This came up in the church group last night, and I didn’t want to start an argument there so I’m venting here. The reading in question is Chronicles 22-29, about David laying the groundwork for the temple in Jerusalem.
The pastor made a big deal about how much money David was spending to honor God, and the number $14 billion was thrown out, in terms of how much gold (in 2012 prices) David donated from his personal stash. That’s on top of however much he raised from the general population.
The thing is, we all know that the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians and its contents (the ark and the ten commandments) lost forever. What I didn’t know, until I read wikipedia just now, is that the temple was sacked a few decades after it was finished by the Egyptians, and only partially rebuilt. It was then stripped 200 some years later by the Assyrians, partially rebuilt again, and then completely destroyed by the Babylonians. That’s quite a checkered history for “God’s house.”
Now, the god I grew up with wouldn’t have cared about the temple anyway, being omnipotent and omniscient and transcending time and petty material acquisitions and whatnot. But that’s not really the point, because I had to sit there while the pastor went on about what a great thing it was for King David to spend all this money on a temple that god apparently didn’t see fit to protect for a measly 30 years. Can this really be held up as an example to strive for? My feeling was that, if anything, it should be a lesson about how not to honor god. After all, the Egyptians built monuments to mere men that have lasted for 4000 years, and Greek and Roman temples are still standing today. All civilizations that not only worshiped the “wrong” gods but were polytheistic to boot. If god really appreciated the temple that he commanded David to build, you’d think he’d have intervened when it was getting trashed.
I know I’m being pedantic, which is why this is in IMHO and not GD.
Well I’m an atheist, but thanks for reiterating my point.
@foolsguinea: Well yes, but supposedly God commanded David to build it. I’m perfectly content to hold this up as an example of “god working in mysterious ways,” or just an ancient tale that shouldn’t be given any gravity, but this church apparently saw fit to hold this up an as example of a righteous way to use money to honor god. That seems strange, given how dismissive god was of the end result.
Yes yes, I know I’m looking for internal logical consistency in places where there’s never going to be any, but I thought it was worth a discussion anyway.
I’ve explained the background in other threads, but suffice it to say that my wife is a Christian and I attend her services and bible studies when she asks me to.
The Bible makes it pretty clear that God allowed the temple to be sacked as a punishment to the Isrealites for turning away from Him. God cared more about the people of Israel than about “his fancy temple.”
Well, if anything, it sort of highlights the nature of warfare then and now. I guess in warfare of the past this sort of unique “one god” centralized temple would be a major strategic and symbolic target, and in a way, the “nuclear reactor” of a Theocratic society, might as well paint a bullseye on it. Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians had a God for every day of the week and as many temples in every major city, hence the survival of some of them. And well, in a way the Temple still survives, or at least its foundation, it is just occupied by another culture who honor the same God.
And really, when you are valuing something like the temple in Jerusalem, people often muddle public works and the building and infrastructure of a major city as a hub of finance and trade with its religious significance. Sure, it had major religious significance but it was also part of the central plan for a major city being built from the ground up. I guess one could look to Dubai and how it sprung up in the last 50 years or so and the massive amounts of money and new technology and engineering built into that city, not unlike the City-State building of Jerusalem. The question is, would the Pastor think that investing 14 billion in urban renewal and revitalization and beautification in say, his own city or several cities, would be an equally wise use of money? Or is that too worldly and not directed to God’s glory?
God commanded David NOT to build a temple, and told him that his son Solomon was to build it. I think you were only half listening. As pointed out above, God allowed the temple to be destroyed because His people were worshiping the other gods.
I thought that also, but looking at your quote, the OP says that it was about “David laying the groudwork” which he did do, tho the $14B figure still probably applied more to Solomon’s actual building of the Temple.
What I want to know is- did steronz actually ask his wife the Q as phrased in the title or was that his way of getting it out of his system without bugging her?
Impermenance is true of all things, but i say, hey… live it up while you can, the sin is the squander.
Personally i don;t think the gilding was a squander… back then it was ornamental and status quo. It got looted, in time, as all things, and distributed eventually as per the dynamixcism of the capitalist/marxist military industrial mercenary pillaging eternal model.
I brought it up, but with as little snark as I could muster. She was not amused, not so much because I was attacking the bible (she’s far from a literalist), but because she gets annoyed when I’m being pedantic. It’s the same thing that prevents me from dissecting bad movies around her.
I laughed so hard that Celtling came in to see what was up!