Christ in the Temple

At this writing the Christmas season is on full display, so naturally the film “Mary,” released December 6, 2024 and reportedly “one of the most-viewed Bible films on Netflix in recent years, and possibly ever,” caught my attention.[1] The script was loosely based on the Protoevangelium of James, also known as the Gospel of James, Book of James, The Nativity of Mary, Revelation of James or the Infancy Gospel of James, which tells (as does the movie) how Mary’s parents, Joachim and Anne, consecrate her to the Lord, bringing her to the temple “at a young age to serve, and to grow up in the shadow of Anna the prophetess and the Temple priests.”[2] It turns out, I discovered after a little internet searching, that as part of the twenty Mysteries of the Rosary (each a “a snapshot in the life of Jesus and Mary [that] provides an anchor to meditate on” while praying[3]), Catholics celebrate not only the Presentation of Jesus at the temple (each February 2), but also the Presentation of Mary at the temple (each November 21)[4] In dramatizing the Protoevangelium’s account of Mary’s parents consecrating (or “presenting”) her as a child for service in the temple, as Hannah and Elkanah had done previously with Samuel, the film prompted me to ponder, “how did Mary and Joseph, and ancient faithful Jews generally, view the temple?” and “how might their feelings for and beliefs about the temple have influenced the Savior as he was raised in their home?” More importantly, we could ask, “how can Joseph’s, Mary’s and the Savior’s involvement with and love for the temple of their day inform and motivate our own choices about temple service and temple worship in our day?”

The Role of Temples in History. As discussed in my last blog about the Brother of Jared’s temple experience on Mount Shelem, we know that wherever there have been “congregations of saints” “from the days of Adam to the present moment,” the Lord has “always commanded” His people to build a house unto His holy name (D&C 124:39). For with temples, “men can be exalted; without them there is no exaltation” (D&C 124:29-40; 131:1-4; 132:1-33).”[5] Elder Bruce R. McConkie taught that “temples [were] constructed before the flood of Noah” and were “built by the Jaredites and Nephites.” When there was not a temple, “the Great Jehovah” visited His people “on a mountain,” as He did to Moses and Nephi, or “in a grove [or] wilderness area,” as He did to Abraham and Jacob (Genesis 28:10-17).[6]

Herod's Temple (Image by D. Kelly Ogden, "Jesus and the Temple," Ensign April 1991)

In about 1450 B.C., Moses oversaw the construction of the Tabernacle (a portable temple) according to the Lord’s detailed instructions (Exodus 25:40; 26:40; 27:8). In about 957 B.C. Solomon completed the First Temple. At the dedication of each of these temples, Jehovah evidenced His acceptance of, and presence in them (in Hebrew, shekhinah (שָׁכִינָה‎)), by a cloud and by fire from heaven (Exodus 40:34-35; 1 Kings 8:10-11; 2 Chron. 7:1). After the destruction of Solomon’s temple by Nebuchadnezzar soon after Lehi left Jerusalem, it was rebuilt by Zerubbabel in 516 B.C. and then greatly expanded by Herod the Great beginning in 20 B.C. (which expansion had continued for 46 years when Jesus began his ministry). “Built of marble and gold, the house of worship itself probably surpassed any of the architectural marvels of that or any day.” Notwithstanding the acute apostasy of Israel’s spiritual and secular leaders, Herod’s temple, “the temple that Jesus knew” and loved, Elder McConkie writes,

Was a true temple. It bore the stamp of divine approval, and true ordinances, performed by legal administrators who had been called of God as was Aaron, were performed in its courts, on its altars, and in the Holy of Holies itself. The priests who ministered in this house of the Lord held the Aaronic or Levitical Priesthood, and on occasional instances, as when Gabriel visits Zacharias, they saw within the veil. . . .  To [the temple] the hosts of Israel came to celebrate their great religious feasts. In its courts sacrifices were made, sins were forgiven, and souls were sanctified . . . Within its walls the faithful assembled to renew their covenants and offer their vows and sacraments to the Most High. . . . There is no way of overstating or overdramatizing the place and power of the temple in the lives of the Jewish people."[7]

