The temple is central to Latter-day Saint worship. Through modern revelation Joseph Smith restored the ancient tradition of temples and the ordinances performed therein. Studies of ancient temples can shed much light on latter-day temples and temple worship.

Several years ago Latter-day Saint scholar Matthew Brown planned a conference entitled The Temple on Mount Zion and began to invite the participants. Matthew Brown loved the temple and temple worship and studied and published on ancient and modern temples. His interests and knowledge were vast. When Matthew passed away very unexpectedly in 2011, his friends decided to organize a series of conferences in his memory. This volume, the sixth in the series, contains proceedings from the fifth conference held in his memory 7 November 2020 and reflects many of the topics that Matthew loved, centered on the theme of the temple: past, present, and future.

Chapters relating to the ancient past of the Bible and the Book of Mormon provide new insights into temple themes in Ruth, sacred names of Moses and Jesus Christ, prayer with uplifted hands, temple iconography of cherubim and seraphim, ritual purity in 3 Nephi 19, the rites of the Raqchi Temple in Peru, and sacred space in the early Christian Church. Of great significance to the present era is a chapter on women and the priesthood in the contemporary Church. And looking toward the future is a chapter on the Millennial Temple in Jackson County, Missouri in the context of its historic past.

The purpose of the book series is to increase understanding and appreciation of temple rituals and doctrines, and to encourage participation in the redeeming work of family history and temple worship.

Edited by Stephen D. Ricks and Jeffrey M. Bradshaw

Published by The Interpreter Foundation and Eborn Books

“THE ANCIENT HEBREWS did not believe that the temple concept originated in the time of Moses. Rather, they taught that temple rituals and doctrines originated with Adam and were handed down among the biblical patriarchs. This is precisely what the Prophet Joseph Smith tried to teach the world during the early 1800s, that the gospel of Jesus Christ is eternal and has been on the earth since the beginning.”

Matthew B. Brown, The Gate of Heaven

Contents:

• The Sacred and the Temple in Ancient Christianity, C. Wilford Griggs
• The Lead Books, Margaret Barke
• Comments on Margaret Barker’s Presentation, Samuel Zinner
• She Took the Veil and Covered Herself, T. K. Plant
• Temple Themes in the Book of Abraham, Stephen O. Smoot
• The Cosmic Temple of Divine Names: Sapiential, Nomistic, and Numerical Properties, Samuel Zinner
• Qumran Reflections on the “True Service” of the Temple and the Coming Messiah, David J. Larsen
• Jacob’s Temple Journey to Haran and Back, Jeffrey M. Bradshaw and Matthew L. Bowen
• “Eastward” in Genesis 2-4: An Exercise in Visual Discovery, Rebecca Holt Stay
• >From Jared to Jacob: The Motif of Divine Ascensus and Descensus in Genesis, the Book of Moses, and the Enochic Tradition, Matthew L. Bowen and Jeffrey M. Bradshaw
• Temples Beyond Jerusalem, Stephen D. Ricks
• <>Ancient Israelite Temple Ritual through the Telescope of Restoration Scripture, David Calabro
• <“That I May Life Up My Eyes”: Bartimaeus as a Temple Petitioner before the Veil, Spencer Kraus
• Luke’s Gospel Portrays Jesus as the Exodus or Way of the Temple, John S. Thompson.