BibleProject - Why Does the Tabernacle Furniture Even Matter? – Exodus E9

Episode Date: May 9, 2022

Why does God seem to care so much about the furniture within the tabernacle? The instructions for the tabernacle furniture are about far more than aesthetics. They were means of dealing with Israel’s moral brokenness, they served as reminders of Eden, and they were designed to form Israel into a people of perpetual surrender. In this episode, join Tim and Jon as they continue to trace the theme of the temple in the third movement of Exodus.View full show notes from this episode →Timestamps Part one (00:00-16:45)Part two (16:45-39:30)Part three (39:30-48:00)Part four (48:00-1:00:30)Referenced ResourcesThe Literary Structure of the Old Testament: A Commentary on Genesis-Malachi, David A. DorseyJacob MilgromInterested in more? Check out Tim’s library here.You can experience the literary themes and movements we’re tracing on the podcast in the BibleProject app, available for Android and iOS.Show Music “Defender (Instrumental)” by TENTS“Midsummer” by Broke In Summer“Day and Night” by Aiguille“Movement” by FeltyShow produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gummel. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder. Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Have you ever tried to read through the Book of Exodus? If you have, you've probably found it fairly riveting. Israel's in slavery, so God has a showdown with Pharaoh to liberate them. Then God leads Israel through the wilderness with death on all sides. And then they come to Mount Sinai and God appears in fire. And God gives them the Ten Commandments.

This is all really exciting stuff. But then, turn the page. And now we're reading the architectural blueprints for a tent that God wants Israel to build, and it's really easy to be underwhelmed as we read the instructions for the tabernacle. But this is an ancient symbol for a magnificent truth. That God wants Heaven and Earth to be one. In the first page of the Bible, we see God creates everything in seven days, and it's good, and humans and God live together, and there's blessing. And this tabernacle, it's meant to shape your heart and imagination, to see Genesis

One life exploding back into this reality. The themes of Genesis One are even in the furniture. Seven items that are designed and all of them are going to be about creation. Eaton. For example, the menorah with its seven lights helping us imagine the lights of creation on day four. The lights that sit in front of the blue curtain inside the tent make make sure they are tended to every evening, every morning, so that they perpetually shine like the stars. And the priests who go in and out of the tabernacle,

they're like new humans entering into a new creation. You get two long chapters about the priests, one describing the priestly clothes, and guess what, you should have an item. So today we continue to read the third movement of Exodus. And as we do let yourself sit and imagine this beautiful piece of craftsmanship that sits at the center of Israel

to shape their entire lives. The Tabernacle was the thing of beauty. It was a place of mercy and grace and it told the story of God's generosity. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. [♪ music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, robust, robust, meandering, conversation. Also meandering. Trying to wrap our minds around, why is the tabernacle even significant? Yeah.

Because here we are, we're going to be talking about the tabernacle, the blueprints of the tabernacle that Moses gets on Mount Sinai. And you asked the question, why does this even matter? And we started just talking about, what does it mean to have access to eternal life, to the heaven and earth space, to God's own life? And if God is the source of all life, the ever present I am, what does it mean to be able to have access to that? Whether that's in the form of a tent, the Israelites are going to get, or let's back

out of that. And just in general, what does it mean that through Jesus we have access to that, whether that's in the form of a tent, the Israelites are going to get. Or let's back out of that and just in general, what does it mean that through Jesus we have access to that? Yeah, but in particular, I think what we were after was in the Tabernacle God as it were self-limits, the power and the scope of His presence into one physical spot, that is at this tent, in a really powerful and dramatic way, which doesn't mean that God doesn't also pervade all of creation, because like David, who brought the Tabernacle to Jerusalem, can talk about celebrating going into God's presence

in the Tabernacle in the tent, but then you can also write a poem like Psalm 139 and say, if I send up to the skies, you're there. So anywhere on the land you're there and anywhere I would go in the sea, you're there too. So there's a sense of God's everywhere because God is the ever-present sustainer of all that is at every moment. Flipside, the tibernacle represents a time and a place where God has localized the divine presence in a particularly intense way here. That is both a blessing, but also dangerous to his people. And that's the focus, or that's what's being explored through

all the furniture and the symbolic architecture that we're going to talk about right now. through all the furniture and the symbolic architecture that we're gonna talk about right now. We went on a detour about what does eternal life even mean? Yeah, or eternity. Eternity. Right. As that's kind of conversation set a little bit, do you have any way to kind of just,

I don't know, I feel unresolved a little bit for some reason. Oh, okay, sure. In my spirit, I don't know. I feel unresolved a little bit for some reason. Oh, okay. Sure. In my spirit. Interesting. Well, God is the eternal, present source of all life, creation, existence itself. The biblical story. He offers it to us. Yeah, the biblical story is about God generating and other, something that is other,

but also contained and sustained within God's own being, because how well it's good anything be if it's not sustained by God. He makes us out of the dirt. Yeah, and we are. Yeah, and the dirt itself is a part of a created order that as a whole is sustained by God. Yes. It's a slabbergasting claim of the biblical story as God wants to elevate a creature, a collocation of dust in the malgamation of dust that he holds together in the form of this conscious being that he appoints as an image of the divine in the world. And he wants to sustain it so that it can become a representation of God's own divine will and character in the world.

