One day we visited Ancient Shiloh with a Singaporean couple from the Garden Tomb where we served together. As we arrived we found the parking lot full of busses. That’s not unusual in a lot of places in Israel, but Shiloh is along Hwy. 60, north of Jerusalem in the West Bank. Not many tour groups went there, at least at that time.
The busses had brought a huge number of Jewish
tourists from the United States. So as
the 4 of us walked around the place we were constantly part of this group. Shiloh has a great media presentation of what
the story of Shiloh is about in the Bible.
At least up to the point where Joshua selected Shiloh as his
capital. It doesn’t get to the point
that the Bible says is important about Shiloh.
Then, as we were down around the place where
it is believed the Tabernacle sat (see the photo in the previous post) we were
permitted to sit and listen as a Rabbi explained the importance of
the story of Hannah and Shiloh. He
emphasized her great prayer and her faithfulness to God and told his audience
that they would do well to meditate on that story. He also pointed out that, unlike at the
Temple Mount, at Shiloh you could actually stand on the place where God
actually had His dwelling with Israel.
It was an interesting thought that I had not previously
entertained. That was the end of his
presentation and they went on their way.
Now here’s the deal. Not a lot of people know about, or give
credence to Psalm 78. That Psalm tells
about the great failure of Israel, and particularly Ephraim, at Shiloh. The story apparently is about the battle when
Israel took the Ark of the Covenant into the fray against the Philistines and
the Philistines captured the Ark. The
Ark never returned to Shiloh. The Bible
doesn’t say this was by vote of the people or even because of the laziness of
the people. It just never returned. And after a stint at the home of Obed-Edom
David brought the Ark to Jerusalem. And
then Solomon brought the Ark to its resting place in the Holy of Holies of the
temple. God did this. God chose the place for His name, as He said He
would in Deut. 12.
Many years later, and many idolatries later,
the prophet Jeremiah would be instructed by God to go stand in the entrance to
the temple (the one built by Solomon, on the Mountain where Abraham offered up
Isaac, and in the area where Jesus would be crucified) and reprove the people
of Israel. Even as the people in the
days of Eli the priest of Shiloh, when the people trusted in the Ark to bring
victory only to be defeated, so now in Jeremiah’s day the people were trusting
in the Temple of Jerusalem, certain that God would never destroy the place that
was His dwelling. “The temple of the
LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD” (Jer. 7:4). Israel was trusting in lying words. The LORD’s house had become a “den of thieves”
(7:11). The LORD spoke through Jeremiah
and told the people to go to Shiloh and see what He did with that place. They were wrong to think that God would not
do it again. And He did!
Many years later, in the Second Temple, Jesus
quoted Jeremiah. After creating a major
ruckus, turning over tables in holy anger, Jesus again described the Lord’s
house as being made into a “den of thieves.”
The people then were certain God would never again do what He had done
at Shiloh, and then by the Babylonians.
But He did. Through the Romans
this time.
“I am the LORD, that is My name; and My
glory I will not give to another, neither My praise to graven images.” (Isa. 42:8)
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