Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 25:1
And the LORD spoke unto Moses, saying,
1 9 . Contribution of materials for a sanctuary (cf. Exo 35:20-29). All liberally-minded Israelites are invited to contribute the materials necessary for the construction and equipment of a sanctuary its fabric, its sacred vessels, and (ch. 28) the vestments of its priests. The materials are to include metals, textile fabrics, skins, wood, oil, spices, and precious stones. The sanctuary, when completed, is to form an abode in which Jehovah may dwell in the midst of His people ( v. 8).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Yahweh had redeemed the Israelites from bondage. He had made a covenant with them and had given them laws. He had promised, on condition of their obedience, to accept them as His own peculiar treasure, as a kingdom of priests and an holy nation Exo 19:5-6. And now He was ready visibly to testify that He made his abode with them. He claimed to have a dwelling for Himself, which was to be in external form a tent of goats hair Exo 19:4, to take its place among their own tents, and formed out of the same material (see Exo 26:7 note). The special mark of His presence within the tent was to be the ark or chest containing the Ten Commandments on two tables of stone Exo 31:18, symbolizing the divine law of holiness, and covered by the mercy-seat, the type of reconciliation. Moses was divinely taught regarding the construction and arrangement of every part of the sanctuary. The directions which were given him are comprised in Exo. 25:131:11. The account of the performance of the work, expressed generally in the same terms, is given Exo. 35:2140:33.
Moses is commanded to invite the people to bring their gifts for the construction and service of the sanctuary and for the dresses of the priests.
Exo 25:2
An offering – The word is used here in its general sense, being equivalent to korban, korban, (compare Mar 7:11). On the marginal rendering heave offering, see the note at Exo 29:27.
That giveth it willingly with his heart – The public service of Yahweh was to be instituted by freewill offerings, not by an enforced tax. Compare 1Ch 29:3, 1Ch 29:9,1Ch 29:14; Ezr 2:68-69; 2Co 8:11-12; 2Co 9:7. On the zeal with which the people responded to the call, see Exo 35:21-29; Exo 36:5-7.
Exo 25:3
Gold, and silver, and brass – The supply of these metals possessed by the Israelites at this time probably included what they had inherited from their forefathers, what they had obtained from the Egyptians Exo 12:35, and what may have been found amongst the spoils of the Amalekites Exo 17:8-13. But with their abundant flocks and herds, it can hardly be doubted that they had carried on important traffic with the trading caravans that traversed the wilderness, some of which, most likely, in the earliest times were furnished with silver, with the gold of Ophir (or gold of Sheba, as it seems to have been indifferently called), and with the brass (the alloy of copper and tin, called bronze) of Phoenicia and Egypt. Compare Exo 38:24 note.
Exo 25:4
Blue, and purple, and scarlet – i. e. the material dyed with these colors. The Jewish tradition has been very generally received that this material was wool. Compare Heb 9:19 with Lev 14:4, Lev 14:49, etc. When spun and dyed by the women, it was delivered in the state of yarn; and the weaving and embroidering was left to Aholiab and his assistants, Exo 35:25, Exo 35:35. The blue and purple dye are usually thought to have been obtained from shell-fish, the scarlet from the cochineal insect of the holm-oak.
Fine linen – The fine flax or the manufactured linen, for which Egypt was famous Eze 27:7, and which the Egyptians were in the habit of using for dresses of state Gen 41:42. It was used as the groundwork of the figured curtains of the tabernacle as well as of the embroidered hangings of the tent and the court. See Exo 35:35.
Exo 25:5
Rams skins dyed red – Skins tanned and colored like the leather now known as red morocco.
Badgers skins – Rather, leather, probably of a sky-blue color, formed from the skins of the tachash (a general name for marine animals), which was well adapted as a protection against the weather.
Shittim wood – The word shttam is the plural form of shtah, which occurs as the name of the growing tree, Isa 41:19. The tree is satisfactorily identified with the Acacia seyal, a gnarled and thorny tree, somewhat like a solitary hawthorn in its habit and manner of growth, but much larger. It flourishes in the driest situations, and is scattered more or less numerously over the Sinaitic Peninsula. It appears to be the only good wood produced in the wilderness. No other kind of wood was employed in the tabernacle or its furniture. In the construction of the temple cedar and fir took its place 1Ki 5:8; 1Ki 6:18; 2Ch 2:8.
Exo 25:6-7
See the notes to Exo. 27; 28; 30,
Exo 25:8
sanctuary – i. e. a hallowed place. This is the most comprehensive of the words that relate to the place dedicated to Yahweh. It included the tabernacle with its furniture, its tent, and its court.
That I may dwell among them – The purpose of the sanctuary is here definitely declared by the Lord Himself. It was to be the constant witness of His presence among His people. Compare the marginal references.
Exo 25:9
According to all that I shew thee – The tabernacle and all that pertained to it were to be in strict accordance with the ideas revealed by the Lord to Moses (compare Exo 25:40; Exo 26:30; Act 7:44; Heb 8:5). The word here translated pattern is also used to denote the plans for the temple which were given by David to Solomon 1Ch 28:11-12, 1Ch 28:19; it is elsewhere rendered form, likeness, similitude, Deu 4:16-17; Eze 8:3, Eze 8:10.
The tabernacle – The Hebrew word signifies the dwelling-place. It here denotes the wooden structure, containing the holy place and the most holy place, with the tent which sheltered it. See Exo 26:1 note.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Exo 25:1-9
Make Me a sanctuary:
God dwelling with men
I.
The dwelling of God among us in Christ Jesus, when it is a reality, and not merely an idea or a phrase, imports and of necessity secures the passing away from us of the things we have most reason to fear. When God comes to dwell among us, which can only be by dwelling in us individually, sin goes from us, in its guilt and its predominating power.
II. God comes thus to dwell with men, for the development of character, and for the nourishment of all goodness. The putting away of sin is but the negative part of salvation. The presence in its place of truth and duty and love and obedience–this is what makes a saved man.
III. For how long does God dwell with men? Deep philosophy as well as high faith sanctions the conclusion that the God of grace, who makes covenant with man and dwells with him, is our God for ever and ever, and that He will never leave us or forsake us. (A. Raleigh, D. D.)
The holy tent
I. We should mark that God makes himself dependent on the will of man. Let them make Me. This is true, not only of material wealth, but of mans nature.
1. God wants human nature, He seems to covet to have the affection of our life, and yearns to be looked to by the creature He has made. Let us not cheat Him, for we shall rob ourselves most of all.
2. God may be thwarted by man.
II. In this Divine conception of the Church, there is a place for the rich. It is not impossible for rich men to be good men. It is not easy, but still it can be done. God has given them a place. This is the offering which ye shall take of them: gold. God would not have accepted planks from those who had gold, and so God will not accept industry in His service in the place of wealth.
III. Labour has its place. There was a great deal of timber required; the wood of the acacia tree was used for the framework. Here was work which the poorest could do. Is it not so to-day? In building the Church, what room for a holy industry!
IV. Woman has her rights here. We read in Exo 35:24-25, of women that were wise-hearted, who did spin with their hands, etc. Influence of Christian mothers. Sunday-schoolworkers. Mothers meetings. Let woman do her work well. We must have her work, or we cannot finish ours.
V. There is room for genius. Precious stones are required. The onyx stones, and other jewels, took up but small room, but they added beauty and splendour to the rest. God does not create genius every day. Many rhymers, but few poets.
VI. Still, we must not forget that the meanest is acceptable, if it is the best we can bring. There are times when cleverness is baffled, and wealth is powerless. But see to it God has your best. Acacia wood will not be accepted in the place of anything else. But if the axe and saw are your talents, by all means use them.
VII. Our best and our all is of no avail without the atonement. Alms and deeds are only safe as they rest upon Christs merits. (T. Champness.)
The Tabernacle and priesthood
I. The Tabernacle.
1. Its general character.
2. Its contents.
II. The priesthood for the Tabernacle.
III. The symbolic meaning of both Tabernacle and priesthood.
1. Scriptural evidence of the symbolic character of these.
(1) The Mosaic ritual, as a whole, is declared to be this (Heb 10:1).
(2) Parts of it declared symbolic (Heb 9:6-9).
2. Some of its symbols explained.
(1) The propitiatory in the Holy of Holies (1Jn 2:2).
(2) The veil dividing the holy place from the most holy (Heb 10:19-20).
(3) The sacrifices of the Mosaic ritual (Heb 9:13-14).
3. The priesthood a symbol.
(1) In its appointment (Heb 5:1-5; Heb 8:1-5; Heb 9:11-12).
(2) In its contrast (Heb 7:11-28; Heb 9:23-28; Heb 10:1-13).
Lessons:
1. The importance and duty of studying the Old Testament in order to understand the New Testament.
2. The marked superiority of the Christian over the Mosaic dispensation.
3. Our weightier responsibilities over those of old.
4. The all-sufficiency of Christ as Redeemer, Priest, and Friend.
5. Our paramount duties–to accept, trust, and obey Him. (D. C. Hughes, M. A.)
The Tabernacle
I. The grand purpose of the Tabernacle was that the Israelites might realize Gods presence with them.
1. The unity of God had been lost in the gradual transference of separate and independent sovereignty to every attempted representation or localization of the Deity. This evil, God now corrects by the strict confinement of His localization to one spot.
2. The conception of the Deity had been demoralized through the forms in which men sought to represent God. And so the God of Israel refuses to allow any image or outward representation of Himself.
II. The manifestation of Gods presence was secured by the construction and furniture of the Tabernacle.
1. The ark was constructed out of the freewill offerings of the people.
2. The Tabernacle in its costliness was, in all the circumstances of the case, wonderfully appreciative of the Divine Majesty.
3. The Tabernacle was constructed in all respects according to Divine pattern. (W. Roberts, M. A.)
Nature and design of the Tabernacle
I. Its nature.
1. It was a simple structure. The materials of which it was composed were costly indeed. There was also much of artistic grace and beauty wrought up into its composition, and yet, compared with the splendid cathedrals etc. which men have erected, how simple and unpretending!
2. It was a structure of Divine origin. Indebted for nothing to the force of mans creative faculty. God planned it.
II. Its design.
1. In reference to the Jews.
(1) The source of present blessing. The bright spot in the midst of a dark and desert world; for God was there, and walked in the midst of His people, to bless and deliver them from their enemies.
(2) A pledge or promise to them of future good. A heaven-devised symbol, prefiguring Gods salvation.
2. In reference to ourselves.
(1) An illustration of the blessings of the gospel. The relation which God sustained to Israel as a nation, He now sustains to His people as individuals. He shades them by day, and, enlightens them by night; strengthens and comforts; guides and blesses them as their own personal God.
(2) The Tabernacle furnishes us with a figurative view of our relation to the heavenly world (see Heb 9:23). We are often tempted to think and feel as if that world must be at an immense distance, a vast remove from us. A proper consideration of the Tabernacle would seem to correct this impression. Here you see the Holy Place, or the Church on Earth, and the Most Holy Place, or the Church in Heaven, in the closest possible contiguity to each other. There is only that thin material veil to separate them. In conclusion the subject we have now considered suggests to us–How thankful we should be for the day in which we live! It is the day of salvation; the dispensation of the substance which succeeded to that of the shadow; the time of direct and full revelation as opposed to the time of type and figure. It is to the dispensation of the Tabernacle what the hour of noon, with its radiant splendour, is to the hour of early dawn, with its dim twilight and its gloom. In regard to light, and grace, and privilege, our position under the gospel is exalted indeed. And if it be true that to whom much is given, of them much will be required, then it becomes us to see well to it, that we improve diligently our privileges. (R. Newton, D. D.)
The Tabernacle a symbol of holier things
1. The Tabernacle was the dwelling place of God. It tells us God is great. It was a costly Tabernacle. The value of the structure was probably not much less than 300,000. There was mystery. The Israelites were not to enter the Tabernacle, but only the priests. Only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies, and that but once a year. Thus God surrounded Himself with an impenetrable veil of mystery. It has been said, God is the greatest mystery in the universe. But, if there is mystery, there is mercy. There was also justice, holiness, and majesty.
2. The Israelites no doubt looked upon the Tabernacle as the palace of their King. The furniture was palace furniture, and the priests were ministers of state.
3. The Tabernacle was set up in the wilderness. In all our wanderings God is with us.
4. The Tabernacle was the first religious structure, in which Jehovah condescended to dwell. Symbol of Divine grace. Erected in midst of sinners.
5. Gods presence is the cause of holiness and it alone removes the curse. God came down to dwell with His people, not because they were holy, but to make them so. No place is holy without God. That place–wherever it may be–is holy if God is there.
6. The Tabernacle was a place of worship. It was called the tent of the congregation (Exo 40:22). They had a property in it. It was the palace of their King. It was the house of their God. There they came to confess their sin. There was no other place of the kind. It was the one Tabernacle for all the tribes, and for all the individual members of those tribes.
7. The Tabernacle was not a model for our imitation, but a shadow of heavenly things (Heb 8:5). The substance having come, we need, not go back to the shadow. In the Tabernacle we have the figures of the true (Heb 9:24). In the gospel we have reality. Its blessings are everlasting. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. He is the truth of every figure, the way to a holy God, and the life of all who believe. (R. E. Sears.)
The Divine purpose in the erection of a Tabernacle
This introductory sentence of the symbolical dispensation involved much. It reiterated the great promise given at the fall, that man, although lapsed, should not be left unaided; that there should be, in the fulness of time, an interference on his behalf of the most remarkable character; and that, to prepare mens minds for its reception, it should, first of all, be presented in a figure.
I. God dwelt in a Tabernacle. In this a glorious reality was foreshadowed (Joh 1:14; Timothy 3:16; Gal 4:4; Heb 2:14).
II. In that Tabernacle He dwelt amongst His people Israel. Christ is the great centre round which all His people are grouped–those nearest to Him, the family within the veil; the glorified ones, who, having finished their service here below, are at rest–while the outer circle is the Church militant, that portion of the family which is still in the midst of tribulation and conflict. But He is the great centre. To Him all eyes, all hearts are turned; from Him all supplies are derived. The one see Him in actual fruition and enjoyment; the other realize Him by faith. (J. Ridgeway, M. A.)
The Tabernacle of the testimony
So many things of a covenant form and character required to be placed under the security and covering of a covenant habitation, a habitation having relation to both God and His people. The Lord Himself had said, I will dwell among them. Here was His habitation. Look at the model after which it was formed (verse 40). God was His own architect, nor were there any deviations in after thought from His original plan: the design was perfect. But why such exactness in relation to this temporary residence, this wilderness habitation of the Lord of the whole earth? A prefiguration of the body of Christ was intended, His assumption of our form and flesh, and which was an act of condescension, a veiling of the glories of His Godhead, a coming down to dwell in concealment. The personal assumption of our nature, therefore, made it of moment that what was to contain the inhabitation of Deity, like the body of Christ, curiously wrought, as it is said, in the lowest parts of the earth, should be of a form, and be put together exactly as God Himself had given the model to Moses in the mount. It was especially of God. In the spiritual worship of the gospel of Christ, and in the doctrines of grace, nothing is suffered to be misplaced, nothing left to be introduced. There is a show of wisdom in will-worship, an appearance of reverence and humility, but none in reality. If we worship God, we must worship Him, after His own instructions, and, under whatever dispensation, in spirit and in truth. The design was Gods, but the execution of the work was mans.
1. Many hearts were in the work. As soon as required to be constructed, the people had a heart to it and well they might since it was bringing God nearer to them, and more visibly with them than He had been. How interesting the union of hearts in such a work, men and women, and, we might think, even children too, wise and willing in the work of the Lord! Delightful was it to have their hearts in what had, from eternity, employed the heart of God, His whole will and understanding, His counsels, grace, and love. How are our hearts affected towards the spiritual temple that is rising in this world of sin? Sweet the frame of mind David was in when he said (1Ch 29:14, etc.). Their hearts were their offerings: there were no niggardly restraints of covetousness. At what expense are many to support the pride of life, and to maintain the superfluities of naughtiness! The day is coming when they will bitterly lament the misapplication of wealth, and the want of a heart, in their fulness, for a ready yieldance to God.
2. Many hands, as well as many hearts, were in the work (Exo 35:26). And how delightful is it to see the spiritual temple rising, and each employed as skill given him! Where there are hearts, hands will not be wanting. We see many employed about the great building God has in progress, and what has set them to work but love? It is this that is the great moving power in the machinery of those many institutions which are in truth the bulwark and glory of the land. (W. Seaton.)
The Tabernacle entire
We think the Tabernacle in its entireness was emblematical of–
1. The incarnation. The glory of Jehovah filled it.
2. The Church. Unity in diversity, and diversity in unity.
3. The believer. As respects both his
(1) present, and
(2) future being. Weak and imperfect now; to be glorified hereafter
4. The millennial kingdom (Rev 21:3-4). (W. Mudge.)
Design and use of the ceremonial law
1. It served to cherish the religious sentiment. The Israelite was reminded by it in all his relations, even the most significant and external, of God; the thought of God was introduced into the very midst of the popular life.
2. It required the recognition of sin, and thus called forth the first thing essential for the reception of redemption, a sense of the need of redemption. The law was, and was intended to be, a heavy yoke, and therefore would awaken a longing after the Redeemer.
3. It served to separate Israel from the heathen; it erected between the two a wall of separation, by which communication was prevented.
4. Many things in the Ceremonial Law served, by impressions on the senses, to awaken reverence for holy things among a sensual people.
5. One principal object of the Ceremonial Law lay in its symbolic meaning. The people, enthralled in visible objects, were not yet capable of vitally appropriating supersensual truth in words, the form most suited to their nature. It was needful for the truth to condescend, to come down to their power of apprehension, to prepare itself a body from visible things, in order to free the people from the bondage of the visible. Would we rather not speak at all to the dumb than make use of signs? The Ceremonial Law was not the opposite to the worship of God in spirit and in truth, but only an imperfect form of the same, a necessary preparation for it. The accommodation was only formal, one which did not alter the essence, but only presented it in large capital letters to children who could not yet read a small running-hand. (E. W. Hengstenberg, D. D.)
The basis of symbolism
The altar was the basis of the sacred places, the priesthood was the basis of the sacred persons, the burnt-offerings were the basis of the sacred rites, and the Sabbath was the basis of the sacred times. Here we discover the links that connect the Ceremonial Laws given by Moses with the primeval ordinances of religion. In the altar set up in the family of Adam we have the genesis of the Tabernacle and Temple. At the beginning the minister of sacrifice was the patriarch of the existing family, and his sacred office passed over to the Mosaic priesthood. In the offering of the blood by Abel and the offering by fire of Noah, we discover the germs of the Jewish ritual. The Sabbath ordained in Paradise became the central institute in the sacred times appointed by Moses. (E. P. Humphrey, D. D.)
The Tabernacle a tent
The Tabernacle was a tent; it was a costly building, but still it was a tent; it was Gods tent in which He lived and walked with His people in the wilderness (Exo 25:8; Num 9:15; 2Sa 7:6; Act 7:38-50). As His people were dwelling in tents, God would have a tent, and would live with them as their Guide and their Guard, their Father and their King; but afterward, when they were settled in the land of Canaan and dwelt in celled houses, He permitted them to build Him a house at Jerusalem, which He then filled with His presence as He had before filled the Tabernacle. As God dwelt in the Tabernacle and afterwards in the Temple, and as men must then come to the Tabernacle or to the Temple to get to God, so God dwells in Christ (2Co 5:19), and all who would come to God must come to Christ: in no other way can any one get to God (Joh 14:6; Joh 6:37). Moreover, as there was but one Tabernacle, so there is but one Christ, and none can be saved from the wrath to come but those who come to Him; and as a man must come out of the camp to get to the Tabernacle, so a man must come out from the world, must be separated from it in spirit, before he can be really in Christ. (G. Rodgers.)
The edifice of the Tabernacle
Moses received on Sinai not only a command to make the Tabernacle, but plans and specifications according to which the work was to be executed. Its ground-plan was a parallelogram forty-five feet in length, and fifteen feet in width. The material was of shittim, a species of acacia, the timber of which has a rich black colour like ebony, and is eminently light, solid, strong, and smooth. The frame of the Tabernacle consisted of forty-eight pieces of this acacia wood standing on end. Eight of them were at the rear, and twenty on each side; the front being left open to be covered with a curtain. They were each fifteen feet long, and, unless the two outside pieces on the rear end were exceptions, twenty-seven inches wide. The description of the corner planks is obscure, but favours the opinion that each consisted of two pieces fastened together at a right angle; so that it was a corner-plank not merely because it stood at the corner, but because it formed an angle. On the lower end of each of the planks, two tenons were wrought, to correspond with mortises in the sills on which it was to stand. Possibly there were also tenons and mortises on the edges where the planks came together; but of this we have no certain knowledge. Such a connection of one plank with another, by tenon and mortise, would give greater strength to the frame, but might not be necessary in addition to the horizontal bars which bound the planks together. There were five such bars on each side, and five on the rear, made of acacia wood, and overlaid with gold. These gilded planks when erected, stood on a base, or sill, of silver, which extended perhaps a little way both outward and inward, from the wall termed by the planks, and was divided into twice as many pieces as there were planks; so that each of the latter stood on two separate pieces of the base, one of its two tenons being inserted into a corresponding cavity in each division of the base. Besides the planks which formed the wall of the Tabernacle, there were four pillars, to support a curtain across the interior of the building, dividing it into two apartments, and five pillars to support another curtain over the entrance at the east end of the edifice. The four pillars for the partition-curtain stood on sills, or socket-pieces of silver, and the five for the entrance-curtain on sills of copper. The wooden frame of the Tabernacle having been prepared, it was necessary to cover it with suitable hangings, or curtains. Of these there were four layers; the innermost so far excelling the others in importance, that it was sometimes denominated The Tabernacle, as if all else appertaining to the edifice were subsidiary to this. The frame, indeed, seems to have been chiefly designed to give support to the beautiful drapery with which it was covered. In the conception of a Hebrew travelling through the wilderness from Sinai to Canaan, the Tabernacle where Jehovah dwelt was of cloth, as was his own habitation. It was, indeed, of a more beautiful fabric than the other tents of the encampment, which were doubtless of goats hair, like those of the nomadic inhabitants of the same region at the present day, while the Tabernacle of God was of fine linen variegated with brilliant colours. The several parts of the sanctuary having been constructed, it still remained to make an enclosure for the court in which it was to stand. The prescribed dimensions of this area were one hundred and fifty feet for the length, and seventy-five feet for the width. It was to be enclosed with hangings of cloth made of fine white linen, not interwoven, like the curtains of the Tabernacle, with figures and colours, but, so far as appears, woven plain. That portion of it, however, which covered the entrance-way at the east end of the court, was variegated with colours of blue, purple, and crimson. The height of these hangings was seven feet and a half; and they were suspended on pillars by means of silver hooks, the pillars standing on sills of copper. The distance between these pillars was equal to the height of the hangings, i.e., seven and a half feet. They were connected by a silver rod, or fillet, extending from one capital to another. The Tabernacle was to stand near the western end of this enclosure, and midway, doubtless, between its northern and southern curtains. A large area was therefore left in front of the edifice for the performance of those rites of worship which were appropriate to the place. (E. E. Atwater.)
The oneness of the Tabernacle
(see Exo 26:6). It is to be one Tabernacle–not in the sense of singleness and uniqueness, as if God had forbidden more than one Tabernacle to be constructed for His service–but in the sense of a real and profound unity. By the golden taches or clasps binding together the curtains which covered it, the whole structure was made one tent or tabernacle, and all its parts and objects were united. Unity is the hall-mark which God stamps upon all His works. It is His autograph written in the stars of heaven and in the flowers of the field, attesting that they all proceed from the same Mind. The universe is a great kaleidoscope which He is perpetually turning round, in which a few simple elements are exhibited in endless diversity; in which the variety is not more wonderful than the unity.
1. In unfolding this sublime lesson, let us look, in the first place, at the illustration of it which the Tabernacle itself afforded. This remarkable structure was one in regard to its parts. Each vessel has its own distinct use, and each can be viewed apart from the others; and yet in every act of priestly service, all are joined together, and are in active operation at the same time. It needs the combination of the whole to make a complete and perfect act of worship, just as it needs the harmomous action of all the members of the body to constitute the act of living. And just as the golden taches link the curtains of the Tabernacle together, and make of them one covering for one structure, so the smaller golden vessels attached to the golden candlestick, the altar of incense, and the shewbread table–the tongs, snuff-dishes, spoons, and censer–linked together the different vessels of the sanctuary into one ministration, forming in this way one golden chain of service simultaneously carried on in the presence of God in behalf of Israel.
2. The words of the Lord to Moses have a wider reference than to the immediate object which called them forth. They may be applied to nature. It may be said that the Tabernacle pointed back to the creation. It was a symbol of the great world of nature, as at once manifesting and concealing God. It was, indeed, as a Rosetta stone, to explain to man the spiritual hieroglyphics in the typology of nature, which had become dark and insignificant to him when he sinned and fell, that God devised the clearer typology of the Tabernacle, and set the cherubim, which were the symbols of creation in connection with the redemption of man, above the mercy-seat in its holiest place, and embroidered them on the veil that divided the outer from the inner sanctuary. There was no typical object or service in the Tabernacle which might not have been seen in nature if man had not lost the key of interpretation. If the creation be thus a greater Tabernacle, in which all the objects are meant to show forth the praise of God, and to symbolize His work of grace, we should expect to find in it the same unity, the same oneness of design and harmony of all parts, that we see in the Jewish Tabernacle; and this is what we actually find. This is the great lesson which modern science has taught us so effectually.
3. But not only did the Tabernacle repeat in miniature the whole creation as Gods dwelling-place, it also more especially typified the new creation–the Church of God. Under all the varying dispensations of His grace, Gods Church has been one The Jews were in the outer court because the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest. Gentiles, by the new and living way opened up through the rent veil of Christs flesh, have entered into the inner shrine. But Jews and Gentiles alike are now united in one communion and fellowship in Christ. The Saviour the Jews looked forward to in rites and sacrifices, we look back to in the ordinances of the gospel. The religion that was veiled to them has been unveiled to us. They saw the types and shadows; we behold the living and glorious realities. Over all is the tabernacling of the same God; and the Church of Jews and Gentiles is built upon the foundation, etc.
4. The Tabernacle was the Bible of the Israelites. God taught them by its object-lessons in their childhood and pupilage in the wilderness. But that age of shadows and symbols has disappeared; man has passed from the childhoods stage of education into the higher school. We have been trained for a clearer perception and a fuller possession of the truth. God has given to us His own written Word, in which His thoughts are woven with mans thoughts, making of the whole Book the speech to the world of Emmanuel, God with us.
5. Mans body is a tabernacle–the greatest of all temples. It is fearfully and wonderfully made, the very highest possible form of organization, the masterpiece of creation. (H. Macmillan, D. D.)
Means of interpretation
There are means of interpretation by the aid of which one may decipher the symbols of the Hebrews as correctly as Champollion deciphered the hieroglyphics of Egypt.
I. First in the table may be placed the parallelism between the mosaic system, as otherwise ascertained, and its symbolic representation. The writings of Moses, like the Greek translation of the Rosetta stone give a clue to the meaning of what otherwise might be illegible.
II. Another key of interpretation is found in the scriptural explanation of symbols. For instance, in the Apocalypse incense is explained as symbolizing the prayers of the holy; and fine linen is explained as meaning, when used for garments, that those thus arrayed were holy.
III. The design of the Tabernacle as declared in the directions for its construction, equipment, and services, is a key to its significance. If the edifice was a symbol it signified that Jehovah dwelt among the Israelites. It represented His true habitation, wherever and of whatever nature it may be, and the spiritual intercourse between Him and those who worship. Moreover, it was equipped in such a manner as to provide for ministrations expressive of atonement, restoration to favour, assurance of reconciliation, and acceptable service; and was thus both a sign and a seal of the covenant relation and of the presence of Jehovah.
IV. The scriptural appellations of the Tabernacle are a means of interpretation.
V. The symbolism Of nature is an important means of interpretation.
VI. Another means of interpretation is the artificial symbolism of the ancients. Kings wear crowns, and sit on thrones; and so crowns and thrones indicate royalty. Among the ancients purple was worn by those in authority, and so became the badge of power and distinction. The temples of the Hindoos, the Chinese, the Chaldeans, and the Egyptians, were built with an adherence to certain forms, proportions, and repetitions, which leaves no room for doubt that their sacred architecture was significant, and that with some difference in the ideas expressed, and some variety in the mode of expressing the same ideas, they employed the relations of geometry and arithmetic to represent the objects of their religious thought. Colour was employed for the same purpose. The three kingdoms of nature–animal, vegetable, mineral–were also made to subserve this artificial symbolism. (E. E. Atwater.)
Gold, and silver, and brass.
Symbolism of minerals
Gold, silver, and jewels have in all ages and countries been regarded as significant of wealth, rank, power. The use of the precious metals for money has, however, rendered it impossible that they should exert in modern times as much influence on the imagination as when used only as insignia.
1. It is quite certain that in the time of Moses gold had not been coined, and was not often used, even by weight, as a medium of exchange. There is a warrant in nature as well as in the universal custom of antiquity, for this employment of the most splendid of the metals to illustrate the highest possible dignity and glory; for it never fails to excite in the mind of the beholder feelings of admiration and awe. Hence, as an emblem, it was among metals what purple was among colours, and found its most appropriate place on the persons and in the habitations of kings and gods. The dedication of a large amount of gold to the service of religion was, therefore, not peculiar to the Hebrews. It was the universal custom of the age thus to do homage to the objects of worship. But, as Mosaism allowed no images of Jehovah, the symbolism of gold must be confined to His habitation and its furniture. It is worthy of observation, then, that the God of the Hebrews dwelt in a golden house.
2. If the Tabernacle of Jehovah was splendid by contrast between it and the ordinary tents of the surrounding encampment, it seems to have been designedly rendered still more splendid by the ordained distinction between the Tabernacle and its court. For while the walls of the dwelling and all its utensils were of gold, so that (with the exception of the sill) no other metal was visible within, the furniture of the court must, according to the specifications furnished to Moses, be of copper. The significance of copper seems to depend chiefly on its rank among the metals, being more esteemed than iron, and less so than silver and gold. As a metal of honour and beauty, it was an appropriate material for the utensils of Divine service, and by its inferiority to gold furnished a background on which the latter seemed more splendid by contrast. Its resemblance to gold deepened the symbolic significance conveyed by the exclusive use of one of the metals in the court, and of the other within the habitation.
3. Between the copper outside and the gold inside, silver was the mediating metal, being found both on the sill of the sanctuary and on the caps of the pillars around the sacred enclosure, to indicate by another sign that the house was higher in honour than the area in front, so much higher that its sill was of the same material as the crowning ornament of the court. Silver was at that time in common use as money; if not in the shape of coin, certainly of bullion, which, when weighed, was current with the merchant (Gen 23:16). Now, this silver which had been wrought partly into the sill of the Tabernacle and partly into the caps of the pillars around the court, had been used as money. Indeed, it came into the possession of Moses in half-shekels, which the people had paid as atonement money, every man a ransom for his soul (Exo 30:12; Exo 30:16). The services of the court culminated in redemption, and not till they were redeemed could the people, even representatively, enter the sanctuary. The shining silver on the top of the pillars of the enclosure was a memorial to the children of Israel before Jehovah to make an atonement for their souls (Exo 30:16), i.e., a permanent reminder that their sins were expiated; and the sill of the sanctuary, into which the greater part of the ransom-money had been molten, was a token that in consequence of their redemption God dwelt among them, and received them to His fellowship. The silver, as an expiation for souls, pointed to the unholiness of Israels nature, and reminded the people continually that by nature it was alienated from God, and could only remain in covenant with the Lord, and live in His kingdom, on the ground of His grace which covered its sin. May not the apostle have had this ransom-money in mind when he said to the people of the new covenant, Ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ? (E. E. Atwater.)
Gifts of materials for the construction of the Tabernacle
Many chapels are burdened with a load of debt occasioned by the bad habit of congregations building, either wholly or in part, with borrowed money. But the Hebrews acted more nobly than such builders, for they collected by voluntary contributions the entire materials with which the sanctuary was constructed ere they began to build (Exo 25:1-9; Exo 35:4-9; Exo 35:20-30). Their free-will offering for the work of the Tabernacle is, in many respects, the most splendid one that was ever given for the purpose of raising a place of worship. (W. Brown.)
Gold
Foremost in the procession of willing-hearted offerers came men and women bringing bracelets, and ear-rings, and seal-rings, and tablets, all of gold (Exo 35:22), till the heap comprised many thousands of articles, and weighed no less than 29 talents and 730 shekels (Exo 38:24), equal to 43,865 ounces, the value of which at the present day is f180,000 sterling. (W. Brown.)
Silver
Gold was contributed by men and women, but silver by men only. This, however, was not on account of the women, who cheerfully gave their gold ornaments, refusing to part with their silver ones, but because silver was to be taken from none but adult males, who were required to give half a shekel each as a ransom for the soul (person) (Exo 30:11-16). The sum of the silver brought was 100 talents and 1775 shekels, or 301,775 shekels (Exo 38:25-27), which proves that every one of the 603,550 men comprising the Hebrew encampment paid the price of his redemption. This was done, however, not by compulsion, but freely; the silver as well as the gold was to be a free-will offering (Exo 25:2-3). The whole was equal to 150,887 ounces, and would now realize 40,000 sterling, Silver appears to have been the only metal used as money by the Hebrews, at least up to the period of the Exodus, and this circumstance no doubt accounts for the ransom price being paid in silver (Gen 23:15; Gen 37:28). (W. Brown.)
Brass
Gold and silver were the most precious metals, but brass (copper) was also needed for the work of the Tabernacle, and those who possessed it–and amongst them might be some who had no gold to bestow–brought 70 talents and 2,400 shekels (Exo 38:29), equal to 106,200 ounces. The original word rendered brass in the text is from a Hebrew root signifying to shine. (W. Brown.)
Typical import of materials
1. Gold. Type of the Divine glory of the Lord Jesus as Son of God.
2. Silver. The preciousness of the Lord Jesus as the Ransom for the sinner.
3. Brass. The power of the Lord Jesus to endure the cross, because He is God.
4. Blue. The manifestation of God as love, in the ways and death of Christ.
5. Purple. The manifestation of the God-Man, God manifest in the flesh.
6. Scarlet. The manifestation of the true dignity and glory of man as seen in the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of Man.
7. Fine linen. The righteous man exhibiting to the eye of faith the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
8. Goatshair. The memorial of the death of the Lord Jesus as the offering for sin.
9. Ramsskins dyed red. The outward aspect of Christ as the Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Born in this world to die.
10. Badgersskins. The outward aspect of Christ, as having no form nor comeliness to the heart of the natural man.
11. Shittim wood. The Lord Jesus, the incorruptible Man. That holy thing, the Son of God.
12. Oil for the light. The Lord Jesus as the light; filled with the Spirit.
13. Spices for anointing oil. The graces of the Spirit in all their fulness manifested by the Christ.
14. Spices for sweet incense. The fragrant graces of Christ made manifest on the cross, and perpetuated in His intercession.
15. Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod and the breastplate. The glory and brilliancy of the Heavenly One reflected also in His saints. (H. W. Soltau.)
Offerings accompanied with devotion
Almost every hill in Mongolia is adorned with a cairn of stones on the very top. This cairn is a thing of the Mongolian religion. When it is determined to erect one, men, women, and children turn out and gather stones, repeating prayers over each stone; and thus the raised heap represents much devotion on the part of the gatherers. Oh, that all contributions in Christian lands for Christian objects were raised in the same way. Gifts are good, but gifts accompanied by heart-felt devotion are better. (S. S. Chronicle.)
The pocket converted
John Wesley used to say that he never believed in a mans conversion until his pocket was converted.
A Divine plan for building
There is a beautiful story told of the plan by which Strasburg Cathedral was made. The architect, Erwin von Steinbach, who was given the commission to build it, was greatly troubled lest he should not get his plan sufficiently noble. He had a daughter named Sabine, who was skilful in drawing, and one night, after they had wept together over the plans, she said to her father, Dont despair; God will help us. After she fell asleep she dreamed that a beautiful angel came, and when she had told her story, said; You shall make the plan for the minster. The angel and Sabine then set to work, and soon the plan was done. When she awoke she uttered a loud scream, for there was a paper before her covered with wonderful drawing. Her father exclaimed, Child, it was no dream. The angel really visited you, bringing the inspiration from heaven to help us. He built the cathedral after the plan, and it was so beautiful that the people really believed the story. (Great Thoughts.)
Blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen.–
Symbolism of colour
The symbolism of colour in the Tabernacle was confined to the curtains of the edifice and the garments of its priesthood, both of which were of fine-twined linen, blue, purple, and crimson. The four colours indicated all inhered in the same material subjected to different processes of manufacture; the fine thread of the byssus being in one process bleached to the greatest possible whiteness, and in the other three dyed with blue, purple, and crimson.
1. That white linen was employed as a symbol, appears from many passages of the New Testament, where its significance is declared and explained. It was a representative of light, resembling it somewhat in colour (Mat 17:2), but more in brightness (Luk 9:29; Luk 24:4; Mar 9:3), and purity (Rev 19:8; Rev 19:14; Rev 15:6).
2. The Hebrew word rendered blue is primarily the name of a shell-fish, and derivatively of the dye yielded by it. If Moses would represent that Jehovah, whose dwelling is in heaven, had come down to earth to dwell with His covenant people, how could he do it better than by employing in the habitation made with hands the azure hue of the visible heaven? If he wished to teach that the priests, and the sacrifices they offered were an example and shadow of heavenly things, how pertinent would it be to weave into their official attire threads of that cerulean tint, which in his day communicated such thoughts to the eye as are now conveyed to the ear by the audible pronunciation of the word heaven!
3. Cloth of purple was much prized by the Greeks and Romans, who included under this appellation a wide range of colour, extending from red slightly tinged with blue to shades in which the blue was predominant; the dye being in all cases derived from shell-fish. In the earlier days of Rome, purple had been worn only by magistrates as a badge of office; but the progress of wealth and luxury was afterward so great, that the first of the emperors thought it necessary to put restriction on the use of it in order to preserve the significance of the ancient symbol; and eventually certain fabrics of this colour, including those held in highest estimation, were entirely interdicted to the Roman citizens, and reserved for the exclusive use of the imperial household. In the employment of purple as a mark of official distinction, the Romans followed the custom of some, if not all older nations (see Jdg 8:26; Dan 5:7, margin). Not only kings, emperors, and their subordinates in civil authority, wore this colour, but sometimes priests, as a mark of honour to their office and the deities they served. Even the images of the gods were adorned with raiment of purple. The appearance of this colour, then, in the curtains of the Hebrew Tabernacle marked that central edifice as the habitation of the Ruler of the encampment. The purple in the garments of the priests indicated that they belonged to the royal household, and were officers of the King.
4. The two Hebrew words which taken together are rendered scarlet, denote a colour derived from an insect called by naturalists coccus ilicis, found in large quantities on certain species of the oak. The Arabic name of the insect is kermes, the root of our word crimson. The only natural object to which the tint is applied in the Old Testament is the lips (Son 4:3). It seems probable (see Gen 38:28; Lev 14:4-7; Num 19:6; Jos 2:18) that this colour was used as a symbol of life; deriving this significance from blood, which was itself the vehicle and representative of the vital force. (E. E. Atwater.)
The colours
1. Blue, being the colour of the heaven, as it appears to man looking up into it, may be regarded not unnaturally as speaking of God. The Israelites were bidden to have fringes on the borders of their garments, and upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue (Num 15:38), doubtless to be a perpetual reminder to them in their daily life that, they were the people of God.
2. Scarlet, or red, is the colour which, after blue, occurs most frequently in connection with the Tabernacle. As blue speaks of God the Creator, so red, or scarlet, speaks of the world, or of man the creature.
3. Purple is formed from the intermingling of scarlet and blue, and thus corresponds to twelve among numbers, which is the result of three multiplied into four, and is, therefore, the colour of the Incarnation. In the Tabernacle, purple appears side by side with blue and scarlet in the interior hangings, in the veils, and in the vestments of the high-priest. When we remember that the Tabernacle, as a whole, was a type of the Word who tabernacles in us (Joh 1:14), we shall not, I think, find it difficult to acquiesce in the suggestion of a devout and learned writer, that the purple appears to have foreshadowed the hypostatical union, i.e., the union of the Divine and human natures in the person of our Lord. It would seem to have been selected to reveal the intimacy and perfection of this union; and the constituent colours of purple, red, and blue, to have been set in juxtaposition with it, to teach that, although the two natures are thus combined in Him, yet are they not absorbed in each other, as if the Divine had been lost in the human, or the human in the Divine, but ever remain to co-exist, notwithstanding their most perfect union.
4. The three colours already spoken of were conjoined with the whiteness of fine linen. White is symbolic of cleansing from sin (Isa 1:18; cf. Rev 7:14; Psa 51:7). White is also symbolical of perfect dazzling holiness (Dan 7:9; cf. Rev 6:2; Rev 14:14; Rev 19:11; Rev 20:11). In the Tabernacle the fine white linen would tell of the purity and holiness which results from that union of the Divine with the human which was already indicated by the three colours with which it was conjoined. The great lesson, therefore, which everywhere met the eye of the worshipper in the fine linen hangings of the outer court, and in the blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine-twined linen of the veils, and sacerdotal vestments, was none other than this, Ye shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. (E. F. Willis, M. A.)
Goats hair
Goatshair formed part of the free-will offerings of the Israelites (Exo 35:23). Many of the goats of the East have black hair, of which cloth is made for tent coverings, but there are some species of goats which have fine white silky hair, among which is the Angora goat, and not a few writers are of opinion that it was hair of this sort with which the tent of the Tabernacle was made. (W. Brown.)
Rams skins
The Israelites, being rich in flocks and herds, would have no difficulty in supplying ramsskins. Those brought by the Israelites (Exo 35:23) were dyed, and probably tanned. Leather of this very description (says Dr. Thomson) is still sold in Syrian towns. From time out of mind the southern part of Syria and Palestine has been supplied with mutton from the great plains and deserts in the north, east, and south; and the shepherds do not ordinarily bring the females to market. The vast flocks which annually come from Armenia and northern Syria are nearly all males. The leather, therefore, is literally rams skins dyed red. (W. Brown.)
Badgers skins
The Hebrews brought badgers (tachash) as well as ramsskins. It is generally admitted that badger is a wrong interpretation of the Hebrew word tachash, but the learned are not agreed as to what animal is intended. Some are of opinion that it was a fish, and others that it was a quadruped; but whether it swam the ocean or ranged the forest, it was likely a large and powerful creature, since its skin was used for the sacred tents outer covering, which doubtless required to be of a tough and strong nature. This would not, however, prevent the skins from being made suitable for ornamental purposes. Sandals formed of these skins appear to have been worn by ladies when dressed in the most costly and splendid attire, and decked with the most precious ornaments; I have shod thee with badgers skins (Eze 16:10); so there can be little doubt that the outer covering or roof of the Tabernacle was not only strong, but also beautiful and ornamental. It is not improbable that the shoes or sandals of the Israelites were also made of this material; and if they were, it was as effectual in defending their feet as it was in preserving the Tabernacle from those influences that might have been hurtful to it. Thy foot did not swell these forty years? (W. Brown.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
CHAPTER XXV
The Lord addresses Moses out of the Divine glory, and commands him
to speak unto the Israelites, that they may give him free-will
offerings, 1, 2.
The different kinds of offerings, gold, silver, and brass, 3.
Purple, scarlet, fine linen, and goats’ hair, 4.
Rams’ skins, badgers’ skins, (rather violet-coloured skins,)
and shittim wood, 5.
Oil and spices, 6.
Onyx stones, and stones for the ephod and breastplate, 7.
A sanctuary is to be made after the pattern of the
tabernacle, 8, 9.
The ark and its dimensions, 10.
Its crown of gold, 11.
Its rings, 12.
Its staves, and their use, 13-15.
The testimony to be laid up in the ark, 16.
The mercy-seat and its dimensions, 17.
The cherubim, how made and placed, 18-20.
The mercy-seat to be placed on the ark, and the testimony to be put
within it, 21.
The Lord promises to commune with the people from the mercy-seat, 22.
The table of shew-bread, and its dimensions, 23.
Its crown and border of gold, 24, 25.
Its rings, 26, 27.
Staves, 28.
Dishes, spoons, and bowls, 29.
Its use, 30.
The golden candlestick; its branches, bowls, knops, and
flowers, 31-36.
Its seven lamps, 37.
Tongs and snuffers, 38.
The weight of the candlestick and its utensils, one talent of
gold, 39.
All to be made according to the pattern showed to Moses on the
mount, 40.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXV
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Having delivered the moral and judicial laws, he now comes to the ceremonial law, wherein he sets down all things very minutely and particularly, whereas in the other laws he was content to lay down general rules, and leaveth many other things to be by analogy deduced from them. The reason of the difference seems to be this, that the light of reason implanted in all men, gives him greater help in the discovery of moral and judicial things than in ceremonial matters, or in the external way and manner of Gods worship; which is a thing depending wholly upon Gods institution, and not left to mans invention, which is a very incompetent judge of those things, as appears from hence, because the wittiest men, destitute of Gods revelation, have been guilty of most foolery in their devices of Gods worship.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
1. the Lord spake unto Moses,&c.The business that chiefly occupied Moses on the mount,whatever other disclosures were made to him there, was in receivingdirections about the tabernacle, and they are here recorded as givento him.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And the Lord spake unto Moses,…. When on the mount, and in the midst of the cloud with him:
saying; as follows.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Exo 25:1-3 (cf. Exo 35:1-9). The Israelites were to bring to the Lord a heave-offering ( from , a gift lifted, or heaved by a man from his own property to present to the Lord; see at Lev 2:9), “ on the part of every one whom his heart drove, ” i.e., whose heart was willing (cf. Exo 35:5, Exo 35:22): viz., gold, silver, brass, etc.
Exo 25:4 , , purple of a dark blue shade, approaching black rather than bright blue. , (Chald. , 2 Chron, Exo 2:6; Dan 5:7, Dan 5:16; – Sanskrit, rgaman or rgavan, colore rubro praeditus ), true purple of a dark red colour. , literally the crimson prepared from the dead bodies and nests of the glow-worm,
(Note: Glanzwurm: “the Linnean name is coccus ilicis . It frequents the boughs of a species of ilex; on these it lays its eggs in groups, which become covered with a kind of down.” Smith’s Dictionary, Art. Colours. – Tr.)
then the scarlet-red purple, or crimson. , , from to be white, a fine white cotton fabric, not linen, muslin, or net. goats, here goats’ hair ( , lxx).
Exo 25:5 rams’ skins reddened, i.e., dyed red. is either the seal, phoca, or else, as this is not known to exist in the Arabian Gulf, the = of the ancients, as Knobel supposes, or , the sea-cow ( Manati, Halicora), which is found in the Red Sea, and has a skin that is admirably adapted for sandals. Hesychius supposes it to have been the latter, which is probably the same as the large fish Tn or Atm, that is caught in the Red Sea, and belongs to the same species as the Halicora (Robinson, Pal. i. p. 170); as its skin is also used by the Bedouin Arabs for making sandals ( Burckhardt, Syr. p. 861). In the Manati the upper skin differs from the under; the former being larger, thicker, and coarser than the latter, which is only two lines in thickness and very tough, so that the skin would be well adapted either for the thick covering of tents or for the finer kinds of ornamental sandals (Eze 16:10). acacia-wood. for , the true acacia ( acacia vera ), which grows in Egypt and on the Arabian peninsula into a tree of the size of a nut-tree, or even larger;
(Note: See Abdallatif’s Merkwrdigkeiten Aegyptens, and Rosenmller, Althk. iv. i. pp. 278-9. This genuine acacia, Sont, must not be confounded, according to Robinson ( Pal. 2, 350), with the Acacia gumnifera (Talh). Seetzen also makes a distinction between the Thollhh, the Szont of the Egyptians, and the Szeil, and between an acacia which produces gum and one which does not; but he also observes that the same tree is called both Thollhh and Szeil in different places. He then goes on to say that he did not find a single tree large enough to furnish planks of ten cubits in length and one and a half in breadth for the construction of the ark (he means, of the tabernacle), and he therefore conjectures that the Israelites may have gone to Egypt for the materials with which to build the tabernacle. But he has overlooked the fact, that it is not stated in the text of the Bible that the boards of the tabernacle, which were a cubit and a half in breadth, were cut from one plank of the breadth named; and also that the trees in the valleys of the peninsula of Sinai are being more and more sacrificed to the charcoal trade of the Bedouin Arabs (see p. 366), and therefore that no conclusion can be drawn from the present condition of the trees as to what they were in the far distant antiquity.)
the only tree in Arabia deserta from which planks could be cut, and the wood of which is very light and yet very durable.
Exo 25:6 Oil for the candlestick (see at Exo 27:20). perfumes, spices for the anointing oil (see at Exo 30:22.), and for the incense ( , lit., the scents, because the materials of which it was composed were not all of them fragrant; see at Exo 30:34.).
Exo 25:7 Lastly, precious stones, probably beryls (see at Gen 2:12), for the ephod (Exo 28:9), and , lit., stones of filling, i.e., jewels that are set (see Exo 28:16.). On ephod ( ), see at Exo 28:6; and on , at Exo 28:15. The precious stones were presented by the princes of the congregation (Exo 35:27).
Exo 25:8-9 With these freewill-offerings they were to make the Lord a sanctuary, that He might dwell in the midst of them (see at Exo 25:22). “ According to all that I let thee see (show thee), the pattern of the dwelling and the pattern of all its furniture, so shall ye make it.” The participle does not refer to the past; and there is nothing to indicate that it does, either in Exo 25:40, where “in the mount” occurs, or in the use of the preterite in Exo 26:30; Exo 27:8. It does not follow from the expression, “which is showed thee in the mount,” that Moses had already left the mountain and returned to the camp; and the use of the preterite in the passages last named may be simply explained, either on the supposition that the sight of the pattern or model of the whole building and its component parts preceded the description of the different things required for the completion of the building, or that the instructions to make the different parts in such and such a way, pointed to a time when the sight of the model really belonged to the past. On the other hand, the model for the building could not well be shown to Moses, before he had been told that the gifts to be made by the people were to be devoted to the building of a sanctuary. , from to build, lit., a building, then a figure of anything, a copy of representation of different things, Deu 4:17.; a drawing or sketch, 2Ki 16:10: it never means the original, not even in Psa 144:12, as Delitzsch supposes (see his Com. on Heb 8:5). In such passages as 1Ch 28:11-12, 1Ch 28:19, where it may be rendered plan, it does not signify an original, but simply means a model or drawing, founded upon an idea, or taken from some existing object, according to which a building was to be constructed. Still less can the object connected with in the genitive be understood as referring to the original, from which the was taken; so that we cannot follow the Rabbins in their interpretation of this passage, as affirming that the heavenly originals of the tabernacle and its furniture had been shown to Moses in a vision upon the mountain. What was shown to him was simply a picture or model of the earthly tabernacle and its furniture, which were to be made by him. Both Act 7:44 and Heb 8:5 are perfectly reconcilable with this interpretation of our verse, which is the only one that can be grammatically sustained. The words of Stephen, that Moses was to make the tabernacle , “according to the fashion that he had seen,” are so indefinite, that the text of Exodus must be adduced to explain them. And when the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews cites the words, “See that thou make all things ” (according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount), from Exo 25:40 of this chapter, as a proof the Levitical priests only served the type and shadow of heavenly things ( ); it is true, his words may be understood as showing that he regarded the earthly tabernacle with all its arrangements as only the counterpart and copy of a heavenly original. But this interpretation is neither necessary nor well founded. For although the author, by following the Sept., in which is rendered , the suffix being dropped, leaves it just a possible thing to understand the shown to Moses as denoting a heavenly tabernacle (or temple); yet he has shown very clearly that this was not his own view, when he explains the “patterns of things in the heavens” ( ) and “the true” things ( ) of both the tabernacle and its furniture as denoting the “ heaven ” ( ) into which Christ had entered, and not any temple in heaven. If the are heaven itself, the showed to Moses cannot have been a temple in heaven, but either heaven itself, or, more probably still, as there could be no necessity for this to be shown to Moses in a pictorial representation, a picture of heavenly things or divine realities, which was shown to Moses that he might copy and embody it in the earthly tabernacle.
(Note: The conclusion drawn by Delitzsch (Hebrerbrief, p. 337), that because the author does not refer to anything between the and their (Exo 9:24), the can only have consisted of the themselves, is a mistake. All that the premises preclude, is the intervention of any objective reality, or third material object, but not the introduction of a pictorial representation, through which Moses was shown how to copy the heavenly realities and embody them in an earthly form. The earthly tent would no more be a copy of the copy of a heavenly original in this case, than a palace built according to a model is a copy of that model. Moreover, Delitzsch himself thinks it is “not conceivable that, when Moses was favoured with a view of the heavenly world, it was left to him to embody what he saw in a material form, to bring it within the limits of space.” He therefore assumes, both for the reason assigned, and because “no mortal has ever looked directly at heavenly things,” that “inasmuch as what was seen could not be directly reflected in the mirror of his mind, not to mention the retina of his eye, it was set before him in a visible form, and according to the operation of God who showed it, in a manner adapted to serve as a model of the earthly sanctuary to be erected.” Thus he admits that it is true that Moses did not see the heavenly world itself, but only a copy of it that was shown to him by God.)
If we understand the verse before us in this sense, it merely expresses what is already implied in the fact itself. If God showed Moses a picture or model of the tabernacle, and instructed him to make everything exactly according to this pattern, we must assume that in the tabernacle and its furniture heavenly realities were to be expressed in earthly forms; or, to put it more clearly, that the thoughts of God concerning salvation and His kingdom, which the earthly building was to embody and display, were visibly set forth in the pattern shown. The symbolical and typical significance of the whole building necessarily follows from this, though without our being obliged to imitate the Rabbins, and seek in the tabernacle the counterpart or copy of a heavenly temple. What these divine thoughts were that were embodied in the tabernacle, can only be gathered from the arrangement and purpose of the whole building and its separate parts; and upon this point the description furnishes so much information, that when read in the light of the whole of the covenant revelation, it gives to all the leading points precisely the clearness that we require.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Tabernacle and Its Furniture. | B. C. 1491. |
1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2 Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering. 3 And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, 4 And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats’ hair, 5 And rams’ skins dyed red, and badgers’ skins, and shittim wood, 6 Oil for the light, spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense, 7 Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breastplate. 8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. 9 According to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it.
We may suppose that when Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and abode there so long, where the holy angels attended the shechinah, or divine Majesty, he saw and heard very glorious things relating to the upper world, but they were things which it was not lawful nor possible to utter; and therefore, in the records he kept of the transactions there, he says nothing to satisfy the curiosity of those who would intrude into the things which they have not seen, but writes that only which he was to speak to the children of Israel. For the scripture is designed to direct us in our duty, not to fill our heads with speculations, nor to please our fancies.
In these verses God tells Moses his intention in general, that the children of Israel should build him a sanctuary, for he designed to dwell among them (v. 8); and some think that, though there were altars and groves used for religious worship before this, yet there never was any house, or temple, built for sacred uses in any nation before this tabernacle was erected by Moses, and that all the temples which were afterwards so much celebrated among the heathen took rise from this and pattern by it. God had chosen the people of Israel to be a peculiar people to himself (above all people), among whom divine revelation, and a religion according to it, should be lodged and established: he himself would be their King. As their King, he had already given them laws for the government of themselves, and their dealings one with another, with some general rules for religious worship, according to the light of reason and the law of nature, in the ten commandments and the following comments upon them. But this was not thought sufficient to distinguish them from other nations, or to answer to the extent of that covenant which God would make with them to be their God; and therefore,
I. He orders a royal palace to be set up among them for himself, here called a sanctuary, or holy place, or habitation, of which it is said (Jer. xvii. 12), A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary. This sanctuary is to be considered,
1. As ceremonial, consonant to the to the other institutions of that dispensation, which consisted in carnal ordinances (Heb. ix. 10); hence it is called a worldly sanctuary, Heb. ix. 1. God in it kept his court, as Israel’s King. (1.) There he manifested his presence among them, and it was intended for a sign or token of his presence, that, while they had that in the midst of them, they might never again ask, Is the Lord among us or not? And, because in the wilderness they dwelt in tents, even this royal palace was ordered to be a tabernacle too, that it might move with them, and might be an instance of the condescension of the divine favour. (2.) There he ordered his subjects to attend him with their homage and tribute. Thither they must come to consult his oracles, thither they must bring their sacrifices, and there all Israel must meet, to pay their joint respects to the God of Israel.
2. As typical; the holy places made with hands were the figures of the true, Heb. ix. 24. The gospel church is the true tabernacle, which the Lord hath pitched, and not man, Heb. viii. 2. The body of Christ, in and by which he made atonement, was the greater and more perfect tabernacle, Heb. ix. 11. The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, as in a tabernacle.
II. When Moses was to erect this palace, it was requisite that he should first be instructed where he must have the materials, and where he must have the model; for he could neither contrive it by his own ingenuity nor build it at his own charge; he is therefore directed here concerning both.
1. The people must furnish him with the materials, not by a tax imposed upon them, but by a voluntary contribution. This is the first thing concerning which orders are here given.
