Ezekiel’s Temple Vision: Both an ‘If’ and a ‘Promise’
“Now let them put away their whoredom, and the carcasses of their kings, far from me, and I will dwell in the midst of them for ever.” Ezekiel 43:9
In Ezekiel 40 – 48, the prophet describes a vision of a large and holy temple. This vision is the subject of much debate. Is mole of Ezekiel’s vision literal or figurative? Is it historical or is it still to come? I believe that God answers these questions Himself in chapter 43.
The Temple History
At the time of this prophecy, Israel (note: by Israel here I am meaning the nation of Judah) is being punished for their continual sin. God required their repentance. According to His long-suffering nature, God gave Israel ample opportunity and many prophets to encourage their repentance and return to Him. The fact is that Israel was deep into sin. They were unjust, hypocritical, and followed after the idolatry of the nations around them even to the point of participating in child sacrifice. However, God finally decided to punish Israel once and for all. The northern kingdom had been destroyed many years ago, and at this point in time, Judah was just destroyed by Babylon, and its people taken into captivity. Not only did Babylon destroy the city, but they destroyed the temple, something any Jew would never have thought possible.
We know that about 70 years from this prophecy, Babylon will fall to a new empire: Persia. It is this new empire that will send the Jews back to their own land commissioning them to rebuild their city and temple. Sadly, many years after this new city and temple are built, the temple and city will once again be destroyed in 70 AD by Rome. This occurs a few years after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As of today, the temple has not been rebuilt.
The Temple Vision
I will not go into the nitty gritty details of Ezekiel’s temple vision. The details of this vision spans several chapters (specially chapters 40 – 42) and includes a lot of exhaustive measurements. However, there are a few things to note that will help us understand the significance of this vision.
1. The temple contains a lot of measurements.
2. The temple is the same basic layout as the previous temples and tabernacle.
3. This temple is almost a square mile. It is very large – much too large for the current topography of Mount Moriah, in fact.
It is hard to envision that a temple with such detailed measurements would not represent something literal. In addition, the previous tabernacle and temple were built to very specific God-given plans, so why would this temple be any different? Finally, although this temple is too large to sit on Mount Moriah currently, we know that end-time events speak to major topographical changes to the land (Zechariah 14:9-11 and Revelation 16:20) which may allow the area to accommodate this temple.
Of course, there is no way to be sure how this temple will play out at this point. However, I believe that for these reasons Ezekiel’s vision lends itself to a literal interpretation of a future temple. But, these points are merely speculative. The best way to know the truth is to see exactly what God has to say!
God’s Speech
The If – Then Statement
After Ezekiel witnesses the return of the glory of God to the temple in chapter 43, God proceeds to speak to Ezekiel. What God has to say here is easy to miss, but I believe it is vital to understanding the point of Ezekiel’s vision and to answer the much debated questions about this temple.
Initially God says two things to Ezekiel:
1. God will dwell in the temple forever.
2. Israel will no longer defile God’s name.
At first glance, what God says seems to be a simple statement. Yet, 43:9 reveals that what God said is actually an ‘if-then’ statement.
“Now let them put away their whoredom, and the carcasses of their kings, far from me, and I will dwell in the midst of them for ever.”
In other words, if Israel will put away their sin, then God will dwell in this temple with them forever.
After the temple was destroyed, many of the Jews in exile longed to return home. One can easily imagine how the Jews needed hope in those pivotal moments after receiving the devastating news of the fall of their beloved city and temple. God provides this hope with the vision of this new large and holy temple. It is true that the Jews return to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple in about 70 years from that moment, but their rebuilt temple is not even close to as majestic and large as the temple in this vision. Even Herod’s temple that was present at the time of Christ wasn’t even close.
But, this vision is clear that this temple is not only large but, more importantly, it is HOLY. In fact, God says in verse 12, “upon the top of the mountain the whole limit thereof round about shall be most holy.” In verse 11, God requires obedience and repentance for this temple when He says, “if they be ashamed of all that they have done, shew them the form of the house…”
So, the requirement for this temple is HOLINESS. Unless Israel repent, that cannot be achieved by the nation of Isreal.
Even though Israel did return to their land and build a temple, they never became perfectly holy. They started out well (see Ezra and Nehemiah) and never returned to the level of idolatry that they were previously involved in, yet they also never achieved the holiness required in this passage. Just fast forward to the time Christ as an illustration of this point. The Jews killed the Son of God!
