13<\/strong>. The basement of the altar<\/p>\n 13<\/strong>. bottom<\/em> shall be a cubit<\/em> ] lit. its bottom a cubit, i.e. in depth or height, and so in breadth. The bottom, lit. bosom<\/em>, appears to be the basement in which the altar proper was set; it was a cubit high and extended a cubit in breadth beyond the first block or stage of the altar proper. The idea that the “bosom” means a drain or gutter running round the foot of the altar to carry away the blood seems without any support. This basement extended a cubit all round beyond the lowest stage of the altar proper, and on the outer edge of this space of a cubit there was a border of a span, probably, in height. This border may have been a moulding, or possibly a very low parapet or close screen, running round the outer edge of the ledge of one cubit. Either would suggest the idea of a bosom in which the altar proper was placed.<\/p>\n higher place of the altar<\/em> ] the elevation.<\/strong> The word is that rendered “eminent place” Eze 16:24<\/span>; Eze 16:31<\/span>; Eze 16:39<\/span> (see notes), and refers to the basement on which the altar proper stood. Cf. Eze 41:8<\/span>. LXX. divides the letters differently, reading: this is the height of the altar<\/em>, and attaching the clause to the following verse. This appears to be unnecessary.<\/p>\n 13 17<\/strong>. The altar of burnt-offering in the inner court<\/p>\n The altar was a large structure, built of stone, and rose in terraces, contracting by means of two inlets towards the top. It consisted: (1) of a basement, with a border or moulding on the top or edge of it. (2) Two cubits above this basement or socket, in which the altar proper stood, was the first inlet, a cubit broad, so that there ran a ledge of a cubit round about the altar on its four sides ( Eze 43:13-14<\/em><\/span>). (3) Four cubits above this first inlet came the second inlet or contraction, also a cubit broad, so as to form in like manner a ledge of a cubit round about the altar ( Eze 43:14<\/em><\/span>). (4) Then four cubits upwards from this ledge was the altar area or platform proper, the “hearth of God,” having horns rising up at the four corners ( Eze 43:15<\/em><\/span>). The area of this altar-hearth was a square of is cubits ( Eze 43:16<\/em><\/span>). At the higher inlet the area was 14 cubits square ( Eze 43:17<\/em><\/span>). Probably, therefore, at the lower inlet the area was 16 cubits square and the basement 18 cubits. Thus the structure had the appearance of four square blocks, each narrower in area than the one below it, and each thus appearing set into the one under it as into a socket. Such structures built in stages were common in the architecture of the East; see examples in Rawlin. Phenicia<\/em>, p. 166 seq<\/em>.<\/p>\n The altar of sacrifice which stood in the inner court, not the altar of incense described Eze 41:22<\/span>. In the temple of the vision the dimensions differ from those of the tabernacle Exo 27:1<\/span>, and of Solomons Temple 2Ch 4:1<\/span>, with a view to introduce definite propositions and symbolic numbers. See Plan L.<\/P> The bottom – <\/B>The base (I) of the altar so called, because it forms with its border (K) a kind of socket to receive the lower settle (L). It was to be a cubit in depth.<\/P> The breadth is the breadth of that portion of the base which was not covered by the lower settle.<\/P> The higher place – <\/B>the base, literally back; the base is called the back because the altar rested upon it.<\/P><\/p>\n Eze 43:13<\/span><\/p>\n These are the measures of the altar after the cubits.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n The altar measurable and immeasurable<\/strong><\/p>\n There is nothing held to be insignificant in the Book of God that pertains to the Divine altar or the holy house. Everything is of consequence; perhaps it would be more than paradoxical to say that everything is of supreme consequence. These are the measures of the altar after the cubits. That is to say, if you look upon the thing geometrically, here it is, so long, so broad, so high, thus, and thus, and no other way. Such is the Divine specification; the altar is measurable, it is a question of cubits; make the cubits right, and you make the geometric altar right. Beyond that, the measuring man can do nothing. But when you have given the cubits you have given nothing. The altar, as a mechanical structure, is measurable; as a spiritual symbol, it is without measure. There are persons who imagine that if they have read the book called the Bible through, they have read Gods revelation completely. It is the same sophism. There are men who think if they have told you how far it is from Dan to Beersheba they have been preaching. They have not begun to preach in the name and spirit of Christ. All this is mere secular instruction. There are what are called ecclesiastical antiquarians. They occupy a respectable position in society. They are often pensive-looking men; they are men of most studious habits. If you wanted to know the meaning of any ecclesiastical term, they would find it for you; they can go back century after century, and tell you the measure of every part, and the colour of every robe, and the significance of every line; and they can press matters down to the centuries of corruption, when all these original meanings were lost or perverted; then they can proceed to the centuries of restoration, and tell you all concerning the reconstruction of matters that had been overthrown, perverted, or neglected. All this they can do without ever praying. A man may build a cathedral and never pray. Remember, in dealing with the altar we are not dealing with a merely geometrical