26 1 MOREOVER thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains; of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet, with cherubim the work of the cunning workman shalt thou make them. The length of each curtain shall be eight and twenty cubits, and the breadth of each curtain four cubits: all the curtains shall have one measure. Five curtains shall be coupled together one to another; and the other five curtains shall be coupled one to another. And thou shalt make loops of blue upon the edge of the one curtain from the selvedge in the coupling; and likewise shalt thou make in the edge of the curtain that is outmost in the second coupling. Fifty loops shalt thou make in the one curtain, and fifty loops shalt thou make in the edge of the curtain that is in the second coupling; the loops shall be opposite one to another. And thou shalt make fifty clasps of gold, and couple the curtains one to another with the clasps: and the tabernacle shall be one. And thou shalt make curtains of goats’ hair for a tent over the tabernacle: eleven curtains shalt thou make them. The length of each curtain shall be thirty cubits, and the breadth of each curtain four cubits: the eleven curtains shall have one measure. And thou shalt couple five curtains by themselves, and six curtains by themselves, and shalt double over the sixth curtain in the forefront of the tent. And thou shalt make fifty loops on the edge of the one curtain that is outmost in the coupling, and fifty loops upon the edge of the curtain which is outmost in the second coupling. And thou shalt make fifty clasps of brass, and put the clasps into the loops, and couple the tent together, that it may be one. And the overhanging part that remaineth of the curtains of the tent, the half curtain that remaineth, shall hang over the back of the tabernacle. And the cubit on the one side, and the cubit on the other side, of that which remaineth in the length of the curtains of the tent, shall hang over the sides of the tabernacle on this side and on that side, to cover it. And thou shalt make a covering for the tent of rams’ skins dyed red, and a covering of sealskins above. And thou shalt make the boards for the tabernacle of acacia wood, standing up. Ten cubits shall be the length of a board, and a cubit and a half the breadth of each board. Two tenons shall there be in each board, joined one to another: thus shalt thou make for all the boards of the tabernacle. And thou shalt make the boards for the tabernacle, twenty boards for the south side southward. And thou shalt make forty sockets of silver under the twenty boards; two sockets under one board for its two tenons, and two sockets under another board for its two tenons: and for the second side of the tabernacle, on the north side, twenty boards: and their forty sockets of silver; two sockets under one board, and two sockets under another board. And for the hinder part of the tabernacle westward thou shalt make six boards. And two boards shalt thou make for the corners of the tabernacle in the hinder part. And they shall be double beneath, and in like manner they shall be entire unto the top thereof unto one ring: thus shalt it be for them both; they shall be for the two corners. And there shall be eight boards, and their sockets of silver, sixteen sockets; two sockets under one board, and two sockets under another board. And thou shalt make bars of acacia wood; five for the boards of the one side of the tabernacle, and 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 hinder part westward. And the middle bar in the midst of the boards shall pass through from end to end. And thou shalt overlay the boards with gold, and make their rings of gold for places for the bars: and thou shalt overlay the bars with gold. And thou shalt rear up the tabernacle according to the fashion thereof which hath been shewed thee in the mount. And thou shalt make a veil of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen: with cherubim the work of the cunning workman shall it be made: and thou shalt hang it upon four pillars of acacia overlaid with gold, their hooks shall be of gold, upon four sockets of silver. And thou shalt hang up the veil under the clasps, 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. And thou shalt make a screen for the door of the Tent, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, the work of the embroiderer. And thou shalt make for the screen five pillars of acacia, and overlay them with gold; their hooks shall be of gold; and thou shalt cast five sockets of brass for them.

NOTE.—The text of the 36th chapter does not contain verses 12, 13, and 30 of the above, and there is a slight and unimportant difference in the first and the last verses of the two chapters.

Otherwise the substance of the two is identical, one containing the command and the other its execution. The latter text is therefore omitted. The several parts of the structure are as follows: Ten curtains with cherubim for the interior (26:1-6; 36:8-13). Eleven curtains for covering and exterior (26:7-14; 36:14-19). Boards for framework (26:15-25; 36:20-30). Bars for holding the boards together (26:26-29). The veil dividing “the Holy place and the Most Holy” (26:31-33; 36:35, 36). The “screen for the door of the Tent” and its pillars (26:36, 37). B.