Yeah. A remarkable story. So it's just a remarkable thing to claim about human beings. So yeah. And so, but those humans have to learn and trust to be God's partners, have to learn trust. So now we're doing what we always do, which just get trapped in Genesis 1 and 2. But God makes available His eternal presence in the form of the tree of life and access to that is lost or forfeited by the humans because of their folly and breaking the divine command.

And so what the Tabernacle represents is among the one family of all the nations that he's chosen to re-store the Eden blessing to everybody through them, is by giving them a little micro-edin at the heart of their camp. And when God is, we can see, takes up residence in the heart of this tent. It's the presence. It's the Eden, presence of God, but in a localized form So that it's a heaven and earth eternity and time touching together at once. I don't know. Is that a decent summary? Mm-hmm Yep, and then for whatever reason my mind goes to what happens when you die?

And I can just hear everyone else thinking that out loud. Yeah, sure. And we can just say, that's not what we're talking about. So let's leave that for another podcast. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Or you could give me the answer to that. I don't know. Well, what I mean, we ended the last conversation by saying, reflecting on what Jesus means when he says to the guy being executed next to him, to I'll meet you in the Garden of Eden later today. Yeah, you're about to die,

but we're gonna be hanging out. Yeah, I'll see you in the hot spot. Yep, see you in the hot spot. But the imagery of the risen Jesus is of him existing in the hot spot and embodied what we would say, material form at the same time. Right? The portraits of the risen Jesus, that's why they're so weird. Yeah. He can be somewhere, not be somewhere. And then, after the ascension, he exists in some sort of resurrected form, but we don't even have that language for it,

physical, non-material, because he can be everywhere, but also localized somewhere. And is that the destiny that I'm supposed to anticipate? I think so, yeah. That I will have some sort of physical form that transcends what I understand as a person. I think that's what John in the Revelation is trying to communicate by talking about, I saw the heavenly city coming down to earth, that it's a fusion or union of the eternity and what we call our present into union or the union of heaven and earth, the union of God and humanity.

Okay, let's get into it. So, because this is not where we're going, but I just have to ask you. So, the story begins with this clear delineation between, you got the host of heaven, right? In Genesis 1. And those are the creatures that you think of is kind of like transcending.

Like they're the ones that get to like, they exist in the divine realm. And they rule the sky. And then you get the humans of rule of the earth. The way that you're describing Jesus is saying, here's a human who is also the sky ruler combined together with a human land ruler as one. As one. Yes, that is what I think that I'm saying. And then when I asked, is that my destiny? Ah, ah, ah, ah. Are you saying that I am meant to, in a some way,

transcend just being a ruler of the earth and also being a ruler of the sky? Oh, well, I think that's definitely how Jesus imagined his destiny on the other side of his execution. Yeah. That is how Jesus is described as being a talking, and that's definitely how Paul articulates it. He says to the Corinthians, don't you know that we're going to rule angels? Hmm.

And he's got Daniel 7 on the brain as a model that he believes has already happened to one person on behalf of the many, which is a human who is transformed into earthly and heavenly ruler at the same time. So yeah, I'm not saying I find any of this easy to comprehend. I'm just saying, I think I understand that this is what Jesus and the apostles are trying to talk about So yeah, and so if you read that back into the story of Adam and Eve When God is saying come eat of the tree of life. What he's saying is I

Know I appointed the sky rulers above and you're the rulers of the land But what I'm inviting you to be is actually with me rulers of both domains Well, yeah, I mean, in terms of meditation literature, when you read through the Hebrew Bible and then come back around for the 200th time, it's hard not to see the destiny of a human in Daniel 7 as being in seed form, pun intended, with the invitation to eat from the tree of life. Because it would be, as we said, in the tree of life video, it would be a kind of life that

transforms you to participating God's own life. And that's how the risen Jesus is depicted, is a human who is at once God's own life, but also a human life, unified together. And now I'm thinking in terms of Paul's categories, if I through trust him in the Messiah, that his resurrection is my resurrection, which is why Paul can talk to Wright to believers in Leodicea or Ephesus and say in Ephesians chapter 3, no, in 2, that you have already been resurrected and seated in the skies with the ruling Messiah. He says that? Yes.

Yeah, you were dead, but God, who is rich, and mercy made us alive together with the Messiah and seated us in the sky realm. Okay. Past tense. Yeah. It has happened. It has happened. Because when there is in Jesus was exalted over heaven and earth, you and I, we were saved. We're part of that. We, we, yeah. His destiny is,

is mine. And so I think another thing, as we set the table again to talk about the tabernacle, is it's easy to then think, okay, this is all about the future of just kind of being able to get access to this future state. Right, right, right. Where there's this real sense of the way we treat each other now, the way that we love our neighbor, the way we treat the other. This is all about bringing heaven and earth together. Oh, that is one way.