figure. The altar has its finite side, yet it has also its infinite aspect. What does the altar do? The altar looks towards the Unknown. If we might personify the altar, we should think of it as having eyes that wander through eternity. The altar would be saying in its silence, There is another home; this is but a stepping stone to something higher, this is but the dawn of the coming day, this is but the seed time–the golden harvest is not yet: I look beyond all these white sapphires that make the midnight rich with their jewellery, and I see beyond, and still beyond, Gods measured sanctuary. It ought to be a grand thing to have amongst us an altar that talks thus. We want some sublimating influences. The tabernacle of God is with men upon the earth. Our houses are sanctified by the presence of the holy place. The walls of the sanctuary give security to the city; not its banks and festive chambers, but its sanctuaries are the glory of the town. We do not know what the sanctuary is doing in any city. It may be the humblest place viewed architecturally and geometrically, but seen in its spiritual significance and relationship it may be the poor little despised church or conventicle that is keeping the city out of hell. Do not, therefore, despise anything that has spiritual significance in it. We cannot tell how far its influence reaches. Little noise it makes; the kingdom of heaven cometh not with observation: when the morning dawns there is no crash of wheels upon the hills; the dawn is glorified silence. What is true of the public sanctuary is true of the home sanctuary: it is your family altar which keeps your house together. It may not be a formal altar, but the spirit of prayer that is in your house makes your bread sweet, and keeps all the windows towards the south, though geometrically they may stand square north. It is the Spirit of God, the altar, the Divine genius that makes the house warm in January and glorious in June. See what other words occur in connection with the term altar. You never find that word alone. Some men could not read this description of the altar. They are too sensitive; there are men so super-refined that they could not read this description of Gods altar. Thou shalt sprinkle blood thereon, etc. Beware of that insensate sensitiveness which cannot pronounce the word blood in its religious and spiritual signification. Do not imagine yourselves refined and sensitive because you can talk about the example of Christ but not about the blood of Christ. You can debase any word; you can pronounce the word music so as to take all melody and all harmony and rhythm out of it; you can pronounce the word gospel so that it shall be but a common word of two syllables; you can shrink from anything: but you can so pronounce music and blood and Cross and Christ as to give those who hear you to feel that you have caught some inner and upper meaning which had hitherto escaped your own attention. Then how do we stand in this matter? You are Bible readers, are you students of revelation? You can quote all the dimensions of the altar, have you ever entered into its spirit? We are called to spirituality, not to carnality; to profoundest wisdom, not mere literal information; to an altar not made with hands, and not merely and exclusively to the altar built even upon the terms of a Divine specification. Holy Spirit, baptise us as with fire! Spirit of the altar, teach us how to suffer, how to pray! (J. Parker, D. D.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Proportions of altar unintelligible<\/strong><\/p>\n And these are the measures of the altar. That was the point at which I became excited. Whilst he was measuring gates and posts and porches I cared little, but when he began to measure the altar, who could but pause? And then came this disappointment, after the cubits. I thought he was going to measure the altar. And what is a cubit? said<\/p>\n The cross is beyond measurement<\/strong><\/p>\n We see the cross no more after its cubit measures. The cross was measurable, the Roman foot rule was laid upon it–so much vertical, so much horizontal, so much in weight–was that the cross? No! That was the Roman gallows, that was not the cross. Oh! why do we not preach the cross, the eternal cross, whose shadow lies even over the light of summer? Men need the cross so interpreted. But have we not made a gallows of the cross, the model of the Atonement? Who can measure the word atone? There are those who are the victims of definition idolatry. They want to know what you mean by this term and that. There are indefinable terms, there are terms that have no equivalent in other symbols. Atonement may be one of those terms. I have seen it once. A man may only see the cross in its truest sense once, but that once spreads itself through all the days. A man may only take, mayhap, the ordinance of the Lords Supper once. Have you taken it so? For convenience, for expedience, for merely ecclesiastical purposes, end for occasional spiritual helps, it may be necessary to have it every Lords day, or every month, or every year, at certain periodic intervals. No doubt, but the soul cannot drink that Blood more than once! Do you suppose that the cross can be measured in cubits? Where was the atonement rendered? In eternity! Do you suppose that Christ was born in Bethlehem in any other than a merely visible and temporal and earthly sense? He was never born in Bethlehem! When did He die? He is the Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. Before the sin was done the atonement was made! You cannot anticipate God. You cannot surprise the Eternal. He does not conceive of the cross as an after device; He does not attempt to make a Roman model into a living atonement. (J. Parker, D. D.