(1.) Speak unto the children of Israel that they bring me an offering; and there was all the reason in the world that they should, for (v. 1), [1.] It was God himself that had not only enlarged them, but enriched them with the spoils of the Egyptians. He had instructed them to borrow, and he had inclined the Egyptians to lend, so that from him they had their wealth, and therefore it was fit they should devote it to him and use it for him, and thus make a grateful acknowledgement of the favours they had received. Note, First, The best use we can make of our worldly wealth is to honour God with it in works of piety and charity. Secondly, When we have been blessed with some remarkable success in our affairs, and have had, as we say, a good turn, it may be justly expected that we should do something more than ordinary for the glory of God, consecrating our gain, in some reasonable proportion of it, to the Lord of the whole earth, Mic. iv. 13. [2.] The sanctuary that was to be built was intended for their benefit and comfort, and therefore they must be at the expense of it. They had been unworthy of the privilege if they had grudged at the charge. They might well afford to offer liberally for the honour of God, while they lived at free quarters, having food for themselves and their families rained upon them daily from heaven. We also must own that we have our all from God’s bounty, and therefore ought to use all for his glory. Since we live upon him, we must live to him.
(2.) This offering must be given willingly, and with the heart, that is, [1.] It was not prescribed to them what or how much they must give, but it was left to their generosity, that they might show their good-will to the house of God and the offices thereof, and might do it with a holy emulation, the zeal of a few provoking many, 2 Cor. ix. 2. We should ask, not only, “What must we do?” but, “What may we do for God?” [2.] Whatever they gave, they must give it cheerfully, not grudgingly and with reluctance, for God loves a cheerful giver, 2 Cor. ix. 7. What is laid out in the service of God we must reckon well bestowed.
(3.) The particulars are here mentioned which they must offer (v. 3-7), all of them things that there would be occasion for in the tabernacle, or the service of it. Some observe that here was gold, silver, and brass, provided, but no iron; that is the military metal, and this was to be a house of peace. Every thing that was provided was very rich and fine, and the best of the sort; for God, who is the best, should have the best.
2. God himself would furnish him with the model: According to all that I show thee, v. 9. God showed him an exact plan of it, in miniature, which he must conform to in all points. Thus Ezekiel saw in vision the form of the house and the fashion thereof, Ezek. xliii. 11. Note, Whatsoever is done in God’s service must be done by his direction, and not otherwise. Yet God did not only show him the model, but gave him also particular directions how to frame the tabernacle according to that model, in all the parts of it, which he goes over distinctly in this and the following chapters. When Moses, in the beginning of Genesis, was to describe the creation of the world, though it is such a stately and curious fabric and made up of such a variety and vast number of particulars, yet he gave a very short and general account of it, and nothing compared with what the wisdom of this world would have desired and expected from one that wrote by divine revelation; but, when he comes to describe the tabernacle, he does it with the greatest niceness and accuracy imaginable. He that gave us no account of the lines and circles of the globe, the diameter of the earth, or the height and magnitude of the stars, has told us particularly the measure of every board and curtain of the tabernacle; for God’s church and instituted religion are more precious to him and more considerable than all the rest of the world. And the scriptures were written, not to describe to us the works of nature, a general view of which is sufficient to lead us to the knowledge and service of the Creator, but to acquaint us with the methods of grace, and those things which are purely matters of divine revelation. The blessedness of the future state is more fully represented under the notion of a new Jerusalem than under the notion of new heavens and a new earth.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
EXODUS – CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Verses 1-9:
Prior to this time, the worship of Jehovah had been associated with altars. No specific form or place of worship was prescribed. But chapters 25-31 give precise instructions both of the manner and place Israel is to worship God. He begins by requiring that Israel bring their very best, as a free-will offering to be used in providing for Him a dwelling place among them.
Offering terumah, lit. a “heave offering.” In the Law, the “heave offering” consisted of the right thigh of the sacrificial animal (regarded as the choicest part), and one cake of the peace offering (Le 7:14). All “heave offerings” were to be eaten at the Tabernacle (Temple), De 12:6, 11. They were considered sacred, and belonged to the officiating priest. The “heave offering” was regarded as the best of the sacrifice, appropriate for the guest of honor (1Sa 9:24). In the text, the “offering” consisted of the choice, most valuable of Israel’s possessions. The word in the Septuagint is aparches, meaning “first-fruits.”
This text teaches that God’s people are to offer freely the best of all they have, in acknowledgment that all they have belongs to God.
The Tabernacle was to be built with free-will offerings, in addition to the tithes Jehovah required.
“Gold” was required for the furniture and utensils used inside the Tabernacle.
“Silver” was required for the sockets supporting the boards of the Tabernacle walls.
“Brass” nechosheth, “copper.” Brass, an alloy of copper and zinc, was not common in the age Moses lived. Some historians believe the “brass” of the Bible to be “bronze,” an alloy of copper and tin. “Brass” (copper) was used for taches (pins) for the outer curtains, for the sockets of the outer court, for the laver, and for the great altar.
The colors designated the various fabrics which were used in the curtains and hangings of the Tabernacle.
“Blue” is indigo, the ordinary blue dye of Egypt.
“Purple” was a dye derived from a shell-fish, Murex trunculus. It was a warm reddish tint, nearly crimson. This color was usually reserved for royalty.
“Scarlet” was the product of a cochineal insect, Cocus ilicis, found on certain oak trees.
“Goats’ hair,” the soft inner wool of the Angora goat. The women spun this fibre into a fine worsted yarn which was woven into fabric frequently used in making tents.
Leather manufacturing was well-known in the ancient world. The “rams’ skins” were likely brought from Egypt.
“Badgers’ skins” takhash, a term applied to marine animals, such as seals, dolphins, etc. The term here likely refers to seals’ skins.
“Shittim” shittah, the acacia tree. A hard, close-grained wood, ideal for cabinet-work, usually of an orange color.
“Oil,” pure olive oil, Ex 27:20.
The spices are listed in Ex 30:23, 24. They were to be used both in the anointing oil, and the incense.
“Onyx” stones were used in the breastplate of the high priest. The other stones to be used in this article are not here listed.
“Sanctuary” micdash, from a word meaning “to be holy.” This term is never used to refer to pagan temples.
“Pattern” tabnith, “building, for,” or blueprint. God showed Moses the exact form for both the Tabernacle, and the instruments to be used in it, Heb 8:5.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES.
Exo. 25:2. An offering.] Trumah, from the root rom, that which is taken off, from what has been put by as private property reserved for special enjoyment. Hence the injunction, of every man whose heart impelleth him, as there might be some who would not willingly part with what they associated in their hearts as pleasurable enjoyments, for the offering was to consist of choice things. Trumah = offering, also admits of the meaning raised, i.e., to higher purpose, from the very things set apart for earthly pleasures offering should be made for the building of the sanctuary. Gifts coming only from persons whose heart impelleth them had to be the material of which the sanctuary was to be constructed, and in such love-built sanctuary, Jehovah was willing to dwell.
Exo. 25:9. Pattern] = tabnith, model or prototype, conveys the idea that a higher purport than the construction of a temporary tabernacle was the design of that pattern, evidently foreshadowing Him who came and tabernacled among us, and in the tabernacle of our flesh lovingly offered by the blessed Virgin. Be it unto me according to Thy word (Luk. 1:38).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Exo. 25:1-10
THE LAWS OF SACRIFICE AND SERVICE[1]
[1] Most of the sketches on Chapters 2533 are specially contributed to this Commentary by Rev. W. L. Walkinson.
We are taught here
I. That whatsoever is done for God must be done willingly. Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring Me an offering, Exo. 25:2. The sanctuary was to be built through offerings, not by a tax. Of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart, Exo. 25:2. There was to be no constraint or coercion. The Hebrew is literally rendered: On the part of every one whom his heart drove.Keil. How noble is service and sacrifice when it is the spontaneous fruit of the spirit! How joyful is such giving and work! The man has not to spur himself, to argue with himself, to just move himself to action and charity by constraint, but his heart drives him, and his work and giving are full of joyfulness. How efficacious such service! A piece of brass touched by a loving soul has more power in it than shekels of gold given by cold hearts and cold hands.
II. That whatsoever is done for God must be our best, Exo. 25:3-7. All things of beauty, preciousness, sweetness, and brightness. We must ever give God our best. Let us be sure that we give Him the best of ourselvesour life in the beauty, sweetness, and preciousness of youth, and not the scraps of a wasted life; let us give Him the best of our powers in seeking to understand His word and worship at His feet; let us not always give Him the smallest coin in our purse; let us not give Him the worthless scraps of our time, or wealth, or ability, or influence; but consecrate to Him the rarest, fairest, brightest gifts of life and fortune.
III. That whatsoever is done for God must be done according to Divine method, Exo. 25:9. And this command is constantly repeated. Let us beware of will-worship. God has great reasons for all His commandments, and we must not lightly depart from them. We must carry out Gods work on the lines laid down in Gods Word.
IV. That whatsoever is thus done for God secures a great reward. And let them make Me a sanctuary: that I may dwell among them, Exo. 25:8. The people gave of their treasures to erect the tabernacle, and then a Glory shone there full of truth and grace. Whatsoever is done simply and spiritually for God, brings us nearer to God, brings God nearer to us. Let all bring their services and sacrifices to God. The princes gave the jewels (Exo. 35:27), but the poor could give the brass; the rich gave the gold and scarlet, but the common people could give a rams or badgers skin. And if all give their best, God shall bless all alike (2Co. 8:11-12).
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Exo. 25:1-10. How befitting the wealthy members of Christs Church among us is disinterested liberality; The tabernacle was mainly formed of the spoils of Egypt: should not our worldly gains be hallowed, in greater or less proportion, to the glory and honour of God? The people of Israel brought much more than enough for the service of the works which the Lord commanded to be made. Indeed, Moses gave commandment and they caused it to be proclaimed throughout the camp, Let neither man nor woman make any more work for the offering of the sanctuary. So the people were restrained from bringing (Exo. 36:5-6). Only think of a proclamation in Christian England to restrain the liberality of British Churches in the cause and service of their Lord and Saviour! What a rebuke to our too general parsimony is here!
W. Mudge.
Surely, divine philanthropy needs not the excitement and the gaze of notoriety to give it impulse. When the stony rock of the human heart is smitten, and a fountain of living water therein opened, its overflowings will be felt, and the Christian, like Abraham, will become a blessing in the place of his sojourn. Israels offering to the tabernacle was a willing offering: and it is the will spiritualised, subdued, and sweetly captivated to the yoke of Christ, that constitutes the seat and source of all true charity. The walls of Jerusalem rose rapidly under Nehemiah and his faithful coadjutors, for the defence and security of the holy city against Sanballat and his arrogant compeers; and the reason assigned for the successful prosecution of their labour is, The people had a mind to the work (Exo. 4:6). With like-mindedness, like results would follow: whereas, without a primary consecration of ourselves to God, our most laborious efforts may prove abortive. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly or of necessity: for the Lord loveth a cheerful giver (2Co. 9:7). It is principle which the great Father and Giver of all Good chiefly regards in the conduct of His creatures (1Sa. 16:7). Hence it is, that mites may be inestimable and millions may be contemptible. Look well, then, unto the state of your hearts before God, and let no attention, however sedulous and constant, to the outward custom and duties of religion, make you forgetful of your inward frame. And at the same time, remember, the higher your station in society, the more commanding your influence and wealth may be, still greater responsibilities rest upon youIbid.
(1.) The tabernacle then was a type or emblem of Jesus Christ. The Word was made flesh, and dwelt,or as the original expresses it, tabernacledamong us. Such a manner of representing the sojourn of the spirit within its tenement of clay, is frequent among the sacred writers. St. Paul calls the body our earthly house of this tabernacle. St. Peter declares that he must soon put it off, or exchange mortality for life. Even thus, the Saviour spake of His own flesh, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. His body was the vail; and in His incarnation, when He descended from heaven, and became Emmanuel, God with us, He shrouded essential Deity in the likeness of our flesh. And as the Most High dwelt visibly within the sanctuary, even on the ark, so did He reside in the human nature and tabernacle of His dear Son: for in Christ dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. We beheld His glory, the glory, as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Dark, indeed, had been the tabernacle in the wilderness, unless the Shekinah had shed its radiance through it, and the glory of the Lord had filled it. Dark and dreary had been the humanity of Christ, to the eye of those who looked for salvation through Him, unless, in the humiliation of that external character which exhibited no beauty that we should desire Him, they could also behold the ineffable splendour shed forth by the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself.
(2.) This consideration leads me to add, that the tabernacle was a symbol of every real Christian. God dwelt within the sanctuary in the wilderness. He dwells within every renewed and believing heart. I will set My sanctuary among them for evermore. My tabernacle also shall be with them. Ye are the temples of the living God. In Christ Jesus ye also are builded together for an habitation of God, through the Spirit. In the soul of every true follower of the Saviour does the Father dwell, the object of his worship, the author of his blessings, the principles of his spiritual and everlasting life. And, as the ark held the commandments and kept them from pollution, so must he in whom the Father dwells, and in whom Christ is formed the hope of glory, lay up the law in his heart, and preserve it from pollution.
The tabernacle also typified the Church. It was an emblem of the heavenly temple. I heard, said the beloved John, when the consummated felicities of the Redeemers Church burst upon him in the visions of PatmosI heard a great voice out of heaven, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God. Did He take up His dwelling in their hearts, as over the ark, in the ancient sanctuary? Did His love, His presence, and His Spirit fill their minds, as the Shekinah filled the holy of holies? Oh, then, what will be the splendour of His appearance, when the cloud shall be withdrawn, and His faithful worshippers shall see Him as He is? Glorious things are related of the tabernacle, and glorious things are spoken of thee, O thou temple of the everlasting hills.Buddicom.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
REV. WILLIAM ADAMSON
Typology! Exo. 25:1-40. If you hold up your hand between the candle and the wall, what do you see? That shadow of your hand is not, however, of the same size and colour. It is only an outline. Holding up some beautiful object which we have never seen before, its shadow would give but a feeble impression of itself. So Heb. 10:1 says, that the Law had a shadow of good things to come. Those good things have come; and
Man has gazed on heavenly secrets,
Sunned himself in heavenly glow;
Seen the glory, heard the music,
We are wiser than we know.
Mackay.
Cheerful-Giving! Exo. 25:1.
1. A missionary association having been formed at Huahine, in the South Seas, the native Christians were reminded that they must give willingly with their hearts One, however, brought a pig to the treasurer, Huatia, and throwing the animal down at his feet, said in angry tone, Here is an offering for your society. Huatia calmly explained to the giver that such offerings were for GOD, not for any Society, and that GOD loveth a cheerful giver. He then, to the chagrin of the native, added, Take it back again, for God does not accept angry gifts.
2. In Tahiti, on a similar occasion, a person brought a quantity of cocoanut oil to King Pomare, exclaiming in a very bad spirit, Here are five bamboos of oil; take them for your Missionary Society. The churlish giver was greatly surprised when Pomare pushed aside his offering with the rebuke, I cannot mix your angry bamboos with GODS oil, so take them away. As Beecher says, There are some who give as a perennial fountain does, freely and without force, while there are others who resemble a well which requires much pumping.
See the rivers flowing
Downward to the sea,
Pouring all their treasures
Bountiful and free.
Procter.
Church-Contributions! Exo. 25:2-8. A missionary rode one day into a ruined village seeking subscriptions to build a church in the neighbourhood. He called upon a Negro Christian, whom he found living with his wife and family and beneath the fallen roof of his hut, which the earthquake had recently shaken and shattered. On ascertaining the missionarys object the negro went back to the hut, and from amongst the confusion of overturned furniture brought ten dollars. Struck by this liberal gift, the servant of God remonstrated with the donor, but he promptly replied, Sir, we must build up Gods house before our own, and get into it, and then our prayers will bring down such a blessing as will soon set all right again.
Give, give, be always giving!
Who gives not is not living.
The more you give,
The more you live.
Anon.
Free-Will Offerings! Exo. 25:3.
1. An Alpine missionary relates an interesting circumstance of the Christians at Vanvert, in regard to the scheme for erecting a sanctuary there, Some, he says, gave money in francs, some devoted portions of their wearing apparel, some, and these not a few, sacrificed their earrings and necklaces, some could give nothing but a cheese, or a sheep, they were so poor.
2. This has its parallel in Southern Africa, where, on one occasion, to build a church, the natives contributed oxen, cows, sheep, goats; also horns, skins, ostrich feathers, eggs, &c. Of them, St. Paul might say, Their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberality; for to their power, yea, and beyond their power, they were willing of themselves, praying us with much entreaty that we would receive their gift (1Co. 8:3). Then
Give! as the morning that flows out of heaven;
Give! as the waves when their channel is riven;
Give! as the free air and sunshine are given;
Lavishly, utterly, joyfully give.
Israels-Gifts! Exo. 25:4-7.
1. Bush remarks that the hair of the Eastern goats, particularly that of the Angola species, is of the most delicate and silky softness, and wrought into the kind of cloth known by the name of camlets.
2. Thomson relates that the vast flocks which annually come from Armenia and Northern Syria are nearly all males, and that the leather, therefore, is literally rams skins dyed red.
3. Macmillan says that the spices here were to perfume the oil. It was composed of two paris of myrrh, two parts of cassia, one part cinnamon, and one part sweet calamus, with a sufficient quantity of the purest olive oil to give it the proper consistency.
4. Spices were also used in making the incense; and, according to rabbinical tradition, a priest or Levite, one of the fifteen prefects of the temple, was retained, whose special duty it was to prepare this precious compound. So precious and holy was this sweet incense considered, that it was forbidden to make a similar perfume for private use on pain of death.
Man is the worlds high priest; he doth present
The sacrifice for all; while they below
Unto the service mutter an assent,
Such as springs use at fall, and winds that blow.
Herbert.
Ark-Speech! Exo. 25:10-17. God gives preeminence to the ark; as the heart and core of all religion.
1. It tells us in language clear and emphatic that Christ should fill up the foreground of each thought and word of ours, that no reserve, no unworthy veil should obscure the brightness of His smile, and that no man should hide Him in the rear.
2. It also tells us that underneath the seeming barrenness of the Mosaic tabernacle details lie hidden many precious truthshidden for man to search forhidden, that when sought and found, man may taste the sweetness of discovery and possession. We, therefore, should not forget that
The roots of fairest bloom lie sometime hidden
The deepest underneath the soil; that stones
Of purest crystal are from gloomiest mines.
Bickersteth.
Shittim-Wood! Exo. 25:10. Dr. Shaw says that the acacia, being by far the largest and most common tree of these deserts, there is good reason to conjecture that the shittim-wood, of which the several utensils of the tabernacle were made, was that of the acacia. The tree abounds with flowers of a globular shape, and of an excellent smell; which is another proof of its being the Scripture shitta tree. The name is derived from the Hebrew verb shata, because the sharpness of its spines made animals decline or turn aside. This plant is so hard and solid as to become almost incorruptible. In the prophecies of Isaiah, it is joined with the myrtle and other sweet smelling plants.
The cedar waved its arms of peaceful shade,
The vine embraced the elm, and myrtles flowerd
Among the fragrant orange groves.
Ark-Symbolism! Exo. 25:10. St. John tells us that with enraptured eye, he beheld the Temple of God opened in heaven, and saw therein the ark of Gods testament (Joh. 11:19). The veil had been rent at Christs death; therefore its snowy surface, with richly inwrought cherubic figures of scarlet and gold, no longer concealed the holiest of all from view. The covenant-ark is visible. John gazes on this familiar symbol so often and so long associated with the fortunes and the history of the Hebrew people, the palladium of their liberties, the rallying-point in every hour of disaster. It had now, however, a deeper significance as the type of the great Propitiatorythe true ark of testimony. In the glories of His Divine Person, says Macduff, and in the fulness of His mediatorial work, Jesus is set in the heavenly temple, the pledge and guarantee of eternal safety and peace to the Church purchased with His blood. I thank thee
For countless mercies from Thy hand, my God,
Which never cease;
For each sprinkling of that cleansing blood
Which speaketh peace.
E. C. C. B.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
THE TEXT OF EXODUS
TRANSLATION
25 And Je-ho-vah spake unto Mo-ses, saying, (2) Speak unto the children of Is-ra-el, that they take for me an offering: of every man whose heart maketh him willing ye shall take my offering. (3) And this is the offering which ye shall take of them: gold, and silver, and brass, (4) and blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats hair, (5) and rams skins dyed red, and sealskins, and acacia wood, (6) oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil, and for the sweet incense, (7) onyx stones, and stones to be set, for the eph-od, and for the breastplate. (8) And let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them. (9) According to all that I show thee, the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the furniture thereof, even so shall ye make it.
(10) And they shall make an ark of acacia wood: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. (11) And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, within and without shalt thou overlay it, and shalt make upon it a crown of gold round about. (12) And thou shalt cast four rings of gold for it, and put them in the four feet thereof; and two rings shall be on the one side of it, and two rings on the other side of it. (13) And thou shalt make staves of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold. (14) And thou shalt put the staves into the rings on the sides of the ark, wherewith to bear the ark. (15) The staves shall be in the rings of the ark: they shall not be taken from it. (16) And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee. (17) And thou shalt make a mercy-seat of pure gold: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. (18) And thou shalt make two cher-u-bim of gold; of beaten work shalt thou make them, at the two ends of the mercy-seat.(19) And make one cher-ub at the one end, and one cher-ub at the other end: of one piece with the mercy-seat shall ye make the cher-u-bim on the two ends thereof. (20) And the cher-u-bim shall spread out their wings on high, covering the mercy-seat with their wings, with their faces one to another; toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cher-u-bim be. (21) And thou shalt put the mercy-seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. (22) And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cher-u-bim which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Is-ra-el.
(23) And thou shalt make a table of acacia wood: two cubits shall be the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. (24) And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, and make thereto a crown of gold round about. (25) And thou shalt make unto it a border of a hand-breadth round about; and thou shalt make a golden crown to the border thereof round about. (26) And thou shalt make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings in the four corners that are on the four feet thereof. (27) Close by the border shall the rings be, for places for the staves to bear the table. (28) And thou shalt make the staves of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold, that the table may be borne with them. (29) And thou shalt make the dishes thereof, and the spoons thereof, and the flagons thereof, and the bowls thereof, wherewith to pour out: of pure gold shalt thou make them. (30) And thou shalt set upon the table showbread before me alway.
(31) And thou shalt make a candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work shall the candlestick be made, even its base, and its shaft; its cups, its knops, and its flowers, shall be of one piece with it: (32) and there shall be six branches going out of the sides thereof; three branches of the candlestick out of the one side thereof, and three branches of the candlestick out of the other side thereof: (33) three cups made like almond-blossoms in one branch, a knop and a flower; and three cups made like almond-blossoms in the other branch, a knop and a flower: so for the six branches going out of the candlestick: (34) and in the candlestick four cups made like almond-blossoms, the knops thereof, and the flowers thereof; (35) and a knop under two branches of one piece with it, and a knop under two branches of one piece with it, and a knop under two branches of one piece with it, for the six branches going out of the candlestick. (36) Their knops and their branches shall be of one piece with it; the whole of it one beaten work of pure gold. (37) And thou shalt make the lamps thereof, seven: and they shall light the lamps thereof, to give light over against it. (38) And the snuffers thereof, and the snuffdishes thereof, shall be of pure gold. (39) Of a talent of pure gold shall it be made, with all these vessels. (40) And see that thou make them after their pattern, which hath been showed thee in the mount.
EXPLORING EXODUS: CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
QUESTIONS ANSWERABLE FROM THE BIBLE
1.
What were the Israelites to bring to Jehovah? (Exo. 25:2)
2.
With what feeling were the offerings to be brought? (Exo. 25:2)
3.
What metals were to be offered? (Exo. 25:3)
4.
What colors of cloth were to be brought? (Exo. 25:4)
5.
What types of animal skins were to be brought? (Exo. 25:4-5)
6.
What type of wood was to be brought? (Exo. 25:5)
7.
What were the Israelites to build for God? (Exo. 25:8)
8.
Where would God dwell? (Exo. 25:8; Exo. 29:45; 2Co. 6:16)
9.
According to what was Gods tabernacle to be made? (Exo. 25:9; Exo. 25:40)
10.
What were the dimensions of the ark? (Exo. 25:10)
11.
With what was the ark to be overlaid? (Exo. 25:11)
12.
By what means was the ark to be carried? (Exo. 25:12-13)
13.
Where were the staves of the ark kept? (Exo. 25:15)
14.
What is the testimony? (Exo. 25:16; Exo. 32:15; Exo. 34:29)
15.
What is the mercy-seat? (Exo. 25:17)
16.
What was at the top of the mercy-seat? (Exo. 25:18; Compare Eze. 10:14; Eze. 10:20; Rev. 4:6-8)
17.
How were the cherubim positioned? (Exo. 25:19-20)
18.
From where did God meet and commune with Israel? (Exo. 25:22)
19.
Of what was the tabernacle a type? (Heb. 9:9; Heb. 9:11-12)
20.
Of what was the ark of the covenant a type? (Psa. 99:1; Psa. 80:1; Psa. 97:2; Psa. 89:14)
21.
Of what was the tabernacle a copy? (Heb. 9:23; Heb. 8:5; Compare Rev. 11:19)
22.
What happened when men looked into the ark without the mercy-seat covering its contents? (1Sa. 6:19)
23.
Suggest ways in which Christ compares to the mercy-seat. (Compare 1Jn. 2:2; Rom. 3:25; Heb. 12:24)
24.
Describe the table of showbread. (Exo. 25:23)
25.
Of what materials was the table to be constructed? (Exo. 25:23-24)
26.
How was the table decorated? (Exo. 25:25)
27.
What equipment was made to be used with the table? (Exo. 25:29)
28.
When was showbread kept upon the table? (Exo. 25:30; Compare Lev. 24:5-9)
2940.
From Lev. 24:5-9 answer these questions about the showbread:
29.
What was the showbread made of?
30.
How many loaves of showbread were to be set on the table?
31.
How much flour went into each loaf? Would this make the loaves large or small?
32.
What was to be poured on each row (or pile) of loaves?
33.
True or false? The showbread is called a type of (sacrificial) offering. (Lev. 24:7; Lev. 24:9)
34.
How often was the showbread to be set in order?
35.
From whom was the showbread to be taken?
36.
By whom was the showbread eaten?
37.
What would the number of loaves of showbread possibly indicate that they symbolized?
38.
What does the name showbread (or bread of the presence) indicate about the significance of the show-bread?
39.
What would the use of frankincense on the bread suggest about it? (Compare Psa. 141:2; Rev. 5:8)
40.
Is the showbread a type or symbol of the Lords supper?
41.
Describe the candlestick (lampstand). (Exo. 25:31-36)
42.
How much gold was in the lampstand? (Exo. 25:39; Exo. 37:24)
43.
Who was to bring olive oil for the lamp? (Exo. 27:20)
44.
When was the lamp kept burning? (Lev. 24:3; 1Sa. 3:3)
45.
Who tended to the lamp to keep it burning? (Exo. 27:21)
46.
Of what may the lampstand be a type or symbol? (Eph. 5:8; 1Jn. 1:5; Php. 2:15; Psa. 119:105; Joh. 8:12; 2Co. 4:3-6).
EXODUS TWENTY-FIVE: SANCTUARY INSTRUCTIONS
1.
Take an offering; Exo. 25:1-8.
2.
Make it according to the pattern; Exo. 25:9; Exo. 25:40.
3.
Make an ark and mercy seat; Exo. 25:10-22.
4.
Make a table; Exo. 25:23-30.
5.
Make a lampstand; Exo. 25:31-39.
AN OFFERING FOR GOD! (Exo. 25:1-7)
1.
Comes from willing people; Exo. 25:1-2.
2.
Consists of valuable possessions; Exo. 25:3-7.
A SANCTUARY FOR GOD! (Exo. 25:8)
1.
Made by MEN.
2.
Dwelt in by GOD.
MAKE IT LIKE THE PATTERN! (Exo. 25:9; Exo. 25:40)
1.
A divinely revealed pattern.
2.
A pattern of the heavenly tabernacle; (Heb. 8:5; Heb. 9:23)
3.
A pattern of the Christian religion; (Heb. 9:8-9)
MESSAGES FROM GOLDEN FURNITURE (Exo. 25:10-39)
1.
The ark (Exo. 25:10-16): God dwells among men!
2.
The mercy-seat (Exo. 25:17-22): God communes (talks) with men!
3.
The table (Exo. 25:23-30): God desires his people in his presence! God sets an offering in his presence!
4.
The Lampstand (Exo. 25:31-39): God gives light to men!
THE ARKTHE FOOTSTOOL OF GODS THRONE! (Exo. 25:10-16)
1.
Contained the ten commandments. Righteousness and justice are the foundation of thy throne. (Psa. 89:14 a)
2.
Had the pot of manna (Exo. 16:33). Lovingkindness and truth go before thy face. (Psa. 89:14 b)
3.
Had Aarons staff that budded. No man taketh the honor (priesthood) unto himself, unless he is called by God (Heb. 5:4).
THE MERCY-SEAT
(Exo. 25:17-22)
1.
A precious golden covering.
2.
A worship-centered covering (cherubim).
3.
A blood-sprinkled covering; Lev. 16:14.
THE LAMPSTAND (Menorah)!
1.
A precious light (golden).
2.
A united light (all of one piece).
3.
A perfect light (sevenfold).
4.
A spiritual light (fueled by oil, symbolic of the Spirit).
SHOWBREAD
(Presence-bread)!
(Exo. 25:23-30)
1.
Twelve loaves (symbolizing the twelve tribes) always in Gods presence! (Lev. 24:5-8).
2.
An offering made by fire always in Gods presence! (Lev. 24:9)
TABERNACLE VIEWS
General view of the Tabernacle and court
The encampments of Israel around the Tabernacle
Ground plan of the Tabernacle and court
SPECIAL STUDY: THE TABERNACLE
1.
What was the tabernacle?
(1)
The tabernacle was that beautiful place of worship made by the children of Israel in the days of Moses. It was a sanctuary, a holy place set apart for God. God showed His presence at the tabernacle, and there received the worship of the people. Exo. 29:43-46.
(2)
It was a portable house of worship. When we go on camping trips, we carry with us a house that we can move about, a tent. Out in the desert the Israelites were constantly moving about. Therefore they had to have a house of worship that could easily be moved with them. The very word tabernacle means a tent, and the word tent certainly suggests a portable dwelling. God gave instructions about how to transport the tabernacle in Num. 4:5-15.
a.
Some pieces of furniture in the tabernacle had staves on each side, so men could carry them on their shoulders.
b.
The heavier parts of the tabernacle were carried by six wagons pulled by oxen. Num. 7:1-7.
(3)
It was the meeting place of God and Israel.
God dwelt among his people, Israel. Exo. 25:8. God particularly revealed His presence around the tabernacle, and especially in that part of it called the Most Holy Place. Exo. 25:22.
The fact that God dwelt in the midst of Israel was the central fact of their life. To Israel Gods presence meant plan, protection, and provision. If God had not manifested His presence in the tabernacle, the tribes of Israel would have been scattered about helter-skelter, with no one to protect or provide for them.
This was an appeal to the senses of a people whose spiritual discernment was underdeveloped. Gods presence among them was plainly indicated by the daily manna, the pillar of cloud, and the miracles that occurred during their journeyings. But to a people brought up amidst the idolatry of Egypt, a centralized shrine was more readily comprehended than an omnipresent spiritual God.
Today God dwells in the midst of his church, just as He dwelt among the Israelites. 2Co. 6:16. The presence and worship of God give order, protection, and purpose to our lives. The worship of God should be as central to us as the tabernacle was central in the camp of Israel.
2.
Where is the information given about the tabernacle?
(1)
The instructions about how it was to be built are given in Exodus 25-31.
(2)
The account of its construction and erection are in Exodus 35-40. Most of the information in this section is a repetition of that in Exodus 25-31.
(3)
The book of Hebrews, chs. 910, discusses the significance of the tabernacle at length.
(4)
Many other references throughout the Bible refer to it. The legislation in Leviticus and Numbers and Deuteronomy was primarily to be carried out in the tabernacle rituals.
3.
What was the importance of the tabernacle?
The importance of this tabernacle can be seen in several ways:
(1)
The details of its construction are described twice in Exodus, and much information is found about it throughout the rest of the Bible.
Arthur Pink reminds us that God only used two chapters to tell of the creation and furnishing of heaven and earth. But he used at least thirteen chapters (and really many more) to discuss the tabernacle!
(2)
The tabernacle is presented as a type of the Christian religion now operative (Heb. 9:8-9). (See Question No. 14 in this special study of the Tabernacle.)
(3)
The tabernacle was an earthly illustration and counterpart of Gods heavenly dwelling and tabernacle. The tabernacle was a copy of things in the heavens (Heb. 8:5; Heb. 9:23-28). Rev. 11:19 : There was opened the temple of God that is in heaven; and there was seen in his temple the ark of his covenant. Both the earthly and heavenly tabernacles therefore had covenant arks. Both had an altar for incense (Rev. 8:3). Both had seven lamps (Rev. 4:5). Christ entered the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands (Heb. 9:11). Christ with his blood entered the true holy place (holy of holies) in heaven (Heb. 9:24). These facts made the earthly tabernacle very important.
(4)
Gods insistence that it be made according to the precise pattern he had showed in the mount stresses the importance of each detail of it.
4.
Who were camped around the tabernacle?
(1)
The Israelites camped all around the tabernacle. Each tribe camped by itself in its designated place. Although each tribe camped separately, the three on each of the four sides of the tabernacle were grouped together into larger encampments, called the Camp of Dan, the Camp of Judah, the Camp of Reuben, and the Camp of Ephraim. See Num. 2:1 to Num. 3:39. See page 550A.
(2)
Moses and the priestly families of Gershon, Merari, and Kohath were camped around the tabernacle up close to it.
5.
What were the names which were given to the tabernacle?
God not only ordains things to exist, but He gives them their names as well. Let us use Bible names for Bible things. Here are the names for the tabernacle:
(1)
Tabernacle. Exo. 26:1. This word is the translation of several Hebrew words (2 main ones). One (ohel) means tent. The other (mishkan) means dwelling place.
(2)
Tent. Exo. 26:36.
(3)
Sanctuary. Exo. 25:8. This word means a place set apart, or a holy place.
(4)
Tabernacle of the congregation. Exo. 29:42; Exo. 29:44; Exo. 30:36; etc. This name is rendered tent of meeting in the Revised Version. The name tabernacle of the congregation is applied to that room in the tabernacle called the holy place. Exo. 27:21.
(5)
House of the Lord. Deu. 23:18. (The church is now the house of the Lord, and God dwells in it through the Holy Spirit. Eph. 1:22.)
(6)
Temple of the Lord. 1Sa. 1:9. This name suggests the magnificence of the tabernacle, as if it were a palace or temple. The church is now the temple of God.
6.
How were materials obtained for the tabernacle?
Free-will offerings provided the materials. See Exo. 25:1-9; Exo. 35:4-29; Exo. 36:5-7.
7.
Who actually constructed the tabernacle?
It was constructed by men specially called and filled and guided by the Spirit of God to have wisdom and skill. God called them by name. Among these builders were Bezaleel and Oholiab. (Exo. 36:1; Exo. 35:30 to Exo. 36:1.)
These builders of the tabernacle correspond to the apostles of Christ in the church. Christ specifically called His apostles, and filled them with the Holy Spirit so that they could establish the church without error. Act. 1:8; Joh. 16:13.
8.
How many tabernacles did all the parts of the tabernacle combine to form?
Just one. It was ONE tabernacle. Exo. 26:6. All its parts formed one harmonious whole.
Accordingly we find a unity pervading the whole church of Christ. There are many different members of it, but all produce one body. 1Co. 12:2.
9.
How was the tabernacle maintained?
It was maintained by an offering of atonement money. Every person over twenty had to give a half-shekel. Exo. 30:11-16. This was an annual offering. Mat. 17:24. The fact that God provided through the tabernacle a means of atonement (or covering) for sins made the people indebted to God and to His tabernacle.
10.
By what act was the tabernacle sanctified or set apart for holy use?
It was set apart by anointing with holy oil. The tabernacle, all its pieces of furniture, and its priests were anointed with a holy oil, so that it was sanctified and became most holy. Exo. 30:22-33; Exo. 40:9-16.
Anointing oil, as used in the Old Testament, was symbolic of the Holy Spirit. See Luk. 4:18; Psa. 133:2; Heb. 1:9; Act. 10:38.
As every part of the tabernacle was anointed with the holy oil, so every feature of the Christian faith is anointed with the Holy Spirit. See Eph. 1:22; 1Co. 12:13; Act. 2:17. Our religion is therefore divine, holy, precious, anointed of God.
11.
What covered over, or lodged above, the tabernacle?
The cloud of Gods glory covered over or lodged above the tabernacle. Exo. 40:34-38; Num. 9:15-23. This glory cloud is called the SHECHINAH. (This word, however, is not actually found in the Bible.)
Gods presence has frequently been associated with a cloud, or a shining light, or smoke, or fire. Exo. 16:10; Exo. 24:16-17; Num. 20:6; Isa. 6:4; Luk. 2:9. This creates a great sense of Gods presence and majesty.
This cloud also guided and led the Israelites. When the cloud lifted up, this was a sign for the Israelites to pack up for moving on. When the cloud moved, they followed. When the cloud stopped, they camped.
The Scripture indicates that God intends to glorify His people today with a glory like that which crowned the tabernacle. Isa. 60:2; Isa. 4:5.
12.
What was the value of the material in the tabernacle?
The value was tremendous. See Exo. 38:24-29. The exact value is impossible to determine, but a million and a half dollars has been suggested as a conservative figure. The worship of God is not a cheap, trifling, and inconsequential thing.
13.
Layout and furniture of the Tabernacle.
A.
The Layout of the tabernacle.
(1)
The Court of the Tabernacle, in which the Tabernacle itself stood, was an oblong space, 100 cubits by 50 (i.e., 150 feet by 75), having its longer axis east and west, with its front to the east. It was surrounded by linen cloth hangings 5 cubits in height, and supported by pillars of brass 5 cubits apart, to which the curtains were attached by hooks and fillets of silver (thin rods or rails between the pillars). This enclosure was only broken on the eastern side by the entrance, which was 20 cubits wide, and closed by curtains of
fine twined linen, wrought with needle-work, and of the most gorgeous colors. (Exo. 27:9-19; Exo. 38:9-20.)
In the outer or eastern half of the court was placed the altar of burnt-offering, and between it and the Tabernacle itself, the laver at which the priests washed their hands and feet on entering the Temple.
(2) The Tabernacle itself was placed toward the western end of this enclosure. It was an oblong rectangular structure, 30 cubits in length by 10 in width (45 feet by 15), and 10 in height; the interior being divided into two chambers, the first or outer of 20 cubits in length, the inner of 10 cubits, and consequently an exact cube. The former was the Holy Place, or First Tabernacle (Heb. 9:2), containing the golden candlestick on one side, the table of show-bread opposite, and between them in the center the altar of incense. The latter was the Most Holy Place, or the Holy of Holies, containing the ark, surmounted by the cherubim, with the two stone tablets inside.
The two sides, and the further, or western, end, were enclosed by boards of shittim-wood overlaid with gold. (Exo. 26:15-26; Exo. 36:20-38).
Four successive coverings of curtains looped together were placed over the open top, and fell down over the sides. The first, or inmost, was a splendid fabric of linen, embroidered with figures of cherubim, in blue, purple, and scarlet, and joined together by golden fastenings. The next was a woolen covering of goats hair; the third, of rams skins dyed red; and the outermost, of porpoise skins (Exo. 26:1-14; Exo. 36:8-19).
The front of the Sanctuary was closed by a hanging of fine linen, embroidered in blue, purple, and scarlet, and supported by golden hooks, on five pillars of shittim-wood overlaid with gold, and standing in brass sockets. The covering of goats hair was so made as to hang down over this if desired. A more sumptuous curtain of the same kind, embroidered with cherubim and hung on four pillars with silver sockets, divided the Holy from the Most Holy Place. It was called the VEIL, as it hid from the eyes of all but the high-priest the inmost sanctuary, where Jehovah dwelt on his mercy-seat, between the cherubim above the ark.
B.
Furniture of the tabernacle.
(1)
In the Outer Court.
a.
The Altar of Burnt-offering. See notes on Exo. 27:1-8; Exo. 38:1-7.
b.
The Brazen Laver. See notes on Exo. 29:4; Exo. 30:17-21; Exo. 38:8; Exo. 40:7; Exo. 40:11. See also Lev. 8:10-11.
(2)
In the Holy Place.
The furniture of the court was connected with sacrifice, that of the sanctuary itself with the deeper mysteries of mediation and access to God. The Holy Place contained three objects: the altar of incense in the center, so as to be directly in front of the ark of the covenant, the table of show-bread on its right or north side, and the golden candlestick on the left or south side.
a.
The Altar of Incense. (Exo. 30:1-10; Exo. 30:34-38; Exo. 37:25-29; Lev. 10:1-2.
b.
The Table of Showbread. (Exo. 25:23-30; Exo. 37:10-16; Lev. 24:5-9.)
c.
The Golden Lampstand., (Exo. 25:31-40; Exo. 27:20-21; Exo. 37:17-24; Lev. 24:1-4; Num. 8:1-4)
(3)
In the Holy of Holies.
In the Holy of Holies, within the veil and shrouded in darkness, there was but one object, the most sacred of the whole. The Ark of the Covenant, or the Testimony, was a sacred chest, containing the two tables of stone, inscribed with the Ten Commandments.
The cover of the ark (called the mercy-seat) was a place of pure gold, overshadowed by two cherubim, with their faces bent down and their wings meeting. This was the very throne of Jehovah, who was therefore said to dwell between the cherubim.
14.
Typology of the Tabernacle.
A type is Some person, thing, or event in the Old Testament age which foreshadowed some person, thing, or event in the New Testament age. The antitype is that person, thing, or event in the New Testament age which was foreshadowed by the Old Testament type. We are expressly told in Heb. 9:8-9 that the first tabernacle is a figure, or type, for the time present. The typology is given for many parts of the tabernacle.
In the list of the tabernacle types that follows we have placed question marks alongside our statements if the antitypes are not specifically stated in the scripture. In most such cases reasonable inferences may be drawn from scripture that should enable us to determine the antitypes with some certainty.
a.
The entire tabernacleA type of the Christian religion that has now come into reality (Heb. 9:8)
b.
The Holy of HoliesA type of heaven (Heb. 9:24).
(1)
The ark of the covenantA type of the footstool of Gods throne (1Ch. 28:2; Psa. 132:7-8). (?)
(2)
The mercy-seatA type of Gods throne, which is a place of mercy because Christ our priest is there. See Rom. 3:25; 1Jn. 2:2; 1Jn. 4:10. The term propitiation in these verses is the same word used in the Greek Bible for mercy-seat.
(3)
The veil between the Holy and Most Holy placesA type of Christs flesh, which was broken on the cross (Heb. 10:19-20; Luk. 23:44-45).
c.
The Holy PlaceA type of the church (?). (As the Holy of Holies was entered only from the Holy Place, so heaven is entered only from the church. As the Holy Place was for priests only, so the church is for priests (Christians) only.)
(1)
Altar of incenseA type of prayer (Rev. 5:8; Rev. 8:3-4; Psa. 141:2).
(2)
Table of showbreadA type of the fellowship of saints in the presence of God (?). (The twelve loaves seem to have represented Israel. Show-bread means presence-bread. Thus the showbread symbolized Israels being in Gods presence, and foreshadowed our fellowship in Gods presence [1Jn. 1:3]).
Also as an offering made by fire (Lev. 24:9) it was a type of Christ our offering (Eph. 5:2), who is always in Gods presence for us.
(3)
LampstandA type of the light of the Gospel (?). We walk in the light (Eph. 5:7-8). God is light (1Jn. 1:5). Christ is the light (Joh. 8:12). The scriptures are a light (Psa. 119:105; 2Pe. 1:19). Churches are lights (Rev. 1:12; Rev. 1:20). Christians are lights (Php. 2:15).
d.
The courtA type of the world, or Gods outreach into the world (?). (As God placed in the court, within the reach of all Israelites, the means for forgiveness, so God has placed in the world the means for forgiveness to all who will draw near seeking God.)
(1)
Altar of burnt offeringA type of Christs death (Heb. 13:10; Joh. 1:29).
(2)
LaverA type of baptism (Eph. 5:26; Tit. 3:5). (?) The word washing in Greek means laver.
Also the laver appears to have been a type of the daily cleansing available to all priests (Christians!) (1Jn. 1:9). This seems to be a necessary conclusion because the priests washed at the laver each time they entered and went out of the tabernacle (Exo. 30:19-21).
e.
The priesthood.
(1)
Aaron, the high priestA type of Christ our high priest (Heb. 4:14).
(2)
Aarons sons (lesser priests)A type of Christians; all Christians are priests (Rev. 1:6; 1Pe. 2:9).
15.
What are the views of many critics about the tabernacle?
Generally the critical view is that the information about the tabernacle in Exodus was written by priestly writers who lived nearly a thousand years after the time of Moses. These priestly writers lived during or after the Babylonian captivity (about 550 B.C.), and wrote their description of the tabernacle from their memories of the Solomonic temple in Jerusalem, or possibly even from their acquaintance with the temple of Zerubbabel built AFTER the Babylonian captivity. They projected back into the distant past an idealized description, based on later temple features. Their writings are usually referred to as the P (for Priestly) document. The P document was supposedly inserted into the older narratives comprising the remainder of Exodus. (Examples of these views may be seen in Noths Exodus, p. 201, and Broadman Bible Commentary Vol. I (1969), p. 431.)
The critics hold that the ark was the imaginary creation of one who knew no more about it than that it once stood in the innermost part of Solomons temple before the Babylonian exile. (Noth, op. cit., p. 203).
The lampstand is said to have been an innovation (!) presumably introduced into the temple of Zerubbabel (516 B.C.). (Noth op. cit., p. 203.) Since it had features resembling those of a tree, some have thought that it reflects an ancient reverence for trees.
The general conclusion drawn from such theories is that nothing in the Biblical stories is true or edifying. Such theories are often asserted as certain truth when there is not a shred of solid evidence to back them up. Archaeological discoveries have frequently shown that the critics have been in error. For example, we now know that moveable shrines (such as the tabernacle) existed in several nations Egypt, Canaan (at Ugarit), Syria (at Palmyra). Many of these go back as far as the time of Moses, and some in Egypt back as far as 2600 B.C. (John Davis, Moses and the Gods of Egypt, 241, 243). Why then should critics assume that the Israelites in Moses times simply could not have produced a moveable place of worship like the tabernacle?
In this commentary we have occasionally discussed the critics views on certain passages. In most cases we have found ourselves in strong disagreement with their opinions.
EXPLORING EXODUS: NOTES ON CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
1.
What is in Exodus twenty-five?
The chapter contains (1) Gods instructions to Moses about taking an offering from the people to obtain materials to build the tabernacle (Exo. 25:1-9); (2) instructions about how to make the ark (Exo. 25:10-15) and the mercy-seat (Exo. 25:16-22);
(3)
instructions about the table of presence-bread (Exo. 25:23-30);
(4)
instructions about the lampstand (Exo. 25:31-39).
2.
Who was to make an offering for tabernacle materials (Exo. 25:1-2)
Everyone whose heart made him willing was to give. Giving to God should be voluntary, not forced. See 2Co. 8:4-5; 2Co. 9:6-7. Those who are willing do give freely. The Israelites gave more materials than were needed for the tabernacle. See Exo. 35:21-29; Exo. 36:5-7. In a similar way many years later they gave very much for the temple (1Ch. 29:1-5).
The word translated offering (Heb. terumah) means a heave-offering, one that is lifted up or separated unto God. The same word is used in Exo. 29:27, Lev. 7:14, Num. 15:19 to refer to various types of sacrifices. This use of this word indicates that a sacredness comes upon all things presented to the LORD.
3.
What materials were given for the tabernacle? (Exo. 25:3-7)
(1)
Blue. This was wool cloth dyed with deep violet color made from glands of the murex shell-fish found in the sea by Phoenicia and Palestine.
(2)
Purple. Wool dyed dark red or reddish-purple by the shell-fish dye.
(3)
Scarlet. Literally this says worm of scarlet. The cloth was colored a brilliant red by color from the cochineal (or coccus) worm (or insect). In the Arabic language the word translated scarlet is kirmiz, from which we get our word crimson.
(4)
Gold. All of the items in the Holy Place room or the Holy of Holies were of pure gold or gold-plated. The gold was probably obtained in Egypt (Exo. 12:35), or possibly by spoil from the Amalekites or by inheritance from their forefathers. Gold was also used to overlay the boards of the tabernacle (Exo. 38:24).
(5)
Silver. This was obtained in part by a levy of half a shekel from each adult man (Exo. 38:26-28). It was used for casting bases (pedestals or sockets) for the boards and pillars (Exo. 36:24-26).
(6)
Brass. This is more correctly translated copper or bronze (the alloy of copper and tin). Certainly it was not brass (copper and zinc). See Exo. 38:28-31. Copper was mined even before Moses time in the rocky hills north of the Red Sea Gulf of Akabah, and still is.
(7)
Fine linen. Egypt was famous for this material. See Eze. 27:7. The Hebrew word for linen (shesh) is a borrowed Egyptian term. Joseph in Egypt was arrayed in linen (Gen. 41:42). It was used for the innermost tabernacle covering (Exo. 26:1), for the veil (Exo. 26:31), the screen (Exo. 26:36), and the priests garments (Exo. 28:6; Exo. 28:8; Exo. 28:42).
(8)
Goats hair. Literally, just goats! The goats usually had black hair (Son. 4:1). The women spun the goats hair, twisting it into yarn (Exo. 35:26), which was woven into cloth. It was used for the second covering of the tabernacle (Exo. 26:7).
(9)
Rams skins dyed red. These red rams skins were used for the third covering over the tabernacle (Exo. 26:14). R.S.V. reads tanned rams skins. This does not appear to be the best translation because the verb means to be made red.
(10)
Sealskins. (R.S.V. goatskins, a conjectural translation; K.J.V., badger skins, a faulty translation.) The New English Bible gives porpoise skins, which seems to be a good rendering. The Hebrew word tahash refers possibly to the sea cow (dugong, or manatee), which is found in the Red Sea. It is ten to twelve feet long, with a rounded head. It has a hide admirably suited for making sandals (See Eze. 16:10). Its upper skin is thicker and coarse, but the lower belly skin is thin yet tough.[356] An Arabic word related to the Hebrew tahash refers to several kinds of sea animals seals, dolphins, sharks, dogfish. Perhaps the Hebrew word is equally applicable to several marine creatures.[357]
[356] Keil and Delitzsch, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 164.
[357] Davis, op. cit., pp. 252253.
The sealskins were used for the outermost covering of the tabernacle (Exo. 26:14), and for a covering over the ark and other furniture of the tabernacle (Num. 4:6; Num. 4:8; Num. 4:10-11).
(11) Acacia wood. (King James, shittim). The acacia trees are the only trees in Sinai or Arabia from which planks might be cut. They are very tough, thorny, rather flat-topped trees, not usually over twenty feet high at present. The author has seen many of them in the Negev, the Arabah, and around the Dead Sea. The wood is indestructible by insects. The thorns (very numerous!) are up to two inches long. Most of the acacia trees now surviving are too small to have been cut into planks one and a half cubits broad (Exo. 26:15-16). The Arab charcoal business has depleted the larger trees. However, S. C. Bartlett in the nineteenth century reported finding a great many large acacia trees in Wady Saal (which leads into Wady Sheikh).[358] Many of these were very large, twenty inches to two feet in diameter. Bartlett tells that Mr. Holland, another Sinai traveller, found one nine feet in circumference. It is incorrect to assert that there have been no trees in Sinai from which boards the size of the tabernacle boards might have been cut. (In Exo. 26:15 R.S.V. renders boards as frames.) (The boards might have been made by splicing wood from several trees together.)
[358] Bartlett, op. cit., pp. 300301.
(12) Oil for the light.[359] This was a pure (or clear) olive oil beaten from the olives (Lev. 24:2). See Exo. 25:6; Exo. 27:20-21.
[359] The Greek LXX omits Exo. 25:6, possibly because of a skip by the eye of the translator between words with similar endings, shittim in Exo. 25:5, and sammim in Exo. 25:6. But the verse is needed to provide a full list of the materials for the tabernacle. See Cassuto, op. cit, p. 327.
(13) Spices for anointing oil (Exo. 30:23-33) and for sweet incense (Exo. 30:34-38; Exo. 35:28).
(14) Onyx stones and other gemstones (Exo. 25:7). See Exo. 28:9; Exo. 28:17-20. The onyx was probably a banded agate with straight bands. Others consider it to be a beryl. (Zondervan Pictorial Bible Dictionary, article Minerals.) These stones were used in the high priests garments. The onyx stones and other gems were presented by the rulers of the congregation (Exo. 35:27). Exo. 25:7 mentions the ephod and breastplate. See Exo. 28:6-14; Exo. 39:2-7, on the ephod, and Exo. 28:15-30; Exo. 39:8-21 on the breastplate.
The absence of mention of iron in the list of materials to be donated is possibly an indication of the very early date of the book of Exodus.
4.
What was Gods purpose for the sanctuary? (Exo. 25:8)
Gods purpose was that He might dwell among the Israelites. God desired to live among his people. See Exo. 29:45; 1Ki. 6:13; Lev. 26:11-12; 2Co. 6:16; Heb. 3:6; Rev. 21:3. It is certainly true that God inhabits eternity (Isa. 57:15), and fills heaven and earth (Jer. 23:24). Heaven is His throne and earth is His footstool (Isa. 66:1). Spiritually-minded Israelites realized this. See 1Ki. 8:27.
Nonetheless, God condescends to meet his children in limited places where they can reach Him.
The word sanctuary (Exo. 25:8) means a holy place, one set apart for God. See Jer. 17:12.
God did not ask for a tabernacle; he asked for a sanctuary. God needs no tabernacle in which to dwell. The word tabernacle in Exo. 25:8 simply means a dwelling. Do not read into Exo. 25:8 the meaning Make me a sanctuary to provide a place where I may dwell among them. The text does not say that God dwelt in it (the tabernacle), but rather that he dwelt in them (the people)!
5.
What was the guide used in constructing the tabernacle? (Exo. 25:9)
The guide was the pattern which God showed Moses in the mount. See Exo. 25:40; Exo. 26:30; Exo. 27:8. Making the tabernacle exactly like this pattern was absolutely required. See Heb. 8:5.
God seems to have shown Moses a model or form of the tabernacle made in the way He wanted Moses to make it. This model was actually a model of the very tabernacle of God in heaven, and the earthly tabernacle was thus to be itself a model (pattern) of the heavenly tabernacle. To have digressed from the pattern shown to him would have caused Moses to misrepresent the design of Gods tabernacle in heaven. Further, it would have produced a faulty type (or advance representation) of the religion which Jesus Christ has brought to us.
Some Jewish commentators have held that Moses saw a prophetic vision of the actual divine dwelling place in heaven, and that it therefore became necessary for Moses to erect in the middle of the camp of Israel a tabernacle designed like that seen in his vision, corresponding to the heavenly sanctuary.[360] Hertz (also Jewish) disagrees, saying that the tabernacle was only an educational tool to wean Israel from idolatrous worship, and that it did not correspond to any tabernacle on a universe-wide scale.[361]
[360] Cassuto, op. cit., p. 322.
[361] J. H. Hertz, Pentateuch and Haftorahs (London, Soncino Press, 1969), p. 325.
Keil[362] argues (correctly we feel) that God showed Moses not the heavenly original, but only a model of the heavenly original. The word translated pattern (Heb. tabenith) seems to have this meaning in Deu. 4:17 (the likeness of any beast), 2Ki. 16:10 (the fashion of the altar), and 2Ki. 16:10 (Davids pattern of the temple, which he gave to Solomon).
[362] Keil and Delitzsch, op. cit. II, pp. 165167.
Observe that the pattern of the tabernacle shown to Moses extended to the pattern of ALL the vessels (furniture, instruments) of it. There is an opinion that God has given men no definite pattern for His worship. God does indeed allow much freedom of expression in worship, but the command to conform exactly to the tabernacle pattern suggests that the pattern is a very real thing for us to recognize and accept.
6.
What was the first item of tabernacle furniture to be described? (Exo. 25:10-11)
The ark of the testimony (or covenant). For further information about the ark, see Exo. 37:1-9; Deu. 10:2-5; Heb. 9:3-5.
The ark was a wooden chest overlaid within and without[363] with gold. It was 1 x 1 x 2 cubits[364] (about 27 x 27 x 45 inches). The ark (Heb. aron) of the covenant should certainly not be confused with the ark (Heb. tebah) of Noah or the ark-basket (tebah) of the baby Moses (Exo. 2:3).
[363] The Hebrew expression in Exo. 25:11 meaning inside and outside could quite literally be rendered in (the) house and in (the) street. This same idiom is used to describe how Noahs ark was pitched with pitch within and without (Gen. 6:14). Probably the ark was overlaid with gold by the Egyptian method of attaching thin hammered plates of gold to the wood by means of small nails. Cassuto, op. cit., p. 329.
[364] Davis, op. cit., p. 246, discusses the length of a cubit, and settles upon a length of eighteen inches. We adopt his conclusion.
The ark of the covenant and the mercy-seat with cherubim
Table of showbread with its double crown and loaves.
The golden MENORAH (lampstand, or candlestick). The drawing shows that the lamps could be lifted off the lampstand for cleaning or refueling. Decorations on the lampstand include cups (resembling the calyx, or false petals, of flowers), knops (spherical ornaments), and flowers. The three-legged stand is adapted from a crude ancient sketch of the lampstand found in the Sinai peninsula. (Drawing by James Sherrod)
The ark is called by several names: (1) ark of God (1Sa. 3:3); (2) ark of the covenant (Num. 10:33; Deu. 10:8); (3) holy ark (2Ch. 35:3); (4) ark of the LORD (Jos. 6:7; Jos. 6:13; 1Ki. 2:26); (5) ark of the testimony (Exo. 25:22; Exo. 39:35); (6) ark of thy strength (Psa. 132:8). In Exodus it is uniformly called the ark of the testimony.