So accurate is the counterpart between the order and the execution, that the one may in most instances be translated into the other by a mere change of tense. What is told to Moses in the earlier chapter as the thing he shall make, is in the later chapter told by him as that which was made. T. C.—In the command of God, the ark, the table, the candlestick, are first described, because they are of the most importance; and the tabernacle is built for their sake; but naturally, in the account of the preparation and construction, the building must precede the furniture thereof. Gerl.—The narrative begins with the tabernacle itself, which is the largest piece of the work. But we may suppose that other sets of workmen were engaged on the furniture, the court, and the priestly dresses. It was necessary also that the tabernacle should be ready for the sacred utensils as soon as they were prepared. M.

Nothing would be less in accordance with the natural order of a history written at a later period than this double account. It has been represented as an argument for a double authorship, as though two sets of documents had been carelessly or surreptitiously adopted by a compiler. It is, however, fully accounted for by the obvious hypothesis that each part of the narrative was written at the time and on the occasion to which it immediately refers. When Moses received these instructions, he wrote a full account of them for the information of the people. When, again, Moses had executed his task, it was equally appropriate, and doubtless also in accordance with the habits of a people keen and jealous in the management of their affairs, and at no time free from tendencies to suspicion, that he should give a formal account of every detail in its execution; a proof to such as might call for proof that all their precious offerings had been devoted to the purpose, and what was of far more importance, that the Divine instructions had been completely and literally obeyed.

In form, structure, and materials, the tabernacle belongs altogether to the wilderness. The wood used in the structure is found there in abundance. The skins and other native materials belong equally to the locality. One material which entered largely into the construction, the skin of the tachasch, was in all probability derived from the Red Sea. The metals, bronze, silver, and gold, were those which the Israelites knew and doubtless brought with them from Egypt. It is also certain that the arts required for the construction of the tabernacle, and for all its accessories, were precisely those for which the Egyptians had been remarkable for ages, and such as artisans who had lived under the influence of Egyptian civilization would naturally have learned. Cook.

The tabernacle was a portable temple, as no other kind of structure would have suited a nomad people; and among a tent-dwelling people, that temple would naturally be a tent, or a movable fabric of wood. Until the Israelites were settled in the land of promise, their sacred edifice must necessarily be such as they could easily take to pieces and transfer from place to place. It was intended as a habitation of the visible symbol of Jehovah, who is emphatically designated “the God of Israel.” . . . In order that the Hebrews might have their relation to God kept constantly before their eyes, the Most High, as their King, caused a royal tent to be erected in the centre of the encampment, where the pavilions of all kings and chiefs were usually erected, and to be fitted up with all the splendor of royalty, as a movable palace.

The tabernacle possessed the twofold character of a sanctuary, or place of worship, and of a royal palace where Jehovah would keep the state of a court, as supreme civil magistrate and King of Israel; from whence he would issue his laws and commandments as from an oracle, and where he was to receive the homage and tribute of his subjects. This idea of the tabernacle, as in part that of a palace for a king, will seem perfectly clear to every one who notes carefully the terms in which this building, and also the temple, are spoken of and referred to throughout the Scriptures; and we doubt not it is a view essential to the right understanding of these structures and the things which belong to them. It is a view also which is held by the Jews themselves, who carry out the analogy, and regard the utensils of the tabernacle as palace furniture, and the priests as its ministers of state and officers. Bush.

Names of the Tabernacle.

The names of this Tabernacle are full of significance; it is called the “House” or “Dwelling-place of God,” the “Tent of meeting or assembly,” as the place where God himself dwells among his people, and through which he enters into communion with them—“the Tent of testimony” (Nu. 9 : 15), as the place where the Law was kept—“the Sanctuary,” as the place which belonged exclusively to God, the Holy One, being severed from all that is earthly, human, sinful. The place where the Holy One of Israel revealed himself, and entered into communication with his people, consisted of two parts : (1) The Holiest of all, God’s especial dwelling-place, which, both in this tabernacle and in the temple afterward, was completely dark. Into this the high-priest only, on the day of expiation, might enter, veiled in a cloud of incense. (2) The Holy place, where the people, through their consecrated mediators and intercessors, the priests, might draw near to their King. Therefore the whole people is represented, if righteous, as dwelling on the holy hill in the tabernacle of the Lord (Ps. 15 : 1 ; 23 : 6 ; 27 : 4). Gerl.

