(Exodus 25:1 - 25:40)
Jehovah addressed Moses with these instructions:
Speak to the Israelites and prevail upon them to pay tribute to me. You are to receive offerings from those who want to give willing from the heart. These are the gifts that you may accept: gold, silver, and bronze; yarn dyed blue, purple, and scarlet; garments of fine linen and goat hair; tanned sheep skins and fine leather; red acacia wood; olive oil for lamps; spices for fragrant incense and anointing oil; onyx stones and other precious gems that can be set in the priest's vestments and breastplates. And they should construct a sanctuary for me, the Tabernacle, so that I can live among them. The Tabernacle, as well as the furnishings and vessels within it, must be built it in accordance with the pattern I will give you.
You must build a chest of red acacia wood, 45 inches in length and 27 inches in width and height. Overlay it inside and out with pure gold and attach a molding of gold all around it. Make four gold carrying rings and fasten them on each leg, two on each long side. Staves of red acacia wood covered with gold may be inserted into them in order to bear the chest. The staves, once inserted into the rings, should remain there permanently. Inside the chest you will stow the records I will give you.
You must build of gold a lid for the chest, 45 inches in length by 27 inches in width. You should make two statues of cherubim wrought of beaten gold. They should be attached to the lid so as to seem a single piece of work, with a cherub on one end and another on the other end. With their spreading wings they should cover the lid; they should face each other, turned inward. The lid should be placed on top of the chest that will contain the records I will give you. It is between the two cherubim on top of the chest that I will commune with you, speaking to you from above and conveying to the Israelites my will.
You should also make a table of red acacia wood, 36 inches in length, 18 inches wide, and 27 inches high. Overlay it with pure gold and make a gold molding around its edge. A raised crown three inches high should be attached around its entire edge. Make four carrying rings and attach one in each corner just above the four legs of the table. The rings should be fitted close to the rim and be positioned to hold staves. These staves should be made out of red acacia wood and overlain with gold and used to carry the table.
Plates and incense dishes, and cups and bowls from which libations are to be poured should also be made out of pure gold. Upon the table should be set out loaves of bread. These should be before my presence at all times.
You should make a menorah of pure gold. It should be of beaten gold with its base, its shaft, its cups and outer ring decorated with buds and petals all of one piece. From the base there should extend six branches, three from one side and three from the other. On the branch there are to be three cups resembling almond blossoms, with an outer ring of buds and petals. Each of the six branches should be similarly adorned. Likewise, on the central shaft of the menorah there are to be three cups resembling almond blossoms, with an outer ring of buds and petals. Where each pair of branches joins the central shaft there should be an outer ring of leaves made of one piece with the branch. This should be the same for each of the six branches. And the outer ring of leaves and the branches should be of one piece with the shaft.
You should make seven oil lamps for the menorah, positioned to light the space before it. Its wick trimmers, snuffers, and trays should also be of pure gold.
To make these items, 75 pounds of gold will be required. In crafting all these things be sure you follow the design that I gave you on the mountain.
Notes
1. Jehovah surely craves stuff (gimme, gimme, gimme!)-- and nothing but the best. The luxurious items he wants donated will turn out to be the things needed to built his Tabernacle and its furnishings and objects of his worship. Why a people wandering in the desert and scarcely finding enough to eat and drink should be forced to give up all their wealth in order to pander to the vanity of their god seems irrational. This kind of behavior, though, enriching the church while the poor starve, is common through history.
2. Jehovah orders the construction of a fancy gold chest and it has to be made just so. You wonder whether he really bothered to make all these precise instructions, or if the objects were made at some later date, and then their construction sanctified by asserting that all was done at Jehovah's behest. Indeed, one may reasonably conclude that all the laws and religious customs of the Hebrews were established by Moses later, or over a period of time, or that they came into being at a later date in Hebrew history, rather than codified and set in stone, either literally or figuratively, when Moses was on the mount. Provided that Moses did have communion with an exalted, superhuman, or divine being we are calling Jehovah, it really seems unlikely that such a being would obsess with dictating such detail in regard to custom and law. It is worth remembering that the Jehovah who visited Abraham had nothing at all to say in regard to law or morality and only a little concerning ritual. (Jehovah did demand a human sacrifice of Abraham, but such offerings and forms of worship were not set forth as being unique -- just the standard practice expected by all the ancient gods.) If, for instance, observance of the Ten Commandments were such a vital part of Jehovan worship, why weren't they given to Abraham -- or Noah -- or Adam?
3. The chest, which I am calling the Chest of Records, is most familiarly called the Ark of the Covenant, an ark, of course, being a vessel, a container, this one containing, among other things, the stone tablets upon which the Ten Commandments were inscribed. The lid of the chest is usually referred to as the Mercy Seat, the Propitiatory, or the Oracle, since Jehovah is supposed to sit on it (or hover above it) and pass judgment or pronounce prophecies. The sanctuary, a sort of portable tented compound where it is housed, is called the Tabernacle. (I have used it for lack of anything better.) The priests' breastplate, in which twelve gems were to be inset, is called the Rational, and the upper vestment, the Ephod. Creating special names endows all these things with importance and dignity, but it also obscures what they really were.
4. Red Acacia is a 20-30 feet tree native to Egypt, called in many texts shittem or sittem. Its wood is very hard and was used by the Egyptians for coffins.
5. Jehovah's insistence upon gold for all his paraphernalia is not surprising. Gold has always been valued for its beauty and for the fact that it never tarnishes. One wonders where these former slaves got so much gold. Were they mining gold in the Sinai (there is still gold there), or did they steal sufficient quantities from the Egyptians? The amount of gold needed to make the chest, table, menorah, etc., 75 pounds, equals one talent, the largest weight denomination in ancient times.
6. The statues of the Cherubim on the lid of the chest are to be depicted with wings. It is not clear exactly what the Cherubim were, save that they served Jehovah, perhaps as a kind of guard force. There is no reference to them actually having wings. However, if they came from the sky and flew in the sky, albeit in a vehicle, what better way to symbolic portray that than with wings? (A similar idea -- our pilots generally wear on their chests medals or insignia with wings.)
7. The menorah lamp stand here described has seven branches, while the more familiar Chanukah menorah has nine. As a lamp, it burned olive oil. Candles were not used at all before 400 AD.
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