The ark and all the articles of furniture within the tabernacle building were of gold or overlaid with gold. Anything closely associated with Gods presence was made of gold. Gods heaven is golden. Rev. 21:10.
The ark and its covering (the mercy-seat) were the only items in the innermost tabernacle room, the holy of holies. Thus the ark was the central focus of the sanctuary, and the instructions concerning it were given first. It seems to have been a representation of Gods throne and His footstool, and therefore it was befitting that first attention should have been given to it.
Likewise we need to set our minds on things above (Col. 3:1-2). Our heavenly home should be our primary focus of interest and our life goal. Set your home perfectly (completely) on the grace (the favor) that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1Pe. 1:13).
Although the ark was the first thing described, it appears that it was not constructed until after the tabernacle building was made (Exo. 37:1-9).
We observe the pronouns in Exo. 25:10 ff. First, they shall make an ark. But then many times after that, Moses himself is told, Thou shalt. . . . This points out Moses leadership in making it. The workman Bezalel actually constructed it. See Exo. 37:1.
It appears from Deu. 10:2-5 that Moses himself had made a previous ark right after coming down from the mount the second time with the tablets of the ten commandments. He put the commandments in this ark, and declared many years later There they are. It appears therefore that Moses considered the ark of the covenant to be in some way a continuation of the simpler ark he himself had built for the stone tablets. Perhaps Bezalel only gold-plated and decorated the chest Moses prepared.
The top edge of the ark had a crown (moulding, rim, border, edge) round about it. This crown served to keep mercy-seat (covering) upon the top of the ark. Also it was decorative. A similar crown was upon the table of show-bread and the golden altar of incense (Exo. 30:3; Exo. 37:26).
7.
How was the ark carried about? (Exo. 25:12-15)
Staves of acacia wood overlaid with gold were inserted into rings of solid gold attached to the four feet of the ark. These staves were used to carry the ark on the shoulders of the Levites (Num. 4:15). The feet of the ark seem to have been short legs or low blocks attached to the corners under the ark to keep it from sitting directly upon the ground. If the rings were in feet on the bottom, the ark would have stuck well up above the heads of the Levites as it was being carried by the staves. The rendering feet in Exo. 25:12 is preferable to corners (King James version).
The staves were not to be taken from the ark at any time. See 1Ki. 8:8. For information about how the ark was covered over before being carried about, see Num. 4:5-6; Num. 4:15.[365]
[365] Num. 4:6 says, shall put in the staves thereof. This does not contradict the statement of Exo. 25:15 that the staves were not removed from the ark. The Hebrew verb (sim) of Num. 4:6 means to set, put, place, but does not mean to put something into something unless it is used with the preposition in. Since this is not in Num. 4:6, the verse probably simply means that the staves were to be properly adjusted for use in carrying.
8
What was placed in the ark? (Exo. 25:16; Exo. 25:21)
The ark was to contain the testimony. This testimony was the two tablets of the ten commandments. See Exo. 31:18; Exo. 40:20.
The word testimony means a precept or law. The Hebrew word translated testimony comes from a verb meaning to turn, return, repeat, say repeatedly, testify, affirm. We might therefore say that the testimony was a constantly repeated communication to the people. That is worth pondering.
Although the original stone tablets were concealed in the ark, copies of their text were certainly available for the people to see and read.
The ark also had with it two other items: Aarons wood staff which budded (Num. 17:10); and a pot of manna (Exo. 16:3. See Heb. 9:4-5.)[366]
[366] According to Heb. 9:3-4, the Holy of Holies contained a golden altar (K.J.V., censer) of incense. No such article is mentioned by Moses in Exodus. A censer for incense was indeed taken into the Holy of Holies by the high priest on the Day of Atonement, and this may be what Heb. 9:3 refers to. Another view is that the passage refers simply to the altar of incense in the Holy place, but speaks of it as being associated with the Holy of Holies because it was so close to the veil and the Holy of Holies. 1Ki. 6:22 says that in the construction of Solomons temple the whole altar that belonged to the oracle (the Holy of Holies) he overlaid with gold. It does not appear from the text that Solomons temple actually had an altar inside the oracle, and that the altar referred to was probably only the altar of incense in the House (Holy Place). All of these facts seem to support the conclusion that the altar of incense was in some ways not fully explained to us associated both with the Holy Place and to the Holy of Holies.
Only the stone tablets were actually put into the ark. The rod of Aaron was before the testimony (Num. 17:10) and so was the pot of manna (Exo. 16:34). The ark contained only the stone tablets in Solomons day (1Ki. 8:9).
Cassuto[367] refers to the fact that ancient kings would sometimes deposit deeds (writings) of a covenant into boxes at the footstools of their idols. The Egyptian king Rameses II placed the documents pledging peace between himself and the Hittites under the feet of his god Re. Similarly the Hittite king placed the documents under the feet of his idol called Teshub, It therefore appears that God used human covenant customs to impress the Israelites with the meaning and seriousness of His covenant with Israel.
[367] Op. cit., p. 331.
9.
What did the ark represent? What was it a type of?
The Bible does not give a direct statement saying that the ark represented one specific thing. Nonetheless, there are some statements that help us to understand what it symbolized.
It appears to us that the ark was a sort of footstool of Gods throne and the mercy-seat upon it was a representation of the throne itself.
Psa. 99:1 : Jehovah reigneth; . . . He sitteth (or, is enthroned) above the cherubim. Similar statements are made in Psa. 80:1; 1Sa. 4:4; 2Sa. 6:2; Isa. 37:16; Isa. 25:22. (The cherubim referred to are the gold angel figures on the mercy-seat, the covering of the ark. See below, section 11.)
King David said in 1Ch. 28:2, It was in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of the covenant of Jehovah, and for the footstool of our God. The and of this verse could be translated even for the footstool. …
Psa. 132:7-8 : We will go into his tabernacle. We will worship at his FOOTSTOOL. Arise, O Jehovah, into thy resting place; Thou, and the ark of thy strength.
These passages seem to confirm the idea that the mercy-seat with its cherubim was a symbol of Gods throne, and the ark a symbol of the footstool of Gods throne.
Consider the rich significance of the ark and the mercy-seat as a symbol of Gods throne! The ark contained the ten commandments. This would indicate that Gods throne rests upon divine LAW and truth. The ark had with it the pot of manna, symbolizing that Gods throne is a place of loving-care for His people. The ark had Aarons staff with it, symbolizing Gods sovereignty in choosing who shall minister unto Him, and how men shall approach Him.
Perhaps the greatest teaching of the ark as a visual symbol was that it was covered by a seat (or throne) of mercy! Let us therefore draw near with boldness unto the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy, . . . (Heb. 4:16)
Mercy and truth are met together (Psa. 85:10). Righteousness and justice are the foundation of thy throne: Lovingkindness and truth go before thy face (Psa. 89:14). All of these things righteousness, justice, lovingkindness, truth are presented to us by the ARK, Gods throne!!!
10.
What covered the ark? (Exo. 25:17)
A mercy-seat of pure gold covered the ark. The mercy-seat had no wood in its composition. It had the same dimensions as the top of the ark and was held in position by the crown around the top of the ark (Exo. 25:12).
The mercy-seat was so significant that in 1Ch. 28:11 the whole room called the Holy of Holies is called the house of the mercy-seat. The mercy-seat was the major spot of significance in the ritual on the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:2; Lev. 16:14-15).
The term mercy-seat was first used by Wm. Tyndale. It is an apt translation of the Hebrew kapporeth. Martin Luther rendered it Gnadenstuhl, meaning throne of mercy. Kapporeth has both the ideas of covering and of atonement for sins. The Latin propitiatorium is a good rendering, meaning a place of propitiation.[368]
[368] Ramm, op, cit., p. 154.
The Greek rendering of kapporeth is hilasterion, meaning a place to please (or propitiate) and be reconciled to God, a propitiatory. The Greek word hilasterion is found in Rom. 3:25 referring to Christ (whom God set forth as a propitiation) and in Heb. 9:5 to refer to the mercy-seat itself. A related word, hilasmos, is used in 1Jn. 2:2; 1Jn. 4:10 to refer to Christ as our propitiation. These usages of words show that Christ has for us the same functions as the mercy-seat had for Israel. Christ is our mercy-seat!
The word kapporeth (mercy-seat) is not used in the O.T. with the limited meaning of lid or cover, as over a box. It is derived from the verb kaphar (found 113 times in the O.T.), which by far most frequently (70 times) means to make atonement. (In some places it simply means to cover.)
What is it that is covered by the functions of the mercy-seat? Your souls are covered (Exo. 30:16). You are covered (Lev. 23:28). Your sin is covered (Exo. 32:30; Compare Psa. 32:1). Thus the atonement provided by the mercy-seat was a very comprehensive covering. (Atonement is a manufactured word in English, from at-one-ment, suggesting harmony.)
Consider the importance of the mercy-seat! When the Israelites in the days of the judges looked into the ark of the covenant (1Sa. 6:19), thousands of them died. They dared to look upon the tablets of ten commandments, Gods law which they had broken.
It seems that men cannot confront Gods law that they have broken and not perish, unless there is a mercy-seat sprinkled with blood between them and Gods law.
On the day of judgment, when the books are opened (Rev. 20:12), and we all stand face to face with God, confronting His law, which we have broken, we shall yet be safe, IF we have accepted Christ as our savior. He is our mercy-seat, our propitiation!
But if we have not received Christ as our propitiation (mercy-seat), we shall be cast into the lake of fire, which is the second death (Rev. 20:15).
11.
What was made to project from the ends of the mercy-seat? (Exo. 25:18-20)
Two cherubim, made of gold, all of one piece with the mercy-seat, and made of beaten (hammered-out) work, projected upwards from the mercy-seat. (The word cherubim is the Hebrew plural form of cherub.) The cherubim were not added upon the mercy-seat, but rose from its top at the ends.
Cherubim are one type of angelic creature. They are frequently mentioned in connection with Gods throne. See Eze. 1:22; Eze. 1:26; Eze. 1:28; Eze. 10:20-21. We are reasonably certain that the living creatures (or beasts) of Rev. 4:6 ff are cherubim. The golden cherubim of the mercy-seat were earthly representatives of the real heavenly beings. They seem to be outstanding for their rapid activity and their reverent worship.
Ezekiel describes the cherubim that he saw as creatures with bodies like men (Exo. 1:6), but having four faces (of an ox, man, lion, and eagle) and four wings (Eze. 1:5-11). Because their faces looked toward one another and also downward toward the mercy-seat, we assume that the cherubim on the mercy-seat had only one face each.
Considerable stress is given to the fact that the cherubim were of ONE piece with the mercy-seat, literally out of the mercy-seat. Perhaps this is to emphasize that adoring angels are always present at Gods throne. Compare Rev. 4:6-8; Rev. 5:11; Isa. 6:1-2.
The wings of the cherubim spread out upwards above the mercy-seat so as to cover it. But certainly their wings did not cover it so completely that it became impossible for the priest to sprinkle blood upon it (Lev. 16:14).
The faces of the cherubim were directed (1) towards (facing) one another, and (2) towards the mercy-seat. In other words, they were bowing. The downward look of the cherubim suggests the reverence due to God, who promised to commune (or speak) with Moses from a position above the mercy-seat (Exo. 25:22). The cherubim did not gaze upon Gods presence above their wings. Compare Isa. 6:2.
Some Bible references picture God as riding upon the cherubim. 2Sa. 22:11 : He rode upon a cherub, and did fly; Yea, he was seen upon the wings of the wind. (Compare Psa. 18:10. It surely seems reasonable to us that this is merely a figurative description of the rapidity of Gods actions. Nonetheless, the expression is Biblical, and we certainly approve of it! 1Ch. 28:18 actually refers to the mercy-seat as the chariot. This brings back to our minds the fact that our God is a God of life and activity, unlike the dead idols that must be moved about by men.
Ancient peoples, such as the Assyrians, Egyptians, and Phoenicians drew and sculptured composite creatures that many people associate with the Biblical cherubim.[369] These had bodies of lions or oxen, and head of humans or birds. The Egyptian sphinx is such a figure. They were usually winged. The Assyrians even called their winged, human-headed bull statues karibu, a word related to the Hebrew cherubim.[370]
[369] M. F. Unger, Archaeology and the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1964), pp. 39, 42.
[370] Cole, op. cit., p. 191. Cassuto, op. cit., pp. 333334.
We surely think that these pagan cherubim(?) were nothing more than feeble, distorted attempts to reproduce the appearance of real cherubim. People had known of cherubim ever since man was expelled from Eden (Gen. 3:24). Their superhuman speed and power probably stimulated attempts to make idolatrous representations of them. Certainly Israel did not need to borrow the idea and designs of cherubim from pagans to form their concept of cherubim as given in the scriptures.
We suppose that the cherubs of the mercy-seat had the basic body forms of men, rather than of oxen or lions. Such four-legged forms would have required too much space on the mercy-seat. This view is strengthened by the fact that cherubim with human forms were placed in Solomons temple (1Ki. 6:23-28). The Jewish Talmud says that the tabernacle cherubim resembled youths.[371] We have mentally pictured the cherubim on the mercy-seat as kneeling, although the cherubim in Solomons temple were standing upon their feet. (2Ch. 3:13)
[371] B. Hagiga, 13b. Referred to in Cassuto, op. cit., pp. 333334.
Cherubim were embroidered upon the veil in the tabernacle (Exo. 26:31) and upon its inner linen curtains (Exo. 26:1). They were not regarded as graven images, probably because no worship was directed toward them. See Exo. 20:1.
12.
Where would God commune with Israel? (Exo. 25:22)
God promised to meet Moses (and Moses alone is referred to) and to speak (or commune) with him from the area above the mercy-seat, between the two cherubim. God would speak to Moses all the words which he wished to command unto the children of Israel.
Exo. 25:22 points out vividly the position of Moses as a mediator between God and Israel.
Observe that God was not in the box, the ark! The presence of God was indicated by the glory-cloud (Shekinah) above the mercy-seat. See Lev. 16:2.
13.
What was the second article of furniture to be described? (Exo. 25:23)
The table of showbread (presence-bread). We find it surprising to us that the table should be given this priority in listing. But our surprise probably only shows our lack of ability to see things from Gods point of view.
14.
Describe the table of showbread. (Exo. 25:23-25; Exo. 37:10-16)
It was one cubit (18 in.) broad, one and a half cubits high, and two cubits (three feet) long. It was really a very small table. It was made of acacia wood overlaid with gold. Like the ark and the altar of incense it had a crown (rim) of gold around its top edge. This prevented items on the table from falling off.
The table had a border round about it, and the border was a handbreadth (about three inches) wide. The term translated border is also rendered as margin, moulding, ledge. The text does not clearly state where the border was placed. Some feel that the border was on the flat table top, so that the table had both an outer and inner crown on its top, causing the top to have a picture-frame appearance. This arrangement would have severely decreased the already limited space available on top of the table for the bread and the vessels. Also, the carved representation of the temple table shown on the Arch of Titus in Rome seems to show a border placed around the legs of the table, about halfway down the legs. The Arch of Titus relief shows two segments of such a frame around the legs of the table near the middle of the legs. Such a border attached to the legs would strengthen the table, like rungs on a chair.
15.
How was the table carried about? (Exo. 25:26-28)
It was carried by gold-plated wood staves thrust into rings of gold, which were placed in the four corners of the table that were on the four feet (or legs) of the table. The rings were placed close by the border. (Close by here means against or joined to it.) Therefore, if the border were on the table top, the rings must have been located near the upper ends of the legs. If the border were positioned about halfway down the legs, the rings would have been there. We favor this view. It would have been much easier to cover and carry the table with the rings down lower on the legs than with the rings and staves near the top of the table. See Num. 4:7-8. The staves in the table were removed except when the table was being carried about. about.
16.
What vessels were used with the table? (Exo. 25:29)
The text mentions (1) dishes, (2) spoons, (3) flagons, and (4) bowls. The dishes (R.S.V. plates) may have been flat receptacles to carry the bread on, or upon which were stacked the loaves on the table. The spoons were probably small cups or dishes used for holding and pouring incense. The same word is used in Num. 7:14; Num. 7:20 to refer to small containers for incense. The flagons (K.J.V., covers) seem to have been small beakers (drinking cups) used for pouring out drink-offerings (Num. 28:7-8). The bowls, like the flagons, were vessels for pouring out. See Exo. 37:16, where the bowls and flagons are mentioned again, but in reverse order from that in Exo. 25:29. Exo. 37:16 says that these vessels were made to pour from. Possibly the bowls were goblets or chalices, having cup-like tops with slim stems beneath for convenience of handling. Such vessels are known to have been used in Moses time.[372]
[372] Ruth Amiran, Ancient Pottery of the Holy Land (Rutgers University Press, 1970), pp. 129131. Cassuto, op. cit., p. 339.
17.
What was the weekly ritual involving the showbread? (Exo. 25:30; Lev. 24:5-9
Twelve loaves were made of fine flour, each having two tenth parts of flour in it. If the tenth parts were tenths of an ephah (about three-fifths of a bushel), then each loaf would have had about a gallon of flour in it! The loaves would have been of enormous size. Lev. 24:7 says the loaves were placed on the table in two rows (or piles). The Hebrew word simply means arrangement and could refer to either loaves or piles. We do not think there was room enough on the table for two rows of such loaves, with six loaves in each row. Josephus (Ant. III, vi, 6) says that the twelve loaves were placed six upon each heap, one above another.
Lev. 24:5-6 speaks as if ONE man (the high priest presumably) set up the table each weekly Sabbath day. Then all the priests (Aaron and his sons) ate the old bread in a holy place. The new loaves were set in place and pure frankincense placed on each row.
18.
What was the significance of the showbread?
The exact theological significance of the bread is not systematically set forth in the scripture. The more we study about the showbread, the more we realize it was a symbol with many facets of meaning, and cannot be fully comprehended under one brief tidy heading.
Firstly, it seems to have been a symbol of Gods people in Gods presence. The very name showbread literally means bread of the face(s), or presence-bread. Exo. 25:30 says rather literally, Thou (singular) shalt set (or give) upon the table bread of (the) presence before my presence continually. The showbread therefore did not symbolize Gods presence, but the presence of someone (or something) else in Gods presence.
The fact that there were TWELVE loaves set out seems to suggest that the bread symbolized the twelve tribes, the people. The showbread surely reminded the Israelites that they were always in Gods presence. Note that the bread is called the continual bread in Num. 4:7, and holy bread in 1Sa. 21:4. What a marvelous symbol the bread was, representing as it did a holy people continually in Gods presence!
Secondly, the showbread was an offering made by FIRE unto Jehovah (Lev. 24:7). As such it was a type of Christ Jesus, who is mans ONLY effective offering unto God (Eph. 5:2). The term fire-offering in Lev. 24:7 is applied to several types of offerings the burnt-offering in Exo. 29:18; Exo. 29:41-42, and Lev. 1:9; the meal-offering in Lev. 2:3; to the peace-offering in Lev. 3:11; to the sin-offering in Lev. 5:12. From this fact we may be reminded that in Christs ONE offering are summed up all the numerous types of offerings prescribed in the O.T. law. It would appear that the showbread was basically one form of the meal-offering (Lev. 2:1-16).
The idea that in the very sanctuary of God there is constantly displayed before Gods presence an offering made by fire is very comforting to those who know the horrible realities about sin!
Thirdly, the showbread was to be a memorial (Lev. 24:7). The term memorial is a sacrificial term referring to that which brings the worshipper into favorable remembrance before God. See its use in Act. 10:4; Lev. 2:2; Lev. 5:12; Lev. 6:15. The showbread is said to have become a memorial when the frankincense was applied to it (Lev. 24:7). Frankincense appears to be a symbol of prayer. See Psa. 141:2; Rev. 5:8. All of these facts cause us to understand that when we pray, trusting in the Lord Jesus, who is always in Gods presence as was the showbread, we are brought into good remembrance before God.
Fourthly, settting forth the showbread was a covenant requirement for the children of Israel (Lev. 24:8). Such acts of obedience are frequently required by God as conditions of continued covenant relationship with Him.
In pagan religions food was sometimes placed on a sacred table as food for the god. For an example see the apocryphal book Bel and the Dragon, Exo. 25:13. The showbread presented a different picture of God of a God who did not eat mens food; of a God who wanted his people to be in his presence more than he wanted gifts from them; of a God who ministered unto His people, rather than the people ministering unto Him.
The showbread has been regarded by some as a type or symbol of the Lords supper. There are a few resemblances, such as the weekly eating of bread by the priests, the offering of frankincense (symbolic of prayers) on the bread, and the fact that both are expressions of a covenant (Lev. 24:8; Luk. 22:20). On the other hand, the fact that the twelve loaves were a symbol of the PEOPLE before God is quite different from the symbolism of the Lords supper, in which the bread is the LORDS body. Also the fact that the showbread was a sacrificial offering made by fire is quite in contrast to the Lords supper, which is certainly not a repeated sacrifice of Christ. (Roman Catholic theology does view the communion [mass] as a sacrifice.) We doubt that the showbread was a specific type of the Lords supper.
19.
What was made to give light in the holy place? (Exo. 25:31-35. Compare Exo. 37:17-24; Exo. 27:20-21; Exo. 30:7-8; Lev. 24:2-4; Num. 8:1-4.)
A lampstand (K.J.V., candlestick) of pure gold was made, and oil-burning lamps were placed on the branches of the lampstand. The Hebrew word for lampstand is MENORAH (a beautiful word, derived from the verb nor [to shine] and the noun or, meaning light). The seven-branched lampstand has become the great symbol of the Jewish religion. A relief carving on the Arch of Titus in Rome shows the menorah taken from Herods temple in Jerusalem (A.D. 70). The lampstand in that carving is not the same one that was in the tabernacle, but it probably resembled it in many ways. It must have been very heavy, judging by the number of men pictured as carrying it. The lampstand in Herods temple is described in Josephus, Ant. III, vi, 7.
The lampstand was made of beaten (or hammered) work, like the cherubim of the mercy-seat. It had a base, the form of which is not described, but the base was almost certainly NOT like the decorated two-stage pedestal shown in the arch of Titus. The Hebrew word translated base means literally hip or thigh, but this does not reveal much about its form. Cassuto[373] suggests that the base resembled those on lampstands found at Megiddo and Bethshan, which had three feet projecting from the central shaft. A rough sketch of a menorah with a three-legged base is shown in Beno Rothenbergs Gods Wilderness.[374] This was scratched onto a rock in the Sinai desert.
[373] Op. cit., p. 341.
[374] Published in London by Thames and Hudson, 1969, p. 179.
The lampstand had a central shaft projecting upwards from the base. We do not know its height. We suppose it was about the same height as the table (1 cubits, or 27 inches) or the altar of incense (2 cubits, or 36 inches). The word translated shaft is kaneh, meaning reed, stem, or cane.
Three branches went out of the central shaft on one side and three went from the opposite side, making seven supports for lamps. Because of the use of the number seven to indicate the complete number of seals, trumpets, etc. in Revelation, seven is usually thought to indicate completeness. The lampstand with its lamps was perfectly adequate, and it furnished all the light that was provided. (Exo. 25:32)
Decorations on the central shaft and branches consisted of (1) cups (K.J.V., bowls), (2) knops (R.S.V., capitals), and (3) flowers. The cups probably were like the cup (or calyx) of a flower, consisting of the green false petals directly under the true flower. The knops (Heb., caphtor) were probably spherical (or egg-shaped) designs, perhaps resembling the ovaries (seed-chambers) of flowers. The flowers were like the blossoms of flowers, perhaps like almond-tree blossoms. (Exo. 25:33)
The whole menorah had the general shape of a natural plant, with a stalk (or stem) and paired branches, turned upwards. The ornamentation was also of floral design.[375]
[375] Cassuto, op. cit., pp. 342343.
Three cups were in each branch, each almond-shaped (that is, the cups were like the calyxes of almond blossoms). Also on each branch was a knop and a flower blossom design. It appears that the top cup (calyx) was the support for the lamp on each branch. In the center shaft (which is by itself called the lampstand in Exo. 25:33 b, 34) were four cups (calyxes) shaped like almonds (or almond-flowers), and a knop and a flower with each. (Exo. 25:34)
In the central shaft just below the levels where the pairs of branches issued forth from both sides were knops. The text says that the knops were both under each pair of two branches and also out of the same. We understand this to say that the knops actually touched each pair of branches, but were actually just below them.
20.
How was the entire lampstand made of one piece? (Exo. 25:36)
All of the connecting points where the branches came forth from the central shaft were to be constructed of one piece with the rest. The branches were not to be made separately and then attached by couplings to the central shaft.
Admittedly Exo. 25:36 is a difficult verse. Noth (Op. cit., p. 208) says it is not fully comprehensible. (Such an attitude is typical for Noth.) The plural possessive endings in their knops and their branches appear to refer to the six branches mentioned in Exo. 25:35. But we cannot imagine that the six branches themselves had branches.
Cassuto (op. cit., p. 343) feels that the branches of Exo. 25:36 (Hebrew, qenoth, having a feminine ending) and the branches of Exo. 25:35 (Hebrew qanim, having a masculine ending) refer to different things. The feminine word is used in Job. 31:22, where it refers to the joint, or socket (Let my arm be broken from the joint). If joint be the meaning in Exo. 25:36, then the verse would mean The knops of the six branches and their connecting points (joints) out of the central shaft shall all be of one piece of hammered work of pure (unalloyed) gold.
Considerable stress is given to the fact that the lampstand was all made of ONE piece of gold (Exo. 25:31; Exo. 25:35-36). Whatever the lamp symbolized should therefore be regarded as a unity, even if it has several parts.
21.
What was to be placed on top of the lampstand? (Exo. 25:37)
Seven lamps, one on each branch. These were made separately from the lampstand. The material used in making the lamps is not stated. It may have been gold, as in Solomons temple (1Ki. 7:49). We definitely prefer this view. Or they may have been made of ordinary clay (terracotta), as were most of the lamps of those times. The clay lamps of the period were like saucers having one place on the rim pinched into a spout or hole for holding the wick up out of the olive oil in the lamp.
The lamps were to be so positioned that they would give light over against it, that is, in front of it, toward the area across the room from the lamp. The spouts of the lamps were pointed toward the north, the opposite side of the room, so that no lamp shadows would block the light. The lampstand itself stood on the south side of the room. See Exo. 36:35.
22.
What implements were prepared for use with the lampstand? (Exo. 25:38)
(1) Snuffers. These were a type of tweezers to remove old wicks and install new ones. (2) Snuffdishes. These were trays or bowls to hold charred remains of old wicks and soot, which would then be thrown out.
23.
How much gold was used in the lampstand? (Exo. 25:39)
A talent, about seventy-five pounds. At a price of $150 an ounce, the lampstand would be worth about $180,000. The vessels and implements with the lampstand were included in this total weight of gold.
24.
What final direction was given about the making of the lampstand and its implements? (Exo. 25:39)
Make all of them according to their pattern which you were shown on the mount! Compare Exo. 25:9. The verb was shown does not imply that Moses had already left the mount and had returned to camp. Rather it indicates that God had already shown Moses the vision of the pattern (or model) of the tabernacle, and then gave the description required to construct it.
25.
What was the ritual connected with the lampstand? (Lev. 24:2-4; Exo. 27:20-21)
Pure (or clear) olive oil was obtained by beating olives to extract their oil. (These the Israelites must have obtained from nomadic caravans.) In the mornings the high priest came in to the holy place to light the lamp (literally to cause it to go up). He was to keep (or arrange) it from evening to morning before the face of the LORD continually.
26.
What was the significance of the menorah? Of what was it a type?
As with the table of showbread, the scripture does not give a systematic exposition of the significance of the lampstand. Nevertheless, certain conclusions seem rather evident.
(1)
The lampstand signified that the covenant of the Lord was essentially a covenant of LIGHT. There were no dark spooky chambers where priests might carry on secret esoteric rites. See Isa. 60:1-3.
In the same way the gospel of Christ is a religion of light. (a) God is light (1Jn. 1:5). (b) Jesus is the light of the world (Joh. 8:12). (c) Christians are children of light (Eph. 5:8). They are the light of the world (Mat. 5:14) and lights in the world (Php. 2:15). (d) The Bible is a light (2Pe. 1:19; Psa. 119:105). (e) The gospel (good news) of Christ Jesus is a light (2Co. 4:4). Christians are to cast off the works of darkness (Rom. 13:12).
(2)
Gods light is complete and perfect. This is indicated by the seven-fold nature of the lampstand. See notes on section No. 19 above. Similarly in the gospel of Christ we have been granted all things that pertain unto life and godliness (2Pe. 1:3).
(3)
The lamp was fueled by olive oil, which is often a symbol of the Holy Spirit. See Act. 10:38; Heb. 1:9; Lev. 8:12; Zec. 4:2-6. Thus the light was the light of the Spirit. Compare Rev. 4:5 (which tells of a vision of Gods throne): There were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of God.
The fact that the scriptures were written by men moved by the SPIRIT (2Pe. 1:21) confirms a correspondence between the tabernacle lampstand and the scriptures. The lampstand was fueled by oil; the scriptures were inspired by the Holy Spirit, which the oil symbolized.
To say that the lampstand was a type of just one thing (as, for example, the Bible alone) is to give an incomplete interpretation of it. Perhaps we could sum it up in a broad way by saying that it symbolized the light of the gospel of Christ (2Co. 4:4).
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
OFFERINGS FOR THE SANCTUARY, Exo 25:1-9.
2. Bring me an offering Hebrews, take for me a terumah . The terumah ( ) was thought of as a gift or offering that was lifted up to the honour of God . The word is often translated heave offering, as in the margin . Comp . Exo 29:27-28; Lev 7:14; Lev 7:32; Num 15:19-20; Deu 12:6; Deu 12:11; Deu 12:17. Here it is used in the general sense of offering, or oblation, and what every man contributed toward the sanctuary was to be given willingly with his heart. No compulsory oblations were to be accepted for this new house of Jehovah, but only such as each man’s heart impelled him to bestow. And so in typical form it was indicated that God builds his spiritual house of willing souls. Comp. Rom 12:1 ; 1Pe 2:5. How willingly the people responded is seen in Exo 35:21-29; Exo 36:5-7.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Provision For Making the Dwellingplace: The People Called On To Make Their Offerings ( Exo 25:1-9 ).
We may analyse this passage as follows:
a The children of Israel to be called on to make an offering according to their willingness (Exo 25:1-2).
b The offering was to be of gold, silver and brazen copper (Exo 25:3).
c And blue-violet and purple-red and scarlet, and fine linen (Exo 25:4 a).
d And goats’ hair and rams’ skins dyed red, and dolphin skins, (Exo 25:4-5 a).
d And acacia wood (Exo 25:5 b).
c Oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense (Exo 25:6).
b Onyx stones and stones to be set for the ephod and for the breastplate (Exo 25:7).
a And they are to make Him a sanctuary that He may dwell (shakan) among them. According to all that He was to show Moses, the pattern of the Dwellingplace (mishkan – EVV Tabernacle) and the pattern of all its furniture, even so they were to make it.
In ‘a’ the people are called on to make a willing offering, and in the parallel they are to make Him a Holy Place (Sanctuary) in which to dwell in accordance with the heavenly pattern. In between these we have the treasures of Israel. Note how in ‘b’ we have the precious metals whereas in the parallel we have the (semi-) precious stones. In ‘c’ we have the materials for the dwellingplace which convey the essential message of the Dwellingplace, its heavenly nature (blue), its royalty (purple-red)and its offer of atonement and righteousness (scarlet), and in the parallel the continual contributions to worship by the people of oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and incense all of which are closely connected to the Sanctuary. In the ‘d’ we have the protective coverings and the wood to add strength, possibly indicating the presence of the earthly aspect in the Dwellingplace.
Note also how, in as far as possible with such overall coverage, all is graded so as to go from the centre outwards, commencing with gold, through silver, to brazen copper; and from the materials for the inner draping to the materials for the outer covering. And we may detect the order, constituents of the inner furniture (gold), drapings and outer coverings, oils and incense for maintenance of worship, jewels for the priestly garments, an order followed in the subseqent narrative.
So the pattern that follows in the subsequent description on the whole parallels the order here, mainly (but not precisely) indicating the first use of the offering made by the people. So we have the making of the inner furniture with the gold (Exo 25:10-40), then the making of the Sanctuary with the coloured materials (Exo 26:1-6), then the outer covering with the goatskins, etc. (Exo 26:7-14), then the frames of acacia wood (Exo 26:15-28), then the oil for the lamp (Exo 27:20), then the jewels for the priestly garments (Exodus 28). We should note that the acacia wood is also used in the inner furniture, and the gold on the frames, so there may also be a pattern based partly on value. The acacia wood by its position is clearly seen as the element of least value among the constituting materials, even though it is contained in much of the inner furniture, probably because it represents the more earthly aspect of the whole. The anointing oil and sweet incense only come in later in the narrative (Exo 30:22-38), although the anointing oil is required for the sanctifying of the priests (Exodus 29). So we can only discern a trend rather than an exact order.
Exo 25:1-2
‘And Yahweh spoke to Moses saying, “Speak to the children of Israel that they take an offering for me. You shall take my offering from every man whose heart makes him willing.” ’
From a human point of view this was an offering of tribute, the first requirement of a suzerain lord, but because the recipient was Yahweh it was also an act of worship, an ‘offering’. The tribute was therefore to be voluntary, a willing contribution. He wanted it to come from the heart. The people were to offer willingly. God receives nothing ungraciously given, or given for the wrong motive.
Exo 25:3-5
“And this is the offering that you shall take of them, gold and silver and brazen copper, and blue-violet and purple-red and scarlet, and fine linen and goats’ hair. And rams’ skins dyed red, and dolphin skins, and acacia wood.”
This is a list of what would be required for the Dwelling-place and its contents. Gold, silver and brazen copper for the furniture, and for the implements and vessels. Bluey-violet, purpley-red and scarlet for the curtains, goats’ hair as a covering over the curtains (see 26:7; 35:26), and rams’ skin dyed red for the outside (see 35:23). The later Arab tent shrines were also made of red leather. There would be no shortage of these things for some had built up wealth in Egypt and they had ‘spoiled’ the Egyptians of many precious things when leaving.
“Dolphin skins” (‘tachash’) The meaning is not certain but it was certainly a leather of fine quality. They were possibly dolphin skins (or porpoise skins) from Red Sea dolphins, or dugong skins. Compare Arabic ‘tuchas’ which means dolphin. But also Egyptian ‘tchs’ which means leather.
We may see the precious metals as a reminder of the glory and splendour of God, the bluey-violet a reminder that this was the place of contact with the heavens (the blue sky would be a daily occurrence), the purpley-red as a reminder that they were approaching a king, and the scarlet as a reminder that they could only do so through the shedding of blood. The fine linen would then represent the true righteousness of the One within, and the acacia wood might be seen as representing the strength and power of God. (It was put within the gold to provide stability and strength). But this is our view of things. They may have seen it differently.
The paucity of words for colour in Hebrew suggests that colour was not considered important in Israel and the words used tended more to suggest the origin of the dyes. And dyed cloth indicated wealth and splendour. The thought may simply therefore be of differing dark, dyed colours, indicating royalty and beauty and the spoils that Yahweh had won for them. The goat’s hair was outside for weather protection and represented the people and the world outside. And finally all would be covered with a covering dyed red. This both made the Dwellingplace prominent and was also a reminder that God could only be approached through the shedding of blood.
The bluey-purple dye was probably indigo and was a common dye used in Egypt, the purpley-red dye was possibly derived from shellfish, the ‘scarlet worm’ would probably be from the cochineal insect found in trees and the fine linen would be from Egyptian flax and of a soft white hue. The word used for linen is of Egyptian provenance.
Exo 25:6
“Oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense.”
The oil of pure beaten olive oil (Exo 27:20) would be required for the lampstand (Exo 25:31) and the perpetually shining light (Exo 27:20-21), the spices for the anointing oil (Exo 29:7; Exo 29:21) and incense (Exo 30:7). Compare the almost parallel verse in Exo 35:28.
This verse is not found in the Septuagint (LXX) and some therefore see it as a later addition, possibly a scribal note from Exo 35:28 eventually brought into the text. On the other hand it may equally have been accidentally or even deliberately omitted in the family of manuscripts from which the Septuagint was translated, or by the translators themselves.
The oil represented the people’s part in letting the light of God shine out, a reminder to Him (in their eyes) of the fact that He was their light and life. The spices and incense represented a desire to please God.
Exo 25:7
“Onyx stones and stones to be set for the ephod and for the breastplate.”
The ephod is described in Exo 28:4; Exo 28:6 onwards, the breastpouch in Exo 28:15 onwards. The word for ‘onyx stones’ is ‘shoham’ which may also mean beryl (so LXX often). The onyx is a black and white transluscent stone, and is easily engraved, the beryl is a green stone. Other alternatives are also suggested such as lapis lazuli and carnelian.
Exo 25:8-9
“And let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell (shakan) among them. According to all that I show you, the pattern of the Dwellingplace (mishkan – EVV Tabernacle) and the pattern of all its furniture, even so shall you make it.”
The word for ‘sanctuary’ (miqdash) comes from the root for ‘holy’ (qdsh). It is thus a sacred and holy place. But it is also His ‘dwelling-place’ (mishkan – tabernacle). The King is here to dwell among His people. And the pattern of it and of its furniture is specifically stated to be divinely determined. We later learn that it is a pattern of heavenly things (Heb 8:5). But even then it is so idealistically not literally. It was to convey ideas not to describe the literal construction of Heaven, which is of course not physical. But the importance of this is in the idea it contained. Here they were in touch with the heavenly.
“The Dwellingplace.” (Mishkan). The temporary nature of the dwellingplace is brought out in 1Ch 6:32 which refers to ‘the mishkan of the tent of meeting until Solomon had built the house of Yahweh’ and 1Ch 17:5 where it says ‘for I have not dwelt in a house since the day that I brought up Israel to this day, but have gone from tent to tent, and from one mishkan to another’. ‘Dwelt (yashab) in a house (bayith)’ is there contrasted with ‘tent’ (‘ohel) and ‘dwelling-place’ (mishkan). The stress in the case of the tent is therefore on the tent as a ‘dwelling-place’, but as more temporary of nature. Indeed its temporary nature is stressed, ‘from one tent to another’. It had constantly to be replaced. Once the temple had been built God was seen as more permanently housed in a building (yashab) rather than more temporarily housed in a movable tent (shakan) which led to the fatal error of thinking that God was restricted to the house and would protect His own house against all-comers. So Ezekiel had to indicate His permanent departure from it (Ezekiel 10). In Exo 24:16 Yahweh temporarily dwelt (shakan) on Mount Sinai. He was not restricted to a place, and indeed could not be.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Offerings for the Sanctuary Exo 25:1-9 records God’s instructions to the children of Israel regarding the collection of the offering in order to gather the material for the construction of the Tabernacle.
Exo 25:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
Exo 25:2 Exo 25:2
2Co 9:7, “Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver.”
Exo 25:1-2 Comments The Principle of Giving and Receiving – God took the children of Israel out of bondage with silver and gold; for they had spoiled the Egyptians (Exo 12:35-36). A few months later, God asks them to give of a willing heart for the building of the Tabernacle. God blessed the children of Israel in order that they might also learn to give willingly and abundantly. This is an excellent example of the divine principles described by Paul the apostle in 2Co 9:10.
Exo 12:35-36, “And the children of Israel did according to the word of Moses; and they borrowed of the Egyptians jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment: And the LORD gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they lent unto them such things as they required. And they spoiled the Egyptians.”
2Co 9:10, “Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;)”
Exo 25:5 “and badgers’ skins” Comments – The badger’s skin was an expensive item to use. It was associated with beauty and wealth (Eze 16:10-14).
Eze 16:10-14, “I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers’ skin , and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy forehead, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen, and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil: and thou wast exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper into a kingdom. And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD.”
Exo 25:5 “shittim wood” Comments – Many of the articles of the Tabernacle were made of acacia wood, also called shittim wood ( ) (H7848). The acacia tree was a thorny tree that grew in deserts of the Middle East. It was a perfect wood for such construction, growing up to twenty feet tall and having a trunk up to two feet in thickness. It has a close grain, which prohibits insect attack.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Exo 24:9 to Exo 31:18 Instructions to Build Tabernacle (Ceremonial Law) In Exo 24:9 to Exo 31:18 God instructs Moses on the details of the building of the Tabernacle. In the description of the building of the articles, the Lord begins with those of the inner sanctuary, the ark of the covenant and mercy seat, then the altar of incense, followed by the table of showbread and the candlestick. Thus, the construction of these articles are arranged in a logical order, from the innermost sanctuary to the outermost. Perhaps one reason for this order is the fact that the order of the erection of the Tabernacle begins with the innermost articles and expands outward to the hangings of the outer court, as described in Exo 40:1-33. Thus, the order of the construction of the Tabernacle follows the order of its erection.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Instructions Concerning the Building of the Tabernacle – In Exo 25:1 to Exo 31:18 the Lord gives Moses instructions concerning the building of the Tabernacle and its articles, as well as the priestly garments. According to Heb 8:5, the Lord showed to Moses this pattern visually, probably while he was on the Mount, for God told Moses to make everything according to the pattern that He showed Moses on the mount. The Lord revealed it to him audibly as recorded in this section of the book of Exodus.
Heb 8:5, “Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount .’
It is important to note that God gave Moses general instructions on the building of this Tabernacle and of the making of the priestly garments. But God left it up to the creativity of the craftsmen, being inspired under their anointing, to design the details of each item they made. In the same way, God will give us instructions for our lives, but He often allows us to make the decisions about many of the details as we are inspired by the Holy Spirit each day.
Here is a proposed outline of Exo 25:1 to Exo 31:18:
The Offerings for the Sanctuary Exo 25:1-9 The Furniture of the Tabernacle Exo 25:10-40 The Ark of the Covenant, Mercy Seat & Cherubim Exo 25:10-22 The Table of Shewbread & its Accessories Exo 25:23-30 The Candlestick Exo 25:31-39 Concluding Statement Exo 25:40 The Building to House the Articles of the Tabernacle Exo 26:1-37 The Altar of Burnt Offering Exo 27:1-8 The Court of the Tabernacle Exo 27:9-19 The Care of the Lampstand Exo 27:20-21 The Garments for the Priesthood Exo 28:1-43 Introduction Exo 28:1-4 The Ephod Exo 28:5-14 The Breastplate of Judgment Exo 28:15-30 The Robe, Mitre, Girdle & Linen Breeches Exo 28:31-42 Concluding Statement Exo 28:43 The Consecration of Aaron and His Sons Exo 29:1-35 The Consecration & Service of the Burnt Altar Exo 29:36-46 The Altar of Incense Exo 30:1-10 The Ransom Money Exo 30:11-16 The Bronze Laver Exo 30:17-21 The Holy Anointing Oil Exo 30:22-33 The Incense Exo 30:34-38 The Appointment of Craftsmen Exo 31:1-11
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Offerings of the Israelites Requested
v. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, v. 2. Speak unto the children of Israel that they bring Me an offering; v. 3. And this is the offering which ye shall take of them: gold and silver and brass, v. 4. and blue, v. 5. and rams’ skins dyed red, and badgers’ skins, v. 6. oil for the light, v. 7. onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, v. 8. And let them make Me a sanctuary, v. 9. According to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the Tabernacle,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
INSTRUCTIONS CONCERNING THE TABERNACLE AND ITS FURNITURE, INCLUDING THE PRIESTLY ATTIRE.
EXPOSITION
THE TABERNACLE AND THE GIFTS FOR IT. The great principles of the moral law had been given in the Ten Commandments uttered by God amid the thunders of Sinai. The “Book of the Covenant,” or short summary of the main laws, civil, political, and social, had been communicated to Moses, and by him reduced to a written form (Exo 24:4). A solemn league and covenant had been entered into between God and his people, the people undertaking to keep all the words of the Lord, and God to be their Protector, Guide, and King. But no form of worship had been set up. Abstract monotheism had been inculcated; and worship had been so far touched upon that an “altar” had been mentioned, and certain directions, chiefly negative, had been given with respect to it (Exo 20:24-26). It remained that the abstract monotheism should be enshrined in forms, obtain a local habitation, and be set forth before the eyes, and so fixed in the heart and affections of the people. God was now about to declare to Moses what the character of the habitation should be, its size, form, and materials. But before doing this, as a first and fitting, if not necessary, preliminary, he required of the people to bring of the best of their possessions for the service which he was about to institute, enumerating the substances which he would condescend to receive at their hands, and especially enjoining upon them that all should be offered willingly and from the heart (Exo 25:2).
Exo 25:2
Speak unto the children of Israel that they bring me an offering. The word translated “offering” is that commonly rendered” heave-offering;” but it seems to be used here (as in Exo 30:13; Exo 35:5, etc.) in a generic sense. The propriety of the people, when God was about establishing his habitation among them, presenting to God all the materials needed, is self-evident and requires no comment. Of every man that giveth it willingly. Literally, “of every man whose heart drives him.” God will have no gifts but such as are freely offered. He “loveth a cheerful giver. If a man gives grudgingly or of necessity,” God rejects the gift. On the noble spirit which the people showed when the appeal was made to them, see Exo 35:21-29; and Exo 36:3 7.
Exo 25:3
This is the offeringgold and silver and brass. Gold was needed for the overlaying of the boards, whereof the ark was composed (Exo 25:11); for the “crown of gold,” which surmounted it (ibid.); for the “rings” (Exo 25:12); the “mercy-seat” (Exo 25:17)the cherubim (Exo 25:18); the dishes, the spoons, the covers, the bowls (Exo 25:29); the candlestick (Exo 25:31); the tongs and snuff dishes (Exo 25:28); the hooks and taches (Exo 26:6, Exo 26:32); for the covering of the table of shew bread (Exo 25:24); and of the staves and pillars (Exo 26:28 : Exo 26:32, Exo 26:37); and also for many parts of the dress of the High Priest (Exo 28:6, Exo 28:8, Exo 28:11, Exo 28:14, etc.). Silver was required for the sockets which supported the hoards of the Tabernacle (Exo 26:19); and for the “hooks” and “fillets” of the pillars of the court (Exo 27:10) Brass, or rather bronze, was wanted for the “taches” which coupled together the curtains of the tent (Exo 26:11); for the “sockets” which received the pillars or tent-poles (Exo 26:37); for the external coating of the altar (Exo 27:2); for the vessels and utensils of the altar (Exo 27:3); for the covering of its staves (Exo 27:6); for the sockets of the pillars of the Court (Exo 27:10); for the “pins” of the Court (Exo 27:19); and generally for the vessels of the Tabernacle (ibid.). To understand how the Israelites could supply all that was wanted, we must remember,
1. That they had a certain amount of ancestral wealth, as that which Joseph had accumulated, and what Jacob and his sons had brought with them into Egypt.
2. That they had received large presents of gold and silver from the Egyptians just before their departure (Exo 12:35); and
3. That they had recently defeated, and no doubt despoiled, the Amalekites (Exo 16:8-13). Whether they had further made money by trade since they entered the Sinaitic peninsula, may be doubted. The supposition is not at all needed in order to account for their wealth.
Exo 25:4
And blue, and purple, and scarlet. Cloths of these three colours seem to be meant. The material was probably wool; the blue dye probably indigo, which was the ordinary blue dye of Egypt; the purple was no doubt derived from one or other of the shell-fish so well-known to the Syrians (of which the one most used was the Murex trunculus), and was of a warm reddish hue, not far from crimson; the scarlet (literally, “scarlet worm” or “worm scarlet,”) was the produce of the Corcus ilicis, or cochineal insect of the holm oak, which has now been superseded by the Coccus cacti, or cochineal insect of the prickly pear, introduced into Europe from Mexico. And fine linen. The word used is Egyptian. It seems to have designated properly the fine linen spun from flax in Egypt, which was seldom dyed. and was of a beautiful soft white hue. The fineness of the material is extraordinary, equalling that of the best Indian muslins. It would seem that the Israelite women spun the thread from the flax (Exo 35:25), and that the skilled workmen employed by Moses wove the thread into linen (Exo 35:35). And goat’s hair. The soft inner wool of the Angora goat was also spun by the women into a fine worsted (Exo 35:26), which was woven into cloths, used especially as coverings for tents.
Exo 25:5
And rams’ skins dyed red. The manufacture of leather was well-known in Egypt from an early date, and the Libyan tribes of North Africa were celebrated for their skill in preparing and dyeing the material (Herod. 4.189). Scarlet was one of the colours which they peculiarly affected (ibid.). We must suppose that the skins spoken of had been brought with them by the Israelites cut of Egypt. And badgers’ skins. It is generally agreed among moderns that this is a wrong translation. Badgers are found in Palestine, but not either in Egypt or in the wilderness. The Hebrew takhash is evidently the same word as the Arabic tukhash or dukhash, which is applied to marine animals only, as to seals, dolphins, dugongs, and perhaps sharks and dog-fish. “Seals’ skins” would perhaps be the best translation. Shittim wood. It is generally agreed that the Shittah (plural Shittim) was an acacia, whether the seyal (Acacia seyal) which now grows so abundantly in the Sinaitic peninsula, or the Acacia Nilotica, or the Serissa, is uncertain. The seyal wood is “hard and close-grained of an orange colour with a darker heart, well-adapted for cabinet work;” but the tree, as it exists nowadays, could certainly not furnish the planks, ten cubits long by one and a half wide, which were needed for the Tabernacle (Exo 35:21). The Serissa might do so, but it is not now found in the wilderness. We are reduced to supposing either that the seyal grew to a larger size anciently than at present, or that the serissa was more widely spread than at the present day.
Exo 25:6
Oil for the light. That the sanctuary to be erected would require to be artificially lighted is assumed. Later, a “candlestick” is ordered (Exo 25:31-37). The people were to provide the oil which was to be burnt in the “candlestick.” In Exo 27:20, we are told that the oil was to be “pure oil olive beaten.” Spices for anointing oil. Anointing oil would be needed for the sanctification of the Tabernacle, the ark, and all the holy vessels, as also for the consecration of Aaron and his sons to the priesthood. The spices required are enumerated in Exo 30:23, Exo 30:24. They consisted of pure myrrh, sweet cinnamon, sweet calamus, and cassia. And for sweet incense. The spices needed for the incense were, according to our translators, stacte, onycha, galbanum and frankincense (Exo 30:34).
Exo 25:7
Onyx stones. On the need of onyx stones, see Exo 28:9, Exo 28:20. Stones to be set in the ephod, etc. Rather, “stones for setting, for the ephod and for the breastplate.” The only stones required for the ephod were two large onyx stones; for the breastplate twelve jewels were needed (Exo 28:17-20), one of them being an onyx. It has been proposed to translate the Hebrew shoham by “beryl” instead of “onyx;” but onyx, which is more suitable for engraving, is probably right.
HOMILETICS
Exo 25:1-7
The law of acceptable offerings.
For offerings to be acceptable to God, it is necessary
I. THAT THEY BE FREELY OFFERED BY A WILLING HEART. Offerings were to be taken of those “whose heart drove them to it” (compare Tennyson”His own heart drove him, like a goad”), not of others. There was to be no taxno church rate. The entire tent-temple was (with one unimportant exception) to be the produce of a free offertory. Thus was generosity stirred in the hearts of the people, and emulation excited. They gave so liberally that they had to be “restrained from bringing” (Exo 36:6). This is noble and acceptable service, when no exhortation is required, no persuasion, no “pressing”but each man stirs himself up, and resolves to do the utmost that he can, not seeking to obtain the praise of men, but desirous of the approval of God. A like spirit animated those who lived in David’s time (1Ch 29:6-9); and again those who returned from the Babylonian captivity with Zerubbabel (Ezr 2:68, Ezr 2:69; Neh 7:70-72).
II. THAT THEY BE OF THINGS EXCELLENT IN THEIR KIND, AND THE BEST THAT WE POSSESS OF EACH. All that is rich and rare, all that is lovely and beautiful, all that is expensive and magnificent, is suitable for an offering to God. We must not “give to Into of that which costs us nothing.” We must not offer “the blind, and the lame, and the sick” (Mal 1:8) to him. Things excellent in their kind befit his service. Gold and silver, of metals; of fabrics, silk, and velvet, and fine linen; of woods, cedar, and acacia, and olive, and sandal-wood; of stones, ruby and diamond, and emerald; of spices, myrrh, and cinnamon, and cassia, and frankincense. Each, however, can only give what he has. Cedar, and olive, and sandal-wood were unattainable in the desert, and so acacia sufficed; silk and velvet were unknown, wherefore God accepted linen and woollen fabrics, and goat’s hair; rubies and diamonds were uncut, so God was content with emeralds and sapphire, and onyx. The widow’s mite pleases him, as much as the alabaster box of spikenard very precious, or the price of an estate brought and laid at the apostles’ feet. If men “have little,” he is content when they “give gladly of that little,” provided still that they give him of their best. And this is true of other offerings besides material ones. The best of our time should be histhe fair promise of youththe strength of manhoodnot the weakness of decrepitude. The best of our powers should be hisour warmest affections, our intensest thoughts, our highest aspirationsnot the dull tame musings of an exhausted and jaded spirit. Each man should seek to consecrate to God’s service the best that he possesses in intellect, in knowledge, in fortune.
III. THAT THEY BE SUCH IN KIND AS HE HAS DECLARED HIS WILLINGNESS TO ACCEPT. There were “unclean animals” which were an abomination if offered to God. There are gifts of intellect, valuable in their way, which are unsuitable for the service of the sanctuary. Many a picture of the highest power, and exhibiting the greatest genius, would be out of place in a church. God points out with sufficient clearness in his holy word, the kinds of gifts with which he is pleased. It will be well for man to “do all things after the pattern showed him in the mount”to avoid “will-worship”and even in his offerings, to follow in the line of precedent, and see that he has a warrant for what he proposes doing in God’s honour.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG
Exo 25:1-7
The materials for the sanctuary.
I. GOD REQUIRED THESE FROM THE PEOPLE. It might have been thought that in order to make this holy habitation, this tent for God travelling along with his people, God himself would have in some way supplied the material. Even as he gave Moses the stones on which the law was written (in the first instance at all events), so he might have made a sanctuary to descend in marvellous manner into the midst of Israel. But it pleased him, who we may be sure always does the wise and fitting thing, to act differently. He required the materials for this sanctuary from the people. They could not provide food for themselvesbut they could provide such a dwelling-place for Jehovah as he would approve and accept. These people who had required so many interventions of God to deliver and secure them had yet been carrying with them in the midst of all their helplessness the great store of wealth indicated in this passage. It is somewhat perplexing to consider the revelation thus afforded of the Israelite condition. In their hearts these people were sinful, idolatrous, unbelieving, unstableit is humiliating to gaze on the sad exhibition of human nature they presentand yet they had managed to surround themselves with these treasures. They were those who had been laying up treasures on earth; and so far these treasures had been of little use; for what will it profit a man to have all this store of gold and silver, and brass and fine linen, and what not, if he lack the daily bread?all the efforts of the people, all their scraping, had ended in the bringing of these things into the wilderness where they seemed of no use. Even gold and silver would not buy bread in the wilderness. But now, behold how God can take this gold and silver and show how to make a profitable and acceptable use of it. When we begin to look regretfully on the results of our natural efforts as if those efforts had been wasted, he comes in to overrule our ignorance and folly. By his consecrating and re-arranging touch, the treasures upon earth can be transmuted into treasures in heaven.
II. THE WILLINGNESS THAT MARKED THESE GIFTS. These materials, valuable as they were, yet yielded in respect of worth to an element more valuable still. These rare and beautiful materials, workable into such beautiful forms, could have been gotten without human intervention at all, if that had been the whole of the necessity. As not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed like one of the lilies, so nothing man can make with his utmost art is so beautiful as the handiwork of God. Nor is the question altogether one as to what is beautiful to the outward eye. The value of beautiful forms is a thing only too easily exaggerated. But no one can exaggerate the beauty of a spiritual action, the beauty of a gift where the willingness and devotion of the whole heart are manifest. This tabernacle might be a very inferior structure, when measured by such principles as dictated Grecian art; but this was a thing of no consequence when compared with the higher consideration that its materials were freely brought. There was none of that extortion and slavish toil, such as we read of in connection with some of the huge fabrics of ancient civilisations. What blood and tears, what reckless expenditure of human life, for instance, in the construction of buildings like the pyramids! When we look at the great buildingsaqueducts, roads, of ancient timeswe must not look at the outward appearance only. These Israelites doubtless had helped in the building of splendid structures; but the foundation of these structures was laid in oppression, and therefore on their topstone rested a destroying curse. There was nothing about all the tabernacle more beautiful than the willingness that marked the gift of the materials. There was no specific demand on any particular person. Let everyone consider for himself whether he will give, and how much. A free-will offering of the inferior brass would be of ever so much more value than an extorted one of gold or silver, or precious stones.
III. THE MATERIALS OF THE GIFTS. Evidently such things were taken as the people had by them; but of these things the very best were taken. Being already in the possession of the people, and valued by them, they were exactly the things to test the willingness of their disposition. When God asks us to give, he asks us to give of our best. All this gold and silver symbolised what was most precious in the heart within. One is reminded of Paul’s words with respect to the materials that might be laid upon the foundation given in Christ (1Co 3:12). We must not bring to God just what we do not want ourselves. The value of the gifts constituted a most searching test of willingness, and willingness was the particular quality that needed to be tested at this time. Men willing to give gold and silver, might be reasonably supposed as willing to give anything else within their power. Then there was a test also in the variety of the gifts. The man without gold and silver would not escape the responsibility of considering what he could do in the way of another gift. For the needs of the tabernacle God required a large diversity of materials; and probably there were few in Israel but could do something towards the supply if only they were so disposed.Y.
