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THE IMAGO TEMPLI IN CONFRONTATION III. Ezekiel and the New Temple as a cosmic restoration The Book of Ezekiel appears indeed to be that which, more than any other, offers us the perfect Imago Templi. This is further confirmed by the fact that it was the book on which the Essene Community of Qumran modelled its own conception of the Temple, in relation to which its ethos was determined in the face of secular norms and of the catastrophe of a profaned Temple. Our first task must therefore be to compare the theology of the Temple in Ezekiel with that professed by the Essence of Qumran. In this we will be guided by the remarkable piece of research undertaken by a Japanese theologian, Shozo Fujita. 42 Although this work is unfortunately unedited, it is truly a model of Temple phenomenology. For Ezekiel, as for the Community of Qumran, the vision of the Temple unfolds into a drama whose starting-point is the ruin of the Temple and the reasons for it, and whose culmination is a vision of the New Temple, the building of which is the prelude to the apotheosis of a cosmic restoration. Here is disclosed the perspective of an eschatology which is already realized in and through the celestial liturgy, a liturgy in which the members of the Qumran Community participate. The theology of the Temple in Ezekiel comprises four major phases: I.. The ruin of the Temple deserted by the Shekhinah and by the Glory of Yahveh; 2. The spiritual Temple of the exile: God himself is now the Temple; 3. The return of the Glory and of the Shekhinah: the restoration of the Temple; 4. The vision of the New Temple on the high mountain as the visionary perception of a cosmic restoration. 1. The ruin of the Temple deserted by the Shekhinah. The sin of Israel, which led to the destruction of the Temple built of old by Solomon, was its apostasy to other gods. Thus it was essentially a sin against the Temple, and the Temple was the place of this apostasy: "... .and behold northward at the 42 Shozo Fujita, The Temple Theology of the Qumran Sect and the Book of Ezekiel: their relationship to Jewish Literature of the last two centuries B.C., (Princeton University Dissertation, Ann Arbor, 1970, Xerox University Microfilms); henceforth abbrev. to Temple Theology. As this thesis has unfortunately remained unpublished, we are glad of the present opportunity to make its content and its outstanding quality known.—Ezekiel, we may remember, was among the first group of exiles deported to Babylon. Thus, exile creates the background to his vision of the destruction and the final restoration of the Temple, a vision which confers a unique character on Ezekelian Temple theology. 284 THE IMAGO TEMPLI IN CONFRONTATION gate of the altar this image of jealousy in the entry . . . Son of man, seest thou what they do? even the great abominations that the house of Israel committeth here, that I should go far off from my sanctuary?" (Ezek. 8:5—6). This is why the condemnation of Israel is symbolically described as the departure of the Glory of the Lord (Kevodh Yahveh) from the Temple, 43 and why Ezekiel has the vision of the Glory leaving Jerusalem. This Presence of Glory signified the personal presence of Yahveh, and that was why the Temple constituted an area which was completely consecrated, separated, closed in upon itself: nothing profane of any description was to be associated with it. This ideal Imago Templi is the basis of Ezekiel's theology of the Temple. Its profanation cannot but induce the divine Presence—the Shekhinah—to depart from it; and this desertion is the real catastrophe in the destruction of the Temple, because the Shekhinah, the mysterious divine Presence, is what makes the Temple the "representative" of the kingdom of God on earth. Its departure is thus what brings about the destruction of the Temple: "I no longer have a dwelling upon earth". This destruction implied, together with the exile of the Shekhinah, the suspension or cessation of the activity relating to the realization of the Kingdom (the cessation of the activity of the divine Right Hand), 44 for the Temple, as the ideal centre of the world, was the centre from which God ruled over the world, the centre of the cosmic theocracy. Furthermore, just as the divine condemnation began with the Temple, so the work of divine restoration had to begin with the Temple. The vision of the New Temple fills the last chapters (40-48) of the Book of Ezekiel. "Thou son of man, shew the house to the house of Israel, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities: and let them measure the pattern" (Ezek. 43:10). In the course of these long visionary chapters Ezekiel's Imago Templi is defined: the image of a supernatural Temple beyond our time 43 For what follows, cf. ibid., pp. 19—26. 44 Cf. H. Odeberg, 3 Enoch or the Hebrew Book of Enoch (Cambridge, 1928), chap. XLVII1, p. 154, note 1. The real catastrophe in the destruction of the Temple was the departure of the Shekhinah and its absentation from the earth, because its presence in the Temple had made it the "representation" of the kingdom of God on earth. God withdraws his Shekhinah from the Temple and this is why the Temple is destroyed. "God no longer possesses any dwelling-place on the earth". We spoke above of the comparison to be made in the work of Suhravardi between the Arabic Sakinah, the Hebrew Shekhinah, the Persian Khurrah (Avestan Xvarnah, Light of Glory), and the Hebrew kavodh. This should form the subject of a phenomenological (we do not say historical) inquiry. 285
