Commentaria in Exodum
Chapter Twenty-five. Synopsis of the Chapter
God commands the ark to be made, verse 10, and the propitiatory with two Cherubim, verse 17. Secondly, the table of the loaves of proposition, verse 23. Thirdly, the seven-branched candlestick of a talent of gold, verse 31.
Note. There were three kinds of laws of the Old Testament, namely moral, judicial and ceremonial: the moral God laid down in chap. 20, the judicial in chaps. 21, 22, 23, the ceremonial he here begins to lay down. In this chapter, therefore, with the three following, is described the form of the tabernacle with its vessels and its furniture. On this tabernacle see Abulensis here, Bede and Richard of St. Victor, book On the Tabernacle, and exactly
1. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 2. Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring me firstfruits: of every man that offereth of his own accord you shall take them. 3. And these are the things you must take: gold, and silver, and brass, 4. Violet, and purple, and scarlet twice dyed, and fine linen, goats’ hair, 5. And rams’ skins dyed red, and violet skins, and setim wood: 6. Oil to make lights, spices for ointment, and sweet-smelling incense: 7. Onyx stones, and precious stones for the ornament of the ephod and the rational. 8. And they shall make me a sanctuary, and I will dwell in the midst of them: 9. According to all the likeness of the tabernacle which I will shew thee, and of all the vessels for the service thereof: and so shall you make it. 10. Frame an ark of setim wood: the length whereof shall be of two cubits and a half: the breadth, a cubit and a half: the height, likewise, a cubit and a half. 11. And thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold within and without: and over it thou shalt make a golden crown round about: 12. And four golden rings, which thou shalt put at the four corners of the ark: let two rings be on the one side, and two on the other. 13. And thou shalt make staves of setim wood, and shalt overlay them with gold. 14. And thou shalt put them in through the rings that are in the sides of the ark, that it may be carried on them: 15. Which shall always be in the rings, and never taken out of them. 16. And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I will give thee. 17. Thou shalt make also a propitiatory of the purest gold: the length thereof shall be two cubits and a half, and the breadth a cubit and a half. 18. Thou shalt make also two cherubims of beaten gold, on the two sides of the oracle. 19. Let one cherub be on the one side, and the other on the other. 20. Let them cover both sides of the propitiatory, spreading their wings, and covering the oracle, and let them look one towards the other, their faces being turned towards the propitiatory wherewith the ark is to be covered, 21. In which thou shalt put the testimony that I will give thee. 22. Thence will I give orders, and will speak to thee over the propitiatory, and from the midst of the two cherubims, which shall be upon the ark of the testimony, all things which I will command the children of Israel by thee. 23. Thou shalt make also a table of setim wood, of two cubits in length, and one cubit in breadth, and a cubit and a half in height. 24. And thou shalt overlay it with the purest gold: and shalt make to it a golden ledge round about, 25. And to the ledge itself a polished crown, four fingers broad: and over that another little golden crown. 26. Thou shalt make also four golden rings, and shalt put them in the four corners of the same table, at every foot. 27. Under the crown shall the golden rings be, that the staves may be put through them, and the table may be carried. 28. And the staves themselves thou shalt make of setim wood, and shalt overlay them with gold, to carry the table. 29. Thou shalt prepare also dishes, and bowls, censers, and cups, wherein the libations are to be offered, of pure gold. 30. And thou shalt set upon the table loaves of proposition in my sight always. 31. Thou shalt make also a candlestick of beaten work of the purest gold, the shaft thereof, and the branches, cups, and bowls, and lilies proceeding from it. 32. Six branches shall come out of the sides, three out of one side, and three out of the other. 33. Three cups as it were nuts to every branch, and a bowl withal, and a lily: and three cups, likewise, of the fashion of nuts in the other branch, and a bowl withal, and a lily. This shall be the work of the six branches, that are to proceed from the shaft: 34. And in the candlestick itself shall be four cups of the fashion of a nut, and at every one a bowl, and a lily. 35. And bowls under two branches in three places, which together make six, proceeding from one shaft. 36. And both the bowls and the branches shall be of the same, all of beaten work of the purest gold. 37. Thou shalt make also seven lamps, and shalt set them upon the candlestick, to give light over against. 38. The snuffers also, and where the things that are snuffed out may be extinguished, shall be of the purest gold. 39. The whole weight of the candlestick with all its furniture shall have a talent of the purest gold.