HOMILIES BY G. A. GOODHART
Exo 25:1, Exo 25:2
God loveth a cheerful giver.
A message to the people. Like messages are often sent, but seldom welcomed. Even when God demands an offering, many people grudge to give it; they yield, as to a kind of heavenly highwayman, of necessity if at all. Consider here:
I. THE OFFERING REQUIRED.
1. Purpose. Jehovah will give the people a visible sign of his presence in their midst. He will have a home amid their homes, a tent dwelling like in character to their dwellings. More than thishe will be their guest. They shall provide for him the sacred tent. If we count it an honour for a town to receive and entertain a member of our royal family, how much greater an honour to be permitted to entertain the head of the royal family of heaven!
2. Materials. All manner of things required (Exo 25:3-7), so that all can share the privilege of providing them. Some may give a few gold ornaments; even a poor man may yet find some goat’s hair for cloth. Not a member of the nation but can do his part in helping to rear the tabernacle for God. All gifts can be used, so that each may have a share in the work.
3. A precedent for ourselves. God treats us as he treated Israel. He asks our help in building for him a spiritual temple, a dwelling-place in which men are the living stones. Some can give personal effort; some can give money to assist the actual workers; no one so poor but that he can give something. Surely the opportunity of helping God is one which ought not to be undervalued.
II. THE CONDITION OF ACCEPTANCE. All may help, but on one conditionthey must help “willingly,” with the “heart.” The offering is valued not on its own account, but as a symbol of that which is more valuable. Gifts to God are a kind of human sacrament, which God deigns to receive at the hands of man: they are acceptable as outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace. If the grace be wanting, the gifts are worthless. God is good enough to make needs for himself that his creatures may have the privilege of satisfying them; if they degrade the privilege into a tax, he would rather be without their assistance. How often is this forgotten! We give to God, when asked, for many reasons. It is the proper thing to do, and respectability requires it; or it will get our name into some subscription list; or we may have an uneasy feeling that we ought to give, and to soothe our uneasiness we must do something. “Grudgingly and of necessity” is the epitaph which must be written above such wasted offerings. God cannot accept as gifts offerings which are never truly given. He may use them, for they are his in any case to do as he wills with them; he cannot, however, enter them in his inventory as received from the giver who nominally presents them. Only he who gives with his heart has his name set down in the inventory of God. The two mites of the widow are remembered; the talents of the ostentatious tax-payer are forgotten.
III. THE RESPONSE MADE. The people of Israel realised their privileges. They remembered what God had done for them, and were eager to manifest their gratitude. They gave even more than enough (Exo 36:6, Exo 36:7). Their hearts stirred them up, and their spirits made them willing (Exo 35:21); so that they even had to be restrained. What an example for us! Church debts, fettered missionary enterprise, ministers of the Gospel converted into persistent yet unsuccessful beggars; what are the Lord’s people doing when such phenomena abound? Do we not need to be reminded of the privilege offered us, which is so fearfully profaned? Do we not need to stir up our hearts, and to take active measures to make our spirits willing? The roused heart loosens the purse-strings; only the willing spirit can offer the willing and generous gift.G.
HOMILIES BY J. URQUHART
Exo 25:1-9
The rearing of the Lord’s sanctuary.
I. FROM WHAT IT IS FORMED.
1. Of material supplied by his redeemed. To them only request and direction come” Let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.” This is still our high calling, to make God a dwelling-place in the earth. Are we obeying? Is God being glorified by us?
2. Of their free-will offerings. There is no constraint; everything is free and spontaneousthe loving gifts of children, not the forced labour of slaves.
3. Of their choicest and best, and yet,
4. of things named by God himself. Even here we are not left to impose burdens upon ourselves. God’s word and the Spirit’s voice in the heart will direct us.
II. GOD IS THE ARCHITECT OF HIS OWN SANCTUARY. The building and furniture are to be in every particular according to his own plan (Exo 25:9). We may not bring into God’s worship or service our own devices. The stepping aside from the simplicity of God’s ordinances is disservice. It is contempt of God or open rebellion to his authority.U.
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
Exo 25:1-10
The command to build a sanctuary.
The covenant being now ratified, everything was prepared for Jehovah taking up his abode with the people. He would dwell among them as their King. In keeping with the genius of the dispensation, commands are given for the erection of a visible sanctuary. It is here called “mikdash, or sanctuary (Exo 25:8), and “mishkan,” or dwelling-place (tabernacle, Exo 25:9), the latter being the name most commonly applied to it. Considering the purpose which the sanctuary was to serve, and the “plenitude of meaning” designed to be conveyed by its symbolism, it was necessary that the whole should be constructed under immediate Divine direction. A plan of the tabernacle, embracing minute details, was accordingly placed before the mind of Moses on the mount (Exo 25:9). It was presented in its completeness to his inner eye, before any part of it was set up on earth. The ark of Noah, the tabernacle of Moses, and the temple of Solomon (cf. 1Ch 28:11, 1Ch 28:12, 1Ch 28:19), are probably the only buildings ever erected from plans furnished by direct revelation. In the building of the spiritual templethe ChurchGod is himself not merely the architect, but the builder; and the beauty and symmetry of the structure will be found in the end to be perfect (cf. Rev 21:1-27.). Consider
I. THE MATERIALS OF THE TABERNACLE. These were ordered to be collected before the work began. They were to be
1. Costly and variousrepresenting
(1) every department of nature (mineral, vegetable, animal);
(2) the richest products of each, so far as accessible in the desert (gold, silver, fine linen, dyed skins, precious stones, etc.);
(3) all varieties of human skill. The design was to make a palace for Jehovah: a beautiful and glorious house.
2. Abundant. There was to be no stint in the gifts. Profuse liberality befitted the occasion. Grudging in our gifts to God betrays an unworthy spirit.
3. Free-will offerings (Exo 25:2). This point is put in the foreground. The people were to bring an offering”Of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering.” Observe in this
(1) The people first offered themselves to God (Exo 24:7), then their gifts. This is the true order. Compare what is said of the Macedonian believers (2Co 8:1-6).
(2) The giving of themselves to God was followed by the devotion to his service of the best of their possessions. The consecration of self, as formerly remarked, includes all other consecrations. If we are God’s, then all is God’s that is ours. He has the first claim on everything we have. Our best ought cheerfully to be dedicated to him.
(3) God values only such gifts as come from a willing heart. He loves the cheerful giver (2Co 9:7). He puts no value on givings which are not cheerful.
(4) Free-will offerings are necessarily various in kind and amount. Not all could give gold, or silver, or precious stones. Some, whose means were small, could probably give only their labour in working up the gifts of the wealthier. Each gave as he was able, and according to the kind of material in his possession. So far, however, as the gifts were offered willingly, they met with God’s acceptance. The giver was accepted in his gift, not according to its absolute amount, but according to his ability, and to the spirit in which he gave. (Cf. 2Co 8:12.) And all the gifts were needed. The variety which they exhibited was part of their appropriateness. What one could not furnish another could. Many kinds of gifts are required in Christ’s service, and there is none so poor but he can furnish something which others have not at command. The Lord accepts, and will use, all.
(5) God’s dwelling with his people must rest on a voluntary basis. They must wish him to dwell among them, and must prove their wish by voluntarily providing the materials for his sanctuary. A living Church will show its desire for God’s presence, and will evince its gratitude, and its sense of obligation to him, by large and willing gifts in his service. These, indeed, are not conclusive as proofs of genuine spiritual interest; but the absence of them speaks with sufficient plainness of spiritual coldness.
(6) The ideal state in the Church is that in which “ordinances of Divine service” are freely supported by the gifts of the people. This principle found distinct expression, not simply in the freewill offerings for the making of the tabernacle, but in the general arrangements of the Jewish economy. The law prescribed amountscommanded tithes, etc; but the fulfilment of the obligation was left to the individual conscience. It was not enforced by legal means. What was given had to be given freely.
II. THE IDEA OF THE TABERNACLE. Some remarks on this subject seem called for before entering on the study of details. A firm grasp of the central idea is essential to a right understanding of the parts. The tabernacle may be considered
(1) Actually, as the literal dwelling-place of Jehovah with his people;
(2) symbolically, as in its different parts and arrangements symbolical of spiritual ideas; and
(3) typically, as prophetic of better things to come. The typical treatment, however, will best be connected with what is to be said under the two former heads.
1. Actually, the tabernacle was the place of Jehovah’s dwelling with his people (Exo 25:8). This is to be viewed as, on the one side, a privilege of the Church of Israel; but, on the other, as a step towards the realisation of the great end contemplated by God from the first, as the goal of all his gracious dealings with our race, namely, the taking up of his abode among them. God seeks an abode with men. He cannot rest with perfect satisfaction in his love to them till he has obtained this abode (Psa 132:13, Psa 132:14). He wishes to dwell with them. The history of revelation may be viewed as but a series of steps towards the realisation of this idea. The steps are the following
(1) God dwelling with men in the visible sanctuary of the Jewsthe tabernacle and temple. This served important ends. It brought God near to men. It enabled them to grasp the reality of his presence. It was, however, but a very imperfect stage in the realisation of the truth. It would not have suited a universal religion. There was, besides, no congruity between the nature of the spiritual Deity and a building “made with hands.” It was but an outward, local presence which this visible sanctuary embodied. The union between the dwelling and the Dweller was not inherent or essential; it could at any moment be dissolved. Higher realisations of the idea wore possible.
(2) God dwelling with men in Christ. Christ pointed to himself as the antitype of the temple (Mat 12:6; Joh 2:19-22). He was Immanuel, God with us (Mat 1:23). The fulness of the Godhead dwelt in him (Joh 1:14; Col 1:15; Col 2:9). The temple in this case is not a mere material structure, but a holy, and now perfected, humanity. The union is personal and indissoluble. The revelation of God, through the medium of humanity, cannot rise higher than it has done in Christ. The life of God in the individual and in the Church is but the unfolding of the fulness already contained in him (Joh 1:16). This unfolding, however, is necessary, that the temple-idea may reach its complete fulfilment. A third stage, accordingly, is
(3) God dwelling in the soul of the believer. Rather, we should say, in the humanity of the believerbody, soul, and spirit forming, unitedly, a habitation for God through the Holy Ghost (1Co 6:19). In this tabernacle, as in the former, there is the innermost shrinethe holy of holies of the spirit, the “inner man” in which is deposited the law of the Lord (Eph 3:16); a holy placethe soul or mind, with its lamps of understanding, etc.; and an outer courtthe bodythe external side of the being, open and visible to all. The individual, however, taken by himself, is but a fragment. The full idea is realised
(4) in the Church as a wholethe whole body of believers, in heaven and on earth, with Christ as Head. This is the true and the living temple (Eph 2:21, Eph 2:22). Realised in part on earth, and wherever a portion of the Church of Christ exists, the perfection of the manifestation of the idea is reserved for the future and for glory. Cf. Rev 21:3“The tabernacle of God is With men,” etc.
The idea of the Jewish tabernacle thus finds its fulfilment
(1) in the body of Christ;
(2) in the body of the believer;
(3) in the body of the Church.
2. Symbolicallythe tabernacle figured out, in its structure, its contents, and its arrangements, various spiritual truths.
(1) On the ark and its symbolism, see next homily.
(2) The separation into two apartments had as its basis the twofold aspect of God’s fellowship with man. The holy of holies was God‘s part of the structure. Its arrangements exhibited God in relation to his people. The outer apartmentthe holy placeexhibited in symbol the calling of the people in relation to God. The shew-bread and the lighted lamps, with the incense from the golden altar, emblematised aspects of that calling. See next homily.
(3) The arrangements of the tabernacle had further in view the symbolising of the imperfect condition of privilege in the Church under the old economy. A veil hung between the holy place and the holy of holies. Into this latter the high priest only was permitted to enter, and that but once a year, and not without blood of atonement. The mass of the people were not allowed to come nearer than the outer court. They could enter the holy place only in the persons of their representatives, the priests. All this spoke of distance, of barriers as yet unremoved, of drawbacks to perfected communion. The arrangements were of such a nature as studiously to impress this idea upon the mind. Accordingly, at the death of Christ, the removal of these barriers, and the opening of the way for perfected fellowship between God and man, was signified by the striking circumstance of the rending of the veil (Mat 27:51). It is implied in the teaching of Scripture that a like imperfection of privilege marked the condition of the departed just, and that this also was removed by Christ, who, passing into the highest heavens, made manifest, both for them and for us, the way into the holiest of all. (Cf. Heb 9:6-13; Heb 10:19, Heb 10:20; Heb 11:39, Heb 11:40; Heb 12:23.)J.O.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
Exo 25:1. And the Lord spake unto Moses The Almighty, as King of the Jews, having delivered his laws, and ratified his covenant with them, now calls for an offering, in token of homage from his subjects, for the great purpose of erecting a sanctuary or palace, Exo 25:8 wherein he might dwell among them as their King and God: and as in their present itinerary state no fixed place of abode could properly be raised, a tabernacle, fit for removing and conveying from place to place, is appointed to be formed; and we read of nothing more common or ancient in antiquity than this kind of portable or ambulatory temple. This of the Hebrews, being temporary itself, was so contrived as to be a perfect model of a future abiding and more magnificent house; while each of them, both the tabernacle and the temple, were designed to be figurative representations of that body, in which the Divinity was to dwell or tabernacle among men, Joh 1:14 and which, in allusion hereto, CHRIST himself calls the temple, Joh 2:19. See also Heb 8:9 : “From whence it appears,” as the authors of the Universal History well observe, “that they go entirely counter to the express tenor of this Epistle, who pretend that the Hebrews had all their ceremonies, tabernacle, ark of the covenant, altar, &c. from the Egyptians; because they find that the Egyptians afterwards used the same kind of religious utensils.” The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews mentions all these, and many more, as instituted on purpose by God himself, to typify those better things which he reserved for the times of the Gospel. It is even plain from the tenor of the Old and New Testament, that the passover, the lifting-up of the serpent by Moses, the Israelites wandering in the wilderness, and their entering into the land of Canaan, and many more of the like nature, were all typical and figurative; and as such they are applied by the writers of the latter. Great caution, no doubt, is to be used in the application of the types. It must be allowed, however, that the general scope and tenor of the law and its services, pointing to and figuring out the Gospel dispensation, undoubtedly tends greatly to manifest the wisdom of God, and gives an additional proof to the truth of that dispensation (see Bishop Gibson’s Pastoral Letters); and though it is very probable, that many things in the Divine ceremonial might be imposed in contrariety to the customs of idolaters, yet it is scarcely credible, that God would have associated in his worship any ceremonies used by idolaters; and it is far more probable, that idolaters should have derived their rites and customs from the true worshippers, and from those practices which were in use among them long before the erecting of the tabernacle, than that the true worshippers should at any time have appropriated to the service of God their corrupt practices. It is true, the Hebrews were too apt to deviate into the vice of idolatry, and to copy the ill examples of the Gentiles; a striking proof of which we shall shortly have in the 32nd chapter of this book: but this, be it remembered, is very different from copying rites and ceremonies, and transferring them by the direction of God himself into his worship from that of idols.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
I. Prerequisites: the materials; the assessments. Exo 25:1-9
As the real temple of God must consist in believing hearts which offer themselves and build themselves into a temple of the Spirit of God, so the typical sanctuary must be built of voluntary offerings of the people of God: Every one whose heart maketh him willing.
On the assessments for the building (, heave-offering), the blue purple (), the purple proper, the white cloth (, , fine linen), etc., comp. Keil, II., p. 163. There is dispute concerning the Tahash skins ( according to some, the seal; according to others, the badger), the shittim wood (probably acacia; see Keils note, p. 164), the Shoham stone (beryl, or onyx), the garment for the shoulder (ephod), and the breastplate. The materials were: (1) The metals. Vid. Knob., p. 257. Iron came into use later.4 (2) The materials for cloths. (3) The woven fabrics (brocades, variegated cloths, plain cloths). (4) Skins. (5) Wood. (6) Oil. (7) Spices. (8) Precious stones. These materials were to be made into the sanctuary, Jehovahs dwelling-place, in which He is to dwell in the midst of His people, and meet with them.According to all that I show thee; not, have shown thee. The ideal significance of the pattern is contested by Keil in such a way as really leaves only a meaningless model for a meaningless structure; though afterwards this view is modified, II., p. 165.
II. The Building Itself. Exo 25:10 to Exo 27:19.
1. The Ark. Exo 25:10-22
The Holy of holies in the strictest sensethe essential, principal thing in it. Three items are here to be considered: (1) The Ark; (2) The Mercy-seat; (3) The Cherubim. In other words: the preservation of the law as expressing the divine will in its special demands; the altar in its highest form, viz., the mercy-seat (kapporeth), as a symbol of Gods gracious willingness to accept expiation as such a fulfilment of His general will as covers and removes the demands imposed by the law, or the special will, on account of guilt; finally, the two cherubim as symbols of Gods righteous dominion in the world, proceeding out of Gods gracious will and the law, in order to the maintenance of the justice which is represented by the union of the ark and the cover [the mercy-seat]. The whole is accordingly the place where God reveals Himself in His glory under the conditions according to which the high-priest is to appear before Him. For a description of the ark vid. Keil, II., p. 167.Why are the tables of the law which are to be put in it called the testimony (so Exo 31:18; Exo 34:29)? Because they are to be a witness of the foundation of the covenant which Jehovah has made with Israel,the original records, therefore, of the exact phraseology of the covenant. So, too, they might become a witness for Jehovah against Israel.Why is the lid called ? Certainly not simply because it covers the ark. But when Keil (p. 168) denies that the religious significance of the term originated with that of covering, on the ground that this older meaning cannot be substantiated, the literal sense of in Gen 6:14 is against him; and when in 1Ch 28:11 the Holy of holies is called , that may indeed not mean lid-house, but it does not therefore for that reason mean house of expiation, but house of the kapporeth, of the lid of expiation. The transition, too, from the first meaning to the second is very natural. The covering up of the demands of specific law formulated in commandments, and the covering up of guilt itself are reciprocal notions. The verb , when relating to guilt, is construed with the Accus., Psa 78:38; also with , Jer 18:23. The word in relation to persons is construed with , with , and with , all in the general sense of for. From the last preposition [in behalf of] it clearly follows that the senseless explanation which makes denote a covering (concealing) of the sinful person himself from the eyes of Jehovah, an explanation which aims to invalidate the doctrine of the atonement, is entirely untenable. The transaction indicated by is performed by the priest both on the part of man and on the part of Jehovah.Examples of the full construction, Lev 5:18; Lev 4:26.On the see Commentary on Romans 3.The symbol of the cherubim was gradually developed out of the passage Gen 3:24; vid. Comm. On Genesis, p. 241. Here there are as yet only two forms, as also in 2Ch 3:13; the full development is found in the symbol of Ezekiel, ch, 1. From Ezekiel we might be led to conjecture that the first two forms were the face of a man and that of a lion; but it is of chief importance to maintain that the central thought is not that of representative forms of animal life, but only of representative mundane forms symbolizing the divine sovereignty as protecting the ark of the covenant; they are forms which come forth out of the substance of the mercy-seat. On these forms see Keil, p. 168, the lexicons, and works on archology. On the staves see Knobel, who without reason denies that by testimony the two tables are meant. These, he says, were already prepared; but the context disproves this. That the images of the cherubim are to be conceived as hollow, does not agree with the representation that they are of beaten work, of one piece with the mercy-seat.Finally, the tent under the designation , tent of meeting, means somewhat more than that Jehovah therein has a fixed place of meeting with Moses and Israel, just as cannot mean tabernacle of attestation, i.e., Gods place of revelation, but tabernacle of the testimony; for Jehovahs revelation was not confined to this place in Israel.
2. The Table. Exo 25:23-30
The symbol of communion between Jehovah and His people. See Revelation of John. On the two crowns (rims) of the table see Keil. The vessels belonging to the table were plates for the shew-bread, bowls for the incense (Lev 24:7), pitchers to hold the wine, and goblets for the drink-offering.The bread of the face, or shew-bread, is, according to Keil, symbol of the spiritual food which Israel was to produce, referring to Joh 6:27, and doubtless also to Hengstenberg. But what spiritual food was Israel, according to Joh 6:27, to produce? A food which the Son of God would give them, the bread which came from heaven. We must also avoid confounding, with Keil, the shew-bread with the bloodless offerings, vid. Leviticus 2. The shew-bread was one of the permanent institutions of the temple, not one of the special offerings of the people. The table, says Knobel, stood in the holy place on the north side (Exo 26:35), while the candlestick belonged on the south side (Exo 25:35), and the altar of incense in the middle (Exo 30:6). Archological observations vid. in his Comm, p. 266, especially on the dishes. On the use to which the pitchers and the goblets or bowls were put, Keil and Knobel come to opposite conclusions, the latter with grammatical proofs.5
3. The Golden Candlestick. Exo 25:31-40
First is to be considered the form of the golden candlestick; next, its use; finally, its significance. The candlestick has been often described and pictured (vid. Thenius, Bcher der Knige, Tab. III., 11). Comp. Winer, Reallexicon; Zellers Wrterbuch, and the Commentaries. [More especially, Reland, de Spoliis templi Hierosolymitani in arcu Titiano, Tr.]. On the base, which mast necessarily have had feet, stood the candlestick, first as a single thing. It extended upwards in the form of a middle shaft, which had on each side three shafts in one plane, bending around in the form of quarter-circles,a unit, therefore, branching out into the sacred number, seven.
The general form is easily pictured: a base; a perpendicular central shaft, the trunk, as it were, of the luminous tree; and proceeding out of it at regular distances three branches on either side. The description is made obscure or difficult by the ornaments. The principal feature of the ornamentation is the almond-shaped cup; it is divided into the knob, or apple, and the flower. The main shaft has four such cups; out of the lowest proceeds the shaft itself, as well as the first pair of branches. Out of the second proceeds the second pair of branches; out of the third, the third; its fourth cup is its top. The six branches, or side shafts, have each three cups. The one forms the top; the second may have been in the middle of the curve of the branch; the third seems to have lain against one of the three divisions, or cups, of the main shaft. The seven cups which form the top stand in a horizontal line; the lamps are set up into their flowers. But the explanations of the difficult passage are various.6
But the main shaft is distinguished by having four cups. So the one unit branches into the three, the three into the seven, and the seven into the twenty-two. The golden candlestick was placed on the south side in the holy place of the tabernacle. For the south is the direction from which the light comes, and is therefore called also . The seven lamps of the candlestick were set up every evening at the time of the evening incense offering, and were kept burning until morning (Knobel). They lighted the whole sanctuary, but cast their light especially northwards towards the altar of incense and the table of shew-bread; for the life of prayer and the communion of salvation are conditioned on the light of revelation, enlightenment. Keils explanation of the candlestick is, in our opinion, as mistaken as that of the table: In the shining lamps, as receivers, bearers of light, Israel is to present itself continually to Jehovah as a people that lets its light shine in the night of this world. Did the nocturnal darkness of the sanctuary symbolize the night of this world? Israel is indeed appointed to bear light, but the light which it is to diffuse is the light of the revelation of Jehovah, and the bearers of the light are primarily the select ones, the prophets of God. Keil himself urges that the oil is a symbol of Gods Spirit, as also the olive-tree described in Zechariah 4, and the seven candlesticks in Rev 1:20. The significance of the sacred numbers, as well as that of the pure gold, is obvious. On the almond flowers, comp. Keil and Knobel. On the appurtenances of the candlestick see Knobel.
Footnotes:
[4][So Knobel says. But the use of iron is ascribed to Tubal-cain (Gen 4:22), and iron instruments are referred to in Num 35:16, to say nothing of the frequent mention of iron in Deuteronomy and Joshua.Tr.]
[5][Their conclusions are different only as regards the and , Keil making the first mean the bowls from which the wine was poured out as a drink-offering; the second, the pitchers in which the wine stood on the table. Knobel reverses this relation, arguing that is derived from , to pour out. With him agree Gesenius and Frst.Tr.].
[6][According to some (e.g., Philippson) the line connecting the seven lamps formed a curve, not a straight line. It would seem probable that the ornamental flowers were not crowded together on the central shaft, as Lange conceives, but put at equal intervals from one another. It is also probable that there were three flowers on each branch between the main shaft and the lamp, and that the fourth flower of the main shaft was between its lamp and the upper branch.Tr.].
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
H.The vision or the ideal of the tabernacle. The ordering of the ark and of the house of the covenant; of the living presence of the law and of the dwelling-place of the law-giver
Exodus 25-31
I. Contributions for the Building. Preliminary Condition
1And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, 2Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart 3[whose heart maketh him willing] ye shall take my offering. And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, 4And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats hair, 5And rams skins dyed red, and badgers [seals] skins, and shittim [acacia] wood, 6Oil for the light, spices for anointing [the anointing] oil, and for sweet [the sweet] incense, 7Onyx stones, and stones to be set in [set, for] the ephod, and in [for] the breast-plate. 8And let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. 9According to all that I shew thee, after [thee,] the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments [furniture] thereof, even so shall ye make it.
II. The Structure itself. The Place of Worship
1. The Ark
10And they shall make an ark of shittim [acacia] wood: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. 11And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, within and without shalt thou overlay it, and shalt make upon it a crown [moulding] of gold round about. 12And thou shalt cast four rings of gold for it, and put them in the four corners [feet] thereof; and two rings shall be in [on] the one side of it, and two rings in [on] the other side of it. 13And thou shalt make staves of shittim 14[acacia] wood, and overlay them with gold. And thou shalt put the staves into the rings by the sides of the ark, that the ark may be borne with them [to bear the ark with]. 15The staves shall be in the rings of the ark: they shall not be taken from it. 16And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee. 17And thou shalt make a mercy-seat of pure gold: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. 18And thou shalt make two cherubims [cherubim] of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them in [at] the two ends of the mercy-seat. 19And make one cherub on [at] the one end, and the other cherub on [at] the other end: even of [of one piece with] the mercy-seat1 shall ye make the cherubims [cherubim] on [at] the two ends thereof. 20And the cherubims [cherubim] shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy-seat with their wings, and their faces shall look [with their faces] one to another: toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cherubims [cherubim] be. 21And thou shalt put the mercy-seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. 22And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubims [cherubim] which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel.
2. The Table
23Thou shalt also make a table of shittim [acacia] wood: two cubits shall be the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. 24And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, and make thereto a crown [moulding] of gold round about. 25And thou shalt make unto it a border of an [a] hand breadth round about, and thou shalt make a golden crown [moulding] to the border thereof round about. 26And thou shalt make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings in [on] the four 27corners that are on [belong to] the four feet thereof. Over against [Close by] the border shall the rings be for places of [for] the staves to bear the table. 28And thou shalt make the staves of shittim [acacia] wood, and overlay them with gold, that the table may be borne with them. 29And thou shalt make the dishes [plates] thereof, and spoons [the cups] thereof, and covers [the flagons] thereof, and bowls [the bowls] thereof, to cover [pour out] withal: of pure gold shalt thou make them. 30And thou shalt set upon the table shew-bread before me alway.
3. The Candlestick
31And thou shalt make a candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work shall the candlestick be made: his shaft, and his branches, his bowls, his knops, and his flowers shall be of the same [of beaten work shall be made the candlestick, its base and its shaft: its cups, its knobs, and its flowers shall be of one piece with it].2 32And six branches shall come out [coming out] of the sides of it: three branches of the candlestick out of the one side [one side of it], and three branches of the candlestick 33out of the other side [side of it]: Three bowls [cups] made like unto almonds [almond-blossoms] with a knop and a flower in one branch [in one branch, a knob and a flower]; and three bowls [cups] made like almonds [almond-blossoms] in the other branch, with [branch,] a knop [knob] and a flower: so in 34[for] the six branches that come out of the candlestick. And in the candlestick shall be four bowls [cups] made like unto almonds, with [almond-blossoms,] their 35[its] knops [knobs] and their [its] flowers. And there shall be a knop [knob] under two branches of the same [of one piece with it], and a knop [knob] under two branches of the same [of one piece with it], and a knop [knob] under two branches of the same [of one piece with it], according to [for] the six branches that proceed 36[come] out of the candlestick. Their knops [knobs] and their branches shall be of the same [of one piece with it]: all it [all of it] shall be one beaten work of pure gold. 37And thou shalt make the seven lamps thereof; and they shall light [set up] the lamps thereof, that they may give light over against it. 38And the tongs [snuffers] 39thereof, and the snuff-dishes thereof, shall be of pure gold. Of a talent of pure 40gold shall he make it [shall it be made], with all these vessels [instruments]. And look [see] that thou make them after their pattern, which was shewed thee in the mount.
4. The Dwelling (the Tent)
Exo 26:1. Moreover thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains of [curtains: of] fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet: with [scarlet, with] cherubims [cherubim] of cunning work [the work of a skilful weaver] shalt thou make them. 2The length of one [each] curtain shall be eight and twenty cubits, and the breadth of one [each] curtain four cubits: and every one of the 3[all the] curtains shall have one measure. The five [Five of the] curtains shall be coupled together one to another; and other [the other] five curtains shall be coupled one to another. 4And thou shalt make loops of blue upon the edge of the one [first] curtain from the selvedge [at the border] in the coupling [the set of curtains]; and likewise shalt thou make in [so shalt thou do with] the uttermost edge of another curtain [the edge of the outmost curtain] in the coupling of the second [in the second set of curtains]. 5Fifty loops shalt thou make in the one curtain, and fifty loops shalt thou make in the edge of the curtain that is in the coupling of the second [in the second set of curtains]; that the loops may take hold one of [the loops shall be opposite one to] another. 6And thou shalt make fifty taches [clasps] of gold, and couple the curtains together [one to another] with the taches [clasps]; and it shall be one tabernacle [the tabernacle shall be one]. 7And thou shalt make curtains of goats hair to be a [for a] covering [tent] upon [over] the tabernacle: eleven curtains shalt thou make. 8The length of one [each] curtain shall be thirty cubits, and the breadth of one [each] curtain four cubits: and [cubits:] the eleven curtains shall be all of [shall have] one measure. 9And thou shalt couple five curtains by themselves and six curtains by themselves, and shalt double [fold together] the sixth curtain in the forefront [front] of the tabernacle [tent]. 10And thou shalt make fifty loops on the edge of the one curtain that is outmost in the coupling [first set of curtains], and fifty loops in the edge of the curtain which coupleth the second 11[is the second set]. And thou shalt make fifty taches [clasps] of brass, and put the taches [clasps] into the loops, and couple the tent together, that it may [and it shall] be one. 12And the remnant [excess] that remaineth of the curtains of the tent, the half curtain that remaineth, shall hang over the back-side [back] of the 13tabernacle. And a [the] cubit on the one side, and a [the] cubit on the other side of that which remaineth in the length of the curtains of the tent, it [tent,] shall hang over the sides of the tabernacle on this side and on that side, to cover it. 14And thou shalt make a covering for the tent of rams skins dyed red, and a covering above of badgers skins [of seal-skins above]. 15And thou shalt make boards 16[the boards] for the tabernacle of shittim [acacia] wood standing up. Ten cubits shall be the length of a board, and a cubit and a half shall be the breadth of one 17[each] board. Two tenons shall there be in one [each] board, set in order one against [equally distant from one] another: thus shalt thou make for [do unto] all the boards of the tabernacle. 18And thou shalt make the boards for the tabernacle, twenty boards on [for] the south side southward. 19And thou shalt make forty sockets of silver under the twenty boards; two sockets under one board for his [its] two tenons, and two sockets under another board for his [its] two tenons. 20And for the second side of the tabernacle on [for] the north side there shall be twenty boards: 21And their forty sockets of silver; two sockets under one board, and two sockets under another board. 22And for the sides [rear] of the tabernacle westward thou shalt make six boards. 23And two boards shalt thou make for the corners of the tabernacle in the two sides [in the rear]. 24And they shall be coupled together [be double] beneath, and they shall be coupled together3 above the head of it unto one ring [and together they shall be whole up to the top of it, unto the first ring]: 25thus shall it be for them both; they shall be for the two corners. And they [there] shall be eight boards, and their sockets of silver, sixteen sockets; two sockets under one board and two sockets under another board. 26And thou shalt make bars of shittim [acacia] wood; five for the boards of the one side of the tabernacle, 27And five bars for the boards of the other side of the tabernacle, and five bars for the boards of the side of the tabernacle, for the two sides [the rear] westward. 28And the middle bar in the midst [middle] of the boards shall reach [pass through] from end to end. 29And thou shalt overlay the boards with gold, and make their rings of gold for places for the bars: 30and thou shalt overlay the bars with gold. And thou shalt rear [set] up the tabernacle according to the fashion thereof which was [hath been] shewed thee in the mount.
5. The Veil
31And thou shalt make a veil of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen of cunning work: with cherubims [linen: with cherubim, the work of a skilful workman] shall it be made. 32And thou shalt hang it upon four pillars of shittim [acacia] wood overlaid with gold: their hooks shall be of gold, upon four sockets of silExo Exo 25:33 And thou shalt hang up the veil under the taches [clasps], that thou mayest bring [and shalt bring] in thither within the veil the ark of the testimony: and the veil shall divide unto you between the holy place and the most holy [the holy of holies]. 34And thou shalt put the mercy-seat upon the ark of the testimony in the most holy place [holy of holies]. 35And thou shalt set the table without the veil, and the candlestick over against the table on the side of the tabernacle toward the south: and thou shalt put the table on the north side. 36And thou shalt make an hanging [a screen] for the door of the tent, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, wrought with needle-work 37[the work of the embroiderer]. And thou shalt make for the hanging [screen] five pillars of shittim [acacia] wood, and overlay them with gold; and their hooks shall be of gold: and thou shalt cast five sockets of brass for them.
6. The Altar of Burnt-offering
Chap. Exo 27:1 And thou shalt make an [the] altar of shittim [acacia] wood, five cubits long, and five cubits broad; the altar shall be four-square: and the height thereof shall be three cubits. 2And thou shalt make the horns of it upon the four corners thereof: his [its] horns shall be of the same [of one piece with it]: 3and thou shalt overlay it with brass. And thou shalt make his [its] pans [pots] to receive his [to take away its] ashes, and his [its] shovels, and his [its] basins, and his [its] fleshhooks, and his [its] firepans: all the vessels thereof thou shalt make of brass [copper]. 4And thou shalt make for it a grate [grating] of network of brass [copper]; and upon the net shalt thou make four brazen [copper] rings in 5[on] the four corners thereof. And thou shalt put it under the compass of the altar beneath [below, under the ledge of the altar], that the net may be even to the midst [and the net shall reach up to the middle] of the altar. 6And thou shalt make staves for the altar, staves of shittim [acacia] wood, and overlay them with brass [copper]. 7And the staves [staves thereof] shall be put into the rings, and the staves shall be upon the two sides of the altar, to bear it [in bearing it]. 8Hollow with boards shalt thou make it: as it was [hath been] shewed thee in the mount; so shall they make it.
7. The Court
9And thou shalt make the court of the tabernacle: for the south side southward there shall be hangings for the court of fine-twined linen of an hundred [linen a hundred] cubits long for one side: 10And the twenty pillars thereof and their twenty sockets shall be of brass [copper]; the hooks of the pillars and their fillets [rods] shall be of silExo Exo 25:11 And likewise for the north side in length there shall be hangings of an hundred [hangings a hundred] cubits long, and his [its] twenty pillars and their twenty sockets of brass 12[copper]; the hooks of the pillars and their fillets [rods] of silver. And for the breadth of the court on the west side shall be hangings of fifty cubits [hangings fiftycubits long]: their pillars ten, and their sockets ten. 13And the breadth of the court on the east side eastward shall be fifty cubits. 14The hangings of one side of the gate shall be fifteen cubits [Fifteen cubits of hangings shall be on one side of the gate]: their pillars three, and their sockets three. 15And on the other side shall be hangings fifteen cubits [fifteen cubits of hangings]: their pillars three, and their sockets three. 16And for the gate of the court shall be an hanging [a screen] of twenty cubits, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine-twined linen, wrought with needle-work [linen, embroidered work]: and their pillars shall be four, and their sockets four. 17All the pillars round about the court [of the court round about] shall be filleted with silver [joined with rods of silver]; their hooks shall be of silver, and their sockets of brass [copper]. 18The length of the court shall be an [a] hundred cubits, and the breadth fifty everywhere, and the height five cubits, of fine-twined linen, and their sockets of brass [copper]. 19All the vessels [furniture] of the tabernacle in all the service thereof, and all the pins thereof, and all the pins of the court shall be of brass [copper].
III. The Persons and Things occupying the Building. The Ritual Worship
1. The Oil for the Lamp
20And thou shalt command the children of Israel, that they bring thee pure oil olive beaten [beaten olive oil] for the light, to cause the [a] lamp to burn always [continually]. 21In the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting] without the veil, which is before the testimony, Aaron and his sons shall order [trim] it from evening to morning before Jehovah: it shall be a statute forever unto [throughout] their generations on the behalf of [on the part of] the children of Israel.
2. The Clothing of the Priest and of his Sacerdotal Assistants
Exo 28:1 And take thou [bring thou near] unto thee Aaron thy brother, and his sons with him, from among the children of Israel, that he may minister unto me in the priests office [that he may be a priest unto me], even Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar, Aarons sons. 2And thou shalt make holy [sacred] garments for Aaron thy brother for glory [honor] and for beauty. 3And thou shalt speak unto all that are wise-hearted [all the skilful-hearted], whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom [skill], that they may make Aarons garments to consecrate [sanctify] him, that he may minister unto me in the priests office [that Hebrews 4 may be a priest unto me]. And these are the garments which they shall make: a breastplate, and an ephod, and a robe, and a broidered [checkered] coat, a mitre [turban], and a girdle: and they shall make holy [sacred] garments for Aaron thy brother, and [and for] his sons, that he may minister unto me in the priests office 5[that he may be a priest unto me]. And they shall take gold, and blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen. 6And they shall make the ephod of gold, of blue, and of purple, of scarlet, and fine-twined linen, with cunning work [linen, the work of askilful weaver]. 7It shall have the two shoulder-pieces thereof joined at [have two shoulder-pieces joined to] the two edges thereof: and so it [and it] shall be joined together. 8And the curious girdle of the ephod [the embroidered belt for girding it], which is upon it, shall be of the same [same piece], according to the work thereof; even of gold, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine-twined linen. 9And thou shalt take two onyx stones and grave [engrave] on them the names of the children of Israel: 10Six of their names on one stone, and the other six names of the rest [and thenames of the six remaining ones] on the other stone, according to their birth. 11With the work of an engraver in stone, like the engravings of a signet, shalt thou engrave the two stones with [according to] the names of the children of Israel: thou shalt make them to be set [inclosed] in ouches [settings] of gold. 12And thou shalt put the two stones upon the shoulders [shoulder-pieces] of the ephod for stones of memorial unto [as memorial stones for] the children of Israel: and Aaron shall bear their names before Jehovah upon his two shoulders for a memorial. 13And thou shalt make ouches [settings] of gold; 14And two chains of pure gold at the ends; of wreathen work shalt thou make them [pure gold; like cords shalt thou make them, of wreathen work]: and fasten [and thou shalt put] the wreathen chains to the ouches 15[on the settings]. And thou shalt make the breastplate of judgment, with cunning work [the work of a skilful weaver]; after [like] the work of the ephod thou shalt make it; of gold, of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet, and of fine twined linen, shalt 16 thou make it. Four square it shall be being doubled [It shall be square and double]; a span shall be the length thereof, and a span shall be the breadth thereof. 17And thou shalt set in it settings of stones, even four rows of stones: the first row shall be a sardius, a topaz, and a carbuncle: this shall be [stones: a row of sardius, topaz, and emerald shall be] the first row. 18And the second row shall be an emerald, [carbuncle], a sapphire, and a diamond. 19And the third row a ligure, an agate, and an amethyst. 20And the fourth row a beryl [chrysolite], and an onyx, and a jasper: they shall set in gold in their inclosings. 21And the stones shall be with [according to] the names of the children of Israel, twelve, according to their names, like [names: like] the engravings of a signet; every [signet, every] one with [accordingto] his name shall they be according to [be for] the twelve tribes. 22And thou shalt make upon the breast-plate chains at the ends [like cords] of wreathen work of pure gold. 23And thou shalt make upon the breast-plate two rings of gold, and shalt put the two rings on the two ends of the breast-plate. 24And thou shalt put the two wreathen 25chains of gold in [on] the two rings which are on the ends of the breast-plate. And the other two ends of the two wreathen chains thou shalt fasten in the two ouches [put on the two settings], and put them on the shoulder-pieces of the ephod before it [onthe front of it]. 26And thou shalt make two rings of gold, and thou shalt put them upon the two ends of the breast-plate, in [on] the border thereof which is in [toward] 27the side of the ephod inward. And two other rings of gold thou shalt make, and shalt put them on the two sides [shoulder-pieces] of the ephod underneath, toward [on] the fore-part thereof, over against [close by] the other coupling [the coupling] thereof, above the curious girdle of the ephod [the embroidered belt of theephod]. 28And they shall bind the breast-plate by the rings thereof unto the rings of the ephod with a lace [cord] of blue, that it may be above the curious girdle [the embroidered belt] of the ephod, and that the breast-plate be not loosed from the ephod. 29And Aaron shall bear the names of the children of Israel in the breast-plate of judgment upon his heart, when he goeth in unto the holy place, for a memorial before Jehovah continually. 30And thou shalt put in the breast-plate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim; and they shall be upon Aarons heart, when he goeth in before Jehovah: and Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart before Jehovah continually. 31And thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue. 32And there shall be an hole in the top of it, in the midst thereof [And its opening for the head shall be in the middle of it]: it shall have a binding of woven work round about the hole of it [its opening], as it were the hole 33of an habergeon [like the opening of a coat of mail], that it be not rent. And beneath upon [And upon] the hem of it [its skirts] thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet, round about the hem [skirts] thereof; and bells of gold between them round about: 34A golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate, upon the hem [skirts] of the robe round about. 35And it shall be upon Aaron to minister [for ministering]: and his sound [the sound thereof] shall be heard when he goeth in unto [goeth into] the holy place before Jehovah, and when he cometh out, that he die not. 36And thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave [engrave] upon it, like the engravings of a signet, HOLINESS TO JEHOVAH. 37And thou shalt put it on a blue lace [cord], that it may be [and it shall be] upon the mitre [turban]; upon the forefront [front] of the mitre 38[turban] it shall be. And it shall be upon Aarons forehead, that Aaron may [and Aaron shall] bear the iniquity of the holy [sacred] things, which the children of Israel shall hallow in all their holy [sacred] gifts; and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they may be accepted before Jehovah. 39And thou shalt embroider [weave] the coat of fine linen, and thou shalt make the mitre [turban] of fine linen, and thou shalt make the [a] girdle of needle-work [embroidered work]. 40And for Aarons sons thou shalt make coats, and thou shalt make for them girdles, and bonnets [caps] shalt thou make for them, for glory [honor] and for beauty. 41And thou shalt put them upon Aaron thy brother, and his sons with him; and shalt anoint them, and consecrate [ordain] them, and sanctify them, that they may minister unto me in the priests office [and they shall be priests unto me]. 42And thou shalt make them linen breeches to cover their [the flesh of their] nakedness; from the loins even unto [loins unto] the thighs they shall reach: 43And they shall be upon Aaron, and upon his sons, when they come in unto [come into] the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], or when they come near unto the altar to minister in the holy place; that they bear not iniquity, and die: it shall be a statute for ever unto him and his [and unto his] seed after him.
3. The Consecration of the Priests
Exo 29:1 And this is the thing that thou shalt do unto them to hallow them, to minister unto me in the priests office [to be priests unto me]: Take one young bullock, and two rams without blemish, 2and unleavened bread, and cakes unleavened tempered [mingled] with oil, and wafers unleavened anointed with oil: of wheaten flour shalt thou make them. 3And thou shalt put them into one basket, and bring them in the basket, with the bullock and the two rams. 4And Aaron and his sons thou shalt bring unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], and shalt wash them with water. 5And thou shalt take the garments, and put upon Aaron the coat, and the robe of the ephod, and the ephod, and the breast-plate, and gird him with the curious girdle [embroidered belt] of the ephod. 6And thou shalt put the mitre [turban] upon his head, and put the holy crown upon the mitre [turban]. 7Then shalt thou [And thou shalt] take the anointing oil, and pour itupon his head, and anoint him. 8And thou shalt bring his sons, and put coats upon them. 9And thou shalt gird them with girdles, Aaron and his sons, and put the bonnets [bind caps] on them: and the priests office [priesthood] shall be theirs for [by] a perpetual statute: 10and thou shalt consecrate Aaron and his sons. And thou shalt cause a bullock to be brought [bring the bullock] before the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting]: and Aaron and his sons shall put their hands upon the head of the bullock. 11And thou shalt kill the bullock before Jehovah, by the door of the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting]. 12And thou shalt take of the blood of the bullock, and put it upon the horns of the altar with thy finger, and pour all the blood beside the bottom [at the base] of the altar. 13And thou shalt take all the fat that covereth the inwards, and the caul that is above [lobe above] the liver, and the two kidneys and the fat that is upon them, and burn themupon the altar. 14But the flesh of the bullock, and his skin, and his dung, shalt thou burn with fire without the camp: it is a sin-offering. 15Thou shalt also take one [the one] ram; and Aaron and his sons shall put [lay] their hands upon the head of the ram. 16And thou shalt slay the ram, and thou shalt take his blood, and sprinkle it round about upon the altar. 17And thou shalt cut the ram in pieces, and wash the inwards of him [his inwards], and his legs, and put them unto his pieces, and unto his head. 18And thou shalt burn the whole ram upon the altar: it is a burnt-offering unto Jehovah: it is a sweet savor, an offering made by fire [a fire-offering] unto Jehovah. 19And thou shalt take the other ram; and Aaron and his sons shall put [lay] their hands upon the head of the ram. 20Then shalt thou kill the ram, and take of his blood, and put it upon the tip of the right ear of Aaron, and upon the tip of the right ear of his sons, and upon the thumb of their right hand, and upon the great toe of their right foot, and sprinkle the blood upon the altar round about. 21And thou shalt take of the blood that is upon the altar, and of the anointing oil, and sprinkle it upon Aaron, and upon his garments, and upon his sons, and upon the garments of his sons with him: and he shall be hallowed, and his garments, and his sons, and his sons garments with him. 22Also thou shalt take of the ram the fat and the rump [the fat tail], and the fat that covereth the inwards, and the caul above [lobe of] the liver, and the two kidneys, and the fat that is upon upon them, and the right shoulder; for it is a ram of consecration: 23And one loaf of bread, and one cake of oiled bread, and one wafer out of the basket of the unleavened bread that is before Jehovah: 24And thou shalt put all [the whole] in the hands of Aaron, and in the hands of his sons; and shalt wave them for a wave-offering before Jehovah. 25And thou shalt receive [take] them of [from] their hands, and burn them upon the altar for a [upon the] burnt-offering, for a sweet savor before Jehovah: it is an offering made by fire [a fire-offering] unto Jehovah. 26And thou shalt take the breast of the ram of Aarons consecration [of Aarons ram of consecration], and wave it for [as] a wave-offering before Jehovah: and it shall be thy part. 27And thou shalt sanctify the breast of the wave-offering, and the shoulder of the heave-offering, which is waved, and which is heaved up, of the ram of the [of] consecration, even of that which is for Aaron, and of that which is for his sons: 28And it shall be Aarons and his sons by a statute for ever from the children of Israel; for it is an [a] heave-offering: and it shall be an [a] heave-offering from the children of Israel of the sacrifice of their [Israel of their] peace-offerings,even their heave-offering unto Jehovah. 29And the holy garments of Aaron shall be 30his sons after him, to be anointed therein, and to be consecrated in them. And that son that is priest in his stead shall put them on seven days [Seven days shall he of his sons who is priest in his stead put them on], when he cometh into the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting] to minister in the holy place. 31And thou shalt take the ram of the [of] consecration, and seethe [boil] his flesh in the 32[a] holy place. And Aaron and his sons shall eat the flesh of the ram, and the bread that is in the basket, by the door of the tabernacle of the congregation [tentof meeting]. 33And they shall eat those things wherewith the [wherewith] atonement was made, to consecrate and to sanctify them; but a stranger shall not eat thereof, 34because they are holy. And if aught of the flesh of the consecrations [consecration], or of the bread, remain unto [until] the morning, then thou shalt burn the remainder with fire: it shall not be eaten, because it is holy. 35And thus shalt thou do unto Aaron and to his sons, according to all things which [all that] I have commanded thee: seven days shalt thou consecrate them.
4. Consecration and Design of the Altar of Burnt-offering
36And thou shalt offer every day a bullock for a sin-offering for atonement: and thou shalt cleanse the altar, when thou hast made an [by making] atonement for it, and thou shalt anoint it, to sanctify it. 37Seven days thou shalt make an [make] atonement for the altar, and sanctify it; and it shall be an altar most holy: whatsoever 38toucheth the altar shall be holy. Now this is that which thou shalt offer upon the altar: two lambs of the first year [a year old] day by day continually. 39The one lamb thou shalt offer in the morning; and the other lamb thou shalt offer at even: 40And with the one lamb a tenth deal [part] of flour mingled with the fourth part of an [a] hin of beaten oil; and the fourth part of an [a] hin of wine for a drink-offering. 41And the other lamb thou shalt offer at even, and shalt do thereto according to the meat-offering of [shalt offer with it the same meal-offering as in] the morning, and according to the drink-offering thereof [and the same drink-offering], for a sweet savor, an offering made by fire [a fire-offering] unto Jehovah. 42This shall be a continual burnt-offering throughout your generations at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting] before Jehovah; where I will meet [meet with] you, to speak there unto thee. 43And there I will meet with the children of Israel, and the tabernacle [and it] shall be sanctified by my glory. 44And I will sanctify the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], and the altar: I will sanctify also both Aaron and his sons, to minister to me in the priests office 45[to be priests unto me]. And I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will be their God. 46And they shall know that I am Jehovah their God, that brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, that I may [might] dwell among them: I am Jehovah their God.
5. The Altar of Incense
Exo 30:1 And thou shalt make an altar to burn incense upon: of shittim 2[acacia] wood shalt thou make it. A cubit shall be the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof; four-square shall it be: and two cubits shall be the height thereof: the horns thereof shall be of the same [of one piece with it]. 3And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, the top thereof, and the sides thereof round about, and the horns thereof; and thou shalt make unto [for] it a crown of gold round about. 4And two golden rings shalt thou make to [for] it under the crown of it, by the two corners [upon the two flanks] thereof, upon the two sides of it shalt thou make it; and they shall be for places for the staves to bear it withal [with]. 5And thou shalt make the staves of shittim [acacia] wood, and overlay them with gold. 6And thou shalt put it before the veil that is by the ark of the testimony, before the mercy-seat that is over the testimony, where I will meet with thee. 7And Aaron shall burn thereon sweet incense every morning: when he dresseth [trimmeth] the lamps, he shall burn incense upon it. 8And when Aaron lighteth [setteth up] the lamps at even, he shall burn incense upon it [burn it], a perpetual incense before Jehovah throughout your generations. 9Ye shall offer no strange incense thereon, nor burnt-sacrifice [burnt-offering], nor meat-offering [meal-offering]; neither shall ye pour [and ye shall pour no] drink-offering thereon. 10And Aaron shall make an [make] atonement upon [for] the horns of it once in a [the] year with the blood of the sin-offering of atonements: once in the year shall he make atonement upon [for] it throughout your generations: it is most holy unto Jehovah.
6. The Contributions for the Sanctuary (Poll-tax)
11And Jehovah spake unto Moses saying, 12When thou takest the sum of the children of Israel after [according to] their number, then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul unto Jehovah, when thou numberest them; that there be [maybe] no plague among them, when thou numberest them. 13This they shall give, every one that passeth among [over unto] them that are numbered, half a shekel after [according to] the shekel of the sanctuary: (a shekel is twenty gerahs): an [a] half shekel shall be the offering of [unto] Jehovah. 14Every one that passeth among [over unto] them that are numbered, from twenty years old and above, shall give an offering unto Jehovah [Jehovahs offering]. 15The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a [the half] shekel, when they give an offering unto Jehovah [give Jehovahs offering], to make an [make] atonement for your souls. 16And thou shalt take the atonement money of [from] the children of Israel, and shalt appoint it for the service of the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting]; that it may be [and it shall be] a memorial unto [for] the children of Israel before Jehovah, to make an [make] atonement for your souls.
7. The Laver
17And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, 18Thou shalt also make a laver of brass [copper], and his foot also of brass [its base of copper], to wash withal [in]: and thou shalt put it between the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting] and the altar, and thou shalt put water therein. 19For Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet thereat [from it]: 20When they go into the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], they shall wash with water, that they die not; or when they come near to the altar to minister, to burn offering made by fire [afire-offering] unto Jehovah: 21So they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they die not: and it shall be a statute for ever to them, even to him and to his seed throughout their generations.
8. The holy Anointing Oil
22Moreover Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, 23Take thou also unto thee principal spices [the chief spices], of pure [flowing] myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty shekels, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty shekels, 24And of cassia five hundred shekels, after [accordingto] the shekel of the sanctuary, and of oil olive an [olive oil a] hin: 25And thou shalt make it an oil of holy ointment [a holy anointing oil], an ointment compound [compounded] after the art of the apothecary [a perfumed ointment, the work of theperfumer]: it shall be an [a] holy anointing oil. 26And thou shalt anoint the tabernacle of the congregation therewith [therewith the tent of meeting], and the ark of the testimony, 27And the table and all his vessels [its furniture], and the candlestick and his vessels [its furniture] and the altar of incense, 28And the altar of burnt-offering with all his vessels [its furniture], and the laver and his foot [its base]. 29And thou shalt sanctify them, that they may be most holy: whatsoever [whosoever] toucheth them shall be holy. 30And thou shalt anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, that they may minister unto me in the priests office [to be priests unto me]. 31And thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel, saying, This shall be an [a] holy anointing oil unto me throughout your generations. 32Upon mans flesh shall it not be poured, neither shall ye make any other like it, after the composition of it [and ye shall make none like it with its33proportions]: it is holy, and it shall be holy unto you. Whosoever compoundeth any like it, or whosoever putteth any of it upon a stranger, shall even [he shall] be cut off from his people.
9. The Incense
34And Jehovah said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices, stacte, and onycha, and galbanum; these sweet spices with pure frankincense: of each shall there be a like weight [an equal part]: 35And thou shalt make it a perfume, a confection, after the art of the apothecary, tempered together [make of it an incense, a perfume, thework of the perfumer, salted], pure, and holy: 36And thou shalt beat some of it very small [it fine], and put of it before the testimony in the tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], where I will meet with thee: it shall be unto you most holy. 37And as for the perfume [And the incense] which thou shalt make, ye shall not make to [for] yourselves according to the composition [with its proportions]: it shall be unto thee holy for [unto] Jehovah. 38Whosoever shall make [make any] like unto that, to smell thereto [thereof], shall even [he shall] be cut off from his people.
IV. The Architects. The Master-workman Bezaleel and his Vocation. Sacred Art
Exo 31:1, And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, 2See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah: 3And I have filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner [kinds] of workmanship, 4To devise cunning [skilful] works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass [copper], 5And in cutting of stones, to set them [stones for setting], and in carving of timber, to work in all manner [kinds] of workmanship. 6And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan: and in the hearts of all that are wise-hearted I have put wisdom, that they make all that I have commanded thee: 7The tabernacle of the congregation [tent of meeting], and the ark of the testimony, and the mercy-seat that is thereupon, and all the furniture of the tabernacle [tent], 8And the table and his [its] furniture, and the pure candlestick with all his [its] furniture, and the altar of incense, 9And the altar of burnt-offering with all his [its] furniture, and the laver and his foot [its base], 10And the cloths [garments] of service, and the holy garments for Aaron the priest, and the garments of his sons, to minister in the priests office [aspriests], 11And the anointing oil, and sweet incense for the holy place: according to all that I have commanded thee shall they do.
V. The Condition of the Vitality of the Ritual. The Sabbath
12And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, 13Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am Jehovah that doth sanctify you. 14Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore [And ye shall keep the sabbath]; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth [profaneth] it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. 15Six days may work be done; but in [on] the seventh is the [a] sabbath of rest, holy to Jehovah: whosoever doeth any work in [on] the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. 16Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations for [as] a perpetual 17covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed. 18And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing [speaking] with him upon mount Sinai, two [the two] tables of [of the] testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
[Exo 25:19. , etc. Literally, From the mercy-seat shall ye make the cherubim. This is understood by some to mean: rising up from the mercy-seat. But the simple hardly conveys that notion; it has, perhaps, somewhat of its original import, part, so that the direction is to make the cherubim a part of the mercy-seat, i.e., of one piece with it.Tr.]
[Exo 25:31. The change proposed in the punctuation is one required by the Masoretic accentuation, as well as by the sense, though adopted by only a few commentators (Knobel, Do Wette, Bunsen). When it is said, its base and its shaft, etc., shall be made of the same, the question arises, the same with what? For the several specifications include the whole of the candlestick. The direction thus would be to make all the several parts of the candlestick of the same piece with the candlestickwhich is senseless.Tr.]
[Exo 26:24. The A. V. rendering (favored also by Kalisch, Gesenius, Glaire, De Wette, Frst, and Canon Cook) assumes to be a contracted form of . But it is singular (if this is the case) that both forms should occur in the same verse, and more singular still that there should be the same conjunction of the two forms in the parallel passage Exo 36:29. So long as at the best the obscurity of the description is not relieved by such an assumption, it seems much more reasonable to take in its natural sense of perfect, whole, and elucidate the meaning, if possible, on that assumption.Tr.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
The origin of the tabernacle is twice recorded in Exodus: first, (considered from its divine side) as a command of God, or (considered from its human side) as a vision or ideal (the tabernacle which God showed Moses on the mount), 2531; secondly, as the historical fact of the execution of the building of the work commanded by Jehovah, but interrupted by the history of the golden calf, 3540.