The Temple in the Lives of Mary and Joseph. With this backdrop, knowing whether Mary actually served in the temple in her youth with other young women (similar to the prophetess Anna, who “never left the Temple” (Luke 2:36-37)), as had Samuel,[8] is less important than the scriptural and prophetic testimony of Mary’s faithfulness to God, to His law and to His gospel. Her life and mission were foretold by ancient prophets (see Isaiah 7:14; 1 Nephi 11:15, 18; Mosiah 3:8; Alma 7:10). Elder McConkie, an apostle of the Lord, asserted that Mary was “about fifteen years of age” when she was betrothed to Joseph, which was the custom of her day.[9] As the record of her life demonstrates, she was a devout, observant Jew. According to James E. Talmage, also an apostle, she “doubtless contemplated,” “in common with other daughters of Israel, specifically those of the tribe of Judah and of known descent from David, the [prophesied] coming of the Messiah through the royal [Davidic] line” (Genesis 49:10; Isaiah 9:7; Jeremiah 22:17).[10] Could it be that Mary, knowing of her royal Davidic heritage, wondered whether she might someday receive the high and holy calling to be the mother of the promised Messiah? If so, this no doubt would have been one more motivation that would explain her devotion and love for God and His law, which she displayed in these early years and throughout her life.[11] Elder McConkie observes, however, that Mary’s faithfulness can best be understood from the perspective of her preexistent status as among the “noble and great ones” Abraham saw in the Grand Council in heaven before the creation (Abraham 3:22):

There was only one Christ, and there is only one Mary. Each was noble and great in preexistence, and each was foreordained to the ministry he or she performed. We cannot but think that the Father would choose the greatest female spirit to be the mother of his Son, even as he chose the male spirit like unto him to be the Savior.[12]

Gabriel, sent from God’s presence, declared her high status: “Hail, thou virgin who art highly favoured of the Lord. The Lord is with thee, for thou art chosen and blessed among women” (JST Luke 1:28). True to their Abrahamic covenant and heritage (Genesis 17:12) and in obedience to the Mosaic law (Leviticus 12:3; John 7:22), “when eight days” had passed, Joseph and Mary saw that the baby Jesus received the “rite” of circumcision and naming, which Elder McConkie states “could have been [done] in the house in Bethlehem where Joseph and Mary [then] lived, or, sensing the need to gain the inspiration of a hallowed place, they could have gone the six miles to the temple in Jerusalem”[13].

View of the inner court (the Court of the Men of Israel and the Court of the Priests), the horned Altar of Sacrifice and the Place of Slaughtering. (Photography by D. Kelly Ogden.)

"And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished, they brought [Jesus] to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord" (Luke 2:22). As Luke explains, in remembrance of the ultimate price paid to free Israel from Egyptian bondage, the death of Egypt’s firstborn, the Lord instructed that all of Israel’s firstborn should be “sanctified” (as Luke records, "called holy to the Lord"), meaning consecrated for service unto Him in His holy house (Exodus 13:1-2). Later, when the Levites were ordained and set apart for this calling, the Lord decreed that the firstborn of every Israelite family be “redeemed” by payment of an offering to the Lord (Numbers 18:15-16). This Joseph and Mary did, passing through the Court of the Gentiles (where Jesus would later cast out the money changers) in the temple complex then up a level possibly through the Beautiful Gate into the Court of the Women on the eastern end of the actual Temple sanctuary. Against the fortified inner walls surrounding the Court of the Women and the rest of the Temple sanctuary “were chests for charitable contributions” into which Joseph may have placed the five shekel offering to redeem “his” son. Then Mary paid the price of two turtle doves or young pigeons (Luke 2:23-24)(one in lieu of the required offering of a lamb, because they were poor) in the rite of purification described in Leviticus 12. “On this occasion,” after depositing the offering into one of the contribution chests, she “made her way, as one for whom a special sacrifice was being offered, to a place near the Sanctuary; and there, while the ordinances was being performed, offered up the unspoken prayers of praise and thanksgiving of a grateful heart. Thus she became Levitically clean.”[14] Then in two miraculous encounters, considering the sheer size of the Temple complex (covering 40 acres, compared, for example, to Temple Square’s ten acres), Simeon, to whom the Lord had promised that he would not “see death, before he had seen the Lord's Christ” (Luke 2:26 ), and then Anna see, and bear testimony of, the Savior of the World—in the temple.