40. Look, and make it according to the pattern that was shewn thee on the mount.
2. THAT THEY BRING ME FIRSTFRUITS.—Because this was the first common offering of the Hebrews, which was made for the fabric of the tabernacle.
Otherwise Theodoret, Quest. 70, and Abulensis: “Firstfruits,” they say, that is, the first and best things; for these are to be offered to God.
OF EVERY MAN THAT OFFERETH OF HIS OWN ACCORD.—In the Hebrew: whom his heart shall have made willing and liberal (1).
4. VIOLET.—Properly hyacinth is a kind of violet; whence it signifies a gem like the violet in colour: for this is called hyacinth. Thirdly, it signifies wool of hyacinth, that is, of violet and heavenly colour, which wool was a delight to the ancients.
Homer says of Helen:
But above it a distaff was stretched, with wool of violet hue.
that is, having violet wool. Here hyacinth commonly signifies this violet wool. Tropologically, hyacinth represents the heavenly mind and conversation. Hence the Church, and every holy soul, is shod with a violet, that is, a heavenly, shoe. Ezech. chap. 16, verse 10: “I shod thee with violet-coloured shoes;” that by this symbol God might signify that the conversation of the Saints who are in the Church is heavenly. So shod was St. Paul, and treading with the feet of his mind the heavens and the stars, he said: “Our conversation is in heaven.” So shod St. Jerome said that saying of Socrates: “I climb the ether, and look down on earth and heaven.” For, as the Apostle says: “Now you are no more strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God.” And again: “You are come to mount Sion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to the company of many thousands of angels, and to the church of the firstborn, who are written in the heavens, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of the just made perfect, and to Jesus the mediator of the new testament,” Hebr. 12:22. Wherefore St. Martin, as in life so in death, constantly looking up to heaven, when he lay in a burning fever on his back with his face raised to heaven, and his disciples begged him to turn his body and lie on his face for a while until the violence of the disease abated: “Suffer me,” he said, “to look on heaven rather than on earth, that my spirit, about to go on its way to the Lord, may be directed.” With eyes and hands, therefore, ever intent on heaven, he did not relax his spirit unconquered from prayer. Wherefore the Church justly sings of him: “Martin is joyfully received into the bosom of Abraham; Martin, here poor and lowly, enters rich into heaven, and is honoured with heavenly hymns.”
In like manner St. Stephen, undaunted amid the whirlwinds of crashing stones: “I see,” he said, “the heavens opened, and Jesus standing on the right hand of the power of God;” and presently crying out: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit,” he flew to Him in heaven, to be crowned.
AND PURPLE.—Purple is a fish, or rather a shell, with whose blood they dye wool, and wool dyed with this dark reddish colour is likewise called purple: from it of old were made, and still are made, royal garments; hence its use was here in the tabernacle.
The Cabalists, as Valverdius reports in the alphabet of Solomon, note that argaman, that is, purple, is composed of the four first letters, from which the names of four angels take their beginning, namely Raphael, Gabriel, Michael, Nuriel; which they assert to be the names of the living creatures that Ezechiel saw, chap. 1. For with that splendour, as with royal purple, God was clothed, according to that: “Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment.” See how easily these weavers of trifles weave their angels out of purple, certainly more easily than a spider finishes her web!
AND SCARLET TWICE DYED.—Coccus is a dyeing grain (whence it is also often called grain), growing on a shrub of the fullonia, which is like the holm-oak: this grain breeds within itself a little worm of red colour, with whose blood wool is reddened, which on that account is called coccus, and in Hebrew worm, or little worm. Of this little worm, or coccus, it is said Isaias 1:18: “If your sins be as scarlet,” literally, red as a little worm. Now wool, that it might be the redder, was wont to be twice steeped in the blood of the worm, namely first when it was still only wool, and secondly when by spinning it had been drawn out into thread: whence it was called twice dyed, and in Hebrew tolaat shani, that is, coccus or worm repeated (1). Hence shani also, standing alone, signifies coccus twice dyed or double-dipped, which the Septuagint call double.