One way. Yeah. I mean, that is living on earth as if you are under the rule of heaven. Yeah. Another way is through prayer. And prayer, through its long history and the biblical story and develop as a theme, is about recognizing that every space that I go is a potential space where I can encounter the divine presence through the presence of the Spirit. And so that is surely

what the author to the Hebrew is saying is we can boldly enter into the inner room of the temple. It's like he uses language like that. And he's talking about prayer and worship. He uses language like that. Oh, and he's talking about prayer and worship. About developing an awareness of God's eternal presence in any moment, in any space. Yeah. And this is what in classic Christian tradition, the practices of silent solitude, prayer, worship, meditation, fasting, these are habits. You can form that train your consciousness to become more aware, heightened awareness of eternity in God's presence in

wherever place I happen to be right now. And all of that is packed in symbolic form into what the tabernacle means in the story. Access to the divine. Yeah, access to the divine. Yeah. And even though it's through priestly mediators, if this tabernacle with these mediators are undergoing these ritual little spectacles, symbolic rituals every day in the heart of your camp. It's teaching you a view of reality about who you are, who we are, who God is, and how the blessing is going to be made accessible to others. So the big biblical story is about humanity having access to that, the tree of life, eternal life, God's presence, the top of the mountain, the holy of Holies. And the reason why we're at this part of the story we're at now, where Israel, this one group of people are given

like this localized version of access to that, is because... Yeah, God brings what he says to the people when he brought them to the mountain. So I carried you on Engle's wings and I brought you to myself. And now he says, we entered into a covenant and I'm going to come live in your midst because you're my partners. We're going to live, we're going to be together. And I'm going to give you through representative mediators,

images of all of the people access to my divine presence through the mediator. So it both teaches you that God wants to be enermished, that God wants heaven and earth to be one. But we're also outside Eden for a reason. Humans are really stupid and selfish and violent. And so that, all of that moral brokenness has to be dealt with before heaven and earth through United. And that's what all of this ritual furniture is all about. But what we've been talking about

is just the fact that there is a sacred space broken into these tears, the map onto the mountain, the map onto Eden symbolically. That's what we have been talking about. But what the rest of the Tabernacle furniture is about is how do you, what are the mechanisms for restoring the connection that has broken down because of human folly and violence? And that's what the rest of the Tabernacle furniture is all about.

So let's look at some golden tables and bronze altars, shall we? Who's that? furniture is all about. So let's look at some golden tables and bronze altars, shall we? Who's she out? Okay, first, let's just a quick tour and this will be less exciting to hear it than it would be to see it. And here I've adapted, not just copying pasted, but adapted some work of a Hebrew Bible scholar, David Dorsey in his book, The Literary Structure of the Old Testament. And he highlighted the literary design of this first section of the Blueprints in a way that was helpful for me, and then I've kind of

modified it and tweaked it a little bit. But check this out. So the first block, this is all, the seven speeches. God's speeches demos this up on top of the mountain, there's seven of them. And it's the tabernacle instructions. And so just check out how the section is designed. It opens with chapter 25, 26, and most of 27 as a list of seven things. This is just in the first speech. So there's a list of the materials. Then it's a verbal description of the arc of the covenant. then it's a verbal description of the arc of the covenant. Then third of the table for the bread goes inside the tent, fourth, the menorah, the lamp's down, that has seven lights on it. Fifth is, oh, the actual curtains and the tent itself, that's gonna house all that stuff.

Then sixth is the altar. That sits outside of it. It sits right outside the door of the tent. And then seven is the pipe and drape that makes the core arid area. So that's the first block. Okay. Material.

Then you get this random little instruction about, hey, yeah, speaking of those menorah lights, the seven menorah lights inside. Yeah, make sure that you light them in front of Yahweh perpetually. They're never burned out and go 10 to them every evening and every morning. And there was evening and there was morning. Yeah. So you got a seven-fold tabernacle, seven items that are designed and all of them are gonna be about creation and Eden. Then you get a little instruction about, make sure the lights, the lights that

sit in front of the blue curtain inside the tent, make sure they are lit, reattended to every morning, so that they perpetually shine like the stars. Then you get two long chapters about the priests, one describing the priestly clothes, and guess what, there's seven items. So the priestly clothes, the center fourth item is the special gold medallion plaque that the priest wears as a crown on his hand. Is that the ephod? No, the ephod is the chest.

That's the chest piece. Yeah, that's right. But it's this gold flower medallion, this is the fourth item. Okay. That is this plaque or this crown plaque thatallion, it's the fourth item that is this plaque or this crown plaque that goes on the forehead of the priest. Then you get a long description

of the ritual for ordaining the priests and of course that takes place over seven days. Then you get another short little law here about the daily sacrifices that need to be offered on that altar every morning and every evening, perpetually. Then you back out and you've got seven more items of the tabernacle furniture that are described. The altar of incense first. Second is this another type of fundraiser that's to go on for the maintenance of the tent. The structure is about that. Third is this water basin, because it's going to get bloody

around there. Some priests need to wash their hands. Fourth is the anointing oil, the special oil for pouring it on everything when you anoint it, make it holy. Fifth is the incense for the incense altar. Six is a paragraph where God instructs the artisans who are going to make it all, God embeds a law and God named Maholeab. And then are going to make it all, got him Betzalal and got him a Huleab. And then the seven... That's not an item, but it's a... Oh, that's right. Sorry, these are seven paragraphs.

Paragraphs, okay. Yeah, I should just say that. And then the seventh paragraph is, make sure you rest on the seventh day. So when you back out, it begins and ends with a list with seven items or seven paragraphs. Yeah. Inside of that are two short little laws about the light. Something that happens evening and morning. Something happens evening and morning.

And in the middle of that is two chapters on the image of God priests. And there's symbolic clothing that they are to wear. And the ordination process that they're to wear. And there's seven items of clothing. And there's a seven day ordination process there to where and there's seven items of clothing and there's a seven day ordination process. This is so rad, man. Like that's amazing. The design is amazing.

