Was the Ark of the Covenant actually an electrical machine? What really happened to it, and where might it be hidden today? What are some of the deeper mysteries behind God’s “Tent of Meeting” and Tabernacle (Mishkan)? Plus: the secret history of the Holy Temple that you’ve never heard, the alternate Jewish Temple that operated for centuries in Egypt, the significance of the Dome of the Rock, the true origins of Rastafari, and scientific mysteries of the number 26.
Tag Archives: Alexandria
The Jews Who Destroyed the Temple
‘Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem’ by Francesco Hayez (1867)
On Tisha b’Av we commemorate numerous tragedies in Jewish history, most notably the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem. The Tanakh outlines quite clearly the events that led to the destruction of the First Temple. When it comes to the Second Temple, however, little is generally spoken of even though we have a lot more historical information about what was going on at the time. We tend to greatly simplify things by reducing it to the same old adage that “the Temple was destroyed because of sinat chinam”, baseless hatred. How did the destruction of the Temple really come about? What were the events that led to the Great Revolt and the first Jewish-Roman War? And who, exactly, were those Jews that harboured such immense hatred for each other?
How Many Israelites Actually Left Egypt?
This week we start reading the fourth book of the Torah, Bamidbar, more commonly known as “Numbers” since it begins with a detailed census of the Israelites. The Torah concludes that there was a total of 603,550 men at this point in the Wilderness, implying a general population of about 3 million people. Or does it? While these are the numbers one generally hears when it comes to the question of how many Jews were present at the Exodus (about 600,000 men, and something like 3 million people when accounting for their families), there is an alternate way to read the Torah which might actually make far more sense.
(Please read the following with an open mind, and do not jump to any conclusions until you’ve read through to the end!)