Most commonly, when a single name is used, it is that which answers to our word dwelling or habitation. Sometimes we find the more definite term house, the house of God, or the Lord’s house, or tent. The dwelling in its original form was a tent, because the people among whom God came to reside and hold converse were then dwelling in tents, and had not yet come to their settled habitation. But afterward this tent was supplanted by the temple in Jerusalem, which bore the same relation to the ceiled houses in the land of Israel that the original tabernacle held to the tents in the wilderness. And coming, as the Temple thus did, in the room of the Tabernacle, and holding the same relative position, it was sometimes spoken of as the Tent of God, though more commonly it received the appellation of the house of God, or his habitation. Besides these names, certain descriptive epithets were applied to the tabernacle. It was called the Tent of meeting, for which our version has unhappily substituted the tent of the congregation. The expression is intended to designate this tent or dwelling as the place in which God was to meet and converse with his people ; not, as is too commonly supposed, the place where the children of Israel were to assemble, and in which they had a common interest. It was this certainly ; but merely because it was another and higher thing—because it formed for all of them the one point of contact and channel of intercourse between heaven and earth. The tabernacle is again described as the Tabernacle of the Testimony, or Tent of witness. It received this designation from the law of the two tables, which were placed in the ark or chest that stood in the innermost sanctuary. These tables were called “the Testimony,” and the ark which contained them “the Ark of the Testimony,” whence, also, the whole tabernacle was called the tabernacle or tent of the testimony. For God dwells in his Law, which makes known what he himself is, and on what terms he will hold fellowship with men. P. F.

The essential significance of the tabernacle may be inferred from the names customarily given to it. 1st. Those which, like house, tent, abode, abode of the testimony, convey the general idea of a place of Divine residence ; 2d. Those which, like tent of assembly, or tent-house of assembly, express the idea of a meeting-place for God and man ; and 3d. Those which, like sanctuary, draw attention to holiness as an attribute of the place itself. As examples of the first class, Ex. 23 : 19 : 25 : 9 ; 26 : 36 ; 38 : 21 ; of the second class, Ex. 27 : 21 ; 39 : 32 ; of the third class, Ex. 25 : 8. Now, a house where God was or was supposed to be must be a place for worship, and a place for Divine worship must of necessity be holy ground ; thus one fundamental idea lay at the root of all these appellations—viz., that the tabernacle was a meeting-place between Jehovah and his covenant people. There Jehovah was to be thought peculiarly present, and therefore peculiarly approachable. There I will meet, is the Lord’s declaration to Moses (Ex. 29 : 42, 43), with the children of Israel, and the habitation shall be sanctified by my glory. And I will dwell among them, and will be their God. Cave.

The tabernacle had an outer and an inner compartment, a Holy and a Most Holy Place, or, as they are sometimes called, the Sanctuary and the Holy of Holies. The innermost compartment was the smaller in compass, but the more perfect in its proportions, being an exact cube of ten cubits, the length, height, and breadth being equal. From the modes of thought prevalent in ancient times respecting number, this would quite readily convey the idea of completeness. The cube form alone, with whatever number associated, might have suggested this—as in the case of the New Jerusalem seen in the apocalyptic vision, where attention is specially called to the circumstance that “the length, and the breadth, and the height were equal ;” but the cube being formed of ten, itself a symbol of perfection, would naturally serve to strengthen the impression. This region of innermost sacredness and perfection was separated from the other part of the tabernacle by a curtain or veil, which was formed of the same kind of material, and inwrought with the same figures as the curtain which formed the interior of the roof, and probably also of the walls of the structure. The curtain was suspended from four pillars, overlaid with gold. Then from this to the door of the tabernacle was a space of twenty cubits in length by ten in breadth and height—the proportions, though larger, being manifestly less perfect; while also the curtain which hung over the doorway or entrance was without the cherubic figures inwoven, and was suspended by golden hooks upon five pillars. But there was a sacred region without, as well as these two hallowed compartments within, the tabernacle; an outer court, surrounding the tabernacle on every side, one hundred cubits long and fifty cubits broad, enclosed by a screen of linen.