The design and what it communicates, just like Genesis 1, it communicates order. This is a highly ordered space. Everything in its place. And then second is the drama, the ritual stage play happening through this is a reenactment where the human images of God keep the ordered space. It's like a place where they rule and they hear God's word and then they do it the way God says and it's a well working, little organism micro-eaten as it were.

And it's all in structures and patterns of seven, which reminds you of the seven days of creation and the purpose of creation. And the number seven, which is completion or fulfillment. Creation, resting, humans ruling, this is all coming to its climactic moment. Yeah, the rift in between God and humans is beginning to be repaired in an important way here. Yeah, it's powerful. It's really powerful. So maybe let's zoom in here on a couple of these furniture items. Okay. And the first set of seven. The first set of seven, yeah.

So they, that is the artisans, call to do all this, they shall make in arc. That's the word a round. Similar to Aaron's name, a-ha round, but it doesn't have the ha in there. Hebrew for Aaron is a-ha round, and then the Hebrew word for arc is a-run. This is not the same word as like the Edo's arc. No, no. Though symbolically, it fits the same slot. It's a little divinely measured and divinely mandated vehicle for the preservation of life.

Why do we call it a box? Why do we have a call in an arc? I don't know. Where's that come from? I don't know. It's very confusing that Noah's arc is called an arc in our English translations, and that this box is called by the same English word arc, because it's two different Hebrew words. Two different Hebrew words.

But it's actually a happy coincidence because symbolically, they both play the same role in their respective stories. Yeah, okay. So they shall make an arc of Akasha wood, Google Akasha trees, they're cool looking. Two and a half qubits long, one and a half qubits wide, one and a half qubits high. You shall overlay it with pure gold inside and out. You shall overlay it, make a gold molding all around. Can be heavy. Can be heavy.

Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's right. Okay, let me just read to you the description of God telling Noah to make an ark. Genesis 6 verse 14. You shall make an ark of gopher wood. It's a different type of wood. But that sentence is almost identical.

Okay. Make for yourself an arc of X wood. And to be clear, it's a different word for arc. Yes, here is the Hebrew word is Teva. Teva. Yeah, which is an Egyptian loan word. Yeah, which is as old as word. Yeah, which is as whole fascinating. Thank you going on here. You shall make the arc with,

and here actually are English translations, kind of struggle. Most of the English translations say, make the arc with rooms. Like all the stables, you'd imagine? Yeah, that's typically what it's taken to mean. The same sequence of Hebrew letters is the same way that you could spell the word

reads, like kind of like what Moses is. The reads. Yeah, would be Kanim. Or the word could be pronounced Kinnim, in which case the meaning of kinim is not reads, but it's also not rooms. It's the word for bird nest. The word kineme means bird nest. Okay. Well nest. Yeah, totally. So anyway, there's a scholar John Day who wrote an article on this long long time ago, because literally it would be, mate, you shall make the arc of Gover trees and you shall make it with nests. And what's fascinating is just like check out how birds nest are talked about in the Hebrew Bible, and they're talked about as refuges up on high, little refuges.

And of course, that's what they are. That's what they are for the animals, little safe refuges up on high, which is precisely what the ark becomes in the story is a nest for the refuge of life from the danger of waters. But then also the birthplace of new life, out of which it will all emerge. So anyway, I can kind of like that. You shall make it with nests.

And you shall cover it inside and out with pitch. So the idea is you have this box. Because the Noah's Ark is a box the Noah's Ark is a box. Noah's Ark is a box. Yeah, and this is how you shall make it. The length of the arc, 300 cubits. It's breath 50 cubits. It's height 30 cubits. So 300 long by 50 wide by 30 high. And a cubit is generally, hmm, do we know? Man, people debate these things. In translation, it says a qubit is generally, do we know? Man, people debate these things.

I guess. In translation, it says a qubit is approximately 18 inches. Okay. So it's a rectangle. It's a big rectangle. Big rectangle, just like. Out of go for wood. Yep.

Pitch on the outside. And on the inside. That's right. And the arc is a big rectangle. Yep. Also made of wood. It's made of wood, case of wood.

Same dimensions are given, and then it is also overlaid inside and out, but not with pitch, but with gold. Is it the same, is it the same dimensions like... proportionately? Portionately. Oh. So two and a half long, one and a half high, what no, one and a half wide. Okay. No, so it's not quite.

But here's the thing, is in the Torah, how many boxes are described in the Torah? Hmm, that's interesting, there's two. Oh, okay. And the way those instructions are designed and even worded and ordered matches precisely the order and the description of this box right here. Right. Yeah. So, and what is this box going to contain within it? It's going to contain God's word,

the commands. You're talking about the arch of the covenant. Yep, that's right. It's going to contain a little jar of mana later on in the story. And then it's going to contain Aaron's little rod, the little magic blossoming., well not magic, the little divinely sprouting almond flower. But the whole point is that this arc is the thing over which Yahweh will dwell. He's the one who dwells above the cherubim. And so this thing has a lid on it, has four gold rings with poles on the corners. So you never touch it. Never touch it, carry it with poles. And then the last part of the description is about two things. One is you shall make a caporette, a lid, pure gold. And it gets translated, this is interesting for 17. So NIV translate this as a tonement cover. English standard version calls it a

mercy seat. New American standards at Mercy Seat. Ooh, so does the NRS of Heat. And that comes from the King James, Mercy Seat. Okay, so it's all Mercy Seat on the big five except for NIV. NIV says a tonement cover. Tonic cover. Yeah. Mercy seat. I mean, it's kind of the seat of mercy. So wait, in Hebrew, it's what? In Hebrew, the word is Kaporet. Kaporet. And that the Ka, the Pa and the Ra is the root letter of the word Kippair.

