For generations, Christians watching developments in Israel have assumed that one enormous event must occur before biblical sacrifices can return to Jerusalem: the Third Temple must first be built.
But what if that assumption is wrong?
According to Rabbi Tovia Singer, one of the most widely followed Jewish teachers in the world, an altar suitable for Temple sacrifices has already been prepared. The priestly garments have been made. Silver trumpets have been fashioned. Other vessels necessary for Temple worship have been recreated.
And according to Singer, the altar is ready to be taken to the Temple Mount.
"We have an altar that's ready to go," Singer recently explained. "It's built. It's here. It's ready to go on the Temple Mount."
Then came the statement that should catch the attention of every student of Bible prophecy:
"You technically do not need a Temple in order for an altar to be placed there and sacrifices to be offered."
That changes the conversation considerably.
For years, prophecy watchers have focused primarily on the enormous political obstacles to rebuilding the Jewish Temple. The Temple Mount contains the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa Mosque and remains perhaps the most religiously explosive piece of real estate on earth. Any serious attempt to construct a Jewish Temple there could produce repercussions across the Middle East.
But rebuilding the Temple and resuming sacrifices may not necessarily be the same event. The biblical precedent is found in Ezra.
When Jewish exiles returned from Babylon to Jerusalem in the sixth century B.C., they found their city devastated and Solomon's Temple destroyed. Yet they did not wait until a new Temple could be constructed before restoring biblical worship.
They built the altar first. Ezra 3:6 makes the sequence unmistakable:
"From the first day of the seventh month began they to offer burnt offerings unto the LORD. But the foundation of the temple of the LORD was not yet laid."
The Temple wasn't standing.
Its foundation hadn't even been laid.
Yet sacrifices had already begun.
That ancient precedent suddenly makes today's Temple preparations considerably more interesting. (Read More)
