Thursday, August 18, 2022

Christopher Davis on Theodore Lewis and the “Temple of Solomon” ‘argument’

My friend Christopher Davis shared the following, which is yet another nail in the coffin of Rob Bowman’s “Temple of Solomon” ‘argument,’ one he continues to use in spite of being refuted on this time and time again (as I have said before, he lacks any intellectual honesty and integrity, so not a surprise):

 

Theodore J. Lewis on the kings/rulers and their association with the names of temples and cultic sites.

 

A while back, a critic of LDS theology, Rob Bowman, made a rather dishonest claim that temples would have never been known by the names of their builders in his attempt to discredit the historicity of the Book of Mormon with its reference of the Temple in Jerusalem as “Temple of Solomon”.  In his attempt to corroborate this argument of an anachronism, I responded by citing scholarship where a passage in Amos 9 has been argued by many scholars to be a reference of the temple when it calls it “tabernacle of David”.  While this interpretation is disputed, it is not objected to on the basis of it being an anachronism which would otherwise prove his point.  Needless to say, while Bowman was ready to walk back his argument to compromise that “Temple of Solomon” was not a proof FOR the historicity of the Book of Mormon, later he denied that he made this concession and never corrected his article that made this criticism.  Since then he has denied that he ever had such an exchange with me.

 

Tonight I offer a new angle to this argument that further refutes Mr. Bowman’s claim.  This is found in the award winning book, “The Origin and Character of God” by Theodore J. Lewis where it is demonstrated that the ancient cultures often raised the kings to be infused with divine qualities as the representation of God performing/administrating the priestly duties. They have direct association with the cultic center  names of the structures that they built, supported, or reformed.

 

“Prior to the building of the Jerusalem Temple, Solomon’s cultic activities include sacrificing and burning incense at high places, with his sacrifice of 1000 olot offerings at the ‘great high place’ of Gibeon being singled out (1 Kings 3:2-4). After his legitimizing dream revelation at Gibeon, Solomon returned to Jerusalem, where he made olot and selamim offerings before the ark (1 Kings 3:15). Solomon’s building of the Temple receives extensive treatment in both the DtrH and Chr traditions.  The detailed narratives go far beyond David’s providing the building materials.  Solomon gathers building materials as well, yet his construction narrative is fleshed out to a much greater degree by including technical descriptions, specific architectural features, and the articulation of a workforce made up of general laborers and those with specialized skills (1 Kings 5:15-8:13 [Eng 5:1-8:13]; 2 Chr 1:18-6:11 [Eng 2:1-6:11]). Though these laborers accomplished the actual work, the authors are keen on using third person singular verbs to describe over and over again that it was Solomon who built the Temple. Notice n particular how Solomon is given credit for building the innermost shrine (debir), the Holy of Holies (qodes haqqodasim), in which the Ark of Yahweh wax housed and guarded by two huge cherubim (1 Kings 6:16-36, 2 Chr 3:8-13). Gold abounds in every aspect of his crafting. Thus we read of Solomon’s proclamation at the dedication ceremony: ‘I [O Yahweh] have built you an exalted house” (1 Kings 8:13//2 Chr 6:2).

 

Royal cultic activities formed a central part of the temple’s dedication ceremony with Solomon engaging in two sacrificial episodes. In the first, his sacrifices of oxen and sheep are beyond number (1 Kings 8:5//2 Chr 5:6), while in the second they exaggerated to be 22000 oxen and 120000 sheep as selamim offerings ass well as olot, grain, and fat offerings (1 Kings 8:62-64//2 Chr 7:5-7).  This is not to imply that Solomon absorbed all priestly prerogatives, for priests alone are privileged to bear the Ark into the Holy of Holies (1 Kings 8:3-11//2 Chr 5:4-7).

Subsequent traditions speak of Solomon’s (regular?) cultic activity of making olot and selamim offerings three times a year (1 Kings 9:25, cf. 2 Chr 8:12-13). Most scholars view wehe’ela in 1 Kings 9:25 as a frequentative (‘Solomon used to…’) and combine it with the Chronicler’s understanding (2 Chr 8:13) to argue that Solomon officiated at the three great pilgrimage feast of Unleavened Bread, Weeks, and Sukkot (cf. Exod 23:14-27; Deut 16:1-17). The Chronicler adds that like his father, David, Solomon also appointed priests and Levites to their service (2 Chr 8:14).  DtrH inserts disparaging comments about Solomon engaging in syncretistic worship linked to the religion of various foreign women to whom he was married. DtrH specifically highlights his building of sacred space (the notable ‘high places’) for two of these deities (the Moabite Chemosh and the Ammonite Molek), yet adds that the cultic activities per se were enacted by the wives, not Solomon (1 Kings 11:7-8).

 

All in all, the Judean royal cult of Solomon (building on the foundation of David) was remarkable in its reimagining of religion: at the end of his reign, the nature of Yahweh was infused with royal imagery.  Ancient Israelites certainly knew of kingship before they had their own monarch; Yahweh was thought to be king in this it earliest poems.  Yet with the creation of the Solomonic Temple, Yahweh now sat enthroned as king in his royal abode in the heart of Jerusalem.  Yahweh the king, at the center of a hierarchical royal and priestly administration, has traveled some distance from the family god who shepherded his people in the most intimate of ways.

 

Many other kings (Israelite and Judean) were very involved with religious and cultic matters - from Bethel being called ‘the king’s [i.e., Jeroboam II’s] sanctuary’ and ‘a temple of the kingdom’ (miqdas-melek hu ubet mamlaka hu; Amos 7:13) to the reforming kings who constructed and deconstructed cultic apparatuses.  Royal cult also saw queens and queen mothers as cultic actors with our best examples being Jezebel and her sponsoring of Baal and Asherah worship (1 Kings 18:19). Athaliah and her patronage of Baal (2 Kings 11), and Maacah and her erection of an asherah image, likely in the Jerusalem Temple (Ackerman 1998a: 142-146)” - Theodore J. Lewis, “The Origin and Character of God”, p.500-2

 

Lewis not only demonstrates the tendency of Israelite and Judahite kings to associate themselves with the name of the temple, but he also shows in the same chapter that the king was often obligated to perform the same duties of priest and existed in a type of understood middle ground on the spectrum of mortality and divinity as king.  It would not be odd at all that Solomon would be associated with the name of the temple in Jerusalem, when other contemporary kings had their names or titles used with their own sites that they built for their deities, since they were considered to be quasi-divine and had priestly obligations.

 

Both myself and Christopher have delivered many death blows to this novel and inane argument against the Book of Mormon. One is reminded of the following scene from The Simpsons:




 

Further Reading


Listing of Articles relating to Amos 9, "Tabernacle/Temple/Booth of David," and the "Temple of Solomon" Issue