Looking now to the structure and appearance of the Tabernacle, we might certainly expect the following characteristics: that, being a tent or movable habitation, it would be constructed in such a manner as to present somewhat of the general aspect of such tenements, and be adapted for removals from place to place; and that, being the Tent of God, it would be fashioned within and without so as to manifest the peculiar sacredness and grandeur of its destination. This is precisely what we find to have been the case. Like tents generally, it was longer than broad—thirty cubits long by ten broad; and while on three of the sides possessing wooden walls, which assimilated it in a measure to a house, yet these were composed of separate gilded boards or planks, rising perpendicularly from silver sockets, kept together by means of golden rings, through which transverse bars were passed, and hence easily taken asunder when a removal was made. But neither within nor without must the wooden walls be seen, otherwise the appearance of a tent would not be preserved. Hence a series of curtains was provided, the innermost of which was formed of fine linen—ten breadths, five of which were joined together to make each one curtain, and the two curtains were again united together by means of fifty loops. This innermost curtain or covering was not only made of the finest material, but was also variegated with diverse colors and cherubic figures inwrought. Hence it is probably to be regarded as the tent in its interior aspect, consequently not merely forming the roof (where there were no wooden boards), but also attached by some means to the pillars so as to hang down inside to near the floor of the dwelling. In this way, at least, one can more easily understand why it should be called simply the tabernacle or dwelling (mishkan) both at Ex. 26:1, where the direction is given for making the curtains, and again at verse 8, where, when joined together, they are represented as forming one dwelling (mishkan). Then over this another set of curtains, made of goats’ hair, was thrown, certainly forming an external covering, and, being two cubits longer than the other, reaching to well-nigh the bottom of the boards. To this day, the usual texture of Arabian tents is of goats’ hair; and this being the tent proper as to its external aspect, it was designated the tent, as the other, which appeared from within, was called the habitation or dwelling. And above both these sets of curtains a double coating of skins was thrown, but merely for the purpose of protection from the elements.

These parts and properties, or things somewhat similar, were essential to this sacred erection as a tent; it could not have possessed its tent-like appearance without them, or been adapted for moving from place to place. Therefore, to seek for some deeper and spiritual reasons for such things as the boards and bars, the rings and staves, the different sorts of coverings, the loops and taches, etc., is to go entirely into the region of conjecture, and give unbounded scope to the exercise of fancy. A plain and palpable reason existed for them in the very nature and design of the erection; and why should this not suffice? But other things, again, were necessary, on account of the tabernacle being not simply a tent, but the tent of the Most High God, for purposes of fellowship between him and his people—such as the ornamental work on the tapestry, the division of the tabernacle into more than one apartment, and the encompassing it with a fore-court by means of an enclosure of fine linen, which in a manner proclaimed to the approaching worshippers, Procul profani! That the apartments should have consisted of no more than an outer and inner sanctuary, or that the figures wrought into the tapestry should have been precisely those of the cherubim—in these we may well feel ourselves justified in searching for some more special instruction; for they might obviously have been ordered otherwise, and were doubtless ordered thus for important purposes. On which account, both characteristics reappear in the temple as being of essential and abiding significance. P. F.

The tabernacle was to comprise three main

parts, the TABERNACLE, more strictly so-called, its TENT, and its COVERING. These parts are very clearly distinguished in the Hebrew, but they are confounded in many places of the English version. The TABERNACLE itself was to consist of curtains of fine linen woven with colored figures of cherubim, and a structure of boards which was to contain the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place; the TENT was to be a true tent of goats’ hair cloth to contain and shelter the tabernacle: the COVERING was to be of red rams’ skins and tachash skins, and was spread over the goats’ hair tent as an additional protection against the weather.

