Bayit Shlishi: The Challenge of the Third Temple
One topic I’ve found that is sure to mix it up at any Shabbos table (no matter what the brand of Judaism of the people sitting around it) is that of Bayit Shlishi, the Third Temple. Since 1967, Israel has (technically) had the opportunity to build the Third Temple, but for a host of reasons has chosen not to.
I have found very few people who will willingly discuss this matter in any detail. My father’s reaction at my telling him that at one time, Judaism practiced routine animal sacrifice, was horror. "I never thought of that as Jewish," he said, astonished and a little grossed out. (It had been a while since he’d opened a chumash.) A charismatic haredi rabbi in Boston heard my question at the Shabbos table about what it would look like (meat or vegetarian sacrifices?) and his face darkened. He said no one is qualified to speak to that, and immediately changed the subject. "Well, we’ve moved beyond that," others have said. Grain offerings and showbreads would be all that would be used, they say, if we ever came face to face with the dubious honor of rebuilding the Temple.
My husband is an exception to this rule, however, and answers the horrified shrieks of "Animal sacrifice? Bulls, rams and lambs slaughtered daily? Blood spattered? How could you suggest such a thing?" with one word: Thanksgiving. The Annual Turkey Holocaust. My answer of choice is even more extreme: McDonald’s. Parshat Tetzaveh describes the daily sacrifices made up of a few animals (4?), and what happens to what bits once they’re chopped up. (Sorry, vegetarians.) There is little waste, and the barbeque gets eaten once it’s finished.
Orthodox Jews pray for the rebuilding of the Temple three times a day. (Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, and any other brand of Jews, help me out here: Do any of you still have these prayers in your siddur? What form do they take?) Yet most aren’t prepared (and not just for political reasons) to imagine it actually happening. I think it’s inspiring and challenging to imagine. My husband is a Levi and while he has the job of washing the hands of the Kohanim in shul every day here in Israel (when he arrives on time), he dreams of singing or playing music in the Temple. (Though they’d probably give him a computer job; a large portion of the building surrounding the courtyards of the Temple was dedicated to offices and administrative functions.)
The overarching question that arises from this subject (at least in my mind) is, What do we do with the sometimes strange, uncomfortable, even disturbing things we find in the siddur, the commentaries, or the Torah itself? Block them out and pretend they’re not there? Follow them to the letter no matter what? Rewrite them? Ignore them?
What do YOU do?
Interesting post Shim.
Here is what Wikipedia has to say about the Conservative take .
Conservative Judaism believes in a Messiah and in a rebuilt Temple, but does not believe in the restoration of sacrifices. Accordingly, Conservative Judaism’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards has modified the prayers. Conservative prayerbooks call for the restoration of Temple, but do not ask for resumption of sacrifices. The Orthodox study session on sacrifices in the daily morning service has been replaced with the Talmudic passages teaching that deeds of loving-kindness now atone for sin. In the daily Amidah prayer, the central prayer in Jewish services, the petitions to accept the “fire offerings of Israel” and “the grain-offering of Judah and Jerusalem” (Malachi 3:4) are removed. In the special Mussaf Amidah prayer said on Shabbat and Jewish holidays, the Hebrew phrase na’ase ve’nakriv (we will present and sacrifice) is modified to read to asu ve’hikrivu (they presented and sacrificed), implying that sacrifices are a thing of the past. The prayer for the restoration of “the House of our lives” and the Shekhinah to dwell “among us” in the weekday Torah reading service is retained in Conservative prayer books, although not all Conservative services say it. In Conservative prayer books, words and phrases that have dual meaning, referring to both Temple features and theological or poetic concepts, are generally retained. However, translations and commentaries generally refer to the poetic or theological meanings only. Conservative Judaism also takes an intermediate position on Kohanim and Levites, preserving patrilineal tribal descent and some aspects of their roles, but lifting restrictions on who Kohanim are permitted to marry.