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The greatest things measurable<\/strong><\/p>\n Let us look at this law of altar cubits a little while, for it admits of divers and useful illustrations. Take the alphabet, your English alphabet. There are some six-and-twenty letters in it. That is the measure of the alphabet after the cubits. Now pronounce the alphabet. You cannot! You have got all the letters in one huge mouthful, and cannot pronounce them. And most of the letters are themselves dumb, waiting for the vowels to touch them to music and into life. But suppose a man should say that was the English language–there you have the English literature, there you have the Paradise Lost <\/em>and the Principia <\/em>and Hamlet <\/em>and all the poetry that has ever been written, and all the philosophy that has ever been reamed or published, you have it all in so far as the whole is expressed in the English language. In a sense, yes; in another sense, no. And yet without the alphabet where should we be? Who could move? Who could express themselves in the English tongue? Are you content with the alphabet? Yes; when it comes to the higher things you are. You smile at the notion of being contented with the alphabet when I refer to letters, to literature, to poetry, and to philosophy, but how many are there who have been in the Church forty years and are in the cradle still–in the alphabet still–and who, when they go to church, want to hear the alphabet pronounced. I wait! But unless you say A, B, and right down to Y, Z, there are some measurers, not sent from heaven, who say you have not preached the Gospel. The Gospel is a sky, a wind, a pathos, a spirit, as well as an alphabet. It has its writings, it can hand them to you, but ask for its inspiration, it breathes through all the centuries and makes a man live according to its kind. (J. Parker, D. D.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The measurement of the altar<\/strong><\/p>\n Manton says: The satisfaction must carry proportion with the merit of the offence. A debt of a thousand pounds is not discharged by two or three brass farthings. Creatures are finite, their acts of obedience are already due to God, and their sufferings for one another, if they had been allowed, would have been of limited influence. Jesus alone, as the Son of God, could present a substitution sufficient to meet the case of men condemned for their iniquities. The majesty of His nature, His freedom from personal obligation to the law, and the intensity of His griefs, all give to His atonement a virtue which elsewhere can never be discovered. (C. H. Spurgeon.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Measuring by orbits<\/strong><\/p>\n God is a great measurer. God has a reed, a line, a pole. God makes His cities four-square, and He will not see the law of the square violated. It is His method! God is a great geometer. All your little Euclids are cut out of the Deity! It is said that He stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and that He spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in. It is reported of Him that He meteth out the heavens with a span. He weighs the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance. And no man can steal one atom of dust, and no little pebble can flee away! It is all measured! The bounds of our habitation are fixed! There are bounds that cannot be measured. What is your house? Tell me about it; I like to hear about houses. Well? It is large. How large? Three rooms on the ground floor. There may be certain minds who have no peace with less than four rooms on the ground floor. One is enough for me–but I am not everybody. Well, then, upstairs? Rooms so many. Lofty? Very. What are your proportions? Thirty feet by twenty-five feet. And the garden? Two hundred feet by one hundred and thirty-two feet. Is that all? I do not want to hear these things! I do not want an auctioneer to speak to me in my higher moods! He has his place, but there are levels to which I go where he in his professional capacity is nobody, and where he cannot speak in my native language. You can lay a line upon the house. Now lay me a line upon the home! No man can do that! But is not the house the same as the home? Ah, there you ask a question which is infinitely ridiculous, so destitute of sentiment, of poetry, of high spiritual sensitiveness and ideality! The house is one thing. The home is another! You may have a house and not a home! You may be in the Church, but not in the Sanctuary! You may have a book, and not a revelation! Why do we not distinguish between things that differ, and get the right values and proportions of them? Coleridge says: I for one am not content to call the soil under my feet my country. Certainly not! The country is not an affair of soil. He says: The religion, the language, the home life, these constitute all that is best in your country. That is what I am labouring to say. We want soil–something to stand upon; but it is nothing until we have crowned it with those happy associations to watch I have just referred. The life that has no home in it, no interior sanctuary, no altar, no cross, no hope–we cannot call it life. Call it the second death! What I want to show you, therefore, needs a little repetition in order to deepen and settle the best impressions. You see there is a measurable quantity, and you see there is an immeasurable quantity; and the measurable is of no use to me except it signify and indicate the immeasurable. The measurable is only a kind of ladder by which I climb to see the immeasurable. This is the spirit in which we have to do our work. This is the spirit, the influence, the spiritual immeasurable inwardness of what we are doing! A certain kind of man–I wonder who made him?