1. THE TABERNACLE. The Hebrew is mishkan—i.e., dwelling-place. When it denotes the dwelling-place of Jehovah, it is accompanied by the definite article. The materials for THE MISHKAN were a great cloth of woven work figured with cherubim measuring forty cubits by twenty-eight cubits, and a quadrangular enclosure of wood, open at one end, ten cubits in height, ten cubits in width, and thirty cubits in length. The size of the tabernacle cloth is indicated beyond the reach of doubt by the number and dimensions of the ten breadths (or “curtains”) of which it consisted. Clark.—It was a splendid fabric of linen, embroidered with figures of cherubim, in blue, purple, and scarlet, and looped together by golden fastenings. It seems probable that the ends of this set of curtains hung down within the tabernacle, forming a sumptuous tapestry. P. S.

The boards were set upright, each of them being furnished at its lower extremity with two tenons which fitted into mortises in two heavy bases of silver. The whole of these bases placed side by side probably formed a continuous wall- plinth. The boards were furnished with rings or loops of gold so fixed as to form rows, when the boards were set up, and through these rings bars were thrust. The veil which separated the Most Holy Place from the Holy Place was suspended from golden hooks attached to four pillars overlaid with gold, standing upon silver bases. Clark.

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; and the covering of goats’ hair was so made as to fall down over this when required. P. S.

2. The TENT is described as consisting of a great tent cloth of goats’ hair, which, according to the number and dimensions of its breadths, was forty-four cubits by thirty, and five pillars overlaid with gold standing on bases of bronze, and furnished with golden hooks from which was suspended the curtain that served to close the entrance of the Tent.

3. Of the COVERING of rams’ skins and tachash skins, nothing whatever is said except as regards the materials of which it was composed. Mr. Fergusson suggests what may be regarded as a satisfactory reconstruction of the sanctuary in all its main particulars. He holds that what sheltered the Mishkan was actually a tent of ordinary form, such as common-sense and practical experience would suggest as best suited for the purpose.

According to this view, the five pillars at the entrance of the tent were graduated as they would naturally be at the entrance of any large tent of the best form, the tallest one being in the middle to support one end of a ridge-pole. Clark.

The Holy of Holies was divided from the Holy Place by a screen of four pillars supporting curtains which no one was allowed to pass. But in the entrance there were five pillars in a similar space. Now, no one would put a pillar in the centre of an entrance without a motive; but the moment a ridge is assumed it becomes indispensable. By the hypothesis here adopted the pillars in front would, like everything else, be spaced exactly five cubits apart. Dic. B

The descriptions in Exodus appear to pass over all particulars of the construction except those which formed visible features in the fabric. On this ground we may be allowed to suppose that there was not only a ridge-pole, but a series of pillars at the back of the tent corresponding in height with those at the front. Such a ridge-pole, which must have been sixty feet in length, would have required support, and this might have been afforded, in accordance with the usage of tent architecture, by a plain pole in the middle of the structure. Over this framing of wood-work the tent-cloth of goats’ hair was strained with its cords and tent-pins in the usual way. There must also have been a back-cloth suspended from the pillars at the back. The heads of the pillars appear to have been united by connecting rods (in our version “fillets”) overlaid with gold.

It is evident that the relation in which the measurement of the tabernacle-cloth stood to that of the tent-cloth had an important bearing on the place of each of them in the structure. The tent-cloth is said to have extended a cubit on each side beyond the tabernacle-cloth, and it appears to have extended two cubits at the back and front. It would appear then that the tent-cloth was laid over the tabernacle-cloth so as to allow the excess of the dimensions of the former to be equally divided between the two sides and between the back and front. We may from these particulars infer that the tabernacle-cloth served as a lining to the other, and that they were both extended over the ridge-pole. In this way, the effect would have been produced of an ornamented open roof extending the length of the tent. Mr. Fergusson has pointed out the very remarkable consistency of the measurements of the different parts, if we accept this mode of putting them together. He assumes the angle formed by the roof to have been a right angle, as a reasonable and usual angle for such a roof, and this brings the only measurements which appear at first sight to be abnormal into harmony. Every measurement given in the text is a multiple of five cubits, except the width of the tabernacle-cloth, which is