In recent responsa on the subject of the role of Niddah in Conservative Judaism, a majority of the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards expressed the view that principles of ritual purity relevant to entry into the Temple are no longer applicable to contemporary Judaism and accepted a proposal to change the term “family purity” to “family holiness” and to explain the continuing observence of Niddah on a different basis from continuity with Temple practices. The Committee also permitted retention of existing observances, terminology, and rationale.
Also Rabbi Ginsberg touches on the subject in a couple of his YouTube videos.
In this one the Temple talk starts about 2:40 in to things and this second video is all about Sacrifices and the Temple.
I myself think we have outgrown any need for the Temple and it’s sacrifices. I think we are mature enough to take on the responsibilities of personal repentance, be it, ethical, spiritual or beyond. Of course as this video clearly shows not everyone feels the same way I do.
Ok so tonight at shul just after Ma’ariv/Havdalah I asked one of my Rabbi’s about the Temple and here is basically what he had to say.
“No we don’t believe in a need for the rebuilding of a 3rd Temple. We have outgrown it.”
I am of course paraphrasing, but I think I got it right. He is, to put it mildly, a CJ Heavy weight. So I’m pretty sure his view is reflective of the movements overall view on the subject.
My guess is basically that The Sacrifices for Atonement have been replaced by personal Teshuvah.
Anyhow I’m not sure what the deal with Wikipedia is but it seems to be wrong.
Avi — I think it probably covers many bases, and this makes sense considering CJ tends to be a little here, there and everywhere on a lot of issues between how the congregants believe versus the rabbis, etc. According to one Masorti congregation’s site, I think they have it pretty accurate: “He believes in the vision of the end of time - regardless of whether he daily yearns for the arrival of King Messiah or just hopes for an amorphous messianic age. There will be one Masorti Jew who awaits the rebuilding of a third Temple without sacrifices and there will be another who awaits neither the Temple nor the its sacrifices.”
Of course this doesn’t help when it comes to what the official stance is, but I think it is pretty accurate as far as the congregation of Conservative/Masorti Judaism goes, don’t you think?
I’m curious why I can’t seem to find anything on the official stance, though :\ Is there an ask-the-rabbi resource for Conservative Judaism?
Chavica wrote:
“He believes in the vision of the end of time - regardless of whether he daily yearns for the arrival of King Messiah or just hopes for an amorphous messianic age. There will be one Masorti Jew who awaits the rebuilding of a third Temple without sacrifices and there will be another who awaits neither the Temple nor the its sacrifices.”
Of course this doesn’t help when it comes to what the official stance is, but I think it is pretty accurate as far as the congregation of Conservative/Masorti Judaism goes, don’t you think?
To be honest no not really. Ok yes your Masorti shul quote, in theory, does capture the potential diversity found within the Movement. However I’m not so sure that pro temple views are that common within the CJ. Also I don’t the believe the Wiki entry accurately represents the CJ view, as it seems to paint a rather monolithic view of the CJ on this topic and I would ad, one which seems to be incorrect and not reflective on any “potential” diversity within the movement.
One reason is based on my conversation with my shul’s Mara Datra, which has led me to believe that his position (as stated in my comment above) is more or less one and the same as the widely accepted position held by both the Rabbinic Assembly and the US CJ. I’m sure there are a handful of conservative theology “Type One’s” who believe in and pray for the building of the third Temple but I would be surprised if there were all that many. My guess is those people have exited stage right either into the Union For Traditional Judaism or straight up Orthodoxy. Having said that, this is speculation on my part and not a concrete fact.
Going back to the Wikipedia entry for a moment. I don’t think it’s very representative because it seems to paint the movement as having this one view, of seeking to rebuild the “Temple” but not restore the sacrifices. I’ve yet to find one source (besides your un-sourced quote above and the Wikipedia entry) from a recognized CJ/Masorti Institution which supports this position. Of course having said that it’s not like I’ve done a whole bunch of research on the subject. So who knows maybe there are other sources that state the same thing.
I don’t have time right now but sometime over the next couple of days I’ll look through Emet Ve-Emunah (the USCJ Statement of Principles) and see if it has anything to say on the subject.
