Kennedy A R S Tabernacle A Dictionary of the Bible Ed J Hastings Vol 4 New York Charles Scribner s Sons 1902 653 68 Public Domain This outdated article assumes JEDP theory unfortunately and flat out denies the tabernacle s historical existence based on his presuppositions Good example how old critical scholarship sliced and diced the text TAH TABERNACLE by A R S Kennedy i ii iii iv The Tabernacle of the oldest sources The Tabernacle of the priestly writers The literary sources The nomenclature of the Tabernacle The fundamental conception of the Sanctuary in P Nature and gradation of the materials employed in its construction v General arrangement and symmetry of the Sanctuary The Court of the Dwelling vi The furniture of the Court a the Altar of Burntoffering b the Laver vii The Tabernacle proper a the Curtains and Coverings b the wooden Framework c the arrangement of the Curtains the divisions of the Dwelling the Veil and the Screen viii The furniture of the Holy Place a the Table of Showbread or Presence Table b the golden Lampstand c the Altar of Incense ix The furniture of the Most Holy Place the Ark and the Propitiatory or Mercy seat x Erection and Consecration of the Tabernacle xi The Tabernacle on the march xii The Historicity of P s Tabernacle xiii The ruling Ideas and religious Significance of the Tabernacle Literature The term tabernaculum whence tabernacle of the Eng VSS since Wyclif denoted a tent with or without a wooden framework and like the skhnh of the Gr translators was used in the Latin VSS to render indiscriminately the lh xo or goats hair tent and the hKAsu or booth which see of the Hebrews Its special application by the Romans to the tent or templum minus of the augurs made it also a not altogether inappropriate rendering of the NKAw mi or dwelling of the priestly writers see iii by which however the etymological signification of the latter was disregarded and the confusion further 653 Kennedy Tabernacle 653 increased The same confusion reigns in our AV The Revisers as they inform us in their preface have aimed at greater uniformity by rendering mishkan by tabernacle and ohel by tent as AV had already done in certain cases see iii It is to be regretted however that they did not render the Heb sukkah with equal uniformity by booth e g in Mt 17 4 and parallels and particularly in the case of the Feast of Booths EV Tabernacles i THE TENT OR TABERNACLE OF THE OLDEST SOURCES Within the limits of this art it is manifestly impossible to enter in detail into the problems of history and religion to which the study of the tabernacle and its appointments as these are presented by the priestly authors of our Pentateuch introduces the student of the OT The idea of the tabernacle with its Aaronic priesthood and ministering Levites lies at the very foundation of the religious institutions of Israel as these are conceived and formulated in the priestly sources To criticise this conception here a conception which has dominated Jewish and Christian thought from the days of Ezra to our own would lead us at once into the heart of the critical controversy which has raged for two centuries round the literature and religion of the OT Such a task is as impossible to compass here as it is unnecessary The almost universal acceptance by OT scholars of the post exilic date of the books of the Pentateuch in their present form is evident on every page of this Dictionary On this foundation therefore we are free to build in this article without the necessity of setting forth at 654a Hastings A Dictionary of the Bible every stage the processes by which the critical results are obtained Now when the middle books of the Pentateuch are examined in the same spirit and by the same methods as prevail in the critical study of other ancient literatures a remarkable divergence of testimony emerges with regard to the tent which from the earliest times was employed to shelter the sacred ark In the article ARK vol i p 1496 attention was called to the sudden introduction of the tent in the present text of Ex 3 37 as of something with which the readers of this document the Pentateuch source E according to the unanimous verdict of modern scholars are already familiar This source as it left its author s pen must have contained some account of the construction of the ark probably from the offerings of the people 33 8 as in the parallel narrative of P 25 2ff and of the tent required for its proper protection Regarding this tent we are supplied with some interesting information which may be thus summarized a Its name was in Heb ohel mo ed 33 7 AV the tabernacle of the congregation RV the tent of meeting The true significance of this term will be fully discussed in a subsequent section iii b Its situation was without the camp afar off from the camp recalling the situation of the local sanctuaries of a later period outside the villages of Canaan see HIGH PLACE SANCTUARY In this position it was pitched not temporarily or on special occasions only but as the tenses of the original demand throughout the whole period of the desert wanderings cf RV v 7 Moses used to take the tent and to pitch it etc with AV Above all c its purpose is clearly stated It was the spot where J descending in the pillar of cloud which stood at the door of the tent v 9f cf Nu 12 5 Dt 31 15 met his servant Moses and spake unto him face to face as a man speaketh unto his friend v 11 On these occasions Moses received those special revelations of the Divine will which were afterwards communicated to the people To the tent of meeting also every one repaired who had occasion to seek J v 7 either for an oracle or for purposes of worship Finally d its aedituus was the young Ephraimite Joshua the son of Nun who departed not out of the tent v 11 cf Nu 11 28 but slept there as the guardian of the ark as the boy Samuel slept in the sanctuary at Shiloh 1 S 3 3ff The same representation of the tent as pitched without the camp and as associated with Moses and Joshua in particular reappears in the narrative of the seventy elders Nu 11 16f 24 30 and in the incident of Miriam s leprosy 12 1ff note esp v 4f both derived from E also in the reference based upon if not originally part of the same source in Dt 31 14f The interpretation now given of this important section of the Elohistic source is that of almost all recent scholars including so strenuous an opponent of the Graf Wellhausen hypothesis as August Dillmann see his Com in loc Little therefore need be