twenty-eight cubits, and the length of the tent-cloth, which is forty-four cubits. With a right angle at the ridge, each side of the slope as shown in this section would be within a fraction of fourteen cubits (14.08), half the width of the tabernacle cloth. The slope is here carried just five cubits beyond the wooden walls and to within just five cubits of the ground. The tent-cloth would hang down in a valance on each side, one cubit in depth. If we allow the tabernacle cloth, according to this arrangement, to determine the length of the tent as well as its width, we obtain an area for the structure of forty cubits by twenty. The tent-cloth would of course overhang this at the back and front by two cubits—that is, half a breadth. The wooden structure being placed within the tent, there would be a space all round it of five cubits in width. Clark.

The tabernacle seems to have had no floor but the naked ground—a singular contrast to its embroidered curtains and golden vessels. It pleased the Lord to take the dust of the earth for the pavement of an “earthly sanctuary.” D. F.

The Inner VEIL and the Outer Screen.

The inner shrine or recess was covered by a veil; the sanctuary was divided from the court by a screen. By both the people were admonished how reverently God’s majesty must be regarded, and with what seriousness holy things are to be engaged in. The veil intimated to the Israelites that the spiritual worship of God was as yet enshrouded in a veil; and thus might extend their faith to their promised Messiah, at whose coming the truth would be discovered and laid bare. Wherefore, when Christ rose again from the dead, “the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom” (Matt. 27:51), and an end was put to the ceremonies of the Law, because God then presented Himself, in His living and express image, and the perfect reality of all the ceremonies was manifested. Now, therefore, in the light of the Gospel we behold “face to face” what was then shown afar off to the ancient people under coverings. Calv.

There was the outer court for the laity; there was the Holy place for the priests; and there was the Most Holy place into which the high-priest went, not without blood, once a year. Before the Holy of Holies there hung a magnificent curtain or veil; and when Jesus said, “It is finished!” this veil, which was in the tabernacle and afterward in the temple, was rent in twain, signifying that from that time all Levitical sacredness was gone; that all distinction between the outer and the inner court, the holy of holies and the holy place—all was gone. The sacredness now is made by the work in which we are engaged. “Wherever two or three are met in my name,” says the Saviour, “there am I in the midst of them”—that is, there is a true Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. But while the ancient economy existed this distinction was kept up, and ever taught and impressed a great and precious truth—that Christ must come and die and enter into the true holy place, before there could be access from grace to glory, from the outer to the inner court. J. C.

The writer to the Hebrews says (10:19, 20), “Having boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil—that is to say, his flesh, let us draw near.” Here it is clear that the veil is represented as in some way shadowing forth the flesh or body of Christ. A right view of the constitution of Christ’s person as God-Man Mediator, and of the prominent place which he holds as the soul and centre and substance of nearly every part of the typical economy, will afford a clew to the solution of the problem. As the folds of the guiding cloud in the wilderness enshrouded the glory of Jehovah, so the human nature or body of Christ, while he tabernacled on earth, served as a kind of temporary envelope or veil of the Divine nature which dwelt within. It was only at his death, when his “body was broken” for the sins of the world, that this intervening cloud or veil was entirely rent and done away, and a way thus opened for the free manifestation of his glory and majesty to all believers, whether Jews or Gentiles. As the veil of the tabernacle was to the inner abiding glory what the Saviour’s flesh was to his indwelling Divinity, it was ordered that at the same time that the veil of his flesh was rent upon the cross, the corresponding veil of the temple was “rent in twain from the top to the bottom,” implying that a blessed way of access was now provided into the interior of the heavenly sanctuary, of which the grand characteristic is, that it is to have “the glory of God,” and from thence to receive its denomination, “Jehovah-Shammah,” the Lord is there. Who can doubt that in the priestly service the High Priest himself, the sacrifice, and the altar, all found their substance in Christ? In like manner may the veil and the inner presence both point also to him? Bush.

Meaning and Design of the Tabernacle.