However in the meantime the little research I’ve done seems to indicate that the Masorti/conservative view is not to rebuild the Temple or reinstitute the sacrifices.
Example one: my rabbi/Mara Datra’s quoted statement as found in my previous comment on this post.
Example two: A response from a Schechter Institute(a spiritual and academic center of Conservative/Masorti Judaism in Israel) rabbi on the subjects of the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem.
Question
Do you know what the plans are for the rebuilding of the Temple. I’ve heard that they have already built various instruments and have worked on reviving the priesthood. The Bible (NT and even possibly OT towards the end of Ezekiel) says that it will be rebuilt. I’m curious what the present status is. Everybody knows obviously that the Dome of the Rock is there, but besides for that, I’m wondering what the plans are if any in Israel.
Thank You immensely,
Mark F.
Answer
Dear Mark,
As far as I know, there are no plans to rebuild the Temple. It is true that there is a very little fringe group, very extreme in their political views who are “preparing” for the building of the third Temple and did build some instruments used for the sacrifices.
There are major impediments to rebuild the Temple. The first one is that on the very place of the Temple are now standing two mosques, the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aksa mosques. They are important Muslim shrines and nobody would think about destroying them. This would lead to a war with the Muslim world, and Israel has enough political difficulties to make itself accepted in the world.
The second thing is that only priests related genealogically to the Levite tribe could serve in the Temple. Obviously, there were intermarriages with non Levites during the generations since the destruction of the second Temple, and nobody today can ascertain that he is purely a Levite.
All the best,
Rabbi Monique Susskind Goldberg
Example three: yet another response to a question on the rebuilding of the Temple from a rabbi at the Schechter Institute.
Question
Dear Rabbi,
Why was the Jewish Temple in Israel not rebuilt?
Answer
One of the main reasons the Temple was never rebuilt is that the Temple’s function is to give sacrifices to God. The people who are supposed to serve in the Temple are the priests, descendants from Aaron’s family. The problem is that a priest must be of proven pedigree to serve in the Temple (see Mishna Midot 5:4). Those currently designated “priests” (Cohanim) are “presumed priests,” inasmuch as there is no legally sufficient proof testifying to their descent from ancient priestly families (see Maimonides, Issurei Bi’ah 20:1-2;). Thus they would not be fit to serve in the Temple.
Another important impediment to the rebuilding of the Temple is that on it’s place are standing two mosques, and politically and morally, Israel cannot destroy them. However there is in Israel a small group of people who would like to rebuild the Temple and to reestablish sacrifices now, but they are really a minority. Generally when people speak about the building of the “Third Temple”, they speak about the Messianic Times.
I want to add that I personally feel that it does not seem that sacrifices are a means by which men and women in modern times want to relate to God. With the destruction of the Temple, and the lost of the priest’s genealogy, sacrifices were replaced by prayers, the Temple by a multitude of “Minor Temples”, our synagogues, and maybe this is the way it was meant to be.
I hope I answered your question.
All the best,
Rabbi Monique Susskind Goldberg
As for your question as to whether or not there is an ask the conservative/Masorti Rabbi service available, the answer is yes.
You can e-mail questions to a conservative rabbi via the USCJ web site here and there is also a great ask the rabbi page set up on the Schechter Institute web site, which can be found here.
Avi and Chavi, thanks for your contributions to the post. Avi’s comments about the official stance of the Conservative movement held few surprises for me. I would expect that most Conservative Jews would not feel a need or desire for animal sacrifices in the modern world given Judaism’s current format of prayer and penitence, and the certain dire political consequences of trying to rebuild the Temple with extant Muslim worship on the Temple Mount are obvious.
I was disappointed in the Schechter Institute’s go-to rabbi on this issue however. Her answers were riddled with inaccuracies, including the following:
1) The Dome of the Rock is a shrine, not a mosque. The only mosque on the Temple Mount right now is the Al-Aksa Mosque. The Dome was originally built to house pilgrims to the Mosque, but has since become its own entity and tourist attraction.