i THE IMAGO TEMPLI IN CONFRONTATION and our space. It is not to be confused, therefore, with the second Temple, built by Zerubbabel in 515 B.C. 2. God himself as the Temple. The promise of the new Temple arises out of the very abyss of its destruction; for, if that destruction were definitive, it would no longer give rise to anything but what goes today by the name of "the theology of the death of God". The theology of the Temple can never accept such a death. The promise of the New Temple comes not from a theology of the death of God, but from a theology of exile; and this inspires a motif in Ezekiel which anticipates the most elevated intuitions of spirituality. In this theology of exile it is God himself who becomes the temple of his faithful; for there were some who sighed and groaned because of the profanation of the Temple (Ezek. 9:8). These are "the remnant of Israel", the last righteous men. The Angel-scribe was ordered to "set a mark upon [their] foreheads" (Ezek. 9:4), as a guarantee of immunity and protection. To all the others the Eternal can say, "I will profane my sanctuary, the excellency of your strength, the desire of your eyes" (Ezek. 24:21), for the love of such as these for their temple is no more than superstition. But the divine Presence which has deserted the Temple will remain in the country of exile among the exiles. "Again the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, thy brethren, even thy brethren, the men of thy kindred, and all the house of Israel wholly, are they . .". Although I have cast them far off among- the heaven, and although I have scattered them among the countries, yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary in the countries where they shall come" (Ezek. 11:14—16). So there is a promise of a divine Presence in the countries of exile. 45 Those who are exiled, who have received the mark of the Angel on their foreheads, are the true heirs of Israel. God is identified with the Temple. The Temple on the earth of exile is only temporary. God is not, of course, identified with the physical building; rather, it is the idea of the spiritual Temple which is heralded by the prophet Ezekiel and which will be realized in the Community of Qumran. The spiritual Temple is the establishment of a spiritual and personal bond between Yahveh and his people: "And they shall be my people, and I will be their God" (Ezek. 11:20). This spiritual proximity is in no way hindered by spatial distance 45 For what follows, see Shozo Fujita, op. cit., pp. 34-43. 286 THE IMAGO TEMPLI IN CONFRONTATION or by dispersion into the countries of exile, for it signifies the habitation of the Torah in the heart through the heart's renewal: "... make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God: wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye" (Ezek. 18:31-32). Even more than the Torah, it is God himself who dwells in the heart: "... yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary". God himself is the spiritual Temple that dwells with the exiles. 46 There is a conjunction between the renewal of the human heart and the establishment of the new Temple that, as a spiritual Temple, presages and heralds the spiritual worship that a spiritual Israel will offer up to God "upon a very high mountain" (Ezek. 40:2). This is the perfect Imago Templi: the spiritual Temple as the place where spiritual worship is celebrated. The Glory of Yahveh has departed from Jerusalem and dwells among the exiles, in Babylon or other places. Yahveh has become the spiritualized Temple, but he has nonetheless promised that when he returns to the new Temple where he will dwell forever, he will restore the Glory to it. This is a new phase in the templar theology of Ezekiel. 3. The return of the Shekhinah. As we have already observed, the destruction began with the Temple and with the departure from it of the Shekhinah or Glory. Similarly, the restoration begins with the Temple and is the return of the Glory of the Lord to the new Temple. 47 "And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is towards the cast" (Ezek. 43:4). As the Glory, carried by the Cherubim, had withdrawn l>y the Temple's eastern gate (Ezek. 10:18-19; II- 23), so on its return it enters the Temple by way of the eastern gate. Now ". . . behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under from 46. This verse from Ezekiel (11:16) allows us to be specific about what we should understand by "spiritualization" of the Temple. We will return to this later (see below, note 121). Here, Shozo Fujita (p. 41, note 1) tells us: "An object can be said to be spiritualized when it is interpreted in accordance with some predominant theological or religious concept. The adjective spiritual describes a state or an action which is attributed to the Spirit of God or to the human spirit as opposed to the flesh. It is also used as a synonym for the word spiritualized. In this dissertation, the word spiritual has been used in the first sense, but it is used here in the second sense." 17 Shozo Fujita, op. cit., pp. 44-69. 287
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