In a previous post, The Pre-existence of the Messiah in the Babylonian Talmud: Only Notional?, I discussed the Biblical Unitarian/Socinian appeal to Pasahim 54a in the Babylonian Talmud that the Messiah's pre-existence was notional only, not personal. However, according to scholars, the temple actually pre-existed, with the earthly temple reflecting the heavenly prototype.
Commenting on the Torah's actual/real pre-existence in heaven, one Jewish scholar notes the following:
According to the Tannaim, the heavenly Torah is no mere idea of mental figment but a real existing being that has made its way from conception to actuality. It is written and exists in the same way that this world does, not as a mere idea in God’s mind. We might think that this is a case of overconcretizing the supernal realm. Actually, it is a way of elevating the status of Torah and emphasizing its grandeur and majesty . . . The Torah says that the tablets which Moses received on Mount Sinai were stone tablets. But Rabbi Simeon ben Lakish taught: “The Torah that the Holy One gave to Moses was white fire incised on black fire, made of fire, carved of fire, and given forth from fire, as it says, ‘From His right hand He gave them fiery law’” (Deuteronomy 33:2)
The notion that the Torah consisted of fire derived from the notion that the Torah came from heaven. In the words of the Sages, the Holly One “is wholly fire, and His ministering angels are fire” (Midrash on Psalms 90:5). Rav interpreted the word shamayim (“heaven”) was a combination of esh (“fire”) and mayim (“water”). They therefore portrayed those things that descended from heaven as if they were made of fire: “an ark of fire, a table of fire, and a lampstand of fire descended from heaven. Moses saw them and copied them” (BT Menahot 29a). Moreover, when Eleazar ben Arakh expounded on the chariot before Rabban Johanan ben Zakkai, “fire descended from heaven and surrounded the trees of the field” (BT Hagigah 14b).
(Abraham Joshua Heschel, Heavenly Torah: As Refracted through the Generations [ed. and trans.: Gordon Tucker; London: Bloomsbury, 2007], 333)
Later in the book, under the section entitled, “The idea of the Preexistence of the Torah in the Middle Ages,” we read the following:
The medieval also wrestled with the question of a preexisting Torah. One starting point of their discussion was Moses’ remark at the incident of the golden calf: “Erase me from Your book which You have written” (Exodus 32:32). To what book could Moses have been referring? The Amora R. Nahman ben Isaac had said that this was really three books—for the righteous, the wicked, and the intermediate individuals (BT Rosh Hashanah 16a). Abraham ibn Ezra said that it referred to the heavens, for all decrees are in the arrays of the heavens” (Ibn Ezra on Exodus 32:32). RaSHBaM and Hizkuni understood it to mean the book of life. (Ibid., 336-37; “RaSHBam” refers to Rabbi Shmuel Ben Meir, also known as Rashi)
As with the nature of the temple’s pre-existence, the Torah was viewed by many Jewish commentators as actually not merely notionally pre-existing in heaven.