2) The dedicated souls at the Temple Institute are “very extreme in their political views”? They are Zionists. They study the Temple service and have tried to recover as much detail as they can about those lost practices. They are the only people who protest the deliberate destruction of Jewish antiquities under the Mount by the Muslim Wakf (intended to remove any sign of Jewish presence on the Temple Mount and try to discredit our claims to it as a holy site for Judaism). And they pray that someday Moshiach will come and the Temple will be rebuilt. With this in mind, they have taken private donations and forged, or commissioned HaZorfim (Israel’s largest silver manufacturer) to design and forge, the keilim, or vessels. (This acceptance of private contributions was how the keilim for the Mishkan were created.) You can see some of the beautiful keilim they’ve built and commissioned at their online gallery. It sometimes seems as though anyone who wants to avoid being labeled “extreme” these days must be a post-Zionist, minimally educated Jew who would rather kowtow to Muslim chauvinism than preserve the integrity of Judaism and its holy sites.
3) The priestly line has not been lost, at least not in the Orthodox world. “Intermarriages with non-Levites” are not forbidden (females carry no priestly status); only converts and divorcees are forbidden as wives to kohanim. Their traditions have continued to be passed down from father to son throughout the generations, and recent research points to the possibility of tracing kohanim through genetic markers. Were the Temple to be rebuilt tomorrow, today’s kohanim would have an awful lot of studying up to do before they could actually serve in it, but they’d be there to do it.
Hi Shim
Yeah, I wasn’t so sure about some of the Rabbi’s arguments myself. Although for me it was more that her points about “priestly” legitimacy and Muslim concerns, don’t seem all the significant to the CJ theological argument for not rebuilding the Temple. I thought she could have made the point without including them
Just to represent the Reform perspective here… we have taken out praying for the 3rd temple from our siddurim. I haven’t looked in-depth in the new siddur yet to see if it is mentioned in the footnotes or offered as an alternative (such as the raising of the dead was), but from what I can tell the official Reform stance (if it can be said to have one) is that praying for the rebuilding of the temple is praying for something that would need considerable destruction to happen and that is not acceptable. We’ve moved beyond the need to sacrifice to communicate with God and prayer has taken the place of sacrifice.
Hi,
I must be a minority of one. I am a traditional Jew, non-Orthodox, but I do observe some mitzvot, such as daily prayer. Plus I am too right-wing to be Conservative.
If I lived in Israel, I guess I would probably attend a Sephardic synagogue or Israeli Masorti synagogue.
My hope is for a 3rd Temple, but no sacrifices of any kind, not even flour, etc.
As you know the 2nd Temple had a “court of the Gentiles”, where non-Israelites could pray.
My proposal is to re-build a temporary structure for the 3rd Temple in Jerusalem, but NOT near the Dome of the Rock or El Aqsa Mosque.
Can you imagine what a powerful symbol the 3rd Temple would be, to Jews and non-Jews. I would also emphasize that it is “a house of prayer for all nations”.
However, anyone wishing to go into the area reserved for Israelites/ Jews would have to be of a monotheistic faith (ie. Muslim, Jewish (Rabbinic/ Karaite), Samaritan, Unitarian, or Sikh).
Then when there’s true peace, it can be re-assembled, Sharing the same land with the Dome/ El Aqsa.
Interesting Dave But I can’t say It’s something I plan on putting my energy into making happen. Not that, this means a whole heck of a lot!
BTW the two Rabbi quotes found in my comment above are from an Israeli Masorti Rabbi. I only mention it because you stated that the Masorti, might be one of your options if you where to live in Israel.
So if you are too right for CJ where do you attend? Is it a UTJ shul? I have yet to met anyone form a UTJ shul.
Avi, so far as I can tell, the UTJ doesn’t *have* congregations/shuls: “The UTJ is a trans-denominational education and outreach organization dedicated to promoting the principles of traditional Judaism.”
I am guessing that they are ever-present among some of the more religious minyans that meet at Conservative shuls, though.