Its immediate object and design was the bringing of God near to the Israelites in his true character, and keeping up an intercourse between him and them. It was intended to provide, by means of a local habitation, with its appropriate services, for the attainment of a livelier apprehension of God’s character, and the maintenance of a closer and more assured fellowship with him. So also, a visible pattern of Divine things was required to help out in men’s minds the imperfection of the spiritual idea; a habitation was needed for the more peculiar manifestations of God’s presence, such as could be scanned and measured by the bodily eye, and by serving itself of which the eye of the mind might rise to a clearer apprehension both of his abiding nearness to his people, and of the more essential attributes of his character and glory. P. F.

It was an act of special grace that Jehovah—in accord with the natural tendency of the human mind to seek the assistance of a visible holy place for communing with God—should condescend to provide a local habitation for himself among his covenant people. As this tabernacle—and, after it, the temple—was the great central idea in the forms of worship in Israel, it was fit that it be constructed out of such costly materials and set apart by special consecration. It was the grand symbol of the kingdom of God on earth. It was to be the one symbol; for Jehovah being the one living God, and condescending to exhibit in an outward and material form the things concerning his character and glory, it was needful to guard against the idea of a divided personality, to which the world was so prone. For this reason there was but one tabernacle and temple as a direct testimony against the idolatries of all countries, under which every neighborhood had its god, and every hill and grove its separate solemnities of worship. The true worshippers must come to the one place where he who “fillet heaven and earth with his presence,” and “whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain,” condescended to meet with them. And it was a remarkable peculiarity of this worship, that as any one who presented the sacrifices elsewhere which were appointed for his house was guilty of violating the order of his kingdom, so on the other hand, to have free access to this chosen residence of Deity was esteemed so high a privilege that to be debarred from it, “cut off from the congregation of his people,” was to be regarded as the extremest penalty for sin. The ideas embodied in the symbols of the Old Testament worship are in the New Testament seen embodied in great and abiding realities. This tabernacle and temple—earthly houses made glorious by the indwelling of God—are now seen to be types of the great fact: “God manifest in the flesh,” when “the Word was made flesh, and tabernacled among us, and we beheld his glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” And this was but the first stage in the development of “the great mystery of Godliness.” For this flesh of Christ’s humanity stood as the representative of all flesh as redeemed, and in him, as its living head, stands the whole elect humanity, and in him finds its bond of connection with God and a channel of real and blessed fellowship with heaven. The idea symbolized in the tabernacle has its realization not merely in the incarnation of Christ personally, but in the incarnate Christ as the head of a redeemed offspring. These great ideas are interwoven with all the teachings of the New Testament. We see now the force of Jesus’ saying, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up,” by which he evidently means that his body had now become what the temple and the tabernacle had hitherto been, and that the great idea symbolized in the tabernacle and temple was actually embodied in His Person, in which Godhead had taken up its dwelling in humanity that men might draw near and have fellowship with it. So his body was raised up again to be the perpetual seat and centre of the worship of the eternal kingdom. God in Christ is now the conception of every true worshipper. In the great ideas of the apostles of the New Testament of the inhabitation of God in the man Christ Jesus as the medium of intercourse and communion between God and his Church—so that the Church has become “the house of God,” his habitation through the spirit, so that each believer is “a temple of the living God,” “a temple of the Holy Ghost”—we find the true typical sense of the tabernacle and its true relation to Christ and his kingdom. S. R.

The Symbolism and Types of the Tabernacle.

The symbolism of the tabernacle was significant of truth which belonged to the time then present; its types were significant of truth which belonged to time then future, to the times of fulfilment. By its symbols the tabernacle and its services were a sermon, or rather a collection of sermons; in its types, a prophecy or bundle of prophecies. Inasmuch as we live in the times of fulfilment, the typical significance of the tabernacle has the most practical value for us. And we who live in the later days of the great year of the Lord are better able than the Jewish fathers themselves to recognize the prophetic aspect of the old and ever valuable symbols of the tabernacle. They could understand the symbolic meaning more easily than we, but we can understand the prophetic meaning better than they. J. M. G.