The tabernacle is not merely a place of worship; but, as being the house of the ark of the covenant or of the tables of the law, and as being the house of the Lord of the covenant who manifests Himself in the Holy of holies, it is first of all the centre of the whole legislation and the residence of the lawgiver Himself, who holds sway between the cherubim over His law, and will not let it become a dead ordinance, but makes sure that from out of the Holy of holies it shall grow into a living power. Hence, therefore, the history of this institution properly stands in Exodus, not in Leviticus. Jehovah has redeemed His people out of the house of bondage, and brought them to His holy house, which is at once palace, temple, and court-house, or public gathering-placethe house in which Jehovah meets with His people.
The tabernacle has been called a nomadic temple. It is indeed the preliminary form of the temple, but itself continued, after the people ceased their wanderings, for a long time to change its location in Israel until Solomons temple was built. As the prototype and opposite of garish heathen temples; as the historical model of the Israelitish temple in its three principal historical forms (temples of Solomon, Zerubbabel, and Herod); as the religious model, or outline, the type of Christian places of worship; and as the symbol of the proportions of the kingdom of God, both outwardly and inwardly considered; accordingly, as the fundamental form of every real sanctuary, the tabernacle preserves an imperishable significancealmost more significant in its naked simplicity than with its ornamentation and wealth. When the outward glory of the temple is gone, God will rebuild the tabernacle of David (Amo 9:11-12).
The tabernacle as Moses idea, which indeed he owes to divine revelation, characterizes Moses as also a great and original man in Hebrew art. Bezaleel was only the artist or master-workman who carried out the idea, working according to Moses plan; and even Michel Angelo, who chiselled the figure of Moses, worked, as architect, according to the theocratic outline which had been introduced into the world through Moses.
Of the numerous treatises on this sanctuary comp. besides Bhr (Symbolik des mosaischen Kultus I. p. 53 sqq.) and Keil (Bibl. Archologie 1, 17 sqq.), especially Leyrer in Herzogs Real-Encyklopdie, Art. Stiftshtte, which gives a condensed view of all the opinions and conjectures which have been propounded respecting its structure and significance. The latest monograms are: Wilh. Neumann, Die Stiftshtte in Bild und Wort gezeichnet, Gotha, 1861 (rich in fantastic hypotheses derived from the discoveries at Nineveh), and C. J. Riggenbach, Die mosaische Stiftshtte mit drei lithogr. Tafeln. (Basel, 18624). Vid. Knobel, Commentary, pp. 249257. Popper, Der biblische Bericht ber die Stiftshtte, etc. (Leipzig, 1862). Wangemann, Die Bedeutung der Stiftshtte. Wissenschaftlicher Vortrag, etc. (Berlin, 1866). Also Winers Reallexicon and Zellers Biblisches Wrterbuch. [To these may be added, besides Smiths Bible Dictionary and Kittos Cyclopedia, Kurtz, Sacrificial Offerings of the O. T.; Haneberg, Die religisen Alterthmer der Bibel (Munich, 1869); T. O. Paine, Solomons Temple (Boston, H. H. & T. W. Carter, 1870); and E. E. Atwater, History and Significance of the Sacred Tabernacle of the Hebrews (Dodd & Mead, New York, 1875).Tr.]
I. General view of the ideal plan of the building. Exo 25:1 to Exo 31:11
External Prerequisites. Building Materials. Assessments for the Building. Exo 25:1-9.
a. The Divine Side of the Dwelling
1. The Ark of the Covenant, with the Mercy-seat and the Cherubim, as the chief thing in the whole Building, Exo 25:10-22. Object of it: the continual, living Revelation of God. Exo 25:22. The Holy of Holies.
2. The Table of Shew-bread (of Communion with God, consecrated to God, Exo 25:30), and the Candlestick with its Appurtenances (the Divine Illumination in accordance with the Ideal, Exo 25:40), Exo 25:23-40.
3. The Sanctuary. Divine and Human. The Tent, or the Dwelling itself, Exo 26:1-30. Conformed to the Ideal, Exo 26:30.
4. The Veil to distinguish and divide the Holy of Holies from the Sanctuary, Exo 26:31-37.
b. The Human Side of the Dwelling
1. The Altar of Burnt-offering. Chap. Exo 27:1-8. Conformed to the Ideal, Exo 27:8.
2. The Court, Exo 27:9-19.
c. Functions Connected with the Building
1. Bringing of the holy Oil, and the Preparation of the Candlestick, Exo 27:20-21.
2. Equipment of the Priest, the High priest and his Assistants, Exo 28:1-43. Object of it, Exo 28:35; Exo 28:43.
3. Consecration of the Priests and the Sacrificial Functions of the Priest, Exo 29:1-46. Object, Exo 29:43-46.
4. Altar of Incense, and its Use, Exo 30:1-10.
5. Assessment for the Sanctuary as a Continual Memorial for the People, Exo 30:11-16.
6. The Brazen Laver in the Court for the Priests to wash from, Exo 30:17-21.
7. The Anointing of the Holy Things. The most holy Ointment, Exo 30:22-33.
8. The Most Holy Incense, Exo 30:34-38.
d. The Master-workmen
Exo 31:1-11.
*****Conclusion.The fundamental condition on which the meeting between Jehovah and His people ideally rests: the Sabbath, Exo 31:12-17. The addition of the Directions concerning the Tabernacle to the completed written Law, Exo 31:18.
II. General view of the actual construction of the building
Foundation: The Sabbath as Prerequisite to the Tabernacle. Exo 35:1-3 (Exo 31:14-17).
1. The Assessments for the Building, and the Preparation of the Material made under the direction of the Master-workmen, Exo 35:4 to Exo 36:7 (Exo 25:1-9; Exo 31:1-11).
2. The Work on the Dwelling, Exo 36:8-38 (Exo 26:1-37).
3. The Ark of the Covenant, the Mercy-seat, and the Cherubim, Exo 37:1-9 (Exo 25:10-22).
4. The Table, with its Appurtenances, Exo 37:10-16 (Exo 25:23-30).
5. The Candlestick, Exo 37:17-24 (Exo 25:31-40).
6. The Altar of Incense, the Incense, and the Anointing Oil, Exo 37:25-29 (Exo 30:1-10; Exo 30:23-38).
7. The Altar of Burnt-offering, Exo 38:1-7 (Exo 27:1-8).
8. The Brazen Laver, and the Court, Exo 38:8-20 (Exo 27:9-19).
9. The Reckoning of the Material used, Exo 38:21-31.
10. The official Garments of the Priests, Exo 39:1-31 (Exo 28:1-43). The Consecration of the Priests, and the Ordinance of the Sacrifices, Exo 29:1-46.
11. The Presentation of the Constituent Parts of the Dwelling, Exo 39:32-43.
12. The Erection of the Dwelling, and the Heavenly Consecration of it by means of the Pillar of Cloud and Fire, the Sign of the Veiled Presence of the Glory of the Lord, chap. 40.
Knobel calls attention to the exact reckoning in Exo 38:21 sqq. and the extraordinary circumstantiality and diffuseness which is found in no other narrator to the same degree. So extended a repetition does not occur elsewhere in all the Old Testament. As to the diffuseness, the O. T. everywhere gives details when the sanctuary is concerned, as becomes the symbolical significance of the sanctuary and the religious spirit of the Israelites, vid. 1 Samuel 4-7; 1Ki 5:1 to 1Ki 9:15; 2 Kings 12; 2 Chronicles 2-7; Ezekiel 40-47; the whole of Haggai; Zechariah 3, 4. It is taken for granted that here in every individual feature there is to be recognized the reflection of a religious thought. As to the repetition, however, stress is to be laid on the general consciousness of connection between ideal and real worship, as well as the special consciousness that the real tabernacle was built exactly according to the idea of it. Moreover, the second account is not a mere repetition of the first. In the presentation of the idea, the master-workmen come at the end; in the narrative of the actual erection of the building, at the beginning,quite in accordance with the relations of real life. In the execution of the work of the tabernacle the sacerdotal garments are described, and even the calculation of the cost of the buildingthe church account, so to speak. So the denunciation of a severe penalty on the manufacture, for private use, of the holy anointing oil and of the incense, is one of the means used to prevent the profanation of a legally prescribed system of worship. Even the hinderance in the execution of the work prescribed in the mount, occasioned by the golden calf, is not without meaning. How often it is a golden calf which hinders the execution of pure ideal ecclesiastical conceptions! Here, however, is everywhere manifested this feature of revelation, that the idea must become fact, and that the fact must answer to the idea.
We make five general divisions in the things commanded: I. The Prerequisitethe Materials. II. The Precept concerning the Structure itself. III. The Persons and Things occupying the Building. IV. The Architects and their Work. V. The Condition of the Vitality of the Institutionthe Sabbath.
Footnotes:
[1][Exo 25:19. , etc. Literally, From the mercy-seat shall ye make the cherubim. This is understood by some to mean: rising up from the mercy-seat. But the simple hardly conveys that notion; it has, perhaps, somewhat of its original import, part, so that the direction is to make the cherubim a part of the mercy-seat, i.e., of one piece with it.Tr.]
[2][Exo 25:31. The change proposed in the punctuation is one required by the Masoretic accentuation, as well as by the sense, though adopted by only a few commentators (Knobel, Do Wette, Bunsen). When it is said, its base and its shaft, etc., shall be made of the same, the question arises, the same with what? For the several specifications include the whole of the candlestick. The direction thus would be to make all the several parts of the candlestick of the same piece with the candlestickwhich is senseless.Tr.]
[3][Exo 26:24. The A. V. rendering (favored also by Kalisch, Gesenius, Glaire, De Wette, Frst, and Canon Cook) assumes to be a contracted form of . But it is singular (if this is the case) that both forms should occur in the same verse, and more singular still that there should be the same conjunction of the two forms in the parallel passage Exo 36:29. So long as at the best the obscurity of the description is not relieved by such an assumption, it seems much more reasonable to take in its natural sense of perfect, whole, and elucidate the meaning, if possible, on that assumption.Tr.]
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
This Chapter relates to us the commands of God to Moses in the Mount, for the service of the sanctuary in the wilderness. The people are to present their offerings. The plan of the building of the tabernacle, the whole of which is to be formed according to the pattern showed him in the mount.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Observe, though the Lord is the proprietor of all the earth, and the silver is his, and the gold his, yet he condescends to accept the gifts of his people, as tokens of favour. 2Co 9:7 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Exo 25:4
We know it to have been by Divine command that the Israelites, rescued from servitude, veiled the tabernacle with its rain of purple and scarlet, while the under sunshine flashed through the fall of the colour from its tenons of gold.
Ruskin, Stones of Venice, (vol. 11.).
References. XXV. 8. W. Allen Whitworth, The Sanctuary of God, p. 1. T. Champness, New Coins from Old Gold, p. 32. XXV. 9. T. M. Morris, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lxiv. 1903, p. 228. XXV. 10-22. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xlix. No. 2838. XXV. 15. S. Baring-Gould, Sermon Sketches, p. 19. XXV. 18. T. Jones, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lii. 1897, p. 268.
The Mercy-seat
Exo 25:18-20
It would be a great mistake to suppose that the mercy-seat was a mere lid, an ordinary portion of the ark itself. It was made of a different and more costly material, of pure gold, with which the ark was only overlaid. There is separate mention that Bezaleel ‘made the ark,… and he made the mercy-seat,’ and the special presence of God in the Most Holy Place is connected much more intimately with the mercy-seat than with the remainder of the structure. Thus He promises to ‘appear in the cloud above the mercy-seat’. And when it is written that ‘Moses heard the Voice speaking unto him from above the mercy-seat which is upon the ark of the testimony,’ it would have been more natural to say directly ‘from above the ark’ unless some stress were to be laid upon the interposing slab of gold. In reality no distinction could be sharper than between the ark and its cover, from whence to hear the Voice of God. And so thoroughly did all the symbolism of the Most Holy Place gather around this supreme object, that in one place it is actually called ‘the house of the mercy-seat’.
Let us, then, put ourselves into the place of an ancient worshipper. Excluded though he is from the Holy Place, and conscious that even the priests are shut out from the inner shrine, yet the high priest who enters is his brother; he goes on his behalf; the barrier is a curtain, not a wall.
But while the Israelite mused upon what was beyond, the ark, as we have seen, suggests the depth of his obligation; for there is the rod of his deliverance and the bread from heaven which fed him; and there also are the commandments which he ought to have kept. And his conscience tells him of ingratitude and a broken covenant; by the law is the knowledge of sin.
It is therefore a sinister and menacing thought that immediately above the ark of the violated covenant burns the visible manifestation of God, his injured Benefactor.
And hence arises the golden value of that which interposes, beneath which the accusing law is buried, by means of which God ‘hides His face from our sins’.
The worshipper knows this cover to be provided by a separate ordinance of God, after the ark and its contents had been arranged for, and finds in it a vivid concrete representation of the idea ‘Thou hast cast all my sins behind Thy back’. That this was its true intention becomes more evident when we ascertain exactly the meaning of the term which we have not too precisely rendered ‘mercy-seat’.
The First Token of Divine Fellowship
Exo 25:22
I. Is it not rather a strange place for communion between God and man. Communion always implies some affinity of nature between two or more minds. One would think the mercy seat the last place for affinity of man with God. It is a meeting of extremes the Holy One and the conscious sinner, the Righteous Judge and the suppliant for pardon, the Sitter on the Great White Throne and the convicted miscreant at the bar of justice.
II. We could have understood communion with the Divine in other quarters. We could have felt it under the throbbing stars, where our hearts vibrate with the sense of the infinite. We could have realized it in the presence of genius where our spirit is made to forget its own limits. We could have learned it even from our moments of spiritual thirst, for the thirst for God implies a capacity for God. But that there should be communion in the moment of our moral conviction, that there should be Divine fellowship in the hour when we recognize that we are clothed in rags this is a startling thing! And yet it is true. For, what is it that convicts a man? What is it that makes a human soul a suppliant for mercy? It is holiness already begun. The white throne of God is only visible to the eye that is emerging from impure waters. I am never so near to God as when I cry, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’ Not even when vibrating ‘neath the stars am I so near as then. The stars reveal something beyond me; the conviction of sin reveals something in me.
III. George Macdonald has somewhere said that there are colours which are only brought to light by a cloudy day. I think it is preeminently true in the sphere of the mercy seat. I never learn that I have a little good in me till I have realized my worthlessness. It is not increased poverty but increased means that makes me a suppliant. It is the light, not the darkness, that brings me to my knees. The shadow that I see is the shadow of my God. I mistake the shadow for nightfall; I sit down to weep. I imagine that I am sitting on the cold ground; and all the time I am on the doorstep of my Father’s house, and the door is open, and my Father is coming out to take me in. It is the brightness of God’s face that makes me cry for mercy.
G. Matheson, Messages of Hope, p. 113.
References. XXV. 22. J. W. Atkinson, The Penny Pulpit, vol. xiv. No. 841, p. 405. XXV. 30. A Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture Exodus, etc., p. 126. XXV. 31. Ibid. p. 134.
Exo 25:40
He is not altogether silent about religion. But he has the power of suspending absolutely his belief and the natural effect it would have on a thoughtful mind busy with man’s nature and fortunes; he lodges it apart, and above him, in dignity and honour, but where it has no more influence on the temptation, the troubles, the issues of the real world than the gods of the epicurean heaven…. He looked on it as a sort of art or mystery, with rules and grounds independent of and unconnected with the ordinary works and thought of life.
R. W. Church on Montaigne, Miscellaneous Essays, pp. 80-81.
In different ages, a different pattern is shown to the prophets on the mount; always what is fairer and more august than can be seen in the restless plain of life below…. The Soul of Christ, the sinless, risen, and immortal, is the pattern shown to us; shown first upon the field of history, and on the paths of this living world, and then taken to the heavens, to look down thence on the uplifted eye of faith and love throughout successive generations.
Martineau.
Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour.
Thoreau, Walden.
References. XXVII. 3-8. Newton H. Marshall, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lxix. 1906, p. 187 XXVIII. 12, 29. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture Exodus, etc., p. 144.
Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson
The Ark of the Testimony:
The Transient Symbol of an Eternal Truth
Exo 25:21
This twenty-fifth chapter supplies minute information as to the construction and contents of the ark. The children of Israel had but recently received the formal law through the ministry of Moses. Up to this time they had worshipped under the open sky, and all the host of heaven had seen the manner of their life. In this chapter it is proposed to have an enclosure, a tabernacle, a place screened and roofed, how unsubstantially soever, which was to be known distinctively as the house of God. This proposition was, indeed, the commandment of God himself: “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart, ye shall take my offering, and let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.” But was not this a movement towards limitation, instead of a progress outward and onward towards wider spaces, even towards infinitude itself? How if the Divine message had read thus: “Speak unto the children of Israel that I am about to enlarge the sphere within which their life has heretofore been confined; they shall now see the higher and larger stars, and an ampler horizon shall gladden and satisfy their vision”? Instead of this, God proposes the erection of a small house, by which he would seem to shut out all the beauty and most of the light For the moment, at least, we are disappointed; expansion, not contraction, would have seemed more like the way of God. But think awhile, lest we mistake proportions and meanings which lie out of sight What we call Infinitude the quality which overflows and confounds our imagination must contract itself, so to speak, if we are to get sight of it; and in this sense the building of the small house, called the Tabernacle, was not a movement towards limitation, but towards concentration, and intensity, and tender nearness. A man may have all the earth round about him, and yet have nowhere to lay his head; plenty of space, but no home; a universe, but no Sanctuary; infinitude to roam through, but no Father to speak to, and no Heart to rest in. All great love has to make boundaries for itself; to put itself into little homely acts, and to use words which simple souls can understand. The mother who would die to save her child has to put her great love into a picture, a toy, a babble better than all eloquence. The great ALL must break itself up into the available Some. It was but small consolation to the petulant man in the parable to be told, “All that I have is thine”; he wanted some of it to be going on with, “a kid, that I might make merry with my friends.” So, even in our common life, we get hints of things that are going on above.
This tabernacle was built for the reception of the ark. A wonderful tabernacle it was, as one glance at the specification will show “Gold, silver, brass, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen; goats’ hair and rams’ skins dyed red; oil for the light; spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense; tables overlaid with pure gold, dishes, spoons, covers, all of pure gold.” So God’s house was no poor hut run up in an hour or two; but so delicate in its richness and beauty as to be more a thought than a thing. It was no creation of human fancy. Moses was no more left to settle the plan and the furniture than Noah was left to settle the colours of the rainbow. There was not a ring, a knob, a loop, a socket, a coupling, or a pin, which God did not specifically design. It was the same when he made the larger house which we call Nature: there was none with him when he laid the foundations of the earth, and when he made a tabernacle for the sun he was alone. It is wonderful, indeed, how little there is of man’s own doing anywhere. He has undoubtedly hammered a few things into shape, and brought together a few walls and roofs which he calls cities; but he borrows the foundation from God, and the rivers are not his own, nor is the light other than a visitor sent from God. It is pitiful to see man’s work exactly as it is; pitiful to see the shortness of his ladders and what trouble he has to set them up; and it sometimes makes one cry bitterly to watch him falling off the very summit of his victories into the dust out of which he came. He cannot bind the unicorn with his hand in the furrow, nor doth the eagle mount up at his command. He is a servant. Let him know his place and keep it. Take your counsel from God, and ever listen for the voice which says “And look that thou make it after the pattern which was showed thee in the mount,” the mount of Suggestion, where we may see in forecast, in gilded and wreathen clouds, what God would have us build for his glory and our own comfort.
As God made a tabernacle for the sun, so he made a tabernacle for the ark, out of which streams a light above the brightness of the sun. The ark of the covenant was a box or chest, say fifty-four inches long, thirty inches broad, and thirty inches high. This box, made of choice wood, was overlaid with pure gold. The lid which covered the box was called the Mercy Seat Observe that particularly. Over the lid, or mercy seat, were two golden cherubs, one at either end, facing each other and covering it with their expanded wings. God promised to meet Moses at the mercy seat: “There will I meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubims which are upon the ark of the testimony,” a promise which explains the words of the Psalmist, “Thou that dwellest between the cherubims, shine forth”; a tender reference to the olden time, a memory of childhood, full of pathetic meaning and tender retrospect. Within the box were placed the two tables of stone on which the ten commandments were written by the finger of God: “I will write on the tables the words that were written in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark.” Thus furnished, the ark was deposited in the inner place, in the holy of holies; indeed, in the first Book of Chronicles, the holy of holies is called “the house of the mercy seat.” So much, then, as a help towards an outward view of the ark of the testimony. A box; a box made of choice wood and covered with pure gold; a box set away in a holy and well-guarded place; plain enough, so far, yet around this box there shall gather meanings deep as the springs of life, and histories full of uproar, and tragedy, and progress; and in the end the ark of wood shall be lost, but the Law and the Mercy which it enshrined or symbolised shall be felt to be in a still holier place and in a more enduring sanctuary. Thus, the corruptible shall put on incorruption. “And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament.” What we call History the shallow and insecure vessel which holds the dregs, but allows the aroma to escape says that the ark was destroyed when the Babylonians set fire to the temple, and declares as a certainty that the ark was not contained in the second temple. Perhaps not We need not be curious about the merely material ark. It descended, in idea and purpose, out of heaven from God, and it was seen amid “lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail,” in the temple not made with hands, uncontaminated by the earth which it had blessed, and unchanged in meaning by all the mutations and dangers of its eventful history.
The ark may be taken as symbolical of the Divine presence, or the Divine plan in human life. It was a visible form of an invisible power. Again and again in private and public history we come upon a peculiar and almost unthinkable Something which focalises and rules all minor administrations; a subtle something, which makes superstition tremble, and constrains religion to pray; now a hand upon the wall, now as the spell of a dream, a benediction of heavenly sweetness, a judgment pure and terrible as fire; Something which analysis cannot exhaust, and which scepticism cannot deny. In the ark, for example, you find law. See, too, the peculiar place occupied by law: the ark is in the tabernacle; not only in the tabernacle, but in the most sacred part of that sacred place; not only in the holiest part of the holy house, but actually in the midst of the ark is found the immutable law of God. Thus we have law at the very centre and heart of things! Not an occasional flash, but a steady, ever-abiding, all-controlling force. Under all surfaces, far below all coverlets woven and arranged by skill of man, deeper than all foam, and tumult, and revolution, is to be found righteous and inexorable law! Some call it fate; some, “a divinity that shapes our ends”; some, “God over all, blessed for evermore.” But there it is! Creation is held fast together at all points by the grip of law. Not a pebble slips off the edge of the world; not a bird wanders away to another star, though it be the nearest light; no drop of dew trickles into forbidden places; and as for men, in their maddest ambitions they do but strike the bars of their prison, and awake by their frantic impotence the remonstrance, “Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?” Sometimes, indeed, the excellency of the wicked has mounted to the heavens and his head has reached unto the clouds; yet out of this hidden ark there has come a voice of doom “Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down.” Nor is this a boast which cannot be tested. All history confirms it. To deny the operation of this mysterious and sovereign law is to take away the key without which history is an impenetrable and confounding enigma. Human history is the visible side of Divine revelation. You have law at the centre; and you must obey that law in all material things, even though you resist or despise its spiritual demands. You may have an atheistic character, but you shall not have an atheistic wall; though the bricks and the stones be banded with iron and cemented with molten lead, yet will they be thrown down if you mock the law which holds up the older masonry of the universe. In this matter, as in all others, peace can only come by righteousness. That which is at the heart of things is right: not something fickle, eccentric, tantalising; but law, righteousness, GOD!
But, happily, the ark represents something more than law; and every reflective man will acknowledge that in the system within which we live, there is a mystery for which some gentler name than law must be found. The lid of the ark was the seat of mercy. It signified propitiation, favour, mediation, ground and medium of communion with God. Study that tender symbol a moment, if you please. Law, in coming up from the centre, comes through the lid or covering of mercy; it is, so to speak, attempered, or it would come like a sword, or a fire, or a judgment terrible in righteousness. On the other hand, starting the movement from the outside, in our appeal to law we go through the medium of mercy. We do not, dare not, challenge the law in its own name or on its own merits. “By the deeds of the law shall no flesh living be justified.” Our approach is through mercy, and our daily prayer is, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” It is most instructive to mark how a life founded as ours is on law, is continually proving the presence of something other and sweeter than law; and it is humiliating to find how easily we exaggerate that tenderer quality, so as to delude ourselves into the belief that law is secondary and impotent. See how law is made almost gracious. Take, as an illustration, the law of hunger, how terrible, how urgent, how inexorable is that law; how soon it assails the life with consuming fire! Yet God has made our food more than a mere satisfaction of hunger: he has provided things savoury and dainty in pasture and vineyard, so that hunger brings with it enjoyment and even religious gladness. That which would burn us with unquenchable fire, is attempered, and softened, and turned into an occasion and process of enjoyment Yet how true it is that this very attempering and softening of law brings with it temptation and peril! Hence, appetite conquers reason, and the tender mercy of God becomes an occasion of licentiousness and aggravated sin. Take any law of your own nature; see how severe and terrible it is in itself; observe how it is graded and modified, so as to become, not tolerable merely, but enjoyable in its operation; and then say whether we have not every one of us made the goodness of God an excuse for trespass and indulgence.
Thus, then, the ark is symbolical of something we ourselves have known in life, apart from specific religious teaching, something of law, and something of mercy; a power of condemnation, and a power of recovery and healing; a severity very terrible, and a goodness that yearns over our life and offers us redemption. Whether we accept the Biblical names and interpretations of these forces, or laws, or phenomena, there they are, as broad and vivid facts in our daily life; and no sophistry of reasoning, or perversion of fancy, can get rid of their solemn and pathetic operations. The severe winter and the gentle summer; the stormy wind and the still small voice; the bitter pool and the tree which sweetens it; the dark fear and the sunny hope; the herb that stings and the herb that heals, these things, known to our senses, strewn all over our life as lessons we ought to learn, show us that this ark, even if only a creation of fancy, symbolises with startling clearness the reality, the grandeur, and the sweetness of life as we know it. This, indeed, is the peculiar glory of the Bible, namely, its marvellous forecast of things that have turned out to be, and its felicitous representations of the times that were to come upon the world. He would be a churl only, and an unjust man, who would deny at least this literary tribute to the dreamers and seers of the Bible.
In noticing a few remarkable points in the history of the ark, we shall be more careful about the spiritual teaching than about the mere chronology of that history, and thus we shall secure closer continuity of doctrine and illustration. As our song is to be of mercy and judgment, it will be grateful to us first to see how the mercy of the Lord was revealed amongst his people. Thus: “And the Israelites departed from the mount of the Lord three days’ journey: and the ark of the covenant of the Lord went before them in the three days’ journey, to search out a resting-place for them…. And it came to pass when the ark set forward that Moses said, Rise up, Lord, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thee: and when it rested he said, Return, O Lord, unto the many thousands of Israel.” And again, though Moses died, yet the ark remained a symbol of mercy in the days of Joshua: “The officers commanded the people, saying, When ye see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, then ye shall remove from your place and go after it; yet there shall be a space between you and it, about two thousand cubits by measure; come not near unto it, that ye may know the way by which ye must go; for ye have not passed this way heretofore.”
Thus the law of human movement is turned into a tender and minute direction by God’s condescension. Unquestionably there is a law of movement. We must go forward. How? Into darkness? Into danger? Into thickening mysteries that bring with them sevenfold darkness, and trouble that makes the soul afraid? No; we are offered guidance, defence, and rest! “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord”; “Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way.” The journey was only three days long, yet it must not be taken without the foregoing ark. The people had not gone a certain road before, and therefore they must be accompanied by the sacred symbol of the Divine presence. A flood was ahead of them (“for Jordan overfloweth all his banks all the time of harvest”), and therefore the mercy of the Lord must prevent and defend and mightily save his chosen; so “the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord.” A wonderful hint this of the place of what is called Providence, in nature. The ark clears a space for itself everywhere. Strange roads become as familiar scenes, and threatening waters are dried up in the channels they have proudly overflowed. Why should we doubt the mere letter when the spirit of such miracles is attested by evidence so accessible and incontrovertible? Christian missions alone furnish a history radiant with this selfsame miracle. Foreign lands have become sweet homes under the benediction of the sacred ark, and hearts that overflowed with contempt and rage have opened themselves in wondrous submission and love to welcome the Lord and his hosts. The same miracle has turned our own life into a marvel and a joy, times without number. Have we not been called to unknown places, and thrown into combinations which have baffled us by their intricacy, and forced into roads which seem to end in darkness? What of the days when we were poor and friendless? What of the first gate ajar that tempted our feet into new pastures? What of the first great sorrow that threatened to swallow us up and to destroy our life as with a flood? Did we not then hear a voice which said, “Ye have not passed this way heretofore”? In proportion as we have been in difficulty and distress, in peril and loneliness, and have seen the delivering hand of God, do we read the record of these old miracles as a familiar language, not the less real and spiritually true because of figures and symbols which to the unsympathetic mind are mere creations of poetry. We ourselves have seen visions, and have felt raptures, which poetry alone could hope to express even in dim and imperfect outline. So much for what has been already known. Ahead of us rolls the overflowing river. “What wilt thou do in the swellings of Jordan?” Arise, O Lord, thou and the ark of thy strength, and the waters that I fear shall flee away, and the floods of Jordan shall be as heaps on either side of thy redeemed and rejoicing servant.
At this point of the history we touch the ark of the covenant with sympathy deep and tender. We ourselves have seen, felt, known, and handled this ark of God. Now and again we have in impious venturesomeness gone forward without it; and what has come of our self-confidence? The imaginary rocks have been as bogs under our feet, and our best devices have lured us into peril. The river has not parted before us, nor has a way been found for us in the desert. On the other hand, we have awaited the rising of the ark; and have followed as it led; and what has been the result? Progress, safety, rest; mountains have been thrown down, and fierce countenances have softened into friendliness and welcomes; we have entered upon a way where no lion lay in wait, nor any ravenous beast could be found, the way of the Lord’s redeemed upward without steepness, with heaven shining at its end. Well may we say, therefore, that the ark has not been lost: “In the temple of God is the ark of his testament.” The wood and the gold have perished, but mercy and judgment still rule us from the heavens. “Lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail,” still have their place in this earthly life; but in God’s temple is seen the “ark of his testament.”
As we have thus seen the goodness of the Lord, we may now behold also his severity, as shown here and there in the history of the ark.
(1) Remember the account of the fall of Jericho, and how usual it is to represent the overthrow of the city as almost due (such is the popular impression) to the blast of “seven trumpets of rams’ horns.” Out of this circumstance has come much teaching about the possible success of improbable instruments and agencies, as if it were only necessary to have a ram’s horn in order to do great wonders in the wars of the Lord. The ark of the testimony was at the taking of Jericho, and must be at the taking of every stronghold. “And Joshua the son of Nun called the priests, and said unto them, Take up the ark of the covenant, and let seven priests bear seven trumpets of rams’ horns before the ark of the Lord.” “And the ark of the covenant of the Lord followed the priests.” “And the rearward came after the ark.” “So the ark of the Lord compassed the city.” It was not the tramp of priests, or the blast of rude horns, but the ark of the Lord, that brought down the strong wall. It is not our officialism, our music, or our noise, but the name of Christ the true ark of the covenant that must bring down the pride of heathenism and all the ramparts of ungodliness. “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” “Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.”
(2) Recall a second instance. Israel went out against the Philistines to battle, and pitched beside Ebenezer; and the Philistines pitched in Aphek; and Israel was smitten before the Philistines, and they slew of the army in the field about four thousand men. In dismay, Israel sent to Shiloh for the ark of the covenant, saying, “When it cometh among us, it may save us out of the hand of our enemies.” So the ark was brought; and when the ark of the covenant of the Lord came into the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth rang again. And the Philistines were afraid, and said, “God is come into the camp.” But the Philistines conquered Israel, and there fell of Israel thirty thousand footmen. And the ark itself fell into the hand of the enemy; and the Philistines took the ark of God, and brought it from Ebenezer unto Ashdod, and set it in the house of Dagon their god. Israel sent for the ark in extremity, as many a man sends for God in the hour of fear and mortal distress; but the ark would not become the mere convenience of capricious and disheartened men. If we stopped here, mistaking, as hurried readers are apt to do, a semicolon for a period, we should say that the ark was worsted, and that Dagon had triumphed over Jehovah. But, lo, the strong god of Philistia was found in the early morning “fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of the Lord”! It was but an accident, mayhap, so Dagon must be lifted up and set in his place again; but the second morning found Dagon in still sadder plight, for his head and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold, and only the stump of Dagon was left to him. Many warriors have taken Christ captive; but he has troubled them until they have cried with the Philistines, “What shall we do with the ark of the Lord? Tell us wherewith we shall send it to his place.” Some victories are the profoundest defeats which any cause can sustain. When Christ and Dagon are brought into close quarters, it is Dagon that dies! A man of Benjamin rent his clothes when the ark was taken; when Eli heard that the ark had been borne away, he fell backward and died; and the wife of Phinehas called her son Ichabod, saying, “The glory is departed from Israel, for the ark of God is taken!” Such is our shortsightedness in looking upon the ways of the Lord. Unchristian men do not know what to make of Christ, even when they suppose themselves to have taken him prisoner in some fierce war of words. They seize him as their prey; they condemn him to exile or death; yet there is something about his name that troubles them, and there is a fire in his words which gives them pain. “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God,” said the falling Dagon. “God is a consuming fire,” say all they who intrude upon his throne. How to get rid of Christ the living Ark was the urgent question of his enemies! They besought him that he would depart out of their coasts. “Away with him! crucify him!” was the indignant cry. He was slain, yet he is found in heaven; as the symbolic ark was burned by Nebuchadnezzar, yet seen in the temple of God. In the kingdom of God, Destruction is an accident, Ascension is a law. Weep not for the ark, weep for yourselves. “Behold, the Lord rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt; and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it.” “Bel boweth down, Nebo stoopeth; they stoop, they bow down together,” for the hand of the Lord is heavy upon them.
(3) A third instance will confirm what has been said about the severity of God. At the bidding of the priests and the diviners, the Philistines sent away the ark, upon a new cart, drawn by two milch kine on which there had come no yoke, and by the side of the ark they put jewels of gold as a trespass offering. Even then the Philistines were not sure whether it was “a chance that happened” to them, or a judgment direct from Heaven. They set a test that they might know this, and the test showed that God had been amongst them of a truth. When the ark came to Bethshemesh, the people were reaping their wheat harvest in the valley, and when they saw the ark they rejoiced with exceeding joy. But, alas, the men of Bethshemesh looked into the ark of the Lord; and the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he slew of them a great multitude. Is the Lord ever patient with our foolish curiosity? Can any man see God and live? It is precisely here that so many men are slain to-day. We go too near the sun, and we are blinded by the glory we would analyse. God will not submit himself to our examinations; hence we find thousands of dead critics where there ought to have been a living Church countless as the stars in number! Let there be a space between us and the ark “about two thousand cubits by measure” for “God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.”
(4) An incident not remotely related to this scene at Bethshemesh occurred when, at the instance of David, all Israel went up to Kirjath-jearim, which belonged to Judah, “to bring up thence the ark of God the Lord.” The bringing up of the ark was again the occasion of great joy. The people had not inquired at it in the days of Saul. David’s proposition, therefore, revived an ancient and precious memory, and gathered, as by the call of a battle-trumpet, “all Israel, from Shihor of Egypt even unto the entering of Hemath.” As the ark was borne away, “David and all Israel played before God with all their might, and with singing, and with harps, and with psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets.” At one point of the journey the oxen stumbled, and to save the ark from apparent danger, Uzza put forth his hand to keep it in its place. But the anger of the Lord was kindled against Uzza, and he smote him, and there he died before God. Will man attempt to eke out the failing strength of Omnipotence? Doth it become us to watch the stars lest they fall, or to open the clouds at dawn lest the sun should miss his way? Shall we appoint ourselves the special guardians of the truth, and surround it with our defences, lest God should have no foothold on his own earth? God is not to be worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed anything, “I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he-goats out of thy folds; for every beast of the forest is mine and the cattle upon a thousand hills.” “If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof.” We have written books, and endowed communities, and passed Acts of Parliament, to keep steady the ark of God. Can we wonder that there are so many dead men, who have a name, indeed, to live, but in reality are plucked up by the roots? Sympathy without meddlesomeness, reverence without self-exaggeration, willingness to help without obtrusion of service, Lord, with this spirit baptize us every one in the pitifulness of thy great mercy!
Coming to still more closely practical applications. Here and there in the course of the study we have indicated one or two modern bearings of the subject, which admit of obvious amplification. Let us look at one or two others.
The Israelites had a visible symbol of the Divine presence so long as they retained the ark in their midst. It was something to look at, something for the heart to stay itself upon in the time of fear and trouble. But look at our own case. Are we not left without a centre that can be seen, and without a locality sanctified above all other places? We are truly in a great wilderness, but to what shrine can we point men when they mock our faith, and foretell a disastrous end to our pilgrimage? Sometimes, indeed, we find our hearts in a mood of intense longing for the days that are gone; they live backward through the many and cloudy yesterdays until they come upon the exciting times when God spake, as it were, face to face with his loved ones; when the guiding pillar went before the host day and night; when the ark was the signal of movement and the pledge of security; when the “fourth like unto the Son of man” walked in the burning fiery furnace with the faithful, and when the Son of God took little children in his arms and blessed them. To have lived then! To have had the eye filled with his beauty and the ear satisfied with the music of his sweet voice! To have touched the hem of his garment, to have stood within his shadow, to have plucked and kept for ever some poor flower of the meadow pressed by his feet, to have seen something that was his! So yearns the heart in tender wish and sad regret. And to the world we seem to have nothing. The rain is not ours, for it falleth on the just and on the unjust; the sun is not ours, for it shineth on the evil and on the good. We look into the great voids of space, but no image makes us glad. And there is no rod in our hand with which we can make scoffers afraid because of the wonders of the Lord. Have we not, then, fallen on mean times, all poetry dead and gone, all music hushed for ever? To such questionings the Scriptures give a distinct reply. They tell us that ours are the brightest and noblest of all the days of time! “If the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, which glory was to be done away, how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious? For if that which was done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious.” But the natural man seeth not this glory, neither can he know it, for it is spiritually discerned. “And it shall come to pass, when ye be multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, saith the Lord, they shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of the Lord: neither shall it come to mind; neither shall they remember it; neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done any more.” Herein is that saying true, “The hour cometh, and now is, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.” The local has become the universal, and all things are inscribed “Holy unto the Lord.”
That law and mercy are still at the heart of things is a truth which is acknowledged in some form even by others than Christian believers; but by Christian believers it ought to be ardently and gratefully maintained as at once the glory and the security of life.
We know that there is law, a law of continuity, for all things remain from one generation to another, the stars do not burn themselves out with all their shining, nor is the sea dried up by the fire of the sun; a law of development, for life changes, improves, and matures itself, subtly but certainly; a law of trespass, for who can take fire into his bosom and not be burned, or trifle with poison and save his life? We know that there is law round about us, and high above us. What is it that causes ambition to break its billows into harmless foam upon the eternal rocks of Truth and Right? What is it that drives the diviners mad when they seek to misread the writing or forge the signature of God? What is it that throws down the half-built tower, whose summits were to have reached the stars? We are shut in, watched, ruled; and yet we see no Hand moving amongst our affairs. We make our plans, and our programmes read like music; but lo, we never enter the City that lured us, or get near the Tree whose fruit was to have made us wise. Wickedness swells with rage, and comes against the righteous in the fury of its strength; and lo, it staggers, and moans, and dies. The winds blow high and the clouds shut out the light, yet no star is lost, nor is any planet-ship wrecked in the wild storm. If we should fear that some loss may have happened in that upper sea, all the stars quiet us with the words, “Do thyself no harm, we are all here.” There must be some meaning in all this, in this infinite order, this calm profound which underlies the storm, this vengeance that consumes, this life that cannot die! What is the secret? Can any man name the spell, so baleful yet so gentle? Do not mock us with a word that we shall instantly feel to be hollow and untrue. Speak to us a word that shall, at all events, have a sound of reality in it, mysterious as if it came up from Eternity, sympathetic as if it issued from a Heart of love. “But the temple of God was opened in heaven, and THERE WAS SEEN IN HIS TEMPLE THE ARK OF HIS TESTAMENT.”
We know that there is mercy; mercy in the very “process of the suns,” for time turns many a bitter pain into a hallowed recollection, and wounds thought to be incurable have been staunched and healed, mercy in the gifts of nature, for in bread there is sweetness, and the meadow and the garden are full of pleasantness, mercy in social life, for sympathy puts our misery to sleep, and friendship revives our drooping strength, mercy in returning slumber, and mercy in the peacefulness of our awaking; minor mercies, all of them, leading, star-like, to a larger love, leading to Bethlehem, to Gethsemane, to Golgotha, and there merging their secondary rays in the ineffable light, the infinite glory out of which they came. “It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed.” “According to his mercy hath he saved us.” There are times in our life when the memory of sin is so vivid, and its burden so grievous, that one cry only can express our necessity and our pain, our self-helplessness and our hope “God be merciful to me a sinner “; “Have mercy upon me, O Lord, according to thy lovingkindness, according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.” It is at such times that we feel the power of words like these, “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin”; “There is a fountain opened in the house of David for sin and for uncleanness.” All the other mercies that have been softening and beautifying our life, say to us in pleading tones, “If we have thus quieted your fears, and set a lamp for you in the time of darkness; if we have found for you unexpected help, and surprised you with unlooked-for gladness, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God:” If you would see Mercy written in largest letters, “Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world”; if you would see Mercy in its sublimest attitude, look upon the uplifted dying Son of God; if you would hear Mercy’s sweetest, gentlest tone, hear it as Jesus says, “Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.” What is the meaning of all the mercy which comes down upon our weary life? Is it a transient shower? Are the influences that quicken and bless us merely fugitive and accidental? Was the Cross the culmination of a rude tragedy? What does Mercy mean? Is it a mere sentiment? Is it a momentary suspension of discipline? Or is it Law in its highest mood? Is it Righteousness weeping? Is it Majesty bowing down from the heavens that it may find the lost? Hear the answer which alone satisfies the judgment and the heart “The temple of God was opened in heaven, and THERE WAS SEEN IN HIS TEMPLE THE ARK OF HIS TESTAMENT.”
And yet we are not left without a visible sign of God’s presence. So long as we have the Bible we have the Ark of the Covenant. The most terrible yet the most gentle of all books is the Bible! Law is in it, and Mercy. It plagues the house, or blesses it, as the house of Obed-edom was blessed when he received the ark of the Lord into his dwelling. It throws down the Dagon of false worship, of dishonest trade, of false appearances. Yet how it overflows with mercy, and promise, and hope! It is like a river the streams whereof make glad the city of God. It is quiet as a green pasture in the summer noon. It is as a gentle rain on the tender herb, and as showers of blessing on the fainting field. Yet what a sword it is, and how like a fire it burns! Let the bad man look into it for a text with which to sanctify his meanness or falsehood, and it will scorch him with intolerable heat! Let the penitent look into it that he may know how to return unto the Lord, and it will glow with welcomes and benedictions! Let a man fall upon it, and he will be broken; let it fall upon a man, and it will grind him to powder! Verily this book is the Ark of the Testimony. The Babylonian may burn the book, but he cannot destroy the Revelation. The infidel may take the book in some controversial war, but it will trouble him until it be released and sent away in honour. Like the Son of man, it is here, yet it is in heaven. It fears not them that kill the body. Fire will not consume it, nor will the sea hold it in prison. Its name is Wonderful, and the government is on its shoulder. “The temple of God was opened in heaven, and in his temple was seen the ark of his testament.”
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
The two chief objects within the Court were the Brazen Altar and the Tabernacle. Sacrificial worship was old, but the local Sanctuary was quite new. The Tabernacle is most frequently called the Tabernacle of the Congregation. A better rendering is supposed to be, “The Tent of Meeting.” The Tabernacle was also called “The Tent of the Testimony,” in allusion to the fact that it was the depositary of the Tables of the Law. The highest meaning of the structure was expressed by the Ark, which symbolised the constant presence of Jehovah. The Speaker’s Commentary says: “We may regard the sacred contents of the Tabernacle as figuring what was peculiar to the Covenant of which Moses was the Mediator, the closer union of God with Israel, and their consequent election as ‘a kingdom of priests, an holy nation’: while the Brazen Altar in the Court not only bore witness for the old sacrificial worship by which the Patriarchs had drawn nigh to God, but formed an essential part of the Sanctuary, signifying by its now more fully developed system of sacrifices in connection with the Tabernacle those ideas of Sin and Atonement which were first distinctly brought out by the revelation of the Law and the sanctification of the nation.” In the Ark there was no image or symbol of God. The Ark of the Covenant was never carried in a ceremonial procession. In all important particulars it differed from Egyptian shrines. When the Tabernacle was pitched the Ark was kept in solemn darkness. The staves were to remain always in the rings, whether the Ark was in motion or at rest, that there might never at any time be a necessity for touching the Ark itself or even the rings ( 2Sa 6:6-7 ). “The cherubims were not to be detached images, made separately and then fastened to the mercy seat, but to be formed out of the same mass of gold with the mercy seat, and so to be part and parcel of it” The Holy of Holies was a square of fifteen feet, and the Holy place an oblong thirty feet by fifteen. So far as known, “horns” were peculiar to Israelite altars.
The Tabernacle
The specification for the building of the tabernacle purports to be Divinely dictated. We can form some idea of the validity of such a claim, for we have the test of creation by which to try it. We can soon find out discrepancies, and say whether this is God’s work or an artificer’s. A revelation which bounds itself by the narrow limits of an architect’s instruction admits of very close inquiry. Creation is too vast for criticism, but a tabernacle invites it. Let us, then, see how the case stands, whether God is equal to himself, whether the God of the opening chapters of Genesis is the God of the mount upon which, according to this claim, the tabernacle was Divinely outlined in expressive cloud. Note, at the very outset, that the account of making the tabernacle occupies far more space than the history of the creation of the heavens and the earth. We soon read through what is given of the history of creation, but how long we have had to travel through this region of architectural cloud. It seemed as if the story would never end. This is a remarkable corroboration of the authenticity of both accounts. A long account of creation would have been impossible, presuming the creation to be the embodiment and form of the Divine word executed without human assistance. That account could not have been long. When there is nothing, so to say, between God’s word and God’s deed, there is no history that can be recorded. The history must write itself in the infinite unfoldment of those germs, or of that germ with which creation began. A short account of the tabernacle would have been impossible, presuming that all the skins, colours, spices, rings, staves, figures, dishes, spoons, bowls, candlesticks, knobs, flowers, lamps, snuffers, and curtains, were Divinely described; that every tache, loop, hook, tenon, and socket was on a Divine plan, and that human ingenuity had nothing whatever to do with a structure which in its exquisite fashioning was more a thought than a thing. So far, the God of Genesis is the God of Exodus: a subtle and massive harmony unites the accounts, and a common signature authenticates the marvellous relation. When God said, “Let there be light,” he spake, and it was done. There is no history to write, the light is its own history. Men are reading it still, and still the reading comes in larger letters, in more luminous illustration. When God prescribed lamps for the tabernacle he had to detail the form of the candlesticks, and to prescribe pure olive oil, that the lamp might always burn. You require more space in which to relate the making of a lamp than in which to tell of the creation of the light; you spend more time in instructing a little child than in giving commands to an army. God challenged Job along this very line. Said he, “Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?” There was no Job between the Creator and the creation; no Moses writing swiftly words Divine that had to be embodied at the foot of the hill. “Where is the way where light dwelleth; and as for darkness, which is the place thereof?” Mark well, therefore, the contrast of the accounts, and the obvious reason for the amazing difference.
The next point of observation relates to the completeness of the specification as corresponding with the completeness of creation. Lay the finger upon one halting line and prove that the Divine Architect was weak in thought or utterance at this point or at that. Find a gap in the statement and say, “He forgot at this point a small loop, or tache, or ouche, and I, his listener, Moses, must fill in what he left out.” We do not know the meaning of great Gospel words until we read our way up to them through all the introduction of the initial covenants. We read backwards, and thus read ourselves out at the lower end of things, instead of reading in the order of the Divine evolution and progress, upward from height to height, until speech becomes useless, and silence must be called in to complete the ineffable eloquence. Could there have been more care in the construction of a heaven than is shown, even upon the page, without going into the question of inspiration, in the building of a tabernacle? Is it not also the same in such little parts of creation as are known to us? There is everywhere a wonderful completeness of purpose. God has set in his creation working forces, daily ministries. Nature is never done. When she sleeps she moves; she travels night and day; her force is in very deed persistent. So we might, by a narrow criticism, charge nature here and there with want of completeness; but it would be as unjust to seize the blade from the ear, and, plucking these, say, “Here we have sign and proof of incompleteness.” We protest against that cruelty and simple injustice. There may be a completeness of purpose when there has not yet been time for a completeness of execution. But in the purpose of this greater tabernacle creation there is the same completeness that there is in the specification of this beauteous house which the Lord appointed to be built in the grim wilderness.
Consider, too, that the temporary character of the tabernacle was no excuse for inferior work. The tabernacle, as such, would be but for a brief time. Why not hasten its construction invent some rough thing that would do for the immediate occasion? Why, were it made to be taken up to heaven for the service of the angels it could not be wrought out with a tenderer delicacy, with a minuter diligence, as to detail and beauty. But to God everything is temporary. The creation is but for a day. It is we who are confused by distinction as between time and eternity. There is no time to God; there is no eternity to God. Eternity can be spelled; eternity can in some dumb way be imagined and symbolised in innumerable ciphers multiplied innumerable times by themselves till the mind thinks it can begin eternity. To God there is no such reasoning. When, therefore, we speak of lavishing such care upon a tabernacle, we mistake the infinity and beneficence of God. It is like him to bestow as great care upon the ephemera that die in the sunbeam as upon the seraphim that have burned these countless ages beside the eternal throne. We must not allow our ignorance, incompleteness, and confusedness of mind to interfere with the interpretation of these ineffable mysteries. But the tabernacle was built for eternity. So again and again we stumble, like those who are blind, who are vainly trying to pick their way through stony and dangerous places. The tabernacle was eternity let down an incarnation, so to say, of eternity, as a man shall one day be an incarnation of God. We mistake the occasion utterly. We fall out of the pomp of its music and the grandeur of its majesty by looking at the thing, and supposing that the merely visible object, how lustrous and tender in beauty soever, is the tabernacle. The tabernacle is within the tabernacle, the Bible is within the Bible, the man is within the man. The tabernacle in the wilderness represented eternal thoughts, eternal purposes of love. Everything is built for eternity: every insect, every dog, every leaf so frail, withering in its blooming. God builds for eternity in the thought, and in the connection, and in the relation of the thing which is builded. See how profound our iniquity in committing murder anywhere. “Thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not steal.” It is one life, one property, a sublime unity of idea, and thought, and purpose. Do not segregate your life, or universe, and attempt a classification which will only separate into unholy solitude what was meant by the Divine mind to cohere in indivisible unity. We were built for eternity. Can God build for less time? Nothing is lost. The greatest of economists is God. “The very hairs of your head are all numbered “; “Not a sparrow falleth to the ground without your Father.” When we speak about the temporary, we know not what we say; or we justly use that word, for the sake of convenience, as expressive of uses which themselves perish in their own action. But, profoundly and vitally viewed, even affliction is part of heaven; our sorrows are the beginning, if rightly accepted and sanctified, of our supremest bliss.
Mark, too, how wonderfully the tabernacle and the human frame correspond in perfection of detail and sublimity of purpose. It is not difficult to believe that he who made the tabernacle made Adam. The tabernacle grows before our eyes and Adam is growing still. The life which God is making is Man. Do not impoverish the mind and deplete the heart of all Divine elements and suggestions by supposing that God is a toymaker. God’s purpose is one, and he is still engaged in fashioning man in his own image and likeness, and he will complete the duplicate. We must not fix our mind upon our mutilated selves, and, by finding disease, and malformation, and infirmity, and incongruity, charge the Maker with these misadventures. We must judge the Divine purpose in the one case with the Divine purpose in the other. I am aware that there are a few men who have from my point of view blasphemously charged the Divine work, as we regard it, in creation with imperfection. There have not been wanting daring men, having great courage on paper and great dauntless-ness in privacy and concealment, and who have lived themselves into a well-remunerated, respectable obscurity, who have said that the human eye is not ideally perfect. So we do not speak in ignorance of the cross-line of thinking which seeks to interrupt the progress of Christian science and philosophy. Is there not a lamp also within the human tabernacle a lamp that burns always, a lamp we did not light, a lamp trimmed by the hand Divine, a lamp of reason, a lamp of conscience, a lamp that sheds its light when the darkness without us is gathered up into one intense and all-obstructing night? and are there not parables in nature which help us to believe that this lamp, though it apparently flicker yea, though it apparently vanish shall yet throw radiance upon heavenly scenes, and burn synchronously with the glory of God’s own life? You say, “Look at old age and observe how the mind seems to waver, and halt, and become dim and paralysed, and how it seems to expire like a spark.” No, as well say, “Look at the weary man at night-time, his eyelids heavy, his memory confused, his faculties apparently paralysed, or wholly reluctant to respond to every appeal addressed to them; behold how the body outlives and outweighs the boasted mind.” No, let him sleep; in the morning he will be young again. Sleep has its ministry as well as wakefulness. God giveth his beloved sleep. So we may “by many a natural parable find no difficulty in working ourselves up to contemplations that fill us with ecstasy, religious and sublime, as we call ourselves “heirs of immortality.”
Did not Moses make the tabernacle? Yes; but who made Moses? That is the question which has never yet been answered. Change the terms as you please, that inquiry always starts up as the unanswerable demand. Your hand carved the marble, but who carved the hand? Singular, if the marble was carved, but the hand carved itself. Your tongue uttered the eloquence, but who made man’s mouth? Who set within him a fountain of speech? Your mind planned the cathedral, but who planned the mind? It would have been more difficult to believe infinitely more difficult to believe that the mind made itself than that the cathedral fashioned its own symmetry and roofed in its own inner music and meaning.
Thus perusing the specification for the building of the tabernacle, and reading the account of the creation of the heavens, and of the earth, and of man, I find between them a congruity self-confirming, and filled with infinite comfort to the heart that yearns studiously over the inspired page in hope of finding the footprints of God. The living Christian Church is more marvellous than the tabernacle in this wilderness. The tabernacle was part of a development; the tabernacle was only one point in the history. We must judge things by their final purpose, their theological aspect and philosophy. What is the meaning of the tabernacle? the temple. What is the meaning of the temple? the living Church. So we find rude altars thrown together by careless hands, symbolising worship addressed to the heavens; then the tabernacle; then the temple; then the living fellowship. Know ye not that ye are the temples of the Holy Ghost? Know ye not that there is a foundation laid in Zion, a corner stone, elect, precious; and that we are built upon it, living stones; and that God is shaping the tabernacle of humanity as he shaped the tabernacle in the wilderness? Know ye not that we are builded together a holy house unto the Lord? Arrest not, even in theory, the Divine progress. The line from the beginning up till now has taken one grand course. Nothing has strayed away and left the Divine sovereignty. The wrath of man is still in the Divine leash, and hell is no independent colony of the universe. There is one throne, one crown; one increasing purpose runs through all we know. We wait patiently for the Lord, and when he says from his throne what Christ said from the cross, “It is finished,” then we may be invited to say, in the terms which God himself used when he viewed creation, “Behold, it is very good.”
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
XXV
THE FEAST OF THE COVENANT, THE ASCENT OF MOSES AND JOSHUA INTO THE MOUNTAIN, THE BREACH OF THE COVENANT, THE COVENANT RESTORED BUT MODIFIED
Exo 24:9-34:35
1. What is this lesson and its outline?
Ans. The lesson is from Exo 24:9 to the end of that chapter, with a mere glance at the next seven chapters, 25-31, and then 32; it covers three full chapters, nearly all of another chapter, and a glance at seven other chapters. I will explain to you about that glance as we go along.
The outline of the lesson is:
The Feast of the Covenant, Exo 24:9-11 .
The Ascent of Moses and Joshua into the Mountain, Why and How Long, Exo 24:12-31:18 .
The Breach of the Covenant, Exo 22:1-6 .
The Covenant Restored but Modified, Exo 32:1-34:35 .
We commence at the first item of the outline, viz.:
The Feast of the Covenant. That part of the lesson is Exo 24 and commences at Exo 24:9-11 . Let us read that: “Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu [two sons of Aaron], and seventy of the elders of Israel [and we learn from Exo 24:17 that Joshua, the minister or servant of Moses, was along. That makes seventy-five persons [: and they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and as it were the very heaven for clearness. And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: and they beheld God and did eat and drink.” That is the feast of the covenant.
2. What of the custom after ratifying a covenant and an example from Genesis?
Ans. Nearly always just after a covenant was ratified the parties to the covenant partook together of a meal to show their fraternity and communion. The Genesis example you will find where Laban and Jacob made a covenant. The covenant is prepared, they agree to enter into a covenant, they put up a token of the covenant, they build an altar, they make sacrifices, they ratify the covenant in the blood of that sacrifice. Then they sit down and eat a meal together, which is the feast of the covenant. You will find all of that in the Genesis account of Laban and Jacob. So here a covenant having been proposed, an agreement to enter into it made, a preparation for it, the terms of the covenant given as stated in their threefold characters, that covenant carefully read, an altar erected, sacrifices offered, the blood of the covenant sprinkled upon the altar and upon the people, and so ratified, then follows this feast of the covenant.