–once wrote in the newspapers something about our missionaries, and he thought he had made them quite ridiculous. Many men have thought that; but The horse and his rider wilt the Lord throw into the sea. He said the income of the Society–perhaps it was your Society or the London Missionary Society–I do not know which–the income of the Society was so many thousands; the number of conversions reported, so many hundreds; dividing the thousands by the hundreds we find that each conversion cost the Society, say, a thousand pounds. What a man that would have been for measuring altars! How very ingenious this application of a foot rule! He thought he made us all look ridiculous because he showed us, by arithmetic and statistical processes, that each conversion cost an almost fabulous amount. That is the measure of the altar by cubits! Now, the measure of the soul! the measure of the character! the measure of the influence! There is a foot rule. Lay it on light, on gravitation. on the fragrance, on the influence, on the effluence! The poor man has come to the end of his tether. If one conversion cost the total income of your Society, it was worth it! That is the right way of looking at it!<\/p>\n Knowest thou the importance of a soul immortal,<\/p>\n Behold the midnight glory, world on world, The astonishing magnificence of unintelligent creation poor!<\/p>\n Unless we work in that spirit we shall give up all our efforts and confuse all our enterprises. I have given up seeking after the results of my ministry. I have asked God in many a high hour of converse to enable me to do my work as lovingly, earnestly, and capably as I can, and I have asked Him to look after the results, and He promised me He would do so. (J. Parker, D. D.<\/em>)<\/p>\n .<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Verse 13<\/span>. The cubit<\/B><\/I> is <\/B>a cubit and a hand breadth<\/B><\/I>] It is the same cubit by which all the previous admeasurements were made, and was a hand breadth or four<\/I> inches longer than the Babylonian cubit.<\/P> <\/p>\n Of the altar of burnt-offerings; <\/B>for the altar of incense was within the temple, and is called the golden altar, but this in this verse is the brazen altar, and stood in the court of the house. <\/P> The cubit is a cubit and an hand breadth; <\/B>the great or sacred cubit, three inches longer than the common cubit. <\/P> The bottom, <\/B>the ledge or settle, or as a little bench fastened to the altar on all sides at the bottom, shall be a cubit in height. <\/P> The breadth, <\/B>from the edge of this settle or bench on the outside, to the edge where it joined the body of the altar, a cubit; and this breadth, twenty-one inches, broad enough for the priests to walk on round the altar, as they had occasion. <\/P> The border, <\/B>a ledge going round on all the squares, on the outer edge of this settle, a span high, about nine inches, which was to prevent the priests. that they slipped not down in walking on this settle. <\/P> This shall be the higher place of the altar:<\/B> this seems somewhat harshly translated; the French hath it, this shall be the back of the altar; as the back bears burdens, so this should bear the weight of the whole altar; this the basis or bottom, as called before, which was one cubit in each square broader than the next square frame or settle. <\/P> <\/p>\n 13-27.<\/B> As to the altar of burntoffering, which was the appointed means of access to God.<\/P><\/p>\n And these are the measures of the altar after the cubits<\/strong>,…. Of the altar of burnt offering, which though measured before, the dimensions were not given till now; see Eze 40:47<\/span>, this altar was a type of Christ, Heb 13:10<\/span> with respect to his deity, which is greater than the sacrifice of his human nature, the support of it, which sanctified it, and gave virtue and efficacy to it, and rendered it acceptable to God, Mt 23:19<\/span> and the measures of it are said to be after the cubits used in the measuring of places and things belonging to this house, described; and what these were appears by what follows:<\/p>\n the cubit is a cubit and an hand breadth<\/strong>; not the common cubit, but what was larger than that by a hand breadth, or three inches:<\/p>\n even the bottom shall be a cubit, and the breadth a cubit<\/strong>; or, “the bosom” t; that is, the foundation of the altar, as the Targum and Jarchi; the basis, foot, or settle of it; this was a cubit high, and a cubit broad:<\/p>\n and the border thereof by the edge thereof round about shall be a span<\/strong>; the edge or “lip” u, of this bottom or settle, was a cubit broad, for the priests to stand and go round the altar, and to this there was a border of a span, or half a cubit, to prevent their slipping; or else to keep the blood, poured at the foot of the altar, from running upon the pavement:<\/p>\n and this shall be the higher place of the altar<\/strong>; or the projection or jetting of it out beyond others, which was further than any other part; otherwise it was the lower part of the altar.<\/p>\n t “sinus”, Montanus; “gremium”, Munster, Cocceius, Starckius. Ben Melech interprets it the middle of the altar. u “labium ejus”, Pagninus, Montanus.