Or it's the root letters of the Hebrew root kippair, which means to aton for. So there's the day of atonement in Jewish feasts if you say it in Hebrew at Yom Kippur. There's the three letters again. So this thing is called a kaporet, a kaporet, an atonement thing. Okay, so it is referring to atonement. It's the word atonement turned into a noun that describes a physical object as the location or place. Is anything else in the Hebrew Bible referred as in the noun caport? Mm-hmm.

No, no, this word caport refers to the golden lid of this box. The lid itself is some sort of atonement. Yeah. I think most, and so that's why atonement cover is where aniv goes. It's the you shall make the thing on which or the you shall make the thing that will become the place where one makes atonement for the sins of the people. In other words, the name of this lid assumes the ritual that's going to be happening in the tent that won't be described until the next scroll of the Torah. Yeah, and then really quick. Yeah. That means the atonement means and the ritual is

yeah, there's two things that atonement does. One is it covers for the relational damage that has been done because of someone's moral, moral failures. So when I damage the relationship between you and I, how do I repair the relationship? I'll take the hit. And so one thing you can do, well, how you would do it between you and I, is you bring an animal for Israelites, bring it. No, we wouldn't do this.

No, we wouldn't do this. If you were an Israelites, it would be called the Asham, the repair offering, or the guilt offering, because I even curred guilt before God and before you. What did you do to me? I don't know. When I stole your lawnmower or something, I don't know.

What did I do? Do you have a lawnmower? I do. Okay, let's say I stole it. Okay, and the Chargers, it's electric one. That's fine. That's not good. So, and if I feel racked with guilt the next day, I come back to you and I'm like, John,

you can't just give me back one more. Oh, I can. And I must. But you also have to. Now, I've wronged you and you're an image of God. So, I've wronged. I've wronged the one who's image you're made. So, I go to the tabernacle and I say to the priest, Moshe, or no, all around, is there

that day and I'm like, man, here's what I did. So here's a blameless goat, a young goat without blemish, and I offer it as an asham. So that animal's life is translated into smoke that rises up to the heavens, and maybe some of it wafes into the tent that it's in front of. And then hold on, it's all right.

I'm getting distracted by the lawnmower. Doesn't feel like a big deal to me. You could have just borrowed it. But not well, I'm not done yet. Well, hold on. OK. But like if you stole my ox, you're stealing my livelihood. Yeah.

And this story, it's like, you got me fired from my job. Oh, I see. Right, it's like that intense. Oh, yeah, I wronged you. You wronged me. Yeah, yeah. There's laws that do it. But they're about stolen goods.

Okay, even stolen goods. Yeah, okay. Yeah. So, but what I do, so the first thing is the animals death. Mm-hmm. What happens, the life of the animal, which is tamim, which means it's without blemish, but it's the same Hebrew word as for moral blamelessness.

God accepts it as a substitute for me. And so it's one thing. Its life is surrendered in place of my life. But then also with the asham, I both give back to you either the thing that I took or the monetary value and I add one fifth of its monetary value. What do you do? And give it back to you with the... Oh, interest.

The guilt offering. Yeah. And where would the priests do that? That only takes place right there at the altar. But then this is Leviticus 4 and 5. What happens if... So I would be there with you when we do this? Oh, that's not described.

Okay. That's not described. Let's say all the people did something. Well, then you would need to take the blood of the animal and not just let it be on the altar, you would need to take some and take it into the tent and sprinkle it on the screen, the veil. And let's say it's the high priest who blows,

it does something. Yeah, you're gonna have to take the blood inside that tent. But let's say like all the people are blowing it and the high priest and everybody's blowing it, well, pretty much there's only one time in place. You're gonna be able to provide a tome for that. And that is on one day a year, only the high priest goes through the two veils,

the one in first veil, second veil goes through the blue sky veil, and pass the chair being, and you sprinkle the blood on the caporate. The caporate. The place of atonement. I see. Yeah. And that's the atoning sacrifice, that's the sacrifice of atonement of the day of atonement. Yeah. How's what's a year? Yep. And there's two goats. They have sin is dealt with in two ways for a day of atonement. One goat is sacrificed like you would offering of atonement. And then the other half of the ritual is that all the sins of Israel are put on the the goat that's alive and then it's driven, exiled to the east, outside of the camp.

So the sin goes with the live goat out of the camp. And what the blood of the sacrifice goat does is it covers for. It's offered up as a substitute, and that substitute life purifies the altar and the camp from impurity. So that's why this thing is called the atonement lid. It's named after the function that it has on the day of atonement, which is funny as you're reading through the Torah because you're like the day of atonement. Like, where am I going to learn about that? Oh, not for a long time reader.

Yeah. But once you read the Torah through one time, then you'll not even come back to it. So that's the ark. And then what God says is after he describes how it's made, then he says, make two caravine, which are just described as creatures that have faces and wings. But both we know from archaeology

and from other descriptions of these beings that they are hybrid, a fusion of human and different kinds of animals. They represent the creatures that reside at the boundary of heaven and earth. And then God says, above the cherubim, I will meet with you and speak to you. And there you go. That's the thing at the hotspot of the tabernacle. That's the tree of Life in a sense. Oh, yeah, it fits the same slot in the Tabernacle that is occupied by the fire on the top of the mountain

that Moses, or the fire in the burning bush that Moses encounters and occupies the same spot as the Tree of Life at the center of the garden. Yeah. And the top of it is the Atomit lid. The Cherubim, there's this line that happens throughout the Psalms, calling Yahweh the one who sits above the Cherubim. This is where there was no human or animal form at the top of Mount Sinai, so God said, don't make any idols of me.