Christ in the Temple. According to Elder McConkie, Mary and Joseph made the “180 mile or so” round-trip [15] journey on foot to the temple in April “every year” to observe Passover rites, evidencing again their faithfulness to the law of the Lord and to His holy house. Moreover, like all faithful parents today, they took Jesus “with them on some or all of these occasions.”[16] On the occasion recorded in Luke 2:25-39, however, Elder McConkie’s epic narrative about the Mortal Messiah impressively turns from the perspective of Mary and Joseph, the faithful, temple-loving parents, to the perspective of Jesus, who, now twelve and a “son of the law” (or “son of the commandment,” that is an official member of the local religious community whose “voice can be legally heard”[17]), accompanies his father to the Inner Court of the Men of Israel, as an active participant in the passover ordinances. Quoting President J. Reuben Clark, another apostolic witness of the Savior and, according to Elder McConkie, the Church’s greatest scholar on Jesus Christ, “the deacon-age Jesus [even at that age] was heir to the visions of eternity on a continuing basis,” including possibly seeing in vision the innumerable events in Israel’s history, past and future (as had other prophets, including Enoch, Moses and Nephi), related to that Holy House, which then and now is all about Him and His Father’s plan for His children. That is, Elders Clark and McConkie suggest, as Jesus “crossed the Royal Bridge” into the Temple complex with Joseph, He perhaps saw in vision “the morning of his arraignments;” as He came into the Court of the Gentiles “among the money changers,” He possibly saw “how He [would] cleanse the Temple of them . . . at the beginning and . . . end of His public ministry;” as He stood with Joseph in the Inner Court of the Temple standing throughout the day and watching the preparations for the Passover sacrifices, Jesus perhaps also saw in vision “the preparations for His Last Supper,” “the agony of spirit in the Garden, and of His body on the cross;” He may also have seen in vision “the day, generations before, that He gave commandment to Adam to offer sacrifice” in similitude of the great and last sacrifice He would make only 21 years hence “on this very day and, in part, in these very [precincts].” In other words, “even then, and though but twelve years of age,” temple-attending Jesus apparently had a breathtaking comprehension of the history of God’s dealings with His children, the ordinances and covenants of His gospel (then and now), and the central role the temple plays and would play not only in His life but in the lives of everyone who ever had or ever would be exalted through His atoning sacrifice.[18] For three days Jesus continued in the Temple, sitting “in the midst of the” learned religious leaders of that time, “and they were hearing him, and asking him questions” and “were astonished at his understanding and answers” (JST Luke 2:46-47).

D. Kelly Ogden, in an illuminating April 1991 Ensign article entitled “Jesus in the Temple,” describes how “the Savior’s life from beginning to end was bound to the Temple,” listing not only the events I have summarized above but many other temple-centered events in His life, including

·    Being “taken up into the holy city” at the beginning of his ministry and being set by “the Spirit” “on the pinnacle of the temple” (JST Matt. 4:5), where “Satan made a vain effort to tempt him;”

·    Healing “the blind and the lame [who] came to him in the temple” (Matt. 21:14);

·    Going “up into the temple” “about the midst of the feast” and teaching the people (John 7:14);

·    Coming again into the temple “early in the morning,” where “all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them” (John 8:2; Luke 21:38);

·    Teaching “daily in the temple” (Luke 19:47);

·    Declaring to Jewish leaders, “I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, whither the Jews always resort; and in secret have I said nothing” (John 18:20);

·    Figuratively comparing “the temple of his body” to the House of the Lord,  which body he said He would “raise up” in three days (John 2:19-21).

What lessons do Jesus’s temple experiences teach us? That the temple is a place of revelation, of worship, of healing, of pondering and learning, of receiving strength to overcome temptation. My Aunt recorded a sacred experience my Grandma Clella Fluckiger had, which, when I think about it, brings these temple lessons home to my heart. At that time, Grandma “was so very worried about her adopted son Eugene. She had been fasting and praying about him. She went to the Salt Lake Temple [where she had] an answer to her prayer. She said, ‘You know you have spiritual eyes and ears as well as mortal eyes and ears.’ She said she could hear and see everything [in the service] but, also see a choir of angels. She explained, ‘It was as if the whole wall was gone and a choir was singing there, and they were singing to me! The song was “Eugene will be okay,” over and over again.’”[19]

At the Savior’s death, “the veil in the Temple’s most sacred chamber, the Holy of Holies, was ‘rent in twain from the top to the bottom’ (Matt. 27:51),” signifying that now not just the high priest would be “permitted to pass through the veil and enter the symbolic presence of God” (and that “only once a year”), but that “through his death, Jesus rent that partition, signifying, among other things, that all people could reach God’s presence” (Heb. 9:11-14; 10:19-22).[20] May we, at Christmas time and always, appreciate more profoundly and gratefully that just as Christ’s path, from the beginning to the end of His life, led Him repeatedly to and through the temple, likewise, our covenant path leads us to and through the temple where we learn about, covenant with and feel God and Christ’s perfect love for us, as evidenced by the Divine Gift of Christ’s atoning sacrifice, which makes all of the precious promises pronounced and sealed upon in His Holy House possible.

