Page 7 - Satan in the Sanctuary

Foreword

FROM THE DIVINE VIEWPOINT, Jerusalem has always been
the center of the stage of world history. In all probability,
Melchisedec, to whom Abraham paid tithes, was king there.
According to the Tell el Amarna tablets discovered in
Egypt, Jerusalem was in existence at least in the fifteenth
century B.C. Abraham was instructed to offer Isaac on
Mount Moriah, near where the Temple of Solomon was to
be built a thousand years later (2 Ch 3:1). Jerusalem was
made the capital of the kingdom of Israel by David and
Solomon, and there the tabernacle was given a permanent
home. Acting on instructions from God, Solomon built the
magnificent Temple that stood for centuries until destroyed
by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. The Temple was rebuilt in
Jerusalem by the returning captives from Babylon seventy
years after Solomon's Temple was destroyed. Finally, Herod
constructed a magnificent new Temple in Jerusalem, begun
about 20 B.C. and completed in A.D. 64.
After the destruction of Jerusalem and Herod's Temple
in A.D. 70, Jerusalem ceased to be the center of Israel's
national life until our generation. The return of Israel as a
nation—symbolized by their organization as a political state
in May 1948—and the dramatic repossession of the city
in 1967 are tremendously significant events. They have
made Jerusalem once again the capital of Israel and have
set the stage for the erection of the next Temple to be built

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