Also here, at the center, there's no form, there's no form of anything above the cherubim. Oh yeah, because this is also meant to be a throne. This is God's throne. This ark, it's not just a box to collect some stuff in. Yeah, it's a throne. It's the throne of God. It's a mobile throne, that's why it's a mobile throne.

That's why you can carry it. That's right. But it doesn't have a back, I mean, it's a mobile throne. That's why you can carry it. Yep. That's right. But it doesn't have a back. I mean, it's kind of more of like an ottoman. Yeah, good. But it is a throne. Yeah.

And it hosts the invisible presence. Now, in a neighboring culture, you go into their temple and you get to where God's God is. And it's a statue. A statue. An auto box. An auto box. God is, and it's a statue. A statue on a box. It's not on a statue sitting on a throne. Yes, sitting on a throne.

There's many examples from the culture's visual neighbors. So you go in and what you would expect is to see the statue of God. There's no statue. No statue. It's the throne is unoccupied in the sense. Yeah, the only thing that it is occupied. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

That's the irony is that one, it's empty as it were in one level. On another level, it's a human image of God, which is the one who's entering in there and seeing it. But then... The priest is. Yeah, it was interesting. So on one level, you'd say, if you walked in there, it's empty. But then when Ezekiel, the prophet and Isaiah, the prophet, have visions, apocalyptic visions,

where the reality of what's happening here is unveiled before them, what they say are their famous visions, so if you always see it on a throne surrounded by these heavenly beings. So, yeah, like in some sense, Yahweh is sitting on a throne, but we're not supposed to make an image of what that looks like. Yeah, and what Isaiah and Ezekiel see when their eyes are open is a humanoid form sitting on a throne. They see the form of a human.

But I think even that right there, there's a way that you could walk into the space and see, but what you would be seeing is not normal, what you would see with your earthly eyes or something like that. Anyway, that's, we're back to our previous conversation, but that's the idea here. Yeah, it's the mobile throne. 1.5% So just as a quick note, the imagery and the architecture and symbolism is being revealed to Moses, right, in this divine pattern, who's being shown on top of the mountain. It also corresponds to how sacred spaces were architected and decorated in the cultures of Israel's neighbors of Canaanite culture, Egyptian culture.

The Caribbean corresponds roughly to the same role that's the Sphinx place and the Pyramids outside of Cairo Egypt. A divine fusion bodyguards. Bodyguards. Yeah, that's right. The divine bodyguards. And these creatures also were set as statues of them were set as guardians of temples out in Assyria and Babylon. So this was a shared cultural motif that the Israelites adopted. but the Israelites adopted, but then they also made these creatures, they fit them, adjusted them into their vision and their convictions about the identity and person of God of Israel. So these are not like rival gods, they are like Bouncer, Guardians, as it were. And there you go.

So that's the box. How you doing? Our tour is not going very quickly. No. And is that box related to Eden in any sense? I mean, we called it the Tree of Life because that's where it sits. Yeah, yeah. But in any other sense, is it related to Eden

or the Cherubim or on it? Yeah, totally. The Cherubim, yeah, are on it. And yeah, the share beam are present as guardians of the way in and out of Eden. I guess that's the most explicit one and gold. Everything's made of gold. Eden had a lot of gold. But but after you leave Eden, the arc revealed to Noah becomes a temporary Eden refuge where the humans and animals

live together in peace. And so when the arc here is described with the language, precisely the same type of language used to describe the construction of the arc, but it's decorated with imagery of Eden. It's a good example of how this narrative assumes that you saw the connection between Eden and Noah's Ark as being images of each other in back in Genesis. So the next three items that are described are... Was that the first of the seven? That was.

Well, the list of materials. Oh, the list of materials. So first paragraph. Second paragraph is Ark. Third is a golden table that is set inside the tent, but not in the most holy place. Yeah, but in the little. Is where the bread is put on? Yeah, so this is called the golden table for bread.

Yeah. Then there's a couple of other things. Then there's the 7. The menorah. All right, menorah that's described as flowery blossoms emerging out of flowery blossoms. It's like blossoms. So there would be multiple blossom like spots as you go up the seven lamps. And then the altar of incense, which is a high, small table, maybe like an end table.

And those are the three pieces of furniture in the little antechamber. And you have to finish through the Torah and even into the prophets. And you get the bread is set in rows. And there's 12 loaves. And of course, the number 12, representing the 12 tribes of Israel. So that's kind of on your,

forget it, is that on your, forget it, on your left or is that on your right, when you go in. So the table's on one side, and then on the opposite side, within the Antichamber is the lights, the seven lights. And later in Leviticus, the two are described as connected because you're said to put the bread before the face of the lights, the light shine upon the bread. So it's this cool little image about the seven-fold light that never goes out, constantly shining on the 12 levels of bread. This is cool. Complete light, seven means complete. So it's an image, I think, of God's own life and light, the light of day one. God's own light, perpetually shining on the perpetually fresh bread, which is God's people.