<\/p>\n Description and Consecration of the Altar of Burnt-Offering<\/p>\n Description of the Altar<\/p>\n Eze 43:13<\/span>. And these are the measures of the altar in cubits: The cubit a cubit and a handbreadth; a ground-framework of a cubit (in height), and a cubit in breadth, and its moulding on its border round about a span. This is the base of the altar. <\/em> Eze 43:14<\/span>. And from the ground-framework of earth to the lower enclosure, two cubits (in height), and a cubit in breadth; and from the small enclosure to the greater enclosure, four cubits (in height), and one cubit in breadth. <\/em> Eze 43:15<\/span>. And the mount of God, four cubits; and from the heart of God upwards, the four horns. <\/em> Eze 43:16<\/span>. And the hearth of God, twelve cubits in length by twelve cubits in breadth; squared on its four sides. <\/em> Eze 43:17<\/span>. And the enclosure, fourteen cubits in length by fourteen cubits in breadth on its four sides; and the moulding round about it, half a cubit; and the ground-framework of it, a cubit round about: and its steps faced the east.<\/em> – To the heading, “these are the measures of the altar in (according to) cubits,” there is once more appended, as in Eze 40:5<\/span>, in connection with the measuring of the temple, the length of the cubit measure. The description commences with the foundation of the altar, and, proceeding upwards, gives the height and breadth of the several gradations of the walls of the altar, up to the horns at the four corners (Eze 43:13-15<\/span>). It then passes from above downwards, to supply the length and breadth or the circumference of the different stages (Eze 43:16<\/span> and Eze 43:17<\/span>). As the first, or lowest part, the is mentioned, literally, the bosom or lap; then by transference, the hollow formed by the sides of a chariot (1Ki 22:35<\/span>); here the lower hollow or base of the altar ( p<\/em>), formed by a border of a definite height, to merely “a frame running round, a stand in which the altar stood” (Hitzig), nor merely “the hollow filled with earth” (Kliefoth), but both together. This ground-framework ( p<\/em>) was a cubit (sc., high) and a cubit broad. That is to be taken as referring to the height, is evident from the statement of the breadth which follows. is not to be altered into , as Ewald proposes, nor is to be changed into (Hitzig); but Hvernick’s explanation is to be adopted: “and a bosom (was there) the cubit,” i.e., of the height of the cubit just described. , breadth, is the extent to which the bosom projected beyond the next enclosure ( q<\/em>) on every side, and formed a support, the circumference of which was a cubit more than the lower cube of the altar on every side. This is shown by the measurements in Eze 43:16<\/span> and Eze 43:17<\/span>. The had a on its of a span (half a cubit) in height ( o<\/em>). , lip, is the rim (1Ki 7:26<\/span>; Gen 22:17<\/span>); and , the bordering on the rim, is a moulding. The feminine suffixes attached to and refer to , which is of the masculine gender, no doubt, when used in its literal sense of bosom or lap, but is construed as a feminine in the tropical sense of an inanimate object. The ground-framework, with its moulding, formed the of the altar. , the arched, then a hump or back, signifies here the support of the altar. Upon this support the altar rose in a cubical enclosure or frame, which diminished in circumference by ledges or steps. The enclosure resting upon the support, and therefore the lowest enclosure ( q<\/em>), is mentioned in Eze 43:14<\/span><\/em>; and the one which followed ( r<\/em>) in Eze 43:14<\/span><\/em>.<\/p>\n The word , which has probably sprung from by the softening of into , signifies enclosure, surrounding, and is mostly used for the outer court of the temple; here it is applied to the altar, and signifies the enclosure or framework of the kernel of the altar, consisting of earth. As the altar rose in steps, a distinction is made between the lower or smaller, and the (upper or) greater . The identity of the lower and the smaller one ( ) is so evident from the course of the description, that it is universally admitted by modern expositors. The lower one ( q<\/em>) is called the small one, in comparison with the large one which stood above it, from the fact that its height was smaller, as it was only two cubits high, whereas the upper one ( r<\/em>) was four. When, therefore, the measurement of the greater one is given in this way in Eze 43:14<\/span><\/em>: “from the small enclosure to the great enclosure, four cubits,” this statement cannot be understood in any other way than as meaning, that this enclosure or frame had a height of four cubits from the lower to the upper end, – that is to say, in other words, that the lower ledge was four cubits from the upper. Consequently the statement in Eze 43:14<\/span><\/em>, “from the ground-framework of earth to the lower enclosure, two cubits,” can also have no other meaning than that the lower enclosure, from the lower edge by the moulding to the upper edge, at which the second enclosure commenced, was two cubits high. This height is reckoned from the upper edge of the , or from the first (lowest) ledge. The height of these three portions taken together, therefore, was (1 + 2 + 4) seven cubits. To this the mount of God ( s<\/em>), which was four cubits (Eze 43:15<\/span>), has to be added, making in all eleven cubits. In Eze 43:14<\/span> is followed by : the consisting of earth, or filled with earth. But the , with its moulding, is designated , the back or support of the altar, and is thereby distinguished from the altar itself; so that, for the height of the altar, we have only to reckon the two enclosures, with the mount of God, which amount to ten cubits. Upon the basis of the , with its moulding, and the two enclosures ( ), there rose the true altar, with its hearth, and the horns at the four corners, noticed in Eze 43:15<\/span>. A distinction is here made between , i.e., mount