Guide
The Future Temple
3rd Century BCE–3rd Century CE
Many Jewish texts written after the destruction of the Second Temple express the conviction that a new Temple will eventually be built. The following passage from 1 Enoch is part of a vision of history told in symbolic imagery. In the culmination of the vision, Enoch sees a rebuilt Temple. Sheep, representing the faithful of Israel, are worshiped and obeyed by other animals, representing the other peoples of the world. The Tosefta, citing biblical prophecies about a return to Zion, expresses the hope that the Temple will be rebuilt in the near future.
Related Primary Sources
Primary Source
Enoch’s Vision of the Rebuilt Temple
Then I stood still, looking at that ancient house being transformed: All the pillars and all the columns were pulled out; and the ornaments of that house were packed and taken out together with them…
Primary Source
The Tosefta on the Rebuilt Temple
But in the last building [i.e., the Temple], which will be built in the future in our lives and in our days, what is said about it? In the days to come, the Mount of the Lord’s House shall stand firm…