Temple of Jerusalem

The temple of the Jewish worship of God Yahweh was built three times in Jerusalem throughout the biblical period (10th century BC to 1st century AD). The Israelites were originally nomadic people, and believed that God lived in tents, so they tended to reject temples that were under the spatial constraints of sedentary agricultural people. King Solomon built the first temple at the beginning of the 10th century BC, and King Josiah's religious reform in the 7th century BC made the temple the only place of God's earthly presence, and the performance of rituals in the temple became the central issue of the ethnic religion. The temple was destroyed by the Babylonian army in 587 BC and rebuilt by Zerubbabel in 516 BC, but it fell into ruin in battles with other ethnic groups, was expanded and rebuilt by King Herod at the end of the 1st century BC, and was destroyed by an attack by the Roman army in 70 AD. This history of rise and fall made the temple not merely a symbol of God's earthly presence, but a symbol of the political sovereignty and homeland of the Jewish people, and its reconstruction was linked to the dreams and hopes of rebuilding the ethnic nation. Since the 7th century AD, the Islamic Dome of the Rock has been built on the site of the temple, and the precincts have been surrounded by a stone wall. Part of the Western Wall is the Western Wall, which has attracted Jewish pilgrims who mourn the lost temple (nation) and pray for its reconstruction.

[Akio Akio]

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

エルサレムに聖書の時代（前10世紀～後1世紀）を通して3回建てられた、ユダヤ人のヤーウェ神礼拝の神殿。元来遊牧民であったイスラエル民族の間では、神は天幕に住むとされ、定住農耕民的な場所的制約下にある神殿を拒否する傾向が強かった。紀元前10世紀の初め最初の神殿をソロモン王が建立し、前7世紀ヨシヤ王の宗教改革で、神殿は神の地上的臨在の唯一の場とされ、神殿における祭儀の執行が民族の宗教の中心課題となった。神殿は前587年バビロン軍によって破壊され、前516年ゼルバベルによって再建されたが、異民族との戦いで荒廃し、前1世紀末ヘロデ王によって増修築され、紀元70年ローマ軍の攻撃にあって崩壊した。この興亡の歴史は、神殿を単なる神の地上的臨在の象徴の歴史にとどめず、ユダヤ民族の政治的主権と国土の象徴とし、その再建を民族国家再建の夢と希望に結び付けた。紀元7世紀以来、神殿跡にはイスラム教の岩のドームが建てられ、境内は石壁で囲われている。その西壁の一部が嘆きの壁（哭壁(こくへき)）であり、失われた神殿（国家）をしのび再建を願うユダヤ人の巡礼を集めてきた壁である。

［秋輝雄］

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