Mt. Sinai, famed as the mountain top where God gave Moses the 10 Commandments, five big promises were also made by God at Mt. Sinai about “the place.” Actually prophecies, they were key to the Hebrews’ destiny and the building blocks to the future Messiah.

The place – five promises: lead the Israelites to the land He promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as the place for their descendants to possess; the place to establish a kingdom; the permanent place for His Name to dwell; the exclusive place for Israel to observe the Passover; and the place for the Judgement Seat of Israel.^[1]

God didn’t say exactly where the place would be. Great faith in these promises was required for a fledgling nation of people who had just fled the only life they had ever known. The Hebrew nation failed the first step.

Moving to the place seemed like an impossible task, especially for a ragtag nation of former slaves without a military. Doubts and lack of faith by the Exodus generation would cost them from seeing God’s promised land.^[2]

Finally the Hebrew nation prepared to enter Canaan and sent spies on a recon mission and they found the land was occupied by many enemies with their kings and militaries. Nothing new…along their journey to the place, local inhabitants went to war to defend their lands to keep out the Hebrews.

Enemy nations, they found, all had a king with a Seat of the Throne within its fortified city, the monarchy’s base of power, and protected by a military. A new kingdom for the Hebrews would require the same:  dominion over a land with boundaries, a fortified city, a king with a Seat of the Throne, and a formal military.

A permanent place for the Name of God to dwell required a temple. Fundamental to a theocracy, this temple had to be located near the king’s throne in the nation’s capital to be protected against heathen enemies.

According to the Law, the Passover was to be celebrated at its appointed time requiring sacrifices to be offered by the priests of God at a central permanent place of worship. This temple would need enough open space to accommodate tens of thousands of people and priests who would attend the annual Passover to offer sacrifices.

For a theocratic government, the Judgement Seat also had to be located in close proximity to both the Throne and its temple.^[3] The most important and most complicated cases of the nation were to be judged in the place God chose.

None of these promises and expectations seemed like the remotest reality to the Israelites who, after 400 years, were starting from scratch after escaping from under the harsh rule of Pharaoh. Yet, against all odds over the coming centuries, these five prophetic promises did become a reality.

Israel conquered its enemies and took possession of the land promised by God to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob where each of the 12 tribes of the sons of Israel were allotted their own land regions.^[4] Their formidable rag-tag military protected the nation even before the establishment of a kingdom.

A king, the most famous in Hebrew history born in Bethlehem in the lineage of Judah, fulfilled the royal prophetic blessing of Judah. At first the giant-slayer, King David, ruled without a Seat of the Throne until he conquered and occupied the fortified city of Jebus or Salem, soon thereafter to be called Jerusalem.

King Solomon, son of David, built the  the Temple on Mt. Moriah still known to this day as Solomon’s Temple. Its Western Wall remnants have become a most holy place in Israel today.^[5]

Consecrated and blessed by King Solomon, the new Temple in Jerusalem was where the first sacrifice was offered on its permanent alter. The sacrifice was miraculously ignited by fire sent down from heaven.^[6]

Passover was then observed at its appointed time at the Temple where sacrifices were offered by the priests of God.^[7] Generations later, King Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the Temple and pillaged its gold contents.

During the Persian Empire, the Temple was rebuilt, its gold contents returned. The observance of the annual Passover resumed until Jerusalem was destroyed by Rome in 70 AD.

Lastly, the capital city of Jerusalem became the Judgement Seat of Israel under the reign of Solomon where both civil and criminal cases were decided. In a theocratic government, God’s Law served both as the civil and criminal code.

Civil cases were initially decided by King Solomon on the porch of the his palace. Cases were eventually moved and judged in the Hall of Judgement.^[8]

Criminal cases involving the highest level of offenses, including capital death cases, were tried in the Temple Court accessed through the Chamber of Hewn Stone.^[9] The Chamber built into the northern wall of the Temple served as the meeting place for the 70 elders of Israel, eventually the Sanhedrin.^[10]

Isaiah’s prophecy of “My Servant” described a cruel sacrificial-type judgement that could only be rendered in the Judgement Seat of Israel. This court during the period of the Second Temple was rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity.^[11]

God’s five big promises given at Mount Sinai laid the ground work for Israel’s future in the place and eventually the foundation of various Messiah prophecies. Over the coming centuries prophets Isaiah, Zechariah, Jeremiah and Micah would give prophecies foretelling details about the Messiah who would come from the House of David.^[12]

All five promises made by God at Mt. Sinai about “the place” came to pass. What are the odds it was all just an extraordinary coincidence?

Updated November 15, 2023.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

REFERENCES:
[1] Deuteronomy 1:6-8, 39; 17:8-10, 14. CR Genesis 17, 22, 35, 49; Exodus 19:6; 23:20; Deuteronomy 1:8, 12:11, 16:2, 17:20.
[2] Deuteronomy 1:34-40; Numbers 14:26-35. “The Twelve Tribes in Canaan.” Maps Database Source. map. 2020. <https://mapdatabaseinfo.blogspot.com/2018/05/32-map-of-promised-land-joshua.html#
[3] Deuteronomy 17:8-10. CR Exodus 18.
[4] Deuteronomy 3:12-17.
[5] 1 Kings 6; 2 Chronicles 3.
[6] I Chronicles 6; Leviticus 9; Nehemiah 11.
[7] Exodus 12:14-15; Leviticus 23:4-8,; II Chronicles chapters 8, 29, 34-35:19; Ezra 6:16-22. Coulter, Fred R. cbcg.org. The Christian Passover. Chapters 12-13, Part 1. n.d. <https://www.cbcg.org/booklets/the-christian-passover/chapter-twelve-when-and-why-the-temple-sacrifice-of-the-passover-was-instituted-part-one.html> 
[8] 1 Kings 3, 4, 7.
[9] Schoenberg, Shira. “Ancient Jewish History: The Sanhedrin.” 2017.  <http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-sanhedrin>   Shachter, J. and Freedman, H.  “ Sanhedrin.”
[10] Exodus 18; Deuteronomy 1, 17; II Chronicles 19:8:4-11.  Shachter and Freedman.  “Introduction to Sanhedrin.”  Soncino Babylonian Talmud. <https://israelect.com/Come-and-Hear/sanhedrin/index.html>  Ariel, Yisrael. “The Chamber of the Hewn Stone.” The Temple Institute. 2014.  <https://www.templeinstitute.org/illustrated/hewn_stone_description.htm>  Ariel, Yisrael. “Blueprints for the Holy Temple.”  <http://www.templeinstitute.org/blueprints-for-the-holy-temple.htm>
[11] Isaiah 52-53. Sanhedrin 16a, 17a. Shachter, J. and Freedman, H.  “Sanhedrin.” Josephus.  Antiquities. Book IV, Chapter VIII.14; Book XX, Chapter IX.4. “Ancient Jewish History: The Beit Din.” Jewish Virtual Library. 2017.http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-beit-din>
[12] Isaiah 7, 9; 11; Jeremiah 23, 33; Zechariah 3, 6, 12.