of God, and ; and they are not to be identified, as they have been by many of the commentators, down to Hitzig, after the example of the lxx. (as the word is to be written according to the Keri<\/em>) does not mean “lion of God,” but “heart of God” ( , from , to burn), as in Isa 29:1-2<\/span>. The hearth of God is the surface of the altar, its fire-hearth ( t<\/em>); whereas , mount of God ( s<\/em>), was the basis or foundation of the hearth. This was four cubits high, whereas no height is mentioned in connection with the hearth of God; but it is simply stated that four horns went upward from it, namely, at the four corners. With the horns of the altar, the size and height of which are not given, and which cannot be reckoned at three cubits, the description of all the parts, from the bottom to the top, is given; and all that remains to complete the measurements, is to describe the circumference of the several parts which rose one above another in the form of steps. This follows in Eze 43:16<\/span> and Eze 43:17<\/span>. The hearth of God is twelve cubits long and twelve cubits broad, and is therefore , square, of the same length and breadth on its four sides. Going downwards, there follow in Eze 43:17<\/span><\/em> the length and breadth of the , with fourteen cubits, as it was a cubit broader on every side according to Eze 43:14<\/span>. It is very strange, however, that the length and breadth of only one are given here, as there are two of different heights mentioned in Eze 43:14<\/span>. Many of the commentators have therefore identified the mount of God with the great , and attribute only a height of seven cubits to the altar; whereas Kliefoth regards both the of Eze 43:17<\/span> and the and of Eze 43:15<\/span> as different from the parts mentioned by the same name in Eze 43:13<\/span> and Eze 43:14<\/span>, and takes them as referring to an enclosure and a barrier of the mount of God. One is as arbitrary as the other, as the words of the text do not require either of these assumptions. The difficulty, that only one is mentioned in Eze 43:17<\/span>, is easily solved, if we consider that in Eze 43:15<\/span> only the height of the mount of God is given, and no breadth is mentioned as in the case of the in Eze 43:14<\/span>. We may see from this that the mount of God had the same breadth or the same circumference as the upper (see r<\/em> and s<\/em> in the illustration). In that case the length and breadth of all the parts of the altar were given, when, in addition to the length and breadth of the hearth of God (t), those of one , and that the lower, were given, as this alone was longer and broader than the hearth of God and the mount of God; whereas the length and breadth of the upper were identical with those of the circumference of the mount of God.<\/p>\n The altar, therefore, upon the upper surface, the hearth of God, was a square, of twelve cubits in length and breath. The mount of God and the upper enclosure had the same length and breadth. The lower enclosure, on the other hand, were fourteen cubits long and broad; and the support, finally, without the moulding, was sixteen cubits in length and breadth. The height of the altar was as follows: the support, with the moulding, a cubit and a half; the lower enclosure, two cubits; the upper, four; and the mount of God, with the hearth, also four cubits in height; whereas the altar in Solomon’s temple was ten cubits high, and at its lower basis twenty cubits long and broad (2Ch 4:1<\/span>). – The description closes in Eze 43:17<\/span><\/em> with an allusion to steps, which the altar of Ezekiel had upon the eastern side; whereas, in the case of the tabernacle, steps were not allowed to be placed by the altar (Exo 20:23<\/span>). The form is taken by Kimchi as a noun. Others regard it as an infin. nominasc <\/em>.; whilst Hitzig proposes to point it as a participle .<\/p>\n The Vision of the Temple.<\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/I><\/span><\/P> <\/TD> B. C.<\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN> 574.<\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/SPAN><\/FONT><\/P> <\/TD> <\/TR> <\/TABLE> 13 And these are<\/I> the measures of the altar after the cubits: The cubit is<\/I> a cubit and a hand breadth; even the bottom shall be<\/I> a cubit, and the breadth a cubit, and the border thereof by the edge thereof round about shall be<\/I> a span: and this shall be<\/I> the higher place of the altar. 14 And from the bottom upon<\/I> the ground even<\/I> to the lower settle shall be<\/I> two cubits, and the breadth one cubit; and from the lesser settle even<\/I> to the greater settle shall be<\/I> four cubits, and the breadth one<\/I> cubit. 15 So the altar shall be<\/I> four cubits; and from the altar and upward shall be<\/I> four horns. 16 And the altar shall be<\/I> twelve cubits<\/I> long, twelve broad, square in the four squares thereof. 17 And the settle shall be<\/I> fourteen cubits<\/I> long and fourteen broad in the four squares thereof; and the border about it shall be<\/I> half a cubit; and the bottom thereof shall be<\/I> a cubit about; and his stairs shall look toward the east. 18 And he said unto me, Son of man, thus saith the Lord GOD<\/B>; These are<\/I> the ordinances of the altar in the day when they shall make it, to offer burnt offerings thereon, and to sprinkle blood thereon. 19 And thou shalt give to the priests the Levites that be of the seed of Zadok, which approach unto me, to minister unto me, saith the Lord GOD<\/B>, a young bullock for a sin offering. 