The oldest saying for Jews of the Diaspora that began in 70 AD went something like “Next Year in Jerusalem”. Why? Being a Pentecostal/Charismatic Christian my guess is that the Jewish homeland is Israel (revived in 1948) and the location of the Presence of God was the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. We call it the Temple Mount because that is the closest phrase of mind that denotes the Temple of God Almighty first built by Solomon and rebuilt by Zerubbabel of the royal line of descent from King David. Zerubbabel’s Temple was then further renovated by Herod the Great whose only real claim to fame was ending the Hasmonean dynasty that followed the line of the Maccabees that established the first Jewish Kingdom since the Babylonians ended the line of David with the first expulsion of Jews from their homeland in roughly 585 BC. Then roughly in 19 BC Herod the Great refurbished Zerubbabel’s Temple on an awesomely grand scale which became known as Herod’s Temple.
It is Herod’s Temple that was totally destroyed by the Romans leaving a rubble of which only the foundations of the Temple remained on the Temple Mount which by the way is the location of Abraham’s test of faith when God held his hand from sacrificing Isaac (location aka Mt Moriah).
Since 1945 the universal Jewish cry has been “Never Again”. “Never Again” to what you may ask?
JRH 5/8/11
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