[1] Peter T; Chattaway, “Mary rises to #3 on the Netflix Top 10,” Thoughts and Spoilers, https://petertchattaway.substack.com/p/mary-rises-to-3-on-the-netflix-top (“the movie about the mother of Jesus was #3 among English-language films worldwide” for the week ended December 15, “with 24,700,000 hours streamed and 13,200,000 views”). [2] Joshua Burks blog, “A Catholic Review of Netflix’s Mary: How Biblically Accurate Is It?” December 9, 2024, https://emmausinstitute.net/library/blog/post/a-catholic-review-of-netflixs-mary-how-biblically-accurate-is-it. [3] “Unlocking the Mysteries of the Rosary: A Deeply Personal Way to Pray the Rosary,” Dynamic Catholic. https://www.dynamiccatholic.com/rosary/unlocking-mysteries-rosary.html?srsltid=AfmBOooGhDFcXt4OuRi3T_xpDOt9DwsyaXWaLr08hVTowfVWpIDYz-UE. [4] In her blog post entitled “The Presentation of Mary: An Historical Event?”, Gloria Falcâo Dodd summarizes “the story of Mary’s Presentation, as well as the background of Mary’s parents and Mary’s conception, as recounted in the first eight chapters of the twenty-five chapters of the Protoevangelium of James, as follows: “Mary’s father, St. Joachim, who was a wealthy and righteous Jew who annually donated double the amount expected at the Temple” is publicly disgraced by the high priest at the Temple when his offering is rejected because he was childless in his marriage. Discouraged, Joachim, not telling his wife where he was going, prayed and fasted for forty days and nights as he camped out with his flocks. Anna, also “dispirited over their infertility and over the sudden disappearance of her husband,” prays for a child. In response to her prayer, an angel tells Anna that God will answer her prayer for a child. She, in turn, “promises to dedicate the child, male or female, to the service of the Lord.” Joachim and Anna fulfill Anna’s vow, taking Mary to the Temple on her third birthday. (post dated September 13, 2019, in Missio Immaculatae (Marian Catechetical-Mission), https://missiomagazine.com/the-presentation-of-mary-an-historical-event/#:~:text=For%20Mary's%20Presentation%20in%20the%20Temple%2C%20an%20apocryphal%20gospel%20most,life%20prior%20to%20the%20Annunciation.For an overview of LDS views on extra-biblical or apocryphal literature, including the Protoevangelium, see Gerald E. Jones, “Apocryphal Literature and the Latter-day Saints,” in Apocryphal Writings and the Latter-day Saints, ed. C. Wilfred Griggs (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1986), 53–107, https://rsc.byu.edu/apocryphal-writings-latter-day-saints/apocryphal-literature-latter-day-saints#:~:text=We%20have%20not%20found%20the,the%20true%20from%20the%20false.%20%5B. [5] Bruce R. McConkie, The Mortal Messiah (Deseret Book 1981), 99. [6] Ibid. 99-100. We do not know when and where Abraham and Sarah were endowed and sealed, but we do know that they were (see “The Brother of Jared “Within the Veil”—Parallels to the LDS Temple Endowment,” https://www.temple-spiritual-treasures.com/post/the-brother-of-jared-within-the-veil-parallels-to-the-lds-temple-endowment). When revealing to the Prophet Joseph Smith the crowning ordinance of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the new and everlasting covenant of marriage, what the Lord described as “the law of my Holy Priesthood,” God explained that Abraham received Sarah and Hagar, his plural wife, and all others who “bore him children,” “by revelation and commandment, by my word.” Having thus been sealed, the Lord declared, Abraham “hath entered into his exaltation and sitteth upon his throne,” meaning, by implication, that Sarah also entered into her exaltation and sits on her throne, “as Isaac also and Jacob,” who also “have entered into their exaltation, according to the promises [among others, those promises pronounced in the sealing ordinance itself] and sit upon thrones,” as do Rebecca and Rachel (D&C 132:28-37). See generally Stephen L. Fluckiger, Drawing Upon the Spiritual Treasures of the Temple (Springville, Utah: CFI, an Imprint of Cedar Fort, Inc.), Chapter 16, “The Spiritual Treasures from the Dispensation of the Gospel of Abraham” and Appendix 2, “Promises Made and Ordinances Given to Abraham Were Renewed with Isaac and Jacob.” [7] Mortal Messiah, 107, 109, 113 (emphasis added). [8] “In summary,” Dodd concludes her blog about the evidence that exists to support Catholics’ belief that Mary served in the temple, “the evidence for the historicity of the Presentation of Mary in the