Yeah, so cool. That's the image. That's the image. And then either to the kind of to the front or next to one of those is the altar of incense, so that this place is continually filled with a smoke. And the smoke represents, in the Psalms, the smoke is described as representing the continually ascending prayers of Israel before God. So just to let my prayer be like incense before you're thrown. So inside there's perpetual prayer being offered on behalf of Israel as it experiences the perpetual light shining upon the twelve loves. That's cool. Yeah. God wants to shine his light upon his people and the vehicle for that is the priestly intercession that is just continually smoking

there, rising up to God. And this is kind of a picture of both what God wants for humanity in like some sort of perfect state of his life shining on them. But then it also shows how this is kind of being realized in this fallen state, which is where only if priests can come in, the prayers are going up as intercessory prayers. And it's kind of holding it together for the time being. Yeah, it's like a little ritual stage show, something like that. There's also the bread.

The bread surely has multiple layers of symbolism because one, it's 12, 12 drives of Israel, the light shines on the bread, but also bread, that's perpetually there and fresh. It's abundance, it's the blessing. Yes, yeah, perpetual food, like eaten, yeah, just perpetually fresh food. Yeah.

Because the bread gets changed out every seven days. So you think by day six it's a little little still a little stale bit. But for ancient bread I'm sure that's still great. You're not going to get away with that in subway. Okay so right outside the tent door, so there's a whole wave hole, as you go outside of that screen or veil, is the place we just described, the holy place, the anti-chamber, and then you go through that, Cherbeam little veil out,

and you'll see a bronze, a large bronze altar. And now you're in the outer court. Now you're in the outer court, but the altar is placed right in're in the outer court. Now you're in the outer court, but the altar is placed right in front of the door. There's this chair beam at every like juncture. Yes. Yep. That's right. There's three chair beam in the holy place like protecting the throne, the arc. Yes, the two on the throne. Yep. Then there's the chair beam in and the blue curtains that let you into the holy of holies. And then to walk in, you'd be in the room.

We were just talking about what the showbred and the incense. And then to get into that room, our curtains with the Cher Beam. It's a cherry beam blocking each level. Yeah, totally. Okay. Yeah, and each step reminds you you are passing through a boundary. Another boundary coming into greater proximity of the, the heaven and our spot. Mm. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's powerful. Mm. Yeah. 1 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 The altar. So you come out, so it's probably seven feet long and seven feet wide, maybe more. It's big. It's a big, huge stone table. And then it has these protrusions on the four corners that are called horns. And it's the same word as used for animal horns.

They were kind of shaped like it. So, and that's where animals that have been already slaughtered and feel dressed, and then are put there, and there's perpetual, there's a, like a mesh net, bronze, what do you call a grate? Oh, like a grill? Like a metal grate grill, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, that the hover is over, you know, coals and wood. So you're actually cooking it up there? Uh, yeah, whatever you put on there is going to be burnt and consumed in the fire. Oh, you're not cooking it to eat it. You're cooking it to just... Yeah, to translate it into smoke. Okay. And so, um, and these are the five offerings, five different types of offerings that we

won't describe now. We'll describe them later. In the next case. So what's fascinating is you're introduced to the altar and the fact that there will be sacrifices, the types of sacrifices are not explained to you until later in the Torah. But the idea is, before I can enter into the place where heaven and earth are one, being in the state that we are out of Eden. Why are we outside of Eden?

Well, because we're violent and stupid, and we do terrible things to each other. So we wrong each other, we wrong God, and God has provided. This isn't about appeasing God and maybe. Yeah, because this is hyperlinking back to the stories of God providing the goat for Abraham, and providing substitute for yes, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. The lamb for Israel and Egypt. Yeah, the Passover lamb.

These are animals like God provided as a way out. That's right. Yeah. So even though it's the same mechanism as your Canaanite neighbors down the road and And they're like, We're trying to appease God. Yeah, we're the Philistines and they're like, Oh, I wonder if Deagon is into us today and will give us favor. Well, let's give them some goats. Yeah, let's give them some goats. And maybe I might even need to, like for the prophets of Bale, you know, let's go around, I might even need to do self-harm when cut myself,

so that I'm bleeding along with the blood of the animals to get the God's attention. And this is different. This is God saying, here's how you can access me. Here's how you can. You can know. You can. And it's a gift from me. No, it's a gift from me, this process, and you, this process will form you into people who begin to see your own moral failures in a certain light, but also see my desire for you expressed through this ritual system. These laws are a part of what the Psalmist who wrote a Psalm 119 said, how beautiful are your laws and your commands? Hmm they give light to my eyes. They guide my path This would be one of the laws that these are I'm a law so these are among the 613 laws the Torah Oh the guidelines for the tavernacle. Okay, mm-hmm. Yeah, so the idea is we're constantly ruining life taking away life through our selfishness, stupidity,

foolishness We either diminish life or we taking away life through our selfishness, stupidity, foolishness, be we either diminish life or we take away life, we kill. And so what God gives as a gift is instead of you constantly dying for your failures, I will provide in your place a substitute animal that is your blameless representative. So it will rise up into the skies on your your behalf and I will accept it as your substitute and then bring blessing on you instead of letting you die in your stupidity. Now, in a sense we're all going to die. In a sense we're all going to die. In a sense, we're all going to die because of, well, I guess in one way you can say just because we're mortal.