After this analysis, it would seem that the hope of this temple is lost…the nation of Israel never came to this type of repentance (and still hasn’t). Is this temple now void? But wait! There is still hope!
The Promise
While it is true that the vision of this temple is dependent upon the repentance of Israel, at the same time, it is a ‘promise’ to the nation of Israel. When you repent, this temple will be built. So is hope now lost? NO! While the nation of Israel during the time of Ezekiel may not have achieved this temple, the people of the future can and…spoiler alert…do! The question that us students of the Word have to answer is WHEN!
The previous chapters of Ezekiel, chapters 34-39, for example, have been promising the regathering of a repentant Israel to their land (note: there are a LOT of other passages in other books of the Bible that also promise this same thing!). While some want to view this regathering as a spiritual event as opposed to a literal event, Ezekiel shows that this promise is literal when he describes the attempts of Gog to destroy the nation of Israel (Ezekiel 38-39). This battle is clearly a literal battle and occurs BECAUSE Israel is regathered after being scattered among the nations. The timing of this battle in the course of history is its own debate, but we can be assured that this battle is literal. Are these the repentant Jews that build this temple? Well…maybe.
There is another option which is the regathering of what I will call the New Covenant Isreal. By this, I mean those who have been “grafted in” to the spiritual Israel thanks to the work of Christ. This would include Christian Jews and Christian gentiles, also known as the Church. We know that after Christ’s return, they will be gathered (1st resurrection) to rule in their glorious bodies in Jerusalem in the Millennial Kingdom. Outside of that holy city will be the tribulation survivors who are not fully holy. This will achieve the true holiness required for God’s mountain to remain HOLY.
The final option, however, is that this temple vision is describing the complex built in New Jerusalem. This is the eternal city built on the new heaven and new earth as described in Revelation 21-22. This city is comprised only of believers who have escaped the punishment of the Lake of Fire and they dwell forever with Christ. Of course, this city would definitely be holy.
Either way, whether this is achieved by regathered Jews before Christ’s return, glorious resurrected dead after Christ’s return, or the occupants of New Jerusalem, the promise is given and is obtained. While we can debate when this holiness spoken of here is achieved, there is no debate that God’s promise is good. God is faithful to His Word and will accomplish all that He says.
While the physical nation of Israel did not achieve this level of holiness, Christ did! It is through His saving work that we too can be considered holy and one day access this temple.
Temple Sacrifices: Why?
One part of Ezekiel’s vision that has confused me up until this point is the fact that the temple not only contains instruments for sacrifices, but the vision even outlines how the sacrifices are to be performed. This constitutes a problem for this temple being built after the final and ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Since the temple is not yet built and we are living in the time after Christ, the sacrificial system just doesn’t seem to make sense in a future temple. Of course, I am not the only person who has been confused by this. It certainly throws a wrench into the whole scenario. Many who believe, like me, that this vision is describing a literal temple that is still to come, see this sacrificial system more as a ‘memorial.’ While I can get behind that, I still find it difficult when Ezekiel spends a considerable amount of time on the description of the sacrificial system that will be completed in this temple including the sin offering (see Ezekiel 43:18-27, 44:15 & 29-30).
If this temple was completed before Christ, then yes. The sacrificial system must be in place. However, AFTER Christ, there is a problem. Christ is the final sacrifice. Since we know this temple was not completed before Christ, and up until this point in history, how then does this sacrificial system fit into the Church? I am going to take a stab at this from another angle which I think could help settle this debate.
At the time of this vision, God is speaking to a pre-Christ Israel. The ‘if – then’ statement would have to include sacrifices in the temple at this point. We have the benefit of hindsight and we know that Israel did not repent to the standard required here. So, this temple, pre-Christ temple, was not built. If this same temple is built for the End-Time Jews, New Covenant Isreal, or New Jerusalem Occupants, the sacrificial system will not be needed in the same way as Christ is the ultimate and final sacrifice. Please note that it is not as if the sacrificial system goes away, it is just fulfilled in the ultimate sacrifice that Christ gave.
Conclusion
The Bible is clear that this temple in the vision of Ezekiel is to come, it is promised to Israel. It will come when Israel is repentant and holy. Ancient Israel was never holy and did not get to realize this temple. However, at some point in the future, this temple will be built! When we realize that this temple is based on repentance and obedience, we understand that it was a promise that is still to be fulfilled. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see that day!