The Fuss about the Temple

So, back to 1 Kings, sorry for the satirical rant... I promise, no more until I get the next email forward .  1 Kings 9 has some poignant things to say about the temple.  "If you turn aside from following me... and do not keep my commandments... but go and serve other gods, then I will cut off Israel from the land... and this house will become a heap of ruins. (9:6-8)" Built in 960 BC Solomon's temple (the first temple) was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BC (about 400 years).

The second temple was rebuilt starting in 516 BC as described in Ezra and Nehemiah under the authority of Cyrus and Darius of the Persians.  Again, the temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD (this one lasted about 500 years), when the Jews rejected the Messiah, and went after 'other gods.'  

From the Palestinian and Muslim perspective, the situation on the temple mount looks quite different.  Stop to consider our Ishmaelite brothers' position for a moment.  They have had control and freedom to worship on Mt Moriah, with a brief interruption during the Crusades, since the early 600's AD.  They call the place holy for some of the same reasons we Christians and the Jews do. They did not destroy the temple, but came after in 637 AD, when Jerusalem was conquered by the Caliphate army during the Islamic invasion of the Byzantine Empire and reigned for nearly 500 years.  The Crusaders took it back for a brief period in bloody religious wars starting in 1104, then Saladin and the Mamlukes for 323 years, then the Ottomans for 400 years, and finally the British in 1917 who then gave it to the Jews officially in 1947. (See Wikipedia for more details)

From a Muslims perspective, the temple, Jerusalem and the dome of the Rock have as much Muslim history as Jewish.  They have ruled there for nearly 1200 years.  Muslims have occupied Jerusalem for the majority of modern history.  

It is important to note, and oft forgotten by we evangelicals, that the political Israel of today is a secular state, and not necessarily the 'my people' that God is referring to here.  Israel has forgotten God (except for a remnant of course) and went after other gods, and so today "Everyone passing by is astonished (that there is no temple), and will hiss and will say, 'why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?' Then they will say, 'because they abandoned the Lord their God.'  We forget that God is the one responsible for ousting the Jews from the temple mount. 

I'm not commenting on the rightness or wrongness of the British Mandate, it is simply a fact to accept now, however, it is good for those of us who grew up in the West to hear the other side of the story, and see history from a different angle.   God is doing amazing things among Muslim and Jewish peoples today, bringing them to faith through dreams and visions, the work of the persecuted church, and thousands of workers who diligently share Jesus in these contexts.   God has a purpose in all of this, and we musn't forget that his eyes are heart are on the temple mount 'for all time' (9:3) not to elevate a people, but to bring glory to himself.  May peace reign in Jerusalem.