Chavi
Based on my research there are (or were) a couple of shul’s which seem to indicate some sort of UTJ connection, if not affiliation. I know that back in 2002 in my hometown of Ottawa, Beth Shalom (an MO shul) voted to go Traditional (read as UTJ) but I have no idea how that all ended up playing out. However it does seem to indicate that at least one shul wanted to, identify with the UTJ in some way.
Also on the links section of the UTJ site there is section titled “UTJ Member links” which includes links to “Netivot Shalom of Teaneck, New Jersey” and the “Traditional Congregation of Creve Coeur, Missouri”. These sound like communities to me but to be honest I don’t know that there is much beyond those two and I don’t even know that either of the communities mentioned above are functional.
Those points aside let me rephrase my question to Dave.
So Dave maybe I should ask my question this way instead. If you are as you put it too right for CJ do you identify with the UTJ, something else or just as “a traditional Jew, non-Orthodox?” Also are you a JBC for JBB (Jew by Birth)
Just curious?
Chavi, I forgot to mention that I also agree with you regarding the following.
I am guessing that they are ever-present among some of the more religious minyans that meet at Conservative shuls, though.
I think that there might be something to this. It fits well with my experiences at the Library Minyan at VBS (a CJ shul). They actually daven with Art Scroll Siddurim.
I have seen two synagogues which seem to embrace Traditional values, though I don’t know if they are member synagogues of the UTJ. One is Congregation Shaarie Torah in Portland, Oregon, that has mixed seating in the middle and separate seating on the sides (a trichitza, as I’ve seen it called). I’m not sure the kashrut or Shabbat standards of the community (it ain’t easy to be fully shomer kashrut or Shabbat in Portland). Another is Temple Bnei Shalom in Williamsville, NY, which is an early OU shul that got grandfathered in with a similar seating plan as Shaarie Torah’s.
UTJ shuls must be fairly rare. Had I not had dreams of aliyah, a little research into them and possibly a conversion through one might have been very appealing. If such a thing is possible.
Interesting post. The one subject liable to leave my husband and I not speaking to each other (or barking at each other) every time it comes up is the 3rd Temple. He is very in favour of a centralised Jewish authority (aka Sanhedrin), as he thinks that would restrain the “less moderate” Orthodox views out there. He also thinks that animal sacrifices as a part of achieving that would be ok. As a JBC I find the idea of G-d being served most closely by a pure-blooded strain of Jews whom I am not good enough to marry into abhorrent, and though I am no longer vegetarian (I was for 10 years) I don’t think seeing slaughter of animals on a massive scale (here in England, we saw it last in around 2000 when we had an outbreak of foot and mouth) is spiritually uplifting.
I don’t pray for the rebuilding of the Temple when it is not actually a part of an amidah (the yihi ratson just after the Amidah I replace with another yihi ratson from another bit of the davening). Where (like on yom tov or mussaf) it is part of the amidah, I do say it, but in my heart have the kavannah of it being a kind of spiritual temple where we would all be “ingathered”, and that the corbanot would be returned as G-d wishes, hoping that He now may want something different from what there was 2000 years ago and would inspire a radical re-reading of the pasukim where the Torah describes the sacrifices, but being open to the possibility that I am entirely wrong and what other people are davening for is more in line with what He actually does want. My rav once taught me that we can’t really pray for what we really don’t want - otherwise the tefilla becomes meaningless - so I don’t. Is that an answer to the “what do you do??”
best
Nechama
Nechama, very well said:
I do say it, but in my heart have the kavannah of it being a kind of spiritual temple where we would all be “ingathered”
That’s more or less how I have been tackling things in my siddur but I don’t think I could have articulated it quite as well as you have.
So I contacted the UTJ about whether they have actual shuls around the country or whether they merely have those that identify with the UTJ but are not necessarily UTJ shuls, and here is the response: “In response to your question, the UTJ has nearly 100 rabbis affiliated with Morashah, the Rabbinic Fellowship of the UTJ. In addition, beginning just last year, in 2007, we began a campaign to affiliate synagogues. To date, we have 15 affiliated synagogues as well as the rabbis mentioned above.”