Temple is not as clear as modern scholars would like. Nonetheless, since there are Biblical and Jewish testimonies for boys, women, and virgins serving in the Temple, it is logical to conclude that it would be possible for some of those virgins to include girls as well. Given these facts, it is reasonable to think that it was most appropriate that Mary would have been one of them. Even though the apocryphal gospels may be inaccurate on the details, both the fourth-century construction of a church and the homilies of the Church Fathers since that time support the early oral tradition of Mary being presented at age three in the Temple to serve there until her marriage to Joseph.” [9] Mortal Messiah, 322. See also Keith Thompson, “The Character and Knowledge of Mary, the Mother of Christ,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 36 (2020): 109-138, https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-character-and-knowledge-of-mary-the-mother-of-christ/#sdfootnote34sym (Mary “was only 13 or 14 years of age at the time Jesus was born,” citing “Mary, a Teenage Bride and Mother”, Truth or Tradition, September 12, 2013, https://www.truthortradition.com/articles/mary-a-teenage-bride-and-mother; and Gerald N. Lund, A Celebration of Christmas (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1988), 31. The former source suggests she may have been as young as twelve when betrothed, and the latter estimates 16.”). [10] James E. Talmage, Jesus the Christ (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book 1970), 80. [11] For glimpses of the character and influence Mary (and Joseph) no doubt exerted in the life of the Savior, see, for example, Bruce R. McConkie, “The Child, the Boy, the Man Few People Know,” New Era, December 2001; Gaye Strathearn, “Mary, the Mother of Jesus” Ensign, January 2019, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona/2019/01/mary-the-mother-of-jesus?lang=eng#figure2_p2; Thompson, “The Character and Knowledge of Mary, the Mother of Christ;” S. Kent Brown, “The Chronicles of Mary and Joseph: part 4 of 4, Bethlehem and Beyond,” New Testament Commentary, Brigham Young University, https://www.byunewtestamentcommentary.com/the-chronicles-of-mary-and-joseph-part-4-of-4-bethlehem-and-beyond/ (“It is likely that Joseph goes to work [in the rebuilding of the prominent city of Sepphoris, just three miles over the hill north of Nazareth], taking the youthful Jesus with him as soon as he is old enough to engage in hard manual labor. The later conversation between Jesus and Pilate illustrates the probability that Jesus accompanies his father. How so? Because in no account is an interpreter said to stand between Pilate, an educated Roman who speaks Greek, and Jesus the man from Nazareth. Most of the foremen who are supervising the rebuilding work in Sepphoris during Jesus’ youth are Greek speakers. Jesus will quickly pick up the language so that he can communicate with them. The effect is to make Jesus quadri-lingual in his youth. He speaks Aramaic in his home, he learns spoken Egyptian playing with other children during the years in Egypt, he learns Hebrew from scripture studies, and he picks up Greek while working alongside his father.”) [12] Mortal Messiah, 327 note 4. [13] Ibid. 352. For an overview of the history and modern practice of the circumcision and Hebrew naming rite, known as brit milah in the Jewish faith, see “Baby Naming and Brit Milah (Bris),” Congregation Beth Emeth, https://www.bethemeth.org/baby#:~:text=The%20first%20part%20is%20the,and%20fulfilling%20this%20religious%20obligation. “Jesus’ name in Hebrew is Yehoshua (Yeh-HO-shoo-ah), which, over time, became contracted to the shorter Yeshua (Yeh-SHOO-ah) . . ., which means ‘the Lord is salvation.’” Jewish Voice, https://www.jewishvoice.org/read/blog/what-jesus-name-hebrew. See also Mortal Messiah 352 (the name “Jesus” “derives from Hoshea, which means salvation; from Joshua, meaning salvation is Jehovah; from Jeshua (Jesus), meaning Jesus is salvation”). [14] Mortal Messiah, 353. Images and descriptions of the temple are taken from D. Kelly Ogden, “Jesus and the Temple,” Ensign, April 1991. [15] Mortal Messiah, 356. [16] Ibid. 371. [17] Ibid. [18] Ibid. 373-77. [19] Family records in author’s possession. [20] Ogden, “Jesus and the Temple.” See also Fluckiger, Drawing Upon the Spiritual Treasures of the Temple, Chapter 15, "The Spiritual Treasure of Passing through the Veil." Image of Virgin Mary by Kara Gebhardt, iStock.