Moses and the Levites.[xi]
Consistently, the biblical account deals with the rebellion with the same
resort to supernatural power that delivered the Israelites from the Egyptians,
thereby providing yet another supernatural endorsement of Moses’ right to rule.
Apart from
all the drama and the various possible reasons for Moses’ motivation to
construct the sanctuary, one very big question remains. Why was there such a
dramatic transition in worship theology? Prior to the Egyptian captivity, God
was understood so expansively that the idea of building Him a house would not
even have been dreamed of. He was worshipped under an open sky, often at
mountain-top altars. What caused the Israelites to now feel that such a God
could now be contained in a tent in the desert? Even King Solomon had trouble
understanding that concept.[xii]
Were they
influenced by the centuries they lived in Egypt to feel that the proper place
for gods was in a temple, hidden in darkness? We often want to assume that the
Israelites came out of Egypt with a pure faith, but how realistic is that? Even
in our day, we struggle over what represents purity of faith, and how much is
influenced by our cultural milieu. Were the Israelites in Egypt somehow superhuman
in this regard? Were they, including Moses, able to resist any sort of Egyptian
religious understandings influenced by over four centuries of pressure to
assimilate into the local culture? Or were there instead those who sought to
build bridges between the two cultures?
Throughout
the history of the Christian church there seems to have been a certain amount
of syncretistic influences operating. On the one hand, there have often been
those that felt by accommodating to some degree the culture where one is living
will open channels of communication for “spreading the gospel.” The idea being
that if we are open to listening to and even incorporating the thoughts of others,
they might be willing to do the same toward us. The basis for such thinking continues
to be mostly anecdotal with little hard data to back up these assumptions, but
they are often strongly held nonetheless.
On the other
hand, another factor that can drive syncretism is the desire to avoid persecution
or open hostility toward one’s own culture or belief system. We may seek this
because it is rarely healthy to continue in a state of conflict for any length
of time. Many societies, both religious and secular, apply a great deal of
pressure for members of those societies to accommodate one another to achieve
order and harmony, even when the accommodations are outside of previously
acceptable practice.
Perhaps this
very syncretistic accommodation not only caused the Israelites to incorporate
Egyptian perspectives into their world view, but it may have also made it
easier for them to accept the radical change in religious practice from their
ancestors that Moses taught them to adopt. Perhaps after so many centuries they
were closer to the Egyptians in their understanding than the patriarchs. If
this was the case for them, then where are we today?
