Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Dora,

>I don't know what to think of Lemche or the thoroughness of his research.
>It is news to me that anyone has been searching for a temple at Shiloh;  I
>always understood the shrine at Shiloh to be only a shrine.

1Sam. 1:9 So Hannah rose up after they had eaten in Shiloh, and after they
had drunk. Now Eli the priest sat upon a seat by a post of the temple of
the LORD. (KJV)

>The actual passages as translated in the New Revised Standard Version DO
>refer to a temple there, but one of the passages also calls it a tent of
>meeting, and my Access Bible interprets this to mean the "temple" was a
>mobile tent shrine.

This is what the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia has to say:

The Israelites set up the tabernacle and the ark of the covenant at Shiloh
(Josh. 18:1), and this remained the cult center duering the period of
tribal history recorded in Joshua and Judges . . . .

While located at Shiloh the tabernacle of Moses was apparently set up more
like a temple than a portable tent. 1 S. 1:9, 3:3 refer to doorposts and a
door; possibly a substantial building and adjacent storehouses were also
added. Shiloh at this time was a place of annual pilgrimage, as can be seen
in the account of the birth of Samuel (1:3, 9).

Although not recorded in Scripture, Shiloh's violent destruction,
accompanied by a great fire, is attested by the findings of archeological
excavations at the site. The destruction of Shiloh is lated referred to by
Ps. 78:60 and Jer. 7:12-14, 26:6
___

The article mentions archeological work by the National Museum of Denmark
from 1926-32. There were seasonal excavations by Finkelstein of Bar Ilan
University, Tel Aviv, beginning in 1981.

                                Yours,
                                Harold Holmyard


>
>What Hebrew word is used, how can it be interpreted, and what light can
>anyone shed on whether the structure was a tent or a temple?
>
>------------------------------
>
>Jeremiah 4:12; Go now to my place that was in Shiloh, where I made my name
>dwell at first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people
>Israel.  Notes explain that Shiloh was a shrine in the northern kingdom that
>was destroyed by the Philistines.
>
>Samuel 1-3:
>
>Now this man used to go up ... from his town to worship and to sacrifice to
>the Lord ofHosts at Shiloh, where the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Pinheas
>were priests of the Lord.
>
>So it went on year by year; as often as she went up to the house of the
>Lord...
>
>After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself
>before the Lord.  Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the
>dorrpost of the temple of the Lord.  ...
>Note on this says "Elkanah's annual pilgrimage to the temple of Yahweh or
>house of the Lord (v. 7) in Shiloh..."
>
>Now Eli was very old.  He heard all that his sons were doing to all Israel,
>an dhow they lay with the women who served at the entrance to the tent of
>meeting.  NOte on this says, "The tent of metting is another name for the
>tabernacle, a moveable shrine.  Apparently the temple of the Lord at Shiloh
>was actually a tent shrine."
>
>3:3:  And Samuel was lying down n the temple of the Lord, where the ark of
>God was.  Note on this says, "Samuel's bed was in the temple near the inner
>sanctuary where the ark of God was kept.  "
>
>Yours,
>Dora Smith
>Austin, Texas
>villandra AT austin.rr.com
>
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