3. What are the provisions used at the feast in such cases?
Ans. The provisions are the bodies of the peace offering. There are two offerings, viz.: the burnt offering, which has to be burned up, then the eucharistic or thank offering. That thank offering furnishes the material of the feast after the covenant is ratified.
4. Who was the representative at this feast with God and a New Testament analogy?
Ans. The representatives here are: First, Moses, then his servant Joshua, his army chief; second, the high priest and his two sons that is five; and third, the seventy elders of Israel. All Israel did not meet God and partake of a feast, but the representatives of Israel in the persons of Moses, Joshua, Aaron and his two sons, and the seventy elders, who meet God and partake of this feast. Now the New Testament analogy is that the Lord’s Supper which was to memorialize the sacrifice of Christ was participated in by representatives of the church, the apostles. The apostles were there, but not there as individuals. They represented the church just as they represented the church in receiving the Commission, so that it was simply a church observance even at the time of its institution.
5. What of the communion in this feast and the New Testaments analogy?
Ans. The communion is not the communion between Moses, Aaron, and the elders, that is, it is not a communion with each other, but it is a communion with God, and the New Testament analogy is as Paul expresses in his first letter to the Corinthians: “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion, or participation, of the blood of Christ?” and yet how often people misrepresent the idea of that communion, as when A, B, and C commune together to show their fellowship for each other, or a man’s communing to show his fellowship for his wife. The word means “participation” and the one in whom is the participation is God: “The loaf which we bless, is it not a participation, the communion of the body of Jesus?” So here these representatives of all Israel communed with God a little way up the mountain, not far.
6. The record says that they saw God. What kind of a sight of God did they see, and what other cases in the Old and New Testaments?
Ans. They did not see any form or likeness of God. Moses is very careful to say that “no man can see God and live.” He is careful to say in Deu 4 that at Sinai they saw no similitude or likeness. Now, in Isa 6 he (Isaiah) sees God as they saw him, that is, he sees the throne; he sees the pavement; he sees a great many things about the throne, the angels, the cherubim and the seraphim, but he doesn’t see any likeness of God, though he hears God talking. Precisely so you find it in Eze 1 . He sees the chariot of God, four cherubim, their wheels, their wings, and their faces looking every way, but he doesn’t see the One in the chariot, and so it is in Rev 4 where John is caught up to heaven and he sees the very same thing, this very pavement, and the throne, the cherubim, the angels round about the throne, and he sees something that represents the Holy Spirit, and he sees something that represents Jesus Christ, a precious stone which represents God, but he doesn’t see God.
7. Apply this thought to transubstantiation and consubstantiation in our feast, as the Romanists and Luther taught.
Ans. The Romanist says, “This is the very body and the very blood of Christ; you can see it and you can taste it.” And the consubstantiation advocate, Luther, says, “The bread is not the body of Christ and the wine is not the blood of Christ, but Christ is there this way: You take a knife and put it in the fire and take it out of the fire when it is red hot, and you have the same metal, but you have something there that was not there before, viz.: heat, you can touch it and feel the effect of that heat burning.” You can take cognizance of that kind of a presence, but in this analogous communication with God they saw no similitude, no form.
8. Explain that part of the feast where it is said that “God laid not his hand on the elders of Israel, though they saw him.”
Ans. It means that God did not slay them. The declaration is often made, “Whoever sees God shall die.” They can’t bear the sight of God. But the kind of a sight of God that these people saw, they were able to see without having the hand of God laid on them, and what a beautiful lesson! Before the covenant was made, when the trumpet sounded and the darkness came and the earth quaked and the lightning flashed, and that strange, awful voice speaking the ten words, the people were scared almost to death; they wanted a mediator, somebody to come between them and that awful Being. But knowing that a covenant had been established and had been ratified by the blood of a substitute, they can see God in the sacrifice of the substitute and not die; see him in perfect peace, just as you, before you are converted, look upon God as distant and unapproachable, but after you see him in Christ in the covenant, the terror of God is taken away and you can sit there just as if eating a meal with a friend.
9. Give again a complete outline of the covenant.
Ans. The complete outline of the covenant is:
(1) God’s proposition of a covenant and their agreement to enter into a covenant;
(2) Their preparation for the covenant;
(3) The three great terms of the covenant;
(4) The ratification of the covenant;
(5) The feast that follows the covenant. Will you keep that in mind? You need to be drilled on that every now and then, so that when anybody asks you where there can be found a copy of the Sinai covenant and all the parts of it, you can answer: “It commences with Exo 19 , and closes with Exo 24 .” That is the whole thing in all its parts.
The Ascent of Moses into the Mount, Why and How Long? This is the second item of the outline. That is found immediately after what we have been discussing, commencing at Exo 24:12 . “And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there”: that means, Moses, you are to be there quite awhile; “and I will give thee the tables of stone, and the law and the commandment, which I have written, that thou mayest teach them.” And Moses rose up, and his servant Joshua; and Moses went up into the mount of God. And he said unto the elders, Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto you: and, behold, Aaron and Hur are with you; if any man have any matters to do, let him come unto them. And Moses went up into the mount, and the cloud covered the mount. And the glory of the Lord abode upon Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud. And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and went up into the midst of the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.” Now here are the questions on that:
10. Why is Moses, after the covenant is ratified and the feast is held, taken up into the mount? (He and Joshua alone go).
Ans. He is carried up to receive the same law which had been spoken orally, now in writing “which I have written.” And what he went up particularly to get was the two tables or the Ten Commandments, and in God’s own handwriting that he might keep them as a witness. “The tables of the Testimony” is the name of them. Moses wrote a copy that the people learned, but that particular copy was God’s own autograph. That was put up and preserved as “tables of the testimony.”
11. What is the meaning of “tables of stone,” “the law,” and “the commandment”?
Ans. The tables of stone I have just described. But what was the law that Moses goes up after? You would miss that if you had to answer it off-hand, and the commentators all miss it. They don’t get in a thousand miles of it. You will find that it was what he received when he went up there a special law, and that special law was that the sabbath, God’s sabbath, should be the sign of the covenant. You find that at the end of this section that we are now on. So the law he went after was the law of the sign. Then what was the commandment he went after? The Commandments are all given in seven chapters (25-32) and every one of them touches the law of the altar. We will glance at the outline of that directly.
12. Why were these tables of testimony and this sign of the covenant and these laws concerning the altar given to Moses?
Ans. The lesson says, “That thou mayest teach them.”
13. Who was to represent Moses in the camp while he was absent in the mount?
Ans. Aaron and Hur.
14. What reminder of a New Testament incident is in these words of Moses: “Tarry ye here for us until we come again”?
Ans. It is Jesus in Gethsemane, when he let the representatives stop, and said, “Stay here while I go yonder and pray.”
15. What was the visible token that God was present with Moses, and why that token?
Ans. Exo 24:16-17 : “And the glory of the Lord abode upon Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it and the sight of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel.” Now, why is that last word, or clause, “In the eyes of the children of Israel”? That was a token to them not to get impatient. “When you begin to say, ‘Moses stays a long time,’ you look up there at that cloud on top of that mountain, how exceedingly glorious it is, you may know that Moses is right in that cloud communing with God.”
16. How long was Moses up there in that cloud before God spoke to him, and why did he speak to him on the particular day that he did?
Ans. Moses was up there six days. God called him up there: “Don’t you get impatient. Here is the test of your faith. You wait. I have called you up here, to have an interview and to receive certain things, and you wait; be patient.” Now on the seventh day, that is, the sabbath, which was the sign of the covenant, God spoke.
17. How long was Moses in the mount, and what is the New Testament parallel?
Ans. Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights, and the New Testament parallel is that after Christ was sacrificed for the ratification of the covenant and they had eaten the feast of the covenant and Christ was risen from the dead, he remains with them forty days, instructing them. That is just exactly what God is doing with Moses. Just as Jesus uses forty days after his sacrifice in careful instruction of his disciples, so God after this sacrifice and ratification of the covenant, takes Moses up into that mountain for forty days of continued explanation.
18. Give, for the present, a mere summary of what Moses received on the mount, set forth in the seven chapters, 25-31.
Ans. Just now all we want is a summary and the reason we don’t want to go into the details is that we take that up in the next chapter in connection with what follows. But all you want to know now is the outline. The outline is:
(1) He received the tables of the testimony;
(2) He received the law of the sign;
(3) He received the commandments as follows:
(a) The commandment upon the people to furnish voluntary offerings for what was to be made;
(b) The making of the ark with the mercy seat on it where God was to be met; the making of a tabernacle for the shewbread; the making of the candlestick; the making of a tabernacle or tent with its subdivisions and its marvelous veil between the divisions; and the court and the oil that was to supply the lampstand or candlestick;
(c) The garments for Aaron, the high priest, when he officiated before God;
(d) The law of the consecration of Aaron to the office of high priest;
(e) The law of the consecration of the altar by which approach to God was to be made;
(f) The law of the daily sacrifice;
(g) The law of the golden altar, or the altar of incense, and bow it is to be offered. Incense is to be offered twice a day just like the lamp is to be lit twice a day and the sacrifice is to be offered twice a day in the morning Aaron goes to trim the lamps as the morning offering and the ascent of the morning cloud of incense representing the going up of the prayers of God’s people, and in the afternoon he goes to light the lamp, and there is the evening sacrifice and the going up of the incense;
(h) The atonement or ransom money and what that signifies;
(i) The laver, that was to be between the altar and the mercy seat, and what it was to be used for;
(j) The marvelous recipe of the anointing oil that was to be poured upon the head of a prophet or a priest or a king or a sacrifice;
(k) The perfume that was to be put at the place of entrance, indicating that they were to meet the fragrance of God right at the threshold of entrance or approach to him;
(l) The inspiration of the artificers of all this work. Just as an apostle was inspired to do his work, so certain men were here named that were inspired to do this work called for in all these things;
(m) That sabbath for a sign which I have already mentioned.
The Breach of the Covenant. This is the third item. Where do you find that breach of the covenant? In chapter 32. We are coming to awful things now. The most interesting thing in the Old Testament: “And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him. And Aaron said unto them, Break off the golden rings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me. And all the people brake off the golden rings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron. And he received it at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, and made it a molten calf: and they said, These are thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, To-morrow shall be a feast to Jehovah. And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace-offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.”
19. Give the seven elements of this breach of the covenant.
Ans.
(1) The rejection of Moses and of God and a demand for other gods to be made: “Make us gods.”
(2) This god, of course, being man made, was an idol.
(3) The form of the god was the Egyptian god, Apis, calf or ox, the Egyptian god that died of the murrain through one of the miracles of Moses.
(4) They built an altar of worship and of sacrifice.
(5) They offered both burnt and peace offerings.
(6) They had a feast to follow this covenant they were making with this new god, and,
(7) Stripping off their clothes, naked, they go into a drunken orgy and practice all of the beastly and infamous lusts that characterized that worship in Egypt and in other idol worshiping countries. Paul says, “The people sat down to eat and rose up to play,” and then adds, “Be ye not fornicators and adulterers as they were.”
20. What was God’s announcement to Moses and what were the purposes announced concerning Israel and the raising up of a new people?
Ans. God saw that breach of the covenant that had just been made. The answer is this, commencing with Exo 32:7 : “The Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves: they have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and have said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and now, behold it is a stiffnecked people: now therefore let me alone that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them: and I will make of thee a great nation.” That is the terrible announcement. They have broken the covenant. “I will instantly destroy them; I will raise up a new people from Moses. He will be the basis of the new people.” Now before they get out of this trouble there will be four intercessions of Moses.
21. What was the first intercession of Moses and its result?
Ans. I quote it, commencing at Exo 32:11 : “And Moses besought the Lord his God, and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people, which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Wherefore should the Egyptians speak, and say, For mischief did he bring them out, to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from thy fierce wrath, and repent of this evil against thy people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, thy servants, to whom thou swearest by thine own self, and saidst unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed, and they shall inherit it for ever.” So the first thing was to stop instant destruction of that people. The result: “And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.” He didn’t kill them right then, but he at least suspended that terrible bolt of divine wrath that was about to fall upon them.
22. What did Moses and Joshua see on their return to the camp?
Ans. All the above happened before Moses came down from the mount. Joshua says, “I hear a great shout down in the camp. There must be an army or there must be a battle.” Moses says, “No, that is not the shout, neither of men on the battlefield, nor of men crying for mercy. That is the shout of singing; those people are singing down there.” And they came down and saw that calf; they saw their naked and beastly orgies; they saw the whole hideous sin which the people had committed.
23. What was the first token that the covenant was broken?
Ans. Moses took the tables of the testimony and broke them all to pieces right in the sight of the people. “You do not need these tokens any more. I have brought you in the handwriting of God the witness of the covenant; you broke it; let the token be broken.”
24. What, in order, are the other things done in that camp by Moses when he got down there?
Ans. Moses was not a man to go down there and hold his finger in his mouth. When he sees that thing he is stirred. Let us see now what, in order, were the things that he did. First, he took that calf and burned it until it pulverized; then he mingled the ashes of it in water and made the people drink it. Second, he shook his finger in the face of Aaron and said, “What have these people done unto you that you led them into this sin? I went up in that mountain to meet God; I left you as my representative. Now what have these people ever done to you that you should lead them into this?” And Aaron pleads the baby act if ever a man did in the world. He says, “Well, they they they said, ‘Make us a god,’ and I told them to bring me the earrings and I put the earrings into the fire and there came out this calf; the fire did it.” An old father who, when his boy came home disappointed and broken in health and knowing nothing, after several years away at school, said, “All that money I put into the fire of education and there came out this calf.” Third, Moses said unto them in the camp, while naked and half drunk they stood before him not daring to open their lips, “Whoso is on the Lord’s side, let him stand by me. I am going to draw a line. Somebody in this great camp surely is on the Lord’s side.” And the Levites came. You remember when Jacob pronounced the prophecy of blessing on his children he gave a big slice to Levi. When Moses goes to pronounce a blessing he is going to pronounce a great honor on Levi, and he is going to assign as a reason what Levi does this day. That whole tribe lined up on the side of Moses. They didn’t stand up there just as a show. “Now, if you are on the Lord’s side, draw your swords and wade into that crowd. Don’t stop if it is your brother, or father, or mother, no matter how close kin to you. There must be a penalty inflicted for this awful sin,” and Levi pitched in and slew three thousand. Fourth, he began to take steps toward saving those people from temporal and eternal destruction, and that brings us to the next question:
25. What was the second intercession of Moses and God’s reply?
Ans. Moses said, “You have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the Lord: peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin.” Now you come to the next intercession of Moses: “And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said [and this is the greatest piece of intercession that ever took place on earth except in the case of Christ], Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin ; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written.” Only one other man ever said anything like that, and concerning this same stiffnecked people, and that was Paul, “I could wish myself accursed from Christ for my brethren’s sake.” Moses, in other words, offered himself as a substitute for the people: “Don’t, don’t destroy them! Destroy me!” It was a grand proposition. Now, what did God say to that intercession? “The Lord said to Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me,, him will I blot out of my book. I will not blot you out for them. The soul that sinneth it shall die. Therefore now go, lead these people unto the place of which I have spoken unto them; behold mine angel shall go before thee; nevertheless in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them. And the Lord plagued the people, because they made the calf, which Aaron made.”
26. What of the effect of this upon the people?
Ans. They mourned and laid aside their ornaments and did not put them on from Mount Horeb onward.
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
XXVII
THE TABERNACLE
Exodus 25-31; Exodus 35-40
This chapter covers thirteen chapters of Exodus, and, of course, I can only touch them in places. These chapters are 25-31; 35-40.
1. Was there a temporary tent before this tabernacle was built?
Ans. You will find in Exo 33:7-11 , that there was a temporary tent and on one occasion it was moved outside of the camp.
2. What were the names of the tabernacle and the reasons therefore?
Ans. First, the “tabernacle of testimony, or witness,” Exo 38:21 ; Num 17:7-8 . Those two names mean the same thing. The tabernacle of testimony, or of witness; and the reason of this is that this tent was the depository of the testimonials; anything that was to be kept for a testimony was to be kept in this tent; for example, in it were the tables of testimony or God’s autograph on the two tables of stone containing the Ten Commandments. That copy was kept as a witness; then in it was the book of the covenant, that is, those chapters, Exo 19:1-24:9 . That part is called the book of the covenant. That was in Moses’ handwriting. Then there were the records made by Moses, that is, the Pentateuch, the entire Pentateuch was put in the tent and kept in there; then Aaron’s rod that budded was put in there and a pot of the manna and later the brazen serpent that Moses erected. All of these were memorials. Now the tent that held these testimonials was called the tabernacle of the witness, or the testimony. That accounts for one of its names.
Next name, it is called the “temple of the Lord.” You will find this name in 1Sa 1:9 , and 1Sa 3:3 ; the reason of that name is that there God was approached and propitiated and worshiped and that gave the name “temple.”
The third name is the “house of the Lord,” because he occupied it. He was the dweller in it. As a Shekinah he dwelt in there symbolically between the Cherubim on the mercy seat and hence it was called the “house of the Lord.”
The fourth name is “sanctuary,” that is on account of its holiness. It was holy unto God; the most holy place, the holy place and the whole ground, or campus, was set apart to sacred purposes, hence, the sanctuary.
The fifth name for it was the “holy oracles”; that applied, of course, only to what is called the “most holy place”; that is very frequently in the Bible called the oracle of the temple, the most holy place. It is so called in Psa 28:2 , and in 1Ki 6:5 . Now, it obtained this name because there God spoke. An oracle is to give an answer to questions propounded. There God spoke, and it was also called the oracle, because in it were kept the written words of God, the place of the oracle; the book of the Pentateuch was kept in there. Now, the references here are very numerous on this oracle question. In 2Sa 16:23 ; in Act 7:38 , and in Rom 3:2 are some references to this most holy place as the oracle: “What advantage then hath the Jew? Much every way, but chiefly because unto them were committed the oracles of God.” There the oracles mean the same thing as the Bible, that is, as their Bible grew in volume it was kept in that place; that was the oracle for their Bible.
Now, I repeat the names of this tabernacle: (1) The tabernacle of the testimony, or witness; (2) the temple of the Lord; (3) the tabernacle is called the house of the Lord; (4) the sanctuary; (5) the oracle.
3. What can you say about the pattern of this tabernacle?
Ans. It was God’s pattern, copy, shadow, or type of a true sanctuary in heaven, that is, there is in heaven a true sanctuary, a true holy place, a most holy place, and as the poet Campbell says, “Coming events cast their shadows before,” so that reality in heaven casts its shadow before in the form of this copy or type. And when the real thing came of course the shadow disappeared. Anyone walking from a light casts his shadow before him, and the shadow will get to an object first; now when the substance gets there, the shadow is gone. I give you some very particular references on this word pattern, what it means and about God’s being the author of it. He furnishes the complete plan and every detail of the specifications. Not only for this sanctuary but for its successor, the Temple, and for the Temple’s successor, the church on earth, and for its successor, the church in glory. I give you some scriptures in point: Exo 25:40 ; Exo 26:33 ; Exo 27:9 ; Exo 39:32 ; Act 7:44 ; Heb 8:2 ; Heb 8:5 ; Heb 10:1 .
All of those refer to this sanctuary that Moses built as having been made according to a pattern which God furnished. Moses was commanded to see to it that everything be made according to the pattern. Now to give you an illustration that will come more nearly home to you, I got an architect to draw me a plan of a house to live in near the Seminary in Fort Worth. He drew four floors, that is, four floor plans; two side elevations, a front and a rear elevation; then a long list of specifications as to material, how that material was to be used, and the bill of the lumber, and of the brick and of the stone, and everything in it was put down. Now when I went to let that contract the contractor entered into a contract to build it according to the plans and specifications. If he had varied a hair’s breadth from what that architect put down, I could have held him liable.
I make this remark to you in order to correct some loose thoughts. People that insist upon sticking to God’s plans and specifications on the tabernacle and on the Temple, will deny that he has any plans and specifications on their successor, the church, and that nearly anything will do for a church, and that they can put things in nearly any sort of an order; they can commence with communion on the outside before a man is ever converted, and as a means to conversion; they can baptize him before he is converted, or they can dispense with it altogether. It is one of the most appalling signs of the times, that there is such looseness with reference to God’s positive institutions. It is a thousand times more important that the church be strictly continued and followed in all God’s plans and specifications than it was with this tabernacle, and yet there was not one-eighth of an inch variation in the measurements of this tabernacle. You may settle it that God is a God of order and not of confusion. This tells us here about certain tables and it tells us how those tables were to be constructed, and what was to go on them, and just where they must put them and just how they were to use them. Some people take the table of the church and put it outdoors and just call up Tom) Dick, and Harry to come and partake; a thing that you wouldn’t dare to do in my house; you couldn’t say where my table should be put. I do that. We certainly ought to allow God the same privilege about his table. You could not invite guests to my house, to dine; I must do that. We ought to allow God that privilege. You are the judge of what you put on your table, and we should let the Lord tell us what to put on his table. Then don’t go and invent a hundred things to tack onto what God has specified.
4. What were the materials of this sanctuary and their value?
Ans. There are eight kinds of materials specified. I will commence with the costliest. There are quite a number of very precious stones, jewels, some of them of exceeding great value and beauty. They are enumerated. The next was gold. The pattern tells you just exactly what gold must be put in it. Some of it was simply threads of gold. The gold must be beaten out very thin and then cut into the finest threads of gold and work these threads into the cloth. And the plans must not be varied from by one single thread of that battered gold.
Then the next material used was silver. It specifies in every particular where that silver was to be used. And the next was brass, and then it tells just what should be made of brass, whether the outside mold, or the brazen altar, or some brazen socket in which a pole or post rested.
The fifth material was the acacia wood, very common in that wilderness, and it was a very hard wood, hence exceedingly durable for building purposes of any kind. Now, it is a notable fact that this old tent had a good deal of acacia wood in it in certain places; it was existing up to the time that Solomon built the Temple, all the posts around it, all of acacia wood. When I read about it I am reminded of what a little boy in North Texas said with reference to bois d’arc. He said a bois d’arc fence would last through two eternities; that he and his daddy had tried it several times. In other words, it doesn’t wear out at all and it doesn’t rot. I know a bois d’arc fence now that is ninety-one years old, and it is just as sound as a silver dollar. So that acacia was the kind of wood to be used. The wood that went into the ark of the covenant consisted of a base of wood and then there was a covering of gold, and the wooden base of that ark was there in that Temple nearly a thousand years later when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the Temple. I mention that to show you how much better it was for those people to follow God’s specifications about the wood. Suppose they had put in something that would have rotted in about two years.
The sixth element of material was the various kinds of cloth. This cloth would either be what is called fine twined linen, finished linen made out of the flax, or it was a coarse cloth made of goat’s hair or it was woolen cloth, or it was made out of skins what is called badgers’ skins, though probably not badgers’. It was more likely to have been the skins of sea animals and that skin was impervious to water when the animal was in the water, and remained impervious to water. They needed cloths for all things, for the girdles, and for the different classes of garments that are specified and for the veils. The seventh element of material was olive oil, pure beaten olive oil. That was to be for the lamps, and the eighth and last specification of the material was spices, perfumes that were to be for anointing. For instance he gives a prescription of the holy anointing oil, with olive oil as a base, and his directions will tell you just what spices to put in it and precisely what proportion; so many parts of one and so many parts of another. And they are not only commanded not to vary from that but they were never to make that holy anointing oil to be used for any secular purpose whatever. A king on his throne couldn’t have as much made as would stick to his little finger.
The question says, give the materials and their value. Unfortunately we have no means of valuing all the materials that were used. There is one place in your lesson that gives you the weight, troy weight, of the gold, silver, and brass, and I can tell you what that was: 3,350 pounds, troy weight, of pure gold; 11,526 pounds, troy weight, of pure silver; 8,112 pounds of brass. The measure is given. A shekel was a weight or measure as well as a piece of money. They give it in shekels and these shekels converted into pounds, troy weight, and you can convert these pounds, troy weight, into dollars and cents so far as gold and silver are concerned, into the present worth.
5. How was this vast amount of materials obtained?
Ans. Every bit of it was by voluntary contribution. Chapter 25 commences with the word of God to Moses to call upon the people to make an offering for the sanctuary. But God declines to take any offering unless it is a free will offering; it must be on the part of the willing heart. And when you turn over to read about how David got the material for erecting the Temple it is a most thrilling part of the Old Testament; the biggest contribution the world ever saw was collected. It is a fine thing to preach on, and a good suggestion to preachers when building a sanctuary for the Lord to take contributions from the willing heart.
6. Who were the artificers that made all these things, and how were they qualified to make them?
Ans. Some of the work was very delicate and required the greatest possible skill and nicety in construction. Exo 31:2 : “And the Lord spake unto Moses saying, See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah: and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, to devise cunning works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, and in cutting of stones, to set them, and in carving of timber, to work in all manner of workmanship. And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiad the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan: and in the hearts of all that are wise hearted I have put wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee.” Only two of them are mentioned by name.
7. What arts were implied in building this tabernacle?
Ans. Well, you can see that they couldn’t have cloths unless there were weavers and they would not have different cloths unless they had industries, and that precious stones couldn’t be cut unless there was lapidaries; and wood couldn’t be carved so beautifully unless there were skilled men in wood carving, and the structure couldn’t be planned and carried out unless there were architects. Then there bad to be the most exquisite work on the high priest’s garment there was to be on the bottom or border a row of pomegranates and bells, a pomegranate and a little bell, then a pomegranate and a bell, and so on all around it. It bad to be the most perfect thing. Whenever the high priest moved the bells would ring, and he couldn’t stop when he was performing the ceremonies in the most holy place. If the bells stopped ringing he would die instantly; and the people ‘would keep praying on the outside as long as they heard the bells on the high priest’s garments ringing. That shows that the high priest rings out to God the petition that they send up, and that shows the intercession. The bells in heaven upon his robe are always ringing, so he is praying for you all the time.
Now you see that to have the instruments to do all these things implied manufacturers; the jeweler’s tools, the carving tools, and the brass; they must have foundries. Think of the number of arts, and what a tremendous change had taken place in these people after they went into Egypt. They were nomads, ranch people, cowboys till then; when they got to Egypt they learned agriculture, city building, architecture, all sorts of fine work, and now it is all brought out with them, and when they go to leave Egypt, the Egyptians are so glad to get rid of them, God put it in the hearts of the Egyptians to bestow on the Jews gold and silver and jewels, and that is where all this gold and silver comes from that they are using now to build the tabernacle.
8. Define the whole space of the court.
Ans. Here the student should make a diagram and let that diagram show the relative places of the entire court, the heights of the curtain wall around that court and the gate of entrance and where the altar, i.e., the brazen altar, is placed, and where the laver is placed, and how they got into the holy place and then into the holy of holies. And he should show in that diagram just where Moses’ place was, and where Aaron’s place was, and the places all around that diagram of the court where the Levites were, and which of them on this side and which on that side, and then show the tribes camped around it; what three tribes on the north side, what three on the south, on the east and on the west. If you want to see a diagram so that you will have nothing to do but copy it, get (and every reader of this book ought to have what I have urged them to have) the Rand-MeNally’s Atlas by J. L. Hurlbut. You ought to read what it has to say about every lesson that we have. And if you have the Hurlbut Atlas it gives you just the picture that I have drawn mentally and orally, showing the length, breadth, and height of the court; showing you where the gate is on the east; showing you just where Moses was to be, where Aaron was to be, where the Levites were to camp, and where the other tribes were to be placed all around it; how big the tabernacle was, how big each division was, and how big the most holy place was in cubic measurement. The question is, Define the whole space of the court.
9. What are the tent divisions, and the sizes of the divisions?
Ans. The tent was divided into two divisions, the holy place and the most holy place, and they were separated by what is called the veil of the Temple, but it came to be a tremendous thing in the Herodian Temple seventy feet long and thirty feet wide, and four inches thick, and so woven that ten yoke of oxen couldn’t tear it, and yet when Jesus died it was rent in twain from top to bottom. The sizes are given in the Atlas.
10. What were the contents of the most holy place?
Ans. There were just two things in there, and don’t you ever put anything else in there. These are the articles, viz.: the ark, which is one thing, and the mercy seat which rested right on top of it; of course, the mercy seat which rested right on top of it had its propitiatory place where the atonement was made, and the Cherubim of pure gold (of course, there were things in the ark the witnesses: the pot of manna, Aaron’s rod, the brazen serpent, and so on). But two things are in there the mercy seat, which is on top of the ark: a chest with its contents inside, and the mercy seat resting on it.
11. How was the most holy place lighted?
Ans. There was no light in it, but clouds of darkness: “a thick pavilion of darkness is my habitation.” Whenever you get to the church in glory the expression, “There is no temple, there is no altar or shrine,” doesn’t mean the general structure about the shrines, just as the mercy seat on top of the ark constituted the shrine. When you get to the church in glory there is no shrine there. Why? Because the Lord God and the Lamb are the light thereof. Now down here in this tabernacle there was a shrine, the Cherubim) and the Shekinah signifying the presence of God.
12. Who enters, and how often, into the most holy place?
Ans. The high priest only, and that only one time a year. Nobody could ever see the outside of what was in there. They couldn’t see the outside of the ark nor the outside of the mercy seat. It was always carried, but it was carried covered. And the tent was first put up upon arriving at a camp and after the tent was put up the bearers of the ark carried it on the inside, and when they went out Aaron alone uncovered it. He was the only one that ever saw it.
13. What were the contents of the holy place, where were the contents set up, and what did they represent?
Ans. Just three things were in there. There was the seven-branched golden candlestick; the light of that lamp was never allowed to go out at night. It was trimmed every morning and lighted every evening just before dark. That candlestick or lampstand was just one lampstand. The one that was in the Temple when Titus captured Jerusalem was carried to Rome as a trophy. Another thing in there was a table, and on the table six loaves of bread in one place and six loaves of bread in another place and a cup; in the third place, there was a little altar called the golden altar in contradistinction from the big one on the outside, the brazen altar. This altar was covered with gold and on that was the frankincense, or incense; the material is frankincense, and it became incense, going up when it was burning in a beautiful smoke and very fragrant. Now as you enter that division from the east, the right hand will be the north. Which one of the things do you out on the north? Do you put a table, a candlestick, or a golden altar? Which one do you put to the south, and which one in the center right opposite the veil that has to be lifted aside by Aaron once a year? The Atlas shows all this.
What do those three things represent?
Ans. They represent the blessings of salvation by grace like the food and the spirit of prayer, as communicants get those spiritual blessings. That bread also represents the twelve tribes shewbread that is, it is bread for exhibition, very sacred, nobody was ever allowed to eat it. David did eat a piece once when he was very hungry and Jesus excused him under the circumstances (he was starving) though “He did eat the shewbread which was against the law.” Now we have found out the contents of the holy place, and how they were set up, and what they represented.
14. Who enters the holy place (not the most holy place) and how often?
Ans. Not the Levites but the priests. The Levites had the run of the court) Aaron the most holy place, the priests the holy place, every day.
15. What are the contents of the court and their respective positions and signification?
Ans. In the open court around the tent there were these things: (1) Near the east gate of the court was the brazen altar, the altar of burnt offering and sin offering. That was the altar of sacrifices. (2) Between that altar and the entrance into the holy place was the laver, a vessel containing water used by the priests in the ablutions necessary to the performance of their duties.
16. Who entered this court and how often?
Ans. Aaron and his sons that constituted the priesthood, and the Levites the whole tribe of Levi that served in the matters of the public worship. They all entered this court. Some of them were in there every day. There were daily offerings, one every morning and one every evening; so that was open all the time to Aaron or his sons or the Levites having special work to perform in there.
17. Where did the people come?
Ans. They came to the gate in the east; they didn’t get inside the gate except in case of their offerings. They brought their offerings to the altar before the tent of meeting.
18. Who were the ministers in the sacrifices and how were they set apart? Divide their respective duties of the court.
Ans. Your lesson tells you all about that: that the ministers consisted of Aaron, the high priest, the priests, and the Levites; just exactly how each one of them was to be consecrated to office; the ritual, etc. Aaron does certain things, and he alone; the priests, certain things, and they alone; the Levites, certain things, and they alone.
XXVIII
THE TABERNACLE (Continued)
1. What was the high priest’s apparel, its use and meaning?
Ans. Your book has a great deal to say about the clothing of the high priest but I shall confine my answer to only two articles of that apparel, viz.: the mitre and the ephod. The mitre was a headdress; towering, and on the front of it just over Aaron’s forehead was a golden plate fastened to the mitre, and on that inscribed, “Holiness to the Lord.” He was never allowed to exercise his high priestly functions unless he had that mitre on.
Now, the other portion of his dress that requires very particular mention is the ephod. The ephod was a garment, a vestment that had a hole cut in it like you see cowboys have in their blankets. It was put on by putting it over the head and the head coming up through that hole, and it came down to the knees. There was an inner robe of course, but I am talking about the ephod. It was carefully hemmed and embroidered around that hole so it wouldn’t tear, just as a buttonhole is, to keep it from widening. At the bottom of the ephod were the pomegranates and little bells that I have told you about. And the bells were to ring all the time that the high priest was performing his functions. It was death to him if they stopped, and their sound was the indication to the people that the high priest’s work was going on and they, on the outside, would pray as long as they heard the bells ringing. That is the ephod proper.
But that ephod had a breastplate, just a span square, at the shoulders; on the ephod was a hook, an ouch, on each side. This breastplate was just a span wide and on it four rows three in a row of very valuable jewels and each jewel had inscribed on it the name of one of the twelve tribes. So that whenever Aaron acted officially he carried over his heart, as a representative, the whole nation of Israel. The twelve tribes of Israel were there, carried on his heart.
The breastplate had two gold chains. The upper part of it had rings and the gold chains went up and fastened to the ouch, or hook, on the shoulder piece of the ephod. Having put on the ephod, he would then take up the breastplate by the two gold chains and hook it to the clasps on the ephod. That would let it drop down on his breast. Then the sides of the breastplate had rings and they were fastened to other hooks on the ephod and that kept it from falling forward, kept it in place.
Now, besides the twelve great jewels that represented the twelve tribes of Israel there were two other jewels, called the urim and thummirn. They went on the breastplate. I am not quite sure but that they were under the breastplate on the inside. The names, urim and thummirn, mean light and perfection. The use of the two particular jewels was to communicate with Jehovah. When the cloud would come down and rest over the tent to signify that Jehovah wanted to have a talk, the high priest would come into the holy place, and the communication would take place. Now, the two jewels Aaron would look at and how, I don’t know and nobody else knows, but through those jewels as a medium, he would understand the communication that had been given to him. Hence a high priest’s method of communicating with God was always through the urim and thummirn. Moses didn’t do it that way, because he was a prophet. God spoke to him direct. But the high priest could only communicate with God through the urim and the thummirn. If he lost those jewels he couldn’t talk with God.
Now, the ephod carrying the breastplate and the two precious stones, the urim and the thummim, was strictly an official robe; so that you often find in the accounts in the Old Testament the expression, “Get me the ephod.” “What do you want with the ephod?” “I want to communicate with God.” The ephod was the robe of communication. You read in the life of David that he went to where the high priest was and told him to put on his ephod and answer him certain questions. Well, the high priest put on the ephod, went up to the door of the holy place, propounded David’s question, looked at the urim and the thummirn, understood the answer, and gave it to David. You read in the book of Judges that Gideon when he assumed to be king had an ephod made so that he could communicate with God. And you read in the prophet Hosea that Israel shall be a long time without a king, without an ephod, and without a prophet. They shall have no means of communicating with God. That is the condition of Israel this day. They have no Temple; they have no high priest; they have lost the urim and thummirn; they have no ephod; no way of communicating with God. Since they reject Christ, the only means of communication, they are shut off. So that the particular thing about the breastplate and its urim and thummirn is that it was a God-appointed means of communicating with the people through the high priest. He adopted a different method when he spoke with the prophets. A prophet was higher than a priest. The prophets communicated with God directly. There are other things about Aaron’s dress, all the details of which had a meaning, but these are the great meanings of the dress of the high priest.
20. What were the regular times of service in this tabernacle?
Ans. Here were the regular times: The daily services every morning and every evening; the sabbath services, that is, once a week; the monthly services, the monthly sabbaths, and the annual sabbaths. Those were the great festivals, three great festivals, and then the Jubilee sabbaths, and in connection with it there came the great Day of Atonement. Those were the regular times of service, but there were provisions for special times of services that I will not now discuss.
21. What the offerings and their meanings?
Ans. I have to answer it so elaborately when I come to Leviticus, I only give now in general terms these offerings: Sin offerings, burnt offerings, eucharistic, or thank offerings; in a burnt offering, all of it had to be burned up. Now, a sin offering had to be burned, but every burnt offering was not a sin offering. I give you this example: If a man wanted to consecrate his whole life to God and brought an offering, that was a burnt offering. Now, that offering had to be burned to ashes on the brazen altar, to signify that God accepted that entire consecration. The sin offering was also burned. Nobody could eat a part of a sin offering. But certain parts of the eucharist, or thank offering, or peace offering, or meat offering could be eaten. Moses ate a certain part, and Aaron and his sons a certain part, and the Levites certain parts.
22. What was the ritual?
Ans. The ritual is that set of rules that told them just how everything was to be done. Almost the whole book of Leviticus is ritual and the larger part of Numbers. For instance, it tells just how every particular offering must be offered. The ritual is the system of rules prescribed, the service and the order of the service in all of its parts.
23. What was the place of the sanctuary in the camp and order of encampment around it?
Ans. I will answer that question more fully when we come to the book of Leviticus. We will suppose Israel is on a march and the cloud stops. As soon as the cloud stops Aaron and Moses stop. As soon as they stop, those carrying the furniture of the most holy place, that is, the ark and mercy seat, set it down there covered. And then the tent is put over it, and then all the arrangements are made about the various articles of the holy place and the court. Then the fence is put up, i.e., the court fence. Now, the Levites come in and camp on three sides, and every tribe knew just where it was to camp one on the north side, one on the east, one on the west, and so on.
24. When was this tabernacle completed and what was the order of setting it up?
Ans. In Exo 39:42 , we have this statement: “According to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so the children of Israel made all the work. And Moses saw all the work, and, behold, they had done it.” Exo 39:42 of that chapter says, “Then was all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of the congregation finished and they brought all the material together before Moses.” Now, the other part of the question was: The order of its setting up? That is explained to you in Exo 40:1-8 ; Exo 40:17 , “And it came to pass in the first month in the second year [that is, since they left Egypt], on the first day of the month, that the tabernacle was reared up. And Moses reared up the tabernacle.” Then it tells how the tent was put up: “Then Moses took and put the testimony into the ark,” brought the ark into its place and then all the other things into their places in order.
25. When was it anointed?
Ans. It was anointed after the setting up, and Exo 40:9-11 , tells about that anointing, that is, setting it apart. And this is what it says on that, “And thou shalt take the anointing oil and anoint the tabernacle and all that is therein and shall hallow it; and all the vessels thereof and it shall be holy, and thou shalt anoint the altar of the burnt-offering and all its vessels and sanctify the altar and it shall be an altar most holy.” “Thou shalt anoint the laver; thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons and make them put on their official robes and anoint them. Thus did Moses.”
26. When was it filled?
Ans. As soon as it was set up and was get apart, and anointed, the record says (Exo 40:34 ), the cloud came down and filled the tent and the glory of it was such that Moses couldn’t enter it. Then God says, “My glory sanctifies this tent.” When we get to Lev 18 , we learn that the tabernacle was sprinkled with blood as well as anointed with oil. Now, you will see from a careful reading of the last chapter of Exodus that a great many commandments are given, telling how things are to be done. Go to Leviticus and Numbers to find out how these orders given in the last chapter of Exodus are carried out. They are prescribed here and they tell you how it is to be done; the orders are given, but in Leviticus and Numbers they are carried out.
27. How dedicated?
Ans. Now, although the cloud had filled the tent, you don’t learn how that house was dedicated until you get to Num 7 . Nearly all of Leviticus and about a third of Numbers ought to be studied with the last part of Exodus. I am going to close what I have to say on this by giving you a little subsequent history of this tabernacle. It went with the children of Israel through all their wanderings. When Joshua got over into the Holy Land he set it up at Shiloh and after awhile it was moved to Nob. There it was in David’s time; then it went to Bethel; then in Solomon’s time it was at Gibeon. David erected a new tent. He didn’t make a new ark of the covenant and new altars and things of that kind, but he did make a new tent when he brought the ark up and put it in Jerusalem. Then he sent to Gibeon later on and that old tent that stood empty at Gibeon was brought but not set up, but just rolled up and when the Temple was built it was put in a chamber of the Temple and preserved, how long, I don’t know.
28. Give the parallels of a later date.
Ans. Well, just as that tabernacle was first prepared fully in all its materials, and these materials were brought together in one place, just so it was done with the Temple. So that when they started to put up the Temple they do so without the sound of hammer. Everything was so carefully prepared before it went up. Just as the church in glory will go up when the time comes. Every living stone will be thoroughly complete: body there, glorified; soul there, sanctified; no work to be done that day. It just goes into place by assembling. In my sermon on the church you will find just how the church in glory will be finally set up, and how that when our Lord built his church, John the Baptist prepared some of the material, which Jesus accepted; and Jesus prepared some of the material. But not all the work of the church was completed until Christ died. When he died he said, “It is finished.” The church was completed.
But that church was not anointed until the day of Pentecost, just as the old tabernacle had to be anointed and the smoke came and filled it. So the church that Jesus built stood open after he left it. He was the guide in it. He was the Shekinah as long as he lived, but when he went away it stood open until the day of Pentecost, when, as Daniel says, the most holy place was anointed. The Spirit came down and filled that house just as the cloud filled the house that Solomon built, and the house that Moses built.
29. What was the position of the cloud with reference to this tabernacle and its signals?
Ans. The normal place of the cloud was up in the air above the tabernacle. If the cloud moved, they moved, and they kept right under it. That was the normal place. If the cloud stopped, they stopped. So that one of the cloud’s signals was its moving, or its stopping. Another one of the cloud’s signals was its coming down and resting on the tent. That signified a communication was desired with the people through the priests. Then the high priest put on his ephod with his urim and thummirn, and went in to receive the communication. If a communication was wanted with Moses, he needed no ephod, since he was a prophet and talked direct with God.
30. What was the value of that cloud for light, shade, defense and guidance?
Ans. All night the cloud up in the air was one great pillar of fire, brighter than all the electric lights of New York City. Night couldn’t come up and touch them. Just think of it being forty years that they never saw the night. Then in the daytime the cloud spread out as a shade and kept the burning sun off them. The heat didn’t smite them for forty years. Then the cloud by its movements infallibly guided them just exactly where to go. They didn’t have to make any inquiries concerning the road they were to follow. They were to follow the cloud. They didn’t have to ask about how soon to start next morning. They were just to wait on the cloud. If it didn’t move, they were to stay right there if it was a year. The whole question was settled as to guidance by the cloud. How was it as a defense? Well, as enemies came, if the enemies were in the rear the cloud moved to the rear and got between them and the enemies with the black face of it toward the enemies. It had a black face and a light face. It would turn the light face toward the Israelites. It did that way when Pharaoh came up after them, and it looked to him like the blackest night the world ever saw, coming right between him and the Israelites, and it stayed there; Pharaoh couldn’t see through the black part of the cloud that was throwing light over Israel, and the Israelites passed through the Red Sea; as soon as they were across the cloud rose up and went on ahead of the Israelites, and Pharaoh following when he got into the midst of the sea, he and his army were swallowed up.
31. What was the value of the sanctuary as a center?
Ans. It was absolutely essential to hold this crowd together. Put three million people out and no center of unity and they will disintegrate; they will go in every direction, but no matter how many the people nor how far out the columns had to spread in marching and the herds had to go in grazing, all they had to do at any time was to look up; away yonder they could see, if in the daytime, the pillar of cloud, if at night, the pillar of fire.
32. What was the value of the sanctuary as an oracle?
Ans. An oracle is a supernatural voice that answers questions and tells you what you are to do.
33. Where was the oracle and what was it?
Ans. The most holy place is many times called the oracle, not because it was the oracle, t)ut because it was there that the oracle spoke. Nobody can estimate how much is the value of an infallible oracle. A case would come up that Moses would not know what to do. “Well, I will go and ask the oracle. I will ask God. God will tell me what to do.” In the New Testament Jesus says, “While you are now asking me questions [they were firing questions at him all the time, and right then in that very discussion of his, Philip says, “Lord, this,” and Thomas says, “Lord, this” and Jude says “Lord, this”] when the other Advacate comes, you shall ask me nothing. You will ask him. You will ask the Holy Spirit. I am going away and you think you will have nobody to answer your questions?” Disciples are interrogation points. They ask questions all the time and often very foolish questions, but Jesus patiently listened and answered, but when he went away that was the thing that troubled them: “Who will answer our questions?” “In that day when the Holy Spirit comes, you will ask me nothing. Just ask him,” says Jesus.
34. How was a communication signified?
Ans. If it was the high priest that was to ask a question, he would put on the ephod with the urim and thummirn and come to the Holy Place, and if the cloud was willing to hear him it would settle down and talk to him, and the same way with Moses, only Moses didn’t use the urim and thummirn.
35. How was the answer obtained and give examples?
Ans. If it was a priest wanting it, the answer was obtained through the urim and thummirn; I will give you some examples: 1Sa 23:9-12 ,-1Sa 28:6 ; 1Sa 30:7-8 ; Hos 3:4 . All these are cases when questions were brought, the methods by which they were brought and how answers were obtained.
36. What was the relative value of this tent and all the other tents?
Ans. A great many tents were necessary for three millions of people. I will let the psalmist answer that question. He says, “The Lord loveth the gates of Zion more than all the tents of Israel.” That tent was worth all the rest of them put together. Without that tent the others would not stand. It was not only the center of unity and the place where the oracle spoke and by which they were defended and guided, but it was the place of God’s presence.
37. What description and explanation the best?
Ans. About the best I know is found in Rand-McNally’s Atlas of the Bible. If you had that book you could turn to a certain page and see the picture of the whole tabernacle, see the diagram showing you just how every tribe camped, where Moses stood, where Aaron stood, etc.
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Exo 25:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
Ver. 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses. ] Gave him the ceremonial law also – as before he had done the moral and judicial – which was their gospel.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
the LORD [Hebrew. Jehovah. spake. See notes on Exo 3:7 and Exo 6:10.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Chapter 25
Now it is interesting as God gives to him the design, He starts not with the tabernacle itself but with the furnishings within the tabernacle. So in chapter twenty-five, we begin with the materials that were, the things that were made that were to be used in the tabernacle.
And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: every man that giveth it willingly with his heart shall take my offering. And this is the offering which you shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, goats’ [hair], And rams’ skins dyed red, badger’s skins, and acacia wood, Oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil, and for a sweet incense, Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and the breastplate. And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. According to all that I show thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it ( Exo 25:1-9 ).
So the people were to make an offering, but what was the requirement? They were to bring it willingly. What does the New Testament say about our giving? That, “It should be every man as he has purposed in his own heart, so let him give, for the Lord loves a hilarious giver”( 2Co 9:7 ). The giving is never to be by constraint, never to be by pressure, never to be by deceitful letters. Man, that upset me. Why? Because God never wants to hear you gripe over what you’ve given to Him. That’s the last thing God wants is to hear you gripe over what you’ve given.
Now if someone’s pressuring you to give, and you’re giving not from your heart, but because someone’s really laying the pressure on you, you’re apt then to later regret what you’ve pledged or what you’ve given. When you get the little notice, “Your pledge is due. We haven’t heard from you in a month or so, and your pledge, and the church is depending upon getting your pledge”, and you think, “Oh, I got to write a check. Ooh.” You’re angry with it; man, that upsets God.
He said, “Keep it, I don’t want it.” He doesn’t want you to grudge what you’ve given to Him. That’s horrible to give unto God grudgingly, or to give unto God out of constraint. He’d rather you keep it. If you can’t give hilariously, then don’t give. Because if you’re gonna gripe about it, He’s just gonna erase the amount anyhow and you’ll never get rewarded for it. God isn’t gonna take into account the grudging money or the griping money that you’ve given to Him. So if you can’t do it hilariously, forget it. Better not to give at all. You’d be much better off not to give at all then to give and later gripe about it.
Some guy the other day, he wrote me a letter and he said he was here and he was upset because of the fact that he went out to have a smoke. And the ushers wouldn’t let him back in at the end of the sermon where he wanted to come down and sit with his girl again down on the front row. So he was really upset because they wouldn’t let him back in and all.
He said, “I put two dollars in the offering and then they wouldn’t let me out.” So I sent him a couple bucks and I said, “Sorry about that”. It’s not about the fact they wouldn’t let him in; I was sorry that he had such a bad attitude. I told him the story for the attitude that he had, the fact that he was so upset, didn’t want the two bucks, God surely doesn’t need it. If he’s upset because he gave it, man, better to give it back. If you’ve given money here and you’re upset about what you’ve given, maybe I said something to upset you and you’re griping, that’s all right. Come to me, and we’ll get your money back. We don’t want any griping money for God’s kingdom. God doesn’t want it and we don’t. It’s a horrible thing to give to God and then gripe about what you’ve given.
I hate people who say, “Well, I’ll be glad to come over and help you.” Then they gripe the whole time. Or they offer to give you something and then you go to take them up on it, and they start griping about it. Man, if you don’t mean it, don’t offer it. I can’t stand to have someone give me something and then later gripe about the fact that they gave it. Whenever I find that out, I return it just as quickly as I can. I don’t want it, and God doesn’t want it. God loves a hilarious giver. Oh, how God rejoices when you give. “Thank you Lord for the opportunity. “Wee. Take this Lord. It’s all Yours.” Giving hilariously, oh God rejoices in that, God blesses that. If you can’t give that way, then don’t do it.
Now first of all He tells him about the ark that is to be in the Holy of holies, the center place of the tabernacle. The place where they’re gonna meet God.
Now notice God says to, “make it after the pattern that I give to you according to all that I show you. Be careful that you make it after the pattern.” Why? Because the tabernacle is a little model, it’s a model of heaven. If you want to know what heaven looks like and get an idea of heaven, you can look at the tabernacle because it is a model of the heavenly thing. So God had them build a little model on earth of what heaven, the throne of God looks like so that the people will have an idea of what God’s throne is like and the place of meeting God. So this is a little model. That’s why, “be careful you make it exactly like you were told.”
That’s why they were to carve the cherubim, because there are cherubim there above the throne of God in heaven. There is the mercy seat before the throne of God.
Now the first thing they were to make was the ark of the covenant. It was to be made with acacia wood and overlaid with gold. It was to be forty-five inches long, and twenty-seven inches wide, and twenty-seven inches tall, sort of a box. Now the lid on the box was called the mercy seat.
First of all, though, this little box called the ark of the covenant, and within the box they were to place the two tables of stone upon which God etched the Ten Commandments. They were to place a jar of manna by which God sustained them in the wilderness, and they were to place Aaron’s rod, the sign of the priesthood being through Aaron, the rod that budded. Those were the three articles that were to go inside of this little box.
The lid on the box was called the mercy seat. It also was to be made of acacia wood and overlaid with gold. Then carved on either end of the mercy seat were to be these cherubim carved of solid gold, and facing each other with outstretched wings and so forth. There the cherubims on the lid of the box, which is the ark of the covenant; and thus, you have a picture of the mercy seat in heaven and the cherubim who are about the throne of God worshiping the Lord. You can read Ezekiel chapter one, Ezekiel chapter ten, and John, or the book of Revelation actually, written by John, chapter four to see the heavenly scene of which this earthly tabernacle is just a model of the heavenly scene.
So these were the only furnishings to be in the holy of Holies, a fifteen-foot cubicle that was within this tent that they were to make. Verse twenty-three, the second furniture that they were to make, the second bit of furniture was a table for the shewbread.
Now this table was to be thirty six inches long and eighteen inches wide, and twenty seven inches tall with a little crown gold ornamentation around the top of the table. It again was to be made with acacia wood, and overlaid with gold ( Exo 25:23-24 ).
This table was to be a part of the furniture in the outer room. Now as you came into the tent you had first of all, a room that was fifteen by thirty, which was called the holy place. It was separated with a curtain from this fifteen-foot cubicle which was the holy of Holies. No one was allowed in the holy of Holies, except the high priest, and that just one day a year.
Now this little table that they were to make, actually the little box they were to make, they were to put gold rings on each corner, and then they were to take these sticks and overlay them with gold, and run them through the rings. So that whenever they would move and have to carry this ark, that the fellows would not touch it, but they would pick up the sticks and carry the sticks. It would be carried between four men who were carrying these gold overlaid sticks that ran through these four gold rings that were on the corners of the ark of the covenant.
Now the same with this table of shewbread. They were also to put the gold rings on it, so that the fellows and the staves, the sticks that were overlaid with gold stayed through these rings. So that whenever they carried it, they’d just pick up the sticks and wouldn’t actually touch the table.
Now this table was to have twelve loaves of bread upon it always, and once a week they would change the loaves of bread. These twelve loaves of bread represented actually the twelve tribes of Israel. There when you would, when the priest would enter this little outer room called the holy place, fifteen by thirty, on his right-hand side there would be this little gold overlaid table, thirty-six inches long, eighteen inches wide, twenty-seven inches high, with the twelve loaves of bread upon it. So he gives the whole thing that we’ve explained to you.
Then on his left-hand side as he would enter in, there was this golden candlestick made of pure gold,
and it was of beaten work, and it had the center shaft, the coming off of it six branches ( Exo 25:31 ),
Now this is somewhat similar to this, except this thing’s brass and it is no doubt not as thick as the one that is made of pure gold, but the idea. However, instead of candles in the cups, these cups, and they were carved more fancy than this, the cups themselves were to be carved like an almond, an overlaid kind of a thing in the shape of an almond. These cups were filled with oil and a wick in them. This candlestick was to be kept burning continually.
So one of the jobs of the priests was daily to fill these cups with oil, to make sure that the candlestick remained burning constantly. It was the light in this tent. It formed the light within the tent, but it really was a symbol of God’s desire for the nation Israel to be the light of the world.
So as the priest would enter into the tent, on his right-hand side this table with twelve loaves of bread, golden table. On his left-hand side this candlestick, with these seven golden cups filled with oil and so forth, representing the fact that God intended Israel to be the light of the world.
Now you may ask, “As long as it’s a symbol of the tabernacle and Israel to be the light of the world, why do we have it in our church? Why don’t we have crosses or something here instead of the candleholder?” Well, the reason why we have a candleholder here in the church is that the candleholder in the New Testament became a symbol for the presence of Christ within His church.
In Revelation chapter one, “John turned to see the voice and spake with Him, and being turned he saw Christ walking in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, holding the seven stars in His right hand. And the Lord spoke unto John and said, interpreting for him the vision, He said, “The seven candlesticks are the seven churches, Christ walking in the midst of the churches” ( Rev 1:20 ). So it is a beautiful symbol of the presence of Christ in the midst of His church, the living Christ.
Though we are grateful and thankful and glory in the cross of Jesus Christ, and thank God for it, we do not serve a dead Lord. We serve a risen Savior who is alive and walking in the midst of His church. We don’t like to think of Him as dead, hanging on a cross. We like to think of Him as alive and present with us walking here in our midst in the church, ready to minister, and to meet whatever needs you might have when you came to church tonight. The risen Lord is here to minister to you and to help you through this week.
So it symbolizes the presence of the risen Christ within His church. This is why we have this particular symbol in our church, because it means so much to us. I’ve been asked many times, “Why a menorah in a church?” and that is the reason why. So again in verse forty, the Lord said,
Look that thou make them after the pattern, which was shewed thee ( Exo 25:40 )
So again the emphasis, “Make it just like you saw it because it has to be an exact thing if it’s going to be a model of the heavenly.” In Hebrews we are told that, “The earthly tabernacle was indeed a pattern of heavenly things.” So we know a little bit what the throne of God is going to look like as we look at the earthly tabernacle and the things that were in it.
We may move a little faster through the remaining part of Exodus, as we will attempt to more or less just give you an overview now rather than thoroughly going into these things, trying to give you a word picture and an overview of these things. It gets a little tedious and a little redundant because it first of all says, “Make it like this”, and then He turns around in the next few chapters, “and they made it like this”, and they repeat the same thing, only saying “they made it like that”, and it gets a little redundant. So rather than getting bogged down, we’ll probably move a little more rapidly and just give you a word picture overview so that you can perhaps sort of picture it in your own mind, as you think of the tabernacle.
You can get a picture of this tent with the two rooms, the first one thirty by fifteen, the golden table of shewbread on the right hand side, the candlestick on the left-hand side, and then the altar in the front of the curtain. Behind the curtain the fifteen-foot cubicle with this gold overlaid box with a lid, which is called the mercy seat. With the two carved cherubim on the top where only the high priest would go on the one day in a year, Yom Kippur to make atonement for the nation for their sins once a year. So we’ll move along a little more rapidly as we finish off the book of Exodus, and pausing only at those places that we feel are significant to us as Christians.
Shall we stand? Now may the Lord be with you, and may the Lord watch over you and keep you in His love, and in His grace. May the Lord cause you to abound in every good work for Jesus Christ. May the Lord grant to you new dimensions of relationship with Him that you might become more keenly aware of His presence with you, and His power to help you. May God bless you, may you have just a fruitful, blessed week walking with Jesus Christ. “
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
Here we begin consideration of the transactions of the forty days. Moses received instruction concerning a place of worship for the nation. It is important that we attempt to understand what this meant to the people at the time. The great underlying principles are all realized and fulfilled in Christianity.
The instructions began, not with the structure, but with its contents. An Ark was to be prepared and its place was to be at the very center of everything. The Ark with the covering cherubim symbolized that God dwelt among them. The mercy seat above it was a witness to a divine method to God.
The next instructions concerned the table of shewbread. In the East a table was always the symbol of fellowship. Thus the people were reminded of the possibility created of constant communion with God.
