The Mikdash (Temple) Educational Center in conjunction with Rabbi Hillel Weiss, the former spokesman for the Sanhedrin, has minted a silver coin to promote a practical effort to establish the third temple.
The coin contains 10 grams of pure silver and represents three times the amount of the biblical silver half-shekel that was donated by every Jewish male to finance the daily operation of the temple.
Weiss emphasized that the minting of the coin was timed to coincide with the beginning of the Hebrew month of Adar when these coins were collected for the temple. It is currently the Hebrew month of Adar. “Donating the annual silver half-shekel is incumbent upon the Jews but this is not just a Jewish project,” Weiss explained to The Jerusalem Post.
“The concept of money in the world and all of the basis of commerce has been lost,” he said. “Commerce is how people interact. The 70 nations would come to the temple in Jerusalem on the pilgrim festivals and interact.
They would express their dedication to the common values of the Seven Noahide Laws. This would help establish the basis for healthy commerce. If there are no shared values, if one country allows theft or lawlessness or the spilling of blood, there can be no commerce.”
He said that “what we have now is virtual money, controlled entirely by rulers who do not fear God, virtual money whose worth is determined by the fantasies of men. The value of money must be based on gold or silver and this was expressed every year in the temple in Jerusalem when the value of the silver half-shekel was determined according to the Bible. This is the meaning of ‘mine is the gold, mine is the silver’” as referenced in Hagai 2:8.
He also cited the Prophet Isaiah (56:7).
“For this reason, the first temples were, and the third temple must be, a house of prayer for all nations,” Weiss said. “The Temple was and will be, the only hope for true peace among the nations. History has shown that any effort to bring the nations together that is not centered in Jerusalem, the city of peace, ends in catastrophe.” FULL REPORT
