Page 109 - Satan in the Sanctuary

/ Will Fill This House with Glory 111

the LORD was laid. But many of the priests and Levites
and chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had
seen the first house, when the foundation of this house
was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice. . . the
people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy
from the noise of the weeping of the people (Ezra 3:11-
13).
The sages of the first Temple, who must have been in
their nineties, could not abide the more modest version.
The Almighty corroborates their opinion through the
prophet Haggai, reporting on the scene: "Who is left
among you that saw this house in her first glory? And
how do ye see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison
of it as nothing?" (Hag 2:3).
But good things can come in smaller packages. Haggai
continues: I will shake all nations, and the desire of all
nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory,
saith the LORD of hosts. . . . The glory of this latter house
shall be greater than of the former, saith the LORD of hosts:
and in this place will I give peace (2:7-9).
Relative peace did prevail then, for centuries, and
little is heard of the second Temple until the period of
the Maccabees (165 B.C.). Apparently the Jews main-
tained their precarious national heritage though their land
remained a playing field for the great military contests of
the civilized world. Alexander the Great and armies of
every nationality passed through at will, robbing and rap-
ing, but the Jews continued their Temple worship and
sacrifices all the same.
As to the Temple itself, it is not celebrated in secular
chronicling, as are the more grand temples of Greece
and Rome. The Greco-Syrian ruler Antiochus Epiphanes,
a merciless warrior, desecrated the house of the Lord in