I gather, then, that these rabbis are supported/mentored but are not certified through any UTJ rabbinical school. But it appears that there are 15 shuls around the country. She said that one can inquire about locations. Perhaps I’ll do just that!
You make some excellent arguments, Nechama. I say all the prayers as written, but I do mull them over when I encounter them. On the one hand, I’m hesitant to change what was traditionally Jewish, and try to imagine re-instituting the Temple Service as it was 2000 years ago. My Torah teacher is always telling us to shed our 21st century minds when viewing what was done back then, and that often helps us to understand it. On the other hand, I’ve always cherished a pet theory that humans and God are on a journey of progress and maturation in their relationship with one another. This involves perhaps less hands-on involvement by Hashem in the form of pillars of fire and prophets, while still giving Hashem room to maneuver when it’s appropriate (founding of the State, reunification of Jerusalem and the nation as a whole). As done by Jews in the Temple, animal sacrifice was relatively tame and subdued for that time. To reinstitute it now might not feel so tame and subdued. I don’t have the answers, but I’m still thinking about them. If I appreciate having such passages in the davening, it’s because they force me to think about what Jews did in the past and what it meant then—and now.
I also wanted to respond to Dave’s very provocative comments. Thanks for writing in—you may indeed be a minority of one, Dave. On the one hand, you seem more eager than most to see the Third Temple rebuilt. On the other, you have a remarkably universalist outlook when it comes to the Temple’s location and service. To think of locating it elsewhere than on the Mount reminds me of Herzl’s brief consideration of Uganda as a suitable homeland for the Jews. (This earned him boos at the Sixth Zionist Congress.) While your notion of a courtyard for Gentiles sounds consistent with what existed before, I’m not sure a Temple without sacrifices of some kind would be a Temple. It sounds more like the National Cathedral to me. When there’s true peace, my hope is that it will be accompanied by the restoration of Jewish worship on ALL of the Temple Mount. But at this point in time, I doubt it could be achieved without a little help from the Moshiach (or Moshicha, as the case may be).
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. A minority of one can be quite interesting.
Thanks for taking the time to look into this Chavi. As I have already mentioned above, I thought that they had shuls affiliated with them.
If you do end up checking out one of their shuls, I would love to know what you thought.
Speaking for myself (and this is without really knowing much about how their shuls function,) I think they are probably a little too far right for me, theologically speaking. Maybe not in terms of observance but in terms of egalitarianism or rather the lack of it within the movement
Hi Shim, et. al.,
This issue is a really interesting one for me. I was raised as a Biblical literalist, and so I am pretty familiar with the role the Beit HaMikdash (and the Mishkan) has played in our past, and I think that it still does play for us psychologically. People have answered the siddur question pretty well I think, but for what it’s worth I agree with the Conservative prayers - especially after having walked on the Har HaBayit when I was in Jerusalem. Al Aksa wasn’t open to non-Muslims, but I hung around on the platform, walked in the gardens, listened to the kids chanting the Qur’an through the open windows of the Mamluk-era madrassas, and I couldn’t help feeling that some acknowledgment of the place’s importance to us would be nice. I share the idea expressed here that having something up there could be a great unifier, although I think who would control it would be a HUGE issue, because frankly, a bunch of yeshiva/kollel guys controlling it the way they control the Kotel could turn it in to a zoo. Every time I was at the Kotel davening I was interrupted by haredim asking me for money for a bar mitzvah or the need for new tefillin (selling the Borsalino fedora would have gotten them closer than any contribution from me!). While I don’t think that al-Aqsa or the Dome should be destroyed to build the Temple, it is really hard for me to sympathize with the Waqf’s objection to anything Jewish being erected up there. For one thing, any serious student of history would know that without Jews having consecrated that site in the first place, there would never have been a mosque built there at all.
Anyway, after much blathering, I am interested in the idea of something being built, but what, when, and where exactly are still up in the air.
kol tuv,
Yair