20 And thou shalt take of the blood thereof, and put it<\/I> on the four horns of it, and on the four corners of the settle, and upon the border round about: thus shalt thou cleanse and purge it. 21 Thou shalt take the bullock also of the sin offering, and he shall burn it in the appointed place of the house, without the sanctuary. 22 And on the second day thou shalt offer a kid of the goats without blemish for a sin offering; and they shall cleanse the altar, as they did cleanse it<\/I> with the bullock. 23 When thou hast made an end of cleansing it,<\/I> thou shalt offer a young bullock without blemish, and a ram out of the flock without blemish. 24 And thou shalt offer them before the LORD<\/B>, and the priests shall cast salt upon them, and they shall offer them up for<\/I> a burnt offering unto the LORD<\/B>. 25 Seven days shalt thou prepare every day a goat for<\/I> a sin offering: they shall also prepare a young bullock, and a ram out of the flock, without blemish. 26 Seven days shall they purge the altar and purify it; and they shall consecrate themselves. 27 And when these days are expired, it shall be, that<\/I> upon the eighth day, and so<\/I> forward, the priests shall make your burnt offerings upon the altar, and your peace offerings; and I will accept you, saith the Lord GOD<\/B>.<\/P> This relates to the altar in this mystical temple, and that is mystical too; for Christ is our altar. The Jews, after their return out of captivity, had an altar long before they had a temple, Ezra iii. 3<\/span>. But this was an altar in the temple. Now here we have,<\/P> I. The measures of the altar, v.<\/I><\/span> 13<\/span>. It was six yards square at the top and seven yards square at the bottom; it was four yards and a half high; it had a lower bench or shelf, here called a settle,<\/I> a yard from the ground, on which some of the priests stood to minister, and another two yards above that, on which others of them stood, and these were each of them half a yard broad, and had ledges on either side, that they might stand firmly upon them. The sacrifices were killed at the table spoken of before, ch.<\/I><\/span> xl. 39<\/span>. What was to be burnt on the altar was given up to those on the lower bench, and handed by them to those on the higher, and they laid it on the altar. Thus in the service of God we must be assistant to one another.<\/P> II. The ordinances of the altar. Directions are here given, 1. Concerning the dedication of the altar at first. Seven days<\/I> were to be spent in the dedication of it, and every day sacrifices were to be offered upon it, and particularly a goat for a sin-offering<\/I> (v.<\/I><\/span> 25<\/span>), besides a young bullock for a sin-offering<\/I> on the first day (v.<\/I><\/span> 19<\/span>), which teaches us in all our religious services to have an eye to Christ the great sin-offering. Neither our persons nor our performances can be acceptable to God unless sin be taken away, and that cannot be taken away but by the blood of Christ, which both sanctifies the altar (for Christ entered by his own blood, Heb. ix. 12<\/span>) and the gift upon the altar. There were also to be a bullock<\/I> and a ram offered for a burnt-offering<\/I> (v.<\/I><\/span> 24<\/span>), which was intended purely for the glory of God, to teach us to have an eye to that in all our services; we present ourselves as living sacrifices, and our devotions as spiritual sacrifices, that we and they may be to him for a name, and for a praise, and for a glory. The dedication of the altar is here called the cleansing<\/I> and purging<\/I> of it, Eze 43:20<\/span>; Eze 43:26<\/span>. Christ, our altar, though he had no pollution to be cleansed from, yet sanctified himself (John xvii. 19<\/span>); and when we consecrate the altars of our hearts to God, to have the fire of holy love always burning upon them, we must see that they be purified and cleansed from the love of the world and the lusts of the flesh. It is observable that there are several differences between the rites of dedication here and those which were appointed Exod. xxix.<\/span>, to intimate that the ceremonial institutions were mutable things, and the changes in them were earnests of their period in Christ. Only here, according to the general law, that all the sacrifices must be seasoned with salt (Lev. ii. 13<\/span>), particular orders are given (v.<\/I><\/span> 24<\/span>) that the priests shall cast salt upon the sacrifices. Grace<\/I> is the salt<\/I> with which all our religious performances must be seasoned, Col. iv. 6<\/span>. An everlasting covenant is called a covenant of salt,<\/I> because it is incorruptible. The glory<\/I> reserved for us is incorruptible and undefiled; and the grace<\/I> wrought in us is the hidden man of the heart in that which is not corruptible.<\/I> 2. Concerning the constant use that should be made of it, when it was dedicated: Henceforward<\/I> the priests shall make their burnt-offerings and peace-offerings upon this altar<\/I> (v.<\/I><\/span> 27<\/span>), for therefore<\/I> it was sanctified,<\/I> that it might sanctify the gift<\/I> that was offered upon it. Observe further, (1.) Who were to serve at the altar: The priests of the seed of Zadok,<\/I> v.<\/span> 19<\/span><\/U><\/I><\/span>. That family was substituted in the room of Abiathar by Solomon, and God confirms it. His name signifies righteous,<\/I> for they are the righteous seed that are priests to God, through Christ the Lord our righteousness.<\/I> (2.) How they should prepare for this service (v.<\/I><\/span> 26<\/span>): They shall consecrate themselves,<\/I> shall fill their hand<\/I> with the offerings, in token of the giving up of themselves with their offerings to God and to his service. Note, Before we minister to the Lord in holy things we must consecrate ourselves by getting our hands and hearts filled with those things. (3.) How they should speed in it (v.