The Hebrews belonged to an age in which symbolism was everywhere employed. The nations then, as the recently-discovered monuments attest, were in the habit of putting all religious truths into external emblems. That form, therefore, as being the existing and recognized medium for the communication of such things at the time, was employed by Jehovah. He chose it just as, in giving us a revelation of his will, he chose language, because he found it already in use. But he did with it as in his revelation he has done with human language—he elevated it and refined it, and put such new significance into it, that men, looking at it, can see as marked a difference between the tabernacle of the Hebrews and the temples of the heathen as there is between the Bible and the so-called sacred books of India and China. The Hebrews of Moses’s day craved something external. That eager desire for an embodiment of Deity which among the heathen tried to satisfy itself in idolatry, and which has now been met for all men in the Incarnation of God in Christ, was as strong in them as in others. Their lapse into image-worship at the very base of Sinai proves this; and, therefore, it became necessary to give them an outward symbolism—which should meet the craving of their hearts, and yet not minister to materialism because it had no visible representation of God. Such a symbolism was set before them in the tabernacle. It was, from first to last, an external emblem of spiritual truth. W. M. T.

Nothing here was intended as a mere ornament or ceremony; all was symbol and type. As symbol, it indicated a present truth; as type, it pointed forward (a prophecy by deed) to future spiritual realities, while, at the same time, it already conveyed to the worshipper the first-fruits, and the earnest of their final accomplishment in “the fulness of time.” All proclaimed the same spiritual truth, and pointed forward to the same spiritual reality—viz., God in Christ in the midst of his Church. The tabernacle was “the Tent of meeting” where God held intercourse with his people, and whence he dispensed blessing unto them. The priesthood, culminating in the high-priest, was the God-appointed mediatorial agency through which God was approached and by which he bestowed his gifts; the sacrifices were the means of such approach to God, and either intended to restore fellowship with God when it had been dimmed or interrupted, or else to express and manifest that fellowship. But alike the priesthood, the sacrifices, and the altar pointed to the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. So far as the tabernacle itself was concerned, the court with the altar of burnt-offering was the place by which Israel approached God; the Holy Place that in which they held communion with God; and the Most Holy Place that in which the Lord himself visibly dwelt among them in the Shechinah, as the covenant-God, his presence resting on the mercy-seat which covered the ark. A. E.

It is abundantly evident that the tabernacle, and after it the temple, was intended to stand as conveying by symbols great ideas in the scheme of redemption to the minds of the people. For we find it interwoven with all the ideas and language of the Church in after times. Yet it is plainly a mistake to attempt to find some typical or allegorical meaning in every separate part of it—many of the things being ordered for convenience as in every other structure. S. R.—No one acquainted with the history of interpretation can doubt that vast injury has been done by a fanciful mode of explaining the Old Testament, by making every pin and pillar a type, and every fact in its history an allegory. Nothing is better fitted to bring the science of interpretation into contempt, nothing more dishonors the Bible than to make it a book of enigmas. The Bible is a book of sense. Barnes.—A system of types, extending to minute particulars, and to bad men as well as to good, has been forced into the interpretation of the Old Testament, to the detriment of all sound philology, and often of common-sense. Men of eminent learning, in our own days, have found in the Mosaic ritual all varieties of allegory and hidden sense, so that, almost literally, every cord has cried out of the tabernacle, and every pin from its timber has answered. In fact, every text distorted, every interpretation far-fetched or unnatural, does something toward subverting the authority of the entire Scriptures, as it becomes a source of doubt and incredulity which extends far beyond itself. B. B. E.

The close connection between the symbolic language of the tabernacle and the symbolism of Egypt under the Pharaohs shows that the tabernacle revelation must have been given immediately after the exodus, and could not have come through more likely hands than his, “who was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians.” It is, in fact, an evidence of date of the same kind as the use of Hellenistic Greek in the New Testament. So that herein we have another evidence of the genuineness and antiquity of the Pentateuch. J. M. G.

FURNITURE OF THE TABERNACLE: ARK AND MERCY-SEAT; TABLE; CANDLE-STICK; ALTAR OF INCENSE; (SILVER TRUMPETS.)