Instructions followed concerning the golden candlestick which was a light bearer symbolizing the testimony these people were called on to bear to the outside world. As between themselves and God the propitiatory or mercy seat had made fellowship possible, so between the nation and the world the same provision made testimony a necessity. Light shining in darkness is ever the symbol of holiness and hope. The very form of the candlestick indicated the unity of the people and the diversity of their service and testimony.
These three were the essential pieces of furniture at the center of the national life and religion: first, a meeting place with God on the basis of propitiation, second, a table for fellowship between God and His people, and, finally, a candlestick indicating the office to which they were called.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
Moses Shown Gods Plan for the Tabernacle
Exo 24:12-18; Exo 25:1-9
There were four concentric circles, so to speak, represented as gathered around the burning center of the Divine Presence. In the outer circle, the people, Exo 24:2; Exo 24:17; next, the seventy elders, Exo 24:9; Exo 24:14; then, Joshua, Exo 24:13; Exo 32:17, and lastly, Moses, Exo 24:18. These represent respectively, the unenlightened; those whose religious life is hindered by their excessive devotion to the flesh; the few whose fellowship is liable to be interrupted by the war-clarion; and those who have been made nigh unto God in Jesus Christ our Lord, and have been baptized into the Holy Spirit. To which group have we attained? We are invited to draw nigh, let us act on the invitation. See Heb 10:19-20. There is always room at the top, and there we may stand, beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord. Notice that God said, Come up unto Me. He longs to have our love and faith; His delights are with the sons of men; at great cost He has opened the door of access, Rom 5:1-2. We need God, but God wants us, and therefore the construction of the Tabernacle is next arranged, that He may dwell with man upon the earth.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
Exo 25:8
We have to consider the Divine presence, the abiding of God with men, how it is accomplished and what it involves.
I. The dwelling of God among us in Christ Jesus, when it is a reality, and not merely an idea or a phrase, imports and of necessity secures the passing away from us of the things we have most reason to fear. When God comes to dwell among us, which can only be by dwelling in us individually, sin goes from us, in its guilt and its predominating power.
II. God comes thus to dwell with men for the development of character and for the nourishment of all goodness. The putting away of sin is but the negative part of salvation. The presence in its place of truth and duty and love and obedience-this is what makes a saved man.
III. For how long does God dwell with men? Deep philosophy as well as high faith sanctions the conclusion that the God of grace, who makes covenant with man and dwells with him, is “our God for ever and ever,” and that He “will never leave us and never forsake us.”
A. Raleigh, Sermons Preached at the Dedication of Union Chapel, Islington, p. 158.
Notice:-
I. God makes Himself dependent on the will of man-“Let them make Me.” This is true, not only of material wealth, but of man’s nature. God may be thwarted by man.
II. In this Divine conception of the Church there is a place for the rich. It is not impossible for rich men to be good men. God has given their offerings a place. “This is the offering which ye shall take of them: gold.”
III. Labour has its place. There was a great deal of timber required; trees had to be cut down and brought to the spot.
IV. Woman has her rights here. We read in Exo 35:24-25, of women that were wise-hearted, who did spin with their hands.
V. There is room for genius. Precious stones are required.
VI. The meanest is acceptable if it is the best that we can bring.
VII. Our best and our all is of no avail without the atonement of Christ.
T. Champness, New Coins from Old Gold, p. 32.
References: Exo 25:15.-S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year, vol. ii., appendix, p. 19. Exo 25:21 (with Rev 11:19.).-Parker The Ark of God, p. 1, and vol. ii., p. 205.
Exo 25:21-22
It was a leading and distinctive feature of Jewish worship that no image was to represent Jehovah, and yet the Jews were taught that the omnipotent God resided specially in the tabernacle, or temple, of their nation, and special rites and prohibitions guarded it, as if the great King were indeed there.
I. The Jewish Holy of Holies was empty of any image of Deity, and was entered by the high-priest alone, and by him only once a year. The centre of interest in the room was the ark of God, a chest of acacia wood, about four feet long and two feet six inches broad and deep. It contained the tables of testimony, the written agreement or covenant between God and the people of Israel.
II. That was not all. The lesson taught at Sinai was not all that the Jewish ark taught, for the ark had a lid or covering known as the “mercy-seat.” Inside the ark and below was the law; above and upon the ark was that vacant space associated, through the sprinkling of blood, with the covering or forgiving of the people’s transgressions; and with this seat of mercy and pardon above, rather than with the seat of law below, the presence of God was associated. The material arrangements taught the Jews great spiritual lessons: (1) that the law had been broken; (2) that mercy prevails over law; (3) that the mercy-seat needed to be sprinkled with blood.
T. M. Herbert, Sketches of Sermons, p. 98.
Exo 25:22
All the time that the history of the Jews was going on, the mercy-seat and the cherubim that covered it were still witnessing to the children of Israel that God was in the midst of them. So the words, “There I will meet with thee,” stood from generation to generation.
The New Testament, like the Old, is written to explain these words. The New Testament declares that He for whose appearance the Jewish worshippers longed has appeared. The New Testament tells us that in His Son God has met men and has reconciled them unto Himself. The lessons of the New Testament take up all the words and lessons of the Old Testament, all that is written about the cherubim and the mercy-seat. They say, “All this is now, not for Israelites, but for men, for men in the farthest ends of the earth.” If you turn to the last book of the Bible, you will find the Book of Genesis appearing again there, a nobler tree of life than that of the garden of Eden, which is not guarded by angels, but the fruit of which all are invited to taste. You will find the Book of Exodus again there. You will hear of the tabernacle of God being with men, and of His dwelling with them and being their God. You will find some of the latest words in the book those which have gone through the whole of it,-“Worship God.” Worship means that God is meeting us and drawing us to Himself, that He has sent His Spirit into the world and established His Church in the world for the very purpose of bringing all to Him. This is the message that the Bible has brought to men in past ages; this is the message that it brings to them now.
F. D. Maurice, The Worship of God and Fellowship among Men, p. 127.
I. To the Jews God set apart one special place for sacrifice, one special place for closest communion, and he who wanted some direct oracle from God must go to that spot to get his answer. The oneness continues, but it is not now oneness of spot; it is oneness of path. All the oneness of the Mosaic types goes to make the oneness of the Lord Jesus Christ.
II. It was upon the mercy-seat that God said, “I will meet thee and commune with thee.” According to our views of Christ, according to our nearness to Christ, so will be our experience of communion with God.
III. There could be no true throne of God in the world if mercy were separated from justice. But now it is just in God to be merciful because of all the deep things that that ark tells us. The sin has been punished in Christ, and therefore God can be just and the Justifier of them that believe in Jesus.
J. Vaughan, Meditations in Exodus, p. 46.
Exo 25:31-37
I. This light shines because it is light, without effort, spontaneously. If the lamp is kindled, it will shine; and so this emblem has its beautiful felicity in that it points, as the highest definition of all Christian men, to the effortless, spontaneous irradiation and streaming out from themselves of the fire that lies within them. Like a light in an alabaster vase, that shines through its transparency and reveals the lovely veining of the stone, so the grace of God in a man’s heart will shine through him, turning even the opacity of his earthly nature into a medium for veiling perhaps, but also in another aspect for making visible, the light that is in him.
II. The light was derived light; and it was fed. We have a Priest who walks in His temple and trims the lamps. The condition of the light is keeping close to Christ, and it is because there is such a gap between you and Him that there is so little brightness in you. The candlestick was really a lamp fed by oil; that symbol, as Zechariah tells us, stands for the Divine influence of God’s quickening Spirit.
III. The light was clustered light. The seven-branched candlestick represented the rigid, formal unity of the Jewish Church. In the New Testament we have the seven candlesticks, diverse, but made one because Jesus Christ is in the midst of them. In this slight diversity of emblem we get the whole difference between the hard external unity of the ancient Jewish polity and the free variety in unity and diversity of the Christian Church, with its individual development, as well as with its binding association.
A. Maclaren, Contemporary Pulpit, vol. iv., p. 253.
References: Exo 25:40.-Phillips Brooks, Sermons Preached in English Churches, p. 1; A. Rowland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xx., p. 140. 25-Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 125; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 303. 25-27.-Parker, vol. ii., p. 2221 25-31.-W. M. Taylor, Moses the Lawgiver, p. 232; J. Monro Gibson, The Mosaic Era, p. 105. Exo 26:6.-H. Macmillan, The Olive Leaf, p. 15; H. Downton, The Sunday Magazine, 1877, p. 490. 26-Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., pp. 113-115.
Fuente: The Sermon Bible
3. The Tabernacle and the Priesthood
CHAPTER 25 The Tabernacle
1. The freewill offering and the materials (Exo 25:1-9)
2. The ark (Exo 25:10-22)
3. The table of showbread (Exo 25:23-30)
4. The golden candlestick (Exo 25:31-40)
This is another intensely interesting portion of this great book. To give a few annotations and hints on the tabernacle is an extremely difficult task, for there is such a wonderful mine of wealth here that a book of hundreds of pages could not contain all.
The tabernacle concerning which the Lord instructed Moses was the earthly place of worship of Israel; it was the means of a continued relationship of a holy God with a sinful people. But besides this the tabernacle and its worship foreshadow in the completest way the Person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. The epistle to the Hebrews bears witness to this. The types in the tabernacle are simply inexhaustible. The word tabernacle in the Hebrew is mishkan, which means dwelling-place. The construction and arrangement were not left to man. God gave Moses the instructions and showed to him a pattern.
The materials are mentioned first, and they are to be supplied by His willing people. The Hebrew expression is literally, every one whom his heart drove. Only His people, not strangers, could furnish the material. And they had to give with the heart. The same principle holds good in the New Testament. The support of the Lords work by unsaved people and the methods of the world are wrong; they have not the blessing of God. We do not touch upon the materials now, but shall do so later.
The ark of shittim wood is the first thing mentioned. Man builds differently. Man lays first a foundation, builds the walls, works from the outside to the inside. God begins within. The ark with the mercy seat is where Jehovah dwelt, between the Cherubim. It is, therefore, a type of Christ. The shittim wood, that is, acacia, grows in the desert, out of a dry ground (Isa 53:2). It is of all the wood the most durable, almost imperishable. We have in it the type of the humanity of Christ. The gold which covered it is typical of His deity. The mercy seat fitted the ark. It was of the same dimensions as the ark. The Hebrew word is kapporeth, which means covering, and has reference to atonement. The two cherubim faced each other and looked down upon the mercy seat, where the blood was sprinkled. They are always seen in the Word in connection with the throne (Ezek. 1; Rev. 4). Beautiful is Exo 25:22.
The table of Showbread still tells us of Christ, for it is of the same material as the ark. What was on the table, the showbread and all its blessed lessons we shall consider in Leviticus. The table and the bread are typical of Christ, who sustains us in fellowship with God.
The golden candlestick is the next article of furniture described. It was of pure gold. Three times almonds are mentioned. From the book of Numbers we learn that the almond, on the blossoming rod of Aaron, is the type of Christ in resurrection. The candlestick typifies Christ in heavens glory, outshining the glory of God. It also is the type of Him, risen from the dead, giving the Holy Spirit, who is seen as the sevenfold Spirit in the candlestick. See and compare with Rev 1:4; Rev 1:13; Rev 1:20; Rev 3:1 and Rev 4:5.
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
the Lord spoke unto Moses
The general authority for the types of Exodus is found:
(1) as to the persons and events, in 1Co 10:1-11.
(2) as to the tabernacle, in Heb 9:1-24. Having the assurance that in the tabernacle everything is typical, the details must of necessity be received as such. Two warnings are necessary:
(1) Nothing may be dogmatically asserted to be a type without explicit New Testament authority; and
(2) all types not so authenticated must be recognized as having the authority of analogy, or spiritual congruity, merely. The typical meanings of the materials and colours of the tabernacle are believed to be as follows: Gold, Deity in manifestation–divine glory; silver, redemption Exo 30:12-16. (See Scofield “Exo 38:27”), brass, symbol of judgment, as in the brazen altar and in the serpent of brass Num 21:6-9 blue, heavenly in nature or origin; purple, royalty; scarlet, sacrifice.
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
Reciprocal: Exo 35:1 – These Exo 35:4 – This is Exo 35:8 – spices Exo 39:32 – all the Exo 39:33 – the tent Exo 39:42 – according Num 7:5 – Take it 2Ki 12:4 – and all the money
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Section 2. (Exo 25:1-40; Exo 26:1-37; Exo 27:1-21; Exo 28:1-43; Exo 29:1-46; Exo 30:1-38; Exo 31:1-18.)
The tabernacle; the means of sustaining relationship when sin has come in: the types of a greater salvation.
We have now the directions as to the tabernacle, the means by which, in the inevitable breach of the first covenant, relationship is to be sustained. We find as yet only the pattern of it, but which fully shows that God has anticipated and provided for the failure of that in which the people placed such assured confidence. Just for this reason was it necessary that they should be allowed to prove fully what was in them. But the trial was to be much longer than this might argue, and not for their need only, but for all after-generations.
1. There are five subsections; of which this introductory one shows how alone Jehovah could dwell amongst them. While He alone must prescribe the manner of it, they yet must provide Him a dwelling-place, and that of their own freewill. The toil of slaves could not furnish this; forced labor could not be acceptable to Him who had been their Redeemer out of Egyptian bondage that they might freely serve Him. The Psalmist’s words find expression here (Psa 22:3): God inhabits the praises of Israel. But what meaning is given to this when we remember whose voice it is that utters itself in this psalm, -that it is His who by His own atoning sufferings makes possible and inspires the praises of His redeemed! And it is of this suffering that the tabernacle-services speak to us throughout. Typically thus we see in the materials here of what our praises must be full, for they all utter to us the blessed name of Jesus.
2. And then we enter upon a survey of the elements of this tabernacle-worship, -“patterns” only as yet, -but which we find realized before the book ends, when they are all emphasized by repetition: what may be seen in this it will be for us to inquire there: at present, we have only the patterns.
(1) First of these, the ark and mercy-seat, together the throne of God in Israel. That He “sitteth between the cherubim” we are often reminded, and thence (we are told here) His law was to go forth to Israel.
Christ is the substance of all these shadows, and in the ark we have surely Christ. The acacia-wood as the wood of the desert, -the only timber-tree in it -speaks of Him as the “root out of a dry ground,” as which He grew up before God (Isa 53:2), precious and durable, the type of victory over surrounding circumstances -of life conquering death. Such was Christ in His humanity; His divine glory is intimated by the gold which covered it, yet was distinct from it, as His deity was distinct from His humanity. The rings are of gold, in which the staves were to remain constantly; for divine love makes Him ever a pilgrim with His pilgrim-people.
Upon the ark, fitting exactly to it, is the kapporeth,* or “mercy-seat,” of pure gold, glorious as divine mercy is, one with the cherubim at each end of it, whose faces toward the mercy-seat are also toward each other, attracted by a common object, which, although not seen as yet, is the blood of atonement to be put there. They are attached thus to the throne of God, and are always seen in connection with the display of judicial authority; as at the gate of Eden in conjunction with the sword-flame by which the way to the tree of life is stopped; or as in Ezekiel’s vision of judgment; again the “living beings” in the midst of the throne in Rev 4:1-11 are undoubtedly cherubic.
{*Not implying a mere “covering,” but a word derived from the intensive form of kaphar (kipper), always applied to atonement or its results. The Septuagint translate it “hilasterion,” “propitiatory,” and the apostle in Heb 9:5 adopts their rendering, while in Rom 3:25 he applies it to the Lord, “whom God hath set forth to be a propitiatory through faith in His blood.” This word, as used of the mercy-seat, derives its significance from the blood of atonement, or propitiation, which once a year was put upon it. But the doctrine of atonement will come up for fuller consideration when we come to Leviticus.}
Their forms are not given yet, for in Genesis they are only named. Here we see their wings, (suggesting their heavenly character,) and where their faces are directed, and that they are part of the throne itself, and two in number (speaking of competent witness). Every thing assures us that they express the executive righteousness of the throne, which requires and finds its satisfaction in the work of atonement.
The ark, then, as a whole, is the throne of God in Israel, in righteousness, yet in mercy, through the blood of sacrifice; and Christ is shown in it as the One through whom alone such a throne can be set up among men. He is indeed God’s righteous mercy-seat. Within the ark is to be put the testimony, the tables of the law; which cannot but remind us of Him who said, “Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O My God: yea, Thy law is within My heart.” (Psa 40:7-8.) But if thus within His heart, magnified and made honorable by His own subjection to it through His life, and in His taking upon the cross its curse upon sin, -it is none the less shut up from man, the curse removed from him. In that which we are considering there is as yet only the shadow, not the substance; but the shadow even shows that not by man’s fulfillment of responsibility, but by atonement only could God have His place among men. The purely legal covenant was not that under which man could really abide at all, and in God’s mind it was already set aside.
(2) We have next the table of show-bread, not the ordinance of the show-bread, which comes in Leviticus (Lev 24:5-9). The mention of it here is only to show the purpose of the table itself. The show-bread, as we find it in the later book, assuredly speaks of communion, and with a wondrous fullness of thought in it which it would be here out of place to enter into. Here the table, made of the same material as the ark, must speak of Christ as the ark does. Christ, then, is here the Sustainer of communion. The wood and the gold we need not dwell on again, except to notice (what is equally true of the ark) that the gold outside shows us the Lord, not as He was in His humiliation upon earth, but glorified in heaven. The whole sanctuary, holy and holiest, is the figure of the heavenly places (Heb 9:23-24), and it is Christ as there, risen, ascended, glorified, -gone up, His work being accepted, -who sustains us in the place of fellowship with God.
Thus the table is of the same height with the ark, over-topped only by the golden mercy-seat, though it falls short of it in breadth and length; for God’s mercy, as revealed in the propitiation for sins, is more than actually realized in the communion of saints. The propitiation is for the whole world (1Jn 2:2), though on condition of faith (Rom 3:25), which all men, alas! have not. Thus the table spread for the saints has not in this respect the dimensions of the mercy-seat.
Around the table is a margin of a hand-breadth, which may imply the divine hand that is round about; while table and margin are encompassed with a golden border -possibly a crown, although the word is not used for crown elsewhere, -which suggests how the divine glory defines and marks out all.
This table, though in character heavenly, is still for present use, as the rings and staves would show. It is part of that provision of God for us which is available by grace through all our wilderness journeying, and the vessels for the drink-offering which accompany the table show us how of necessity communion and thanksgiving are linked together.
(3) The only other portion of the furniture of the sanctuary that we find here (for the incense altar is found in another connection, chap. 30) is the golden lamp-stand, which we must, of course, distinguish from the light it bears. In Rev 4:5, in unmistakable reference to what we have here, “the seven lamps of fire burning before the throne” are interpreted for us as “the seven spirits of God.” The lamp-stand supports the light, while it is itself lighted up by it, -a thing of the most essential consequence in this case: for if the Spirit of God is the Sanctifier, Christ is Himself the means of sanctification to the soul (1Co 1:30), and the work of the Spirit is thus to take of the things of Christ and show them to us.
Moreover, it is not only Christ, but Christ in heaven, who is our sanctification, as He says: “And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.” (Joh 17:19.) He sets Himself apart as the One gone up to God, a Man, to be at once the pattern and the power of sanctification in men and “we all beholding the glory of the Lord with unvailed face” -in contrast with Moses, vailed one -“are changed into the same image from glory to glory” (2Co 3:18).
We have now the means of interpreting the sanctuary lamp-stand. It is of pure gold simply, not (as with the ark and table) of wood and gold: the distinction of natures in Christ is here, therefore, not the thought; our attention is to be fixed upon this, that it is the “glory of God” we behold in the face of Jesus Christ (2Co 4:6). It is to the image of God we are to be brought by this outshining of the glory of God.
Yet we see in whose face it shines: for all over the stem and branches is the semblance of the almond, bud and flower and fruit. Now the almond brings us back to the tree, the human element; nor only so: the almond is in the book of Numbers the symbol of Christ, and of Christ in resurrection. The rod of Aaron put into the sanctuary bursts into sudden bloom and fruitage after the manner of the lamp-stand, the clear and beautiful figure of resurrection. This declares the divine Priest (Num 17:1-13), and with our sanctification the glorious Priest, as gone in for us into the sanctuary, is concerned. But not only so; on each branch we find the resurrection-number 3 of these almond symbols, and connecting the three pairs of branches three more on the central stem, which has itself four -thus a 3 + 1.
Still more, the almond is, in Hebrew, shaqed, “hastening,” because it is the first tree which, reviving out of the winter-sleep, “hastens” to put forth its blossoms, first-fruits of all that is to come. How beautiful the type here of Christ our “first-fruits” in connection with this theme of sanctification, in which when perfected the after fruits will be rendered to God!
But again, as to the branches of the lamp-stand, Isa 11:1-16 is surely an inspired interpretation. There we find the Lord indeed in another character, as the Branch out of the root of Jesse, King of Israel, but with the fullness of the Spirit for the government of the earth. Here is the connection, and it is a remarkable one; for as in the lamp-stand the seven branches which bear the seven lamps are in three pairs, with one uniting central stem, so are the seven spirits of Isaiah united and divided: “And the Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of Jehovah.” Here the “Spirit of Jehovah,” standing necessarily alone, yet unites certainly all the rest. “Jehovah” is God’s name by which He is in covenant with His people as their Redeemer, as this book of Exodus has taught us; and thus Christ, as the Mediator of the new covenant, holds His people fast to God. Is not this possibly the reason why there are, as we have seen, four almonds (the number of the creature) upon the central stem?
Strange at first it seems that for these lamps there should be provided snuffers and snuff-dishes; but it becomes simple if we remember that here as elsewhere the Spirit of God is seen as connected with the human instruments He is pleased to use, and that they need (how often!) the service which this implies. Snuffers are thus “golden,” (for the glory of God,) though a priestly hand alone can use them aright.
(4) The tabernacle has three aspects in which we are to view it, in all of which the thought of its being the dwelling-place of God is fundamental. In the first place, it sets before us the heavenly places, as the epistle to the Hebrews fully shows: here its interior space with the ark, table and lamp-stand is specially in view. Though in connection with the earth, the house of God must, of course, in character be heavenly. Then it represents Christ Himself, as made flesh and tabernacling among us, the glory here being the glory of the Only-Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth (Joh 1:14, R.V. marg.). Here the curtains of the tabernacle are before us. And lastly, the church, is God’s house, as the epistle to the Hebrews again teaches (Heb 3:6) with distinct reference to the tabernacle. Here the boards of the tabernacle, the wooden part of the structure seem to give the thought.
We begin now with the curtains, and here we see that if the tabernacle is throughout the “pattern of things in the heavens,” yet they are here brought down to earth, essentially a place of worship for the wilderness, whose bare sands were under the feet of the worshipers. In the land, the tabernacle was replaced by the temple. It is thus, as belonging to the earth, God in it come down to man, that the tabernacle fills its numerical place here, and the goats’ hair tent, and its coverings, harmonize perfectly with this.
The curtains speak, as their material shows, of practical righteousness, as the fine linen which covers the bride in Rev 19:1-21 does: “the fine linen is the righteousnesses of the saints.” The Revised Version here gives “righteous
acts,” and such robes have to be washed in the blood of Christ to make them white, (Rev 7:14; comp. 22: 14, R.V.) a clear evidence that they are not the symbol of Christ our righteousness, which can need no washing.
The “coats of skin” with which God clothed the first sinners were no human production: they were the fruit of death, not of life. But the “fine twined linen” speaks of human manufacture, the patient labor of which had not been yet transferred to the iron sinews which today bear the burden. The ten curtains confirm this thought, a number which -or some other multiple of 5 -meets us in the tabernacle again and again. Here they are divided into two fives, and in the measure of each curtain we find numbers just as significant -twenty-eight cubits in length, which is 4 X 7, and four cubits in breadth, showing how in the weakness of the creature into which He had come, one Man had reached an obedience that was perfect.
But we have not alone the fine twined linen here: blue and purple and scarlet are interwoven in it. We scarcely need the assurance of Maimonides, that the first of these “was the color of the firmament,” to recognize the symbol of heavenliness; the purple and scarlet are both royal colors, and may well refer to Christ’s double royalty, as King of Israel, “the root of Jesse, and He that should rise to reign over the Gentiles,” as the apostle quotes Isaiah. And this is the more plain, if as Keil says, and the literal rendering of the text seems to confirm, the blue, purple, and scarlet were simply used for the cherubic figures, which were wrought both upon these curtains and on the vail. The cherubim point to divine government, as we have seen, and thus we find here the King of God’s kingdom very simply declared. Let us notice too that the colors here are really purple-blue, purple-red, and crimson, so that through them all is a pervading tinge of the blue, -the heavenly color. But the fine linen, though these figures are woven into it, is itself white, -that which, as absolutely pure, reflects back the undivided ray of light, and “God is light.”
Loops of blue and golden clasps unite these curtains into one tabernacle: every where this heavenly character connected with the display of the glory of God.
A tent of goat’s hair surmounts it, and here we have what is very different. For the goat is the evident type of the sinner, and therefore speaks also of the Substitute for sinners. “Sin” and “sin-offering.” are the same word both in Greek and Hebrew. Thus the type here is simple enough to read. The eleven curtains of goats’ hair are divided for us into five and six, God with man and triumphing over sin; while each curtain in length is thirty cubits, and in breadth four. The latter number may remind us of the wondrous fact that in human weakness -power all against Him -was the battle won; while the former, if it is not to repeat and emphasize the former truths (being 5 X 6) must be taken as 3 X 10, and thus God glorified in the judgment of sin. The sixth curtain is doubled in front of the tent, facing with its gospel message the one who comes toward it from the world outside.
The tent had, again, a double covering: the innermost, of rams’ skins dyed red, and the outer, of seal-skin (or, as some still think, of badgers’ skins). The latter may speak of immovable steadfastness which no circumstance could affect,* underneath which lay, as the secret of it, a consecration to God which was devotedness even to death: such surely was the rams’ skin.
{*It is the suggestion of another that the seal-skin may imply perfect protection from a strange element.}
Such, then, is the picture of Him in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. We now come to the board frame-work. And here there are forty-eight boards in all: 6 X 8 = 48; the number of victory over sin and the number of new creation come together. This is when we look at all together -the Church as a whole; when we look at the boards singly, we have quite different numbers. Each board was ten cubits long and one and one-half broad. The number of responsibility is clear enough, whatever the other may be, and this is perpendicular measure also.
But when we look at the boards, there seems a great difficulty in applying them, in the way we are doing, to the Church or to individual believers in it. Each board is of the same material, outside and in, as is the ark, and as is the table; and if these speak of Christ, how can the boards speak of any other? That is perfectly just: the boards do speak of Christ; but there is just the glory of divine grace, for we are in Christ. Thus it is that nothing could rightly represent us in our standing before God, except that which will turn our eyes entirely from ourselves, and rest them upon Christ in glory.
Yet let us test this every way. Is it not still an objection that the gold should be here, which we have looked at before as typifying the deity of our Lord? Is it not as Man, and simply as Man, that He represents us before God? and can the gold be in place then in such a connection, if it is still to typify, as in consistency it must, what it typified before?
Now it is surely right to insist upon strict accuracy here; for if error in divine things is ever serious, how much more when it involves points so fundamental as are these? It is certain that it is as Man only that Christ represents us before God. As God, He is our God and our Creator simply. Yet we are said (in some sense) to be in the Son, and even in the Father (Joh 17:21; 1Th 1:1; 2Th 1:1.) This, of course, is not position: it is relationship; it is in virtue of that “eternal life” we have received, which we have not in ourselves, but in Him who is the Source of it, and by which we are in very truth the children of God. Our life is in Christ thus, who is the “eternal life,” not human life, but divine; and upon this depends our position also; for thus Christ is “last Adam” to the new race of men, and as in the old fallen head we fell, in the risen One we stand upright, as the boards stand before us here, rooted in their double sockets of silver, the witness of atonement (Exo 30:15; Exo 38:27). This silver of the atonement-money upon which they stand seems to show clearly that it is not Christ Himself who is contemplated in these boards, but His people in Him.
The bars that unite them are of the same two materials, but here there is no difficulty, for Christ is surely the uniting bond for His people.
The vail, again, is exactly like the inner curtains, and the inspired interpretation given in Heb 10:20 confirms that of the curtains also. It is Christ in His humanity, the way into the presence of God, but for which it must be rent, as we know it was rent when He died. Looking back, as we do, upon these types, we have to introduce this thought, that the vail is rent, and I think it is on this account -because of the ideal connection of the vail and its rending, that the cherubim are found upon it, as they are not upon the door of the tabernacle or the gate of the court. In these, the colors and the fine linen are still found; for it is the same Christ that is presented to us, but it is as having suffered He has entered into His glory. The cherubim speak of government in His hands already, Christ, as now we know Him, although now on the Father’s throne, not yet on His own; but on the Father’s throne speaks of His fullest dignity and of His eternal glory.
What, then, are the “pillars” that support the vail? It is plain that (in another form) they are just the boards of the tabernacle over again -acacia-wood and gold resting upon silver sockets. Thus we should naturally think of Christ as He now is, held up by the testimony of redeemed men, as in the pages of the New Testament prophets and apostles. And is it, perhaps, on this account, that whereas the boards stand each upon two sockets, the pillars stand each upon one only: they being the original witnesses upon whose testimony the Church is built? The number (4) may tell us, moreover, that even in this primary witness Israel’s exclusive position is set aside, as in Luke, the Gentile evangelist and historian of the Church. (Comp. Col 4:11 with 14.)
The division of the sanctuary by the vail into the holy and most holy is here pointed out. Thus was constituted that “first tabernacle” which the apostle speaks of (Heb 9:2; Heb 9:8,) as characteristic of Judaism, and for us now done away as such, -the rending of the vail having made the two one. This shows us in what way “the law, having a shadow of good things to come,” was “not the very image” (Heb 10:1), a fact full of significance, and not to be set down to the general disparagement of such symbolic teaching, or as an excuse for loose and ill-fitting interpretations. On the contrary, this in the law is not meaningless, but full of meaning. “The way into the holiest” -into the presence of God -could not be opened while as yet man was under the test of the law: how would he have gloried in himself could this have been! To sinners confessedly under the condemnation of the law, on the other hand, Christ’s death has rent the vail and sprinkled the mercy-seat. The word for us -how opposite to all we had but a little while since as to Israel -is, “Let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith.” (Heb 10:22.)
The covering for the entrance of the tent shows by its materials and colors what we know beforehand doctrinally, that Christ is ever the “Way.” The cherubim are absent from it, however, as already noticed, and while the curtain still hangs from golden hooks, the five pillars stand now upon brazen and not silver sockets. Brass, (or “copper” it may have been; the word stands, as it appears, for both,) is the type of what is fixed and unchanging -of enduring strength. (Deu 28:23; Deu 33:25; Psa 107:16; Jer 1:18.) The “tent upon the tabernacle” is united into one by brazen clasps, and in the court outside we find it repeatedly, replacing the silver or the gold elsewhere. The pillars are still of acacia-wood and gold, and as not standing on silver sockets, would seem necessarily to represent Christ himself and not His people, -Christ’s own ministry, when upon the earth, which, going far beyond Judaism, introduced into the sanctuary itself, though the holiest of all only His death could open. “God manifest,” as the gold declares, and standing in divine strength (upon the brazen sockets), the five pillars would beautifully speak of Immanuel, “God with us.” Christ Himself come was thus the entrance of the sanctuary for us, the beginning of the ministry of heavenly things.
(5) We come now to the altar of burnt-offering; and its numerical place speaks again of God with men, as the same number in the length and breadth of it does of that human responsibility, the failure in which atonement was needed for. “The Son of Man must be lifted up” and “God gave His Son” are both thus in the type. For the altar has again its two materials, like the ark and they table, thus speaking of two natures; but the gold is replaced by the brass, the divine nature seems obscured and lost, yet is not, for the strength of superhuman endurance is found in the Man, Christ Jesus. And the altar is three cubits high, for God is glorified, -yea, and the Son of Man is glorified in the cross (Joh 13:31.) The brazen horns point every way from the four corners, for Christ died, not for Israel only, but for all; and the horns, speaking as elsewhere of power, are the ministry of that, through the blood that anoints them, to every ungodly one that is without strength (Rom 5:6.) The altar, being hollow, admitted the sacrificial fire within it, not bore it on the surface merely, -a solemn realization as to atonement.
(6) In the court of the tabernacle, the fine linen which encloses it has necessarily the same meaning as elsewhere. It speaks of practical righteousness, but there is no adornment of color or of figure traced upon it. The pillars which support it are, with their sockets, which are single, all of brass, but the connecting-rods and the hooks by which it hangs are of silver. The measure of the hangings of the courts is exactly that of the beautiful curtains of the tabernacle; but here the fine linen hangs from silver hooks, answering to the sockets of the tabernacle-boards, so that it is not Christ that is pictured, but the righteousness of saints, yet which is measured by what Christ is. The silver hook is dependent upon the silver rod, by which the weight is thrown upon the brazen posts, which easily sustain it, -redemption linking the believer with a strength that is not his own.
The numbers everywhere speak of responsibility, however, as well they may; for these white hangings close round the sanctuary to maintain its separation from the outside world. Sin is to be repelled and excluded from this slight-walled enclosure, where the only entrance is by Christ, as the curtained entrance here again shows, hanging as the fine linen of the court hangs -from silver hooks, because Christ as the way of access depends indeed upon the atonement He has made. Thus divine power has wrought for us in human weakness, as the four brazen pillars show which uphold the curtain.
Here, at the border of the sanctuary-enclosure, where it meets the world, the types are found of God’s triumph over sin.
3. In the third series of these tabernacle-types, we come now to consider man’s approach to God, and in connection with this, necessarily the Mediator-Priest. It is here for the first time the priesthood comes formally before us. Melchisedek in Genesis has given us the type of a better order of priesthood than that of Aaron, but he is very briefly, and as it were incidentally, introduced. In Exodus, beside Jethro, we have among the people of Israel priests recognized, “young men,” probably of the first-born, who are not further noticed, but give place necessarily to the exclusive priesthood of Aaron and his sons. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, not to speak of Abel and of Noah, plainly exercised priestly functions, and it seems certain that the law, as it invested the priesthood with special sanctity, correspondingly restricted its exercise, and hedged it round with penalty in a way before unknown. And this is evidently connected with the character of the law as giving the knowledge of sin. The breach of the first covenant, so soon to follow these typical ordinances, was only the beginning of the reiterated proofs of man’s natural inability to stand before God, and his need of a Mediator; and God by all these enactments fixes the eye upon this need, and upon Him who alone really meets it, -of whom Aaron was but the shadow. The idea of priesthood will, of necessity, become defined as we go on, and it is best to leave it thus to the Word to develop the meaning in its own perfect way. It is enough here to say that the word for “priest” in Hebrew (kohen) seems most probably derived from kun, in its significance of “preparing,” and “to mean,” says Oehler, “either intransitively, to present one’s self,’ or transitively, to prepare, fit;’ in the former case, kohen would be one who stands to represent another, and in the latter case the priest would be named from the preparing and presenting the sacrifice.”
(1) Before, however, we come to the description of the priest himself, we have, in the first place, that which was indeed put under his care, but which is introduced here evidently for the sake of the general principle as to the ways of God. God is light and the first thing in the great original six days’ work was, to bring in the light where there had been darkness. Here also, when the practical working of the tabernacle begins to be set before us, the provision is made for continual light. In His presence, as in Himself, there is no darkness at all; but while, therefore, in the holiest there could be no such provision, in the holy place outside the vail the sanctuary-lamp was needed, so that through earth’s night there should be none for those approaching Him. It was never to be out -a continual light through the hours of darkness.
The necessary application of this type shows us how indeed the “things that happened unto Israel” are “written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages are come.” While Christ, the light of the world, is absent, it is night, and the light for the priests of God (our calling as Christians) is in the sanctuary only, the light of the seven lamps -the perfect illumination of the Spirit of God -as ministered by Christ risen, the Spirit of Christ. Notice how in 2Co 3:1-18, where, “beholding the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image from glory to glory,” “the Lord the Spirit” and “the Spirit of the Lord” are connected together, or in a sense identified. “Now the Lord is that Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty,” while the change produced in us is “by the Lord the Spirit.”
For us, indeed, it may be rightly urged, that the vail is rent, and the holy and the holiest are one. As priests in the sanctuary, we are brought into the immediate presence of God. But the light of the glory of God has not for us eclipsed the light of the golden lamp-stand: no, but the two have become for us one, as the apostle shows us in immediate connection with the passage just referred to. For the “glory of the Lord” is the “glory of Christ who is the image of God;” and thus “God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2Co 4:4; 2Co 4:6.)
Let us remember, too, that the responsibility of the children of Israel to furnish the oil, and of the priests to maintain the light, has practical reference to ourselves to-day, when the apostle can say to those who have the Spirit, just on this account, “be filled with the Spirit.” (Eph 5:18.) Alas! there may be even for the Christian lamps gone out, through drowsiness and neglect. Yet the Spirit, given to abide with us (Joh 14:16), abides; and therefore the same apostle’s energizing call, “Awake, thou that sleepest! and arise from among the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.” (Eph 5:14.)
Light, then, is ours! how suitable a preface to all the instruction about priestly service from which the world-church, gone back to the darkness of carnal ordinances, has extracted so much mere antichristian blasphemy! How needful, too, the lesson of our responsibility as to all this! Our own true and glorious High-Priest who is passed into the heavens does not Himself even interpose to keep us from God, but in His own Person has brought us to Him. For us the vail is rent, and “we walk in the light as God is in the light.” (1Jn 1:7.)
With what loathsome impurity, which has done its best to justify the infidelity it has produced, has the verdict of history made infamous the priest! How it has identified “priest-craft” with mere deception and villainy! God introduces His account with the witness that He is light, and makes it the solemn and (as it were) the first duty to maintain the light. “God is light;” and we can add, “in the light.” All must be light and in the light with us.
The perpetuity of the light is what the numerical place seems to insist on here. The eternal light brings every thing to the test of eternal righteousness; and thus alone is the sovereignty of God maintained over the soul. How solemnly is it insisted on as to be “a statute forever”!
(2) As the priest is emphatically the minister, so his garments are again and again spoken of as “garments of service,” and express this. Not that there are not personal ones as well as official, or that the official do not imply character: in the true Priest, -not the type, but the antitype, -every thing, as we shall see, depends upon this; and thus the divine principle is emphasized which was just now insisted on. It is the heart of the blessed Lord which makes Him serve: it is His spotless purity which enables Him to draw near to God, when for men to see Him is to die: and thus on the day of atonement the high-priest enters the holiest in the personal dress of pure white linen only. (Lev 16:1-34.) We are now, however, to contemplate His service for us.
(a) But “even Christ glorified not Himself to be made a High-Priest, but He who said unto Him, Thou art My Son: this day have I begotten Thee.'” (Heb 5:5.) This is how the apostle interprets for us that designation of Aaron by God, which is here for the first time announced plainly. This is therefore a necessary point to begin with. It makes the service which ensues obedience, and the sweet assurance of what was in the heart of God toward us. We “believe on Him whom God hath sent” (Joh 6:29), and that gives the right character to Him who sent: “by Him we believe in God.” (1Pe 1:21.)
The clothing of Aaron is the first step in his installation in his office. The garments are “for glory and for beauty.” How beauteous is Christ in this mediatorial place! how glorious has He made a place of service!
(b) The ephod is by the Septuagint styled the “shoulder-piece,” and this seems its most distinct feature, as we find it here emphasized by the two onyx stones engraved with the names of the tribes of Israel which were upon the shoulders. This is not, however, all, for it as evidently links the breastplate with the shoulder-pieces, and thus the latter help to sustain also the former. The ephod is thus characteristic in the highest way of service, -the maintenance of the people before God.
The ephod is made of the same materials as the tabernacle-curtains and the vail, but without cherubic figures, in which upon these the blue and purple and scarlet were interwoven. The symbols of conferred royalty are thus absent, though the materials of it are here. What qualifies Him for this place is seen, -what makes Him the “desire of all nations” (Hag 2:7), so that the power put into His hands gratifies that desire. But the priestly office is distinct from the kingly, and power is shown in a very different manner in the lowly service of the priest, while it is meant to be plain abundantly that the Priest and the King are one. If moreover, the cherubim are absent, on the other hand the ephod is interwoven with threads of gold. Is God any where more manifest than in this wondrous provision for man’s need, which at such cost has been furnished to him?
In the onyx stones upon the shoulder the end of the priestly office is expressed. The names of the twelve tribes are there, permanently graven upon the banded stones, to be borne up upon the priest’s shoulders. So plainly have we here the One who “goeth after that which is lost until He find it and when He hath found it, He layeth it upon His shoulders, rejoicing.” (Luk 15:4-5.) Thus the priest’s office is declared.
(c) But if Christ’s people are thus sustained by His mediatorial work, we need to see more perfectly the connection between the display of power which the shoulders express and the holy love which is manifested in the breastplate. By means of the ephod, the breastplate itself is borne up by the shoulders, and in the breastplate again the names of the people are engraved, as in the engraving of a signet, but now upon twelve precious stones, -each cared for with the same care, but each set as it were in the glory of a new lustre!
Would that we could know, in any measure, what these different stones are intended to convey! but even their identification is not certain, and any interpretation would seem too purely conjectural to be attempted. There is, however, no scriptural reason to doubt that they are together the Urim and Thummim, the “lights and perfections” of the thirtieth verse, and this is thus far interpretation, and of convincing clearness.
God is light, and “the Father of lights” (Jam 1:17) for the lights are but the prismatic radiance of the one ray of colorless light as we see it in the rainbow, and in which its beauty is displayed to us (see Gen 9:1-29.) In this it shines but for a moment, like a brilliant deed, though an eternal memory of glory, but in the jewels it is enshrined, permanent, as are the divine, attributes in God. This is what in fact the jewels mean: they are the “lights and perfections” of Him who is light and perfection; and as the names of the people are graven on the jewels, so is He abidingly glorified in His redeemed. Plaitings and rings, and twined chains of gold, connect the breastplate with the ephod, the manifold interweavings of divine glory with the maintenance of the people thus: while all is upon the heart of the High-Priest, the type of Him who, as the Mediator between God and men, Himself God and Man, maintains ever what is due to God upon the one hand, and His own in blessing on the other, and these not as things apart, but as identified -the names graven upon the breast-plate!
The ephod unites the breastplate with the shoulder, and throws in this way the burden upon the shoulder. All the counsels of God in connection with this great salvation are such a burden as Christ only could sustain; and not the King’s, but the Priest’s shoulder bears it: the power is realized in weakness, the victory of voluntary humiliation and self-sacrifice. Blessed be His name!
This, then, was the “breastplate of judgment,” -that is, in connection with which God answered appeals, and gave sentence among the people (comp. Num 27:21; 1Sa 28:6 Ezr 2:63), for the divine wisdom is always found in holding together the two principles implied in the breastplate.
(d) The robe of the ephod, like that one of our Lord for which they cast lots at the cross, is of one piece, woven without seam, and bound around the necessary opening, that it may not be rent. It is entirely of blue, the heavenly color, and upon its skirts are alternately pomegranates, -the fruit of many seeds, -and golden bells, which give their sound on going into the sanctuary before Jehovah, and on coming out. Here, then, is the heavenly Man, the fruit of whose work has in itself the abundant seed, wherever the gospel goes forth in the power of the Spirit: this gospel, as it seems to me, characterizing especially the time He goes into heaven -the Pentecostal outburst, -and the time when He shall be coming out again, when the “everlasting gospel” is proclaimed for blessing to millennial nations.
The numerical place, as it seems to me, emphasizes the heavenly Stranger’s visit to the world, and the diffusion every where of the seed of the gospel: its result, heaven opened to earth. The words “that he die not” appended to the commandment as to these gospel-bells, as it cannot apply to the great High-Priest, may speak of Aaron as the representative of the nation, as their music is indeed a sign of how Israel shall not die but live -alive to God.
(e) Next we have the iniquity of the people in their holy things provided for, the high-priest taking the responsibility of it upon himself. This, of course, involves the necessity of atonement; but it is not atonement that is here spoken of, but the ordering of all, left with perfect confidence to Him who is the Son over God’s house, and upon whose forehead rests the “diadem of holiness,” as it is elsewhere called (chap. 39: 30). In Him who stooped to the uttermost requirement of holiness upon the cross, holiness is indeed a crown. He with whom in that darkest hour of all that ever was could be left the responsibility of the accomplishment of all God’s counsels of blessing for eternity, can be safely entrusted with all the care of the holy things.
(f) Finally, we have the ordinary dress of Aaron and of the priests his sons, who are for the first time brought in here. They are our picture, and we are necessarily reminded of the difference between ourselves and Christ: even Aaron taking his place as one in contrast with Him. This the numerical place seems to point out -the priesthood of sinful men, but in whom grace shows its victory over sin, clothing their nakedness, and bringing nigh. This naturally closes the account of the priesthood.
(3) But we have yet to consider the sanctification of the priesthood and their induction into their office: as yet, of course, only the commandment as to it, for the fulfillment of this is in Leviticus.
(a) First, the materials are to be provided and ready, as all things wait upon God’s call. Then Aaron and his sons are brought near to the entrance of the tent of meeting and are washed entirely with water. This evidently corresponds with that to which our Lord’s words point -that one washing of the whole person that needs not to be repeated (Joh 13:10). All Christians are “a holy priesthood” (1Pe 2:5) -a people as a holy people able to approach God. The washing which makes them this is “the washing of regeneration” (Tit 3:5): a new state resulting from new birth. Herein, “He who sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one,” (Heb 11:1-40,) the children of God partaking of the life of their glorious Head. In His person human nature was cleansed from its defilement, and God did what Job declared impossible for man -brought forth a clean thing out of an unclean (Job 14:4). He was as born into the world what we are as new born, but without taint of evil, perfect in all things, -yea, the Eternal Life itself.
Thus, while all are of one, there is an essential difference, and we see this in the type in Aaron’s being anointed alone, without blood, with all the priestly garments already upon him. The divine life which is His is already His sanctification to the Priesthood, and as absolutely without spot -God’s beloved Son, in whom His delight is, -the Spirit of God descends upon Him after His baptism by John, in which He had presented Himself to God for His “baptism to death” afterward. Thus He is now the Anointed One -the Christ.
(b) Aaron’s sons are then brought near and clothed with the priestly garments, the bullock of the sin-offering slain, after Aaron and his sons have put their hands upon its head, and the horns of the altar of burnt-offering are anointed with it. Then one of the rams is offered as a burnt-offering, Aaron and his sons identifying themselves in the same way with it, and its blood sprinkled upon the altar round about. Aaron we have seen, as the type of Another, anointed already without blood; but we find him here with his hand, along with those of his sons, on the head of the sin-offering as well as the burnt-offering. The necessary antecedent to the call of a “holy priesthood” -truly, not merely typically, such -was, the fulfillment of the atoning work; and for us individually, we need to stand in the value of it before God in order to be priests to God. But it must be carefully remembered that if Aaron still be a type of Christ in this, his hand upon the victim cannot signify what it does in his sons’ case: it can only be the sign of the acceptance, on the part of the One who offers for it, of the burden of sin and of its penalty. And this the cross declares, -sin’s awful judgment and the righteousness of Him who judges.
(c) The next thing is consecration -in Hebrew, “filling the hand.” For this the ram of consecration is taken; and the ram we have seen in the coverings of the tabernacle to be a type of devotedness. The sheep yields itself to the slaughter, and the ram, as the male sheep, is probably chosen to intensify the thought of self-surrender. Upon this also Aaron and his sons lay their hands; and then it is slain, and the blood put upon their right ear, hand, and foot, -the whole man set apart to God in the power of redemption, to receive from Him, act for Him, walk with Him.
The blood is then sprinkled upon the altar, and then, mixed with the anointing-oil, upon Aaron and his garments, and upon his sons and their garments “with him.” Notice how the same connection and order are preserved in the statement of the effect: “and he shall be sanctified and his garments, and his sons and his sons’ garments with him.” Christ is surely before us here, the blessing found by His people in association with Him, and His own sanctification as gone up to God in the power of His precious blood for them, the measure of their own. As He said, when going to the Father, “For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.” (Joh 17:11; Joh 17:17-19.) It is His sanctification, or setting apart on high, as Man gone in to God, of which He is speaking. In this new place it is, a glorious Man in heaven, that His people know Him, and only there, for He is in the world no longer (2Co 5:16-18). Into this new sphere we are introduced with Him, and all things become new.
And now comes the “filling of the hands:” the ram of consecration is a peace- (that is, a communion-) offering. We are to be occupied with that in which God delights, which is a sweet smell to Him. The new priests’ hands now are filled with that which expresses Christ, and which is presented to God as a wave-offering. Notice the parts: first, the fat and the kidneys (the reins, comp. Psa 16:7) and the fat of the inwards, -that which expressed the health of the animal, and upon which the flame especially fed. “The use of this symbol, fat,” says another, “is sufficiently familiar in the Word. ‘Their heart is fat as brawn.’ ‘Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked.’ ‘They are enclosed in their own fat, with their mouth they speak proudly.’ It is the energy and force of the inward will -the inwards of a man’s heart. Hence where Christ expresses His entire mortification He declares they could tell all his bones; and in Psa 102:1-28, ‘By reason of the voice of My groaning, My bones cleave to My skin.’ But here, in Jesus, all that in nature was of energy and force, all His inward parts, were a burnt-offering to God, entirely sacrificed and offered to Him for such, a sweet savor. This was God’s food of the offering, ‘the food of the offering made by fire unto Jehovah.’ In this Jehovah Himself found His delight; His soul reposed in it, for surely it was very good -good in the midst of evil -good in the energy of offering to Him -good in perfect obedience.” (Synopsis, vol. 1. p. 169.)
It is easy to see how all this unites with the thought of consecration; but it is Christ, we must remember, who in all this occupies us: occupation with Him brings communion and like-mindedness.
With the fat we have the “shoulder” -simple reminder of how for us He bowed His shoulder to bear; and then the meal-offering, of unleavened and of oiled bread, -in general meaning as simple. Waved before Jehovah, all this is then put upon the altar, and goes up to Him. The priests are now consecrated.
(d) Yet still there remains for us what is most needful and most precious -the experimental apprehension of our own portion in Christ, and here warning has to be mingled with the instruction. The breast of the ram of consecration is for him who offers it, a place in this case held by Moses, but who, I think, here represents, not Christ, but the typical worshiper. How necessary that the love of Christ (which the breast must signify) should be thus experimentally enjoyed by the heart that worships! In after-cases the breast belongs to Aaron and his sons (v. Lev 8:27) along with the (left) shoulder, the experience of His strength who bears us up before God. But the whole ram (except what has gone up to God) is theirs, and these parts are specially named, to emphasize them: all must be eaten “in the holy place,” which does not mean here the sanctuary, however, but at the door of the tent of meeting in the court, as is immediately afterward stated (and comp. Lev 8:31). The unleavened bread must be eaten with it, and the stranger -that is, in this case, every one outside the priestly family, -excluded. Nor must the flesh be kept until the morning, to guard, as we see in Lev 7:17, against any possible corruption: we are warned how readily it comes into our most holy things. Seven days of sanctification cover our whole life here and connect it with the rest beyond.
(e) The instruction as to the altar of burnt-offering comes by itself. It is God’s meeting-place with the children of Israel; and here I think they are (as on the day of atonement,) their own type. Or, to say better, the priestly house representing the Church (or perhaps the heavenly saints,) the nation at large, outside of these, represents Israel, or the earthly saints. The court, where the altar of burnt-offering stands, is, without any doubt, the earth where the cross has been; and it is meet and right that there the glory of God should be displayed, as it yet will be: Immanuel’s name in all that it implies even for the earth revealed, and (in the new earth) the tabernacle of God with men. Their daily offering upon the altar speaks of what to God the work of Christ is, and God’s meeting there with Israel, though it give not the full thought of what is our portion, has its special beauty and significance. A blessed thing, with which the feast of our consecration will be ended: not, blessed be God, the priesthood itself.
(f) But Israel’s blessing does not complete the glories presented to us here. We must rise, as it were, from earth into the heavenly sanctuary, and enter upon our service at the golden altar of incense, to see how fully the triumph over sin has been achieved. The altar, as we see by its material, is Christ, and Christ as entered into heaven; not on earth. Yet as an altar, or “place of sacrifice,” as the word (mizbeach) means, and foursquare, with its horns facing every way, -its virtue in the blood that is presented on them, -it speaks of sacrifice, while yet no sacrifice is to be made upon it, and in the sanctuary cannot be. Thus it speaks the virtue of what has been done elsewhere, and (so far as the golden altar itself is concerned) can need no re-doing. The golden altar is for perpetual incense -ceaseless praise to God: “We have an altar,” says the apostle, an altar to which we come as priests of no earthly tabernacle, an altar upon which no bleeding sacrifice can be again. Christ is our altar still, but no such sacrifice can He offer again. What sacrifice, then, have we? “By Him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise continually, -that is, the fruit of our lips, confessing His name. But to do good, and to communicate, forget not; for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.” (Heb 13:10; Heb 13:15-16.) Thus we have sacrifices of thanksgiving and praise to offer, -fruit of the lips and fruit of the life, -confessing Him who has done the work which gives us our changeless place with God. The true sacrifice is no longer on the altar; it has been accepted of God once for all, and cannot be repeated, and thus we have the altar clear for our own sacrifices, which whether of lip or in life are still but the confession of His name! What a crowning triumph over sin, that sinners such as we can as “a holy priesthood” thus draw nigh!
4. The description of the incense-altar ends the subject of priestly consecration and another subject is introduced with the words, “And Jehovah spake unto Moses.” To find these words before, we should have to go back to the beginning of the twenty-fifth chapter, all the instruction of the tabernacle being one continuous discourse as far as this. Yet they occur six times now within the limits of two chapters. Thus each portion here is detached from the rest, and given a special emphasis, which is still further seen in the solemn penalties denounced upon transgression in five cases out of the six. In subject, they are also diverse from one another, though not without a certain connection also among themselves, as we shall presently see; yet they look exactly like so many supplementary addenda to what has gone before. This is Keil’s view; and the numerical structure establishes, I believe, its correctness.
The number attached to the whole characterizes it as essentially a series of special warnings or tests as to obedience, whose significance is, as we might expect, brought out by their typical meaning. All this is plainly a magnificent symbolism, which we can only read in any worthy way as “figures of the true:” things which “happened unto them for types, and are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come.”
There are in the section before us six sections manifest, with a brief faint seventh (31: 18) which must be reckoned as that, and which in its faintness even has for us the instruction which never can be any where lacking in God’s blessed Word, if we have only eyes of faith and hearts of desire for it. The section being, then, a septenary series, divides naturally into 4 + 3, as is here very evident, the first four, to the end of chap. 30, being connected together as completing the tabernacle itself; which is then put as complete [in plan] into the hands of the master-workmen.
(1) We begin the series with the account of the atonement-money, in which Israel confessed their common guilt and need of ransom. None was to be exempt, none give more, none less, -translated into gospel-language, just the “no-difference” doctrine of the apostle (Rom 3:1-31.) This is the evidence of a genuine repentance, to have come down to the confession of such guilt as needs a ransom. The amount of the atonement-money may have significance,
shekel merely meaning “weight,” and the bekah, therefore, “half-weight.” Is it the confession of what was charged against Belshazzar, “Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting”? Notice, too, that the shekel is that of the sanctuary, and that being twenty gerahs, the half shekel is just ten gerahs -the responsibility-number.
Repentance is in thus taking our place before God; but if the ransom-money speak of man’s own short-coming, how does it come to speak also of atonement? This question is not difficult to answer; for atonement is by substitution, -Christ taking our place as coming short. In the same way, the same word in the Hebrew stands for “sin” and “sin-offering,” “trespass” and “trespass-offering.” Nor is there any true repentance or confession but that in which Christ is laid hold of or confessed.
Out of this silver the sockets of the sanctuary, and the hooks of the pillars and connecting-rods, were made (chap. 38: 25-28). It is instructive to note that silver was emphatically the medium of exchange, so that (as in French today,) “silver” and “money” were the same word (keseph); and that the derivation of this is from kahsaph, “to grow pale,” as with longing, shame, or anxiety. Such thoughts cluster round the atonement-money.
Here, then, is the basis-test for the soul. The dwelling of God is with the redeemed: the tabernacle speaks of relationship to a Redeemer; and only those have this who have in repentance and faith, as involved in the common guilt of all, taken their place among the people of God in His great census-roll as under the blood of the Lamb. The book of enrollment is the “book of the Lamb slain.” (Rev 13:8.)
(2) As thus redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, we are, of course, already priests to God: the warning as to the brazen laver therefore now applies to us. The laver does not speak of new birth; it was for washing the hands and feet simply, and thus it speaks of cleansing by the Word from the defilement by the way. If we are indeed to be permitted to handle holy things, or to draw near to God in the sanctuary, the Word of God must do its work upon us.
The laver was of brass, the symbol of what endures as with divine power. So the Word of God endures, and, moreover, abides unchangeable, whatever our wills may be. Its stand, too, is of brass; for the Word of God rests upon the unchanging nature of God. As He is, so He speaks, and nothing can alter it.
“Separation from evil” is here what is enjoined upon all who draw near to God, or occupy themselves with His things; and this is an “everlasting statute” which abides for all times and dispensations.
(3) The unction of the Spirit is the third thing. Would that one could realize something of the meaning of the various ingredients of this holy anointing-oil! The five constituents, are, however, plainly marked, as 4 and 1, and show us the meeting of the human and the divine; for the Spirit of God is pleased to work in and through man, and we see Him in the effect (Joh 3:8). It is a sad failure not to be able to recognize God, because He works in familiar and apparently natural ways. Holiness, however, there must be, and this is what is here specially enforced. The oil must not be poured on flesh of man -cannot sanctify what is really fleshly; and it must not be imitated -there can be no manufacture on man’s part of what is the Spirit’s work.