<\/I><\/span> 27<\/span>): I will accept you.<\/I> And if God now accept our works, if our services be pleasing to him, it is enough, we need no more. Those that give themselves to God shall be accepted of God, their persons first and then their performances, through the Mediator.<\/P><\/p>\n THE ALTAR AS SYMBOL OF TRUE WORSHIP<\/strong><\/p>\n Verses 13-18:<\/strong><\/p>\n MEASURE OF THE ALTAR<\/strong><\/p>\n Verse 13 gives <\/strong>the measure or dimensions of the altar of the burnt offering, <\/strong>the appointed means of access, by which unholy men might come to an Holy God, be reconciled to Him. This altar stood in the inner court to the east, in front of the house of God, Eze 40:47<\/span>. The higher place <\/strong>of the altar of God was to be: a) the bottom a cubit, b) the breadth a cubit, plus a hand breadth, as related Eze 40:5<\/span>; Eze 41:8<\/span>, and c) the border around the edge was to be a span or about 9 inches in width.<\/p>\n Verses 14, 15 state <\/strong>that from the bottom on the ground, up to the lower settle was to be two cubits, with a breadth of one cubit; then from this lower or lesser settle up to the greater settle was to be four cubits, with a breadth of one cubit. So the altar was to be four cubits, and from the altar upward on each of four corners was to be an horn, making four horns on the altar without, Eze 40:47<\/span>.<\/p>\n Verses 16, 17 further <\/strong>describe the altar structure as being 12 cubits long, and twelve cubits broad, making a square. The settle was to be fourteen cubits long and 14 cubits broad, making a square. Its border was to be half a cubit (9″) and its bottom a cubit about it, with its stairs of ascendancy to the east, toward the eastern gate, Exo 20:26<\/span>. Upon ascending the steps, the priest was to go up with flowing priestly robes, that his nakedness not be revealed, Gen 3:7<\/span>; Gen 3:10<\/span>.<\/p>\n Verse 18 reveals <\/strong>that upon this burnt offering altar that provided for man a symbol of the means by which his sins could be remitted, paid for, or put away, so that he might then and thereafter worship and serve an Holy God acceptably. The sacrifice Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
I. <\/strong>And he mocked me with this reply: A cubit is a cubit, and a hand breadth. Ah! that undefined hand breadth; that plus quantity that is in everything. And from the bottom upon the ground even to the lower settle shall be two cubits, and the breadth one cubit, and from the lesser settle even to the greater settle shall be four cubits and the breadth one cubit. So the altar shall be four cubits; and from the altar and upward shall be four horns. And the altar shall be twelve cubits long, twelve broad, square in the four squares thereof. Do you understand that? No man ever understood the altar. Remember that and be calm. The altar is not to be understood. There are some places at which we can only pray, and wonder, and weep, and wait. It is the man with the foot rule in the church that I dread! He tells me, forsooth, how long I preached. Can any man preach with that person in the audience? The use of the measureable is to point to the immeasurable. The measureable is algebraic, symbolic, indicative. The foot rule means the sky, the sky, God. At first we are greatly taken by bulk, by magnitude, and we talk of the great mountains and the great seas. It fits our age well, we shall outgrow it. Great mountains! Why, a child, give him time, can climb to the top of any one of them, and wave a banner there. No height at least can keep a child back; there may be ruggedness of way, but of that we are not speaking, but of mere height, mere greatness. How great you used to think those houses down in your village–you did! I did! We passed the great house, ivy-covered, with a kind of suppressed but not wholly unconscious awe. Then you came to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, London, and went back, and you said, Where is that great house? Ay, where? That is it! No. It is! No, no! Certainly that is the house! I thought, it was so large and had so many windows in it, and that it reared itself among all the other houses, very important and almost majestic. That is it–come down. Why? Because of the greater sights you have seen, the greater houses that have passed before your vision. And thus all life goes down in that sense and yet up in another. The man who has communed with God fears no opponent. Goliath looked so huge when I saw him from the human standpoint, but after five minutes with God I sought him and he could not be found. So you tabernacle with God, live and move and have your being in God, walk in the heavenlies, then when you come down to earth, with its battle and stress and cross and pain and need, you will understand what the Apostle meant when he said, If you look at affliction from one point it seems intolerable, often beyond words and imagination, but if you look at it from another point you will say, Our light affliction is but for a moment. How so? Why, we look not at the things that are seen; not at the cubits, but at the altar; not at time, but at eternity; not at the present, but at the future. It is heaven that must one day explain the earth. (J. Parker, D. D.<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Amazing pomp: redouble this amaze.
Ten thousand add and twice ten thousand more.
One soul outweighs them all, and calls<\/p>\n
<\/strong><\/p>\nFuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible <\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary<\/b><\/i><\/h4>\n