Serving in Solomon's Temple

               

Let’s talk about serving in the temple:

Around 966 BC, King Solomon built an elaborate, permanent dwelling place for the Lord. His father, King David had already set aside all the materials and the plans, and Solomon was eager and willing to do oversee the construction.

                                                                                    Tissot Solomon Dedicates the Temple at Jerusalem. (wikimedia)

Along with the half-month dedication ceremony, Solomon appointed workers to serve in every aspect of the day-to-day running of the temple, including priests, high priests, musicians, gatekeepers, bakers, perfumers, treasurers, etc..

Those who were qualified to serve were members of the tribe of Levi (according to the delegation from the Lord back in the days of the wilderness wandering). Those from the line of Aaron were eligible to be priests (all priests were Levites, not all Levites were priests).

                                                                     Jewish Priests (wikimedia)

I don’t know about you, but when I had thought of priests and Levites serving in the temple, I guess I pictured continual service.

That would have been true of some, the High Priest (i.e. Annas and Caiaphas in Jesus time.) who served in the position for life.

But the others (i.e. Zacharias, John the Baptist’s dad) would have come in for a week at a time.

According to the instructions God gave to David as he was getting Solomon set up to build the first temple, the priests and the Levites were divided into 24 courses within their assigned duty. The length of each service was 7 days (1 Chronicles 9:25), beginning and ending on the Sabbath (2 Chronicles 23:8). These rotations occurred twice a year.

In addition, all the priests served for 3 extra weeks during the year during special feasts.(Deuteronomy 16:16).

                                                                                     Sukkot Celebration (Kotel2014sukkot Wikimedia)

Can you imagine scheduling all this? At any given time there were as many as 1,300 Levites in the temple complex. This is gatekeepers, priests, musicians, cooks, priests’ assistants and more.

In Jeremiah 20:1 Pashur is named the Chief Governor of the House of the LORD. I imagine his job description included the scheduling.

It’s been quite some time since I was in charge of making out schedules, and my (less than 15) people served in the same capacity week after week. I can’t even begin to fathom how to keep all those people straight!

In Ezekiel’s Song, I played around with this behind-the-scenes workings of the Temple. The Bible didn’t mention what capacity Ezekiel served in at the temple, but the later on in Babylon, the Lord names him a Gatekeeper for the people of Israel (and how often does the Lord prepare us for the bigger jobs, by training us in the day-to-day work? AmIright?).

I imagined that Ezekiel was a common fixture around the temple. I even have him serving as aide to the governor of the temple, scheduling and making sure everyone is in their place at the right time.

                                                     Solomon's Stables Under the Temple Platform (wikimedia)

Another aspect would be the inconsistency of the workers. If everyone rotated every seven days, how did you know who to count on? What about musicians? Can you even have a semblance of normal if you are constantly training new people? When would you even rehearse?

 
Here's an interesting tidbit about musicians and temple service: 1 Chronicles 9:33 says the musicians were free from other duties. Can’t you just see the musicians milking that? “I don’t have to do any chores. I’m a musician.” 

What part of serving in the temple was new to you? Would you be in charge of organizing the sheer volume of the workers that showed up on any given day?

                                                           

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