(4) And now we close this first part of this appendix with the incense, in which we find, no doubt, the fragrance of Christ for God. The numerical place points Him out, I think, as Man, and as the Son of Man, the title He so constantly assumed to Himself: not the partial and narrow Jew, but the One in whom all could find their own; while, above all, God could find in Him the ideal Man to obtain which He had created man, One in all things for God, as was the incense here, -fully and emphatically the Man of God.
The ingredients again as yet seem to baffle research, which has been too little given to their spiritual meaning. Even their number has been disputed, whether four or five. No doubt salt was added to it, according to Lev 2:13; but this is noticed incidentally only, and as a matter of course, while the distinctive composition of the incense was of four ingredients, -certified as such by there being three and one, -three spices and the frankincense: this 3 + 1, beautifully significant of Him through whom creation completely attains its ultimate end of manifesting God.
The incense too is guarded from profanation as the anointing-oil had been. This is God’s Christ, though man finds in Him his fullest blessing also. So the burnt-offering went up all to God, though in atonement for man; and it is just here, indeed, that he becomes for us all He would be, when we find in Him every where the Doer of the Father’s will. “Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God,” characterized His life throughout.
(5) God now calls by name the human workmen who are to carry out in the power of the Spirit His designs. In Bezaleel, Judah comes to the front in the work of the sanctuary -quite according to the meaning of the name and Jacob’s prophecy (Gen 49:1-33). Dan furnishes his assistant in Aholiab. But beside this, in every wise-hearted man God puts wisdom, and employs him in the building of His habitation. The principle is easy of application, but would that we could know more of what is here for us!
(6) The emphatic reiteration of the injunction as to the Sabbath closes all this instruction. The keeping of it is the sign of covenant-relationship subsisting with Jehovah, and of a people set apart to Him. Indeed no labor marks us as the people of the Lord so truly as enjoyed rest does, -a rest according to the Word, and on the basis of God’s own rest. But this is ours in Christ only, and the numerical stamp here assures us that under this first covenant it will not be attained. The law makes nothing perfect and this assurance seems enforced by
(7) The faint shadow of a seventh section, in which indeed the law is now completed and handed over to Moses on behalf of the people; but the covenant is already broken, and in a little more the tables of the covenant lie broken to fragments at the foot of the mount.
Fuente: Grant’s Numerical Bible Notes and Commentary
THE PATTERN IN THE MOUNT
We have now reached in the revelation of the tabernacle the most important step in the history of grace yet met with in Scripture. There are several reasons for believing this: (1) the unusual preparation required on mans part for its reception (see Exo 24:9-18); (2) the large space occupied by its recital thirteen chapters in all; and (3) the depth of detail seen throughout.
AN OBJECT LESSON
The tabernacle was a divine object lesson; an embodied prophecy of good things to come; a witness to the grace and saving power of God. It taught salvation through propitiation, forgiveness and blood-shedding.
Access to God and worship it disclosed; the holiness of God; the sinfulness of man; the reconciliation which in due time should be affected, are all clearly set forth by the tabernacle and its rites.
Seven chapters are given to the specifications of the tabernacle, and six to its construction; while in between the two is the record of the unbelief and apostasy of the people in the matter of the golden calf.
Of the seven chapters of specification, three are occupied with the tabernacle itself, three with the priesthood, and one with the arrangement for carrying the whole into effect.
Our present lesson deals with the tabernacle itself.
THE OFFERING OF THE PEOPLE, (Exo 25:1-9)
On what principle was this offering to be presented (Exo 25:2)? What three metals are specified (Exo 25:3)? Three colors (Exo 25:4)?
What vegetable textile is mentioned and what animal (Exo 25:4)? What two kinds of skins (Exo 25:5)? The badger here spoken of is thought to be not the animal commonly known by that name among us, but some other animal equally well known in Arabia.
What species of wood is named (Exo 25:5)? This is supposed to be the acacia, abundant in Moses day.
The oil (Exo 25:6) was from the olive, the spices are more particularly indicated (Exo 30:23-24); the precious stones (Exo 28:15-21), as also the ephod and breastplate in the same chapter.
What name is given to the building (Exo 25:8), and for what purpose is it? The fulfillment of this purpose was in the visible cloud of glory which
overshadowed the tabernacle when completed, and rested upon the mercy seat in the Most Holy place.
As to the name sanctuary, it denotes especially the holiness of the place. What other name is given it (Exo 25:9)? This simply means a dwelling, and is sometimes used in an indefinite way for the curtain, the framework or the entire structure.
Tent is the name given to it in the following chapter; and at other places the tent of meeting, having reference to the meeting of God with His people (Exo 29:42-43); or the tent or tabernacle of testimony (Numbers 2:50, 53), as designating the place where God declared His will, and especially testified against the sins of His people, by His holy law which, within the ark, witnessed to the covenant they had entered into at Sinai.
According to what design was the sanctuary to be erected (Exo 25:9)? Thus we see it was a type of Gods dwelling place in the heaven of heavens, a fact that profoundly impresses us with its significance in every detail.
We do not know how the pattern or type was shown to Moses in the mount, whether by a visible model, or vision presented to his mind, but we know it was in some sense a copy of heavenly things, and that hence Moses was allowed no liberty in constructing it.
Archeological Discoveries
Archeology has shown an analogy between the tabernacle service and the ritualistic practice of some of the heathen nations, but this is not to be interpreted as imitation or adoption on Moses part.
There is a similitude in the modes of worship fundamental in the human race, and Moses may have been used of God to cull out the truth from this mass of wrong and falsehood.
A parallel is that of the Code of Hammurabi, a Chaldean monarch, hundreds of years before Moses, who in this code gave laws to his people corresponding to those in the previous chapters.
The critics used to argue that the Mosaic code could not be of so early a date as Moses since it presupposed too advanced a civilization on the part of the people for whom it was intended. When, however, this code of Hammurabi was discovered, their tune was changed, and they exclaimed: Ah! Moses copied after Hammurabi.
The truth rather is that just suggested about the tabernacle. Hammurabis code is based upon fundamental principles of law in the constitution of the race, albeit commingled with many grotesque fancies in consequence of the fall. These fundamental principles, however, are, in their origin, divine, and in the code of Moses we find them separated from the false by the hand of their heavenly originator.
QUESTIONS
1. What three reasons show the importance attached to this theme?
2. What names are given to the tabernacle, and what are their meanings?
3. How may the pattern have been revealed to Moses?
4. How would you explain the similarity of the tabernacle service to the rituals of heathen nations?
5. What is the Code of Hammurabi, and what light does it throw on Moses writings?
Fuente: James Gray’s Concise Bible Commentary
Exo 25:2. That they bring me an offering. We now enter on the tabernacle, a hallowed work, a figure of the church, and emblem of the heavenly glory. This mystical temple was not new: it had existed in paradise; it had no doubt been preserved by Noah in the ark, for we find it in the Egyptian and Indian temples, as well as among the ancient Greeks. Yet God by special revelation was pleased to renew it in a figure of perfection.
Exo 25:4. Blue and purple. Some materials proper for the work, and of the colours here mentioned; wool or threads, or some such like things, as appears from Heb 9:19.
Exo 25:7. The ephod, or superhumeral, a species of long shawl which covered the shoulders and breast of the high priest; and to which the pectoral or breastplate was appendent. See Exo 28:15.
Exo 25:8. A sanctuary. A sort of ambulatory temple; and in all antiquity we find nothing more ancient than such portable temples.
Exo 25:10. Ark of shittim-wood, or the acacia wood, as Dr. Shaw, our learned traveller, suggests. All the more distinguished temples of the heathen seem to have had an ark or chest, in which to preserve their sacred utensils. The predictions of the Sybils, written in verse, were preserved in a chest. For an account of those prophetesses, see Lanctantiuss Institutes, book 1.; Augustines City of God, book 18. chap. 23. If those poems were forged, yet the traditions were true, for the Voluspa, a poem beforementioned, foretels the same things.As the law was deposited in the ark, it is promiscuously called the ark of the testimony, the ark of the testament, and the ark of the covenant.
Exo 25:11. Crown of gold, a border raised up above the rest of the ark.
Exo 25:16. The testimony, the two tables of stone, on which the decalogue was written. Exo 30:6. Lev 16:13.
Exo 25:17. A mercy-seat, or propitiatory, which covered the ark, and upon which the God of Israel is represented as having been seated; and hence the ark was called his footstool. See Leviticus 16. This is several times alluded to in the new testament. Heb 9:5. Rom 3:24. 1Jn 2:1.
Exo 25:18. Two cherubim of gold. Moses has not told us what was the form of these cherubim; but they were designed to represent the angelic nature. Josephus admits that they were of a configuration unknown to men, and represented celestial beings. In Ezekiel, the number is four. The sphynxes of the Egyptians had some resemblance to these figures. See Eze 32:4.Beaten work. Not made of several parcels joined together, but beaten by the hammer out of one continued piece of gold.
Exo 25:23. Table of shittim-wood. The LXX read, a golden table. King Solomon made this table of gold, 1Ki 7:48; and the LXX follow that reading. Thus the Hebrew copy and the Greek version are both correct.
Exo 25:25. I will commune with thee, as in Exo 28:15.
Exo 25:30. Shew bread: twelve loaves in two heaps. God is not unmindful to provide bread for those who wait at the altar.
Exo 25:39. Talent of gold, containing three thousand shekels, value about three hundred and fifty pounds. Exo 38:25.
Exo 25:40. Pattern shewed thee in the mount. This being often repeated, marks its importance: no fancy work was allowed there.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Exodus 25
This chapter forms the commencement of one of the richest veins in Inspiration’s exhaustless mine – a vein in which every stroke of the mattock brings to light untold wealth. We know the mattock with which alone we can work in such a mine, namely, the distinct ministry of the Holy Ghost. Nature can do nothing here. Reason is blind – imagination utterly vain – the most gigantic intellect, instead of being able to interpret the sacred symbols, appears like a bat in the sunshine, blindly dashing itself against the objects which it is utterly unable to discern. We must compel reason and imagination to stand without, while, with a chastened heart, a single eye, and a spiritual mind, we enter the hallowed precincts and gaze upon the deeply significant furniture. God the Holy Ghost is the only One who can conduct us through the courts of the Lord’s house, and expound to our souls the true meaning of all that there meets our view. To attempt the exposition, by the aid of intellect’s unsanctified powers, would be infinitely more absurd than to set about the repairs of a watch with a blacksmith’s tongs and hammer. “The patterns of things in the heavens” cannot be interpreted by the natural mind, in its most cultivated form. They must all be read in the light of heaven. Earth has no light which could at all develop their beauties. The One who furnished the patterns can alone explain what the patterns mean. The One who furnished the beauteous symbols can alone interpret them.
To the human eye there would seem to be a desultoriness in the mode in which the Holy Ghost has presented the furniture of the tabernacle; but, in reality, as might be expected, there is the most perfect order, the most remarkable precision, the most studious accuracy. From Ex. 25 to Ex. 30, inclusive, we have a distinct section of the Book of Exodus. This section is divided into two parts, the first terminating at Ex. 27: 19, and the second as the close of Ex. 30. The former begins with the ark of the covenant, inside the veil, and ends with the brazen altar and the court in which that altar stood. That is, it gives us, in the first place, Jehovah’s throne of judgement, whereon He sat as Lord of all the earth; and it conducts us to that place where He met the sinner, in the credit and virtue of accomplished atonement. Then, in the latter, We have the mode of man’s approach to God – the privileges, dignities, and responsibilities of those who, as priests, were permitted to draw nigh to the Divine Presence and enjoy worship and communion there. Thus the arrangement is perfect and beautiful. How could it be otherwise, seeing that it is divine? The ark and the brazen altar present, as it were, two extremes. The former was the throne of God established in “justice and judgement.” (Ps. 89: 19) The latter was the place of approach for the sinner where “mercy and truth” went before Jehovah’s face. Man, in himself, dared not to approach the ark to meet God, for “the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest.” (Heb. 9: 8) But God could approach the altar of brass, to meet man as a sinner. “Justice and judgement” could not admit the sinner in; but “mercy and truth” could bring God out; not, indeed, in that overwhelming brightness and majesty in which He was wont to shine forth from between those mystic supporters of His throne – “the cherubim of glory” – but in that gracious ministry which is symbolically presented to us in the furniture and ordinances of the tabernacle.
All this may well remind us of the path trodden by that blessed One, who is the antitype of all these types – the substance of all these shadows. He travelled from the eternal throne of God in heaven, down to the depths of Calvary’s cross. He came from all the glory of the former down into all the shame of the latter, in order that He might conduct His redeemed, forgiven, and accepted people back with Himself, and present them faultless before that very throne which He had left on their account. The Lord Jesus fills up, in His own person and work, every point between the throne of God and the dust of death, and every point between the dust of death and the throne of God. In Him God has come down, in perfect grace, to the sinner; in Him the sinner is brought up, in perfect righteousness, to God. All the way, from the ark to the brazen altar, was marked with the footprints of love; and all the way from the brazen altar to the ark of God was sprinkled with the blood of atonement; end as the ransomed worshipper passes along that wondrous path, he beholds the name of Jesus stamped on all that meets his view. May that name be dearer to our hearts! Let us now proceed to examine the chapters consecutively.
It is most interesting to note here, that the first thing which the Lord communicated to Moses is His gracious purpose to have a sanctuary or holy dwelling place in the midst of His people – a sanctuary composed of materials, which directly point to Christ, His Person, His work, and the precious fruit of that work, as seen in the light, the power, and the varied graces of the Holy Ghost. Moreover, these materials were the fragrant fruit of the grace of God – the voluntary offerings of devoted hearts. Jehovah, whose majesty, ” the heaven of heavens could not contain,” was graciously pleased to dwell in a boarded and curtained tent, erected for Him by those who cherished the fond desire to hail His presence amongst them. This tabernacle may be viewed in two ways: first, as furnishing “a pattern of things in the heavens;” and, secondly, as presenting a deeply significant type of the body of Christ. The various materials of which the tabernacle was composed will come before us, as we pass along; we shall, therefore, consider the three comprehensive subjects put before us in this chapter, namely, the ark; the table; and the candlestick.
The ark of the covenant occupies the leading place in the divine communications to Moses. Its position, too, in the tabernacle was most marked. Shut in within the veil, in the holiest of all, it formed the base of Jehovah’s throne. Its very name conveys to the mind its import. An ark, so far as the word instructs us, is designed to preserve intact whatever is put therein. An ark carried Noah and his family, together with all the orders of creation, in safety over the billows of judgement which covered the earth. An ark, at the opening of this book, was faith’s vessel for preserving “a proper child” from the waters of death. When, therefore, we read of “the ark of the covenant,” we are led to believe that it was designed of God to preserve His covenant unbroken, in the midst of an erring people. In it, as we know, the second set of tables were deposited. As to the first set, they were broken in pieces, beneath the mount, showing that man’s covenant was wholly abolished – that his work could never, by any possibility, form the basis of Jehovah’s throne of government. “Justice and judgement are the habitation of that throne,” whether in its earthly or heavenly aspect. The ark could not contain within its hallowed enclosure, broken tables. Man might fail to fulfil his self-chosen vow; but God’s law must be preserved in its divine integrity and perfectness. If God was to set up His throne in the midst of His people, He could only do so in a way worthy of Himself. His standard of judgement and government must be perfect.
“And thou shalt make staves of shittim wood, and overlay them with gold. and thou shalt put the staves into the rings by the sides of the ark, that the ark may be borne with them.” The ark of the covenant was to accompany the people in all their wanderings. It never rested while they were a travelling or a conflicting host. It moved from place to place in the wilderness. It went before them into the midst of Jordan; it was their grand rallying Point in all the wars of Canaan; it was the sure and certain earnest of power wherever it went. No power of the enemy could stand before that which was the well-known expression of the divine presence and power. The ark was to be Israel’s companion in travel, in the desert; and “the staves” and “the rings” were the apt expression of its travelling character.
However, it was not always to be a traveller. “The afflictions of David,” as well as the wars of Israel, were to have an end. The prayer was yet to be breathed and answered, “Arise, O Lord, into thy rest: thou and the Ark of thy strength.” (Ps. 132: 8) This most sublime petition had its partial accomplishment in the palmy days of Solomon, when “the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord unto his place, into the oracle of the house, to the most holy place, even under the wings of the cherubims. For the cherubims spread forth their two wings over the place of the ark, and the cherubims covered the ark, and the staves thereof above. And they drew out the staves, that the ends of the staves were seen out in the holy place before the oracle, and they were not seen without: and there they are unto this day.” (1 Kings 8:6-8) The sand of the desert was to be exchanged for the golden floor of the temple. (1 Kings 6: 30) The wanderings of the ark were to have an end; there was “neither enemy nor evil occurrent,” and therefore, “the staves were drawn out.”
Nor was this the only difference between the ark in the tabernacle and in the temple. The apostle, speaking of the ark in its wilderness habitation, describes it as “the ark of the covenant, overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant.” (Heb. 9: 4) Such were the contents of the ark in its wilderness journeyings – the pot of manna, the record of Jehovah’s faithfulness, in providing for His redeemed in the desert, and Aaron’s rod, “a token against the rebels,” to “take away their murmurings.” (Compare Ex. 16: 32-39; and Num. 17: 10) But when the moment arrived in which “the staves” were to be “drawn out,” when the wanderings and wars of Israel were over, the “exceeding magnifical” house was completed, when the sun of Israel’s glory had reached, in type, its meridian, as marked by the wealth and splendour of Solomon’s reign, then the records of wilderness need and wilderness failure were unnoticed, and nothing remained save that which constituted the eternal foundation of the throne of the God of Israel, and of all the earth. “There was nothing in the ark, save the two tables of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb.” (1 Kings 8: 9)
But all this brightness was soon to be overcast by the heavy clouds of human failure and divine displeasure. The rude foot of the uncircumcised was yet to walk across the ruins of that beautiful house, and as faded light and departed glory were yet to elicit the contemptuous “hiss” of the stranger. This would not be the place to follow out these things in detail; I shall only refer my reader to the last notice which the Word of God affords us of “the ark of the covenant,” – a notice which carries us forward to a time when human folly and sin shall no more disturb the resting-place of that ark, and when neither a curtained tent, nor yet a temple made with hands, shall contain it. “And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ: and he shall reign for ever and ever. And the four and twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshipped God, saying, We give thee thanks, 0 Lord God almighty, which art, and wast, and art to come; because thou has taken to thee thy great power and hast reigned. And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear thy name, small and great; and shouldst destroy them which destroy the earth. And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of His covenant: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail.” (Rev. 11: 15-19)
The mercy-seat comes next in order. “And thou shalt make a mercy-seat of pure gold; two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them, in the two ends of the mercy-seat. And make one cherub on the one end, and the other cherub on the other end; even of the mercy-seat shall ye make the cherubims on the two ends thereof. And the cherubims shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy-seat with their wings, and their faces shall look one to another; toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cherubims be. And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark shalt thou put the testimony that I shall give thee. And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubims which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel.”
Here Jehovah gives utterance to His gracious intention of coming down from the fiery mount to take His place upon the mercy seat. This He could do, inasmuch as the tables of testimony were preserved unbroken beneath, and the symbols of his power, whether in creation or providence, rose on the right hand and on the left – the inseparable adjuncts of that throne on which Jehovah had seated himself – a throne of grace founded upon divine righteousness and supported by justice and judgement. Here the glory of the God of Israel shone forth. From hence He issued His commands, softened and sweetened by the gracious source from whence they emanated, and the medium through which they came – like the beams of the mid-day sun, passing through a cloud, we can enjoy their genial and enlivening influence without being dazzled by their brightness. “His commandments are not grievous,” when received from off the mercy-seat, because they come in connection with grace, which gives the ears to hear and the power to obey.
Looking at the ark and mercy-seat together, we may see in them a striking figure of Christ, in His Person and work. He having, in His life, magnified the law and made it honourable, became, through death, a propitiation or mercy-seat. for every one that believeth. God’s mercy could only repose on a pedestal of perfect righteousness. “Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Rom. 5: 21) The only proper meeting place between God and man is the point where grace and righteousness meet and perfectly harmonise. Nothing but perfect righteousness could suit God; and nothing but perfect grace could suit the sinner. But where could these attributes meet in one point? Only in the cross. There it is that “mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” (Ps. 85: 10) Thus it is that the soul of the believing sinner finds peace. He sees that God’s righteousness and his justification rest upon precisely the same basis, namely, Christ’s accomplished work. When man, under the powerful action of the truth of God, takes his place as a sinner, God can, in the exercise of Grace, take His place as a Saviour, and then every question is settled, for the cross having answered all the claims of divine justice, mercy’s copious streams can flow unhindered. When a righteous God and a ruined sinner meet, on a blood-sprinkled platform, all is settled for ever – settled in such a way as perfectly glorifies God, and eternally saves the sinner. God must be true, though every man he proved a liar; and when man is so thoroughly brought down to the lowest point of his own moral condition before God as to be willing to take the place which God’s truth assigns him, he then learns that God has revealed Himself as the righteous Justifier of such an one. This must give settled peace to the conscience; and not only so, but impart a capacity to commune with God, and hearken to His holy precepts in the intelligence of that relationship into which divine grace has introduced us.
Hence, therefore, “the holiest of all” unfolds a truly wondrous scene. The ark, the mercy seat, the cherubim, the glory! What a sight for the high-priest of Israel to behold as, once a year, he went in within the veil! May the Spirit of God open the eyes of our understandings, that we may understand more fully the deep meaning of those precious types.
Moses is next instructed about “the table of showbread,” or bread of presentation. On this table stood the food of the priests of God. For seven days those twelve loaves of “fine flour with frankincense” were presented before the Lord, after which, being replaced by others, they became the food of the priests who fed upon them in the holy place. (See Lev. 24: 5-9) It is needless to say that those twelve loaves typify “the man Christ Jesus.” The “fine flour,” of which they were composed, mark His perfect manhood, while the “frankincense” points out the entire devotion of that manhood to God. If God has His priests ministering in the holy place, He will assuredly have a table for them, and a well-furnished table too. Christ is the table and Christ is the bread thereon. The pure table and the twelve loaves shadow forth Christ, as presented before God unceasingly, in all the excellency of His spotless humanity, and administered as food to the priestly family. The “seven days” set forth the perfection of the divine enjoyment of Christ ; and the “twelve loaves” the administration of that enjoyment in and by man. There is also, I should venture to suggest, the idea, of Christ’s connection with the twelve tribes of Israel, and the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
The candlestick of pure gold comes next in order, for God’s priests need light as well as food: and they have both the one and the other in Christ. In this candlestick there is no mention of anything but pure gold. “All of it shall be one beaten work of pure gold.” “The seven lamps” which “gave light over against the candlestick,” express the perfection of the light and energy of the Spirit, founded upon and connected with the perfect efficacy of the work of Christ. The work of the Holy Ghost can never be separated from the work of Christ. This is set forth, in a double way, in this beautiful figure of the golden candle stick. “The seven lamps” being connected with “the shaft” of “beaten gold,” points us to Christ’s finished work as the sole basis of the manifestation of the Spirit in the Church. The Holy Ghost was not given until Jesus was glorified. (Comp. John 7: 39 with Acts 19: 2-6) In Revelation 3, Christ is presented to the Church of Sardis as “having the seven spirits.” It was as “exalted to the right hand of God” that the Lord Jesus “shed forth” the Holy Ghost upon His church, in order that she might shine according to the power and perfection of her position, in the holy place, her proper sphere of being, of action, and of worship.
Then, again, we find it was one of Aaron’s specific functions to light and trim those seven lamps. “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Command the children of Israel that they bring unto thee pure oil olive, beaten for the light, to cause the lamps to burn continually. Without the veil of the testimony, in the tabernacle of the congregation, shall Aaron order it, from the evening unto the morning, before the Lord continually: it shall be a statute for ever in your generations. He shall order the lamps upon the pure candlestick before the Lord continually.” (Lev. 24: 1-4) Thus we may see how the work of the Holy Ghost in the Church is linked with Christ’s work on earth and His work in heaven. “The seven lamps” were there, no doubt; hut priestly energy and diligence were needed in order to keep them trimmed and lighted. The priest would continually need “the tongs and snuff-dishes” for the purpose of removing ought that would not be a fit vehicle for the “pure beaten oil.” Those tongs and snuff-dishes were of “beaten gold” likewise, for the whole matter was the direct result of divine operation. If the Church shine, it is only by the energy of the Spirit, and that energy is founded upon Christ, who, in pursuance of God’s eternal counsel, became in His sacrifice and Priesthood, the spring and power of everything to His Church. All is of God. Whether we look within that mysterious veil, and behold the ark with its cover, and the two significant figures attached thereto; or if we gaze on that which lay without the veil, the pure table and the pure candlestick, with their distinctive vessels and instruments – all speak to us of God, whether as revealed to us in connection with the Son or the Holy Ghost.
Christian reader, your high calling places you in the very midst of all these precious realities. Your place is not merely amid “the patterns of things in the heavens,” but amid “the heavenly things themselves.” You have “boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus.” You are a Priest unto God. “The showbread” is yours. Your place is at “the pure table,” to feed on the priestly food, in the light of the Holy Ghost. Nothing can ever deprive you of those divine privileges. They are yours for ever. Let it be your care to watch against everything that might rob you of the enjoyment of them. Beware of all unhallowed tempers, lusts, feelings, and imaginations. Keep nature down – keep the world out keep Satan off. May the Holy Ghost fill your whole soul with Christ. Then you will be practically holy and abidingly happy. You will bear fruit, and the Father will be glorified, and your joy shall be full.
Fuente: Mackintosh’s Notes on the Pentateuch
Exodus 25-31. P The Tent of Meeting or Dwelling of Yahweh.To pass from the action and movement, and the jostling of old and new, in Exo 25:19-24 into the group of chapters 2531 is like passing from the crosscurrents and broken waters of an open, storm-tossed bay into the calm and order of an enclosed harbour. It is explained by the theory, now generally accepted, thatstrange as it seems to our ideaswe have here no ancient, much less contemporary, account of the planning of the Tabernacle in minutest detail, but the leisurely elaboration, by that school of scribes of which Ezra was the type and leader, of their view of what must have been in the mind of Moses, on the general assumption that the Temple at Jerusalem before its destruction, Ezekiels sketch (Ezekiel 40-48), and Zerubbabels reconstructed building could be taken as imperfect copies of the ideal once realised in the golden age of Moses. That, therefore, which to these scribes seemed to point most clearly to what they believed best for the Temple worship of their own times, they set down without hesitation as what actually was long ago.
The grounds for this view can only be barely indicated here. The practical conditions, quietly assumed, as to leisure, materials, labour, and skill, are all contradicted by the artless narratives of JE, and are incredible in themselves; e.g. the weight of metals required was eight and a half tons, and its value at present rates about 200,000. There was, indeed, a sacred Tent of Meeting, but it was utterly different in all respects from the splendid portable temple of P (see pp. 123f., Exo 33:7-11*). And the existence of this last is virtually excluded by those passages of Judges and Samuel where it must have been referred to. Further, the account, for all its minuteness, is quite incomplete as a specification of work to be done (cf. MNeue, p. lxxx). The religious value, however, remains the same, while an insoluble historical difficulty is removed. Indeed, just because it is late, this account presents profounder religious ideas. These will be noted in their place. Only here and there is the inner meaning of the whole or the parts specified, but each main element will have had its symbolic idea, and will often also bear a typical application to that system which replaced shadow by substance (see Hebrews 8-10*, and commentaries by Westcott and Nairne). The best working out of the details as a whole is in A. R. S. Kennedys article on the Tabernacle (HDB). MNeile is also clear and full on all aspects. See further on Exodus 35-40.
Exo 25:1-9 P (6 R). Appeal for Materials.Mans liberality must provide Gods Dwelling, the materials of which must come by way of contribution (Exo 25:1-3 a, not offering, but what is taken off from some larger mass, Driver). The metals needed (Exo 25:3 b) were gold, silver, and bronze (i.e. copper hardened by tin. the precursor of iron, not brass, i.e. copper and zinc) The spun and woven materials required costly dyes, violet and purple-red from Mediterranean shell-fish, and scarlet from an insect reared on the Syrian holmoak; and they included fine linen (not cotton, as mg. or silk) and goats-hair (Exo 25:4). Skins of rams and porpoises were needed for outer coverings of the tent (Exo 26:14), and acacia wood for the framework (Exo 25:5), as well as oil and spices (Exo 25:6), and gems (Exo 25:7). All were needed to make for Yahweh a sanctuary where He may dwell in their midst (Exo 25:8).
The Godward-tending spirit of man, climbing upwards, has clung to the belief in some Real Presence of God in the world, and has found in sacred places points of attachment for this faith. In Exo 20:24 f. we have an early stage of this belief. But the rude altars of earth or unhewn stone, set on ground fragrant with some gracious memory of a very present God, lost their simplicity. Countless high places were scenes of the degradation of worship into riotous pleasure-seeking, through the rivalry of local priesthoods. The reform under Josiah centralised worship at Jerusalem, and cleared the ground for the unchallenged and unique sanctity assumed in these chapters to belong to the One Dwelling of Yahweh in the midst of His people.
The general truth that God is the author of all wisdom and skill is here expressed in the statement that Moses was to make both the sanctuary and its furniture (i.e. fittings and utensils) according to a model shown him in the mount (Exo 25:9). Driver recalls how Gudea, king of Lagash (c. 3000 B.C.), was shown in a dream, by the goddess Nina, the complete model of a temple which he was to erect in her honour: gold, precious stones, cedar, and other materials for the purpose were collected by him from the most distant countries. Any thing of beauty must be first seen upon the mount of vision before the artist can give it external form.The AV confused the two Hebrew names hel and mishkan by the indiscriminate use of tabernacle. It is best to render the former always tent with RV (see Exo 27:21*), and the latter dwelling with RV mg., thus preserving the idea of Exo 25:8 throughout the many repetitions of the title.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
WILLING OFFERINGS FOR GOD’S SANCTUARY
(vs.1-9)
The law has been declared to Israel, with its stern ordinances and regulations. Now the Lord instructs Moses in a matter that is in striking contrast to the principle of law, for all here speaks of grace and blessing rather than law and cursing. Thus, even when God put Israel under law, the grace of His own heart could not refrain from shining through in a remarkable measure.
In this case, God makes no peremptory demand, but tells Moses to speak to the people to the effect that they should willingly with their heart bring an offering to the Lord. There was no question as to how much each should give, nor if they should give at all if their heart was not in it. This must be a fully voluntary offering. The principle here corresponds fully with the principle laid down for the assembly of God today in their giving. 2Co 8:1-24; 2Co 9:1-15 deal extensively with this question. Chapter 9:7 is most plain, “So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity: for God loves a cheerful giver.” Therefore this offering of Exo 25:1-40 shows that even in the giving of the law God looked beyond the law to the grace that would yet be revealed.
The offering however was of specific materials for the building of the tabernacle. God designated these. There was no place for sackcloth or for people’s personal household furniture. Gold is mentioned first, for this symbolizes the glory of God. Then silver pictures the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Copper is typical of the holiness of God, which is an outstanding characteristic of His sanctuary.
Blue material speaks of the heavenly glory of the Lord Jesus, the eternal Son of God, as is seen specially in the Gospel of John (See Joh 6:32; Joh 6:37; Joh 6:50-51; Joh 6:58). Purple is the royal color, and reminds us of Matthew, which presents Christ as the King of Israel. Scarlet is the color of attraction, which is seen in the lowly, faithful service of the Lord Jesus in Mark’s Gospel. Fine linen pictures the beautifully intertwined moral perfection of the Lord Jesus as the unique Man of God’s appointment, which is seen in the Gospel of Luke.
Goat’s hair (4) calls to mind the sacrifice of Christ as our Substitute, while ram’s skins dyed red speak of the same sacrifice in its submission and devotion to God, the red calling special attention to this. Badger skins (or possibly porpoise skins) are of a drab, unattractive color, and they formed the outside covering of the tabernacle, emphasizing the fact that to the natural eye of Israel and the world there appeared to be “no beauty” in the Lord Jesus (Isa 53:2).
Acacia wood is from a hardwood desert tree, speaking of the enduring humanity of the Lord Jesus as “a root out of a dry ground” (Isa 53:2). Oil for the light is typical of the Holy Spirit. Spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense are the varied fragrances of the Lord Jesus united with the energy of the Holy Spirit (v.6). Onyx stones and other precious stones to adorn the special dress of the high priest symbolize the bright reflections of the many beauties of the Lord Jesus.
All of these things were for the purpose of making a sanctuary for God to dwell in among the children of Israel (v.8). This was temporary in view of the eventual building of the temple by Solomon (1Ki 6:1-38). In regard to this tabernacle, however, nothing was left to the discretion of Moses. Verse 9 is clear that God Himself decreed the entire pattern of the tabernacle and its furniture, just as God today has laid down the full truth concerning the church of God and all its arrangements. Nothing is left to the wisdom or discretion of any of His saints or servants.
THE ARK OF THE COVENANT
(vs.10-16)
Before instructions are given for the building of the tabernacle itself, God lays down the plans for the ark, the table of showbread and the lampstand The ark has the place of most prominent importance, for it speaks of Christ as the Sustainer of the throne of God, just as the ark sustained the mercy seat. All the authority of God is therefore seen to be centered in the person of the Lord Jesus.
The ark was made of acacia wood, speaking of the humanity of Christ as a Root out of dry ground. But it was overlaid with gold, which emphasizes His deity, for He is God over all. Its length was two and a half cubits. Two speaks of testimony, for God’s throne bears testimony always to what is true. The added one-half is interesting, however. It reminds us of the Queen of Sheba’s words to Solomon, “the half was not told me” (1Ki 10:7). Therefore this indicates that the glory of Christ is beyond human apprehension. The height and width of the ark were each one a half cubits. Therefore in every dimension the glory of Christ exceeds our understanding. The one cubit however speaks of unity. In the authority of God there can be no inconsistency, but one perfect standard of judgment for all.
The ark was a chest overlaid with gold both inside and out. A crown of gold was on the top, crowning the entire circumference. This speaks of the glory the Lord Jesus has now acquired by reason of His sacrifice and His resurrection, that is, He is now “crowned with glory and honor” (Heb 2:9) in answer to His willing humiliation.
Because the ark was to be carried by means of staves, there were two rings of gold attached to the ark on each side. The staves were made of acacia wood overlaid with gold, and those were slipped through the rings in order for the ark to be carried. The priests did not touch the ark, but carried it by the staves (vs.12-15). Thus believers have the place of priests in order to carry the Lord Jesus as a testimony before the world. The staves were to remain always in their place. This continued until the temple was built, when we read that “they drew out the staves” (1Ki 8:8) because the ark was then in its proper resting place.
The testimony God would give Israel (the law written on tables of stone) was to be put into the ark (v.16). This reminds us that in contrast to all others, the Lord Jesus could say, “I delight to do your will, 0 my God, and your law is within my heart” (Psa 40:8).
THE MERCY SEAT
(vs.17-22)
The mercy seat was made the same length and width as the ark (v.17), but this was pure gold, for it symbolized the throne of God, of which Christ is the capable Sustainer. The same truth applies to its dimensions as is true of the ark. No form was ever seen on the mercy seat, for God is invisible (1Ti 1:17). As the throne of God, this represents absolute dominion, authority righteousness, truth, yet amazingly it is called, not the justice seat, but “the mercy seat.” Thus from the throne of absolute righteous God is able to dispense mercy. This is marvelous, but only possible because of the truth emphasized on the great day of atonement. for no one could ever enter into the holiest of all where the ark was except the high priest only once a year, when he sprinkled blood seven times before and on the mercy seat (Lev 16:1-19). This is typical of the Lord Jesus having made propitiation for our sins on Calvary, having been raised from the dead and entering into heaven itself for us (Heb 10:11-12; Heb 10:24).
On each end of the mercy seat was a cherubim facing inwards with their wings spread above each one, so that evidently their faces would look downward the mercy seat with their wings overshadowing all (v.20). The cherubim were one piece with the mercy seat, all hammered from one piece of gold (vs.18-19).
Since the cherubim form a part of the throne itself, it is plain they are not angels, or created beings, but purely divine principles of judicial righteousness. Looking down upon the mercy seat would indicate the vital interest that God’s righteousness takes in the value of the blood sprinkled on the mercy seat.
The mercy seat formed a covering for the ark, and in the ark was the testimony, the law of God on tables of stone. This was the only seat in the tabernacle, the place where God would meet with Israel, though none of Israel except the high priest once a year, could enter there. From that place God would communicate His mind and will to Moses for the children of Israel (v.22).
Thus, the ark and the mercy seat are seen to be found in beautiful consistency with the character of what is emphasized in the building of the tabernacle. For here we see the heart of God made known in some lovely measure, even in a dispensation which in itself does not make known the heart of God, that is, the law.
THE TABLE OF SHOWBREAD
(vs.23-30)
The table was inside the holy place, on the right side as one entered the tabernacle, but not in the most holy, as the ark was. The twelve loaves that were put on the table (Lev 24:59 speak of communion or fellowship involving the twelve tribes of Israel in their fellowship with the Lord and with one another. Therefore the table is symbolical of the Lord Jesus as the Sustainer of fellowship. This was in the holy place, speaking of heaven itself, Christ therefore glorified in heaven sustaining His saints today in fellowship with the Father and with one another.
Again the Manhood of the Lord Jesus is emphasized by the acacia wood, and His deity by the complete overlaying of gold. Its height was the same as the ark, two and one half cubits. For the upward (Godward) blessing of fellowship is precious beyond our understanding (the one-half), while the two speaks of the value of this as a testimony before God. But both the length and width have no extra half cubit, for our fellowship is limited in both these directions. The two cubits and the one cubit speak similarly of those dimensions in the ark, however.
A molding of gold was to surround the entire circumference of the table, and a frame of a handbreadth (about four inches) was evidently inside the molding (v.24), then another molding on the inside of the frame. The frame likely extended over the legs, and two gold rings were put close to the frame at each end of the table, that is, underneath the frame, so that it could be carried by staves. The staves (or poles) were again made of acacia wood overlaid with gold (v.28)
Dishes, pans, pitchers and bowls used in connection with the table were all made of pure gold, for the fellowship of the saints of God is to be on a divine level, that is, “fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ” (1Jn 1:3).
THE GOLDEN LAMPSTAND
(vs.31-40)
The lampstand was placed on the left side of the sanctuary as one entered. This was made of one piece of beaten gold (v.31). The lampstand is distinct from the light, for it is really the light-bearer, and speaks of Christ as the Sustainer of all testimony for God. Light is the very nature of God: “God is light” (1Jn 1:5), therefore the humanity of Christ (the acacia wood) is not involved in this at all, but only pure gold. As the eternal Son of God He sustains all testimony for God.
There was a central stem in this stand, and six branches proceeding from that stem, three on either side (v.32), for seven is the number of completeness or perfection.
On each of the six branches there were three cups or bowl shaped ornaments, like almond blossoms, each one evidently nesting a knob (possibly a bud) and a flower (v.33). It is thought likely that this compares with Aaron’s rod that “put forth buds, had produced blossoms and yielded ripe almonds” (Num 17:8). The language is not that plain here in Exo 25:1-40, but the lesson of resurrection is unmistakable. The almond is the first tree in Israel to blossom, speaking of Christ as “the firstfruits” (1Co 15:20-23).
Although, as we have seen, the pure gold of the lampstand speaks strictly of the deity of Christ, yet His Manhood is inferred when we think of Him in resurrection, for He must be Man in order to die and rise again. We must always remember that the Lord Jesus is one blessed person: though His deity is distinct from His Manhood, yet this same One who is exalted as God over all is the One who died and rose again.
On the central stem there were four of these sets of almond ornaments (v.34). While the number three speaks of the Trinity and also of resurrection, four is the number of earth and may imply that the testimony of God is intended for all the world.
The seven lamps, one at the top of the stem and those at the ends of the six branches, were to be arranged in such a way as to give light that would draw attention to the lampstand itself. It would also shed light on the table of showbread and on the golden incense altar. Thus the light of God shines primarily upon Christ Himself, whether as the Sustainer of the Light, whether as the Sustainer of fellowship, or as the Sustainer of worship, of which the golden altar speaks. He is revealed in all His beauty. Besides this, however, He is the Revealer: He shines for the blessings of others.
The lampstand then portrays Christ as the Sustainer of testimony, of which the light speaks. This testimony must necessarily have its basis in the truth of the Word of God, just as is plainly stated in the words of the Lord Jesus, “You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth” (Joh 18:37). Also today, any true testimony for God that is carried on by believers, is not sustained by their own energy, but by the Lord Jesus.
Connected with the lampstand there the “wick-trimmers” and trays of pure gold. This is the only indication that believers have any part in connection with the lampstand. They are the wicks, though the wicks themselves are not mentioned, but only the necessity of trimming them. The oil in the lamps speaks of the Holy Spirit of God, without whom we could never continue to burn. But a burned wick must be trimmed in order to burn brightly. The trimmings, put in the trays, could not burn again. Thus we need to judge ourselves constantly, and never depend on former experiences of burning in testimony for the Lord. Those things are to be left behind. The Lord as it were puts them into the trays. He will not forget, but we must burn freshly for Him every day.
The lampstand was formed in one piece out of one talent of gold. At present-day prices, the cost of this would be over $700,000. The measurements of it are not given. As to the pattern, God had shown this to Moses on the mountain, and he was to follow it precisely.
Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible
2. Contributions for the construction of the sanctuary 25:1-9
"Only voluntary gifts were acceptable as materials for the Lord’s house (Exo 25:2; Exo 35:3; Exo 35:21-22; Exo 35:29), since love rather than compulsion is the basis of all truly biblical giving (2Co 9:7)." [Note: Youngblood, p. 113.]
Moses usually employed one of four different terms to describe the tabernacle each of which emphasizes one of its purposes, though other names also appear.
1. Sanctuary (Exo 25:8) means "place of holiness" and stresses the transcendence of Israel’s God as an exalted being different from His people. However this verse also states that such a God would "dwell among" His people. [Note: See Angel Manuel Rodriguez, "Sanctuary Theology in the Book of Exodus," Andrews University Seminary Studies 24:2 (Summer 1986):127-45.]
2. Tabernacle (Exo 25:9) means "dwelling place" and emphasizes God’s purpose of abiding near His people. The tabernacle looked like the other nomads’ tents that the Israelites lived in. They would have thought of it as God’s tent among their tents. It had furniture, just as their tents did.
"Just as they lived in tents, so God would condescend to ’dwell’ in a tent." [Note: Youngblood, p. 114.]
3. Tent of Meeting (Exo 26:36; Exo 29:42-43; Exo 35:21) also stresses the imminence of God. God met with Moses and the Israelites in this tent. The verb translated "meeting" means a deliberate prearranged rendezvous rather than a casual accidental meeting. Some scholars believe that the tent of meeting was a structure different from the tabernacle and that it was always outside the camp of Israel. [Note: E.g., Eugene H. Merrill, Deuteronomy, p. 401.]
4. Tabernacle (or Tent) of Testimony (Exo 38:21; Num 9:15; Num 17:7-8) indicates that the structure was the repository of the Law. Moses sometimes referred to the ark of the covenant as the "ark of the testimony" (Exo 25:22) that contained the "two tablets of the testimony" (Exo 31:18) on which were the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are the "testimony." They were the essential stipulations of the Mosaic Covenant, the heart of the relationship between God and His people.
God designed the tabernacle structure and all its furnishings to teach the Israelites about Himself and how they as sinners could have a relationship with Him.
"The thoughts of God concerning salvation and His kingdom, which the earthly building was to embody and display, were visibly set forth in the pattern shown [to Moses]." [Note: Keil and Delitzsch, 2:167.]
"The tabernacle also provided a prophetic prefigurement of the redemptive program of God as focused in Jesus Christ. . . . [It] was a remarkable picture of the high priestly work of Christ both here on earth and His eternal work in the heavens." [Note: Davis, pp. 245-56.]
"Probably the conception of the tabhnith, the ’model’ (Exo 25:9), also goes back ultimately to the idea that the earthly sanctuary is the counterpart of the heavenly dwelling of a deity." [Note: Frank M. Cross Jr., "The Tabernacle," Biblical Archaeologist 10:3 (September 1947):62. For a good introduction to the background of the tabernacle, see G. Ernest Wright, "The Significance of the Temple in the Ancient Near East," Biblical Archaeologist 7:4 (December 1944):65-77. Cf. Exodus 25:40; Hebrews 8:5.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
CHAPTER XXV.
THE SHRINE AND ITS FURNITURE.
Exo 25:1-40
The first direction given to Moses on the mountain is to prepare for the making of a tabernacle wherein God may dwell with man. For this he must invite offerings of various kinds, metals and gems, skins and fabrics, oil and spices; and the humblest man whose heart is willing may contribute toward an abode for Him Whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain.
Strange indeed is the contrast between the mountain burning up to heaven, and the lowly structure of the wood of the desert, which was now to be erected by subscription.
And yet the change marks not a lower conception of deity, but an advance, just as the quiet and serene communion of a saint with God is loftier than the most agitating experience of the convert.
This is the first announcement of a fixed abiding presence of God in the midst of men, and it is therefore the precursor of much. St. John certainly alluded to this earliest dwelling of God on earth when he wrote, “The Word was made flesh, and tabernacled among us” (Joh 1:14). A little later it was said, “Ye also are builded together for an habitation of God” (Eph 2:22); and again the very words used at first of the tabernacle are applied to faithful souls: “We are a temple of the living God, as God said, I will dwell in them and walk in them” (2Co 6:16; Lev 26:11). For God dwelt on earth in the Messiah hidden by the veil, that is to say His flesh (Heb 10:20), and also in the hearts of all the faithful. And a yet fuller communion is to come, of which the tabernacle in the wilderness was a type, even the descent of the Holy City, when the true tabernacle of God shall be with men, and He shall tabernacle with them (Rev 21:3).
It may seem strange that after the commandment “Let them make Me a sanctuary” the whole chapter is devoted to instructions, not for the tabernacle but for its furniture. But indeed the four articles enumerated in this chapter present a wonderfully graphic picture of the nature and terms of the intercourse of God with man. On one side is His revelation of righteousness, but righteousness propitiated and become gracious, and this is symbolised by the ark of the testimony and the mercy-seat. On the other side the consecration both of secular and sacred life is typified by the table with bread and wine, and by the golden candlestick. Except thus, no tabernacle could have been the dwelling of the Lord, nor ever shall be.
And this is the true reason why the altar of incense is not even mentioned until a later chapter (Exo 30:1-38). We do homage to God because He is present: it is rather the consequence than the condition of His abode with us.
The first step towards the preparation of a shrine for God on earth is the enshrining of His will: Moses should therefore make first of all an ark, wherein to treasure up “the testimony which I shall give thee,” the two tables of the law (Exo 25:16). In it were also the pot of manna and Aaron’s rod which budded (Heb 9:4), and beside it was laid the whole book of the law, for a testimony, alas! against them (Deu 31:26).
Thus the ark was to treasure up the expression of the will of God, and the relics which told by what mercies and deliverances He claimed obedience. It was a precious thing, but not the most precious, as we shall presently learn; and therefore it was not made of pure gold, but overlaid with it. That it might be reverently carried, four rings were cast and fastened to it at the lower corners, and in these four staves, also overlaid with gold, were permanently inserted.
The next article mentioned is the most important of all.
It would be a great mistake to suppose that the mercy-seat was a mere lid, an ordinary portion of the ark itself. It was made of a different and more costly material, of pure gold, with which the ark was only overlaid. There is separate mention that Bezaleel “made the ark, … and he made the mercy-seat” (Exo 37:1, Exo 37:6), and the special presence of God in the Most Holy Place is connected much more intimately with the mercy-seat than with the remainder of the structure. Thus He promises to “appear in the cloud above the mercy-seat” (Lev 16:2). And when it is written that “Moses heard the Voice speaking unto him from above the mercy-seat which is upon the ark of the testimony” (Num 7:89), it would have been more natural to say directly “from above the ark” unless some stress were to be laid upon the interposing slab of gold. In reality no distinction could be sharper than between the ark and its cover, from whence to hear the voice of God. And so thoroughly did all the symbolism of the Most Holy Place gather around this supreme object, that in one place it is actually called “the house of the mercy-seat” (1Ch 28:11).
Let us, then, put ourselves into the place of an ancient worshipper. Excluded though he is from the Holy Place, and conscious that even the priests are shut out from the inner shrine, yet the high priest who enters is his brother: he goes on his behalf: the barrier is a curtain, not a wall.
But while the Israelite mused upon what was beyond, the ark, as we have seen, suggests the depth of his obligation; for there is the rod of his deliverance and the bread from heaven which fed him; and there also are the commandments which he ought to have kept. And his conscience tells him of ingratitude, and a broken covenant; by the law is the knowledge of sin.
It is therefore a sinister and menacing thought that immediately above this ark of the violated covenant burns the visible manifestation of God, his injured Benefactor.
And hence arises the golden value of that which interposes, beneath which the accusing law is buried, by means of which God “hides His face from our sins.”
The worshipper knows this cover to be provided by a separate ordinance of God, after the ark and its contents had been arranged for, and finds in it a vivid concrete representation of the idea “Thou hast cast all my sins behind Thy back” (Isa 38:17). That this was its true intention becomes more evident when we ascertain exactly the meaning of the term which we have, not too precisely, rendered “mercy-seat.”
The word “seat” has no part in the original; and we are not to think of God as reposing on it, but as revealing Himself above. The erroneous notion has probably transferred itself to the type from the heavenly antitype, which is “the throne of grace,” but it has no countenance either in the Greek or the Hebrew name of the Mosaic institution. Nor is the notion expressed that of gratuitous and unbought “mercy.” When Jehovah showeth mercy unto thousands, the word is different. It is true that the root means “to cover,” and is once employed in Scripture in that sense (Gen 6:14); but its ethical use is generally connected with sacrifice; and when we read of a “sin-offering for atonement,” of the half-shekel being an “atonement-money,” and of “the day of atonement,” the word is a simple and very similar development from the same root with this which we render mercy-seat (Exo 30:10, Exo 30:16; Lev 23:27, etc.).
The Greek word is found twice in the New Testament: once when the cherubim of glory overshadow the mercy-seat, and again when God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation (Heb 9:5; Rom 3:25). The mercy-seat is therefore to be thought of in connection with sin, but sin expiated and thus covered and put away.
We know mysteries which the Israelite could not guess of the means by which this was brought to pass. But as he watched the high priest disappearing into that awful solitude, with God, as he listened to the chime of bells, swung by his movements, and announcing that still he lived, two conditions stood out broadly before his mind. One was the bringing in of incense: “Thou shalt bring a censer full of burning coals of fire from before the altar, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy-seat” (Lev 16:13). Now, the connection between prayer and incense was quite familiar to the Jew; and he could not but understand that the blessing of atonement was to be sought and won by intense and burning supplication. And the other was that invariable demand, the offering of a victim’s blood. All the sacrifices of Judaism culminated in the great act when the high priest, standing in the most holy and the most occult spot in all the world, sprinkled “blood upon the mercy-seat eastwards, and before the mercy-seat sprinkled of the blood with his finger seven times” (Lev 16:14).
Thus the crowning height of the Jewish ritual was attained when the blood of the great national sacrifice was offered not only before God, but, with special reference to the covering up of the broken and accusing law, before the mercy-seat.
No wonder that on either side of it, and moulded of the same mass of metal, were the cherubim in an attitude of adoration, their outspread wings covering it, their faces bent, not only as bowing in reverence before the Divine presence, but, as we expressly read, “toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cherubim be.” For the meaning of this great symbol was among the things which “the angels desire to look into.”
We now understand how much was gained when God said “There will I meet thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat” (Exo 25:22). It was an assurance, not only of the love which desires obedience, but of the mercy which passes over failure.[39]
Thus far, there has been symbolised the mind of God, His righteousness and His grace.
The next articles have to do with man, his homage to God and his witness for Him.
There is first the table of the shewbread (Exo 25:23-30), overlaid with pure gold, surrounded, like the ark, with “a crown” or moulding of gold, for ornament and the greater security of the loaves, and strengthened by a border of pure gold carried around the base, which was also ornamented with a crown, or moulding. Close to this border were rings for staves, like those by which the ark was borne. The table was furnished with dishes upon which, every Sabbath day, new shewbread might be conveyed into the tabernacle, and the old might be removed for the priests to eat. There were spoons also, by which to place frankincense upon each pile of bread; and “flagons and bowls to pour out withal.” What was thus to be poured we do not read, but there is no doubt that it was wine, second only to bread as a requisite of Jewish life, and forming, like the frankincense, a link between this weekly presentation and the meal-offerings. But all these were subordinate to the twelve loaves, one for each tribe, which were laid in two piles upon the table. It is clear that their presentation was the essence of the rite, and not their consumption by the priests, which was possibly little more than a safeguard against irreverent treatment. For the word shewbread is literally bread of the face or presence, which word is used of the presence of God, in the famous prayer “If Thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence” (Exo 33:15). And of whom, other than God, can it here be reasonably understood? Now Jacob, long before, had vowed “Of all that Thou givest me, I will surely give the tenth to Thee” (Gen 28:22). And it was an edifying ordinance that a regular offering should be made to God of the staple necessaries of existence, as a confession that all came from Him, and an appeal, clearly expressed by covering it with frankincense, which typified prayer (Lev 24:7) that He would continue to supply their need.
Nor is it overstrained to add, that when this bread was given to their priestly representatives to eat, with all reverence and in a holy place, God responded, and gave back to His people that which represented the necessary maintenance of the tribes. Thus it was, “on the behalf of the children of Israel, an everlasting covenant” (Lev 24:8).
The form has perished. But as long as we confess in the Lord’s Prayer that the wealthiest does not possess one day’s bread ungiven–as long, also, as Christian families connect every meal with a due acknowledgment of dependence and of gratitude–so long will the Church of Christ continue to make the same confession and appeal which were offered in the shewbread upon the table.
The next article of furniture was the golden candlestick (Exo 25:31-40). And this presents the curious phenomenon that it is extremely clear in its typical import, and in its material outline; but the details of the description are most obscure, and impossible to be gathered from the Authorised Version. Strictly speaking, it was not a lamp, but only a gorgeous lamp-stand, with one perpendicular shaft, and six branches, three springing, one above another, from each side of the shaft, and all curving up to the same height. Upon these were laid the seven lamps, which were altogether separate in their construction (Exo 25:37). It was of pure gold, the base and the main shaft being of one piece of beaten metal. Each of the six branches was ornamented with three cups, made like almond blossoms; above these a “knop,” variously compared by Jewish writers to an apple and a pomegranate, and still higher, a flower or bud. It is believed that there was a fruit and flower above each of the cups, making nine ornaments on each branch. The “candlestick” in Exo 25:34 can only mean the central shaft, and upon this there were “four cups with their knops and flowers” instead of three. With the lamp were tongs, and snuff-dishes in which to remove the charred wick from the temple.
As we are told that when the Lord called the child Samuel, “the lamp of God was not yet gone out” (1Sa 3:3), it follows that the lights were kept burning only during the night.
We have now to ascertain the spiritual meaning of this stately symbol. There are two other passages in Scripture which take up the figure and carry it forward. In Zechariah (Zec 4:2-12) we are taught that the separation of the lamps is a mere incident; they are to be conceived of as organically one, and moreover as fed by secret ducts with oil from no limited supply, but from living olive trees, vital, rooted in the system of the universe. Whatever obscurity may veil those “two sons of oil” (and this is not the place to discuss the subject), we are distinctly told that the main lesson is that of lustre derived from supernatural, invisible sources. Zerubbabel is confronted by a great mountain of hindrance, but it shall become a plain before him, because the lesson of the vision of the candlestick is this–“Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.” A lamp gives light not because the gold shines, but because the oil burns; and yet the oil is the one thing which the eye sees not. And so the Church is a witness for her Lord, a light shining in a dark place, not because of its learning or culture, its noble ritual, its stately buildings or its ample revenues. All these things her children, having the power, ought to dedicate. The ancient symbol put art and preciousness in an honourable place, worthily upholding the lamp itself; and in the New Testament the seven lamps of the Apocalypse were still of gold. But the true function of a lamp is to be luminous, and for this the Church depends wholly upon its supply of grace from God the Holy Ghost. It is “not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.”
Again, in the Revelation, we find the New Testament Churches described as lamps, among which their Lord habitually walks. And no sooner have the seven churches on earth been warned and cheered, than we are shown before the throne of God seven torches (burning by their own incandescence–vide Trench, N. T. Synonyms, p. 162), which are the seven spirits of God, answering to His seven light-bearers upon the earth (Rev 4:5).
Lastly, the perfect and mystic number, seven, declares that the light of the Church, shining in a dark place, ought to be full and clear, no imperfect presentation of the truth: “they shall light the lamps, to give light over against it.”
Because this lamp shines with the light of the Church, exhibiting the graces of her Lord, therefore a special command is addressed to the people, besides the call for contributions to the work in general, that they shall bring pure olive oil, not obtained by heat and pressure, but simply beaten, and therefore of the best quality, to feed its flame.
It is to burn, as the Church ought to shine in all darkness of the conscience or the heart of man, from evening to morning for ever. And the care of the ministers of God is to be the continual tending of this blessed and sacred flame.
FOOTNOTES:
[39] This investigation offers a fine example of the folly of that kind of interpretation which looks about for some sort of external and arbitrary resemblance, and fastens upon that as the true meaning. Nothing is more common among these expounders than to declare that the wood and gold of the ark are types of the human and Divine natures of our Lord. If either ark or mercy-seat should be compared to Him, it is obviously the latter, which speaks of mercy. But this was of pure gold.