But another way you can say is because of our corruption. Yeah, or that's right. The fact that all of us on our own ways replay the failure of Adam and Eve. Yeah, which keeps us in this state of... Perpetual exile from... Which it's gonna end in actual just yeah We turn to the does returning to the dust. Yeah, and in another sense when I when you owe like you stole my lawnmower Mm-hmm you don't deserve to die because of that. Oh Okay, no sure I hear you're still like the animals getting in yeah

Yeah, but yeah. The process. Yeah, I think it seems like this ritual system doesn't separate. It does acknowledge degrees of sin and consequence. So like if your average is polite, like wrong somebody else, the blood just needs to cover for the altar. But if a high priest or all the people, you need to take it inside the tent. So there's the sense of like human moral failure and evil is this vandalizing effect.

God staked out and God wants to be with sinful people. But he stakes out a little holy outpost. Human evil is constantly threatening to overwhelm. It vandalizes it, so to speak. And so through these purification rituals, the blood, both covers four, in terms of a substitute life. But also the blood is a purifying agent. There's the geoscollar Jacob Milgram, who's like the sage master of all things Leviticus. He wrote like 1600 pages, It's multiple, multiple documentaries.

So he calls the blood a ritual detergent. It's as sin is like this vandalism of creation and of God's holy space. And so the blood is a ritual detergent, which is a metaphor in purity, defilement, vandalism. Do they go in and wash this down every once in a while? Well, they had to do. And that's why there's a big bronze basin of water. It's constantly refilled. Yeah, a lot of hand washing.

Well, not just their hands, but I mean, if you're going in and sprinkling stuff with blood, you let that cake on. Oh, yeah, it's totally. You come back, I mean, that's intense. It is. Think of the blood that sprinkled on the atonement lid once a year.

Yeah. And that adds up over the decades. Yeah. A little pile of dried blood. Yeah. Especially if there's no like wind or breeze in there, it just get kind of gnarly. Anyway, there's a lot more that we could do,

but that's the basic outline of the first seven. But that's just the first seven. Oh, yeah, totally. Yeah, but those are the main seven Okay, so the lights are lit day and night inside perpetual incense going up in the fresh bread outside There's a morning offering and a evening offering That's for nobody and everybody Like it's just offered no matter what

The Justin case offer. Yeah, totally. And those are the Ola. So some offerings you offer part of the animal. Actually, we'll talk about this later when we get to Leviticus. But the daily offering, an evening of morning, is called the Ola. And it's the whole animal. Okay.

Nothing is left. It all is consumed. And it's perpetual surrender. Remember all the way back. This is all patterned, connecting back to Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah and also to the Passover lamb that was offered as a substitute. And both of those stories are hyperlinked to each other

through shared language. And then together this altar and its sacrifices are filled with language from both Passover and from Isaac on Mount Mariah. So it's an act of perpetual surrender before Yahweh, and when Yahweh's people surrender and ask him for forgiveness, he will happily release from the source of life, who will release the blessing out towards his people. And that's the story being told in this space every evening and every morning and all throughout the day. It's a powerful man. It's the power of ritual, the power of symbolic spaces and behavior to tell a story that shapes the people.

So I imagine that we're going to have to move on to the next story of the Golden Calf. Yeah. I kind of figured it would be like this. The blue prints are five long chapters. There's a lot more here. There's more here. We haven't covered everything, but I think we've covered the important things that we can't cover. Well, I mean, the priestly garments sound important. Oh, yeah, they are cool. Actually, we'll come to them. They will become relevant when we talk about Moses on the mountain shining, shining like star. Okay.

But so yeah, there's two big blocks of blueprints. One is the description of them, five chapters, X is 25, 31, and then there's five chapters of them being made in the same verbal detail as the blueprints, and that's chapters 35 through 40 of Exodus. To the end of the scroll. So I thought we could just have the conversation we just had, and the one before that, to cover those two big blocks in the center of those two big blocks is the story of the

Golden Calf. It's a narrative. Yeah, that's the Golden Calf. Where Moses becomes, takes the role and job of the high priest of Israel because the guy who's supposed to be the high priest of Israel is not covering for the sense of the people he is adding to them. And that's the next story.

But for now, let's just ponder the beauty of this picture. The tabernacle was the thing of beauty. It was a place of mercy and grace. And it told a story of God's generosity. But also, it told a story that human evil is terrible, and it ruins us and it vandalizes the most beautiful place that's at the center of our life, but God has provided a way for us to be reconnected to Him

and that's the story that the Tavanuckel tells. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project Podcast. Next week, we finish up the third movement of Exodus. The instructions for the Tabernacle have been given and Moses comes down to find Israel building a golden calf. So the golden calf did something that ruptured the relationship between God and His people such that even Moses who could and did ascend into the glory cloud, now that the glory cloud dwells in the middle of these people, there's unresolved problems. Today's show was

produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gubble, show notes by Lindsay Ponder, and the Antidid podcast for the app is done by Ashlyn Heiss in Hannah Wu. Bible project is a nonprofit. We exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. And everything that we make is free because of the generous support

of thousands of people just like you. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us. All right, hi, this is Mike. I'm from Portland. I first heard about Bible project from my sister in Hawaii. I use the Bible project for my daily devotionals. My favorite thing about Bible project is it just really touches your heart and makes things very understandable. We believe Bible's unified story that leads to Jesus. We're a crowd-funded project by people like me.

Find free videos, study notes, podcasts, and more at thebibelproject.com. Yeah, yeah. you